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The morning started with me waking a few hours before my alarm and proving hydration. I kept waking up and going to sleep for the next two hours. Finally, the alarm on the iPhone brought an end to this cycle. I had to take Air Volvo to the mother ship today–it had a tire alarm, and a service light was demanding a visit to the mother ship. So I had scheduled this before my weekend visitors were coming–today.

I logged on to the shoe company and my own accounts and read the email and Slack messages. I was busy in the morning. While doing this, I had a bagel and some of yesterday’s coffee–I had made some late last night to help when I was too tired. The coffee is Fair Trade coffee from Equal Exchange and promised to help the farmers who grew the coffee by paying them a decent exchange for the coffee. Yes, liberal coffee and every cup makes the world just a little bit better.

I dressed and started my Zoom meetings with the camera showing my office with Lenin looking down. My new office is really working out for me. I feel much happier working in my own space.

It was a planning day, so I joined the department Zoom meeting, chatted with some folks, and then listened to the overall agenda for planning. We plan the work for the next set of sprints (a sprint in our group is two weeks, and we often do seven in a row before making the next plan) and then vote to accept the plan. It is a fantastic process with folks hooking up to figure out what they need from each other to finish work. Further work is the planned development and needs to be sequenced and spread across the sprints to balance the workload to the resource (people and systems).

It may sound silly, but we do this to know what we should be doing and who we need to work with. There is so much that always needs to be done, so something cannot be done, or we need to solve a critical path of resourcing. It can be a geek-fest of mixed properties. One vote against the plan sinks the plan, so it is vital that everyone believes in the plan and understands it. As you can imagine, I have been that one vote.

Next, headed out in Air Volvo to Herzog Meiers Volvo (the mothership) and turned over the vehicle for scheduled maintenance and anything else they could find. I added an alignment if the tires were intact despite the warning light. I wanted them to check everything and do the 45,000 updates and clean-up.

I had a Lyft back to the house from the mothership. The driver and I chatted about the world and how everything is scary, but after reading about World War Two recently, I told him that we do not seem to be so stupid as to return to a World War, but he was less convinced. He pointed out the crazies like Putin and Kim in North Korea, and I had to say they certainly matched the template for certain twentieth-century leaders. I wished the driver well and thanked him for the friendly chat. I also noticed that he was careful and drove within the speed limits, and I gave him five stars later.

I returned to work and then ordered lunch through GrubHub from Gyro House. I had the ground beef and lamb Gyro with extra spice sauce and feta. It is not as good as New York City (see Greek Kitchen), but pretty good. The pickles are delicious.

I did some work and organized the guest bedroom between things. I managed to change my 401K to 10%, and I will increase other before-tax items to decrease my salary so I can get some tax efficiencies. This is part of the plan to cover the over $8,000 a month in medical expenses I have now. That is after insurance. This year I will have paid over $120,000 in medical costs. I will try to get some tax efficiencies by claiming that while reducing my salary to increase the amount I can write off.

On the subject of spending money, Volvo called and sent me a Lyft, a very untalkative guy, and soon I was paying $1200+ for maintenance. That is a lot of money, but this was the fuel injector cleaning and all of that, which adds $600. I was happy that the car did not need any service and the tires were good. The brakes and tires will likely need to be replaced next year, but they are suitable. Excellent! The super detailing is next month, making it feel like a new car. Instead of buying a new one, I just have Air Volvo super detailed (Detailed is an American term that means cleaned, polished, and renewed–every detail is checked).

As I was already halfway to hummingbird house, I left the mothership and took the cleaner and better handling (I was noticing a slight loss of power before) Air Volvo towards Metzger Park and Susie’s place.

Susie was happy to see me. She threw off the blanket in the recliner and wanted to head to the park. She twice asked to head to the park when I first stopped on the porch–fearing it was too hot. Nope. Susie wanted to enjoy the trees and see all the folks in the park. We chatted with some folks and waved at lots of little people who were too young to be in school or at least too young to be in school all day.

We called Leta and reached her. She and Susie chatted for a while. I noticed while they talked that the trees in short distances were becoming grey and, to some degree, indistinct. You can’t see this smoke, but it is dissolved in the air and makes the air less clear. So you see it in distances as a greying and loss of detail. The fires are in the south, and the bad air is still not here, but the smoke is starting.

