What a week

Steps: so for the last month or so, I've managed to hit 10K steps every day with the exception of days when the kids were home and the weather was not conducive to being outside.  There was also at least one day where I got close (8700) and I honestly believe it is more a case of not having my tracking device with me at all times than missing the mark.  NG and I go on walks and usually get at least two, sometimes three laps around the subdivision which nets a good 4500 steps right there.  There have been a few days where I've reached 15K steps as well.

I also do get some running in.  In 2022 I've run 16 miles, which is more than half what I logged for 2021.  

Weight:  My weight is trending down and orbiting the 210 mark.  I'm hopeful that I can get it down to at least 205 by the end of February.

it reads 207.9 lbs

Dry January:  We made it to Day 22 of Dry January.  Honestly, I was only going to go until Jan 28 and then celebrate the end of my contract with the Lunatic PM.  I didn't really notice a difference between Day 2 and Day 22 and that is likely my eastern European DNA being able to process alcohol better than it should.  

Contracts:   speaking of the project from hell....my contract got extended to March 18th.  OF course, no one told me it was extended.  I only found out by logging into the Consulting Firm website and seeing it under Contract Transparency.   There is an option to discuss your end date and I clicked but no response so far (24/48 hrs, it's been two weeks).

I'm not sure why my contract was extended.  First of all, the amount of work we've had over the last two weeks would be equal to one really busy day if we lumped it all together.  Second, the PM and I obviously would prefer a divorce so why not just keep the other consultant and adjust his hours?

Finally, something like this isn't sustainable.  I mean considering we were dropped down to 30 hours, I suppose it's good insurance to have two people available for TASKS that attorneys might need at a drop of a hat, but could be done much cheaper if lawyers could just get over themselves.

The PM is annoying me but this is a sweet gig from the standpoint of I am getting paid to do little to nothing and it is sanctioned and approved.  It won't last forever but I should enjoy the revenue stream while I can.

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Ultimate Playset Drama

Edit from the future:  I had sitting in my draft folder from a year ago.  I finally decided to publish as is instead of working it out.  I'm backdating this to the date I wrote it.

Yesterday we were expecting delivery of a Playset.  We were told it would arrive at 11 am but they did not get here until 1:12 pm and it took 2.5 hours to put together so it wasn't quite ready when the kids got home from school.  It's mostly pre-assembled but the components have to be connected and it has to be leveled and a few more minor things.  Still much better than the two weeks my neighbor and I spent putting their much smaller playset together from scratch last year.

The thing is, we ordered this kick-ass Ultimate Playset in early November.  They said 6-7 weeks which would have put the delivery date on Christmas Day.  I did not expect them to deliver on Christmas Day but I expected it either a couple days before or the week after.  Unfortunately, I waited until that week to call and it turns out, they didn't process our order.  I called the place we purchase from and the person who answered the phone apparently was driving and gave me the builder's number.  I called him and he told me that he just received the order.  I insisted that we ordered six weeks prior and he reluctantly confirmed and said he would try to get it out to us in two weeks.  Of course, by then the Mississippi Winter started and the weather was a factor.  No point in putting it on wet soggy ground.

We finally got a good week (this week) and there was still some gaslighting from the person who was supposed to deliver.  He called on Monday and we confirmed Wednesday.  When I called him he insisted I said Thursday.  There's no point in arguing so I said "okay make sure it's Thursday."  He still was a few hours late but we have it now and the kids can burn energy instead of being on their tablets all the time.

First Post of the Year

 At the start of a new year, thousands of bloggers rediscover their dormant blogs and make a promise to start blogging again.  I'm the opposite. Every January I ask myself, is this the year I quietly end Mysteries of Life and not post anymore.  The answer is, as long as I have this space, I will continue to post from time to time because I can.  I enjoy writing and doing good or at least consistent writing takes practice.  Also, I love looking back at a post from years ago and remembering something I forgot.

