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Going backward, I was home rewatching episode 3 of The Rings of Power at 11ish. I managed to get 1/3 of the way before falling asleep and going to bed. Before this, I discovered that the new print on the new huge 3D printer failed and was a pile of hardened resin at the bottom of the tank. Frustrating.

Moving to the earlier evening, I played board games at Richard’s house in Portland. Val and Shawn joined us for a four-person board game of Vast. Only Richard was familiar with the rules. I have not played it since before the pandemic; it is not a very good two-person game. We played my copy as I had the figures for the game (an extension that just adds plastic pieces in place of wooden or paper standees). I played the Cave which was a bit boring, and I helped the knight too much, but I was relearning the game. Richard slew the dragon; Val played the dragon. Shawn was the goblin horde, and he was getting beat up by everyone.

Vast is an exciting game as each player plays an entirely different game that all interfaces on the board. It was the first of the genuinely asymmetrical competitive board games I learned. When you have four good players, and they know the rules, it is an exciting game. Our game was a bit muted by having to check rules and actions, but it was still enjoyable.

We then played the card game, The Crew, for the rest of the evening. This is a version of a trump-based card game, but unlike many card games, this is a cooperative game. Each mission is mainly to ensure that a particular player, or crew member, gets a specific card in a trick. This means you have to provide the player receives the lead and takes the trick, which is easier said than done and runs against my usual card play. Cooperative card play makes for an exciting game. But, you may not speak during the play. Instead, you get a marker and can flash one card and use the marker to partially describe the card. It is a good filler game.

It was a pleasant game, but soon I was tired, and time to leave. My drive was not difficult, though there was a lot of smoke. I was coughing in the car from the smoke.

Before heading to Portland to play board games, I wrote more for my naval institute contest fiction story. I managed to reach the second draft and edited it to below the limit of 3,000 words. I will do the final editing on Sunday and then let it rest for a bit. It is due 15Sept.

My coughing and sneezing slowed in the afternoon.

Susie was ready for a visit to the nearby Metzger Park when I reached the hummingbird house just into the afternoon. I had driven across Beaverton in the smoke, and I was having, in the morning, out-of-control coughing and sneezing. It was so bad I took a Covid-19 test before heading out, which was negative. I was unsure if I should see Susie or play board games with Richard if all I could do was cough and sneeze.

I managed to control the coughing and sneezing when I reached Susie’s place. Tigard, the location of the hummingbird house, is near the Columbia Gorge, and the wind blew much of the smoke away. We managed the park, but it was covered with tree debris, and we stopped at a bench not under any trees. There, we called Susie’s mother, Leta, on the cell in the park.

It was good that I stayed out of the trees. I pushed Susie on the path in her wheelchair in the park, and I was hit in the head by a pinecone. I had worn my Indiana Jones hat for today, preventing any cuts.

We saw a dragonfly holding on to a rose bush. It was hot, windy, smoky, and not a place for a large dragonfly.

After surviving the park, we got comfy and watched, for the first time, The Rings of Power, episode 3, in Susie’s room using her TV (we had a challenge with the logon first, but that cleared up), which again bounces all over a map of Middle Earth from the Second Age. I am a Tolkien fan, so I like the maps and art, but still, the story is moving at Game of Thrones (GOT) speed, so I wish for more action and a faster pace. But, I think, like GOT, the writers are setting up for the big push (likely at the season’s end). Susie nodded off here and there, mainly during the Numerian and hobbit scenes, and was soon ready for a nap. I kissed her goodbye, and then Vanessa moved Susie to her bed to get some rest.

Before this, I wrote the blog and made improvements on the previously mentioned fiction story for the Naval Institute fiction contest. The smoke blogged out of the light this morning, and I had to turn on my desk lamp to write!

Lunch was leftover Southwest salad from BJ’s Brewhouse.

I also got a finished print from my new and expensive Jupiter 3D printer. This was my first successful printing and, so far, only successful print. The test print is two chess rooks on the same print.

I used blue-clear water-soluble resin, it was all I had, and they are perfect. I then tried a huge bust of HP Lovecraft, but, as I said above, that print failed and left me with only a puddle of clear resin stuck to the bottom again. Somehow appropriate for Lovecraft, I think. I am unsure what I am doing wrong, but I will try again.

I started at 7ish and was coughing and sneezing all morning. So I had oatmeal and liberal coffee for breakfast.

