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It is Halloween, and I have had one trick-or-treater visit, Harper from next door. I tried to guess, but I did not connect to the show Wednesday until her mother said it: she is the too-nice werewolf girl in the show. Excellent! I am dressed up in my outfit for work, a three-piece suit with a top hat and Guy Fawkes mask–Anonymous, but most folks thought V from the movie I liked V too.

I put out the light pumpkins that were brought back from the shoe company in Air Volvo’s cargo hols. The pumpkins I carved and decorated went to work with me for our Halloween party, and then I returned to decorate the driveway and walkway. I was hoping the pretty lights would attract trick-or-treaters, but alas, no.

I was home before four to set up and wait for any early ones–sometimes, the neighbor kids would do the locals before heading out to a better-candied location. I ordered pud-thai and some crab ragoons delivered. I ate that in the living room, waiting for kids and watching House of Wax with Vincent Price from the 1950s, but in color. I try to catch an old scary movie with Vincent Price every Halloween. I have met his daughter at The H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival and have her biography of him somewhere, signed.

Before this, I was at the Nike WHQ in the Swift Building with quite a few people dressed up. No other Anonymous or V characters but me. I did my afternoon meetings in my mask on Zoom. Folks loved it. I also spoke to our SAP leader for the project while in my mask, which he found surreal as I suggested a support model for the upcoming go-live. We got a picture together, which will likely get some laughs at SAP. “We knew those Nike folks are weird; now we understand,” could be an imagined conversation.

Mark Parker, chairmen of the board of Nike and Walt Disney, came to our building to talk to us. Mark was a shoe designer who became CEO and served for thirteen years. He spoke about his experiences and said we should believe in ourselves, have faith, and try things. He is famous for saying folks are succeeding too much and thus are not trying hard enough–because they are not failing.

I skipped the pizza party and costume contest at the shoe company CORE team. Instead, I took one of my lighted pumpkins to the hummingbird house. Jennifer, the weekday nursing aide, was there and dressed in a comic shark costume with a tail. She loved the pumpkin I said was for Ely, her son. They loved the LED cut into the small pumpkin with a coin battery connected by electrical tape.

Vida was there, and she had been visiting her spouse for years; she is my hero. They all have been missing me and, of course, Susie. They still think they hear her and often walk into her room to see her, only to remember she is not there. They grieve with me in their own way. It was good to visit today in costume, and we took a picture of Jennifer and me together. While sad, we all felt better meeting again.

Soon, it will be The Day of the Dead, and I will put Susie’s pictures up and light a candle. While not my culture, I think it will be OK. We will let Susie find her way back for a day. I will put out her new skates so she can skate.

Before this, I started the day at 6AM and made breakfast of my new bread with butter and jam and a banana. Coffee was from the Smiths and is Zabar’s grind from NYC. While not liberal, it is NYC, which is good to remember, too. Susie’s last trip was to NYC.

Which reminds me, Yesterday I located and salvaged some of the bagels from the Smiths and Susie’s Aunt Joyce in North Carolina packages from Zbar’s. Thank you all! UPS had put the package at the local UPS store as our road was closed for construction. It was a surprise as mail and other deliveries worked, but at least that mystery is explained.

I did my usual reading of emails, Slack channel updates, and news. I showered, cleaned up, and then carefully dressed in a suit and my mask and tophat. I took Susie’s cane from China. It is made from a cast of an antique ivory cane and is quite heavy.

I arrived in costume and got help to carry in the decorations. We decorated our area for the party. Everyone loved my look. I then started my hours of meetings wearing my Guy Fawkes mask for the Zoom live view.

Aside: I had breathing issues all day and a bad asthma attack that had me nearly fall to my knees–I had to grab the table. I need to take my inhaler more often. I get going and forget that I can’t breathe well until I choke and see stars. Stupid, really, and I will try to do better.

Thanks for reading.

 

 

 

 

Today started at 7AM with me rolling over and starting my day at 7:30AM instead. Today, and until 8Jan2024 Mondays are work-from-home days for Nike WHQ employees. So I was up at 7:30 and finished my homemade no-knead bread and a banana for breakfast. Of course, I made liberal coffee in my French press to go with breakfast and to help me wake up.

Meetings started at 8AM, and I was reading the events from the weekend. The go-live has begun, and this weekend, we loaded the first changes into production. While the process was successful, there have been some data edit issues. Our changes worked and seemed stable, but maybe not as loved as we hoped. Details cannot be put here.

