Author: Peg

Brunch with some of my accidental family today. We had an excellent time. Lots of residents had their families visiting. It has taken 3 years to get back to “normal”. I do hope that “normal” lasts as long as I do. 

In addition to eating and drinking, I did a couple of walks today (to try to offset the eating and drinking) and played around with Final Cut Pro. I am so not Pro. I feel guilty even owning such a powerful chunk of code. But, I don’t use all that Photoshop has to offer either. Not even close. Actually, the only software that I use anywhere near max are Lightroom and Excel. And, if Photoshop didn’t come with my monthly Lightroom subscription, I wouldn’t have Photoshop. 

I tried not using Excel for a few years. But, sooner or later I always ran into something that couldn’t be done with the free versions. Heck, the Mac version of Excel is bad enough compared to the Windows version.  This is a very first-world problem. I remember when there wasn’t Excel. In the beginning, there was Visicalc. It was the first killer app for Apple. This would have been in the 1978-1980 era. 

And without Lightroom, I would never be able to find a photo. 

I guess I am more about organizing, filing, sorting, and finding and less about designing and creating. 

I am not sure why they were doing this. One of those social media things. But I was just collecting photos from my video in support of sensible gun laws.

While I was trying to figure out how to use Apple Motion to make text crawl along the bottom of my video, I was playing with MidJourney. It makes great stock filler images. I was running it in slow mode because I get unlimited slow service, but not very much fast service.  So I tried tossing Kyrie, eléison in as a prompt. 

Well, that was cool. But, maybe MidJourney doesn’t speak Greek. Or maybe MidJourney wasn’t fed the Tridentine Mass. But, it’s a really cool image.

So, try again, this time in English.

Ok. This is interesting. Definitely, something to play with someday when I have a lot of time to kill. 

Accomplished things today. And, my room was cleaned by someone else. I always love that. Enjoyed happy hour with my friends. Followed by dinner on the patio. The food was lacking but the company was good. 

Damn, this is very boring blog entry. Sigh.

Just normal boring Little Old Lady Shit. What can I say? I am a Little Old Lady. And damn that sucks. But, it’s what it is. So deal with it. 

I was looking around my blog as I was in 2001 (and the term blog wasn’t really used by then) when I come upon my bookmarks from May 2001.  I am slightly curious about what mattered enough to bookmark 22 years ago. Bookmarks really mattered way back then. Just checked. Most are LONG gone. 

Been sleeping poorly since I returned to The Asylum. And, my watch agrees. I have been scoring in the low 70’s. I think it’s because I have been finishing up an audiobook at bedtime. Tonight, I will read a book and see if I can get a better sleep score tonight. 

Most of today was “wasted”. As in accomplished very little. But I did very carefully fill out a “Daisy” award for the ED Charge nurse who drove me to my hotel in Clarkston. 

Haven’t heard of a Daisy Award? I am not surprised. Most hospitals have a way that you can nominate one of their nurses (or an entire group of nurses) on the hospital website. It’s a lightweight silly-sounding name but it’s the Academy Awards of Nursing. The DAISY Award® for Extraordinary Nurses.

I could have died that night when I started walking two miles to the hotel in the dark. Actually, that’s overly dramatic. But, I might have passed out in someone’s front yard. It wouldn’t have been a good night.

Don’t think the Rosemary and Sage have ever looked this happy. 

So much for gracious living. It’s more like Toy Story. But, I have resolved to not let such trivial matters concern me. If this were my building I would have knick-knack-free elevator lobbies. But, not my monkeys, not my circus. 

I was charging madly through my day, just finishing up yoga, half a sandwich, and 2 cups of coffee when I was overwhelmed by a need for a major nap. 

During the early Covid days, I made a pretty good video about our Asylum’s George Floyd/BLM Rally. Folks seem to think I can do a good one on an upcoming “Sensible Gun Laws” rally. I am not so sure. Anyhow, I am thinking about it. (I don’t think management knew exactly what we were up to back in 2020, this time management is “concerned”. Which, of course, means I need a bitching great video.)

I find myself rather uninterested in my trip photos.  ChatGPT and I wrote a nice email to Lindblad asking for a refund or future credit. I know nothing will come of it. I was told that on the phone many times. I have it in writing that fluking a Covid test gets you put ashore with no recourse. But, I am still willing to spend 15 minutes crafting an email. On the off chance that something might break my way.

My life is almost back in order after being away for 19 days. I have a few more emails to attend to. And the to-do list that I made on the train is untouched. When I come back from a trip I am always overwhelmed by how much crap I have. So, it is a great time to do some major deacquisitioning. 

I am almost ready to go again too.

Made it back all in one piece. And that’s about all I have to offer tonight.

I am all unpacked and everything is back where it belongs. So, I can start planning my next getaway. But first I need to do my laundry. 

And sleep for a couple of nights in my own bed. Did I mention that my watch thinks I have been awake 72+ hours because it could not tell I was asleep on the train? Isn’t technology grand?

All day on the train. Miles and miles of miles and miles.

Will be getting on the Capital Limited soon. 

I see that Prince Chuck became King Chuck without any help from me. I wonder what happened to Prince Harry? All things considered, I bet he has more fun than his big brother. 

Time to go find the train. It has my dinner and my bed.

WiFi is non existent and cellular is iffy.  The food is is surprisingly good and the people on board are interesting. And, I must say that I am liking the bedroom experience. 

Has this trip changed my future travel plans? Nope. Except I will be a damn site more zealous about masking. Maybe.  

Grateful for my old age. I must stop wasting this bonus round. And, that’s a totally inside job. First, wrap of the death cleaning. Second, ignore the Asylum. It really is just another rental building with a totally non functional food service operation on the premises. And my friends live there. 

Grateful that I was able to hangout on the concrete in the sunshine this morning. The first train was 2 hours late. Not really Amtrak’s fault. Two cars fell off the 101 freeway and landed on the tracks.

will be getting on the train in about an hour. The train leaves in two hours. Plenty of time to settle into my “bedroom”. I have not had a bedroom in a long time. 

It has a private potty. So the room has a slight chemical toilet scent. But it beats the smell of the shared johns after the first day. 

So, what to do today? I decided to walk along the dock, sea wall, beach.  No one was surfing. Because there wasn’t any surf.  But, it was still the ocean.

There were all manner of fine benches all along the way. And my buddy Billy from Kona called. We had a nice chat. Each of us looking out at the Pacific Ocean.  

My walk about ends with 13,000 steps and 5.5 miles on the Fitbit. Brought some takeaway sushi back to the hotel with me where I enjoyed it on my private patio.  

After dinner, time to get it together for 3 nights on the train.