Thanks for reading.

This will be a brief blog. I was tired yesterday and went to bed early. All my plans to write and maybe play a game of Nemo’s War did not materialize as I was worn out. Today, while I write this, the sky is yellow and overcast with smoke, and our air quality due to smoke is yellow 69. I am also initially writing this in MS Word as Grammarly is hard to use in the WordPress editor. However, I am not finding MS Word much better as it seems outdated.

The light is so muted this morning that I had to turn on my desk lap!

Returning to my story, I was going, as usual, a bit later Friday, about 7ish. I work from home on Mondays and Fridays as mandated by the shoe company and thus do not have to drive to the Clubhouse. The Clubhouse is the former golf office building and is the home of the project and my working home for over five years.

I found oatmeal, instant, in the pantry and made two packets for breakfast. I made liberal coffee to go with that, using the French Press.

Today I learned that the project decided to move on from the software I have worked with for five years or more, which affected me more than I expected. I don’t usually grieve for work but having worked on this stuff through the pandemic, I was surprised how it has leaked into my soul. I will miss it and feel myself going through the phases of grief: anger, denial, bargaining, and acceptance. It is taught that these are separate steps, but I have found you shift between them, and acceptance is not really that but sort of wearing yourself out in the other phases of grief.

I was already tired and dragging, and the news of the change had all the exhaustion just move to the surface. My back hurt, too, so I rested for a bit and was surprised when the phone ringing brought me back from a profound sleep. I had only closed my eyes for a moment!

I went back to my in-home office with some coffee and kept going and following along at work. Fridays are usually quiet, and this is the first working Friday—during the summer, Nike WHQ closes down at noon on Fridays—was uneventful. There were no crises of the moment, and the Friday emails, texts, and Slack messages quieted as it was early Saturday in China and India and late afternoon here in the Pacific Northwest. We are also not getting the notorious Friday 4 PM emergencies that often plagued the heritage SAP system. But, again, they are one day ahead, and Thursday is a bit busy—their Friday.

In the middle of work, I headed out to see Susie (I am not going in order today but going by item). I was there just before Tracy from Physical Therapy (PT) showed up. Tracy proved that Susie could stand on her legs. However, Susie is just off balance and very unsure of herself. Susie leans to one side, the stroke damage is visible, and one side is stronger and more controlled. This mismatch makes it even harder for Susie to feel safe.

We also managed to get Susie to use the new peddles from a recliner, and she was able to peddle a bit. We can keep working on this without PT as it is not high-risk like standing. So we can get Susie some exercise now!

Tracy had Susie standing in a walker, and Susie had started to compensate and was standing straight. Success got a smile from Susie. We are just a little bit hopeful.

Susie was tired, and I left with a kiss as Susie was headed for a snack and a return to her recliner in the living room. She was watching Blueblood, a fav, reruns. I returned in Air Volvo with the sky turning yellow and the East winds from the desert making the air worse and the winds high.

At the house, the trees, gum trees, were being beaten together by the strange backward winds (winds don’t usually go East to West), and it was raining small branches, leaves, and prickly balls (I don’t care for those) all over my front lawn and the street. The air was hot and roared. Yet, my trees did not break as they have survived snow, the 2020 cyclone winds, and the winter winds for years.

Changing subjects, I was trying to print something successfully on my new Elegoo Jupiter 3D printer. It failed again! I know I had correctly reset the printer’s Z axis and was disappointed. Worse, the print was welded to the bottom of the resin tank, which was full of resin. Resin is slightly poisonous but not that dangerous. A mask and gloves are mandatory.

But that does not usually require the local cat. I noticed some things fell off shelves and a piece of furniture fell. I put most of the stuff back and then saw the cat. It was likely trapped in the garage when I closed the door yesterday. It was hiding by the water heater, and I started to meow at me. I pointed at the open garage door, and it just meowed. So, I meowed back and pointed again—my attempts to communicate the obvious failed to impress the unhappy cat. Putting asides what horrors could happen if I got a broom and tried to force it out, I instead, thinking the obvious might still work, went back inside, found an unbreakable bowl, filled it with water, and placed it in front of the cat.

The cat looked at the water, got out, smelled it, walked by it, and then ran out of the garage. When it hit the road, it jumped for joy and ran faster for home. Later, I looked up while working on the printer, and the other local cat was looking at me in the garage. I said, “No,” and waved it away. It looked disappointed. Cats!

