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It is a clear Wednesday morning, with blue skies, and I am rising late, after 8:30. It is the calm before the next storm. Another 2-4 inches of rain (5cm-10cm) from another river-of-rain is predicted for Thursday-Saturday. We are drying out in Oregon, and the Coastal Mountains absorb the initial rains, reducing them before coming into the interior; Washington State does not have the same barrier, and the rains come deep into its west before hitting the Cascade Mountains. I believe my area, the Aloha-Beaverton-Hillsboro area, southwest of Portland, will survive the storm with just big puddles.

Returning to Tuesday, I discovered that while I pushed the correct button and loaded the coffee maker with water, I had failed to put coffee in the machine. I had a pot of hot water, but at least it served as a cleaning. I redo this and have coffee soon.

I had no time to write the blog because I had to get to Richard’s house at 9, since we moved the time up by 30 minutes. I was rushing, showering, and all that, and poured the coffee into a thermal cup and jumped into Air VW the Gray. It would not start. I needed the fob, and second, I needed to unplug it. Yikes!

The traffic was heavy as usual for a Tuesday rush hour, and the earlier morning did not improve my experience (When I was in Washington, D.C., every minute past 7:15 was five extra minutes of travel, I calculated in the 1980s-90s when I worked there). I arrived on time, discovered that James could not make the earlier time, and Richard and I set up and chatted for a while.

James arrived at the usual time, and soon we started back into Tainted Grail and began to understand our goals. We are about 1/2 through the story and play, and our characters, this is a board game version of a role-playing game campaign, are powerful. I asked to try some new areas and something we have not tried before, with various degrees of success. Richard suggested redoing one location, and it worked as we now had the proper items and knowledge (there is a log of what you learn) to get different experiences.

The game seems more immersive, but we are a bit lost now as we stumble along looking for the next thread of the story. I am liking the experience more. We are also seeing tasks for higher points in the story. We are in chapter 7, and 11-14 are showing now. I find my interest in the game growing.

We stopped at 1. Richard had an appointment, and James shared some Christmas games for me (he picked something more to play at church — very kind). I gave him a JFK pencil (sticking to simple things this year).

Next, I drove back to Beaverton and had some SPRC work at the church (for those who do not speak Methodist, the HR committee is SPRC). It was a pleasant meeting, and later Wendy pointed out a mistake in the refresh work. Blake, who leads the effort from Pinepoint, our contractor, said he would look into it.

I headed to Elephant’s Delicatessen off of Cedar Hills in Beaverton. They had Beef Bourgogne for lunch! It was good, but mine is better, a variation of Julia Child’s version that Deborah and I learned to make in cooking classes in Detroit. Now with too much food, I head home.

Corwin shows up with a leaf blower and uses my ladder to clean my roof and gutters of mush that was once green and part of the trees. I am tired and sleep in the chair while he blasts away (the loss of hearing has some advantages) and get caught up on my rest. I also finally started the blog. Corwin offers to pick up dinner, and I order online from Gyro House. I had the veggie plate, and Corwin had the fried chicken.

As Lay Leader, leader of the refresh work, and SPRC member of my church, I had to attend the Church Council Zoom meeting and also another one before that. All church stuff, including the budget, was approved and finished by 7:30. I ate my dinner while on Zoom, and Corwin finished his. I also wrote a check for Corwin’s cleaning.

And for those who might need some leaf or other work outside: https://americanhomesolution.org. This is Corwin’s company.

I was tired and had my fill of Zoom (felt like I was back to work). I served on the Internet for a while and then read more Judge Dee detective stories set in China’s Ming Empire. I found sleep, woke, and finally slept the night away. No bright dreams that I remember, just comfortable blackness.

Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

I woke at 4ish, and wow, was I not enjoying life. My only good ear, my right, was plugged and icky. I was dizzy and could not sleep. I rose and found it hard to do anything. I found the coffee was cold, so I remade it. I wrote the blog and tried to find my way. It was hard going as I could not hear and felt off. Ugh!

I started the laundry and finished the dishes. I had only sipped some coffee and soon crawled back into bed after using some ear drops I had from the last issue with my ears. I managed to get a few hours of sleep.

I finished the blog late. I was slowly feeling better. I stopped by and got some Ibuprofen, and that helped too. By the afternoon, I was feeling more like myself. Corwin stopped by and did the local Sushi track place. It was nice to get some food, hot soup, and tea. Corwin had an appointment, and we managed to make it work.

