Monday 11/06/2023

The hummingbirds have finally gone away, or almost. After a week of heavy consumption last week, refilling the jar two or three times a day, suddenly there’s only one bird coming by and the juice lasts more than a day. I never posted my nice hummer shot here, did I.

It was like that for a couple of weeks. Now, nothing.

Also, yesterday when I went over to the California Ave. market, I spotted a parking space and pulled into it, and only when I got out did I notice the coincidence.

Same make and year and color (not the same model, the other one isn’t a plug-in), and license plates only 47 apart, 6VHU068 and 6VHU115.

Took a standard walk first thing. Then down to FOPAL where I spent 2:30 processing a shit-ton of books and getting my section all tidy for the sale next weekend.

Spent some time on guitar practice, but the news there is, I finally got time for a tete-a-tete with Mary to find out why and how exactly she wants me to perform. Her concept is there will be a general revue or showcase of everyone around here who plays anything. A relaxed post-holiday party in the lobby on 12/27. There will be a cello duo, a flute duo, piano and so on. Different people showing what they know. So I said, “So only one song?” Oh, no, at least two, maybe three. But things people might sign along with. So I am going to focus on that.

“Puff the Magic Dragon” was one I had suggested earlier and she liked it. Unfortunately I am finding that one just brutal to play. It has a really pretty chord sequence, G – Bminor – C – G – C – G – Eminor. Which if you play it right, gives you a lovely descending scale in the bass (listen). But the first G has to be a barre chord, stopping all six strings at the third fret, then smoothly down to all six strings at the 2nd fret for the Bminor. And my poor left hand just is having a hell of a time doing that, repeatably. So possibly I may give up and start with Malvina Reynolds’ “Sing Along” which is fun to sing and to play.

Other than that one, “This Land Is Your Land” is easy to play, but I would want to have all the verses memorized. Finish with “Jambalaya” which is super easy to play, only 2 chords.

Sunday 11/05/2023

This was fall-back Sunday, the day after the time shift. So of course I was up “early” i.e. t the same time as yesterday but now that was 5am. After the usual sunday chores and a little guitar practice it was — not quite 9am. So to pass some time I hopped in the car and drove over to the Cal ave street market. It was jumpin’, very crowded and cheerful.

Back for lunch than set up the auditorium so the Appreciation Fund committee could rehearse. The what now? OK. Like probably all senior residences, tipping, or indeed any kind of gifting to the staff, is forbidden. However, it is a long-standing tradition that each fall the residents hold a campaign to get everyone to write a check to the Appreciation Fund. The total is then divided into equal checks and given to the staff at the annual Employee Holiday Party. Pretty much everyone kicks in. Last year as I recall there were a very few hold-outs and certain generous donors wrote checks in the names of those people. The suggested donation this year is $1200, which seems rather paltry when you divide it by 365 and realize that at that rate, you are tipping at just over 3 bucks a day across all the staff, housekeeping, dining services, everybody. My check each year has been rather larger than the minimum ask — although still a bargain compared to daily tipping in a nice hotel, say.

Anyway the drive for the Appreciation Fund is managed by the A. F. Committee who are always trying to outdo last year’s committee. The rehearsal today was to practice for an event this Tuesday. Silly songs and skits.

Saturday 11/04/2023

Only scheduled activity today was to lead the 2pm tour at the CHM. Unusually, there was a private tour scheduled to start at 1:30. Ordinarily that would be no problem; half an hour of headway should be plenty. Unfortunately the docent who led that group — someone I don’t know, named Jim Holtman — was very slow and talky. So when I led my group toward the first stop, there he was still talking, half an hour after he started. And the rest of the way, I was having to constantly stop and stall, riffing about things I normally don’t cover, waiting for the preceding group to move on. I ordinarily finish the 2pm tour at 2:55, in plenty of time to send my group off to see a live demo that starts at 3:15. This time it was 3:10 before I could finish. Holtman was still yakking to his group out in the lobby at 3:15, almost 2 hours after he started. He seemed to be holding their attention all that time, I have to give him that.

Well anyway, quiet day otherwise. I walked out in the morning to enjoy a sinfully large almond croissant at Madame Collette’s coffee place.