The new tank is about three times larger than anything I have worked on before, and the printer is just set on the garage floor. It needs its own table. Soon, I was spilling resin, trying to get it back into a bottle after filtering it. The tank holds much more resin than I am used to working with! A good feature when printing, but the handling needs more space and better planning. I finally broke the print from the transparent bottom—it uses a high-temperature strong 97% transparent plastic film that is replaceable.

I saw that the resin was strangely sticky and wondered if it was just old or maybe a bad mix. It is only soluble in alcohol. I was soon pouring alcohol on the tank out in the driveway like it was water. Unfortunately, I forgot about the strong sunlight, and soon the remains of the goo was rock hard and still sticking to the film. I had to scrap it off with a plastic scraper. I finally managed to clean the tank. I brought the tank into the house and used water to remove the remaining sand-like bits.

I grabbed the water-soluble transparent resin I bought some time ago to try again. I replaced all the bits and cleaned the old resin where possible. Then, I started the print again. The new resin is blue transparent, even in the tank, and soon it was correctly printed. Yeah!

Mariah sent a text, dinner with beer. I accepted and then, as often happens, spent a while drinking beer alone at BJ’s Brewhouse, chatting with Mo, my waiter, and saw Kate, who bar tendered for me last time. She was doing tables today and dropped my beer off.

Mariah showed after I got a second load of chips for my cheese dip complements of Mo. We both had salads for dinner, but those steaks and prime rib looked excellent. Mariah was excited as she might have found a house she could own. This is no mean feat in the current market and ongoing interest rate uncertainty! The price was lowered, and the terms changed to work better for her. The owner liked Mariah and wanted her to have the house. Excellent.

We talked and hung out for a while. Mariah commented that I looked tired, and I agreed and headed home. Air Volvo got me home as the winds slowed. I will sweep the street on Sunday once the air is good—it is covered with tree debris.

Next, I was going to write, but I staggered and grabbed a seat in the living room. I found a fantastic science show: Everything and Nothing. I managed to get through ¾ before I started to fall asleep. I went to bed at 8:30 and managed to be back awake with my heart pounding from a nightmare. Not very nice. I went back to sleep anyway and managed to wake up again from an unpleasant dream. Finally, at 12:30 took my pills and went to sleep.

It was a painful hard day. I am glad it is over.

Thanks for reading.

The morning started with me waking to my alarm at 6:15 AM, as usual. Thursday is a strange day as there is an all-day party at Nike WHQ, Just Do It (JDI) Day. I was rushed and managed to get to the Nike campus in Beaverton before 8 AM. I parked in the distant parking lot, Jay Street Lot 2, so I could walk out and visit Susie. The parking garages sometimes have lots of slow traffic.

I met some friends and saw my boss, Brad, from a distance. They were signed up to run or walk to celebrate Nike’s 50^th. Yes, that is how you have a party at a sports company. Still recovering from chemotherapy, I was clapping and cheering on the walkers and runners.

I then went into the new buildings; I had not been inside. I toured each lobby and was happy when my badge let me inside. After that, I had breakfast at one of the new Cafes.

I saw a lot of older computer folks, and many folks said hi to me whose names I had forgotten. It has been twenty-five years at Nike, and I do not remember all the names. But, it did feel nice to be together on campus and see each other.

Aside: I am still working on my ticket with Grammarly. They asked me to use their editor; it was not that good. I am now writing in MS Word with their legacy plug-in. It, too, will go away soon. I am strongly urging them to rethink this. Sadly, the MS Word version is missing some of the issues found with the WordPress editor add-in. I am now editing twice.

I spent the morning walking and talking and enjoying the cool day. Soon my feet and back proved once again that I was brittle, and it was time to leave. So I headed to Susie’s area, walking another mile to Air Volvo.

I drove 26 to 217 and then stopped by Jimmy John’s to get a sandwich, and then headed back to Susie at hummingbird house. I made a mistake and discovered the roads were a mess of construction with a multi-mile backlog of cars. Oh my! No place to go. I drove back to Beaverton Central and got back on 217, and retraced my route. It is the only means to get there!

Susie was happy to see me, and I was tired and fading. We called Susie’s mother, Leta, on my iPhone using FaceTime so they could see each other. They had a friendly chat. Next, Susie wanted to head out to Metzger Park. I promised only a short time as I was tired from walking.

