Today 19Jan2023: Thursday, Finally

We are finally making it to almost the end of the workweek, Thursday. I woke by my alarm, knowing it could not be 6AM already; it was. I had gone to bed at 10ish as I was not feeling great on Wednesday, but I still woke to wonder how the night could be so short. I decided then, my back was complaining, not to do my excises. I felt more Belz Lugosi as I rose, but I decided to get it over with and did most of my stretches and excises anyway, leaving the standing knee stuff for another day.

It is a work-from-office day (WFO), so I was rushed to complete everything necessary. I made peanut butter toast with my banana and liberal coffee made in my trusty French press. This leaves me with enough coffee to fill my thermal cup for the ride in and for the first set of status meetings.

I spent the morning reading emails, texts, Slack messages, and my own email. I also check CNN for essential news. Ever since the September 11th attack, I check the information every morning, hoping for no more attacks. Unfortunately, I had not checked the news on 11Sept morning and learned in my car as I drove in to work at the shoe company that the twin towers were no more in New York City. At first, I did not believe it and thought I had misheard the news.

Air Volvo was headed to the office, the Clubhouse office building not on Nike WHQ campus, by 8:30 and arrived around 8ish and started my first meetings at the new time of 8:05. Meetings at the shoe company are now not to start on the hour and half-hour, but to give five-minute breaks. This allows, and it is, so silly to do this for bathroom breaks and to give folks the time to walk to the next conference room and/or to connect via Zoom. Too many folks were getting back-to-back meetings and could not even get time to use the restroom. My friend Michael G, who got no lunch multiple times a week, threatened to wave a cardboard sign in the meetings to bystanders that said, “I will come to your meeting for food.”

I spent the morning on meetings and then had a crisis of the moment as some software needed to be installed, now. I worked with the release manager and got this done. I got a few more crises and worked them too. The morning was refreshingly busy instead of the usual status-filled slog.

I headed next to Susie at the hummingbird house (I forgot to take pictures, sorry). The travel was through light traffic, with me patiently watching as my fellow drivers switched lanes with little concern for Air Volvo’s paint. I arrived, intact, from my travel from Highway 26 to 217 (Highway 217 called, with no love, “The Devil’s Bowling Ally”).

I waited for Susie to finish her breakfast. The Comcast cable was down in the area all night and into the day. Jennifer, the live-in nurse aide, has selected her personal copy of the musical/movie Hair Spray (2007), and Susie was not eating. Instead, she was watching one of her favorites and singing along. Jennifer and I had to remind Susie to eat. Here is one of my favorite songs: Timeless. Susie, distracted, finally finished her breakfast.

We called her mother, Leta, and surprised her by being early. My lunch meeting was off this Thursday, so I was running early on Thursday. Leta and Susie chatted for a bit, and I filled in here and there. It was a pleasant time with Susie wheeled into the social activity room–I did not need a mask there as long as I was just with Susie.

Soon, as often happens on work days, I needed to say goodbye with a kiss. Susie was back to watching Hair Spray (Timeless was playing when I left). Here is the best song, I think, from the movie: I Know Where I Have Been. I went to Carl’s Jr. and had a Western Burger for lunch. I needed a coffee later as I was getting sleepy from the burger and fries. I was feeling better.

I applied a few more vendor patches that were requested. I will, working on the crises of the moment, apply a pile of those to development on Friday morning (while listening to the endless status meeting) and hope to promote them to the release soon after. I drove home at 3:40ish and then logged back on from home and answered some more questions.

At 5PMish, I closed my laptop and rested a bit. I then got up and headed to BJ’s for dinner. I had a small steak, baked potato, asparagus, and my favorite beer. I wrote the blog at the same time. Eric was my waiter, and Mel, my other waiter, said hello (she liked the show I recommended, Wednesday, from the Addams Family).

So I am drinking my after-steak dinner coffee and writing.

Thanks for reading.