My Head Hurts

But first, another random memory.
In high school I had a crush on M, a flute player. I must have blurted something like that out to her, she took it as a request for a date, and she chose for us to meet at a local park's tennis court. I had no idea how to play tennis, and it was a very meh date. Thinking back, the reason she chose tennis may have been that I used to keep a tennis racket in my locker, and on days when I didn't want to go straight home after school I would take it out and my excuse for being home late is I was playing tennis with my friend Sam Archer. Online class lists say there was no such person. I guess he was my Bunbury.

We never dated again, but when I went off to college, I wrote long romantic letters to her, way too many, way too often. I mentioned how I would like her to model for me (portrait photos) and she sent me a small framed copy of her class photo. Kind of missed the point. Eventually she would return to sender the letters unopened.

In high school, M had the hots for T,  a trombone player, and she confided in me that her plan was to get pregnant by him at the prom. He was engaged to someone, but M's plan was to lure him away for a few minutes on the excuse that she wanted a ride on his new Honda motorcycle. "You meet the nicest people on a Honda" was their marketing slogan at the time.

FF to a year later. I was home for the summer, walking up the block from the bus stop to the family castle, and there was M coming out of one of the small apartments across the street. She invited me in, and caught me up. Her nefarious plan went like clockwork, T gave her that motorcycle ride, then that other ride, and M spent the last 6 months in the home for wayward women up the street. T signed paternity papers and the baby was put up for adoption. She was sharing her apartment with R, who had escaped her guardian in Idaho twice in two years, pregnant each time. Unlike M, R loved having her picture taken, and I always had my camera with me back then. M left us alone to go shopping, and by the time she got back I had a roll of nudes of R and a roll in the hay as well. For the rest of the summer R would invite me over when M was away. M was not too pleased that we'd been intimate, because the reason R was living with M was on the theory that M would act as Big Sister and keep R out of trouble. By the end of the summer, R was sent back to Idaho, never to be heard from again.

Many years later M had gotten married and moved to Alaska. I have no idea where she is now, she was listed as "lost" on our 50th reunion email.

My Head Still Hurts

Up on time, out almost on time, took the exit before mine to bypass the long slow line of traffic, and that worked. It is more roundabout but seems faster.

Grabbed a banana & egg & sodas and went to The Hole. Set up my next project, but when I updated the firmware it bricked the machine. I had a USB drive to recover it to an earlier version, but had to ask the engineer next door for directions - the ones on the web site were wrong.

11:45 in the car and drove to the shoreline lakeside bistro to meet Candace, who had been my contract rep when I first got to Google. She has since moved to a better job at a better company. I had sent her my resume, she fixed it up so it was easier to browse, keeping all the good stuff in. Great conversation, a lot about photography - she is a good photographer but wants to learn more, even about film and manual settings. She needs a zoom lens. My to do list is to send her info on where to get a negative scanner (I have a nice hand-held one) and maybe B&W film developer kits.

Back to the Hole, They had added two more folders of data and about 15 more steps.

Got that going, and it asked to scan the antenna for channels, but I did not have the tuner plug-in card. Got one from next door, but now the machine doesn't think there is one. Reset to factory settings and went to Hole 2 for our final conference call with Asia Twerp.

He messed up big time - told us he was sending 50 TVs to us to distribute around for ad hoc testing. There is no way we have space for 50 TVs. After some interrogation, he realized it was only 12 TVs, 50-inch model.

I'd started the wheels moving with facilities to move my stuff Friday between 2 and 5:30, so after the meeting I grabbed some boxes and the already-printed stickers with my name and new location to put on them and on TVs & such.

Back to the Hole, the test machine still doesn't see the tuner. :-(

I filled one box with assorted cables and set-top boxes and an antenna. And I put all my personal stuff in my backpack. That will go home with me Friday. Friday morning I'll fill another box with the contents of my little under-desk cabinet, and another with the A/V receiver and its speakers. And one more with assorted other stuff.

Home, delivered were the box of sharpies and medium point dry erase markers. Those were in the mailbox along with the replacement temp sensor, which I actually won't need after Friday. By the front door was a box with the pair of big bottles of Hershey's syrup. Spot, of course, rushed outside. He likes the catmints which are ground cover for the roses.

Dinner was a piece of steak and some marinated artichoke hearts and the last of the mint moose track ice cream.

The rest of the blood tests came in, all within range. Kidney one was better than the last two times. Cardiologist is puzzled. I need to reply to her - she wanted to know if my water retention was due to an increase of salt in my diet, and that's a definite no.

Watched PTI and Happy Hour. Leaving two other items on Tivo for now. Looking forward to Saturday, I have a ticket for the SF Giants game, for the Barry Bonds jersey retirement. Lots of big names will be there, but since I am sitting behind where Barry used to play in the outfield, I may not get much in the way of recognizable photos. The ceremonies start at 5, the game at 6, I will probably have to leave before it's over to catch the train home.

Which reminds me, I need to check the balance on my Clipper card.

Plans for tomorrow:
Work
Sync with Boss, NP and replacement Boss (Boss is on vacation starting next week)
Home