Random Ramblings

A better week than I was expecting? N, G, and m are at OVFF, and I'm left here with the cats (modulo the housekeeper on Saturday mornings, and j on the weekends), but it's been magageable, and not too lonely. (I'm usually somewhat isolated down here on the ground floor anyway.) The main extra work was the two extra litter boxen, and feeding Brooklyn (who I swear is part hobbit -- four meals a day). (Cricket eats only kibble, so it's just a matter of making sure her bin stays filled.)

Also, I've taken six walks (though none longer than .7km), ordered some of my favorite groceries (including fish-other-than-salmon and bread-other-than-plain), and gotten a fair amount of work done on the HyperSpace Express website. In particular, the Books page, from which you can find out where to get N's book, The World As It Ought to Be, and subscribe to her newsletter.

And I have somehow managed to log a two-year streak in Duolingo. For what that's worth. Lately that hasn't been much.

I have gotten somewhat less done yesterday and today, because OVFF over Zoom.

Those of us with hidden disabilities may be interested in the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower Official website Disabilities index, search (The list is extensive.)

For those of us who couldn't get to OVFF, here are the 2025 Pegasus Award winners:

Best Villain Song: "The Evil Eyeball," Sibylle Machat
Best Hero Song: "The Ones Who Walked Away," Beth Kinderman
Best Performer: The Blibbering Humdingers
Best Writer/Composer: Eric Distad
Best Classic Filk Song: "Merry Meet," Steve Macdonald
Best Filk Song: "One Small Boat," Marilisa Valtazanou

( Notes & links, as usual )

Today I am thankful for...

• Thunderbird, emacs, pandoc, LaTeX, CSS, and a blanket to put over the yak I had to shave. (But Unicode does not appear to have a yak emoji, which makes me sad.)
• Linux, and the way it processes updates when I want it to. Also its ability to perform even rather drastic updates without making me stop what I'm doing and deal with them. With a few exceptions. *Glares at Firefox.*
• Grocery stores that deliver.
• Fresh noodles. Also, butter, mushrooms and shallots.
• The local swans.

Rough week. Mostly my fault. Stuff that should have been done weeks or months ago, having to be done at the last minute and not very well. Have I mentioned that I suck at getting things done?

Okay, I did finish my US income taxes a three days before the deadline. But not having looked at them for months I appear to have lost track of some paperwork. Or I never had it. I'll probably get my refund, then get a bill -- probably in a couple of years. If they ever notice. I'm not going to worry about it.

Should have started on N's author website months ago, along with the updates to hyperspace-express.com, which is actually the publisher's website. Should really have had the author site and the mailing-list automation done before the book went to the printer. Months before. Oops. It'll work, but it'll be awkward and not as good as it should be. We're still learning how to do this, of course, and I'm learning that I'm not nearly as competent as other people think I am.

And then there's the "personal alarm" fiasco. You see, N and G are out of the country for the next two weeks (family visit, then OVFF). N thinks (and I kind of agree) that I should have some kind of alarm pendant to wear, to easily call for help with. The first one we found -- a couple of weeks ago -- would have been perfect, except that the company is in Ireland and despite saying that they serve all of the EU I'd have to make my own arrangements with local emergency services.

So -- after I put off deciding for way too long -- I wound up with something that on the surface looked okay, and could ship quickly. But when it arrived, I found out that there was no two-way voice communication in the pendant -- you have to be where you can talk through the base station. Non-starter, in this house. I tried to tell the installer to take the damned thing back, but he kept repeating the same line about pressing the button if I fell over (pantomiming a heart attack). I'll keep it as backup until N and G get back, then we'll bring it back and get our key back.

Meanwhile, suspecting that something like that might be the case, I had already ordered a smartwatch (Samsung GW-7) which will probably do what I need it to -- it has fall detection and emergency calling. It would work better if I had a Samsung phone, but Google's watches are twice as expensive. So some of its myriad of features won't work.

And of course that's assuming I can actually wear the thing without it hurting. There are reasons why I stopped wearing a wristwatch 50 years ago.

Something good came out of that fiasco, however. N and I were over at StudiOjo, for one last coaching session before N and G's trip, to discuss our changing plans for recording (which I'll talk about later in the week). N mentioned that, in order to get the personal alarm, they were going to want a local friend or neighbor who could go over and check on me. So now we have a local friend, just a short walk away.

Linkie! Go watch The Nine Billion Names Of God - short film - YouTube. Very well-done adaptation of Arthur C. Clarke's story.

( Notes & links, as usual )