Blog

Going backward, I was home after midnight as Kathleen, Richard, and I chatted for a while after the last game. I will start with the fact that I did not win the two Wingspan games we played. In the second game, Richard included the Europe-Asian expansion, and we enjoyed the new options (my score was even lower)–recommended now by me. Having been sleeving the cards before we played, Richard had never opened the expansion before; he explained his choices for sleeves and how he watches for sales and just orders various practical sizes. I don’t sleeve all the cards to protect them in my games.

The board game Wingspan is an elegant game where you collect birds into your sanctuary and have little eggs, and you can build engines and react to other player’s actions. I find it a bit more random, but it is fun to play.

Next, we play the basic version of the hidden movement and searching game Mind MGMT. The game is played with one player as the recruiter, and the other players play agents trying to capture the recruiter. The agent players can ask some questions to try to locate the recruiter. I like this kind of game, but they are not engine-building or traitor games, so not every gamer like this style. Next, we played the training version–this kind of game has a lot of mechanics that take a few plays to get right. The Fury of Dracula, where one player plays Dracula, and the others are trying to hunt the vampire before he places more vampires, is another well-loved version that I have and have played quite a few times (now in its fourth edition that is only a few component changes (larger figures and bigger cards) than the third edition–I have the 3rd). It has multiple rule books and an obscure combat system but still a favorite. In comparison, Mind MGMT plays fast, and the rules are easy once you get used to the strange colors and words.

Before this, I was at The Lucky Labrador in Portland off of Hawthorn playing games and eating (and drinking) with Evan. We played Wingspan (my copy of the game and I won that one) and the locally created Vindication board game. I had a Czech beer and a Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato (BLT) sandwich (the bread is artisan, and the bacon is hot, thick-cut–wonderful). Evan was happy to crush me in Vindication.

Before this, I was at Susie’s. Susie fell asleep in minutes today. She looked comfortable and seemed happy. But, when I went to leave at 2ish, she said, “You are going to leave me,” with a sad face. Susie wanted to go with us but knew it was impossible for some reason, which made her sad. I cried in the car driving to Portland. But, soon, Susie kissed me goodbye and was quickly fine.

We tried the new Peacock show, Poker Face, but Susie slept through most of it. Evan, who also showed up, slept through it. I liked it (and did not get sleepy). This is a remake of something like Rockford Files or Columbo, where the murder is shown, and now you watch as the detective works out how to catch the bad guy (some guest star). This version is a gal who knows if you are lying–she cannot be fooled even on the phone or on video. While in her thirties and set in the current times, she smokes and drinks, and swears like a sailor. I liked the mix and would recommend it.

We called Susie’s mother, Leta, and Susie and Leta had a friendly chat, but Susie nodded off a few times. Leta was happy that it was above zero (-18C) and was enjoying a lazy Saturday. We made it a short call as Susie had trouble paying attention and staying awake.

I have not mentioned driving; today, the traffic was heavy but always moving. The lane changing and merges were hair-raising a few times today. The mix of polite but crazy is not fun at speeds over fifty! On the way to Richards from The Lucky Labrador, I got on the back streets and found myself dodging a bus! In this case, I had started crossing four lanes, and then the bus started as I was halfway–there was no place to go but hit the pedal and get around the bus–I am not proud of that one. No paint was lost on Air Volvo today.

I started the morning working on my ship models. I put on the flags and names for the ships that fit some past gaming use and the current times: Unexpected and Unprecedented. I built the sales for the Unprecedented but then decided the space jammer would look better and be more useful as a gaming model without the masts. I attached the deck equipment (including a lovely brass wheel) and wrapped the edges in mahogany wood strips. I have kit bashed an HMS Victory wooden model kit of the bow (front) of the famous ship. This a cutaway. I bought the ruined and partially finished kit years ago on eBay, thinking I could try this–A new kit is $370. It is the nearly impossible Italian kit where you must cut out everything and do it perfectly to have the model come together. I paid much less than that, and it has been sitting in the garage for more than five years. Time to use. No regrets.

I wrote the Friday blog on Friday at Wildwood Taphouse. After finishing the blog, I had another beer and started on my Kaggle contest. Yes, beer helps my python programming. I reread all the directions with care. I read other folks coding examples (nobody was coding like me–interesting) in the articles (this contest has a cash reward for articles–the idea is that more articles then more contestants and better results with some knowledge sharing). I must admit that the double integration and power series math problems go back to the 1980s for me. However, I did see some ideas that I was wondering about, least-square (some custom implementations to match the problem), centroids, and other line-matching processes.

