sweetmusic_27 | Reading

Yesterday, we got everything done for Gretchen's Medicare enrollment. Yay!

Today, I made the COBRA payment for the kids and me. Ouch!

And then I went to the Social Security website to see how my Medicare enrollment is coming, only to discover that the website is being very, very ill right now and can't locate anything.

In any case, it looks like we will be spending a lot of money on healthcare. This is somehow not a surprise.

Cubs pitcher Shoto Imanaga tonight had a terrible outing in what has been, so far, a pretty good season for him. He ended up giving up eight runs which was plenty for a 9-3 Brewers victory tonight in my third game of the season.

Why is this only my third game of the season, given that I am no longer employed and theoretically have more time -- *and* when the Cubs have played a lot of very good baseball? Well, it turns out that I've been busier in unemployment trying to sort everything out than you'd expect.

And the remote parking situation is execrable. The new parking is 15 to 20 minutes farther away from home than the old lot, which adds a lot to the transit time for getting to the park. It is completely unfriendly to anyone who has difficulty with stairs, because the elevators are *still* shut off. Supposedly they work and just need to be inspected by the city before they can be used. This was the same thing I was told a month ago at my previous game. Someone *has* done an excellent job of cleaning up the various flyers that complained about the broken elevators though. It's good to have priorities.

It took an hour after the final pitch to get back to the garage and out to the street in my car. I have had times in the past with the old parking lot when I was able to be *at home* an hour after the final pitch. Mind you, that was a case of *everything* timing out right, but it was *possible*.

This is the situation when the night games are starting at 6:40 PM. When they move to 7:05 PM shortly, traffic is going to be even worse.

Clearly, this is not going to be fixed this year. Maybe next year.

Maybe someday, they will inspect the elevators.

$mdlbear: blue fractal bear with text "since 2002" (Default)$

We -- m, G, and I -- got back from (German filk con)D.F.D.F. a few hours ago. I think it was mostly good but I'm exhausted and should not be considered a reliable witness. The fact that we spent more time waiting for the wheelchairs we'd requested than actually in the air coming home may have something to do with that.

Like last year, the hotel was good and the food, which was included in the room rate, was excelent. I did a little singing in circles. The first night someone requested A Talk with the Middle-Sized Bear, which I followed, after a short delay, (because it was poker-chip bardic and I could) with A Tribute to the Middle-Aged Bear. Saturday I read the intro to N's upcoming book, Paleomythic. I think it went over well -- you could hear a pin drop after I finished. Sunday at the Dead Tired circle, I sang The Toolmakers (at m's request, so that they could sing their descant, which is spectacular). So, three songs and a prose poem. Not too bad considering how early I left the circles. I still didn't get much sleep, but slept better than I usually do at home. I blame the cats.

I'm too tired to find links tonight.

( Notes & links, as usual )

Current Mood: exhausted, down
Current Location: Schildhaven in Den Haag
Current Music: Yes! DFDF all weekend

Julie is officially a high school graduate, walking with her class today. She finished classes in December, but now it is all done. We'll see what's next. :)

In other news, K continues to prepare for painting her room. She does not want the Laura Reynolds dragon painting that has been hanging in her room, so I took it down and have rehung it in the office over the recording laptop. On the other side of the room next to the pinball machine, I hung the Theresa Mather dragon that I bought at Windycon.

There are more things that will need to be done, but Gretchen and I need to get up early tomorrow, so it's a good time to stop doing things and go to bed. :)

The heat is on outside. I helped K to clean out the furnace filters today and we got them reinstalled this evening. That's good, because it was just too hot outside today for us to sleep tonight and I've turned on the air conditioning for the first time this season.

I got a few things done today (including a second run at the same repair on the pinball machine, following instructions from the support line this time). I would like to get more things done, but there are a lot of little obstacles in the way.

I've had the new Harry Potter pinball machine for a week now. Earlier today, the Death Eater drop target malfunctioned, which is not good. It went down and wouldn't come back up and stay up.

I poked around a bit on line. Then I opened up the machine, removed the glass, stood the playfield on end, and spent some time inspecting the problem. Eventually, I concluded that the screw at the bottom of the associated coil was loose, so I tightened it up. Then I put everything back together.

Things seem to be working correctly now. And I am thankful that this was a simple repair. This is a *complex* machine!

