I woke early to my alarm at 6, threw on some clothes, and headed outside to freeze. It was at least not slick. I walked about 1/2 of my usual. It was too cold for my hands, and I, in light gloves, was cold, and I was concerned it was too dark to be safe, let alone some unexpected ice or frost. It would not do to fall while trying to get some exercise. Morning walks in the winter are out.
(Yes, a slightly grumpy blog. I have a baguette and am not afraid to use it.)
There were police everywhere, and rescue trucks were prominent. Sirens wailed in the predawn. I did not find any news references to the police and rescue worker pile-on (And Grammarly stopped working again). This also had me scamper home: a police car, all lit up and with brights on, stopped by me, then backed up and did a U-turn. Their Nav was off, and they headed to the pile-on. I was concerned there was a call to stop suspects who matched my description amid all the ruckus, but nope. I vowed that my next walk would be in the daytime, after the ice had melted! Yikes!
My new locks worked well and did not take the keys with them. I have not hidden a key yet, in case the lock’s battery fails or otherwise, so that I do not get locked out. I like alternatives.
On silly subjects, LG contacted me about the delivery of my replacement for The Machine! I called the service center, and they are escalating my request to be paid rather than receive a replacement. Yikes! I was clear about my wishes, but I suspect that, when given the choice between replacement and payment, someone overrode my request. I was told it would take up to 5 days to change this, and then there would be more forms. I told them I would NOT take delivery, and that got them moving on this. Not unexpected, as I am cynical about multi-nationals being helpful; I used to work for another customer product multinational. Nothing in my memory is messier than reverse logistics, where every possible mistake in a supply chain exists simultaneously.
Costco has scheduled the new laundry for Wednesday afternoon. No coin laundry this week! Yay!
I figure the coin laundry costs $20 for 90 minutes a week. This means no water or electricity (I use electric dryers at the house). Calculating $1040 a year plus water, which I would guess at no more than $20 a month. Now I travel and miss about 10-25% of weeks, and I can do full loads from travel for that $20 (making it the conservative value and likely high). Thus, I reduce the total cost by 10%, and the same for water and electricity: $936 plus $18*12 = $1252. That means the return on investment is less than 2 years. As long as I don’t buy the new laundry on credit, the investment makes sense, since I plan to live here for 5 years or more (though I sometimes want to sell the house).
Tuesday is a gaming day, and I have a 9:30 game at Richard’s to play with James and Richard. Sadly, my would-be dermatologist office calls, and we cancel the appointment. They don’t actually take Regence’s personally purchased insurance (only corporate versions); f**k! I call Regence, and they explain that my network is smaller on my plan, but yes, my doctors take it (thus why I bought it). The customer service person suggests that in Nov 2026, I check their website and pick a better, larger network. I cannot change until open enrollment.
Maybe insurance is worse than reverse logistics. And yes, for those who wonder, Americans cannot, for example, pay a price to join Medicare (which would be less than any of these corporate offerings) or change their insurance once they are locked in for a year. Americans who have no employer-based insurance (putting aside the reason by law that your employer is your source of insurance — a form of being indentured) have to guess which one they want and then pay 20-30% more than employer based insurance (with the illusion that your employer is actually paying anything for the insurance — they pay you less and then pay for it from those funds).
Aside: I would suggest that if we passed a law in another country requiring them to use the American system, there would be a revolt. Nobody would ever be willing to pay so much for such terrible and expensive services. No person would think, in the other Western democracies, that employers should supply health care.
We play cooperative storyline games and are currently buried in Tainted Grail. Today, after feeling that our last play was just bouncing randomly across the board, we started finding some threads to play and forced a few cases, as we are tired of bouncing around. Some checking on the Internet discovers that we are missing some awards from the previous chapters; oops. We begin our tracing threads, and Richard remembers one; this one was offered at the start, but we did not have a character capable of it back then, and our knowledge of the game was too new to solve it. We manage it now, along with other small items. We play until 2:30 and pack in the game. It has a save process, and we put everything away for next week’s game.
My travel back was non-eventful, but my trip into Portland made me 15 minutes late (James, who came from Washington State, was late too). There were two wrecks on Highway 26, with one causing a slowdown even with the accident in the other direction! The accidents all looked like the usual failure to stop and rear-end collision.
I do not stop in Portland for lunch and a beer (not after gaining 30 pounds) and head back to Beaverton. Instead, I stopped at Paris Baguette and got a sandwich and some baked goods. I am hungry, it is past 3, and I ate my chicken sandwich in Air VW the Gray. I remember a baguette sandwich in Paris with local cheese and ham, and a wicked mustard, and I also think of New York City back in 2026. I discovered Paris Baguette there in 2021, and it was one outside Mount Sinai West Hospital. I would go there for lunch while wearing my mask.
I sent Cat in NYC a text saying I was thinking of her and NYC. I hope to get back there sometime in 2021.
I returned to writing the blog and texting with Deborah. We are counting down to her visit to Beaverton, starting on February 12 and ending on the 21st (ten days). Deborah was busy.
It is 4ish before I get the blog done. I found the package in the house and other hints that later Corwin confirmed was his checking in. He stops by the house here and there and has my permission to do that and raid the fridge and other sources of food. He has the code for the front door (I love my new locks). Some of his mail appears here.
I lose track of time; it is soon 6:30, and I have a church meeting. That went for an hour and was surprisingly pleasant. With that done, I do some minor stuff on Kaggle. I cannot get my head around my problems and challenges; I instead decide to take a day break from coding AI stuff.
Having seemingly lost control of my day and it disappearing, I discover I did not get out for another walk, and it is dark again (yes, I realize I should not be surprised that it gets dark at night, but I really wanted a walk). I have not had dinner, and it is approaching 8:30.
I arrange the smoked salmon, pickles, left over backed beans, and sliced fresh baguette. Sort of a disassembled sandwich that I eat in pieces. I clean up the kitchen, make coffee for Wednesday morning, and then assemble the bread machine to make French-style bread (but it never comes out crispy enough for me). I added some grain mix from King Arthur Flour and some water, and the sticky mass started the bread machine dancing. I have it on a towel and on the top of the stove, and that will stop it (I have too much experience with this) from jumping off the counter (again).
The Social Security Administration sent me an email that they are working on my application in Carlson City, Missouri (?!). I signed in to SSA, and it showed me the second part of the process, promising a response in 30 days or less. After Elon and Trump messing with all of this, I hope these estimates are correct, but I would not be surprised that, as a person from wartorn and undocumented persons overrun Oregon, I will have to prove my identity and worthiness to be paid the money I already paid in (and receive about a 10% return on my investment). But let us, dear reader, hope for a better outcome.
I did not read in bed; it was nearing midnight when I climbed in. I soon fell asleep after a late call.
Thanks for reading!
Alohawild (Michael Wild's) Website 