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For the summer, I work until noon on Fridays. This is a Nike WHQ thing. Today was the first time. Usually, I work until noon at the Evergreen Buildings, my home building which is not on the WHQ campus, and then head to the amazing cafe, The Paint, and have lunch until 1ish. This allows me to support the cafe, get lunch, and give anyone an extra hour to find me.

Working from home means just stopping. I stopped at noonish. I then drove to Old Chicago Pizza for lunch. I used to eat there a lot 14 months ago. Usually, once a week getting a Stromboli with a salad and iced tea. Today I return, again trying to lose my fear, for lunch. I had my usual, and I felt safe.

I returned home and went back to painting this afternoon, hoping to finish more of Richard’s miniatures for Anachrony this holiday. I am painting the blue faction that looks like a cross of a giant squid and a mole crab. I am painting it mostly shades of blue and metal with a gray base shade. I tried to put a decal on the figure, but the surfaces are too curved to do this easily.

I hope to finish these in the morning on Saturday. Just one more, the purple faction to go.

Mariah came over and did laundry, and then we got some paperwork done for her traveling on Sunday. Corwin, Mariah, and I had dinner at Matzatlon Mexican Food nearby. We brought back Susie’s dinner.

Back to painting!

I should finish this story. I fixed the other fob for Air Volvo today. If you remember, the car stopped starting, as you must have the fob near the car to start it. If the fob’s battery is dead, the fob does not work. I replaced the battery, and one fob still did not work! Also, both fobs were dead at the same time.

This has happened to me before. I remember a batch of desktop computers in the 1980s all failing in the same week when the battery backing up the CMOS definition in the old IBM PCs died. The computers were all purchased together, and they all failed within a week. The life expectancy of the batteries was very predictable!

I ordered new coin cell batteries, 2032, a fav of hardware hackers like me. I replaced the battery, again, in the unworking fob and popped out the new battery that failed. I noticed that it had a sticker you need to remove that was still on it. I may have then made comments that are best not repeated here. There was a safety label with a baby image saying not to give this battery to young children that I overlooked. I removed it and reassembled the fob. It works now.

The china made 2032s I just got are very cheap in 50 battery purchases, do not have safety labels. Only USA-bought ones have these stickers.

627 people died today from Covid-19 in the USA.

Lift Every Voice and Sing was on my mind as we try to lose the fear of these last two years.

I managed to get going at 7AM this morning. I did sleep in about an hour. The morning started with me seeing that all of my items had not moved forward and read my email and text Slack messages. I then sent out requests for updates for status on the items I had requested and got ready for the day.

I was ready for the first Zoom meeting and was surprised that I had actual items to cover and status to give. I was reading the new items, emails were sent of these mysterious tasks appearing assigned to me when my name was called at the stand-up meeting. I stumbled through it. I updated the status verbally and learned I have deliverables that are being tracked by the project. Have to pay more attention now!

After doing some more work and emails, I headed out for lunch at the Reedville Cafe. I had a table for one and ate a normal lunch, trying to pretend that the pandemic is ending. To find normal again, I believe you have to go search for it. Instead of staying at the house and making lunch or ordering GrubHub, I went out and did my usual lunch break. I had my mask and all safety steps were in place at Reedville Cafe. I felt safe, ate my tuna fish melt, used my Apple to read emails and some online articles. What I would do in my pre-Covid-19 life.

Returning to working from home, I managed to get some attention from folks working for the shoe company, and we fixed one of the outstanding issues. I officially unblocked my task (that I only learned about today). Blocked tasks are escalated to various meetings, and thus the problem was resolved today (TCI OSS note application is not without challenges, for those who speak SAP). My other issue cleared today.

I also wrote just a few code lines and created a PowerPoint for a meeting with SAP customers about data conversions. PowerPoints always take longer than you expect, and this one took the afternoon.

I rallied Susie to head t.o BJ. Brewhouse to meet with Rev.Dr. Wayne and Rev. Anne Weldmartin for dinner. We had a nice dinner together. Susie got a dessert to go. We will see them on Monday at 5PM for pizza, beer, and some games for Memorial Day.

Sorry, it is a short story as it was as normal a day as I could make today. I am reaching out for normal or at least try to lose some of the fear and stress. Let it go! song for those who want to sing along–just dumping the fear, not the safety, and finding the future.

630 people in the USA passed away from Covid-19 today.

This is My Father’s World seemed to fit today. I found this virtual chorus version arranged by one of the members.