Gretchen's application for Social Security and Medicare has been processed, which is good, because she has more immediate medical needs than I do. My application is still in processing, I'm told because they need to check my earnings record. We've got an appointment for Monday to sign Gretchen up for Part D and Medigap insurance, after which she will be good to go. Me, well, I've got COBRA, but since it's subordinated to Medicare, I *may* be able to get prescriptions with it right now. I need to check on that. And the kids, at least, should have coverage once they get done processing that.

I went out to see my financial advisor today and we are in the process of getting things moved from the Oracle-sponsored Fidelity accounts to our accounts at Ameriprise. This will (of course) take a while. But it's in process and -- although it can't be completed until late next year because of some restricted stock -- it will help get things sorted out.

Since I slept badly last night and took a nap this afternoon, that was pretty much the sum total of progress for the day. All things considered, I will take it.

Today I am thankful for...

Ticia and Bronx.
(Framework 12)Lilac.
Diclofenac and compression gloves. NO thanks for trigger finger and whatever is wrong with my left shoulder.
But thanks for them not being incapacitating.
D.F.D.F. this weekend.

Current Mood: grateful
Current Location: Schildhaven in Den Haag
Current Music: Carmina Burana earworms

I feel like I should be getting more things done, but I am doing a lot of running in place.

Let's see how tomorrow goes. :)

Someone has now written an AI-driven wiki dedicated to hallucinating on various subjects. Yes, this is of absolutely no use, save for entertainment.

Here, for example, is the article on The Great Filking Schism of 1799.

I saw sheep!

Julie, Sam, Bonnie, and I went over to Randhurst and saw "The Sheep Detectives" today. It is a very sweet little film and we enjoyed it.

Meanwhile, the freezer thermometer confirms that the freezer is back to the correct temperature, so what we had was an improperly closed seal somewhere in the system that let warm, humid air into the freezer. Once I got everything resealed correctly, the temperature started falling. We will have to be more careful.

But now I have a refrigerator thermometer!

We got a call from a nice lady at Social Security at 7:30 AM on Thursday as she was the person who had been assigned our application. We explained that the thing that we were most concerned about was getting signed up for Medicare, because without that, we effectively have no health insurance, even if we signed up and paid for COBRA. She said that she would push the application through to the Medicare processors and that they would pick it up on Monday or Tuesday. Apparently, I managed to complicate the process by filing for Social Security benefits at the same time. It's not clear how I could have filed for one without the other when filing on-line, although I could have (I suppose) if I had taken the Medicare application to the Social Security office. The process seems to be complex.

Today, I signed up for COBRA for myself and the kids. If I could have, I would have just signed up for COBRA for the kids, but that is not allowed by Oracle's plan. I also extended our dental and vision insurance for all of us. Gretchen is going in to have her crown applied tomorrow for which dental insurance should help, while the entire family needs the services of the optometrist, so while extending vision insurance is not normally the best choice, it looks like a pretty close bet in our case.

I took K to Home Depot to pick up some painting supplies and paint chips. Painting is going to begin soon. First, there will be spackling.

And when I got home from Home Depot, Gretchen announced that the freezer was misbehaving. I have acquired a freezer thermometer and we will see what things look like in the morning. I also checked. I recall that we bought a five-year service policy from the store we bought the refrigerator from. And my blog tells me that I bought the refrigerator in July, 2021.

Good.

Located in the Crowe & Dove House deep in the wilds of Iowa!

The room block closes June 4th, get your reservations in before that. The code is good from Thursday to Sunday.

Pre-reg closes June 19th. Registration at the con will be card only. If at all possible please pre-reg so we have a better idea of how many are coming.

If you backed the Go Fund Me and have not let us know if you are attending, please send me an email, my address is on the website.

The food guide is available on the Hotel page on the website as well as in the files in the FCB Facebook group.

The website has been updated with this information.

The Ropers will be there selling CDs.

The numbers are looking very good. I am actually a little concerned about whether our mainstage area will be large enough to seat everyone. What a terrible problem to have!

See you soon!

It was a relaxed celebration here for Mother's Day. I grilled steaks for dinner. Now, Gretchen is introducing the kids to "Camelot", a movie that I've not seen in quite some time.

The amount of yelling at the screen is amusing.