I am seriously questioning the time and effort I am putting into guitar. What am I going to do with it? Am I going to perform for others? I have been kinda shaping toward that, trying to put together a little set list of songs I wouldn’t be ashamed to do in semi-public. But do I really want to? And if so, when and how often? Or is this just for my private fun — and if so, am I enjoying it?

I meant to take advantage of the fact that Mary, the choir director who informed me that I would perform “in late December”, eats dinner about the same time. I meant to go down and sit with her and have a heart-to-heart about this. However, at the elevator I met my neighbors Leon and Margaret, who immediately invited me to sit with them, and how could I turn that down? So… later.

Friday 11/03/2023

First day in a long time with nothing at all in the google calendar. Took a walk, worked on the novel, played some guitar. Somehow it passed very quickly.

Thursday 11/02/2023

Going back to yesterday, I’m always taking pictures and forgetting to post them, here’s the view of Andrew Binder, the police chief, addressing us, as seen from the A/V desk.

So many screens, huh? From right to left, a monitor showing the views from our two cameras and which one is selected. A screen showing the output of the Zoom Room PC, the image from our center camera. Below it my Macbook, being the Zoom host. The small one is an iPad that controls the Zoom Room software. In the center an iPad that controls all the hardware.

So this morning I edited the video for End of Life session 4. That I had recorded directly to disk from the video switcher (out of frame on the right). It takes an hour or so to edit a 90 minute video when it’s simple, no slide show. Just go through it and snip out any empty pauses while people are shuffling their microphones around or whatever. Then iMovie takes half an hour to process it to make a movie file. Then I run it through another app, Handbrake, to compress it further. Then I upload it to Vimeo and when that’s done, send the link to various people.

I went out to buy more hummingbird sugar at 10:30, while the Macbook ground away in iMovie export. On return I checked and it was time for the 6th floor to come down for the flu shot clinic. Except when I went down, they didn’t have my name on the list. I am dead sure I did sign up for it, but somehow I got lost. No problem, they could take me after the scheduled shots later.

So back to my room and edited the video from Chief Binder’s talk. That was recorded in the cloud by Zoom, so I had to download it first. Then same deal, into iMovie and trim the beginning and end and any gaps during. Export, compress, upload. All done for lunch, then down to get my shot.

Afternoon I played guitar and cleaned the apartment, then out to let Wanda do her thing. Wanda, our highly valued 6th floor housekeeper, just got her U.S. citizenship, and we are all congratulating her.

I went down to supper and for the first time in a long time, I was displeased. There was nobody I wanted to sit with, and the menu didn’t interest me, so I didn’t sit down, walked through the dining room and on down to the garage and drove over to Town and Country and had a burger and shake.

Walking around T&C after, went into the bookstore. Nice bookstore, hadn’t been in there in literal years. There was a time when Marian and I would make regular trips to dinner and a bookstore browse.

Wednesday 11/01/2023

Hoo boy. Finished editing and uploading the travelogue video (want to see it? Here.) Then it was time to set up for the fourth session of the End of Life series. No media to show for this one, so it was easy to run. All about dementia and the great difficulty care-givers of all types have, deciding when someone is competent enough to make medical choices. There’s a lot to it. Details of VSED and assisted suicide, and the legal ramifications.

Next up: lunch and laundry. Managed to get a 20 minute nap and then it was time to go down to see the Happy Birds. I didn’t have to run this show, Bert did. It was a good show, quite entertaining. Cockatoos and Macaws and Parrots, several of which talked or sang. Two rode bicycles and one rode a teeny little skateboard.

Another 20 minute nap and time to go down for dinner, as invited by Gloria, who was hosting the evening’s guest speaker, Andrew Binder, the Palo Alto chief of police, to dinner before his talk. Seven at table, me and Ian and Kay and Edie and Shirley and Gloria and the chief. He’s youngish (probably 40?) and very articulate and personable.

Then off to the auditorium to set up for his talk, which came off very smoothly. He answered some tough questions very smoothly. I managed not to screw anything up.

So tomorrow I have two event videos to edit, the EOL panel and the police chief’s talk. But not much more on my schedule than that.

Tuesday 10/31/2023

Paid a credit card bill. Happily the refund for the TiVo that I returned, has been processed. So that fiasco is over. Started editing the video from the travelogue event of Sunday night. Then it was time for the writers meeting, and for the what, third time? I hadn’t written anything. Cue for next week is “My Joy.” I don’t do joy, typically. Hope I can think of something.