The forecast is for medium-quality air in the valley on Thursday and later this week. The air quality at the park and near Susie is green and was good when I was there.

We are the blue dot. We are tonight already in the yellow.

Soon, I needed to be home to clean and finish work. I said goodbye to Susie, who wanted to go home with me, but agreed that the hummingbird house would be safe for her. I took Air Volvo back to the Volvo Cave.

Back in my office and signed into work, I worked on a few crises of the moment and saw one de-escalate, finally.

Next, I headed out with some games in the car. I had to reload them as I took them out when sending Air Volvo to the mothership. I met the choir folks at the hot church and played board games with Zophia while they practiced.

I won the games. Zophia almost caught me in our fav of Azul. We are still getting the scoring right, but we like the game. Zophia, this time got caught with many more dropped tiles in these games. Azul is a game of pattern matching and themed on little tiles–It is highly recommended.

We played a rough game of chess next with my silicone pieces. Rough in that neither of us was playing that well. I took Zophia pieces, but then I would get going too fast and lose mine in exchange. I still managed the end-game and marched a pawn to become a queen, and the two queens finally caught Zophia’s white king. I then set my king on the table, and Zophia threw the pawns at it until it was knocked down–something you can do with a silicone set!

Howard, our music director, is back from a holiday in the UK. He had a great time and showed me some pictures, and recommended the fish and chips. He also, seeing all the games we play, showed me how he plays Othello (the board game) on his phone. It was great to have Howard back!

The choir practice was done, I returned the games to Air Volvo, and I headed home. I then cleaned the shower in the main bathroom. It is clean now. I will clean the 1/2 bath, the one I use attached to the master bedroom, on Thursday.

I finally wrote the blog. Thank you for reading.

 

Going backward, I just arrived at the house tired and in some pain. I also noticed some unsteadiness that I sometimes get from the blood pressure meds. I overdid it a few times today. But, some water and sitting in my Ikea chair at my Ikea desk with Alexa playing music are making it easier now.

I have just left Swaggart Indian Cuisine for dinner with the Smiths and Mariah. Cat was still here with David and Michelle until this Saturday, when she will return to New York City, so this was a chance for us all to meet again. I had the Lamb Vindaloo that I shared with everyone. There were many other items at the table and plenty of bread. I managed to avoid rice which is just bad for me (type 2 diabetes controlled by, hmm, diet and exercise), and stick to naan and roti. We were all happy to meet again, eat, and we all got to look at Mariah’s growling Hemi-powered muscle car.

Cat trying out the muscle car and starting it.

Mariah and I waiting for the Smiths (only 15 minutes late). Mariah tried the whiskey, and I had the White Lotus (a chai version of a Spanish Coffee).

Before this, I was mopping the floor at the Volvo Cave. I have guests coming this weekend, and the blog will be limited to not include them at their request. I have to clean the shower tomorrow, dust, vacuum, and get organized over the next two days.

I also was resting a bit as I am still brittle from the chemotherapy, and I did something to my back and legs when helping Susie during physical therapy (PT). I left work early and took some Ibuprofen and Tylenol (the chemo painkiller combo) and laid flat and napped. It helped. I then made coffee! I could have slept all night without pain and nightmares. I was, oh joy, able to mop then.

Before this, I had lunch at Burger King as I was out of time, but as I said, I was unsteady, and my go-to for that is a burger or steak when feeling wrong. I picked this up in the drive-thru and ate it in the parking lot as the temperatures started to soar to over 95F (35C). It was 100F by 5PM, and Oregon in August is always hot.

Previously, I was at hummingbird house working with the PT person, Tracy, to help Susie use her new peddle device. It is just too large to fit even under the transfer wheelchair. I had to get out the stuff, and I think that lifting and helping Susie got me. I need to be more of an observer.

Susie was able to stand a few times with lots of help. It is hurting a bit for her as she is stretching out her legs for the first time in a long time. It seems to be easier for her each time Tracy or Rick comes for PT. I am moderately hopeful.

