Finally, a good night's sleep!

 

Last night, I was running on empty.  Not having good sleeps for several nights, I was very tired by the time it came for my nightly phone call with RQS.  Since I planned to get up and take care of a couple of things before sleeping, I decided to get comfortable on my bed for the nightly call.  And shortly after the call, I fell asleep.  Did I get in my jammies?  No.  Did I apply cream to my feet?  No.  Did I do any of the things in my normal post phone call routine before going to sleep?  No!  I simply passed out with my phone on my chest.  Boy, the waking up at 6 am had me feeling fully refreshed for a change.

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One of the projects I've been working on is to extract a Linux distribution, load it to a thumb drive, and then install it on a 10 year old laptop.  And for some unknown reason, I have been unable to do this.  It'd be nice to be able to play with Linux on my machine before I toss it out.  Sadly, none of the software I have works properly on this machine, and I can't figure out what I'm (likely) doing wrong.

At this point, I'll likely trash this machine because it's too slow for my purposes.  Given the age of this machine, its weight, etc., I'll wipe the hard drive and then send it to E-Waste processing.  I find it amazing how much E-Waste there is, considering that almost everything we buy now days has some form of computing chip (programmable controllers to CPU's) in its design.  (Who'd have thought 30 years ago that we'd have programmable toasters, light bulbs, and microwave ovens, among other devices.)

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Going to game night was a little awkward - in getting out of the apartment.  I had piled 5 garbage bags by the door, and could only take 4 of them out.  And that was a minor problem for me. But once the garbage was in the dumpster, I was able to get to Yonkers in a reasonable amount of time and play a game.  As usual, I lost.  But I go there to have fun, and not to be competitive.

  

 

Lunch with CCS and Zooming with the girls (a short post)

 

I had 2 things on the docket today, but not much else to do.  And yet, I virtually forgot about one of them until a reminder came on my screen.

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Not having enough sleep last night, I knew that I'd be taking a nap sometime between lunch and my zoom call with our Texas friends.  So, around noon (after several hours in bed which I couldn't return to sleep), I got showered, made up, and dressed to see CCS in Ossining for lunch.  

CCS arrived at the pizzeria shortly before I did.  (She was walking to the pizzeria while I was waiting to pull into a parking spot.)  Our conversation flowed like we had never had a month since our last lunch.  I talked about my recent cruise, while she talked about her new house.  And then, we got to world politics - where we share a similar worldview.

All too soon, we had to go our separate ways, and I went home to rest.  I was on the computer when a pop-up appeared.  My Zoom meeting with our Texas friends was about to begin.  So it was back on with a little bit of blush and lipstick, then I got dressed for the Zoom.  Unlike other Zoom meetings, RQS and I did 95% of the talking.  Neither of us enjoyed the meeting, as our two friends had nothing to contribute to the conversation.

The Zoom meeting ended earlier than planned, and it was just as well.  Neither RQS nor I were in the mood to carry on the meeting by ourselves. 

 

A free day before a lot of activity

 

Tomorrow, I will be dealing with a Doctor's appointment as Mario, and then a Dinner engagement as Marian.  So, it will be one of those "half and half" days where I have to change my presentation in mid day.  This is part of why I did nothing much today other than to pay a bill or two, and to do some more laundry.

But first....

I woke up after a good sleep.  How did I know it was a good sleep?  Well, I rarely dream, and I had a vivid dream during the night that has since faded from memory (like most dreams do).  Once I was fully conscious, I warmed up some frozen quiche from Trader Joe's (Meh!) and sat down to fold some of last night's laundry.  Even though the sock monster ate two of my ankle socks, I have more than enough to spare.

Next on the docket was paying some bills.  Although my car insurance went up, I was glad to get this payment out of the way, as I expect even more bills to come up before the end of the month, as well as a funds transfer to pay for work being done on the family homestead.  AARGH!  Yet, one good thing came of this - I found out why credit card payments to one account weren't being processed.  It seems like the partner bank for one of my cards had changed, along with both account number and lockbox addresses. So I updated this information, and I hope that next month all will be OK.

Finally, I got around to doing my laundry.  Two loads washed and dried, but not yet folded.  I will need to do this before the weekend, as I have to bring a packed suitcase along with me as I drive RQS home after the upcoming weekend.  This way, when I go there by train, I'll have my carry-on, my CPAP machine, and maybe my backpack.

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One item of mote: Today, I read a report where US Customs detained a US Citizen and his wife at the Canadian border, and made him surrender his cell phone - even after he noted that he was an attorney, and had sensitive information on it.  Even bright red congressional districts have had enough of this crap and are complaining.  The US Citizen and his wife were eventually released, but what does this say about the heavy handed treatment that ICE is showing people of all nationalities, including our own?

Given that I will be out of the US at least 3 times in the next 6 months, I wonder what will happen to me, as I am openly against this administration's actions.  Will they subject me to the same headaches as this citizen experienced?  Yes, I'll be traveling as a cisgender white male, and not the transgender woman I am.  But how long will it be possible for me to deal with being in stealth mode, and when will they start hunting us down, like the Nazis did in the 1930's?