Wednesday 09/30/2026

I wasn’t able to join the usual Wednesday hiking group because we docents were summoned to the Museum to be introduced to a new temporary exhibit.

The temporary exhibit is about Virtual Reality hardware, mainly fancy glasses but some other devices. There have been attempts at an immersive VR experience for a long time. The curators pulled about 100 examples from the collection and put them together for this.

After lunch I sat in the auditorium while Bert and IT guy Andrew experimented with the projector. Bert wanted to find a way to get our (very expensive top of the line) video projector to crop its image to half height. I stayed out of it. He’s welcome to screw around, as long as he puts things back the way they were. I left while they were trying to put things back but hadn’t quite. It better be right when I run an event.

At 5pm I went up to 11 where we had a special Webster Street Grille for prospects. The Marketing dept paid for this. A Webster St. Grille as I’ve described before, is a fancy restaurant-style meal. Ordinarily it costs $50 for a resident to partake but this was a freebie. There were ten tables and they had invited ten respectable residents like myself to be table hosts. So I made nice conversation with Jay and Sally and Margie, who are on the Advantage list (have paid a small deposit) waiting for the right apartment to open up, and Tom and <forgot her name> who have actually signed and paid for an apartment at Arris, the new satellite campus. They expect to move in, in December they hope.

Tuesday 09/29/2026

Just sixty-three days left in the Blog Year, burning down the wick on my eighth year of blogging. I shall write something profound for day 7.365. Sure.

Took an early-ish walk, 7:30, then sat down to write something for the group. And got completely side-tracked trying to sort out my own history. I often regret that I didn’t keep any sort of diary back in the 60s. There are isolated chunks of my life, associated with particular apartments and jobs, that I remember clearly, but this morning I went down a total rabbit-hole trying to establish when a particular memory, about which I wanted to write, occurred.

The one person who knew me during the period in question, John Snow, unfortunately has passed on. He would have been able to tell me exactly when I was anywhere in Seattle.

Writer’s meeting came and I had nothing. So I just listened and commented appreciatively.

After lunch I took a nap, and then, forgetting completely about the Line Dance class, decided to go and do my gym workout. Later on, Joanne texted “want to go for a walk?” and of course I did. So I racked up 5.1 miles for the day.

Monday 09/28/2026

Out at 8:30 to drive first to PAMF for my fall flu shot. I could get a flu shot from my new Concierge PCP, but unfortunately he cannot bill my UHC Medicare Advantage plan. PAMF can do that. So can my local CVS pharmacy, but PAMF sent an email, time to get your flu shot, so I went with them.

And then on to FOPAL where there were 9 boxes of books waiting. I got through them about 12:15, and came on home. Thinking as I came, you know, I could not do a normal 8-hour workday any more. Lunchtime and I’m pooped. (Dude, you’re old. Accept it.)

In the afternoon I did various things. Responded thoughtfully to some email threads. Oh, used Claude to make a spreadsheet for our shared car expenses. Remains to be seen if J. will be willing to use it.

Sunday 09/27/2026

Flashback to the Moonlight Walk of a couple days ago. I look like an idiot, as usual. Joanne looks cute, also as usual.

Normal Sunday morning; so nice to have a routine. Off at 10:30 for the museum to lead a private tour.

Tour was sort of a fiasco. Apparently Google has a deal with the Museum, they get two docent-led tours per year. This was to be one. Someone at Google told our person that they would have 32 people. So word went out, we need two docents for Sunday morning 11:30.

I got there at 10:45 and waited around. Then Dave Hoyt, another very experienced docent showed up, and we waited together. 11:30 passed, no Googlers. Then a woman with two kids showed up, said she was from Google, and “a couple” of others were coming “soon”.

We talked it over and obviously they don’t need two docents. Since I had signed up first, Dave Hoyt got to leave early. I hung around talking to the nice woman and her two well-behaved kids, about 5 and 7 I would guess. I had expected a group of high-powered tech types. But she worked in HR. And the ONE other person who showed up to join her was also clerical. So my big tour of tech types turned into a stroll around the exhibits with two women and 4 small kids.