I boarded Air VW the Gray with figures, notes, dice, and the rules for version 1 of Pathfinder, a variation of D&D 3.5 that many still play. I also had Mariah’s birthday and Christmas gift. I forgot the Presidential magnets (they do look nice on my fridge). I then took the EV, using navigation, and avoided part of Highway 26 by staying on Canyon Road, then found moderate traffic in Portland (I was between lunch and the evening rush), and was early at Hopworks off of Powell’s in Portland.

Unlike reports from the President, the city looked lovely in its Christmas lights. It is the second night of Hanukkah, and Menorahs were out too. Happy Holidays, indeed. No Hellscape here.

I was early, read my emails, and did some looking at Adafruit’s website. I received my LED letters (WILD) and was looking at how to light them. Three volts, hmmm. More to follow.

Mariah arrived, and we talked about houses, careers, and travel. She listened to my trip stories. I ate again, nachos, small with pulled pork, this time. The beer, a German-style pilsner, was wonderful.

Next, we said our goodbyes for this year, 2025, and got in our cars. Hers was a growling gas-based Ford Mustang, and mine was a silent EV. She won the contest for coolest!

I traveled five minutes and then drifted around the neighborhood, looking for a parking place in the mass of leaf-mush that is parking in Portland in the fall. It is dark and damp, and the walk with a box of 28mm gaming material was not without hazard, but I found the place, Bill’s house, a change, and Bill was new to me.

I walked in with the pizza person who figured out the gate, and we set up to play role-playing. My copy of the old rules for Pathfinder was borrowed, and I had to try to make it work with Sean’s help (our DM). We soon had Bill playing, and soon we were back to the massive graveyard we had investigated (using a polite word for grave robbing–did I mention I am playing a Lawful Evil wizard). We managed to anger some undead with our liberation tactics, and it took some effort to remove them. Somehow, even as 1st-level characters (pathetic in the older systems–I used to start at 3rd when I DM’d, as it was just too dull to DM/play the first levels), we took down the undead. Our elf, who the player failed to make the game session, found a trap with their last hit point, and we managed to stabilize them (meaning not-dead-yet).

Feeling that luck was on our side, we continued to explore and found, with just good rolls, more traps, avoided a falcrum trap that we worked out on our own (right out of an old D&D book on traps and Tomb of Horrors adventure), and managed to re-dead two more undead without loss. Really lucky for the 1st level.

Sean was getting his legs under him as DM; the story was moving, and we got to do four to five encounters. I got to be evil: “Heal or Animate, one will work,” I suggested. My fellow players are thinking I do not have their best interests in mind. It was fun.

With that done, I returned to Beaverton without issue. I took more pills and crawled into my bed. I was tired and happy.

Thanks for reading!

Going backwards, it is Monday when I write this, and my sleep was wrecked by a stuffed ear (I have only one working one now after the brain surgery). I was up at 4, took a nap, and now I am coughing and feeling off. Not enough sleep and rest. Ugh!

I reached home about 9:30 in Air VW the Gray after playing Dungeons and Dragons 2024 at M@ place without the usual group. Jack was filling in for Mackers. We finished Desert of Desolation: Pharaoh (once I3) adventure. Again, details cannot be recounted here, but Karyn’s character was slain by some undead. But when we finished, we got a free wish, and we used that to return Karyn.

I have DM’d the original I3 in the AD&D version back in the 1980s, and can say that the reworking was better. I had only a small memory of the original, and it has been on my shelf for years. I keep them for when I am looking for ideas for another adventure.

Scott brought vegan gift loaves, and I provided pencils from the JFK Library (I gave pencils from the Carter Center before). M@ made burgers, and we played our newly leveled-up 8th-level characters. Jack was a paladin and not a bad choice to take into an undead-filled tomb. It was a tough challenge; Karyn’s loss was tough, but we managed to survive the attacks, absorb the punishment, and finally break out and finish the challenge.

Before this, I was at home, tired out from rising at 6:30 to cook jambalaya and then helping with ushering and helping with the potluck. It was a pleasure to serve, and everyone seemed to like my food. I unloaded the dishwasher and chatted here and there with Deborah. She had some family obligations, so we were both busy on Sunday.

