2020 Spring April 21 Tuesday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

51 degrees this morning, 86% humidity

Turned out to be a beautiful day yesterday, started out a little cool, but warmed up to 78 degrees with no wind.  A late afternoon thunderstorm came in, with very little rain.

Lifted weights this morning, sit-ups, barbells and bench press.  I skipped a couple of days, I thought I might have pulled something, but I think it was something else.

Walk , 23:03  minutes, pace was 41 seconds slower than my goal.

Cool down walk was 13:23 minutes 

Listening to the Great Course today, on Confucius, Bubba, Jesus and Mohammad.  Today he continued with Confucius.   

He noted in the preamble he was going to review the life of each and then the teachings although as he noted frequently their life is their teachings. Kind of like “the media is the message”.  

He has a good point and probably  we all don’t realize how much we “teach” by our actions, rather than our words.  

What surprised me is that he noted that when Confucius was alive, China wasn’t called China, and his name was never Confucius while he was alive, but probably it was about 3 or 4 centuries later when  he was  known as “Confucius”.

Of course there is also the speculation that he never lived, that he was a melding of 4 or 5 people , etc.  

However, the Instructor feels he was alive and was a person.  

He also noted that it is not known if Jesus and Mohammad were literate in the sense they could read and write, but it wasn’t that important because only about 5% of the population was literate and people learned through stories and behavior.

He thought probably Confucius was literate and Buddha was literate.  

When we were in China, one of the sites I wanted to see was a shrine to Confucius, but I never made it there.  

He did note that, like others, many followers of Confucius in later years were killed, including being stoned to death or buried alive.  

Otherwise, life continues.  It is already April 21,2020.  2020 is even a stranger year than I ever would have expected.    

By now, there would have been a series of events, we would have been immersed in baseball (attending minor league, watching major league on tv) and planning our summer and fall trips.

Life goes on anyway,  and we’ll just have to just be flexible and enjoy each day as we can.

That’s it for now, Tuesday, April 21, 2020.

#Resist

2020 Spring April 20 Monday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

51 degrees this morning  95% humidity

Yesterday was coolish, but nice, much colder than “average”.

Walk: 24:07 minutes, pace was 54 seconds slower than my goal.

Saw a comment on tv about an American Indian tribe representative saying that  “if they lose their elders they lose their culture , etc.”. 

Meanwhile  cowering coward trumpies are promoting killing senior citizens so they can make more money and buy a few more houses or airplanes and supposedly help the lying coward lunatic win re-election so he can continue to keep destroying the environment  stealing tax $ for his personal businesses and shoveling trillions of tax $ to his donors, lobbyists and big business. 

This was emphasized to me since  the book I am listening to on my walk is in the Confucius stage and they emphasis how history was so important to Confucius which included not only history and older people but a great respect for dead ancestors.  

Saw pence on tv yesterday, I really don’t know how he lives with himself, he was kow towing to the lying coward lunatic and lying about him being a “great leader” which is a real joke. He had  to know he is lying and an embarrassing book licker.

In my opinion the lying coward lunatic has completely lost his mind, and is committing treason by encouraging people in states with Democratic governors to riot.  He ought to be personally responsible for any damage or deaths.  A real scumbag moron, a bad joke as a so called president. 

The joke fox “news” ought to lose their license and be charged with criminal fraud for their “Doctors” promoting products that are nothing but attempts to rip off people and take advantage of their fears.  

The lunatic has the blood of thousands of Americans on his hands who got extremely sick or died due to his negligence, incompetence and game playing.   At some time, he will need to be accountable for this, to whom I don’t know.  I guess the American people and perhaps the people of the world.  

Speaking of quotes, several weeks ago, I woke down a quote that I thought was impressive was “ the view from the ground depends on where you are standing”.  When I first heard that I laughed and laughed.  I wasn’t laughing at the quote, it was so true, I couldn’t help laughing about it.  

When you think about it, it is obvious true.  Actually, I may be overthinking it, but it is really a correct observation.

I can look back on my life and see times when my “view from the ground” changed depending on “where I was standing”.  

A lot of really vivid dreams lately, I rememberer them but they are so complex and vivid, I have a hard time writing them down and capturing the overall fabric and flow of the dream. 