I edited my talk on the fly to toss out a lot of more technical points and shorten things up so as not to stress the kids. We had a nice time and wrapped up in 45 minutes. But this was not best use of docent time for sure, and I made sure that the people behind the desk would register that fact with our tour bookers.

Quiet afternoon back home, playing with my computer. In the middle of the night I had decided to do a thing and now I did it. Over the last couple of years we have put on several “Good Times” shows with different kinds of music, most recently the Beatles, but C&W, early 60s, show tunes. For each show I made an elaborate video with music videos and lyrics. Those were sitting around on the drive and I wanted the space back, so yesterday I had moved all that stuff to the trashcan. But didn’t empty it.

In the night I realized, I have a way to back them up. In a drawer I have a box of writeable DVD discs, and I have a DVD burner. I haven’t burned a DVD in 8 years, but I still could. So this afternoon I pulled those videos out of the trash, burned them to a DVD, and stowed it away safely. Then I trashed them again and emptied the trash.

Saturday 09/26.2026

A day of little stuff. Well, did some research and bought a laptop that will do to replace Dennis’s old machine. No big improvement in features, but at least will run current Windows. Initially I drove down to Best Buy and confused myself thoroughly by looking at all the laptops laid out on counters. But all the feature details were spelled out in tiny font on little labels fixed to the counters and it was hard to get a picture of the different models. So I came home, got some advice about the appropriate HP model from my friend Claude, then shopped online.

Did some other making and mending around the house, did my round in the gym. Watched another lecture in the Great Courses sseries with Joanne. That’s about it for the day.

Friday 09/25/2026

Took an early muffin walk with Joanne. Got back before 9:30. Right at 9:30, Leah pulled up and I got in her car and off we went to Dennis’s place. He’d been having some computer problems, and since I am not good with Windows, I brought in Leah as a consultant. She and Dennis worked through some of his issues while I sat by and played with my phone 😉

At 5pm, I went downstairs and met with Joanne, Rob, Nancy, Prue and Lennie to car-pool to the annual Palo Alto Moonlight walk and run. Several thousand people participate, although this was my first time, and Joanne’s. The others had done it multiple times. Prue shot a picture of me and Joanne with the moon rising behind us, but I don’t have it yet. If it’s any good, I’ll post it here when she sends it. Meanwhile, here’s 2 pics I took.

5K is 3.1 miles. That plus the muffin walk in the morning gives me 5.2 miles for the day.

Thursday 09/24/2026

A day with nothing scheduled on the Google calendar app. Oooh, scary!

Took my standard walk. Later in the morning I did some gardening, cleaning out one old plant and potted a new one.

I took care of a long-standing issue. Back like 4 years ago toward the end of the Covid days, on behalf of the Resident Association I ordered a case of face masks. A big cardboard box with several dozen smaller boxes of N-95 masks. About 5 boxes got used. Then the cardboard carton sat on my deck and I ignored it.

Months ago I asked somebody on staff if they could use the masks. Sure, they said, leave them, I forget where they said. Anyway I didn’t do it, just left the carton on the deck. Well, today I got rid of the damn carton. Found another staff member, Alejandra, and got her permission to leave the carton in her office, and I went and got it and carried it down and left it. The masks are finally gone.

Did some reading, wrote some emails. Ate supper early. At 7 I will join Joanne in the auditorium to see a movie.

Wednesday 09/23/2026

Joanne had chosen not to lead a hike this week. Instead just we two took a local hike, walking down to the Edgewood Market for chai lattes and return (3.9 miles).

After lunch I did a little work for Scribble & Sketch. Jerry had an idea for a front cover showing Santa with a dog entering our new satellite, Arris. Point being, pets are allowed at Arris. He had generated a picture showing Santa with a large furry dog with a wreath around its neck and “antlers”. Joanne wanted a related picture for the back cover, so I used Midjourney to generate a similar dog, now lying on a lounge chair on a balcony with an eggnog.