Tracy arrived while Susie and I were returning from Metzger Park. When I arrived there, leaving just before the planned Fire Alarm Drill at the Clubhouse office building, Susie was in her recliner but waiting to go out. She actually threw her blanket and pointed at the outside when I got there.

Moving to the morning, I managed to cover a few crises of the moment and provided some training. I attended various team and status meetings at Clubhouse–all Zoom or Zoom including meetings. Yes, I go to the office to sit in Zoom meetings.

I had to rush to work as it was an office day. I awoke before my alarm and ended a nightmare of returning to college and trying to find my way to my classes. Yes, I still get those nightmares. I went back to sleep and managed to continue the dream; ugh!

Thanks for reading again.

I have guests coming this weekend, so I know the house is not ready to receive. I started at 6:15 with this knowledge, and also I am working long term goals, and I am making changes to align with these goals. It is Monday, so I am not rushing to the office and can afford not to dress until needed. My meetings in the morning required nothing from me but to listen. I finally dressed at 8ish and made the 8:30 meeting without issue.

I made coffee using the French press and enjoyed liberal coffee all morning. I had some canned peaches and a bowl of cereal for breakfast.

I also called Comcast and closed my account as of today–just before the month-end; perfect. I packed up the equipment. I had to use needlenose plyers to loosen the cable and was amused that whatever made the Internet slow at the house was not the cables. They were new and well-mounted. The TV box, router, and remote were all in the bag.

I loaded up Air Volvo and made it to the Xfinity store just as it opened. There was a line to get in! I gave the equipment to someone with a name tag, and that was all I needed to do. I am free of Xfinity now!

I stopped by Einstein’s Bagels and got the Monday special of a slightly cheaper bagel-like product. I got some shmear to go with the bagels, plain and onion with chives. While their bagels are more bread-like than I like, they are fresh and toast well.

I stopped next at Safeway and got some cleaner–Pine-Sol, mop, and flowers for Susie. I got two bunches, one summer and another fall colors. After that, rushing the whole time, I went to the Volvo Cave, unloaded, and then headed to the hummingbird house.

There was no traffic other than construction popping up on the local roads like the fairy circles on my lawn in the summer. Being careful to not hit an orange cone, I made it to the hummingbird house. Susie was happy to see me. She had already finished breakfast and was waiting for me. After talking with her mother, Leta, on my iPhone using FaceTime to see each other, Susie threw off her blanket–she was in her recliner and was ready to get out of there. Jennifer got Susie in her unusual wheelchair–Susie showed some impatience that Jennifer just smiled at.

It was still in the low 80s (26.7C), but the day would bake in the late afternoon, reaching 94F (34.4C) at the Volvo Cave. The park was busy with dogs, runners, walkers, and small kids who were not in school yet. Everyone wants to get the park in before the heat, and the rains start in forty-five days (with highs then of only 65F/18.3C and one in three days being wet). Susie loves the cedars and just watches and is part of the park. The staff sees us as regulars and waves and ensures we are OK.

I stayed longer than usual as Susie was so happy to see me and hang out in the park. But, soon, I had to return to the Volvo Cave and leave with a kiss. Susie looked happy when I left–excellent.

There was no issue on my return, and I found the last of the pizza I bought a few days ago. So, yes, I had leftovers! While reading my email and getting caught up. I had an ad hoc meeting with the upgrade team lead, and we discussed the process. I then followed along as they proceeded through the process.

I took the two overlapping meetings at 5PM and finished with the status meeting.

Once done with work, I got out the old bucket I used to mop with. I found it this morning thrown off the deck and lying in the ivy. I got it and poured water from the hose into it, adding dish soap to help clean it. This brought the wildlife out of it–the slugs had claimed it. Now slugless (don’t ask), I dumped the soapy water on the yellow jackets who so far had resisted my efforts to kill-evict their nest near the deck.

I had to clean the bucket more in the kitchen, but finally, it was now not dirty or infested, and I loaded it with hot water and Pine-Sol. I had my workout; I mopped the kitchen. The floor was dirty. I dumped that water on, you can guess, on very disagreeable wasps.

