On the evening of August 10, we took Derek and Kevin out to our favorite Italian restaurant, Frantoio’s.

We don’t have any pictures until the interim between dinner and dessert because earlier we were too busy noticing what was on the table. We were also having a good conversation about Kevin and Derek’s work on the youth magazine _Solid_, which is roughly equivalent to Derek and Kevin’s version of the World of Nerd Management.

A better way to round off my birthday? I can’t think of one.

And now, the reason for the title of this dispatch: Today I am 35.

Now I’m normally not one to remark much on the passing of years, unless the number has some particularly interesting numerological aspect (which 35 doesn’t, really. 5×7? Gotta do better than that, suggestions are welcome).

However, today does have a kind of cosmic vibe to it: I’ve known since I could count that in the year 2000 I’d be 35. When you’re 10 this seems pretty far off. (So *OLD*! I thought. In the *future* I thought.)

But 10 years ago to the day I sat outside in the sun and thought to myself, “10 years from now it’ll be the year 2000 and I’ll be 35. What is it going to be like?” I even had a crystal ball list:

– I’d feel the same at 35 as I do at 25: Check. – I’d be married: Check – but I hadn’t met her yet: Check – Walter and I would have finished our music album project: no check. Still working on it.

I didn’t even have a checklist item for where in the world I’d be living, but I wouldn’t have figured on California if I’d even thought about it.

I think I’d become a realist enough to know that if Big Brother seemed unlikely and pessimistic in 1990, that by 2000 we still wouldn’t have flying cars, and probably no prospect for a planned manned Jupiter mission next year either. No suprises there.

And so, here I am. Living in California with a wonderful woman and two step kids who seem to have adopted me into their lives with remarkable willingness. This is despite not being around for most of their lives, I feel I don’t really deserve it, but anyway I’m watching them grow up into independent people with lives of their own, and I’m grateful to be here.

Hmm. Now that I’ve arrived here, I can tear a hole in the fabric of space-time and tell the earlier version of me that it’s ok, mostly everything works out ok, and I’ll see him when he gets here.

It’s time for me to sit out in the backyard with a drink and think about what life will be like in 2010.

A special Happy Birthday goes out to my niece Elizabeth who will be 12 today (or rather, yesterday, thanks to conventions of date/time zones).

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELIZABETH!!!!

The weather here is doing its usual crazy thing. No longer stinking hot, instead we get overcast fog (and therefore, chilly) until about midday, when it all burns off and gets warm again.

Watched _Tea with Mussolini_ last night (on DVD of course). It was great, and we’re glad we finally saw it. We were intending to go see it when it was in the theatres, but somehow we didn’t get to see it.

I was browsing the usenet newsgroups this evening and noticed that Dream Theater and Spock’s Beard are scheduled to be performing in San Francisco on Aug 16. Excellent! Navigate to basstickets.com and bought a couple of tickets. We’re not missing out on them this time (I missed the last DT concert and regretted it.)

Jethro Tull are playing in this town on Sep 1, so far no online vendor has tickets available, but we could always go over to the Marin Civic Center Box Office and actually buy them in person <g>.