I spent until 10AM in meetings, as usual, and I then slipped into the shower, cleaned up, and dressed. I also finished my bread process this morning and had it doing its second rise. It was baked and ready before lunch. Excellent. I reheated some Brunswick Chicken Stew I made this weekend and had it with the new warm bread.

I added an extra teaspoon of salt (I saw in another recipe they increased the salt) and let it rise a bit longer (twenty hours). I added 1/2 cup of King Arthur grain mix and 10% more water. This really changed the taste and even the crunch of the bread–excellent flavor. Jack C was asking me about my use of King Arthur Flour Company. I have used them since the pandemic, as they shipped flour during the pandemic when all the rest was not reachable. I like their recipes and boxed mixes. I love their gift sets and have sent them to many folks to enjoy, and they love them. Bob’s Red Mills products are good and local. I buy their grits, oats, and other specialized items. I have bought Bob’s products for years, and, oddly, I have never used their flour products–I am sure they are great.

The recipe is from NY Times, with me adding more salt and grain mix.

I watch ShipHappens on YouTube and Nerd of the Rings: Travels of Sauron. I also watched Drachinifel’s new video on the Midway wrecks. I was nerding out while burning my mouth on too-hot microwaved stew and crusty bread; I must admit I had three pieces of warm bread with the stew.

I then discovered again, the third time, that eTrade had hosed up my money transferred. I called them again, and they checked that and said everything would be OK. Later, I found myself locked out of trading. I then transferred the money I would use to buy a treasury out of the account to my US Bank account. Yikes! I will get the money away from them and stop using the account. Enough is enough. I will leave it in place until tax paperwork is provided.

I returned to work for more status meetings in the afternoon and followed along. It was quiet for me, and with me crying every couple of hours, it was best to not have any high-stress items or some complex issue to solve. I am not myself still.

In the early evening, I head to Safeway. I acquired a large pumpkin ($8) and four small pumpkins ($2-$4), usually used for making pies. I also got some good candy for Halloween. I returned and rested as I was tired. The emotions that come rolling over me exhaust me. Anything that suggests change or life or death starts the tears. I saw Awz at Safeway, a checker who came to live here after the Iraq War, and asked about me and my wife. In tears, I told him she had passed, and he was shocked but kind. I find myself comforting him, “It is the way of things,” and “She died in her sleep–the best way.” I hate to shock people, but the truth is best, I think.

I made a salad for dinner, chopping veggies and ham to make it a meal. I added sesame sticks and Mexican-styled shredded cheese to jazz it up. I put on The Phantom of the Opera, the Movie, but this made me cry, so I switched to Rocket Man, which caused less sad emotions. I carved the large pumpkin in the kitchen and made a large eye that fit a lens for the creepy moving eye device from Lady Ada in NYC. I cut a slit second eye, a small nose, and a mouth with one tooth.

I put the device into a zip lock and got it in place. I will have to pin it in place each time I move it. I put coin batteries (2023) with LED electrically taped and wrapped in plastic wrap to protect it from dampness. It’s so easy, and I bought LEDs and 2023s in bulk years ago.

Next, I took the small pumpkins and cut slits into them, and slid the 2023 battery and LED into the skin. Borg pumpkins or lighted ones, at least. I wrapped these LED/Batteries with extra tape instead of using plastic wrap. Worked a bit better.

I then read and rested as my back was complaining. I am still not able to stand for more than thirty minutes without complaints. But it was fun.

I then wrote this.

Thanks for reading.

I had dinner tonight and overate–I want a nap. A New York Strip that had been soaked in teriyaki sauce all afternoon and then broiled. I had sprayed some Pam non-stick spray, which promptly caught on fire. A part of the steak also burned with flame. Still, it was medium and quite good. I do not panic when these things happen. I just used a potholder to blow the flames out once I moved the steak out of the broiler. No problem.

I also boiled a few potatoes and mashed them with butter and a bit of cream–perfect. I found frozen corn and put that in a steamer basket, which was good. This time, I remember to cover the grill with tin foil and line the pan too. No clean-up issues this time with burned-on teriyaki sauce. I ate this while finishing the rewatching of The Sandman season 1–I enjoyed it. I cried hard when one character, very sympathetic, returned to his form as a place and asked folks to visit him and enjoy his trees and meadows. I also cried when I watched the start of The Phantom of the Opera, the movie version. The Phantom was one of Susie’s and my favorites.

Before this, I was doing laundry, started to make no-knead bread, deposited a check–a refund of some of Susie’s care, and installed my new lamp in my work area. My neighbors next door, Christine and her daughter Harper, left a rose for me to plant in Susie’s memory. It is a large plant in a gallon, and I will find a place for it.

