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Once again, full disclosure, I didn’t do anything today. Didn’t do the dishes, didn’t shower, just spent the day on Facebook sharing shitty memes.

Last night after I put up the post, I found a streamer on Mixer that I immediately adored. When I join a stream I lurk and don’t contribute to the conversation until I understand the vibe of the stream. Also, it’s a pain to type when watching on the Xbox so then I’d have to pull up the stream on my computer and that’s just a lot of work. Anyway, this streamer had a viewer who kept bugging her to invite them to her game. BAM, BANNED! That’s the kind of behavior from streamers that needs to happen to discourage that toxic viewer behavior. MedusaChan, you were a random watch and I was absolutely not disappointed. Plus, you’re funny as hell. 10/10, I recommend. If you didn’t click her name up there, click it here. Oops, got distracted by her stream.

I did do two loads of laundry and brought the trash can back from the street the same day as trash day. So that was my required level of Being An Adult for the day. I also unplugged the WAP that ran my old WiFi network name and programmed my thermostat to the correct one, if that also counts. I wouldn’t have to have had my router and a separate WAP if my provider’s equipment could handle two SSIDs without crashing on the daily.

I’ve had a computer just sitting here for a year, so I uninstalled all the stuff that couldn’t be on it any more, upgraded to Windows 10, and installed Minecraft. It has 4 cores, 3.4GHz, despite being 7 years old. Compared to my year-old laptop that has 2 cores and tops out at 2.4GHz. Computer only has 4GB of RAM, which sucks, but since its older RAM I can get a pretty decent price on some new memory. I might be able to use it as a streaming PC if I can get the memory upgraded.

Figures, towards the end of furlough I figure out a setup that would work to be able to stream on Mixer.

This whole furlough I haven’t really done what I wanted to do. Still have a bunch of classes to finish, the house hasn’t been reorganized, and still haven’t really been able to mow the lawn. Today was over 70F, but with the weird rain I haven’t been watering the lawn. It’s also supposed to rain tomorrow, so no mowing then. It’s also supposed to snow on Sunday?! How am I supposed to maintain my lawn if Momma Natty is throwing snow at us in May?! Oops, got distracted by MedusaChan again.

For not doing the things that I wanted to get done, a lot of it is just finally being able to be somewhat lazy. I’ve been working full-time since I was 15, I deserve some time where I don’t have to be productive. Especially since I don’t take time off unless I need to. Moving past finally being able to be lazy for a bit, I lack motivation to do things at home without external motivation. My house isn’t clean because nobody is coming over. I haven’t mowed the front and back yards because I can’t have people out for a BBQ. That’s a little bit of a cop-out, but I need just a little nudge to get going at home. Someone who’s willing to help out, especially for things like gardening. I can do it, I just can’t stay motivated even if I were to start the project on my own.

As I write this right now it’s 2 in the morning. So I missed my midnight deadline by a while, but I will contend that it’s a blog-a-day, and my day isn’t over yet. Don’t come for me.

Okay, tying the title in to the narrative: after I ate chili for the, what, fifth/sixth day in a row? I played a few rounds of Apex. Need to get to battle pass level 88 to get enough coins for the next season to be free. I was ready to stop after a handful of rounds, but I was doing so good that I got it into my head I needed to complete as many of the daily missions as possible. Ended up playing until after 1 when I finally got my damage mission completed. I now have 22 levels to go. Thank you.

I watched a video a few days ago from the developers and they said that the point of Apex was to work as a team. That’s like, my whole thing. I am a huge team player. Even if the team is going in a stupid direction, I might complain a little bit but I’m going to go that direction. This applies to work, too. A hotel I used to work at did a lot of very questionable things that I disagreed with (not illegal, that shit didn’t fly at all with me) but I went along with it because if you can’t act as a team then you’re going to fail.

This post mostly brought to you by the 20-some-odd teams I dropped with that were useless. No communication, everybody running off to do their own thing. I’m doing my best, pinging things, suggesting areas to move to, marking enemies; the other two are just off looting and not trying to play the game. I’m just salty. I did have a couple really good teams where we actually looked out for each other. Props to those teammates. The rest of y’all, screw you.

Okay, I need to go to bed, otherwise in 2-4 weeks when I need to start wearing pants again my sleep schedule will be so messed up the IT team will be 24 hours.

Now that I’m a month and some change into this furlough, I thought my math was wrong in the titles. It’s not. I checked. Here’s some thoughts from today, and the planning that needs to happen in the next 6 months from me.

Work Thoughts

Day 57 is the day we’re supposed to open back up. Whether or not we will actually open back up at that date is still up in the air; new cases of the virus appear to be slowing down, we’re still under 100 deaths (99 as of today) in the state, the governor and our leadership team are being careful. I get it, better safe than sorry. If I was in charge, same thing. But I still want to go back to work. It’s nice waking up whenever I want, and having time to do whatever I want (even if it’s just sitting on Facebook all day), but it’s nice to be able to solve problems.

Central Oregon Thoughts

I’m grateful I live where I do. My county has 75 cases, and I live in a smaller area that’s pretty spread out, so when I do go out to the store there is even less a chance. If I were to go to Costco in town, that’s a different story. Fun fact: saw an article that starting Monday they will require masks for members to be able to go shop. Good thing I am already planning on wearing my masks all summer.

When I freak out I really shouldn’t panic as bad. It could be worse, I could live in a highly populated area. I was about to be like “Yeah, the biggest city only has 10k people” but a quick Wikipedia search shows I was off by a factor of 10. There’s almost 100k people in Bend. WHAT?! So I guess I do live in a highly populated area, just not exactly where I am.