Next, I cleaned the vanity in the main bathroom and removed much of the flotsam jetsam from Corwin leaving and not cleaning. I had to clean even the walls and toss some old candles from Susie’s long-lost fascination with Candlelight parties.

After a break, I mopped the bathroom floor. Even with it being hot today, I have all the windows open to help dry the mopped floors. I dumped that too on the local pests and made another mix of hot water and Pine-Sol. Next, I mopped the entrance from the front door and the garage entrance. The water was nearly black when I was done. It was dark when I finished.

Moving backward, I stopped for a bit and got gas for Air Volvo for $4.89; I next visited Aloha Teriyaki and got some prawns, chicken, and rice. This was one of Susie’s fav, and I always think of her when I stop there. Susie would get the chicken bowl and chat with the owner. Tonight the owner’s husband went to take my order, and his wife returned and told him to give her the pen, and she named my usual order and put it in. The husband smiled like a naughty child caught with a cookie and went to the back and got back to wrapping plasticware. She was smiling; she was a bit stern and all business, but tonight she gave my meal to me with a thank you and a huge smile. I think they are happy to see the old customers survived Covid-19 and time.

I ate my dinner while watching the second episode of House of Dragons, which started going full Game of Thrones with marriages and family troubles (plus dragons). It felt more like a later GOT episode than a new show. The actors are starting to find their roles, with Matt Smith, formally The Doctor, continuing his role as a troublemaker. The ending was a surprise and, like I said, very GOT.

Aside: Folks have firm opinions on GOT and the last season. I liked it–an aberration, I understand from GOT purists. I also like this new show.

More: I managed to find the remote for the TV and the Amazon Fire so I can still use the TV. I returned the do-everything Comcast remote. I did have a moment when nothing worked but using my twenty years of computer and networking experience, I turned it off and then turned it on. Now it works.

I then did the mopping I mentioned and feel like I got my exercise too.

I also chatted with the Smiths with Cat here for another week. Cat is working NYC hours–we will try to have dinner together on Tuesday. We are looking forward to Indian Food together.

Sundays are not usually so crazy, but it was packed today. I was up at 6:30 to be ready for the tech coming at 8ish to fix the slow Internet. Ziply Fiber was running at best 180mbs with losses down to 45mbs at some points. Not good.

I did manage to start the laundry and do some dishes before Ajmal from Ziply texted me and appeared 30 minutes later. He went to work and worked closely with me as we defined the source of the issue. Ajmal verified that we had 1G coming to the house, so the cables on the pole appeared good. We were still slow, meaning that the issue was not intermittent, which was a relief.

My Mac is not the most convenient system as it does not have a direct connection to Ethernet. So I switched to my Dell Windows laptop computer I purchased to do robot work. It is a nice i5 with plenty of memory (16G) and speed. We were able to use it to test the speeds and talk to the router.

The conclusion is that the router was bad after less than twelve hours of use. Not something I have seen before. We replaced the router, and the speed is back to 800-900mbs again.

It was 10:30 when Ajmal left, and I had working fast Internet. I did manage to listen to 1/2 of the sermon at church today as it was transmitted on YouTube.

During the time I was working on the network or house items, Providence called. Rick was coming by on a Sunday, and we agreed to 2:30.

Breakfast was coffee and muffins. I had reheated pizza from BJ’s Brewhouse for lunch. Then, I swept the floors and started washing blankets and stuff from the spare bedroom. After that, I watched some videos on the battleship Bismarck and the RMS Olympic. I knew the story about RMS Olympic, but it was well done. The Bismarck information was covering the erroneous statements about the wreck on Wikipedia. It was all fascinating to me–I did not know there was a book on the wreck and that it was being misquoted. How strange!

While cleaning, I found the bag I used for chemo with some pills I don’t need anymore. I put the drugs in a cabinet and threw away the bag with glee. I don’t need that now!

I drove to Susie’s place, hummingbird house, after eating and doing a bit of housework. I reached the area without incident, but the police were out even on a Sunday. I brought the red transfer wheelchair with me. Susie ate lunch while we waited for Rick.

Susie finished, and we called her mother, Leta, and they spoke for a while using FaceTime.