Went to FOPAL for 2 more hours to finish up with all the donations. Lots of good stuff, including a couple of high-value ones, selling for over $150. Back home, little guitar practice, dinner with Patty, Hannah, and Mildred.

There is an event on the 12th, what was to be an ordinary sing-along, no problem, Rich was going to set out mics for that. But now suddenly they’ve decided they want to show a slide show on the mobile TV, too. I need to get hold of Rich to see if he can handle that. Rich is not good about answering emails. Must make phone calls.

Monday 01/30/2023

Went for the standard walk, starting early. At 10am one of the nurses came around for my annual wellness check. That’s a long questionnaire about my health, my impediments and problems, whatever. I’m fine.

Then off to FOPAL. I had in the car, two boxes of books that weren’t needed by the CHM. Gretta had me take them last Thursday. So now I unloaded them and into the sorting room. The sorting room was in a mess, I don’t know who was sorting last, there was nobody but me in the building the whole time, but they had left the place very untidy. So I sorted the two boxes I had brought, and a bunch of other books just piled on the table, and generally put things to rights. Then processed 4 boxes of computer books, leaving 4 more for another day. It was now 1pm, I grabbed a couple of energy bars from the store and went home.

In time for a halloween party in the lobby. Loud music, staff dressed in costumes. There had also been a staff competition for best pumpkin, with people voting on favorites. Here was my favorite.

It didn’t win, boo.

Sunday 10/29/2023

After my usual Sunday morning religious ritual — namely, watering the plants and doing the big NYT crossword — about 11am I put on my red docent shirt and headed for the Museum. I led the noon tour, with a small group, 10 at the start, dwindling to 7 at the end. Not one of my better tours, I forgot a couple of points.

Put in some guitar practice. Not happy with the songs I am currently rehearsing, or with my ability to play them. During supper, my neighbor Brian quoted some lines from a Woody Guthrie song and I realized, hell yes, I need some Woody Guthrie. Not just “This Land Is Your Land” but some of the others. They’re tuneful and also probably simple to play.

At 6:30 I set up the auditorium for an event: a travelogue by the son and daughter-in-law of Colin, one of our older residents. I didn’t get the son’s name, but the presentation was by Sue, and it was pictures from a two-week cruise in the Southern ocean, from the Falklands to South Georgia Island to Elephant Island, all that Shackleton area. Really good quality photography, lots of penguins of various kinds and other sea birds, lots of dramatic mountain and glacier scenery.

Sue was a delight to work with; very smart and quick to catch on to our system. The whole show came off very well. When I edit the video in a day or two I think it will be a splendid production to watch, too.

Saturday 10/28/2023

I omitted to mention yesterday, that there was a private event on the 11th floor, and after the AV committee meeting, I went up there to set it up. I didn’t stay for that party, but had dinner alone, as I mentioned. This morning I went up at 8am to tidy away the equipment from that party. I noticed that the electrical cords on the lecternette were a tangled mess. Also I remembered that at the meeting, we had agreed that the key to the backstage equipment rack should be put in a different place. So I took care of those two things.

First I walked up to our hardware store, to look for velcro cable tie thingies. They had them in a nice roll. Plus I bought key tags and a stick-on hook. Back at CH I tidied up the cables on the lecternette and put it away. Then I went to the auditorium and put the roll of cable ties in a supply cabinet where we can use them for other things.

The equipment rack for all the AV equipment got a new door in the recent upgrade, and the pair of keys for the door were just dangling in the lock. I put a tag on each key and I stuck the hook on the side of the rack and hung one key there. I gave the other key to the front desk person to be stored with other keys they manage.

I had a long session with the guitar. So frustrating. For the couple of songs where I can trust my fingers to hit the right chords reliably, and I can get into a groove and sing freely, I can sound pretty good. One song, Jambalaya, the only two-chord song, C and G7, in my list, that one I can do without looking at the music or the lyric sheet and sound pretty good. Acceptable, anyway. I live in fear of being a William Hung. His audition for American Idol was gosh-awful, but he seemed blissfully unaware of how bad he was, and the producers let him audition in multiple rounds just capitalizing on the cruel humor of it.

Had a very pleasant dinner out with Edie, talking about among other things, trusts and bequests and the end of life series. As old folks do.