I am so in a not-working frame of mind. Nothing like a four-day weekend to make you completely forget what it is you do for a living and create a sense of Monday morning panic as you stare at your desk and wonder what the heck it was you were working on that seemed so very, vitally urgent five days ago.

Sigh.

Also, I have friends. Not a lot of friends. Just a handful, but they're all precious to me. I'm currently in the midst of one of my periodic bouts of self-flagellation over how I neglect them.

It's a time issue. Although I rarely seem to do much that's worth blogging, there are just never enough hours in the day to get done the things I want to do, or enjoy doing.

I always want to talk to or to see my friends, I just can't always bring myself to lay aside one of my many hobbies to do so. It always seems that there will be time later. That there will be time tomorrow or something, you know? Today I have to watch this movie or finish this book or work on that drawing or, or, or....

We don't always get tomorrows, though. So I'm going to turn over a new leaf.

I've turned over enough leaves in my life to outfit a small tree (or at least a good-sized bush), but maybe this time....

Probably of equal interest to you (meaning, not much) is my current dissatisfaction with the new high-speed light rail here in Denver. I tried it twice over the weekend, timing my trip carefully on at least one occasion.

The experience of riding was delightful. Smooth and easy. It was a joy to ride down on Friday, avoiding the red-eyed travelers grimly racing for various malls and shopping outlets on the city's highways. Meghan, the friend I was meeting for lunch and shopping, took the bus from her house (close to downtown) and we both agreed that this is the way we'll go in the future. Neither of us had any idea that it would be so simple.

But the time!

How can something call itself "high-speed" when it takes an hour to go a distance I can drive in half that time? I rode it downtown and back again twice this weekend and both times it took 50 minutes. I shudder to think how slowly it moves when the trains has to wait to load and unload masses of passengers during the weekday commute.

I've been planning, for a long time, to start using this handy-dandy form of mass transport, as soon as it was open from my end of town. Now...I'm not so sure. I accept that mass transportation is less convenient. I accept that it's more expensive than my highly fuel-efficient Toyota. I accept that it's going to take longer than just getting in my car and going where I want to go.

I'm just not sure I can reconcile myself to the idea of catching a bus at 7:05 a.m. to ride two miles, change and catch another bus to the light rail station, get on a train and ride three miles, change to a bus to take me a (not-walkable because of the interstate highway) 3/4 mile, change to another bus and ride it as it stops every block for fifteen blocks until it gets me within walking distance of my office at or near 8:30 a.m.

I can leave my apartment at 8:05 and make it to work by 8:30, you know.

(I've been trying to find a better route on the online "trip planner" but it's been down for most of the last 24 hours.)

You heard me. My daily commute, which takes me around 20-25 minutes when I drive, is going to balloon to a 1-1/2 hour marathon. And it's going to cost more than driving.

I would like to be Green. I'd like to Save the Planet. I'd like to Conserve Natural Resources.

But I don't know if I want to do these things badly enough to give two hours a day of my life to them, you know? I'm old. I have only a finite amount of time left to me.

Time. The real non-renewable resource.