Lunch was a potluck after church. I had a plate or two, and I supplied ham as we are usually low on mains. We seem more of a dessert type of Methodists at First United Methodist in Beaverton–there were plenty of choices of cakes, pies, cookies, brownies, and other sugar and flour heavens. I wore my blue suit, the red Old West style vest, and a standard tie with my new homburg hat. I had the gold-colored pocket watch and chain to finish the antique look. Black leather shoes, of course, were the final touch.

Church was pleasant as the songs to sing were in easy 4/4 time and simple keys (though if you think I hit any of the right notes, you have not heard me sing–if it can be called that). I knew three songs and listened to some before, so I could fake it. Pastor Ken’s sermon was to make some sense of the massive passage in Acts 5 that Z, our reader, got to try. Z had to read more than two pages of text. Z asked how to pronounce Sadduces, and I gave Z the sound of the word and told Z to over-annunciate it confidently and fake it like the rest of us. Rev. Anne gave Z one name, sitting in the front to direct the choir and help Wayne. Z got applause for making it through.

For the sermon, Pastor Ken explained that it is essential to know what labels mean when discussing politics and religion in the Middle East now or from 2,000 years ago. He pointed out that the officials in the passage who arrest the apostles and are fighting to keep the status quo are not unlike us. We are not the apostles, though they are heroes of the story, but much closer to the temple police and officials in current times. We need to understand the labels we are using. We also have to remember the change might be God’s plan, and like the official said, do nothing; we need to be careful not to push against God’s plan. Ken is clearly not stating anything to be attributed to the current situation but for us to remember in our dealing with the world that we may not be the apostles but the temple police in the story–operating from authority and wealth. He also said we often feel overwhelmed and, like the officials in the story, are tired of new conflicts. “I have enough,” said Ken. And just like the officials, we need to be careful to not demand the status quo because we are exhausted.

When I asked Ken to do grace for the potluck, he told me he was tired and had enough with a smile. So I requested Rev. Anne, and Ken watched as Anne led us in a song for grace instead. Ken smiled; it was good–God’s will was found.

Before this, I was up at 6:30 baking and then carving $25 worth of ham. I wrote the blog too. I also went back and added more to the blog. Once the ham was hot and looked good, I carved it up and put the slices and pieces in a dish, wrapped in tin foil, and put it in the cooling oven.

I stacked the dishes, showered, and dressed in my three-piece suit. Breakfast was a slice of my homemade bread with butter and jam and a banana. I had liberal coffee from my French press. It was a struggle to start so early as I was asleep after midnight.

Thanks for reading.

Addition:

The tears come when I am alone–I feel I can just cry alone. I want to let it out, which is an embarrassment to many.

I react to anything associated with death or a final change. The theme of Phantom of the Opera makes me cry hard–“Let us have some illumination!” never caused me to cry before, quite the opposite. The sudden change now brings forward all the feelings of loss. My emotions are uncontrollable; again, the tides of sadness and loss come unbidden and often with no warning. But food tasted better today, and colors returned to the world. The Sandman was fascinating again (Netflix).

 

I am up early Sunday morning to heat a ham for today’s church potluck. I could not find my favorite, a spiral-cut ham, and thus, I am using a regular ham and will have to carve it; ugh! But I am getting ahead…

The morning started with having dreams I don’t remember and being surprised to wake up after 8AM. Joyce, Susie’s aunt in North Carolina, sent more NYC bagels from Zabar’s, but they were lost, and another shipment is now headed to me. Instead, I had a slice of freshly made no-knead bread and a banana to go with my liberal coffee in my French press for breakfast.

I wrote the blog the previous night, so I went slow and tried to enjoy a pleasant morning. I tried to assemble the model of the building I am making for Richard for his Suburbia. I am always so optimistic when I start a model, and I thought this one would come together with ease. It did not. I broke a part, which forced me to assemble more to mount it repaired than I wanted before I worked out the lighting. I also drilled some of the supports with an electric drill and cracked one, but not seriously. Goodness, this is turning into a major project!

I painted the outside with off-white (Mummy Robes from Army Painter), using a brush and diluted paint. I wanted to not have brush marks, so I went with very wet, light coats. I had sprayed “white” Mr. Hobby’s Surfacer on the parts, so the paint just colored the model something, not a stark white primer. I decided to paint the window frames, and my brush made a mess of it. I will need to mask the building and then touch-up (a light off-white will not easily cover a Gun Metal color from Army Painter) light issues. This means I will not finish this soon.

