Going backward, Air Volvo arrived at the Volvo Cave just before midnight from Portland. I played my usual gaming night at Richard’s house on Saturday. We played Great Western Trail: New Zealand (2023), a recent implementation of the original game now with sheep and set in New Zealand with many improvements. It is considered the best version by many. It is rated the 78th best strategy game on BoardGameGeek’s website, and I recommend it for skilled gamers with a cost of about $60; there are no expensive add-ons, deluxe versions, or part improvements. It comes complete at this price. It does have a large footprint and complex iconography. I like the game (even coming in last against Chris–just above my score–Kathleen–who fought for first place–and Richard–who won) and enjoy playing git. Someday, I will learn enough and put it together to be a threat.
Ross Island in the Greater Portland Area had a serious fire, and tires and old equipment burned. The press speculated that the old tires may have spontaneously caught fire (this is unlikely). The skies were filled with black smoke as Air Volvo took me to Portland from home. Traffic was light.
Great Western Trail: New Zealand is a Euro game with many subsystems and rules. There is some player interaction and limited player interaction. Scoring is done, and it is complex, too, at the end of the game. I knew I was at the bottom, but Kathleen was unsure if she got Richard. There is deck building (your sheep) with limited opportunities to thin your deck (that I wish I had paid to do more often). I would suggest playing with someone who can teach the game to see if you like all the rules and complexity (much of it just flows and is logical).
Going back to earlier on Saturday, I finished the blog before 11 and was soon dressed and ready to get outside. I could smell pine and smoke, and because of my allergies and asthma, I was greatly impacted by bad air, so I was not going to do any walking. I did the usual chores of getting gas at the reduced it-is-after-summer-hikes of $4.19 a gallon (remember there is no sales tax, and there is no additional charge for full-service in Oregon) and getting the car washed (I pay a monthly pass and wash Air Volvo often twice a week). I took a bag of small stuffed animals that Glenda had collected into a bag some years ago when she came out to help me with Susie, yes, that long ago and took the items (including the Intel bunny suit guy, which is a collector’s item–I saw one in the Computer Museum in San Jose California) to Goodwill and gave them away.
I saw I was near the newly renovated Taco Bell and the newish Dollar Store (formally an unneeded Walgreens within a mile of another Walgreens and across from Fred Meyers). Instead of finding an office supply store or heading to Fred Meyers (owned by Krogers for those in the Eastern USA), I tried the Dollar Store—I am retired. I found the Post-it arrow markers, some good pens, and a mailer for all under $5. I saw a man with two boxes of Crunch and Munch as I walked in (I have not thought of that stuff in years), and there were many low-priced household and food snack items. I shall return now that my time is my own and I am living using my investments for the future. A buck an item (or so) is a good price.
Next, I tried going into the rebuilt Taco Bell. If you brought cash, someone would come off the cooking line and take your order. Otherwise, there are touchscreens with full-color pictures of food for you to order from. I ordered a few items as Taco Bell had new spicy chicken items. There was no human interaction as I typed in my name and supplied my Alaska Air Miles Visa for payment.
As I waited for my order, I thought this felt like a fast-food place on a spaceship in a sci-fi setting. All we needed was to get rid of the windows and some low G-moves in the food line. As per the strange queuing process of American fast food, in-house guests wait for the orders from the drive-through. They called out “Michelle” and then corrected the name to “Michael,” which got a laugh from me and the gal who left the line to pack and deliver the bag of Taco Bell goodies. I was asked, surprisingly, with all the technologies, if I had a drink and what size. I replied and was handed a cup. I did my own drink (!?).
The chicken crunchy taco was good and spicy. I am not sure I could make one that good, but it was excellent. The rest of my food was less than good. The cheese was industrial-style and might have been shown a picture of a cow. It was dripping out of the hot food. But the sour cream and the guacamole were good with each in little containers, making me think of SciFi again in low Gs. I ordered a regular crunchy taco supreme and it was the same why-would-you-make-this-so-bad flavor and “meat.” It is still just as bad as before.
The dining area was remade to be uncolorful, and the chairs were hard with uncomfortable metal backs. Previously, the area was a mix of tables and chairs, uncomfortable still, but it matched the decor with bright colors on the walls and tables, plus many LA-like images that conveyed a message of welcome and that Taco Bell was hip. Now the message is, why not take that to go? I thought Doctor Who or a remake of The Fifth Element movie could use the same setting for a Taco Bell on a distant space station in the far future. Just use them as is–there is no need to add any SciFi updates. Just cover the windows or green screen them to a view of Saturn or like image.
After this, I headed to Big River Coffee, got an Americo with a shot of caramel syrup, and worked on my next writing project. I have the Annotated Sherlock Holmes by William Baring-Gould, which you can find in used bookstores. It has two large volumes for just a few bucks (my copy from Powell’s was the seventeenth reprinting of the 1968 work). There is a newer work, but it runs as high as over $100 for the two or three-volume set. I took Post-it arrows and marked each interesting section of Mr. Baring-Gould’s book.
I have started a short story about Holmes and Watson waking up to current times as an AI-generated chatbot like ChatGPT. I have some ideas, but I want to get the words and sentence structure close to the original, so I am reading and doing homework. I hope to send the completed story to 2600 Magazine as a follow-up to my previous story published about AI and the Turing Test. I was at this until about 3ish.
I returned home, rested a bit, and then made an early dinner of a grilled cheese sandwich (with cheese that came from a more natural process) and some canned peaches (also from a farm I visited). I headed out to Richard’s house at 5.
At the start of my day, I rose about 7 and started on the blog. I had toast with jam and some canned peaches with my locally roasted and ground coffee from Kenya in my French Press. I had four cups (I had to add water for the last cup). It was a strongly caffeinated day!
Thanks for reading.
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