I felt like I was preparing a Powerpoint presentation for a meeting or something

Finish the sign I did. I met a neighbor on the way out the door, and saw her at the bus stop. "Hey, where you going" "the Anti-War demonstration" "Oh, you too!" :-)

Got off at Divisadero, and saw another person who had a studious look. "Hey, where you going" "the Anti-War demonstration" "Oh, you too!" :-)

I felt strangely lazy, clustering with a bunch of people in the shade of the trees at Dolores Park. Well, no, we were pacing ourselves. I figured I would end up good and sunburnt, so I might as well, "go slow", or something.

There were a whole bunch of signs ! A lot of originality - maybe half the signs were original, maybe half the ones that ANSWER and other anti-war groups created.

One of the skits showed a person in a Condi Rice mask with a sign saying, "I heard New Orleans needed pumps !", a referrence to her little $6000 shoe-shopping expedition at Ferragamo's the week of hurricane Katrina.

Crowd size - just a total gut feel, "2000" I thought about 11 AM, which is when it was supposed to start. But it kept growing ... and growing. When we finally "took to the streets" (and abandoned our privileged places in the shade), the crowd looked to be about 7 blocks long. So ... maybe ... 5000 ?

San Fran "Official-dom" accomodated the march well, cordoning off streets, etc. We actually worked up a decent sweat, hiking in kind of a zig-zag (extra-wide ?) pattern from Dolores Park, down Market, past City Hall, then over to another Park on Gough.

There were cops all over the place. I didn't see any ocifer doing anything except sit.

There were a few counter-protestosterone's, with whom I did not care to debate.

And circling high in the sky, a CHP helicopter followed us from Dolores Park to Lafayette Square. Somehow I have a feeling it was not just CHP personnel in that copter.

And there was a mainstream media news van and a reporter with a mike and a guy with a video camera.

In summation, we did not stop the American military juggernaut.

But it was a good feeling to be surrounded by good old-fashioned anti-war, pro-peace, and truly pro-life people.