Jerry wanted some changes, so I made them.

Tonight I ran the AV for a lecture by Iris Nemani, the artistic director of the Stanford Live arts program. She’s responsible for booking and scheduling dozens of performing artists who come through Stanford in a year. She gave quite an interesting talk.

Tuesday 09/22/2026

Laundry day, housekeeping day. I spent the morning tidying up and running the laundry. Then at 10, went to the auditorium for a presentation on dealing with dementia. The writers group had postponed its weekly meeting because several of us wanted to attend this one-time class.

One of the many resident-organized volunteer committees here is The Buddies. This is composed of residents who commit to frequently visiting a “buddy” who resides in the Lee center, that is, someone who needs assistive care. Some of those are at some stage of progressive dementia. The Buddies had asked for training on how best to interact with a buddy in that condition. Staff had organized this presentation by two women who had been in elder care for more than 30 years each.

The presentation was based around the “best friends” approach advocated in the book The Best Friends Approach to Dementia Care. A lot was stuff I had read at some point, but some were new and enlightening to me. Bottom line, you could say it’s all about taking extra effort to be a decent, caring human being.

Then I met with Bert and Kass to learn about the plan for the Appreciation Fund Kickoff. I am going to have to assist with the rehearsal, although Bert will run the actual show.

Joanne and I took a nice walk up to Town & Country to talk, go over our schedules for the upcoming days.

I ate a sandwich in my room and went to the 11th floor to prep the music and tv system there for the planned Contemporary Music Exposure meeting. And the stupid 11th floor TV would not talk to my computer. Piece of junk. People were starting to gather and I couldn’t get it to work. Bert came around but couldn’t think of anything helpful either. So I said, let’s go to the auditorium. Then somebody said, Tuesday night, they’ll be showing a movie. So I said, ok, cancelled. Then Marcia called from the auditorium — no movie tonight, come on. So I and all 25 people who had come for the event went on downstairs and I set up there.

And we listened to all of Arianna Grande’s new album, Petal. Which I don’t think anybody liked. I certainly didn’t. The music production was boring and simple-minded, just synthesizer chords and percussion. And her lyrics were not great either. One person said, If I was her mother I’d be heartbroken, this is a girl in mental trouble.

Anyway I have learned my lesson, future CMX’s will be in the auditorium. I had resisted that, wanting the more intimate group setting upstairs, but the equipment is not to be relied on, and the whole think worked fine downstairs.

Monday 09/21/2026

I have been waiting for the equinox, promising to do a couple of things. Of course I just assumed it was 9/21 like usual, but on ho, it’s 9/23. Don’t care. This morning I changed my bedding, putting the light wool blanket away and bringing out my feather duvet, which hasn’t been on the bed in a long time, also changing the throw on the back of the couch for a slightly different look, and–drum roll please–turned my mattress. AND tomorrow I start wearing long-sleeve shirts after a long summer of wearing polos.

The a standard walk, back in time for the monthly 10:30 am EvCo meeting. IT Czar Jean Tinant presented the future resident platform, Cubigo, to the group of people who put on events. I’d heard about Cubigo at ResTech meetings, but this was the first time he had showed it to normal (non-techie) residents. Also he showed us what the screen in the new elevators will look like. Which is pathetic, 13×7 inches, half the area taken up with logos and floor numbers, about a playing-card size space for any kind announcement or info.

Back to my room after lunch and had a visit from Leah, talking about a special project I want her to take on.

In between and all around, I finished preparing the video of our Beatles party the other night. I can’t put the link here because it is full of copyrighted music. But I sent the link to the people who performed so they could see themselves.

And at 4 it was time for Rhonda’s monthly open meeting, at which she presented a new plan for dining services. They have entered into a “partnership” with Unidine corp. All our dining services employees will move to be employed by Unidine. Many supposed advantages will flow from this, we are told. We’ll see.