 

I started the morning, as usual, at 6ish, and, as usual, I then went back to sleep for 30 minutes or an hour when there were no meetings in the early morning. I was back at it 6:30ish as I could not sleep anymore.

I started into my emails and missed text in Slack. I was caught up quickly, making breakfast as I read and then eating it.

Another busy, crazy morning of status meetings, but no progress on some pressing emergencies. I send out a few requests for updates and start back into the coding I was doing again. I am trying to restart the work I left back in February.

Instead of walking in the pollen-enriched air, I cleaned up some more stuff in the house for 30 minutes. I am slowly getting my working spaces back to the normal before Covid-19 look.

I make soup for lunch, veggie beef from a can, as I am trying to reduce expenses—much less GrubHub in the future and more sandwiches made at home. Before, I felt I needed to help as I was working, and many others were not working. But now, it looks like a lot of money that I could use. Again, trying to find the normal.

I managed a walk in the grass today, and some more roses are out. One more is now starting to bloom.

 

So far, two roses are yet to bloom. One is, I believe, 50+ years old red tea roses and came with the house. The legend is that the previous owner’s mom’s rose bush was transplanted here in the 1980s. The other rose that is yet to bloom is Mr. Lincoln, and it is the newest and looks like a stick with some sickly leaves. It may require some intervention.

Work went on for a bit. I was coding new scripts. Switching from the programming languages Groovy to BASH and back. I then run the revised and new scripts using the open tool called Jenkins.

I was working up to the moment I needed to leave for the Dentist.

The car would not start!

Air Volvo uses a fob and has no ignition key. A live working fob is needed to use Ait Volov.

The fobs’ batteries are 2032 coin cells. They are dead, both at the same time. I walk to the dentist for my cleaning. It is a mile.

The cleaning goes well, and there is no need for extra work. Another escape! I then walk back.

I take the fobs apart and replace the batteries. One is working now. Volvo wants me to bring the car in and check the fobs. If I can get the other one working, I will not need to visit them! I will take the one that is not working apart again and find another battery. I use the 2032 coin cell for electronic hacking. It is possible I just used a dead 2032 as I only had one in the packaging. That one now works.

For a moment, I had visions of having to have Air Volvo towed to the mothership. One fob is working well now, so I think I will avoid the mothership. Air Volvo had been to the Volvo Spa just a few months ago to do the scheduled 40,000-mile items.

The walk back, the pollen, dentist, and having to make dinner have left me tired.

Dinner was pork chops from Safeway, 1/2 thick and a nice size, that I prepare the same way I usually make chops. I fry them in a large pan with oil and sprinkle them with salt a spice, Herbs de Provence, and brown them just slightly on both sides. I finish the pork chops in a 350F oven remembering never to grab the pan’s handle.

I had some nice bread that I sliced. I made green beans from Schwann’s also the usual way. I put them in the microwave. I cook on the stove almond slices and salt in butter. I add the beans when done and finish them on the stove.

Around dinner time, I spoke to Cory, and we will play the board game Wingspan on Sunday night. He bought a copy about a year before the pandemic but never got a game in. Now that we are all vaccinated, I can do a teaching game on Sunday night. Exciting, more normal!

I am dragging tonight.

607 people in the USA died today from the virus.

I decided to go with a favorite, In The Garden, as I thought about flowers often today.

I have to admit I awoke after just lying down to read for a few minutes about 4:30ish and really woke up with a start at 6PM! I was more tired than I thought. I had interrupted sleep all night, but I thought I could keep going. I did manage to make it to 4ish for the shoe company.

I slept into 7ish, but I woke at 6ish and was very tired and dizzy, so I slept another hour.

I was on my first status meeting at 8. I made breakfast while listen and left on the video. I think everyone wanted breakfast after that, a bagel with cream cheese and a banana, all with coffee.

This meeting was followed by meetings all morning on Zoom. The lack of sleep started to get to me a few times as some of the discussions were long on talk. I tried to pay attention and help. I also had some trailing emergency of the moment that seemed to be restarting from the previous day. I tried again to put them away.

I had some vendor patches to apply, but that broke as I need special authority. That was not forthcoming. I decided instead of lunch. I split my lunch with Corwin, Massaman Cury. Today is Corwin’s birthday. He went to the beach with a huge load of firewood for a great fire on the beach tonight. Today is an epic blood moon. I suspect, if the clouds are less, I will get quite a picture from Corwin about 1:30 Thursday morning.