So how is it going?  Well, I'm still working that contract gig.  I'm doing one repeatable task over and over.  There really shouldn't be any drama.  And yet, the Project Manager has come out of the Sanity Closet and gone into full-fledged lunatic mode.  I've bounced my thoughts against the other consultants and we agree that the PM has burnt through all the goodwill we have available and is just being annoying, oftentimes on purpose.  I will try to do a separate post about this because as I mentioned above, it's good to come back in a few months and see how far you've come.

My weight is gradually and consistently getting lower.  I'm at the 210 - 212 lb range this week.  When we can, NG and I take laps around our subdivision.  One lap is 1 mile if we start from the top of our driveway.  When we do two, we have to remember to add the climb up the driveway as well.  We are still on track with Dry January.  In February, I hope to go Mostly Meatless to see how that affects our weight, diet, and overall energy levels. 

$6K and they have only used it for 30 minutes

Some days are harder than others to get our laps in.  Yesterday we were expecting delivery of an Ultimate Playset.  We were told it would arrive at 11 am but they did not get here until 1:12 pm and it took 2.5 hours to put together so it wasn't quite ready when the kids got home from school.  It's mostly pre-assembled but the components have to be connected and it has to be leveled and a few more minor things.  Still much better than the two weeks my neighbor and I spent putting their much smaller playset together from scratch last year.  I will try to do a separate post on this one too, but for now every time I start writing about it, I get a little stabby.

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A little late to the steps game

Recently, reluctantly, I enabled the step counting or tracking features of my iPhone.  In my running heyday, I never cared about getting in a certain amount of steps per day (and it wasn't a thing that I recall anyway) because I knew that even my easy mileage would knock out 10K steps.  not to mention going over it so much that my rest days would be covered as well.

Alas, I'm not running as much yearly as I use to do weekly.  According to Strava, I've run just over 20 miles this year, and the bulk of that came in October when I decided to do a virtual 10K.  The Michael Meyer's Virtual run.

This step tracking comes in conjunction with the purchase of a new scale.  It's fancy.  It tracks all the stats, except maybe one or two that you'd need an even higher-priced version.  Anyway, the first time I step on the scale, Dec 1, I weighed in at 220 lbs.  Five days later, without doing any exercise or diet modification, I was at 216 lbs but went back up though never reaching 220 again.  With some intentional running, walking, and eating modifications, I've managed to hit a low of 213 lbs.  Weight fluctuates.

Back to the steps.  Nightingale agrees with me that the steps probably aren't accurate unless you are wearing a Fitbit or Apple Watch or other such devices.  Most mornings I do the same thing in the first hour of the day.  Fetch coffee from the kitchen, feed the cats, and pace the house while getting Moose and Squirrel up and to the breakfast table.  Yet the difference is astounding.  one day I hit 1000 steps by 8 am, the next it's only 500.  Today it was 2000 but that's because Friday is garbage day and i have to walk our cans down the driveway to the road.  Granted some days I forget to carry my phone with me all the time so I miss a lot of steps.

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Need a Do Over

 Been up less than 30 minutes and I already need a do-over.  First, I forgot to hit the “ready to brew” button on the Alexa-compatible coffee maker.  The RTB button is to make sure Alexa doesn’t turn on a pot with no water or coffee grounds.  I got one because on weekends we never know how long the kids will let us sleep (spoiler alert it isn’t long) so no point in scheduling coffee.  But this morning I had to walk into the kitchen and turn it on manually, like a caveman.

 Then I’m trying to quietly open a can of cat food and end up flinging it across the kitchen, spreading cat food on the counters, dishwasher and perhaps one Feline. 

 The good news is that the Bears are on national TV tonight so I get to watch that game.  The bad news is Bears are on national TV tonight and I get to watch them lose. 

Also woke up to learn Anne Rice died.  