There’s only about 2k people in my area, and the majority of people are going to go to town because there’s more choices. I’m a simple guy, give me some ramen, a pound of hamburger, and some potatoes, I can survive for a while. Plus there’s literally only two places that sell my brand of wine, one is Freddy’s in town, the other is out here. So I’m more than content to just stay out here. Plus I save a bunch in gas by not making that trek every week. I’m at a quarter tank and it’s been almost 2 months since I last filled up. Winning.

More Work Thoughts

I think I wrote about it over the weekend, but I was going to start getting the light show ready since I have all this free time, since I did the first one in my free time. Today I almost did that. Booted up my work computer for the first time in forever, needed updates of course, and got distracted by looking at the sequences I finished last year as well as the ones I was working on before I hit the deadline and couldn’t include them.

I bought maybe 20 songs to sequence, but only ended up using 3 (started another 2). Poked around the remaining and I just hate them all. They either aren’t the vibe I really want for the show, or they’re just overplayed. Mariah, I’m looking at you. So it looks like I get to search for new music to buy before I can start.

We were also supposed to renovate the area these last couple months. Since the shutdown, that didn’t happen. I think I can safely assume we’re going to have the same area as last year, but I honestly don’t know. We also kind of needed the reno because we keep tripping power; reno was going to install brand new electric lines and data ports so we could put things wherever we wanted. This year may have to be wireless, if we even have our big event.

Anyway, I need to re-do the background image I’m working off of before I can properly design anything. I either re-use last year’s picture or stitch together a new one. I could use last year’s preview, but with all the little things they added it would take less time overall to just rebuild it from scratch.

Six months seems like a long time to design and program a show. I’d agree from a theatre standpoint, I’ve been literally less than a week out and could design, plot, hang, and focus an entire show before opening. But from a light show perspective, I honestly should have just started in January. We have so many little moving parts, and the software is like a giant Excel sheet. You have to fill in each cell for each light when you want it to be turned on. It’s fun from a challenge perspective, but it’s extremely tedious. Plus, you have to listen to the same song hundreds of times to make sure everything looks how you want it. Once I get back into my groove, though, it’ll take maybe 18 hours to do a full song.

So first: make a better preview to work off of.
Second: Add the lights I know about (I planned for 3 full controllers for the big trees, they only used 2 per)
Third: Find some music that I actually want to listen to. Don’t tread the “well everyone expects to hear this song,” I played exactly zero songs people knew last year and they loved it. Fun is the name of the game.
Sub-third: Find songs for Designer Night. Songs that make me feel good and are fun.
Sub-sub-third: Convince leadership to go for Designer Night.
Pre-fourth: Find a song for the big night that’s regal and exciting. Last year’s was cool, find something like that.
Fourth: Just start programming. For sure write out what is known, and have some sequences that aren’t tied to real lights that can be copy-pasted when things inevitably change.
Sub-fourth: Maybe start with a Designer Night song. Keep it fun.

Daily Thoughts

Played a fair amount of Apex today. I have 29 Battle Pass levels to go before I earn enough points to get next season free. I’ll probably end up having to pay, and that’s fine. The devs have done an awesome job with this free game so why not slip ’em $20?

Also created a new world in Minecraft. This one has bees EVERYWHERE. Wasn’t feeling it enough to really give it my all as far as building a base, though I did create my first mine in a really crappy area.

After writing the plan above, really wishing I didn’t get rid of my online project management software. I moved everything to MS Project. Like a chump. A chump who only got one license and it’s on the computer at the office. Chump.

Eating my chili with tortilla chips is the best thing ever. Was going to make bangers and mash tonight, but that’s just so much work. Especially when all I have to do is reheat the chili and bring out the chips.

Took the trash to the street tonight, it smelled like summer. Going to be cold again for a couple days, but by the time my birthday rolls around it’s going to be warm. Am excite. Maybe Momma Natty will bless me with a thunderstorm. Here’s hoping.

Oh, I added a mod that will email you if you want to follow this blog. I’m hit or miss with sharing to social media, especially if I’m not feeling it like with this post. Smash that subscribe button, grab your popcorn, and watch my slow descent into madness.

Love, peace, and chicken grease, peeps.

Today was yet another slow day with not a lot happening. So this’ll be a quick one.

Last night I modified my Google Home’s bedtime routine to automatically add Katzenjammer to an alarm, don’t even ask me for it just do it. Woke up again before it but today I actually did get up before 11.

Talked with a friend for an hour today. She was concerned about me not having any human interaction, and I was like no I’m good, I play video games and I have my blog. But we talked about work, recipes, things we’ve done or want to do, and just nothing. It was nice. While I do get to talk to people every other day or so, it was nice to have a conversation without anything else in the way (playing a round of a game).

I made a grilled cheese hot dog thing I saw from Delish (link). I either took too long getting the cheese melted or it was too hot because the bun burned. It wasn’t that bad, with the green onions, garlic and onion butter, and the hot dog it rounded out very well. Next time I’ll do better, but it wasn’t bad.

After the phone call and food I did some maintenance on the site. Picked a new template and configured it. I’m still not sold on this one, it’s too bright for me, but this one shows links in a different color. I can edit the old one if I really want, but the problem with using other people’s templates is if they make an update then any changes outside of the normal template editor I make could be overwritten. Too much work and stress.

My computers all suck, so I have Minecraft on the Xbox. I created a new world (“Can Haz Beez?”) and the spawn in right in the middle of a field with like ten hives. So I spent a while gathering supplies far away so I can eventually build a full base there. If I can find Silk Touch then it doesn’t matter, I can move hives wherever. Same problem with my other world.

