Plan today was to attend a concert by the Keller Sisters at the San Gregorio General Store. Originally several people were planning to carpool, but all of them dropped out except Joanne, so this turned into our little outing together. I didn’t plan it that way but it pleased me no end.
So off we went for a nice drive over the mountain through the redwoods on a beautiful spring day. The concert was excellent. We were back by 2:30 or so.
In the afternoon, looking around Reddit (I used to spend 30-60 minutes a day keeping up with Reddit, but these days it’s more like a couple times a week), I found a post about a new novel writing tool with AI integration. It’s written in Python using PyQt, which is a platform I am very used to having written a couple of apps using those tools myself. So I spent a couple of hours installing it and giving it a bit of a test, and writing some notes for the author.
Main activity today was to lead a tour at the museum. This was a private tour for 15 Apple employees. I asked them what their group did, the answer was “chips”. So I guess they were somehow working on the Apple silicon, either CPUs like the M4 (my M4 Mini is supposed to arrive on the 15th) or the new Apple modem chip. Or who knows. Anyway, hardware.
Because it was a private tour I wasn’t constrained to come in under an hour. On the other hand, since this was a bunch of people working in hardware, I didn’t need to spend any time on what is a transistor, and what is an integrated circuit, or Moore’s law. Just the same, when I parted from them and checked my watch, a bit over 90 minutes had passed. But they were fine with that.
In the afternoon I practiced music for another 90 minutes. And spend some time reading Fei Fei Li’s book, The Worlds I See. She is interweaving the story of her growing up in China and then as a high school student with limited English, in New Jersey, with the story of the development of artificial intelligence research. Nice book.
Nothing much planned for this day. I spent an hour diagramming how I will connect all the various cables of the new computer when it arrives. Yesterday I realized that I have bought a 5K monitor, but that the Mac Mini only supports up to 4K over HDMI. To go to higher resolution it uses its Thunderbolt ports. So I ordered a well-reviewed thunderbolt to displayport cable.
Anyway. I also went down to the auditorium and tested both our “AV” laptops, the new Dell and an antique but still functional MacBook, making sure that both can function as either a zoom host or a zoom attendee. Then I did some reorganizing in the AV cabinet backstage and found a couple of bulky boxes that haven’t been touched in a long time. One was a mish-mash of Radio Shack wireless mics and matching receivers. They were all made obsolete for us when our sound system was remodeled in 2020. So I pulled them out and will recycle them somehow.
Played some guitar, read a book. Quiet asocial day.
Started the day with a standard walk, with the addition of Joanne’s company, which makes it an event, not mere exercise. Then I worked on the new AV PC. Since none of my crew jumped up to set it up, I decided to do it myself. When I was done it was very nice, if I do say so. You log in as the user named CHAV and immediately all the things you need for zoom hosting are right there.
After lunch I edited the fourth video, completely clearing out all pending events. Well, there will be another recorded tonight.
Also in the afternoon the desk called, I had a couple of large packages in the deliveries. I picked them up and opened them, and I now have all the pieces of my new computer — except for the computer.
5TB backup drive, mouse, keyboard, trackpad, and 27 inch monitor with webcam
That’s after unwrapping everything. Which created a large pile of packaging.
At dinner David G asked, “you have a webcam for zoom, fine, what are you doing for a microphone?” Excellent question, DG. I hadn’t given it a thought. I need to add a USB microphone. That brings up the whole matter of, where do all these cables plug in? There are USB-A and USB-C ports on the back of the monitor, and USB-C ports on the Mac Mini, and I have a USB hub with five more USB-A ports… I need to think this out, make a diagram, plan for neat cable dress. Tomorrow.
Tidied up for housekeeping. Then paid a bill and did the monthly accounting. And resumed editing the event video I started last night. This is not a difficult process. A Zoom cloud recording gives me two useful videos, one the view from our cameras, the other the speaker’s shared content, slides or whatever. I stack them in iMovie, the slides on top. Then I chop away the slides to reveal the speaker behind the podium. When they say, “And this shows” and turn toward the screen, I cut back to the slides for ten seconds. I also cut out long pauses, and breaks when they couldn’t advance their slides, and boring questions from the audience… It takes about 2 hours to finish editing a one-hour lecture. So I got the first one done before it was time for the writers meeting. For which I had nothing, and Dr. Margaret scolded me. Fair enough, I deserved it.
After lunch I edited two more events, so that’s three for the day. Around those tasks I worked on a stupid PC. Well, they are all stupid. This is a nice new Dell laptop that the IT department bought for the AV team to use for Zoom hosting. But somebody has to make sure it is updated and has all the needful software. I tried to pass this to my team, three of whom are more familiar with Windows than I am. But one was sick, and one is busy, and blah blah. So I started on the job myself.
Ran the only AV event in March that I am signed up for. That was the First Monday Book Talk, a morning event. The speaker was Miriam Freedman whose book is a biography of her mother, who was a Channing House resident back around 2005. Interesting story. I didn’t screw up the AV and got a decent recording, so that was alright.