Susie enjoyed the park, which was busy, as usual, with dogs and little kids enjoying the cool September afternoon. The weather is changing to cool temperatures (with only Saturday being hot). We did not see any large butterflies today. Susie was soon cold, and we headed back a bit early.

I left with a kiss and headed home. I returned to the Volvo Cave without issue. I soon reviewed my emails, discovered I missed a friend from Europe at JDI and checked for any crises of the moment. I then rested for a bit as my back and feet were uncomfortable.

I ordered Italian Food from Grub Hub as I was tired. I re-watched the Rings of Power episode 2 to see if I would like it better. It was a bit better. So I am hopeful for the series now.

We had Theology Pub tonight at 7 PM, local time, using Zoom. The subject was Fear, and we talked about how Religion uses fear to push terrifying agendas. We discussed finding the means to find the faith to remove or reduce the fear. We also are concerned about the people who are alone and thus have no support groups to help them with fear. We were told to look for people pushing a cart at a store looking sad or sort of lost. They are there to be with people and are alone and scared. It was a frank discussion.

Next, I returned to my fiction story for the Naval Institute contest due on 15Sept and finished the first draft. It is slightly over 3,000 words. I can cut, so I feel good about it and make the deadline.

I then fought with Grammarly some more and ended up in MS Word writing tonight.

I was reading a lot today about the Queen’s passing. Sad to see her go.

Thanks for reading.

 

Let’s start with some issues. The Grammarly ticket returned that it was not a mistake but a feature I was unhappy with. They have made the WordPress editor nearly useless for me. I am not very happy with Grammarly, and since I was using the legacy non-Java editor already, I am not sure what options I have. I will have to look for a replacement.

I will write the day from tonight back to the start. I was, as I said, just updating the support ticket with Grammarly with unhappiness. I was just checking my new Jupiter 3D Printer, and it is happily printing the test file of two chess pieces, rooks. It will be done soon, and I will try to print something from Space Race, the board game next. They make very tall models that I could not print before. It will be a good test.

Aside: I discovered that the first printing failed. Not a happy start. Looks like I did not correctly set the base. I failed to push the set to zero button.

I put the coffee cup in the tank for size.

Before returning home, I was at First United Methodist Church, Beaverton, for choir practice. I don’t sing but play board games with Zophia while she waits for her mother, Dondrea, to finish. Tonight we managed a few new ones. We played the basic version of the Istanbul board game. It is a unique game of resource collection and management. You can also get some valuable superpowers. Zophia beat me by two moves. I spent too much time upgrading my cart instead of collecting items. She liked the game.

Zophia hoarded all the gems after winning.

I had picked up a used cheap copy of Pandemic (yes, there is irony all over that statement). This is the original cooperative game that started me back into games. The second edition came out with corrections, but I had an old copy and never updated it. I gave it to Goodwill as we were not playing it very often. I saw the new version that was cheap and picked it up.

The game starts easy and then starts to build pressure on you. Zophia and I were not removing infections from cities, and soon we had outbreaks, and explosive growth nearly ended the game for us. We just managed to cure the last disease and win.

Next, we played Azul and Zophia slipped by me by just a few points. It was a good night for Zophia! Azul is a pattern-matching game with some competition and meta-gaming that can hurt your head: Trying to find the right choices for yourself while not giving away too much to your opponents.

It was a fun night, and I got a cupcake too.

Before being beaten by Zophia, I was at the house and got the new 3D printer to start and print (with the zero set wrong, oops). First, I had to assemble the printing surface and remove all the packing. It is a huge printer, and I was happy it was alive and working.

Moving back further, I had lunch at BJ’s Brewhouse at the bar. There was nobody there, so there was no chance of getting Covid-19. Kate, the bartender, was friendly, and we chatted while I had lunch and wrote a bit. She is 23, and this is her first gig as a bartender, and she likes it. Kate has been in the Pacific Northwest for less than a year, but she loves it here–she enjoys the outdoors. I had a burger because I was tired and thought some protein would be good.

Before lunch, I saw Susie at the hummingbird house. She was having a slow day and eating breakfast when I arrived. She can feed herself, but she easily chokes.

We went into the park to enjoy the sunshine and the cool breeze. The park was primarily empty today as school had started, and it was the middle of the week. I was happy to see a swallowtail butterfly again near the entrance. Summer is still going.