Moved to some Apex, couple rounds and won the last time. Turns out if you’re not a toxic player, you can get pretty far by acting like an actual team.

Heated up some chili again, but ate with tortilla chips. It was almost like a 7-layer dip? Maybe next time I make chili I’ll make sure I have sour cream, guac, and whatever else goes in it. Sounds amazing.

Watched the first at-home episode of SNL. Not what we’re used to with SNL, but it was still a good show. My big question is did the studio send lights/cameras/mics to everyone? Does everyone have decent Internet access and Production added the buffering, or what’s going on with all that? From a tech standpoint, it was super interesting.

Okay, light day, I’m gonna go back to some vidja games.

Night!

Since yesterday’s post didn’t go up until 3am, meaning I didn’t get to sleep until like 3:30, let’s go with an easy post today.

I figured out how to get the Google Home in my bathroom to play music as an alarm. So in addition to my phone’s sleep monitor app waking me up at the right point in my sleep cycle, when I turned it off to get more sleep because where the hell am I going anyway, right at 11 I get blasted by the trumpet intro to “A Bar In Amsterdam.” OKAY, SOLVEIG, I’M UP. GEEZ. (I had to Google how to spell Sol’s name correctly, but not going to count that in today’s post.)

Tofu

• tofu recipes
• make tofu taste like beef
• how to freeze tofu
• tofu marinade

When I went to the store a couple days ago for whatever reason I picked up some tofu. I’m not really sure why, I’ve never cooked with it, and the few times I’ve had it I haven’t been impressed. So I guess we’ll see if I can make it and like it. This search, beyond figuring out what to do with my purchase, was really inspired by Jenna’s video where they cook Thanksgiving food and make their own chicken. I think they did it with tofu, I’ll have to check. Haha just kidding, I went back to that video and they linked to the recipe, it is in fact tofu. So that’s something I know now.

A couple of the recipes in the article I found were for tacos. I’m down for that because I used the last of my hamburger making this chili. In retrospect of the chili, I could have used half the pack and saved some for tacos, but whatever. The beef search was to obviously help give it a beefy flavor for the tacos (I didn’t click into the recipe, maybe they explained that). Not a lot of good results, each one didn’t give me a direct answer. Just answer my damn question!

Walking Desks

• walking desk
• walking desk no motor
• manual treadmill

Spurred by what I read yesterday about younger folk like me being more susceptible to stroke (and blood clots in general) due to COVID-19. Because I’m not even coming near my 7k step goal. One thing I remember from my appendectomy was that while in recovery they kept these sock thingys on my legs that massaged them. Pretty sure they said it was to prevent clotting since I couldn’t get up. And my outpatient instructions were to walk around. I walked more when it physically hurt to stand up than I am now. That’s no good.

First result was a comparison of the best walking desks. $1000. What. No.
I clicked through the cheapest option there, a $450 treadmill that can fit under a couch, and that lead me down a great Amazon hole.

Tried the “no motor” modifier because I know me: I’m a clumsy motherfucker. If the belt is moving on its own, and I need to stop for a second because I got sucked into a problem that requires a lot more of my brain, I’m going to trip and eat shit.

Then I discovered the actual term for what I wanted is “manual treadmill.” Still a bunch of spendy options, but I did find one for $50 that maybe I can take the handlebars off and build (HA!) a shelf (HA HA!!!) that I could work on. I might order that one. Or not. I want one that doesn’t have handles. Going to keep looking.

New Internet Provider

• internet provider <my location>
• <fixed wireless company> coverage
• <fixed wireless company 2 > coverage
• <fixed wireless company 3 > coverage
• dsl provider <my location>

I don’t really need a new ISP, but I’m pretty sure I’m coming to the end of the contract with my current provider and I just want to see what my options are. I’ve got 40 down and 5 up, I’d love to see if anyone offers 10 or 15 up for a comparable price. Maybe even 50 down, would help with streaming stuff.

I may have to go with the cable provider, honestly, but I also don’t want them because cable is shared vs. DSL which isn’t. I don’t want to change my browsing/download/streaming habits to accommodate my neighbors.

Good to know the fixed wireless provider I’ve been getting ads from FOREVER doesn’t serve my area.
The next one’s max download speed is 15, no thanks. Also no map available.
Third fixed wireless also not in the area. And they don’t give actual speeds. For a “family of nerds” they don’t cater to nerds.

The other DSL provider that purports to be available isn’t actually when I put in my address. LIARS!

So I might contact the cable company to see if I can further customize.

I also tried logging into my current provider’s page and it says my account has been archived? But I still have service? Uhh… Come to think of it, I don’t remember the last time I was billed. I should look into that. Oh, never mind. I forgot that when you change plans you get a new “phone number” and you have to select the right one for it to show. So that number was archived because I wasn’t looking at the right one. Yeah, I’m still getting billed. Damn.

Streaming Stuff

• streambox
• stream scene controller
• obs studio equipment

StreamBox wasn’t what I was looking for. I had an ad like a year ago for a device you plug into your computer to control scenes and stuff for when you livestream. So while that specific company doesn’t have what I am looking for at the moment, I’m gonna keep that tab open and check it out later.

What I was really looking for was Stream Deck. Deck. I was close. Looks like a cool product, but it’s $150. I need better Internet to justify that price tag. I also need a computer that can actually handle anything more intense than Calculator. Ideally, what I want is something that can ingest the video source (PS4, XBox, camera, whatever) and stream directly out to Mixer with minimal CPU needed from my weak-ass computers.