$mdlbear: blue fractal bear with text "since 2002" (Default)$

Happy Mother's Day to those in a position to celebrate it. I'll be over here with the widowers and orphans. Meanwhile I'm getting depressed over how little I've gotten done recently. (Which, depending on how one counts, may include much of the last decade.)

On the other hand, I'm not actually in bad shape physically, considering. Walks six days out of seven. And I got some web work done, on naomi-rivkis.com and hyperspace-express.com/, specifically on the .../Books pages, because there's enough information about N's next book, Paleomythic to have gotten started on it. So I've been more productive than usual, which of course isn't saying much.

If you want a taste of what Paleomythic is like, N has submitted a couple of stories in the same universe (the Pantheon of Worlds series) to a contest on Reedsy.com.

In other good news, I now have a charger for Scarlett, and an update cable for Romann. I suspect that the former may not be able to deliver enough power, and the latter needs a Win$ computer to run the software despite the fact that the dongle is supported -- with free software -- on Mac and Linux.

On the gripping hand, my (gripping?) hands are in somewhat sorry shape -- I'm suffering from trigger fingers again. Working on it, with topical diclofenac gel, paracetamol (at my GP's insistance), and sometimes compression gloves (which don't seem very effective). It is not at the point where I can't type, play guitar, or put on my compression socks, and hopefully will get away from that point rather than to it. But it's worrisome and annoying.

Linkies: BBC: 100 years of Sir David Attenborough (whose 100th birthday was Friday). Life and Death of a Planetary System - Intro - NASA Science nice series, with short videos. Some random math links under Sunday,

( Notes & links, as usual )

Current Mood: somewhat productive, but desolate
Current Location: Schildhaven in Den Haag
Current Music: next weekend at DFDF

Sam and Bonnie came out to see the new pinball machine and take a look at furniture that needed to be moved. I had intended to swap the older La-Z-Boy recliner in Julie's room for the newer one from downstairs, but Julie said she would just as soon not have a chair in her room, so I have not yet solved the problem of the furniture in the living room.

K, meanwhile, wanted to get rid of the nice (although slightly worn) white desk in her room to make more space and *Gretchen* claimed that, putting it in the window nook in our bedroom, replacing the parson's bench that had been there.

This means that we now have a recliner and a parson's bench that are looking for a good home among our friends. Let us know if you're interested.

Sam, Bonnie, and I spent some time exercising the new pinball machine. After consideration, Sam and I shifted it a bit to the right so that it doesn't block the window and is flush against the sewing machine. That configuration looks much more intentional. It also leaves a nice spot on the wall next to the pinball machine and over the sewing machine to hang the Theresa Mather piece that I bought at Windycon, so that works out too.

There is still plenty of cleaning (and painting!) to do, but progress is being made and the conversation was good. :)

So I did a thing.

Back in early March or thereabouts when I was still employed and figured I was going to start collecting Social Security in May, I said to myself that I was going to have a bit of surplus cash and that I wanted to buy myself a retirement present even if I wasn't planning to retire for some time yet. And I put a deposit down on a pinball machine, because -- although I have a Flash machine in the basement that is *almost* working -- new pinball machines do a lot of things that older pinball machines didn't do.

The pinball machine arrived today and is now installed in my office.

It looked smaller in the woods.

Today I'm thankful for:
1) Retirement so I didn't have to try to work before and after going to the dentist.
2) Finding a new, more-local dentist. Three fillings later...
3) Stacey Abrams.
4) Jesse making crab salad sandwiches for dinner.

Today was research day. I have learned a lot of things. I have a lot more things to learn.

I now have two free LLMs downloaded on my desktop computer -- which is happily robust. Free is a good price. Also, the shim application that I'm using to manage this has a plugin that links to Duck Duck Go, so it can supplement the LLM's data set with web searches, which is a *very* good thing.

I am working to get Visual Studio Code configured, because it is *also* free. I will find out what the limitations are eventually. :)

And -- since I have a Synology NAS sitting on my desk -- I can have a Git Server. And now I do.

This is awesomely close to being a development environment.

Which is cool.

Today I am thankful for...

Stories.
Pain meds.
My families.
Support groups.
Comforting fantasies.

Current Mood: grateful
Current Location: Schildhaven in Den Haag
Current Music: Dylan: Tomorrow Is a Long Time

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