I understand that for some reason the virus or the pandemic aspect of it leads to vivid dreams, or it seems I dream more in the Spring and Summer.  Or maybe not.

That’s it for now, Monday, April 20, 2020.

#Resist

2020 Spring April 19 Sunday

#Purple_DaysI_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

60  degrees this morning 72% humidity

Relatively good day yesterday, cool, but no wind. Sunny most of the day.  Supposed to rain and storms, so it was nice to have a good day.

Walk:  23:39 minutes, pace was 55 seconds slower than my goal.  I had decided to “stroll” rather than try to go fast, and my time wasn’t that much different.  

Walk (cool down walk):  13;54 minutes 

Twenty-five years ago today, the anniversary of the Oklahoma City Bombing.  While I won’t go into detail today, it is always a time and experience that is seared in my memory.  Not just the actual event itself, but the events that followed, seeing the news trucks, the lighting and rescue operations 24 hours a day, seeing tanks and military guarding the area, and perhaps most of all the outpouring of support by Oklahoma City residents.  I literally remember most of the events like it was yesterday. 

Throughly disgusted with PayPal.  Couldn’t set it up because it kept saying it “was having a problem”.   I couldn’t call them so supposedly you’d text them and they would respond, “within an hour”.  They never responded, but after about an hour, a message would come up “something went wrong”.

I remember now why I never liked PayPal, I first tried to use it years ago and had the same problem.  Of course, now they are trying to blame the virus for their incompetence.  

As we adjust to the “new normal," we are learning both the positive and pitfalls of ordering groceries on-line for pickup or delivery.  

As I have mentioned, “Substitutes” aren’t always really well thought out, so we just say “no substitutes”.  However, there is also the problem of getting the wrong item sometimes 2 or 3 of the same item , etc.

Many of these problems may be “operator error”  (i.e., my mistakeI) rather than the fault of the business.  Fortunately most of the errors are relatively inexpensive. We just chalk it up to experience.  

Part of the problem is there is only one store that we can trust to always have the item once we put I tin our “cart”.  So if I’m not  sure if we’ll get something, so we may order it from several sources hoping we will get it from one!   Of course, in that case, we always get what we order from all the stores!

The state is talking about “opening” the state from the virus shutdown.  Hardly a good idea when they still can’t test for the virus and people are still catching it and deaths are increasing daily.  It seems rather than making rash and misleading statements about “dates” they should be discussing “circumstances” to determine under what conditions they will open up, not just dates.

Yesterday I started listening to a “Great Course” about Comparative Religion, which concentrates on the life and teachings of Confucius, Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad.  

I like it because it has a written PDF I can review prior to or after I listen to it.  I guess it could be considered “multi-media” learning!  

At the start he mentions each person attempted to describe or teach the “Art of how to live life well”.  I like that.  

The first lesson, while introductory, promises to be an interesting Course, something I can look forward to while walking. 

That’s it for now, Sunday, April 19, 2020

#Resist

2020 Spring April 18 Saturday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

35 degrees this morning, 89% humidity Wind mph

Yesterday was a miserable, windy day.  Cool most of day (around 40 degrees) although it actually reached a high of 62 degrees late afternoon.

The weather even said this was “February 1” weather, not April 17 weather!  

I thought about walking today, but at the time I usually walk it was 40 degrees and about 20 mph wind.  I stepped outside, but decided I wasn’t going to take a chance on coughing again.  

Had my first “telemedicine” visit today, just a routine follow-up.  Quite frankly it won’t replace a real visit, although it was ok for what the visit was for.  I  guess it could lead to someone having a “Doctor” thousands of miles away, kind of like someone with a favorite sports team thousands of miles away!

I used to have a colleague who would absolutely go water skiing every April 15.  I have no idea how long he continued it. Considering how cold it is on April 15, I don’t know how he did it without getting hypothermia or whatever.  

I never really realized how cold it could be on April 15 until he told me that!

Glad the weekend is here again.  Even with restricted travel , etc., I still have plenty to do.  

I was thinking about my theory concerning “battery” powered houses/buildings that decentralized from “the grid” and are self sufficient on their own. It would work especially if there are designed to use wind and sun to “store” electricity so they were entirely sufficient.  