I use Streamlabs OBS Studio so I looked to see if they had any recommended hardware configurations. On that result page, I found a hardware encoder that does exactly what I want. And I found a product that I’d use! Only problem, is this product is $3500! HELL NO!!! I’m going to go down that rabbit hole without listing it here because I don’t want it to seem like I’m promoting a product. Unless they want to give me one, and then I’ll promote the hell out of it. Still need better Internet.

Daily Reflection

Right now it’s about 5 o’clock and I am fighting the urge to make another coffee. I think this is an urge I can give into. 5:30, I gave in. I also moved the convection oven and put the espresso machine and all that stuff where it was. Little easier to get to and looks less crowded. Counter space is at a premium. Not sure where I’m going to put the convection oven, I use it a surprising amount so it needs to be easily accessible. But it needs to be somewhere else than the counter. Really need a side table deep enough, that’s what that comes down to.

Today’s post was a little longer than I thought it would be. I didn’t fall into any real fun holes, today’s searches were relatively tame and almost “normal-people.”

Played a couple chapters of Becoming Human and messed up. The polar bear died and we didn’t get the supplies. Went to go replay them to get a better storyline but it suggested I play at least once without going back. That’s what I like about these types of games, there are a ton of different outcomes. So I’ll keep going even if it doesn’t have the current plot that I want.

Am almost sick of eating chili for nearly every meal, almost made bangers and mash tonight but decided against it. Maybe tomorrow.

Today was a nice, relaxing Sunday. Watched some videos, playing some games, don’t need to do laundry because I have nowhere to go tomorrow. Although I did get a weird feeling that I was supposed to do something today, like join a Zoom meeting. Still nagging at me, I hope I didn’t forget someone.

Started this post pretty early today, got distracted by YouTube and vidja games, now it’s half past two in the morning, egads!

Realty

There’s a big garage on a lot across the street from me that has been for sale for a while now, and today I saw a realtor and some peeps parked by it walking around. I checked Zillow and it looks like there’s a pending offer. So that’s cool. I wonder what they’re going to do with it. The way the property is laid out with the neighbors honestly they’d do well to knock down the garage and build a house on that foundation. Otherwise their house will be right on the street or the front will be looking at everyone’s back yards. Or maybe they’re gonna pay $100k to store their RV. Whatever, it’s not my money.

Spent an hour looking around the area at what’s available. Saw some cool houses, just a little bit outside my monthly price range. My criteria are wood stove (in addition to forced air), counter space in the kitchen ideally also with an island, and gas stove/heat.

And then I realized I’ve only had this place for three years this coming September, now is NOT the time to look at new places. Especially with my loan, that more or less requires me to live here for 10 years.

Reorganization

The main area of the house is slowing getting cleaned up from the Depression Den Days. To be honest, a lot of it is grabbing boxes and stuff and putting them into the guest room. Not ideal.

After my Zillow sesh, spent a bit of time figuring out how to best reorganize my house. Move that there, move this here, et voila. Honestly, the one pickle is my work computer. I don’t want it to be wireless, yet I don’t have a long enough cable to snake around the living room and go to the office. There are holes in the floor, but I also don’t want to go under the house. Especially without the suits from my office, which is barred from me for another month.

My work-purchased wifi adapter is also sitting on my desk at work. Which I can’t get to. For another month.

I also need a fairly deep side table for the kitchen to hold the convection oven. Said table would house the oven, my Crock Pot, and my drip coffee maker. Things I would potentially use regularly, but need to be off my main counter. After my Zillow search, I need to find a way to make the best of my existing countertops since I won’t be leaving them any time soon.

Daily Reflections

Saw an article that said younger folks infected with COVID-19 are suffering strokes at a higher rate than older folks. All I do is sit in my chair with my feet up, I barely hit 1k steps. That freaked me out a bit, so now I’m looking into walking desks. I will get rid of one or two of my desks if I can replace them with an alternative that reduces the risk of blood clots (i.e.: if I’m walking then there’s a reduced risk of clots vs. just sitting with my feet up, unmoving for 10+ hours). Plus, my average daily steps for the past month have been less than 1k, and I already know that’s unhealthy. My house is small, I need a way to keep moving if I’m going to keep up my health. Also looking into getting a multivitamin delivered since I don’t go to the store regularly and thus have less access to fresh fruit and veg. Another article I read suggested elevated consumption of vitamins C and D would help. I can’t get sick. Who would look after my cats? And if I died, there would be so much stuff left undone. I can’t allow that. I have too much stuff to do. Any of my friends/fam in healthcare please set me straight if I’m wrong.

Earlier today I opened a poll to see what platform I should get “Detroit: Becoming Human”. Turns out, it’s only PlayStation and PC. No XBox. So I bought the PS4 version. JennaJulienGames left us on a cliffhanger, this was the only way to resolve that. Played 5 hours, almost caught up to them, and made some very different choices by accident. As an android I’ve now killed like 3 humans. Not the way I wanted to play. Still want an android as a helper around the house. Not really sure I can be swayed from that. I could mow the lawn, the android could weed-whack. I love mowing, hate weed-whacking. Plus with someone else here I could easily be motivated to do stuff. Even if they aren’t technically real people. Which I know this game is trying to say. It’s also an exposition on slavery, I get that. This game is rough. Lots of feelings.