Kaggle contests are money for solving a machine learning (ML), artificial intelligence (AI) problem, or other math-centric problems for real-world problems. For example, I am working on ICE data from a neutrino detector, and the idea is to trace the detection back to the sky that sourced the particle. A very fuzzy and small set of data that simple (or complex) typical math solutions fail at is the world of approximating ML and AI detection. From my undergraduate 1980s AI work (I don’t get to say that often), I know that least square and other like approaches are overly sensitive to errors in the data–so it was nice to return to a problem I worked on once before.

My first approach on Kaggle code is to produce a result set that, while hard-coded to the wrong results, at least passes the initial test and correctly submits. Unfortunately, my code failed, and I had not returned to it, frustrated, for a week. As I had no working code, I also missed the chance to write an article. Very frustrated. The beer helped, it was my second one, and I noticed that nobody was reopening the results file and appending the results. Instead, they unloaded their results set directly from a dataframe. I tried to make each batch independent, but that was not what the other working examples were doing. I changed my code to accumulate the pseudo-results and write it out as a CSV with a header. Pass, and somehow I even scored higher (!) than other folks (266th best team). I am back in the game.

I hope to find some time one of these evenings to work on slightly improved results using least-squares and then adjusting with a Monte Carlo (random improvements). It is often a good idea to combine something like this to create a base and know that any cool ML or AI solution you write needs to be better than a stupid sled-hammer-like algorithm.

I managed to sleep and get going without issues on Saturday.

I am running out of time, so I will stop here: Thank you for reading!

Sorry, I forgot the photos today as I was helping feed Susie today.

I was feeling out-of-sorts and decided to head to Wildwood Taphouse and write the blog tonight with a dark beer and friends. On the way, I called another friend to learn that the bad cold is Covid-19. This friend tested and was negative, but when he/she could not smell Vic’s Vapor Rub, it was time to test again–Covid-19. Appropriate steps are being taken now, and the household is improving.

I was tired a few times and always wondered if these were close calls for me.

Today is Friday, so it is a work-from-home day at the shoe company for our department. The rules are, growl, different by departments and sometimes by the director. I slept in a bit, having gone to bed early. I finished the novel WinterSwallows (Commissario Ricciardi book ten) and stayed up late on Wednesday to finish it. I was a bit unhappy as it dragged, but the last section was tremendous, and I recommend the book. This left me with hardcover books or ordering more brain cookies on my Kindle. 

I am reading the hardcover How to Tell a Story: The Essential Guide to Memorable Storytelling from The Moth, which is terrific. It is not a brain cookie but an excellent book on telling stories. I enjoyed the introduction and the first chapter. I have also found a brain cookie, not a very well-written one, in a new (well, some time ago) Grey Mouser and Fafhard book: Swords Against the Shadowland (Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser Book 8). This one is not by the original author and is filled with flourishes that don’t match the previous books. But, it is a new story, and while eight in number, it is set between books one and two. While a copied story and not a good one, I still like it as a brain cookie, and so if you need a new-ish Sword and Sorcery from the 1960s-70s style, here it is. 

I continued with work and followed along. As the big 7/24 stuff starts at 7:30 Sunday it was a day of catch-up and trying to slide one more thing in before the project starts running full-out. Between meetings, I made oatmeal from steel-cut oats with cranberries, some brown sugar, and walnuts added once cooked. You cook it for twenty-five minutes. I reheated some breakfast sausages to go with it. Then, I made liberal coffee to get me going in the French Press. I would do ten minutes and then run out and stir and then return to work.

I did my stretching and excises today and five minutes of Susie’s stationary bike. I am feeling better, so it is time to return to that. It wore me out for part of the morning, but I soon felt better. I got my shower in and dressed also between meetings.

I headed out near 11 to see Susie at the hummingbird house. As usual for Friday, the traffic was heavy, and I had to dodge some interesting driving. I also was passed at about 60 in a 40 mph in Beaverton. Air Volvo arrived in Tigard without incident.

I believe we had the night nurse on today, and Michelle Nixon was there too. Susie was eating her breakfast, and I saw she had some challenges and so I sat next to her and helped feed her a couple of times, and then she was able to feed herself. Susie did finish all of her Ensure, and I think she was full. I helped her for fifteen minutes or more.

