Back to Late

Almost 1 am when I sat down to write this. As planned I slept in. Had turned off the alarm before I went to sleep, and despite Spook attacking my feet under the quilt at about 6 am, when I looked at the clock when I finally really woke up it said 10:55. It's a clock/weather guage, and it also said it was 75° outside. After yesterday's cold rain, I was planning on wearing jeans, but kept to the shorts and Hawaiian shirt instead.

Switched up my routine and went straight to the kitchen and the hgl meter, took my meds and shot up the day's regular insulin then checked the PC backup & email before doing my morning toothbrush exercise & decontamination procedure.

The email check was much shorter than it had been, I had deleted all the Thailand RSS feeds, since it is clear the country is hopeless as a place to retire to or even visit in the near future. Democracy is dead there.

No breakfast or lunch, finished reading Life on the Mississippi which has 4 appendices, one of which is a business report not worth reading.

Watched a tiny bit of football, then about 4 pm got into the car and drove downtown. Lovely 85 degree day, light breeze, so I walked my pre-employment Ingress route, hacking a lot of portals, capturing two and linking them and making three fields. I still don't have any level 8 resonators.

This route was full of children when Pokemon mobile first came out, there were lots of kids in the plaza but no one was interested in that game anymore. Parents probably locked down the data feeds, there is no open wi-fi downtown. There was supposed to be free county-wide but it never made it to Sunnyvale.

The north half of the portals done, walked to Starbucks, which had plenty of free spaces, and a lot of pretty butts in yoga/track/exercise pants. And some short-shorts. The fitness center next door was in full swing.

After Facebooking, I fired up the Kindle app on the laptop and started my next read, Tales of the City by  Armistead Maupin. The City is San Francisco, and from what my local friends tell me, it is practically required reading. I like his style, and his City chauvinism seems to equal or exceed that of Herb Caen. After one chapter, I'm hooked.

After finishing my iced mocha and butter croissant, which took the trainee cashier far too long to get right, most of the eye candy was gone, and I was done listening to the mid-20-ish man who lives in the new yuppie apartments upstairs flirting with the Indian coed, I Ingressed the south side of the neighborhood, which includes the train station and has had a bogus portal added. It's a food stand by the station, which doesn't exist. It might balance out the one portal in the north side which has disappeared. The south side has all the restaurants with the outdoor tables, and there were so many pretty women.

That took me back to the plaza, where an inflatable movie screen had been set up, several large porta-potties plopped into place, and people were beginning to stake out their lawn chairs. Lego Batman was not due to start for a couple of hours, and I wasn't interested in seeing it amongst all those screaming children, so after it was clear there was no eye candy to be seen, I went back to the car and drove home.

Fired up Tivo, and watched college football live. Stanford/UCLA, UW/CO, OR/AZ. Easy to flip between them, Tivo was supposed to have recorded the UW game, don't know what happened there. Happy to see UW walk all over CO in the second half, and Stanford did a good job on UCLA, though it was a lot closer since they lost their QB in the first quarter.  Oregon lost, thanks to poor execution in the final minutes.

Dinner was smoked turkey drumstick, corn on the cob, cole slaw. Lactaid caramel ice cream with magic shell and sprinkles and cherries for dessert. Apple turnover for dessert chaser.  I had put the turnovers, as instructed, into a 475° oven and immediately turned it down, as instructed, to 400. Somehow, when I plucked their slightly singed bodies out of the oven, it was set to 450. Need to remember to put on my glasses.

Speaking of which, at Starbucks I went online at 39dollarglasses.com, and ordered two new pair of computer glasses with .5 diopter increase in magnification. I mostly need the increase at work.

Social Security made it into my bank account yesterday, so today that went to pay down the credit card I'd used on all my pre-Helsinki charges. I paid off the Helsinki charges (another card) when I got back from Worldcon.

In the park slot was the rent bill. My electric bill for the month was $185, mostly for air conditioning. It was a very hot month. Printed a check, and will hold onto it till next Saturday.

Spook played with the feather-on-a-string toy with me, and hopped up on the sofa with me to let me brush her for a bit. So I grabbed her and trimmed her claws. She doesn't like it at all, and her thick fur makes it hard to see where her nails are.