I glued some clear, bright LEDs into the supports, which I will power with the 2023 coin cell holders I have inbound from Amazon. I forgot to remove the paint before I glue, thus gluing to paint, and one part keeps falling off. Generally, I started to remember all my modeling skills, how hard model building is, and why it takes so long. I will take my time and do this one right.

I do my Quicken checks, and eTrade refuses my download from Quicken, hmmm. I am locked out from any transactions until I contact eTrade. This is not expected, as I just received money from the insurance company, and I am now transferring it to my regular checking. eBanks are sensitive to money laundry, and, being from Oregon, I need to show that this is not profits from a natural business like illegal (at the federal level) mushroom sales. I found someone, Penny, in some far distant call center for Morgan Stanley (eTrade is Morgan Stanley), who has me take photos of the insurance letters and death certificate. That is not enough, but the insurance company answers their phone for Penny on the weekend (wow!) at yet-another-call-center in some distant land and agrees that my transaction is from them and legitimate. My accounts are released, and I celebrate by spending another hour trying to invest some of the now-approved cash into something that pays interest. I managed to get 1/4 of the money (all I want to lock down) to buy a US Treasury for three months. Lastly, I put in the transfer only to cancel it as I saw that the previous one (I got a note that it failed) was still in progress, and not wanting to double the transfer (and exceed the transfer limit), I canceled the newly entered transfer. Yikes! I will see if this one will clear on Monday.

I cleaned up and dressed. I always use Utterly Smooth 25% Urea (cow pee), as advised by my Doc and the oncology pharmacist. My numbness is not getting worse in my fingers and toes. I do not know if this works or why it would work, but it is not expensive, so I continue with it. My hands have never been smoother.

I took Air Volvo to Fred Myers (owned by Krogers for those in the mid-west) and could not find a spiral-cut ham, so I bought a hefty $25 ham. It is a lot of ham. I will have to carve it on Sunday morning after I heat it through. It’s not as easy as I like it for a church potluck.

Returning to Volvo Cave, I stored the ham in the frig; next, now running late, I headed to Portland. I picked the Lucky Labrador today for gaming, beer, and food for this Saturday afternoon, and soon, having no traffic to mention, arrived and parked in their parking lot. Perfect.

I had their excellent BLT with perfect bread and freshly cooked bacon with mayo. I drank two beers there, resisting my need to self-medicate from grief by enjoying more than a glass every other hour. Evan and I played Vindication, with Evan surprising me with what tiles he included in the game. We played our usual game, and luck was with Evan; he pulled ahead by 11 points when the game unexpectedly ended. I also got low-scoring monsters and lost two companions to poor rolls as I tried to raise my score; ugh. In the second game, I got the companion that gives you two more points for every companion. So soon, I was twenty points ahead, spending most of my time repeatedly getting companions (four or more points a turn is good in Vindication). I also vindicated myself to add some more points and have options. Evan should have headed out for more high-point-generating locations–I had vindicated in case I needed to change tactics, but luck kept many of these places undiscovered and in the Scum Bag. I won by about ten points, tripping the game end by having lots of companions, with Evan finding some points on mastery to improve his final score.

We were running out of time, so we did a rushed game of The Lost Ruins of Arnak, but we could not finish the game. The scores were close, with my landing the top points for research, but Evan was ahead on defeated guardians. We had one round left when we put the game away. I was 15 minutes early when I left, but I forgot to pay and had to drive back and pay. Traffic was light, and I found a parking spot in front and managed to pay and leave in minutes. The area was full of people now dressed for Halloween–there must have been some dance parties starting (no kids). This made me twenty minutes late for Richard’s game.

It was Kathleen, Richard, and I tonight and the board game Voidfall. This game, which I like, is a military 4X (without the one X for Exterminate, as you cannot be eliminated by rules) redressed into a worker placement game with engine-building. It has the weird technology trees you see in many 4X games, but also the point cards that you acquire and most of the points to win. I scored last as I am not very good at collecting bonus cards. I also tried to follow the military for my race, but that was not quite right as the game is worker and engine-building. Kathleen almost caught Richard, whose score was nearly double mine. Still, I like it and will try to learn the bonus card part next.

Air Volvo took Kathleen home with me, discussing gaming and other good distractions. We spent a while in her driveway talking about Lord of the Rings (LOTR); I would like to try the role playing game (RPG) of LOTR. Kathleen tried Dungeons and Dragons 5E (5E) almost a month ago with Corwin and me. She enjoyed. So, she would like to try LOTR 5E. So will see if we can do that. A chance to play hobbits in The Shire!