Once done with her breakfast, Susie and I headed to the Social Activities room and called her mother. We talked to her, Leta, on my iPhone using FaceTime. We had a friendly chat, and Leta was headed in the evening to the church, despite the cold in Michigan, to the Chili Dinner. We soon saw the clock running to noon, and I needed to return to the house. So I left with a kiss and drove home. Today I took 217 to TV highway and avoided local Beaverton traffic on the way back. The traffic was light on the highway, but it did include some non-standard merge rules.

I returned via Air Volvo to the Volvo Cave and reheated the jambalaya from a few days ago, no seafood, watched a few YouTube videos on shipwrecks, and was late for my 1PM meeting. That was the last zoom meeting, but I had an ad hoc meeting to discuss the request to move software changes over the weekend (no way).

The later afternoon was a few crises of the moment that disappeared or moved to Monday.

With work over, I painted my second spell jammer ship model. It is getting there. I will try to make the mast and sails on Saturday morning. I am making smaller and smaller mistakes with paint. I should be able to finish the touch-up on Saturday morning while the sails are drying.

As I wrote, I went to Wildwood Taphouse to get away and write.

I was thinking I could write a better Swords and Sorcery story than what I am reading, but I don’t need another thing to write now.

The bar, The Golem’s Fist, was full of customers all looking for work, adventurers all. The drinks, a mix of intoxicants and magic, are of good quality and quantity, but most importantly to the patrons, cheap. The long-lost owner, Grey the Evoker, only his drinking mug (of cancelation) survives and is the tip jar now. Grey was never interested in overcharging but instead enabling work for adventurers. Grey only demanded they paid their bill when they were flush after some successful plundering. When working the bar before he was lost, Grey would send broke patrons (with high tabs) to explore a lost tomb, a hidden mine, or another adventure he discovered when doing his other job. Grey was an explorer and searcher for lost treasurers. He collected side trips for his customers while facing horrors he seldom described. Grey could always find a profitable adventure to help pay off a tab, but the survival rate was a bit low, “We remember our lost friends today, drinks around on the house,” was his usual call when learning another quest he initiated failed.

I was doing some research, and in the 1880s, they celebrated the possible end of winter and feasted on the groundhog. Unfortunately, I have not found that on the menu today, and I will write this at BJ’s Brewhouse, enjoying their excellent pork chop. Eric, my usual waiter, got me the last one–Excellent (you must get here before 6PM to get the chop).

Groundhog Day 2023 started with me waking for my alarm and deciding I wanted another 1/2 hour of sleep. I also had light nausea throughout the day, making me want to head home and pull a blanket over me. But I resisted and made it through the day. Today was a sunny day meaning that any local groundhog would have seen its shadow. We have top-level predictors that ensure that there are no slow ground-based varmints and ground animals drown here–we thus have no groundhogs. Still, by tradition, we have 6 more weeks of winter (so also was the ruling in Pennsylvania today) from the sunny day. Puke!

Aside: Constipation is a new normal. The surgery that removed 25 cm of my colon seemed to remove the nerves that let me know it was time to go. Thus I am running on empty or packed full. I am trying to develop habits to prevent the swings and find a happy (and easy) medium. So far, no accidents and no need for potty training!

Returning to the story of my day, I continued the rushed morning reading my emails, work emails, text, and the all-important Slack channel messages, but nothing important this morning was revealed. I then continued the ritual that resulted in me being summoned to work (i.e., eating breakfast of toast with peanut butter with liberal coffee supplied via a French Press, showering, and dressing).

I took Air Volvo in almost no traffic to Clubhouse, our office building not on WHQ Nike Campus, and arrived in time to start all my status meetings. But instead, our leader is going on vacation, so we had our last meeting to plan the next two weeks. I am leader-light as I will be doing status meetings and should only have to smile and nod as our colleges should report in the status meeting. I get the “we will review the issue internally” statements if folks don’t show up or an unexpected question arises in a status meeting. I also am a backup approver, and I even read two design documents today and approved them. So back in the saddle again.

We start working a 7/24 schedule with me doing status meetings all weekend for the next two weeks, beginning on Sunday. I had some crises of the moment to deal with today (thus the reading of designs) and was busy much of the day. I left after 4:30, learning that I am a Python resource and PySpark may be my next chance to supply amazing service to my group. Oh my!