Perhaps electric vehicles could even be the same and store up electricity from the sun and wind powered generators.  

In this “new normal," it would be a good idea to be able to decentralize from the “grid”.  I don’t know how we would ever be able to “decentralize” our food supply. 

Now would be a good time for me to go back and review the “food supply” chain and how there coddle be problems with it.  

Considering the current situation, where farmers and cattle raisers are literally throwing food away while there are lines literally miles long for Food Bank items, it seems there much be a way to take the milk, vegetables and other food now be thrown away and harvesting it for the people who need it.  

It seems there could be a way to help both the farmers, as well as the persons who need some help getting food.

Considering the trillions thrown at businesses (much of it misused by big business paying lobbyists to pay off politicians to sneak provisions in so they can rip off tax $ meant for small businesses, literally stealing tax $.  

Big business who spend billions “buying back” shares instead of saving for a rainy day are now being thrown tax $ meant to small businesses.  Of course with the corrupt administration in office now, what else would you expect?

I’m sure for what one business is ripping off, they could use the use the funds to resolve the problem of throwing away food and long food lines while providing for more employment , etc.  

Just a lack of creativity and the greedy politicians just doing things the “same old way” and getting the taxpayer ripped off again.  

That’s it for now Saturday, April 18, 2020.

#Resist 

2020 Spring April 17 Friday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

41 degrees this morning, 85% humidity,  20 wind mph

Yesterday temperature wise was nice, but 24 mph winds (gusts to 40 mph)  during the day were just strong enough to make the temperature index (or whatever) miserable.  Anyway, I stepped out and decided it wasn’t worth walking today.  A high of 72 degrees, but a very cool 72 degrees with the wind. 

I have been doing fine regarding coughing, but did note I had some (very small) reaction the past few times I walked in the cold wind.  It is hard to determine because the time I coughed was in the morning, not after a walk.  It really wasn’t enough coughing to get worried about, but there is no reason tempting it either.  

I hope I can start riding the bike again soon.  I will aim for next year for the “bike across the state” trip. I really miss biking, but don’t miss the coughing.  I hope covering my mouth , etc., will help.  Something to look forward too.

Of course, right now, I’m focusing on walking and weights.  Eventually we will start going to the Fittness center again and I’ll actually be able to start swimming.  

The meetings with “Microsoft Teams” went well.   Frankly it is much more impressive than “Zoom," although I don’t know that much about it, except basic use, ditto with Zoom.  

As I mentioned this morning, I don’t think the video meeting will ever supplant the actual meeting, although I expect it will be a part of our life for more minor meetings, it would save a lot of mileage.

A lot of talking about “restarting back to normal”.  I expect it will never be “normal” again as it was before, but it will be a new normal. 

I don’t really see much “return to normal” until they have widespread testing and eventually either a vaccine of a good treatment. 

We have basically decided, at least for now, to stay in our house and deal with the maintenance problems that are a part of it.  While we may change our mind, I don’t think we will ever really feel comfortable living in close quarters with other persons (such as a Senior Housing complex).  

While we were thinking of a separate unit, it still was in an area with a lot of units.  As I have noted before any time they talk about “Senior Housing’, they are thinking of sardines in a can, or just a warehousing type of thing.  In other words they are thinking of lots of $ and not the comfort or safety of Senior Citizens.  

We may change our mind, but not for the foreseeable future.  We really like the idea of no maintenance but….

It is strange how we have gotten used to the “new normal”.  I think since we know eating out, sports, and get-togethers , etc., are simply not possible so it isn’t something we even think about .

As long as the virus is out there with no testing, vaccine or treatment, it is hard to imagine any kind of “back to normal”.

That’s it for now, Friday, April 17, 2020.  

#Resist

2020 Spring April 16 Thursday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

50 degrees this morning, 60% humidity, wind 13  mph

Cool yesterday, warmed some, but not really warm.  Supposed to be in the 70’s today before it cools down again.  I’m ready for Summer!

Walked 24:33  minutes, pace was 39 seconds slower than my goal.

Today is going to be “video day” as I have two work related meetings on “Microsoft Teams”  (the Microsoft version of “Zoom”).  I think it is more stable than Zoom and has more features. 

It has some interesting features that allow for “on demand” or general announcements to “Team” members. 

