Today's bike ride...

Began on Channing Way and headed toward the only record (viz, LP's, to those of you younger than 40), which is a few blocks down from the sadly horrible new location of Black Oak Books on S Pablo Ave. Are they serious? In any case, record store closed, I was looking for an old Pioneer component system.. Heading back north on S Pablo, decided to check out the huge garden, which I had always taken for a commercial one, one supplying the local foodie restaurants, & turns out that it's s coop run by young Jewish folks for the benefit of the poor community. Go see the beautiful hens, the cool earthen oven where they back bread, their ingeniously designed hot houses.

Heading north up Dwight & left on Action, stopped by the hippyish place a couple of blocks from Addison. Check out their ostrich. Their bird enclosure abuts to Strawberry Creek (the creek, not the park).

Had to visit Missing Link, & on the way had a gastronomically delightul experience at Slow, a small restaurant in the block (south side) before MLK. Sat at a sidewalk table, reading P. Roth, one of his books sure to enrage all of Berkeley's brain-dead PC gender feminists, while I ate a pulled beef sandwich w/fresh fig/gorgonzola chutney served on a fresh sweet batard, watched lovely women walk by, relished the relish and Roth's autobiographical reflections on the relations of women & men. What a pleasure! Go there! Good! Inexpensive. After, you can visit next door & top your sandwich choice off with a piece of handmade chocolate.

If you can't live in Europe, can't afford New Haven or Sante Fe, find Portland & Seattle too funky weather-wise, well, you may as well be in Berkeley.

On the way home, stopped off at TJ's on University to spirit home half a dozen bottles of Vino Verde. Shove a bottle into your freezer for half an hour while you fire up a bowl of Mendocino,  then drink the whole bottle. You'll feel ever so much better about life in general.

A genuine autumn day, maples on fire, ginkoes shimmering gold, sun or no.