We then watched the new Lord of the Rings (LOTR) show in Susie’s room, The Rings of Power. Susie was only good for two episodes, and I could not blame her. The story moved strangely, and the actors were all rather stiff and not sympathetic. I am hopeful it will improve. Tolkien is hard to write and make real (I wrote one adventure in the setting for a special version of Dungeons and Dragons made for LOTR, and it is an exciting process to write in such a constrained setting). I am hopeful.

Moving back further, I wrote the blog and more of my Naval Institute fiction. I have to 15Sept and have managed 1,500 words so far. I will try to get to 2,200-2,500 and polish it.

I started at 7AM and had only nectarine for breakfast with liberal coffee.

 

I took off Tuesday and Wednesday to extend the holiday.

I was up, as usual, at 6:15 to write the blog and get some liberal coffee into me to get going. As I had guests, I made a pot of coffee. The blog took me about an hour, and then I had a shower and got dressed, not having any sudden reason to shower, which was a relief. We then headed to the French place for a more complete breakfast.

La Provence at Orenco Station is back to its pre-Covid-19 hustle and bustle. A few folks with masks, but the tables are close together again. Nobody still really sits at the bar, and you can always notice how folks try still to stay apart. Some things are changed forever, I think. I had Risotto Cakes & Eggs, which came with squash and rosemary and a perfectly French croissant.

The food was perfect. The food was always a treat, even when delivered in the middle of the worst pandemic. I would always order extra croissants, which would come with a slice of Brie and some jam. 

After breakfast/lunch at La Provence, we headed to the employee store. There I found a sweatshirt with a zipper in Susie’s size from Jordon (boy’s large size) and some socks for me. My guests found a few things. Unfortunately, the store was nearly empty of soccer and NFL items. Even the NBA and WNBA items were scarce.

Next, we saw Susie after trekking across Beaverton in Air Volvo. Unfortunately, physical Therapy was there at 12:30 and not at 2:30 as I had in my appointments. So I missed helping at the session. Susie was visibly worn by the workout but was happy to head to the park in her wheelchair.

We spent some time hanging out with Susie in Metzger Park. She was her Marvin the Martian sweatshirt and soon was a bit warm. The park was full of dogs and smaller kids. The gentleman pushing the baby walker with the small dog in it always brings me a smile.

Susie was soon ready to return to the hummingbird house, and we said our goodbyes, with me getting at least one kiss. We returned to the Volvo Cave for a few moments, having only seen a few exciting drive techniques; we picked up a game, then headed back to Beaverton and parked the car outside near Central Taps.

We all grabbed a beer and played the board game Azul until it was time to leave for the airport. I won a game. My opponents had learned that you needed to take tiles in Azul that gave you points and ended the game when you wanted it to end. You do this while disturbing the plans of your opponents. It can be mind-bendingly difficult to know which tile color to take when you are playing the meta-game in your head! We played three games while enjoying locally brewed products.

The trip to the airport was with some traffic, and we saw the mountains again from the bridge. Mount St. Hellens and Mount Hood were a bit grey from smoke. The traffic required me to not sightsee while driving (always a problem with such lovely views) and keep Air Volvo moving and safe.

Aside: Grammarly has revised its feedback process. Instead of giving me a list of issues and a means to sort them, it is now just popping each one willy-nilly and demanding I fix it. Not what I am used to, and I can find no means to return to a better workflow. Ugh! Grammarly is also making incorrect suggestions now; sad to see a good tool ruined. I repeatedly have given feedback and have a support ticket in for this.

I had to gas up the Volvo. The prices keep falling about five cents a week (or faster in the non-Metro areas). This time it was only $82 for a fillup.

I dropped off my guests to their fate as they entered the transportation system. They found dinner at PDX and then got on their first flight. We wish them well (and luck) as they head back home.

Evan contacted me, and I met him for dinner at Arrowood Tap House in Portland, a few minutes from PDX. Initially, I was going to stop by IKEA at PDX and have some meatballs, but I was already too late (closing now at 7PM for food). I had a nice beer and a cheeseburger with fries. I was hungry, and dinner was good.

I then drove once again back to the Volvo Cave. I wrote for a few minutes and did some laundry. Finally, I was in bed early as I was tired but had trouble sleeping as I was thinking over my Naval Institute story; instead of sleeping–I dreamed some of it.

Thank you for reading.