Monday, June 26, 2017

dead dead dead

Home computer, dead.
Printer at home, dead.


If I can finagle a USB stick with a Windows 10 recovery I may be able to save my home computer.
I think I just need to replace the printer.

Salmonella isn't my favourite bacterial disease.

I thought of ghost this morning, between the hours of 2h30 and 5h30, as I turned and tossed, unable to fall back asleep again. It is a particularly rare occurrence that I am unable to return to sleep if I have awoken. Under normal circumstances I do not wake up at all during my primary sleep period; and on those rare occasions that I do awake, I usually return to unconsciousness in only a few moments.

Oh well; perhaps tonight my sleep will be better.

Space X launched and landed two rockets over the weekend, one of which had been previously launched. I read today that they are adding another platform to their arsenal which would mean that it would be theoretically possible to launch four rockets in rapid succession if not simultaneously. I do not know if the ground crew demands are such that they would need to separate each launch in order to monitor it.

The idea of the Hyperloop Hotel is intriguing. I think of it as like a private cruise ship that crosses land. I imagine upon first install that these would be expensive rooms to hold; but perhaps within my children's life time it would be a more common way to visit places.

Chris Cornell is the third dead from the subject; though he died 39 days ago, I heard him singing in an Audioslave song just yesterday. His passing did not affect me nearly as much as did the passing of David Bowie, but still; I was quite the fan of both Soundgarden and Audioslave.

I have one more Spartan Race to compete in, it is at the last week of August at the Stoneham ski center northwest of Quebec City. I have booked an AirBNB close to the race that I will be sharing with a friend who will accompany me for the weekend trip. The race will be the 'Beast' distance, completing the Trifecta for 2017.

As my girls finished their school year this past Friday we had to undo all of their school supplies and locker components, put them in storage for when school starts up again in the fall. This was quite an ordeal taking a number of hours on Saturday and Sunday. Fortunately, the job is done now. We already have the list for both C-Ling and V-8, so we could, theoretically, look into those supplies to see what can be used again for the following year, but we want to let the dust settle a little, to give ourselves a break.

Swim lessons begin tomorrow and continue each Tuesday and Thursday evening at 18h; it isn't the best time for the lessons, but since my girls are staying at my mother-in-law's house through the summer, they can be fed a 17h and then I can pick them up after my work day is over and they'll already be ready to head over.

It is looking like I will need to buy a new pair of shoes in the next three weeks.

The Quebec provincial government today announces 42 measures of a 1.5 billion dollar value that will go towards promoting clean energy and reducing GHGs. There is an immediacy to this that the money is being spent over the next three years with some of the measures going into effect immediately. I may look into this to see what kind of financial assistance the government would give me to remove the oil part of my furnace and replace it with electricity. This may cost more in terms of energy consumption, but it would mean that we are no longer burning oil in our house on the coldest days of the winter to heat the house.

Anca Zoltan; now there's a name I won't forget soon. I just wish I had a better photo.

My guess is that the most favourite flavour of ice cream that people who love chocolate ice cream is chocolate ice cream.

I have not yet begun to think about what costume I would get for this year's Halloween. I did see a Deadpool suit that I thought would be fun; but there are still other options.

This coming Friday I am leaving with my kids to a Dad & Kid camping weekend; we'll be leaving Friday morning and then coming home again Sunday afternoon/evening, though we may return sooner depending on the weather. At the moment there is a forecast of rain over the weekend, include 15-20MM on Saturday, which means heavy rain. This is not ideal weather for camping.

Tomorrow at my work place I am participating in a social events committee meeting to discuss what our next plans are to try to build upon past events that aim towards maintaining and growing a sense of community within the company. Last year we had a 'beach party' in July that it may be too late now to organize an equivalent event. In the last two years we had a family day where both of those events were held at the same location. There is a question about having the event again this year, but at a new location. There may be other community service suggestions that come up, we shall see.

I have really been sucked into this 'Wish' application on my mobile device. I have ordered a bunch of things spread out over six weeks or so, most of which have cost only a few dollars. I have 'flagged' a larger number of things into a few different categories; like: something for me, gift for someone else, or Camping. That last is a little shaky as I haven't really any intention of increasing the amount of time/expense/effort I already take in terms of camping. Still, some of the things I see on the app look very appealing to have in terms of camping.

I should probably end this post; it is probably long enough.

On Monday, a week from today, it will be C-ling's turn for 'Daddy-and-Me' day. The plan is to get her her Opus pass and then walk around the city, maybe catch a movie. The Opus pass is the public transit pass and I need to bring her to have her photo taken as the student fare on an Opus card requires the photo. The one I have has no photo. Once we have the pass, I will then be able to register it online with the pass that I am already paying for G-bot. The program is called Opus+ and it makes it really easy - the monthly payments for the transit cards are automatically withdrawn from my credit card and I pay only 11 months out of 12. They don't really need to have the pass for the full months of July or August, as they are out of school, but if we take one of those two months as the 'free' month, then the other one is just a little bit extra that we pay which gives them unlimited access to the transit network year round. With respect to G-bot, this has taken a load off as I do not need to be driving him around nearly as much as I would have otherwise. I expect the same to hold true for C-ling in short order.

For V-8's 'Daddy-and-me' day I'll be taking her to Arbraska which is a tree-climbing obstacle zip-lining place about a 45 minute drive out of the city. In the past I've taken both G-bot and C-ling to this place and they always have a good time.

One idea I've had for G-bot's 'Daddy-and-me' day would be to rent an AirBNB apartment in the downtown of my city for a Friday-Saturday night. There are some apartments that are quite inexpensive. I would make sure he would get any homework done, and then we could walk around the city; have a nap, go out at night and walk around; go see a movie; play video games in the apartment, eat in to cut costs but eat one meal out. This would be the most I'd ever have spent on one of these days; so I do not know if I would end up doing it.

I have not played table tennis, or ping pong, or as we used to call it: i/g, in a very long time. I dream of some day being in a place in my life where I can play it regularly with friends who love this game as much as I do. Fifteen years ago for a few years in a row I was able to play against two of my best friends where we would rotate 1 vs 2, then 2 vs 3, then 3 vs 1, then 1 vs 2 and so on. We would play at our lunch break, almost daily, and on top of that, periodically, we would come outside of work hours to play for a more extended period. I do not know how mobile my two friends are now, compared to then, I also don't know how much loss of mobility I have lost since then, but still, I think it would be fun.

Tomorrow it is back to the routine, here at work, as this past weekend was La Fête National, a Quebec Holiday; so half of our department was off on Friday and the other half today. Tomorrow we should all be present. It made today a very quiet day; making tomorrow quite the contrast. This coming weekend is Canada Day weekend.

If you've read this far, it means you have read this far. Have a good rest of your whatever time zone you are in.

1 comment:

Debstar said...

Yes, I read all the way to the end, it was quite an update. Life goes on unless you are dead,dead,dead.