Church was before this, and upon my arrival, I unloaded the huge pot of jambalaya, along with some spices and other possible additions. I delivered these culinary joy items to Z, the head of hospitality at the church, and she tasted them and was pleased. I put on a warming oven (Bill pulled it before it re-cooked; even the warm setting is a bit high). The church folks for First United Methodist were in full potluck mode (as the other church, Emmaus Church, was headed out). I headed to the church service and took up my usual post as usher.

And I did have a gentleman, younger, with his gym bag and backpack, walk in and out. I stopped him from leaving and offered him coffee and lunch. This was not what he expected. I walked him down to the now set-up Wesley Hall and got him a plate of jambalaya. He is a cook, and he thought it good, and I shared the recipe with him. Z and Bill said they were good with him there; no issue. I saw him leave early, smiling and waving.

Next, the Pastor decided to focus on the repression of people worldwide and how we can help for a Christmas series. I suspect I would have chosen something more traditional, like holiday symbols or cookies. We light a red candle to remember these folks. Ken directs us to Jesus’ “Love your enemies” statement. I do check the translation, as he tells the story of some right-wing folks who deny that it is a Biblical quote (it is, translated correctly, and in two Gospels).

Before all of this, I rose at 6:30 and played music, danced, and cooked in my kitchen. I had prepped the day before, and so this was cooking and assembly. I followed the recipe I did in New Orleans at the NOLA School of Cooking. I adjusted it to be spicier (remembering one of the assistants telling me, “You always need more of the spices”) and cooked down the veggies, then browned the sausage until it was dark brown. I later added more spices, crab boil, cooked shrimp, and more uncooked veggies to give the rice-packed goodness a bit of bite.

I remember Chef Renée making it in a demo back in NOLA. I took note then and included some of his recommended updates.

And that takes us to me rising, thanks for reading.

 

I did not start early on Saturday and found no coffee ready, as I still had 1/4 pot from last night. Corwin and I made coffee while we played my newest board game: The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship. We lost the game, and I left the game set up in case I want to study it.

I reheated some coffee, sat down in my office (formerly Corwin’s bedroom), and started on my usual tasks: updating Quicken, reading my email (which means deleting most of it), and doom scrolling (i.e., seeing what the latest excuse for raising prices, deporting US citizens, and not delivering the Epstein Files is). Satisfied that I was depressed enough, I stopped reading the news and played a few late-night comedians to get their take on the chaos. Laughed.

Next, I returned to Friday in my mind and began constructing a narrative of what I remembered and selected to share. I typed this into WordPress with the help of Grammarly (though I have to resist its AI effort to turn my words into mush). I spent the next couple of hours, as I often do, creating this blog. I watched the sunrise and, with reduced clouds, actually saw some blue and light.

With the blog done, I returned to the kitchen, on my third reheated cup of coffee (liberal Fair Trade) and got out Mom Wild’s smasher chopper. Oh, yes! I cut up and slam the veggies through the weird non-electrical appliance. So satifying to smash ’em. The onions, now even more insulted than knife work, release their worst, and I can barely see. I revel in the slam chop.

Deborah and I connect here and there through Saturday. Her sons are there to start their holiday break at home.

I am short of green pepper. I cut up the baked chicken and am happy there is enough left (1.5 lb needed in the jambalya) for my lunch. I slice the sausage into coins (I like to do smaller squares, but the coins are the tradition for New Orleans). I load all my work into the fridge for Sunday morning. I do multiple washes, not wishing to mix the chopped items and cause cross-contamination.

I head to 185 Veggie folks and grab a few green peppers, three of their smaller ones, and a few items. Their prices are good, and I do not break about $7.00. I rewash everything and chop-slam the green peppers with all my work done, and the morning and early afternoon gone, I rest for a bit.

I also get that laundry done that I skipped on Friday. I am happy that The Machine did not leak, as I risked the tub-cleaning process that once before flooded the area during subsequent use. I put out a towel just in case. It worked without issue. Reports from Deborah: She loves her new side-loading laundry.

I made cheese and toast with a little bit of summer sausage and some sweet pickle slices that have been in the fridge waiting for the right moment. The blue cheese, made by our local world-renowned Oregon cheese makers, was lovely. I had some other French cheese slices. It was a great lighter dinner with Market Choice cheeses. I had tea with it.

I also updated my Dungeons & Dragons character, an Other Sorcerer, to 8th level as we are playing on Sunday night. This is D&D accounting, and while others find it fascinating, I just try not to make mistakes and follow the character arc, avoiding some min-max options for more role-playing choices. I am part thief with a charlatan background. But I am too charismatic to hide, so stealth is not my thing (I do try, though).