Returning to the middle of my day, I had lunch at Serena Williams building at Nike WHQ. We started at 11:45 to beat the crowds and find a table. Scott had read in this blog that I was discomforted by folks sitting next to me at tables and kindly offered a new time to avoid the lunch crush. I was not complaining but more surprised by my reaction. I still can’t sit next to strangers without feeling threatened. Thanks, Scott. We talked about more work I am interested in joining. There is so much exciting stuff out there!

After lunch, I headed to Susie’s place: the hummingbird house in Tigard. Susie was asleep in her recliner when I arrived in the shared living room. She had only had breakfast, and I was told she was up all night–Susie again has sleepless nights. I had to wake her; she was delighted to be awoken by me.

We called Leta, her mother, on my iPhone using FaceTime, and they were happy to see each other. Susie would nod off and be distracted, but they still had a friendly chat. I was a bit rushed as I had a list of items to work on when I returned, and soon I left with a kiss, but Susie looked a bit confused (not sure if it was a short visit or she nodded off). Jennifer distracted her with questions about lunch as I left. Susie seemed happy today.

I headed to BJ’s for dinner, and I am finishing this story as I drink my after-dinner coffee.

Thank you for reading!

Sorry, I forgot to take pictures today.

Well, it is now February 2023. I started with a night of good sleep and then waited until 6:30 to get going. I skipped my exercises and stretches again. I will do some tonight, but I was still tired and sore.

I made the last bagel from NYC today for breakfast with liberal coffee. I then read emails (both mine and the company’s) and then reviewed updates provided by Slack channels. These also appear on my phone. There were no exciting texts to study.

I also read CNN, BBC News, and some New York Times to get a feel for what is happening worldwide. Using the bluntest of tools–Interest Rates–the Fed decided to only inflict another 1/4 point on us. Yes, I do not like this approach (Don’t try to explain it to me–I understand the theory). More shootings. It just hurts sometimes to read the news.

I went off to the office and managed to be ready and there in time to call into the stand-up meeting. The sprint is over, so we are closing tasks. New tasks will open on Thursday. It is the Agile way (I feel very Mandalorian).

The rest of the morning is meetings and me applying vendor patches (SAP OSS notes for those who speak SAP) and asking folks to test them. I also approve some access, and I am now, again, backing up folks. So it is a busy morning.

I head out to see Susie and arrive without any interaction with Beaverton’s Finest, experiencing any unique application of driving practices as often seen in Beaverton and the Greater Portland Area or the loss of paint on Air Volvo due to unexpected contacts. Susie had been up all night and was tired this morning. Jennifer was also running a bit late, and Susie was still eating when I arrived at 11ish. I waited fifteen minutes.

For years, Susie had issues with sleepwalking, not sleeping, wandering, and getting lost in the dark in the house. I would have to find her. Many of her falls were caused by confusion at night. I improved things by using voice control on the lights and Susie stopped getting lost and hurt. Thank you, Alexa (named Echo in my house).

Now, the nursing aides care for her at night and there is a crash pad next to Susie’s bed when she is alone. She has not been hurt for about a year now. While I miss Susie at the house, I am so happy she is safe and stable at hummingbird house.

Returning to the narrative, Susie was delighted to see me and seemed surprised and pleased to see her mother’s face on FaceTime via my iPhone. Susie was slightly confused today, likely caused by poor sleep. But it was an excellent time together, and I decided to run a bit over and rush back to the shoe company. I had twenty minutes to get back, the amount of time it took to drive back when I left Susie with a kiss. Jennifer was ready to get Susie in her recliner in the shared living room.

I returned to work just in time to meet the master data engineering team and join them for Jatin’s birthday lunch. We headed to Thailand for, obviously, Thai food. I had a lunch version of the Mussaman curry, beef, with rice. Service was just one gal and so it took a while for us to get our food. But we enjoy each other’s company and so it was a nice time.

At lunch, I talked to one of my colleagues about how he always feels like he has one leg in India and one in the USA. He is, as many Indians are, conflicted and has aging parents in a distant land. We talk about my experience with Susie and I can see the worry–he is flying back to India on Friday–and he wonders what the future holds for him. Hard choices come as you suddenly discover you are the responsible older adult in the room! When did that happen?!

I continued to work on crises of the moment and help where I can. Brad, my boss, discovers I am responsible for the status of the next test session, a 7/24 adventure starting soon.