Plans for tomorrow:
Sleep a little less in . Maybe 9.
BestBuy&Beyond, exchange a sodastream cartridge, meet Janice at the nearby Starbucks at 5

Forgotten Already

Missing from the previous report was the gardening news. I spent about an hour after sunset cutting back the huge salvia bush (too many bees to do it in the daytime) and while I was in Destructo mode, I pulled out the gone to seed oregano (which smelled great, but the leaves are too small to harvest properly) and as much of the mint as I could get to, which was a lot, but not nearly all of it. I may need to revisit that when it's light out.

I watered all the outdoor plants, completely Senior Momented the indoor ones.

Way Too Tired

Nodded off twice in front of the TV today, despite a good night's sleep. Okay, maybe I should have gone to bed earlier. Hgl was far from low all day, so that's not the reason.

Spook helped wake me up at about 9, then curled back up in her doggie bed in the bedroom.

Breakfast was the last 4 house brand chocolate waffles, toasted. One less big box cluttering up the freezer door slots.

Football was sad today. Watched the Seahawks struggle against themselves, then the Raiders got skinned in DC. Love the Redskins cheerleaders' outfits, not so much the overdressed Raiders cheer gals. Seagals have also covered up a lot, but the Titan babes are in dresses, even more stuffy.

As promised. I went outside in daylight and pulled a lot more mint plants. There is a verbena bush which is overgrowing a lavender bush, and mint is growing under the combined pair. I got most of it, but the vines are thick. I do want new mint to pop up from the torn-out plants. Mint dries up and gets useless after it has gone to seed - while it is flowering the honey bees love it, so I had to wait till that cycle was done. Maybe I will move the lavender over to the other end of the carport garden, there's a spot between the two salvia plants. The overgrown salvia looks a lot better now, and there is still plenty for the pollinators.

I sat out on the porch for about an hour, sipping on lime soda and watching the hummingbirds not drinking from the feeders very much. I think the lavender food coloring may be confusing them. I thought it would be a magnet, since it's the color of the salvia flowers they love so much. So as a control, I dug out an old feeder with a 2-cup capacity and filled it with clear sugar water. Same proportions as the others. No takers that I saw, but didn't go out at dusk the check. Maybe tomorrow.

BB&B - exchanged a sodastream cartridge and bought one each of syrups - diet cola, diet root beer and diet ginger ale. I had a least one of each already, but they were on sale for $1 off (25%).

Starbucks, half an hour early, snagged a table outside, it was about 80° and a nice breeze. Laptopped until Janice showed up.** She had a lot of news, just returned from a trip to Germany & whatever country has the little mermaid statue. She was visiting a guy I'd met a few times before who had inherited a house in Germany from a widow, somehow. When I met him years ago, he thought the road to world peace with his non-profit, which would use Hummers to deliver laptops to children in third world countries. Because nothing says Peace like a Hummer. Even more puzzling because he was a Navy/Marine aviator at one time. In other news, she is a Red Cross volunteer, but hot & humid doesn't work for her, and the Montana fires are already full up with volunteers. So she'll probably be home for a while.

Bad "too soon" joke of the week - The Wall would be shaken down in a week.

**looked up the printing company which does my calendars, hoping they could print board-mounted photos for display (planning my Worldcon art exhibit for next year) but they don't. Costco does, but I don't want to re-join just for that. I think I saw CVS or Rite Aide photo department does, need to check their web sites.

Home, Dinner was - wait, don't tell me, it will come to me -started with cole slaw, then a container of Safeway house brand clam chowder with Ritz crackers. Apple turnover a la mode.

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Politics & sports: I have a problem with kneeling during the Star Spangled Banner. No, I'm not a fan of the military, I did my national service in the Peace Corps. And having had to stand for the national anthems of two other countries I lived in, it's not about patriotism, it is about courtesy and respect.

Yeah, everyone has a right to free speech, on their own time, but hey, those athletes are at work. Save it for when you're not at work, and not in a uniform representing your work. I disagree with the coaches who won't draw that line.

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Plans for tomorrow:
Work (hopefully the over the weekend test ran okay)