Wednesday 08/30/2023

Did I mention my left big toe was painful last week? I don’t think so, it subsided in a day. Last night my right big toe had its turn. It was painful enough that I couldn’t go for a walk this morning. About 4pm it eased up and I took a short walk down to Pardee park, just a 1.5 mile round trip.

Nothing was on the schedule for today, other than to pay a couple of bills, and then sit down and get serious about writing. Get serious means, sitting up at my desk with the big iMac instead of slouched in a chair with the laptop. But damn. It’s tough. I have attractive characters and an interesting situation. I have written maybe 8 short chapters, and those, read in isolation, are highly competent writing. Good dialogue, colorful prose. But there’s no story. I know what should happen for the first maybe half of the plot but then I can’t see how to pull it together into any kind of satisfactory conclusion.

I turned to my current favorite among the chatbots, Claude. He listed a number of websites for writers, two of which it turns out, I already have logins at. I last used them back in ’21 and had more or less forgotten about them. So I spent the evening building up “credits” by doing critiques of other people’s writing at Critique Circle. I would have spent the time at Scribophile, which I remember was more helpful, but it now says “You have used up your Basic Membership.” Pay $89 for a year of premium. I could afford it, but I’m offended.

Full moon tonight, colored orange from smoke.

Tuesday 08/29/2023

Did the gym machine round. Afterward I felt tired and took a nap. Not sure what was up. Then the writers meeting, for which I had nothing to contribute. After lunch I felt normal so went down to FOPAL for 2 hours of sorting.

For a week I’ve had Joe’s old 2014 iMac on my kitchen table, waiting for a copy of the newest version of MacOS that supports this antique, “Catalina” aka MacOS 10.15. I ordered a copy of that on a USB stick from a guy on ebay. It came today and I just finished installing it. All up and working. And now it says, “would you like to upgrade to Big Sur (version 11)?” Well, I didn’t think this machine could run that, but if you say so, heck, sure. So now it is into another hours-long upgrade process.

Monday 08/28/2023

A nice quiet Monday. Took a standard walk in the morning. Then did 2.5 hours at FOPAL, pricing a huge mess of donations. 4.1 miles for the day!

My weight having been at my target level (165) for nearly a week, today was the day I allowed myself an indulgence I haven’t had in over a year, a chocolate-chocolate shake at the Peninsula Creamery. I invited neighbor Edie to go along. Had a pleasant dinner.

Sunday 08/27/2023

Usual Sunday morning. About 9:30 walked over to University avenue for the Arts Festival. When this was last held in 2019, I purchased a hand-woven woolen blanket for my then brand-new bed at Channing House. Recently I had gotten it down and put it on the bed again. So when I spotted the same hand-woven blanked booth I could tell the proprietor I had slept under one of his blankets last night. He was very pleased.

It was a good arts festival, lots of quality art and other stuff on display. I began to spot shapes and such, so I made a little collection of abstract photos.

I saw that Tom Rigney was going to perform on one of the music stages, so I came back at 2pm to listen. He’s a cajun-style fiddle player, usually with a larger band, but here with just a piano player. They were pretty good. Fun to listen to.

Saturday 08/26/2023

In the morning I modified the Country & Western video I had made. One of the segments is old TV video of Patsy Cline singing “Crazy”. Joanne thought the audio was not up to par, and wanted me to use the audio from a CD she had of Patsy Cline’s greatest hits. Sigh. So I ripped the CD into the computer, and took the audio of that track and used it to replace the audio track that came with the YouTube video. Juggled the timing around so the words on the new recording pretty much matched up with Patsy’s mouth moving–can’t be perfect because she didn’t phrase the song the same way every time, but it matches well enough.

(Actually, now I look at the original video, it isn’t properly synced itself! I don’t think the audio in that video is from the TV show, I think somebody patched in her singing from a different record. So I replaced one phony audio track with another one.)

Then I had to do the steps to finish the video. First, iMovie export to a file, that takes 45 minutes. Then use Handbrake (wonderful piece of freeware) to compress it to 1/10th the size that iMovie makes, another 45 minutes. Then use MetaDoctor Pro (an app I bought) to install the chapter markers on it. That step at least is quick.

At 1pm I left for the museum to lead the 2pm tour. I don’t know, I was off today or something. I had one woman that was really riveted by my talk, really into it, and maybe 6 others who were attentive throughout, but quite a few of the starting group of 20 or so, drifted away.

Anyway, had a nice supper with Patty and Jean and Martha.

Friday 08/25/2023

Took the standard walk in the morning. Last night, during the time I would normally be watching TV and playing games on my phone, I ended up re-reading the bits of the YA novel I have, and getting excited about it again. There’s good stuff there. So this morning instead of listening to a podcast as I walked, I talked to myself about the novel and mentally sketched another chapter.