I’m not familiar with it all that much, just use it.  It will be interesting to see how much programs like this are continued to be used after “normal” returns, whatever normal may be.

I don’t really like the intrusive nature of it, but it is convenient for right now.  

I can’t imagine video meetings ever replacing “personal meetings” since so much goes on “on the side” at regular meetings it is difficult to imagine how the video meetings would take the place of all regular meetings.  

Of course, there are all kinds of ways you can “chat” in private , etc. I don’t know or care to know how to use them unless the video meetings become a major permanent factor.

I just don’t care about intentional  “networking” any more, at least deliberate networking with intent, if that makes any sense. Networking that occurs naturally is fine.  Actually I have found that “unintentional” networking always worked best for me.

Actually I am surprised that the Apple Face Time isn’t used more, probably the others have more features and work with any type of device.

Another sign of the “new normal” is more payments electrically. While I love electronic banking , etc., I have never really used PayPal , etc., in fact I avoided them.

So now I have to set up a Payday account for a club I am Treasurer in and I don’t have any idea how to do it (without incurring fees).  Usually I can pretty well figure things  out from looking at Google, but I am having a problem setting it up without being charged  fees.

I have really been pleased with the battery life on the new iPhones.  I use my work phone very intensively during the day and it still has 68% battery life at night.  The other one always  has 75% or so. 

The one I have for work automatically shuts down at 4:30 p.m. until 7:30 a.m. Absolutely nothing gets through, although I have a lot of notifications at 7:30 in the morning as well as voice mails etc!  

That’s it for now, Thursday, April 16, 2020

#Resist

2020 Spring April 15 Wednesday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

38 degrees this morning, 70% humidity 

Cold day yesterday, fortunately the wind was low.  

Walk, 22:51 minutes,  pace was 51 seconds slower than goal.

Weather was cold today, I am definitely ready for true Spring.

Of course, nothing seems like Spring without all of the normal Spring events.  Somehow it had developed into a strange sort of normalcy.  

I was enraged today to read that the recent “stimulus” bill includes a tax break for mainly millionaires and billionaires that will cost taxpayers $90 BILLION this year alone in tax losses due to some huge tax breaks the Senate Republicans snuck into the stimulus bill for their billionaire donors, lobbyists and themselves.  

Evil crooks.  

$90 Billion dollars to millionaires and billionaires, and the lying coward lunatic and his cowering cowards continue to shovel tax $ to their donors, lobbyists and rich buddies as they continue to cut food stamps, medicare, social security and any other program that benefits the average citizen.  

This is after the 2 trillion tax $ they shoveled to them several years ago in the “tax cut” that only benefitted the wealthy while they increased taxes for the average citizen.  

The  evil lying  coward lunatic is certainly showing why the 25th amendment should be used to kick this lunatic criminal out of office and throw him and his cowering cowards  in jail.

After he failed to take responsibility for anything because he is a coward, he suddenly declares himself the king and dictator and will stuff the virus down our throat so his buddies can get rich with an early “reentry” that  will kill thousands of people so the lunatic can brag about the economy for the election.  

Hopefully the cowering cowards in the Senate will finally get a backbone or some courage and stop this runaway clown. 

Now he is even putting his “name” on the stimulus checks as a tax paid political campaign!  Like he hasn’t already stolen enough tax $.

Again I hate to waste time and space on the evil lunatic, but he has really gong too far along with the cowering cowards shoveling tax $ to their donors and destroying the future of this country.

April 15, 2020.  It seems impossible that the year has gone so fast, especially with the “new normal”.  I expect that “normal” will change every day for a long time.  

That’s it for now, Wednesday, April 15, 2020.

#Resist 

2020 Spring April 14 Tuesday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

36  degrees this morning,  90% humidity

Yesterday, weather was cold all day, high of 46 degrees with mild wind, but it was cold all day.  The good thing is it didn’t snow.

Walk, 21:56  minutes, pace was 19 seconds slower than my goal.  Wind was around 18 miles per hour but it really didn’t bother me.

Listened to my “iPod mini” again today.  It is really nice.  I listened to one of my favorite violin/fiddle albums.  

Getting close to meeting my goal on my pace on my walk.  One of these days I will meet/exceed my goal.   It probably will come when I don’t even feel like I am walking that fast. That is the way it seems like goals are achieved or exceeded.