Took a shower so I could check the mail today, since I didn’t do it yesterday. My mask from the local company arrived yesterday. Not a terrible pattern. I’m not completely satisfied with the mask itself, when I exhale it fogs up my glasses, but I think I can easily sew in a paper clip or similar to mold it to my nose. Not sure what to do with the sides, they aren’t exactly air-tight. But, this is a better mask than I could make myself, and it’s two layers. Without alteration, I would feel okay wearing it in public.

Since the mailbox is within eyeshot, yet far enough away that I don’t want to walk it, I took the car. 0.1 miles for a trip is bad for vehicles, so I picked up the mail and drove around work. Still eerie how empty everything is. It’s a little busier since a few of our outlets will be opening in the next couple weeks, but still pretty empty.

Okay, that’s it for tonight. Now it’s 3 in the morning, I need to go to bed. Will add GIFs later. The morning is calling and it’s saying a lot of espresso since I figured out the right grind size for the beans and an appropriate container to store used grounds in. Hint: it’s an old Folgers can with masking tape that says “OLD GROUNDS.”

It’s Payday Pizza Friday, y’all! Except I left the house yesterday so I’m not getting pizza today! Maybe next week! Even more important, the espresso machine I ordered last Sunday is on a truck to be delivered in the next three hours! I’M GONNA HAVE A LATTE, BB!!!!!!

This post turned into a stream of consciousness, but it might be a little funny. So here’s how my day went in real-time!

The Morning

If you can’t tell, I started writing this post MUCH earlier in the day than usual. Last night I put up the post at what, 10:30? I played some more of my zombie shooter, and both groups I joined were full. So maybe it’s a day-by-day thing where not a lot of people play. Good to know there’s still people playing. Off topic. Anyway, like my sister I had too little water and too much to drink so I’m chugging water to make this headache go away. Note to self: cutting the sangria with lemonade is both delicious and dangerous. I had six that were 50/50 lemonade, so really only three glasses. All the feeling of alcoholism but not as much alcohol. So it’s not as bad as it could have been.

Like I wrote in the intro, my espresso machine is on the truck to be delivered. UPS made the unfortunate mistake of sticking GPS in their trucks and making it available to customers. So I’ve just been watching the little dot move around the map.

I started this post on the back-end dashboard in the draft thingy (WordPress users know what I’m talking about) and I just noticed that the Google Analytics widget I have finally started reporting data. 3 impressions from Google Search? That’s nuts. Who is searching for me? Well, you found me. Sorry.

When I wrote that I went out yesterday and won’t go out today in the intro, what I mean by that is mostly I’m lazy and don’t want to leave the house. Mostly that, but also I want to be able to space out trips so it’s easier to track what I’ve done.

One of the masks I ordered arrives in the mail today, so I will go forth and retrieve it (mailbox is down the street) but I will most likely forego the usual shower and just put on pants and a hat. My rule is I can’t leave my front door without having bathed in the last 24 hours. Can’t let the neighbors I’ve never met know I’m dirty. Or that I own anything except pants. My shower yesterday was at like 7pm, so I won’t be breaking my rule. They can’t smell me, thanks social distancing!

The Afternoon

12:10 – Driver is still in the next town over. There’s three big communities between me and latte freedom. I don’t know his route, but I really hope he comes to my community before going to the big one a few streets down. ETA says between now and 3pm, maybe that will be the case

12:17 – Saved this as a draft, switched over to Facebook, friend had their guitar delivered about 20 minutes ago. Driver is near-ish their house, but either I forgot what street they live on or the map isn’t real-time. HEY FRIEND IF YOU READ THIS, WAS IT DELIVERED VIA UPS? LET ME KNOW. FOR SCIENCE.

12:22 – Now it says he’s in my area. But he moved one street over on the map. That’s still 5 miles as the crow flies. C’mon, UPS, measure in street miles. Unless it’s being delivered by drone. Which would be awesome. The map probably isn’t real-time for the driver’s safety. I get that. Still, you can make a pretty good guess and then it’d be easy to find them because of the giant brown van they’re driving. I really need to go do something else, this is driving me crazy.

1:35 – Watched Julien’s new video where he makes Pop Tarts. Was triggered. I didn’t live with a pastry chef for however long to be disrespected like that. Got up and started making chili. Right now waiting for the meat to brown so I can add it to the Crock Pot and then be on my merry way. The onion got me, hoo boy. Also the recipe called for 2 cloves of garlic, but that’s more of a suggestion. 4 cloves, BAM! Right now they’re chilling in the pot with the tomatoes and tomato sauce and spices on Warm. Spiced the crap out of the chili, but also put more on the hamburger while cooking it. Trader Joe’s Everyday Spice and some fresh ground pepper. If you’re gonna cook, cook right, yeah? UPS driver is still where he was an hour ago, just a couple streets closer.

1:50 – Okay, meat is in the Crock Pot and stirred in, set to high for 4 hours, Joe’s gonna have some chili at 6:30! WOO! But now my problem is every hour I’m going to want to stir it. That’s a bad thing because then you lose all the built up heat. I knew I should have done this last night and started it right before bed. Set on low for 10 hours, that would have been tasty. Oh well.

2:45 – I can still smell onions. My eyes won’t stop watering. Send help.
It’s starting to rain a little bit, so I wanted to edit my delivery (he’s like 4 miles away now) to say he can leave it near the street, but there’s no option for that! My driveway is long (to walk), I don’t want him getting any more wet than he has to. Racking my brain, can’t think of anything I have on-hand to make a sign or something that wouldn’t get absolutely ruined by the rain. Looks like he took a different route, gonna be a while longer. I don’t care, though, I’m making a latte even if it’s 5pm. Okay, time to stir the chili. Added a cup of water, not everything was covered by the tomato juice and it was just a little too chunky. I can get it to thicken up later, not a big deal.