I leave at 5ish and head to see Rev.Dr. Wayne Weld-martin at Maryville (room 113B–find 113 and B is the next room). Wayne is recovering from various medical challenges and looked good and was happy to see me. He had called me at work and asked me to see him. My game with Zophia was canceled today (Dondrea has a cold) so instead visited Wayne as that just worked today. We talked for a while and Wayne showed me his books to read. I left after Wayne’s dinner arrived.

Air Volvo returned me home without incident, and I made baked potato wedges and clam strips (we used to call clam strips, “The Show”) for dinner and had them with tarter sauce and watched more of the Lord of the Rings, The Rings of Power. I really like the dwarf and elf relationship bits.

After that, it was already past 8 and I got to writing.

My 2600 showed up, but the story I wrote was not published. Hackers! Should be in the next one. Or the one after that. Growl.

Thank you for reading. Sorry if it is a short story today.

Yesterday I thought it was the last day of January, but that is today. Finally, I was feeling much better after getting some sleep last night. I woke on Tuesday morning at 6 and decided to sleep until 6:30, which seemed only a few seconds later. I got started, skipping stretches and exercises as my back was painful. I made toast with peanut butter and the rest of the canned peaches from yesterday, dumping most of the syrup. The peaches are canned in their own juice, not sugar syrup. I made coffee in the French Press, liberal coffee.

I soon read all the emails (work and my own), messages on Slack channels, and text and read the news on BBC and CNN and a bit of the New York Times. Together I get a clear picture (the BBC has better reporting on Ukraine and often has interesting USA news that CNN and NYT lose in all the important stories). Next, I rush to the shower and dressed, collect the Nike laptop and charger, and took Air Volvo to work.

The drive-in was busy with folks driving slowly on perfectly dry roads without rain. The puddles were frozen by the cold night and freezing wind from the high desert east of here. I was cold and had some trouble getting warm at work.

Work was a continuation of yesterday’s issues and chaos, or in other words, the usual. The feel is not the on-coming of layoffs but the usual chaos of software development and pushing technology to the limits–again, my typical day. More old friends have been announced joining the project, and some of the problems we solved before need to be solved again. I was feeling better today about work.

I was rushed all morning but managed to slip out after 11 to see Susie and find lunch. I called my mother, Barb Wild, and she was unhappy as she woke and the ceiling in her bedroom had a problem, maybe a water leak. I asked her to call my sister. I talked to Rev. Anne Weld-martin while at work and called her back after ringing off with Mrs. Wild, Sr. Pastor Anne had a problem with her computer, and I will visit her tonight after 8 to help with it. Unfortunately, her printer is not working right, and I could not solve it over the phone.

Mom, Barb Wild, I learned had a dream about the issues with her house. It was not real. I am glad everything is fine.

Susie was just finishing a late breakfast when I arrived. She was delighted to see me, and we retired to the social activity room; she was still in her wheelchair. We then called Leta, Susie’s mother, and they chatted for a while on my iPhone. We talked for an extended time, but soon it was noon, and I had to leave. I had a meeting at 1PM and needed to find lunch. So I kissed Susie goodbye, left her in Jennifer’s hands, the live-in nurse aide, and got aboard Air Volvo.

I tried a new sandwich place, and no name is given here, as the service was good, but the food was microwaved cheaper sandwiches, not toasted. Terrible. The meat in my NYC-styled sandwich was cheap and reminded me of a substandard sandwich I had at Arby’s. A total miss.

I rushed back to the office, noticing I was wrong, as I saw some flashing lights and Beaverton Police was out in the cold. I had not seen them for months on Highway 26. I returned to work and had a few meetings and more crises of the moment. I drove home at 4:40ish after my last meeting.

My 5PM meeting was gone from my calendar. Yeah!

I started on dinner. Gnocchi in North African style sauce with green beans and artichoke hearts. I boiled some water while heating excellent sauce from a jar that is a lemon and olive-flavored red sauce, not Italian-style. I cooked frozen beans, Schwann’s, in the microwave. I opened a can of artichoke hearts, used half, and froze the rest for later. I added that and olives to the sauce heating on the stove. I then combined the drained and cooked gnocchi, green beans, and sauce. It was wonderful and had no meat.

I had leftovers that I packed in the glassware that Glenda and Gene sent me.

I watched some more Lord of the Rings, The Rings of Power series and enjoyed another episode. I am still liking it a second time. It does not drag so much the second time–interesting.

Well, I have to get this done so I can head out and help Rev. Anne at 8. I had a few Girl Scout cookies for dessert.

Thanks for reading!