An unfortunate set of events for New Rigel

My desktop, New Rigel, has finally bit the dust.  it seems like every time we move into a new house, one of my computers breaks a few months later.  Okay, I only have two data sets for this and both machines were already pretty old before moving them around several times.  But I had just sunk a little over $100 into upgrading the memory because it was giving me some performance issues when I tried to work with remote Citrix for my contract gig.  

I ordered a new computer desk in November.  It took two weeks to arrive via some crappy Amazon issues.  I actually had to reorder it but got a $40 credit for my troubles.

After building the desk, I powered down the PC and put everything on the new desk.  I didn't power it back up because it was evening and I didn't need to do anything computer-related.  The next morning it wouldn't turn on.  Something must have happened during the night because the UPS device I keep my PC plugged into was off, and out of backup power.  

As I had to start work, I borrowed Nightingale's laptop and was able to find most of my URLs through the power of Chrome.  This has been a decent short-term solution but Nightingale really wants her laptop back.  

I did some troubleshooting and found that if I removed the ATX CPU cable, the computer would power on, but of course, nothing would boot up.  The next thing to try was the Power Supply.  I ordered one off eBay and there was drama with that because I had my old address in my account and didn't notice until I hit Purchase.  eBay has no mechanism to change an address after an order has been placed, and the seller was less than helpful.  

The new Power Supply didn't make a difference so now the best, and really the only course of action is to get a new computer.  I'm not ready to purchase my next Forever Computer so I'm looking for a cheap but serviceable one.  My current gig goes until January 28th and I don't know when the next gig comes along.  

My dead desktop was pretty robust and it had built-in WiFi.  The cheapies I'm looking at on Woot either don't have WiFi or come with a USB dongle, which isn't ideal but I'm warming up to it. 

I considered buying an exact version of my old desktop off eBay so I would just swap out hard drives and reuse the RAM I just bought.  But as Nightingale pointed out, why would I want an 8-year-old computer?  And as some friends on Facebook pointed out when I bragged about upping the RAM, solid-state drives are where it's at, man!  

There are some cheap refurbished desktops on Woot but many of them do not come with built-in WiFi or optical drives.  Some do not say how much RAM They support.  I think I have found two that might suffice, but I'm torn between going cheap or going for the long haul. 

Lenovo M900 Small Form Factor Desktop, Intel Core i5-6400 2.7GHz Quad-Core, 16GB DDR3, Solid State Drive, Win10Pro (Your Choice: Model) -$359.99

Lenovo M900 Small Form Factor Desktop, Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz Quad-Core, 16GB DDR3, Solid State Drive, WIFI, Win10Pro (Your Choice: Model) - $529.99

Note: I know these links may disappear but I've basically shown them with max price options on Woot.  

The major difference is the processor and each comes with different SSD size options.  Basically, I either buy the i5 with the half-terabyte SSD or I get the i7 with the 1 TB SSD.  none of the options in between are worth it.  I'm hoping that I can reuse my optical drive from New Rigel.

I'm leaning toward the cheaper option.  If it fails, i won't feel as bad knowing that I save $200 which can be used to buy the next desktop, a gaming machine perhaps.  

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Gig Work

 When all was said and done, and Nightingale gave notice at work, the plan expectation was for us both to be unemployed for a little while.  We would use the time to get the house in order and exercise every day after getting the kids to school.  

As luck would have it, I landed a contract job that started on her first day of her being unemployed.   It's doing one repeatable task that doesn't require a lot of brainpower, but the pay is decent and there is overtime if I want it.

It's been a long time since I was paid by the hour.  The contract goes until late January but given how the work has slowed down, I wonder if that end date will come sooner.  

I'm not sure what to say about this project.  From conversations with the other two contract consultants, I'm vindicated that:

• the data isn't well organized;
• the workflow could be improved;
• and the PM is a flake.

I admit that I'm bringing with me the Ghosts of Jobs Past and I'm trying not to let it cloud my judgment.  I'm not always successful.

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