I get some hits on my journal page from people using search engines, "fifties" or "the fifties", 4 referrals on "fart" and 2 on "photographs". Maybe between fifties and photographs I generated searching on specific words. This month I've had 10 referrals on one or two people who found something useful, but I doubt it. One of the two "photographs" was looking for "old photographs" and a couple last month were looking for "fifties photographs". I'm looking for a description of what I think I'm doing here and the problem, of course, is I'm not totally sure.

My guess is I'm looking to do this chapter better than the last. I think of my life in chapters lasting maybe five or ten or fifteen years for each. They have a beginning, a middle and an end and if I look back I notice some things that I screwed up, a couple of things that I really screwed up and one or two things that I fucked. I didn't listen enough. I didn't sit back and pay attention.

Ever start noodling around with something, futzing around on the computer with a small graphic, for example, adding a bevel here or a line there and wham! the weekend is gone and you feel just right? Well, I started noodling with this and noodling with that and then remembered more important stuff I had to get done and let it drop. This time I'd kind of like to not let it drop. Follow the heart. So I need a better description that doesn't include horrible California cliches like "follow the heart" that drives people away shaking their heads, yet means the same thing. How about "Follow the BMW", a secret code. For adepts. "An old fart in his mid fifties looking for a Beemer in Paradise." Take my hand. That'll make the old hit counter shout.

I did get a call from the rental agency and talked with a woman named Allison about the market and what was available that I could afford. There was a unit available right smack on top of the Rockridge BART station two steps from the Lucky store that I looked at after work. Ugly as sin, but given the location and the price, it gave me hope there were affordable things somewhere out there I might actually like.

There was another unit, a condominium, a large one bedroom with a big kitchen in Oakland that I drove by as well. From the price I figured it was in some sort of free fire zone where you couldn't be on the street after dark, but it was nice. Nice design, trees on the streets, balconies and all the rest. Covered parking in the basement with an electric gate. I asked Allison why so little money, when everything else was going for $300 more? She really didn't give me an answer that made any sense, so I'm going to ask to look at it tomorrow and see what it's like on the inside.

Which leads me to a rock and a hard place. This is described as a large one bedroom on the fourth floor. The street is tree lined and shady and off the main drag, but there's still a fair amount of traffic. Which means Mr. Wuss will have to stay inside.

I don't think I want to live in a place where my cat has to stay inside. Mr. Wuss goes out to do his stuff while I take my bath in the morning and then comes back inside when I leave for work. He's in the apartment all day. He goes back out when I return in the evening and hangs out around the small patio and garden, then comes in and sleeps at the foot of my bed at night. Not a lot of time outside and when he is outside he has to travel some distance to reach the street, a street with very little traffic. Which I like.

Now there are a lot of people who own cats who never let them outside. And they're good people who take good care of their cats. And a large one bedroom apartment on the fourth floor for them would be fine. Except. I have this set of beliefs about cats. They're cats and cats need to get outside every now and then and experience the world. They may be neutered and overweight, but they need a taste of the outside, they need a good set of claws if they run into the local alpha male and they need to crouch down and think about jumping whatever it is making all those rustling sounds in the grass even if they haven't got a chance in hell of catching it.

Attitudes like these don't lend themselves to living in fourth floor condominiums with an elevator on a semi busy street. That rents for less than all the other places we talked about by an amount that equals a decent car payment. Did I mention I need to make a car payment? Soon? When the Toyota breaks? And that noodling around business above, listening to the core. Which is the better choice? Life works when you take care of your cat, car payment or not. A great view of the city is less wonderful when your small animal is building a case of claustrophobia in your closet. I think. This listening to the core can be hard work when your rental agent is shouting sweet condominiums into your ear. Or maybe this is all hogwash. I mean this is the first day of looking, Prop. What's this about?