Of course, the hardest part of meeting or exceeding your goal is to keep meeting or exceeding it. 

I have noticed I walk faster when I am listening to any type of music, but my goal isn’t really just to walk fast, it is also to learn while I walk, so I will primarily listen to books or podcasts .

I have read some articles about the virus being around in December in the United States.  I really wonder if I didn’t have it after Christmas, when I was literally coughing all the time, but I didn’t have a lot of the other aspects of it.

While I don’t watch the lying coward lunatic in his squealing his lies and vicious petty false  attacks at his tax supported political rallies disguised as press conferences, I do catch see some of the excesses on regular news.  

I don’t listen because I can’t stand the sound of his braying squealing lies, vicious petty attacks and his sickening bragging on himself.  Almost worse is pence and the other cowering cowards fawning on the lying coward lunatic and the boot licking that starts every comment 

Last night I have to feel he finally exceeded even what the cowering cowards could take, but you never know. 

The coward actually “retweets” a tweet, so much a coward he can’t even write his own lying tweet while he is gorging on junk food and watching junk news. 

The clown is sick, a real lunatic who feels he is a dictator or king.  Actually using our taxes to even prepare a (false) tribute to himself so he won’t get his feelings hurt. 

The lunatic is making  desperate attempts to attempt to take credit for “reopening the country,"  after the cowering out of taking any action to control the virus because he is a gutless coward.  

Anyway, I don’t like to waste time and space on the lying coward lunatic, but I see his attempts to “reopen” the country as another attack on the ordinary citizen so his donors, lobbyists and rich buddies can buy another airplane or house, or install another gold plated commode.  Doesn’t matter how many people they sicken or kill, just “get the economy going” so the lunatic can brag as the election gets closer. 

That’s it for now, Tuesday, April 14, 2020.

#Resist

2020 Spring April 13 Monday

#Purple_Days_and_Golden_Nights

#My_Journey_20

#Spring_of_20

34 degrees this morning  63% humidity wind 18 mph, “feels like” 23 degrees

Yesterday started coolish, but then warmed up to 72 around noon, when I took my walk, it was 53 a few hours later and 39 with wind at an average of 23 mph around 8 p.m. last night.  

It is supposed to get down to 31 degrees in a few hours.  However, on rain or snow is forecast. 

Walk: 22:26 minutes, pace was 30 seconds slower than my goal.

“Cool-down” walk of 7:23 minutes, we had to cut it short since the storm was coming in.

I called Apple about the bad mouse (or perhaps I should say the mouse that developed a technical problem) and they are replacing it under warranty,  Of course, right after the phone call, the mouse started working again!  Such is life.

My 3 year warranty on the iMac , etc., expires in June of this year.  I thought at first it may be the battery, but it was fully charged.

Listened to music on another Apple device on my walk yesterday  that I have had for a number of years (probably about 2010, maybe a little older.  It still works fine, has a good strong battery.

The battery on my iPhone 3 and iPhone 3+ will works fine, I just haven’t decided how to repurpose them.  

Monday, the start of the work week.  While there are a lot of benefits of working in the office 5 days per week, I miss the field days also!  

I have started working different types of assignments each day to provide some variety.    

One of my concerns is they may try to send us back into the field too soon,  Not  the immediate Supervisors , etc.,   but the Governor etc. who seem to  feel they have to kow tow to the federal government, which is now so incompetent and corrupt and only thinking of how every decision may affect the election of the lying coward lunatic that they seem to have lost all sense of decency and ethics.  

The federal administration  have no concept of leadership, just trying to kow tow to the lying coward lunatic as he desperately tries to get election through any possible means, no matter how many people get sick or die due to their negligence.

Just listened to some cowering coward apologist (on 60 Minutes) who told the lying coward lunatic in January exactly what would happen and, even while admitting the lying coward lunatic  had read his memo, he was cowering and trying to boot lick him by saying he had done “better than any other President would have done”.  I’m surprised he wasn’t struck by lightning or at least jeered out of the interview.  

Today marks the beginning of the fifth week I have been working at home.  I don’t think we have been in a store for a month.

That’s it for now, Monday, April 13, 2020. 

#Resist