Yesterday Joe, my grouchy 92 year old computer client, called to say he couldn’t get into Fidelity to check his stock. Naturally this is the fault of his new computer and since I installed it, my job to fix. I spent almost an hour trying to get his password reset, eventually spending 20 minutes on the phone with Fidelity customer service. It was a mess but we got it worked out.

Simultaneously I was asked to help Hannah install a DVD player. Why me? Because a month ago I advertised a free Blu-ray player on the house email list, known familiarly as CHBB. She had replied to ask for it, but was too late, so we had an email exchange about what Blu-ray she should buy. She then bought one, and her sister who lives nearby, came by to install it. Install is a big word for plugging it in and sticking the HDMI cable into the HDMI2 port on her TV. But after her sister left she couldn’t remember how to run it, so she put in a tech squad call, but specifically requested me. So I got to show her how to turn on the player and play a disc. As I was about to leave she asked, “So if something doesn’t work, can I call you?” and I very bluntly replied, “No.” She said, “OK, I call the tech squad.” “Yes, that’s right. Byeeeee.”

These two interactions left me feeling very frazzled. So I basically hid out in my room until it was time for the AV team meeting at 3pm. This was quite productive actually, we practiced running a zoom meeting using the big mobile TV with its Zoom Room box. The first 11th-floor event with a zoom component is coming up soon and the two people who will run it, Kass and David G., got good experience. Also did Alice, who is a very quick study.

I left the meeting with 3 action items to investigate, which I accomplished in about 20 minutes, and that was that. Tomorrow I do a docent tour, then Sunday is completely open — gotta think of something fun to do — and the following week is very light on obligations, too. That’s nice. I’m rather tired of obligations.

Thursday 08/24/2023

Was going to do the gym machines but found them in use by 2 other residents, so bailed on that. Tidied as usual for Wanda’s cleaning at 2, then drove to Shustek in Milpitas where I and Dave B. cataloged documents, something like 38 of them in the course of the day.

Returned just in time for the annual Resident-Board meeting, where Channing House finances are reviewed. We’re losing money but are on track to stop losing money next year, plans are in place, our auditors love us, etc. Then a reception with snacks.

Wednesday 08/23/2023

Took a short, 40 minute walk while my first load of laundry was running. Then finished the rest and then — deep breath — call up Joe to see how the new computer was working and if I could come down and try to make the screen more legible. For half an hour at least (felt like more) around 2am i was obsessing about this, and about what to do if this crochety dude was not happy.

But in fact he was very happy. Everything he normally does with the computer — he has a very limited repertoire of things that he habitually does every day — was working. I did go down and spent half an hour working over the settings in Firefox, Safari, and the MacOS system settings to make everything as visible and contrasty as possible. But that’s it, he’s settled, and out of my hair, and an enormous load off my mind.

After a chat with Dennis I headed down to FOPAL to sort for an hour. I’d have stayed longer but four other volunteers turned up and it was too crowded.

Later in the day I resolved a tech problem for my neighbor Edie — sensible and pleasant and constructive, like night and day.

After supper, on a whim, I played for myself Disc 1 of the two-disc set of The Fellowship of the Ring. It holds up; a very well-made movie.

Tuesday 08/22/2023

Did the round of gym machines. Then did “managing” for most of the morning: scheduling a meeting of the AV group for Friday. Making sure that the people I hoped would attend, would be able to attend. Emails. Booking the use of the 11th floor.

Writers meeting. Cue was “time of great happiness” or something like it. I had nothing, actually there were fewer pieces than usual. I couldn’t pick out a particularly happy time in my life. Not that I’ve been unhappy, just no special high points.

The whole afternoon was devoted to installing Joe’s new iMac. This is a pain in the butt. However I involved myself in this and I have to see it through. I don’t want to go into it. But it was a hard day all around.

Monday 08/21/2023

Started the day with the standard walk. (Excuse me while I check my phone: oh, 3.7 miles for the day, yay me. No wonder I was tired in the afternoon.)

Then it was time for the monthly Events Committee meeting, where everybody who sponsors or organizes events meets to make sure nobody is stepping on anybody else’s dates and like that. Nobody was. Finished in an hour, nearly a record.

Down to FOPAL where I found 6 boxes of donations and spent 2+ hours sorting and pricing and shelving. I may go down another day this week, probably Wednesday. There is a big backlog for sorting and Janette has been sending out “please sign up to sort” emails.

Back home I sat down and relaxed and immediately passed out in an hour-long nap. Had dinner in my room for the first time in a while. I like the flexibility of being able to order for carry-out off the regular dining room menu.