Monday Catchup

I typically sleep in on Mondays and start slower. I rose after eight and missed the sunrise. I made liberal coffee and tried not to read too much news. There are rumors of immigration raids in Oregon, but the local press says they have not started here (KOIN 6). The impact on people and programs now that Trump has ordered the halt of payments for programs will be profound. I spent the morning writing the blog and later writing some replies to the blog and other church-related communications. Dondrea and Deborah were already telling me stories of people they knew impacted by Trump’s policies, real stories, not rumors.

I spent many years as a corporate warrior and know these disruptor people and their chaos. It was why people leave companies, how billions of dollars were spent with little to show, how careers were made and destroyed, and how change was done just for change. Towards the end of my corporate years, I could find old presentations that just needed to be updated to the newest art, and a few words were changed. Database to AI, business intelligence to embedded logic, hardware to cloud, and coding to development–just a few examples.

Returning to the narrative, I wrote and tried to cover a lot of Sunday. I was more selective than usual, as I said in that blog. I finished the blog late in the morning and started on sheets that I purchased for the guest room. The Machine managed to tie the sheets into a ball; some never dried, and I hung them up on chairs and doors to air dry. Later, I got a code that a sensor failed in The Machine. I rebooted it.

The Machine leaked this morning, Tuesday, causing me to have an extensive cleanup. I am not sure what to think. That is one of the reasons the blog is late.

With the blog done, I moved to the spare bedroom, found old towels, sheets, and blankets used in Susie’s last year, and packed that all (except for a few quilts I had before Susie’s decline) for Goodwill. I also found some more Peanuts Christmas displays we had not used for years. I consolidated them with items I saw in the garage. All this went to Goodwill, but the grief was not easy.

I took Air VW the Gray to Target on the other side of Beaverton, but there, I found all the fast charging stations were in use. I plugged in a cable with a slower charge. I headed to Swagot for lunch. I had their lovely tray lunch. The buffet has gone away for COVID-19 and has not returned–instead, you get a tray. The food was excellent and had a slight kick. I was their last guest for lunch. I arrived thirty minutes before they closed for a few hours before the dinner menu was offered.

I returned to the EV and could not get the plug to release. I called the 1-800 number and, after a few steps in the call tree, reached a person with a strong accent on a poor phone line. Listening carefully, I learned to press my unlock button thrice on the Air VW the Gray’s fob. And the cable was released. I saw this in the instructions now on the app (it was graphic with a fob and three arrows, but I had no context for what it meant).

I connected the EV once I changed parking to the available station and charged it to 80% battery life in fifteen minutes. This fast charge process takes 10% of the time of the slower process. I would have preferred 100%, but somehow, I set it back to the standard of 80% between charges.

I wrote a letter to President Trump and found an old pre-stamped envelope and additional stamps that allowed me to raise the postal rate. I figure the extra stamps will make someone at least open it. The letter covered the Paris Accords (Trump again removed the USA from this important climate agreement), quoting from my 2017 letter on the same subject, and complained about Trump’s attempt to redefine the 14th Amendment because he hasn’t the votes to overturn it. This reconstruction amendment is often called unfair to states and ‘unclear.’ The 1868 reconstruction-era changes are precise, and they were meant to curtail states and set the federal courts and laws above states. I put that letter out in the mailbox.

I stopped by Costco. I found more Liquid IV drinks powder. I also picked up a few items, including a case of shelf-stable milk for the church’s kids’ backpacks program and some protein bars. Next, I did not know that the baked goods, which I thought were good sizes when I picked them out, were bought in sets of two. Oops. I checked out and then walked to the bakery to get another set. Hmmm. I also got some tulips that bulbs

I had snacks for dinner as lunch was so late and heavy. I watched more Classic Doctor Who, with one episode recalling the racism of the British Empire books like Sax Rohmer. The episode had a warning that it would offend people, and it featured a British actor in poor makeup as an evil Fu Manchu-like character. It also included the willing sacrifice of a minion. It was a Jack-the-ripper, alien invasion, and Fu Manchu mash-up with The Doctor. It was just awful.

I returned to reading Agatha Christie’s letters on her travels in the 1920s, which gave a first-hand account of the communist takeover of part of South Africa, something I had not heard about. The raising of a Soviet group openly declared and crushed by police was not something I had ever read about. She also wrote that she held back her letters until later to avoid running them through censors, which surprised me. I did not know censorship was so strong.

I painted figures until after 11 and got 4077 figures more finished. I finally went to bed with the Washer/Dryer LG running a cleaning cycle. This would be the flood I would find in the morning. Ugh.

I slept through the storm from the flood. I found it in the morning.

Thanks for reading.