Day 226: Tuesday Chaos

The first meeting on Tuesday is with the data migration team in India and here in Oregon. It starts at 7AM, making the morning a rush. This is followed by various meetings and status meetings. I spend most of my time listening and trying to work through the email, text, and messages from last night and this morning. It is crazy as you try not to be “that guy” who has to ask for the question to be repeated or answers the wrong question. This happens too much now as we have too many Zoom meetings.

Today was a crazy rush. I had soup for lunch, from a can, while I worked through meetings and status. Susie got going, and I got her coffee; I drank almost the whole pot and made her lunch. Susie asked for a grilled cheese. I quickly, rushing, produced a near-perfect grilled cheese. I fry it in butter. I learned to add some water, covering tightly, to the pan when it is hot to steam the sandwich. This gets all the cheese melty and excellent. Not too much to make the bread wet. I cut it in half and then into quarters. Susie likes to take smaller bites.

I took Susie to the dentist and executed all the rituals, including masks, promising we are well, and having our temperature taken. I was just below normal, 97.6, and Susie was coldish with 97.1! Today Susie endured getting a temporary crown. The final crown is being manufactured at the dentist’s office–I saw the equipment last time. There is a CNC machine that will make the replacement tooth from the computer scans Dr. Packham, our dentist, took of Susie’s tooth and mouth. The soft carved tooth is then baked in a kiln tonight to finish it (it hardens and shrinks to the final size–20% reduction). Susie get her new tooth at noon Wednesday!

Aside: Dr. Packham and I talked about replacing the software that runs the CNC to make Dungeon and Dragons figures. We could even harden them. The CNC is locked down to software changes, and the license is clear–don’t mess with it. But it was a cool idea!

While Susie was at the dentist, I had an emergency meeting on fixing the problem that has been running for a week. The problem is causing some escalation in leadership. The technical team, called BASIS, was not able to show. So we just talked a bit on Zoom until the dentist called. I got Susie, who was very tired.

I then slipped out to get a prescription while Susie rested a bit. My emergency inhaler ran out–pollen! I bought lots of candy and then was told that Halloween is cancelled this year. I bought face shields and PPE clothing. I am still checking if we can do anything. I have the candy in the garage–far away from me!

I finished my meetings and started to read for a bit to unwind–the chaos was getting to me. I finished The Memory Called Empire. It was one of the best SciFi that I have read in a while. I like space opera and this story was a movie playing in my mind. There is only one novel so far, book 2 is in pre-order for a March 2021 release.

I got going again and my boss and another architect was ready to try to fix the problem. I tried to help Sandeep, the architect, and my boss to find a solution. We managed to find some help, but could not resolve anything.

I then cut up onions, carrots, celery, potatoes, and defrosted some beef roast. I made my goulash but this time as a beef stew. I felt that I wanted to use some of the veggies that were getting oldish. Stew was a good answer. Susie had quiche for dinner, I made that on Sunday, and later a small snack of goulash-stew. I had too many bowls of beef goulash.

Another aside: I had an issue cooking the goulash as it started to burn. I had not put enough fat and water in the pot. I managed to save it by scrapping the almost burned items off. I just managed to save it. The water and stirring fixed it.

While almost burning dinner, I stated back on figure painting, and Scooby-doo is brown now, and the gang has painted hair. I also filled and adjusted the bases last night–they look better. I will shade the bases to match the color assigned to each gang member. Today I received the Hot Wheels Id version of the Mystery Machine from Amazon. Interestingly, Hot Wheels now come with RFID tags so you can track your playing with them on the Internet! All of this is for my copy of the board game Scooby-Doo Betrayal at Mystery Mansion.

I bought a copy of “Dracula, Untold” on my Apple and watched it. I like this version. It is near Halloween and so I wanted at least one scary, sort of, movie. That made me a bit late on writing tonight.

I am tired tonight so just a little painting and blogging.

The death rate has returned to the August 2020 level with over one-thousand thirty people in the USA expiring from the virus today.

You Are My Anchor is a 2020 choir work by David Wesley. I really have enjoyed his work.