After ordering a gift for Deborah, I found that time had run away from me. I had packed away the LOTR game and offered it for tonight. I got aboard Air VW the Gray at 5ish and headed to Richard’s place in Portland. Beaverton traffic, it is now a week from the Winter Solstice, in the dark.

Navigation sends me over the hill, and I connect with Highway 26 after much of the slow-moving merge traffic from 216 and Beaverton. I managed to arrive at Richards in about 50 minutes, not a terrible time for Oregon, but in Michigan, I would be halfway to Flint from Detroit in the same time!

Laura, Richard, and I teach the LOTR game, and we soon have it down and flowing. We play the standard first scenario as suggested on easy mode. It takes us a while to get into the groove, but soon we are playing fast. We manage to get ahead of the Pandemic-like engine that controls the Dark Lord’s forces, and Frodo’s hope is excellent as we have kept the Eye of Sauron off of the character. We get five Ring cards to Frodo, and the Eagle card will take him to Mount Doom (like in the funny YouTube videos), and we win!

Richard proves that he has Flip-7, a favorite card game, down, but it is still fun to play a few games. We talk for a bit, and the verdict on the LOTR games is “Yes, we could play that anytime.” Laura looks for a copy for her kids but finds none at any of the cheaper sites. I recommend buying full price at Guardian Games, which has copies; their online inventory is almost impossible to search.

I head home, and the traffic is snarled on the streets of Portland for unknown reasons. I turn away from Broadway, and Navigation takes me across various streets to a familiar entrance to the highway by a hospital. From there, the EV faces no more challenges. I arrive home at 11 and soon am reading in bed about Judge Dee in a fantasy Ming China.

I start to fall asleep and turn off the light. I wake a few times and once again am wandering for my dreams, but this time more tourist than breathing issues or other nightmares. My alarm wakes me too early to start cooking.

Thanks for reading!

 

For those who read the blog and even wait for it to appear, yesterday it was very late. I had problems with my laptop backups and was focused on them, so the blog didn’t finish until late yesterday. Sorry.

What I discovered while writing the blog was that I could not find a Microsoft Word document on my laptop, and I thought I might have deleted it in error (I had the wrong name for it). I checked my backups. I use Apple’s Time Machine to keep long-lasting records of changes to my laptop. Meaning I could, at least a few months ago, check back a year or more for something. I was shocked to see that something had changed, and Time Machine now contained only a week of history. Yikes!

Corruption or malicious changes often take a month to discover. A backup needs to be able to recover the laptop from a month-old copy. A week is not enough. My checks, which I was doing instead of writing the blog, showed that the fast, solid-state drive I have used for years was now 90% full, with only a week’s worth of updates. The same drive that once held for years. Something changed.

And indeed it has, I am using the Tahoe 26.1, the latest version of the OS, and it appears that this destroyed all my backups. Apparently, there was no backward compatibility, and it just scratched them all. Time Machine is not always stable over the years, but I have rescued my Apple Laptop many times with it. Every hard drive has failed, and I have rebuilt my systems from a Time Machine image.

I also have another fast (and expensive) external drive that I keep not in the house (usually), and I manually copy all my files to it. I also back up Quicken to it. If I wanted to get ancient-style, I should use an optical drive and make everlasting copies, until the technology fails or you realize the copy did not really work. But a simple file copy works, and most of what I want to keep is not current. Quicken also backs up online (part of the service) and will sync an old copy. Had to do that once already.

I found the file on the grey drive that I grabbed from its hiding place (my Time Machine drive is called ‘Silver’ — the metal cases are different shades), then found it on Local on my laptop. Somehow I had searched the Cloud, not my Apple laptop (?!), and do not get me started on iCloud and how my files are there, too. Still, I was disturbed that my dream of safe backups was dashed. I manually copied my files, and ran out of space. F**k!

I was out of time, the morning spent on an IT mission to get safe. I have found that backups and file searches somehow take hours that disappear in a puff of IT blue smoke. I hopped into the shower, shaved, and all that. Ignored laundry day (Friday for me), and boarded Air VW the Gray and headed to Beaverton.

I was only a few minutes late for my blood donation, but then I was told to wait until the setup was done at my church, First United Methodist Church in Beaverton. Not ‘Global’ but ‘United’ as we are the loving original now officially accepting LGBTQ, and we fly a flag on the outside of the building matching this. Generally, we UM folks think there is enough ‘excluding’ out there without us adding to it.