Then off to FOPAL to process 6 boxes of books and tidy up my section because the monthly sale is next weekend.
Got back about 3:30, just in time to make the 4pm meeting of the Poetry Out Loud group that Joanne organizes. It’s a pleasant meeting.
After supper I started the process of editing one video, then set it aside. Tomorrow.
Sunday morning stuff. Then out early to go lead the 12pm tour at the museum. Early because I went first to Safeway to buy a couple things. Then to the Cal. ave street market just for fun. Then down to the museum. Smallish tour group, 14 or so at the start and 10 at the end.
Meanwhile I’d received a plea for help from Nancy who organizes the writers group. Her Macbook Air was doing odd things. It turned out to be a nearly new one, with the M2 chip. I had researched beforehand how to run the Apple diagnostics, but they reported “no issues”. Very shortly after that it had a kernel panic and rebooted. So all I could say was, take it to Apple.
Practiced my songs, including “Nobody Knows You”. I’m getting close to performing for a test audience.
Taxes! I have all my 1099’s and Realized Gain and Losses forms, so this morning I started filling out the accountant’s workbook. I had to break off at 10 to meet Stew and David G2 on the 11th floor. (Really we have too damn many David’s around here — it must have been THE most popular baby name in the 1940-1950 decade. This is David Green, as opposed David G1, Golden, not to be confused with David M. Morrison and David T. Thornton.) DG2 and Stew had compiled a playlist of 60s songs for the Good Times committee after-party tonight. DG2 had the songs on his laptop and we were to test the setup for sound.
That turned into a clusterfuck. I intended to connect his laptop to the hifi receiver in the TV lounge, from which we can put sound on speakers around the room. Except his laptop didn’t want to talk to the receiver. I went and got my own laptop, and it connected, no problem. But his wouldn’t and after half an hour of f’ng around I opted to go down to the auditorium and get one of our monitor speakers, bring it up and connect his laptop direct to that. Which finally worked.
After lunch I finished the tax workbook, uploaded all the files to the accountant’s Sharefile site, and emailed my rep at the firm. Taxes: done.
In the afternoon I practiced “Nobody Knows You” and made a clean song chart with the chords properly spaced to reflect how they change with the words of the lyrics.
Had dinner with Mary Andrew and John (sounds like a 70s folk group). Then off to the Good Times after-party. David G2’s playlist was very appropriate and sounded good. The committee chairs gave out award certificates to everybody and we all clapped. It was nice.
Started by taking the standard walk (2.4 miles) with Joanne for company. Stopped for coffee and a pleasant heart-to-heart chat.
Half an hour break and it was time for Line Dancing class. Then down to lunch, after which I set up for the monthly AV meeting. Three of our members individually sent regrets for one reason or another. However, everybody had picked events to do off the shared spreadsheet, so the five of us who showed chatted a little and broke up.
In the remaining afternoon, I did something I’d wanted to do for a while: learned the chords and rhythm for “Nobody knows you when you’re down and out” from this video.
I had been invited to a table with David M. and Karen, for the monthly Webster Street Grille. That’s where our Dining Services lays out a fancy meal–and I do mean fancy, five courses, each a plate with a pretty little serving in the middle — on the 11th floor. Anyway David and Karen had invited me, Hannah, Mable, and Joanne (quite coincidentally?) to join them so we did. Really a nice meal. Plus I think our chefs and servers enjoy practicing like a real restaurant. Lots of good conversation.
This morning I took on the large task of breaking the dragon-wing begonias up. As I’ve mentioned Marian planted these back around 2015, give or take, and they grew on our front porch until I moved here in 2019. The micro-climate of my balcony here is quite similar to our front porch on Tasso street, a couple of hours of sun each morning and then shade the rest of the day, and they have thrived. But after a decade they have gotten too big and pot-bound, so I wanted to split them up. I had forgotten that Marian carefully put a layer of shiny beach pebbles on top of the dirt. The pebbles aren’t shiny any more, but my first job was digging them out of the dirt where they were firmly embedded. Then I stabbed all around the edges with my highly professional tool, a table knife. And I was able to lift them out.
Then came the job of dividing the plant, which was not easy. There is a solid wood core under all those shoots. But I got it done, twice, and now two have become four.
I am wondering which of the four will thrive. Have I killed any? Probably all four will be fine. Later in the spring, when they have a big ball of foliage and start to bloom, I will give two away.
Later in the day I did an hour of music, then I sat down for a little work on my taxes. All my 1099’s are available, so I downloaded those, and I assembled a final spreadsheet of all my tax-deductible contributions. There’s nothing left to do except fill in the accountant’s workbook, which I expect to get done Saturday, I think.
For dinner I had set up a proper dinner with guests, specifically the Greene’s, relatively new residents, and me and Joanne. This is something other people do all the time, reserve a table in the dining room and invite guests, and bring wine, and you know, dine. I’ve only done it a few times, like lunch with Jean and Darlene a month back. So it was very nice. Joanne is extremely sociable and knows how to draw people out and keep a conversation going.
Codgerville 