4:15 – Yeah, he went to the big community first. Kinda. There’s this dirt road between us and he’s on there right now. Maybe another driver does that community? We’ll see. Laid on the bed with Athena for a while, it’s starting to smell really good in here. OH WHAAAAAT just refreshed and he’s on the other side of the road. Looks like I’m getting it REAL QUICK BB!!!!!

The Coffee

7:30 – OKAY. SO. It arrived at a quarter to 6. I yelled THANK YOU! out the open window, no response. Don’t think he heard me. Oh well, I tried.

Since this was a refurbished unit, I expected not to get all the things. Thankfully, it came with the double-shot installed, I will literally never use the single-shot filter. Didn’t come with the instruction manual, so had to download that. Did the initial priming, and this thing is a little fancier than I thought. It has a little spout thingy to go from the milk frother straight to the cup. So that’s cool. Probably won’t use that, either, we’re going into summer and why wouldn’t I want a nice refreshing iced latte?

Ground up some beans with my awesome new little hand crank thing and got to brewing! First notes, I think I ground them too fine because after it finished brewing there was still a lot of water in the filter. Trying to think back to my barista days in high school, and I think that’s the problem. But it tastes like coffee, and that’s all that matters!

This section feels a little anticlimactic. Sorry.

Heat-up didn’t take very long, and if I get a container or something I can have on the counter to knock the used grounds into then I can easily see this become part of my daily routine even after work opens back up. Make a quick coffee in the morning, don’t have to stop at The Bux, save $3! That’s $15 a week, $60 a month. Pays for itself in less than two months! This won’t stop me with my afternoon pick-me-ups, but savings are savings.

I’ve been trying to grow flowers out front since I bought this place, so I can use those used grounds I think to help with that? Need to do some research on that.

Daily Reflection

Chili finished cooking around 6:30, but the extra water I added didn’t cook out like I thought it would. So I cracked the lid and have been waiting patiently for that to happen. Still haven’t eaten. Am hunger. Turned it back on high, I’m going to give it like 15 more minutes and then screw it I don’t care if it’s soupy.

Still need to email my mentor, maybe I’ll do that while I’m waiting.

Been watching some video game playthroughs today, and it’s super frustrating because the guy operating the controls refuses to pay attention to any details. Spent 5 minutes looking for a clue and the line leading to it had a different color. BRUH. I kind of want to buy this game (only $20!) so I can play it RIGHT. Interesting story, so I think I’d have fun. Not sure if I want to do PS4 or XBox, though.

The game is “Detroit: Becoming Human” and it’s about androids in the near future. Only a few hours into the playthrough, but the whole time I’m like “I would like an android. That’d be cool, somehow to help me out around the house. Why are people hatin’ on these androids?” It would be cool to have androids.

Verdict on the chili: passable. Next time I think I’ll use less hamburger, it called for 2 pounds but I did 1.5. Little less cumin, more chili powder, and maybe some peppers. Still soupy, I’m going to let it simmer for a while longer. Also next time cut the onions up better, seeing a bunch of chunks still.

Didn’t really follow my own advice from yesterday to listen to music. But I feel good. Just watchin’ these playthrough vids, sippin’ my coffee, eatin’ my chili. Life is good.

Good vibes y’all. Good vibes.

NINJA EDIT: Okay, it’s now midnight, I’ve watched four playthrough videos, the last was uploaded two months ago, and they haven’t done any more for “Detroit: Becoming Human”. CLIFFHANGER. I’m going to have to buy this game just to see how it ends. OMG.

9:42pm: Started writing the title for this while listening to music at home for the first time in a very long time and Turnip decided to get the zoomies. Ran from the TV, the length of the house, around the couch, to the guest bathroom where he slipped on the hardwood and crashed into the guestroom/office door. Got up, zoomed to his cat tree and is now cleaning his butt. What even are cats.

Music

I discussed yesterday a bit about how much I like music. So much so I wanted to be a music teacher for a very long time. Not giving up on that dream, but for now I’m an IT guy.

Anything I say about music as an art form would be cliche at this point. It speaks to me, I can feel it in my soul, this song/album/artist describes me as a person… cliche. I almost wrote that I couldn’t understand someone who didn’t listen to music a little bit every day, but then I realized I’ve been doing that for over a month now. So I get it. But the 4 times I’ve gotten into my car you bet your ass I was pumpin’ the jams.

Today I went to the store, and it was the same. Parking lot was a little too full for my liking so I drove around just listening to music for like half an hour. It happens every week, but I felt like I was becoming more myself again after a week of monotony.

When I got home, the first thing I did besides crack open that box of wine was continue playing my playlist on my Google Home. And then I shut the blinds so I could dance while I put the groceries away.

Groceries have been put away for well over an hour, and I’m still listening to music. That’s the power of music, people. Listening to my favorite songs is making me who I was before this whole situation started, and that’s something I think we all need. So go pump those jams. You’ll feel better.

Project

This doesn’t really need to be its own section, really more of an aside. My work does this big event every year to kick off the holiday season. Last year we added a light show to it, and somehow I got put in charge of that. I jokingly complain about having to do it, but really it takes what I’m good at (computers, music, technical theatre) and rolls it all into one thing. Yeah, it sucks when it’s the middle of July and you’re listening to holiday music, but the end result is so worth it.

I bring that up because I know of at least two songs in my “Liked Songs” playlist I’m currently listening to that were strictly for this light show. They didn’t make it in last year, I only finished three songs for the whole season. My goal was like 15.