Air Volvo managed to reach the Volvo Cave without incident. I was dodging people and cars in Portland and did get honked at once when I noticed that the lane I was pulling in did not have room for Air Volvo as someone drove in the middle–it was not a one-way, but we escaped without losing paint.

My packages arrived from Amazon, but still no bagels (likely on Monday). I went to bed, setting the alarm for 6:30 to bake the ham and carve it before church. I fell asleep a few minutes into reading. I dreamed about the book before I realized I was asleep while holding my Kindle; I put away the Kindle and slept.

Thanks for reading.

Added later:
I am still feeling sad, and I cannot find that much pleasure in doing many things. I enjoy doing them, but afterward, I feel sad as I miss Susie and feel strange to forget that moment while working on a model or playing a game. The colors are faded, and the food taste is a bit less. I feel like I am in a dream–disassociated–and want to wake up and find Susie happy next to me, and the sad dream is over. Tears come here and there. It is hard to move to the next thing, but I do, like a mental syrup or the leaded limbs of a dream. I can see why folks slide into drugs (including alcohol) as they want to escape not from the grief but from noticing the dream-like world. I will try to get more exercise and keep doing things I like. I suspect the disassociation feeling will remain, but the episodes will become shorter and shorter over a year.

I just wanted to include what I am feeling. Thanks for reading.

Dear reader, I am at Wildwood Taphouse having a beer. I told the bartender that my wife had passed away on the 13th when she addressed me. I got a hug, and my beer was on the house. I did not know how to say it, so I told her. She was shocked and saddened, but now I did not have to pretend. The bartender seemed happy that I shared that with her.

I am writing the blog at a table, just enjoying the company and the energy of our local taps.

It was a dry day today, but it was still cool and grey. The forecast suggests sun for the weekend, but we will see.

I have been building a model, N-Scale, on and off all day that I am making for Richard for the board game Suburbia. It is not going as well as I hoped. The model has broken and has not come together as quickly as I expected. I also have to go out of order to enable lighting of the building, making it more complex. I decided to stop after painting some of the model’s surfaces. I will need to mask it, and that will take time. I also searched the house for my coin battery holders, but I could not find them. I put them somewhere before Matt organized the room, so it was not that. I gave up and ordered some more ($6) from Amazon to be delivered on Saturday.

Before this, I was eating Brunswick Stew with chicken I had made from scratch today, a huge pot. I found the recipe in the NY Times and wanted to try it. I started this before my work day finished as it needed to simmer for multiple hours. My boss reminded me via Slack that I had some training to complete. This corporate year, we have 90 days to complete Unconscious Bias and Cyber Security training. My laptop browser was not working right for one of the classes, so I stopped 1/2 way last month. Today, I copied the URL to Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, and everything started to work–I use Google’s browser as a default. I completed the strew and the class at about the same time.

I watched the last part of the very long and latest Mission Impossible movie on my Apple while enjoying dinner. I had a couple of slices of my homemade bread with the stew. I buttered the slices and sprinkled them with just a little sea salt (I use unsalted butter). I enjoyed the movie. Dinner was good.

Before this, I was working from home, and it was a quiet day with about four hours of status meetings–all Zoom. The project I am working on is busy this weekend with a few things, but generally, we are quiet, and I do not have to work this weekend.

I did slip out and grocery shop for the Brunswick Stew and a few other items at Safeway. It is still strange to me to see full shelves and no masks being required–some folks (more than before, I think) are now wearing masks. I got a few bags and returned with my goodies to the Volvo Cave.

Work started at home at 8AM. I had trouble sleeping and woke at 5ish every ten minutes after that until I gave up and started my Friday at 7ish. I made liberal coffee, butter a slice of my bread, and added some jam; lastly, I finished the canned peaches I had started yesterday. I scoop out the fruit and, being diabetic, send the sugary juice down the drain.

I plan to pay off the loan on my 401K to cover Susie’s medical costs with the insurance money for Susie, but eTrade cannot seem to make their banking work. I can write a check and deposit and might do this soon. I should be able to transfer freely to my US Bank checking. I had issues with this before. eBanks are good at taking your money and less about sharing it. I am mildly annoyed–I have experienced this before, and if they don’t fix it soon, I will make some harsh decisions about their service and contact agencies about not having access to funds.

Before I headed out, I put the stew in containers and a freezer bag. I have enough for all week!

Thanks for reading!