I tried to do some coding of scripts for installing software today. I went back and reviewed what I had built in February. There may be a need for it soon.

And then Chrome took our my Nike laptop. It totally locked up, and nothing could fix it. I powered it off. It recovered the Chrome sessions and totally locked again. I then powered it down hard and restarted it again. Finally, Chrome detected a failure and offered to restart. I said, “No!” and my laptop lives again. Ugly!

Schwann’s came, that is why I woke up–the doorbell, and I got some cheese and bacon, potatoes skins for dinner, and other items for later. I made dinner and opened a can of peaches to share to go with the skins.

Susie and I ate dinner while watching the BBC news on PBS and then some of News Hour. We watched the news in the Middle East and the USA trying to deal with the first anniversary of George Floyd’s death. Already a year has passed.

I went back to painting tonight. Richard’s next faction I am painting is the squids. Not sure what they mean in the game, but they are nautical.

Washington Country, Oregon, where we live, is at a 55% vaccination rate.

It was reported that 669 people in the USA died from the virus today. Four of those people died here in Oregon.

After flipping through the Methodist Hymnal, I decided on I’m Gonna Sing When the Spirit Says Sing. I found this nice 2021 version.

Today we played Roll20, online Dungeons and Dragons 5E, as usual. One of our players, Matt, is leaving us as he is also our in-person DM. He will be focusing on his three re-starting in-person game. I am a player, currently a gnome wizard who sees dead people and specializing in charming.

I will be playing on Saturday night at a board game in Portland, and then Cory is hosting some board games on Sunday at his house. I am excited to be unlocking a bit and playing in person.

Oregon is about 50-60% vaccinated rate, and the infection rates are falling. We are also Oregonians, so we are mostly polite and follow the rules. Even when protesting, we have seen crowds socially distancing (!?).

Starting from the beginning this morning, I had only a few hours of sleep. Susie was up and down all night. I also had some caregiving to do, and that, combined with getting Susie out for her appointment with Zerida, meant I was not even dressed until almost eleven. No, the camera was not on for the Zoom meetings–me in my robe and my hair looking so, Einstein.

Work was made more chaotic with a schedule change that put an upgrade no longer next month, but now. I began all the steps to prepare for a major process. It will take me a few days to get ready and prepare the system. Then, it will blow out as we discover issues. This is the practice upgrade and is full of learnings and surprises. Often I have to work India and USA hours then. It can be hard on me.

Lunch, as I was ill over the weekend from a Popeye’s Spicy Chicken sandwich, was lamb kabobs (protein!) from Gyro House. So good! Not cheap, but perfect when you are running slow.

I did not do my walk or organizing the house as I needed to get dressed. It is silly when you have to plan when to fit in brushing your teeth!

I was managing a few crises of the moment and trying to prep for the upgrade.

I managed to slip out at about 4ish, after one more Zoom meeting, to buy groceries. We are were out of milk, and I picked up a few favs for breakfast for Susie.

I baked some breakfast sausages and made scrambled eggs with cheddar cheese for dinner. I even buttered the toast to go with it. Susie loved it. She had a rough night too, and so I wanted her to have a nice dinner, even if it is breakfast for dinner.

I took a few minutes to finish my book and started the next in the series, Blood Curse. I strongly recommend the Commissario Ricciardi series crime novels. Set in 1930s Italy and a mix of crime and ghosts and fate. Makes me want to write more Howard stories; I love good stories and writing!

You may wonder how I keep going when I am so tired, and things are so chaotic. I read good stories when taking a short break and listening to Opera (Carmen’s Toast to the bullfighters and Rigoletto song about love is a butterfly and more). I sing along in very poor Italian.

Turning to more pleasant thoughts, one of my other roses is in full bloom, and the next one is starting.

We are playing the Candlekeep Mysteries for Dungeon & Dragons in Roll20 this evening, as I covered before. This is prepared material from books published by the makers of D&D. It comes with color pictures and nice maps. The text is well organized to allow the players and DM to move quickly through the material. Tonight was mostly combat despite the book theme of the adventures. This was a bit of a surprise for the players. They were expecting mysteries and book stories. So far, the high-level items in this set of been working for us.

I hope you forgive me for stopping here. I usually count deaths. Not tonight.

Instead of a hymn, my song that keeps me going: Toréador, en grade. Computer Architect work sometimes seems to fit this song.