I have to fill out the online form. I got multiple calls, texts, and emails reminding me of the appointment, but none had me fill out the online form. But I then remember it is only good for 24 hours, and just sit and do it on my iPhone. There are two people ahead of me, as I am now a walk-in, as I did not do the online form first, and then show up (eye-rolling moment, but it is a volunteer organization, so it gets special dispensation, and I just smile and follow their processes). I waited about ten minutes and chatted with Cliff, the check-in volunteer. We both worked at the same local NGO, Building Together, but did not know each other.

I pass with exceptions (travel to Iceland, having cancer, and breathing issues not currently an issue) and soon fill a pint while trying to read, bleed, and relax. I am feeling fine. I have now done this about every three months and have no issues except a headache and some fatigue later in the evening. With a cookie and a bottle of water, I head to get some groceries. I plan to make Jambalaya for the church potluck (yes, more UM stuff). I stopped by 185th Veggies, and they were happy to see me. I spent $20 on veggies (and some microwave popcorn).

Next, I stopped, fading a bit, at Market of Choice and was once again amazed at the prices. I got some sausage and a whole baked chicken for the Jambalaya, and found Pacific Seafood’s shrimp without tails (and cleaned). I grabbed a few other items (including more eggnog) and still spent more than 5x at 185th Veggies. The hams were $8 a pound, more than twice Costco’s price, I learned from Dondrea.

With all my goodies, I head to the house in the EV. I talk to Deborha on and off while traveling. I still forget some items, and I sit in my chair and get a few minutes’ nap when Corwin shows up.

We return to the board game we started on Friday, The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship, from the same people who made Pandemic. We make corrections, and this first play is really invalid, but we finish the game and win. We reset and play again with the rules all correct, I think, and it reminded me of the Pandemic building engine. We soon became desperate, hoping to just make it. We manage to distract Sauron like in the movie by marching out our armies of the Free Peoples, but the Ring Bearer is not in Mordor, and hope is fading. Corwin, again running Frodo and Sam, gets them in Mordor, but hope is lost, and we lose: Frodo loses hope, and Golem is not there (he is not in play for two players). Next time!

It was an excellent experience, and the game works and is not overly predictable like the original Pandemic (which makes sense for a virus). It reminds me of the War of the Ring by Ares, but faster and for more than two players (though War of the Ring can play three, it is not really a good three-person game). There is dust on War of the Ring as it is hours to set up and hours and hours to play, and often many rules issues as you try to remember how to play and keep all the rules right. After two add-ons, a rollout map, and other updates, it’s an expensive game to gather dust.

(got to read the map upside down)

After our loss, I had to head out, and Corwin and I said our goodbyes. The EV crossed Beaverton using the same sliding path I used when visiting the Humminbird House after getting two tickets. I avoid lights with cameras and Beaverton’s Finest using this path. Dondrea and Z welcome me to their home for a quick dinner, a giant pot pie from Costco. We open some gifts and, after a delicious dinner (I brought the pumpkin pie and the new eggnog), I teach how to play a new board game, Tiny Epic Galaxies. Dondrea, telling us she does not get it, smokes us.

With the game taught, box packing needing to be done, and me getting tired fast (blood loss showing). The travel in Air VW the Gray across Beaverton without issue (or attracting unwanted attention from civil authority). I did little more than sit in my chair in the living room and relax.

But the blog was not done, and that is against my discipline, so I would not let it carry over to the next day. I grabbed an electric blanket, my laptop, and wrote the blog in my chair, not my desk, and finished and published the blog wrapped in a warm blanket (thanks, Kathy and Martin, for the blankets).

I decided I need to invest. These wonderfully fast, wallet-sized, multi-Tbyte, solid-state drives are not cheap; the OWC Apple site provides the latest (and more expensive than last time, damn tariffs!). Too much money (over $400) and it will be here next week. I cannot risk deleting old data due to Time Machine instability to free up space on my manual backup. I click and spend; ugh!

I put on my PJs and take my meds, but not my emergency inhaler. I read more Judge Dee stories and finally turn off the light near midnight. Sleep is disturbed by dreams of small spaces, suggesting a feeling of drowning. But not too serious this time, I remember in my dream being able to breathe and deciding to try to go on.

Sleep was hard, but not as bad as the night before, and I got some rest. I do wake and take my inhaler, and that helps.

Thanks for reading.