We were on the porch when Rick got here. He decided to do some of the work on the patio. So I got the pedals and the transfer wheelchair on the porch. Susie underwent some stretching with Rick that was not without its discomfort–I am sorry to report. Rick transferred Susie to the other wheelchair. The pedals fit under it, unlike her usual wheelchair, and she could peddle a bit. Unfortunately, the pedals are too low still and will have to be raised up about an inch to make it more comfortable for her. Susie got some peddling done.

We moved inside and Susie, still in the transfer wheelchair, did standing practices. The transfer wheelchair is lower, so Susie had to work extra hard to get out of it and stand. That got a complaint from Susie. Susie got one excellent stand done. Rick left, and Vanessa, the nurse aide for today, got Susie back in her recliner, and I got a kiss and left. Susie was tired now.

I left and returned home. I updated my Dungeons and Dragons 5E character as we were playing tonight. I also rushed to make dinner. Chili from a can with broken taco shells and cheese. I heated the shells in the oven and the chili in the microwave. I ate it as I recreated the printer on the network. To stop connection issues, I hardcoded the printer’s address on the Comcast network. I deleted that printer and recreated it to print my character sheet. I may have to assign it an address on the new network.

I managed to get ready for the game, and the Internet speeds were still good. I took Air Volvo to Corry’s house, and we played our usual 5:30 to 9ish. I struggled with being tired, but I still had a good time. We did our usual crazy and took out a bad guy, and, not being a combat-centric bunch, we ran after finding the good stuff.

We got out the balloon model I made for this adventure. My character got to do a Mary Poppins, jump off a building with a magical parasol, and float down to the ground, taking minimal damage. Never done that before in D&D!

We are planning, so far, to play the adventure I am writing in late 2022 or early 2023.

I am tired while writing tonight. I hope it is not too rushed. Thank you for reading.

Saturday was a day that disappeared in my efforts to do a whole weekend in one day. Time just seemed to run through my fingers like sand. It all started with me waking to my alarm…

The morning came after I had to get up around 2ish to prove that I was adequately hydrated and then, once back in bed, rolled over and went back to sleep. My kidneys are on a mission to ensure that I don’t develop any sleeping issues. Saturday was another day off; yes, working for Nike IT does not mean you are free on weekends, so I slept until 7:30.

I got out the red bag of Fair Trade-certified coffee from Equal Exchange and my recently washed French Press and made a few cups of liberal coffee. I imagine that when you sip that cup of union-loving coffee, all the conspiracy theories fade away like phantoms exposed to light, and suddenly you are ready to do a fair day’s labor for fair pay. With new clarity, you remember that this is a country of laws, not of privilege, and even politicians and businesspeople are held accountable. I do love a good cup of coffee.

Aside: For those who wonder what is liberal, the liberal agenda can be simply defined as the Four Freedoms as a focus for the future. Recently, the Four Freedoms were cut into stone in Washington DC: Here. They were even on US postage stamps three times! The Four Freedoms are the freedom of speech, religion, from want, and from fear.

I finished writing the Friday blog on Saturday as I felt out-of-sorts on Friday. The blog is not about what is right or wrong but what I am experiencing. So I wrote about being down, having trouble finding my way, and the stress getting to me.

It is hard when you feel like crying all the time from stress and sadness, but you must instead try to work out a tax efficiency system to help you cover your wife’s health expenses (running $8,000 a month after insurance). But, like the songs say, I will overcome and know that the God of our silent tears is there.

Putting aside all the writer fluff and returning to our story, I was finishing the blog I managed to start the night before, so it was soon done. Except, the Internet access was slow. Speed test results had collapsed to 50 mbs again, so with an eye roll and resisting other ironies, I call Ziply Fiber and enjoy an irony-rich morning.

Imagine a tech on the phone with such a bad connection they fade in and out and can’t even get your account number. Yes, my new Internet provider cannot provide clear lines for their helpdesk. The gal from West Virginia goes over all the obvious stuff, and we unplug stuff, restart, and set some things back to manufacture settings. As the hardware still had a new equipment smell and had not smoked, it is very unlikely to be that. The yellow data light on the modem hints that the problem is in the cable or pole, not the house. Finally, after a pleasant hour (using a voice connection that fades in and out at random), I end up with a tech scheduled to continue the summoning ritual at the house on Sunday morning.