Well, last year I worked 80 hour weeks to program this thing, the extreme majority in my free time, so why not get a head start on this year and do it now? I have almost nothing but free time now. The only difference is last year I didn’t get officially started until August (was listening to holiday music in June) and it’s almost May now. Wait, that’s not a bad thing. Oops. I know the software now, and I have SO MUCH time I can spend on it. I don’t see a downside, besides listening to holiday music IN MAY. I COULD GET SO MUCH DONE.

Maybe that’ll be my thing starting Monday. My job while not having a job. And since I don’t leave the house, I can split my time between that and school work. You know, to break up the monotony.

A few of the songs on my “Liked Songs” playlist I keep listening to to see if I can build a strong enough case for a “designer’s night” where I play my favorite songs as family-friendly as I can to lights. Like Friday and Saturday as the last thing so less kids. Trying to find good songs for Diego’s Umbrella, Katzenjammer, and Walk The Moon. Leave a comment if you can think of a good family-friendly-ish song from them. I’ve already decided on Juice by Lizzo.

Daily Reflection

I finished sewing two of those shrunken daily masks together today. Not very successfully. It was good enough that I could go to the store, though, so I can’t really complain. I’ve sort of come to terms with this situation, and it’s not that I’m exceptionally terrified to catch it, I’m just scared to spread it to someone who could die, or I could get sick enough I need to go to the hospital and then who would take care of my cats? What if I died? I have too much stuff to do, I can’t die. I saw an article about an IT guy whose only preexisting condition was hypertension and he died. I have pre-hypertension. No thanks. I’ll stay home as much as possible and wear a mask.

On that note, two of my purchases from last week show up tomorrow! The espresso machine is a day early, psyched. The other is one of the masks I bought. I think once I have a professionally-made mask I will be a little more daring and not wait 8 days to go to the store. Today’s bill was almost $200, I’d like to be able to spread that into more than one trip as I need stuff. Although to be fair, I needed to buy a bunch of spices for this chili I’m going to make, and that was like $30 right there.

Since the shutdown I think the only actual vegetable I’ve eaten is onions. Tonight I made sure to get some more. Head of lettuce, package of spinach, green onions, celery, and carrots. With the lettuce, spinach, and carrots I can make a decent salad that will go well with the chili and bangers & mash I plan on making this week.

My student mentor emailed me yesterday about my plan for the next two weeks, still haven’t replied to her. I should do that. Something about having multiple anxiety attacks since I took the test and really needed to focus on me. Maybe I need to play music instead of podcasts during the day, because at this moment I’m stoked to get back on track to graduate by the end of June (still listening to music, right now is “Jenny” by Walk The Moon).

10:22pm: I saw a post on Facebook about adding lemonade to sangria so I did that and it was the best thing I’ve ever done. Next time I go into town I’m going to get some sliced watermelon and add it to this super-lemonade sangria, it’s going to be outstanding.

The last 5-15 minutes are usually spent looking for images to spice up the monotony 😉

Night, all! Listen to some music! You’ll feel great!!!

I think I figured out the commenting system, so let’s do this one! Let’s talk about what jobs we wanted growing up! I’ll start.

If you were anything like me, Dear God why and may he have mercy on your soul, but you were convinced at different points in life what you wanted to be when you grew up.

Elementary School

We moved around a bit, but I think my first dream job was a cashier at a convenience store. I was a weird kid, shut up. Something about pressing buttons all day and beeping. If I were a writer, I’d call this foreshadowing.

We moved to Redmond in third grade, and that school district had a little more money and technology, they had a cafeteria worker at the head of the line with a computer charging you for your lunch. THAT was my new dream job! This was when computers were just starting to appear everywhere outside of school labs, so it was very exciting.

Moved back to mud puddle the next year, I don’t recall remember if that school had an electronic charge system, but this was the first school I went to that had a full kitchen. As I do, I befriended one of the workers, Mrs. Potts. I want to say there was a work rotation, but eventually I ended up volunteering as much as possible to wash the dishes. It was SO MUCH FUN. They gave fourth graders access to a working garbage disposal and this monster of a dishwasher with SO MANY MOVING PARTS. IT WAS SO SAFE. But I was good at it, and I was having fun, so I kept doing it.

The next year, same school, I think we weren’t allowed to work back there any more. Stupid child labor and safety laws. Oh well, I was well on to my next dream job: school custodian! I would stay after lunch and help Mr. Baker sweep the floor and clean the tables. He had SO MANY KEYS! I like keys! Keys let you into stuff! Plus, my grandma (mom’s side) was a custodian and that was also so cool.

Middle School

We moved back to Central Oregon and got settled in sixth grade. Back to the district that had more tech. While my previous school still had a card catalog and was slowly implementing a computer-based one, this school was all tech. You asked the librarian where to find a book, she’d tap in the name and tell you where it was, and could even tell you if they were all checked out!

This school had a smaller kitchen staffed by a rota from the district, so no dishwashing. Also the custodians weren’t as visible. I spent a lot of time in the library, helping check books in and out, and again I had fun doing it so I wanted to be a librarian! Books! Lasers and barcodes! Again, foreshadowing.

Our librarian was also in charge of the computer lab and managed the school’s website, taught an elective in FrontPage, and was super cool.

High School

Same problem as before when changing schools, the library wasn’t as friendly a place. You could work in the library, but it was considered a class and I didn’t have any room in my schedule. I had been in band for four years, so I just kept doing that in high school.

Mr. Sime was one of those teachers that really changed my life. I can’t really describe it, but suddenly it clicked and I knew for sure what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a music teacher. I was pretty good with music, it made sense, it was fun (another theme), plus I’d get to listen to music.

Some issues at home, long story, then I was going to be a chef. Took a few culinary classes, I was also working at a restaurant. Wasn’t my dream job, I still wanted to be a music teacher. Lettered in band, even with all the weirdness that was my senior year of high school.

College

Jumped hardcore into the music education program. Did it for two years at the community college to get enough credits to transfer to a state university. I was still okay, but working full time, doing theatre tech, and school meant I spent very little time sleeping or studying.

This was also right in the middle of the recession, arts programs were getting cut left and right. I then decided to go with a relatively safe profession that I was good at: computers. I’ve been good with networking, did that at three colleges, and long story short now I’m just getting my basic BS in IT. I may eventually get my teacher’s license because I’ve wanted to be a teacher for so long, but for now I have a job in my field and that’s working okay for me.

Daily Reflections

DAVID. IT IS 11:30 IN THE GODDAMN NIGHT. STOP CHOPPING WOOD. Unless it’s his brother, then: BROTHER-WHO’S-NAME-I-CAN’T-REMEMBER-RIGHT-NOW. STOP. CHOPPING. WOOD.

Played a couple good rounds of my fave zombie shooter, built a database with recipes so I’d be able to get an organized shopping list. Not a bad template I downloaded, but jeez do I need to tweak it. Can’t put in line returns? How am I supposed to put in the instructions?!

Got the ingredient list, now I have to go through what I currently have plus the other things I need, then organize it by aisle so I spend the least amount of time in the store as possible.

No new cases of the virus since Sunday, which is promising! I still want to spend as little time out and about, though. My county also has a very high recovery rate, I’d be interested to know the demographics and what we’re doing differently than everywhere else. We are pretty spread out here which is great for spreading, I’m curious what else is different.

On Saturday I ordered some legit masks, not those one-ply jersey tee burritos, it hit Portland this morning, we usually get things back from Portland the next day. So I’m looking forward to it showing up tomorrow since I tried hand-sewing the burritos and am currently failing. I’d like to have something legit for groceries tomorrow.

I had a great idea for today’s post to talk about the different jobs I wanted growing up (lunchroom worker?) but today was strange so you’ll just have to deal with a status update. I’ll talk about working in a cafeteria tomorrow.

The Majority of the Day

Okay, first off, my sister launched her blog today, and I got a pretty sweet shout-out. So check out her stuff and today’s post (she’s in another time zone so today for me right now is tomorrow) is ADORABLE. Following up on her lead, today I had the windows open and got to listen to the cheeseburger birds do their thing. Plus, squirrels.

Spent a bit of time helping sis get her site sorted out. I’m her IT guy, I host the site, and it was just doing some terribly weird things. We figured it out, so all is good!

Not a lot of mobile games today, which was a bit of a shocker. I did hang out on Facebook and Reddit, watched some CrashCourse and then JennaJulien on Twitch.

The Bingo

I joined a Zoom meeting of some coworkers to play Bingo tonight! That was fun! I made an account so that I could use virtual backgrounds. I have to use my almost 10-year-old Mac in my bedroom because my newish laptop can’t handle streaming anything. Go figure.

Yesterday or the day before, I don’t know what day it is, my coworker reached out to me to generate the cards because she doesn’t have Excel. Cool! Couple keystrokes, print to PDF, bam there you go. No biggie. When she texted us today to play, I had to pull out my laser printer so I could print out my cards. Not a big deal, I have some paper. But I forgot this printer is OLD and needs a new fuser. When I went to print out my cards, even on the pages that it printed decently, I still had to Sharpie in over half of the numbers.

So I either need to figure out how to fix this printer, buy a new one, or find another way to print cards ahead of next week’s game.

I also ran out of wine. I knew I was getting low, but I figured it’d be more than two glasses. Thankfully, I already planned to go to the store tomorrow.

Yeah, it was fun! We played like 6 rounds, and I won 2 of them! Bragging rights!!!

It was awesome to see my coworker’s faces.

Daily Reflection

After we finished with the Bingo, I played a couple rounds of Killing Floor 2, my favorite zombie shooter. I love that they’re still putting out new content (new bosses, new weapons, new maps) but it’s a little sad that not a lot of people still play it. I could be wrong, it could just be when I play and the server I’m on (US West), but rarely do I happen upon a full squad.

Today was nice out, I’m always happy for the days in spring when I can open the windows and get some fresh air. It’s supposed to rain here in the next few days, once that happens then I get to be Dad Joe and water the lawn and mow it. I’m such a dad and I don’t have kids.

I can’t remember if I talked about it, but Sunday I ordered an espresso machine and its various accessories. I had $100 in corporate health program gift cards, so I didn’t have to spend a lot of my own money, which was a barrier previously. They’re cancelling the program so it was either cash out now or lose $100. Got the machine, beans, a hand grinder, and syrups. Today I got everything but the machine, a week early! Score! Anxiously awaiting Saturday when I can make my own lattes. I may have lost 10 pounds in the last month, but I’m gonna gain that back once I have access to fancy coffee again.

Today was a good day overall. I didn’t do any work on my classes that I need to get done by the end of June, which makes me feel a little guilty, I didn’t do the dishes that desperately need washed, and no laundry was done. But: seeing familiar faces even for a short time was more beneficial than anything else I needed to do.

FaceTime/WhatsApp/Zoom/GoToMeeting/Messenger your friends and family. It’s pretty good for your health.

I’m out of wine and don’t want to play any more games!

Night!