This all fits my expectation. All networking equipment and cool gadgets require an excellent cable. Throwing one on a pole and then wrapping it around my house is pretty basic, and it might take one or more tries to get it to work. Clear glass-laser connections ain’t easy on legacy settings like the Volvo Cave. The wires in the area are on wooden poles–think about it (just like when back two hundred years ago with telegraphs).

I finished the blog with slow Internet, got dressed, and headed to the hummingbird house two hours late. Susie was a bit grumpy this morning when Air Volvo delivered me, but we soon walked into the park; Evan showed up too. Before this, Susie talked to her mother from her recliner in the living room. This is a shared space with a giant TV.

The park was lovely as usual, and we also walked some of the streets and stopped by the magnolia tree to spot a bloom. Evan found one of the plums of another tree intact on the ground and found it to be good.

Susie did not want to watch a movie and was yawning a bit. It was likely time for a nap for her. I kissed her goodbye and headed out. Vanessa, the nurse aide, immediately started to talk to Susie and asked her about a snack and what Susie wanted to do–it helped distract Susie and made the pain of leaving less for her. I sincerely appreciate this.

Mariah wanted to meet for lunch too. So we all headed to the Golden Valley Brewery, and Jennifer was our waiter (it was her last few days there after six years working for GVB, having graduated from college and starting to work for UPS soon). Jennifer remembered me and knows Mariah.

I had a few glasses of wine–wanting to mellow my Saturday and had a steak salad. Evan had the Hatch Chili burger. Fresh chillis are imported from the New Mexico desert and roasted. It is always a bit of a celebration in the Pacific Northwest when the fresh hatch chilis arrive.

After lunch, Mariah got into her Hemi-engined orange car, growled through the parking lot, and headed off for the rest of her day. As usual, Evan and I met at Central Taps after parking in the free lot. I brought the board game favorite of mine, Concordia, and we got a table and beers–running a tab.

We played Concordia with the Hispania board from Salsa without the salt add-on but using forum cards (you will have to see the particular set-up in the rules for the board not to use salt). This was the first time I played this board. The game is a resource management and worker placement game, one of the best. Usually, you are struggling with having resources–not with Hispania without salt and only two players. Our end-of-game scores were each over a hundred showing we were not starved for resources. That made the game much more fun. We will be back to this board, but only with two players.

Aside: Concordia is a newish board game with the usual bright colors and decent components you see in the new productions. The rules are simple, and your turn is easy to understand, but your strategy is complex. My favorite type of game. The opposite of the Terraforming Mars board game and like engine building games with complex turns. We were using the add-on Salsa expansion, which I do recommend for the boards and forum addition, but not for the salt add-on. There is a reworking called Concordia Venus that purports to be a more loving version (thus the name), I have a copy, but I like the original. The full copy of Venus includes the original base game.

Evan showing the first salt ever used in my copy.

I won the first game with twenty points which were not that many points in this game and could be counted as one card, Weaver, that I had at the end of the game.

We enjoyed it so much that we got more beer and played again with salt. Evan was playing to build a salt-producing trading post while I played a usual game. I did not have the wine to build the salt-producing trading post (unlike all the other trading posts, these took wine and tools to make and five money–a huge expense). I actually never built even a wine trading post!

It was a run-away game for me. Evan found the salt was not as useful as promised, and the cities’ costs were too high. Also, reducing three cities from the map to do salt reduced the abundance, and the Hispania board lost much of its charm. Evan used the salt mostly to buy cards, but in the end, the cost of the cities prevented him from buying as many cards as I did. My score was insane, and we stopped counting it.

We found salt was not something we would want to use again. We still like forum and loved the board it came with.

Next, time was running away as it was eight-ish, and we headed to the carts after paying the tab at Cental Taps, which surprised me that they were still open. We had waffle sandwiches again. Excellent. Evan headed back to Portland while I went home in Air Volvo.

There was no Saturday night game with Richard, so I was done gaming. Evan asked to play Scythe next time. I did a little writing and some paperwork. I went to bed around 11PM as time seemed to run fast today.

Thanks for reading!