For the side porch!

After the successful completion of the side entrance way, the next step in phase one is to make the side porch a three season porch. J and I took some time to look at possible window units the other day and picked four that we thought would work. Below is one of them.

Possible future window for the side porch

The other three are not the same. Do I care? Not at all. I just want the side porch enclosed. We haven’t really decided what to do about the two doorways. I know it would be way more expensive, but I am leaning towards putting up new walls and real doors there. J thought we might just do plexiglass. Both are possibilities. We shall see.

Today I took another Augustus day. I just didn’t want to dash. And the weather was chilly (46°F). And wet. It rained all morning. And it seems to still be dripping now. Just a grey miserable day. Instead, I stayed in bed and did little. Then had some lunch. Then I got a call from M. She needed a ride to Walmart. From there we went to the post office so she could get some stamps. Lastly, we went to Wegman’s so she could get some halloween candy in case she gets some trick or treaters tomorrow.

I also ran a few of my own errands. I went to State Farm and dealt with some notification they sent me about charging me more to be able to sue my spouse in case of a claim. Weird. No thank you. Then I dropped off a book at the Library that I had finished. Next stop, bottle return. I got $4.75! Woo hoo! And not all of that is just money that I already spent. I’d say a third of it, about, is from found bottles and cans. Last stop, Friehoffers. More english muffins (straight into the freezer – it is hard to have too many English muffins! You never know when you might need them!) and two sweet things – a pecan coffee cake and some crumble top donuts.

At home, I went up into the attic (where there is another critter or a critter still – not sure which) to retrieve my computer table. I decided that I was tired of having a hard time accessing my sheets from the cedar chest. I moved that to a spot beneath a window. And the TV is now on a computer table. So exciting!

And that has been my day. I am having leftovers for dinner. Pizza and wings. And a caesar salad. Yum.

Oh, I got a message from the delivery people who rejected me saying that because I didn’t answer all of the questions correctly on their silly quiz – come on, 80% isn’t good enough? – I was not offered a place. I can reapply in 30 days. Which I will do. At least they answered and clarified what happened. I thought the green checkmark that I received after the second time I took the test, meant that I had passed. It did not. It meant that I had finished my second attempt. I suggested they fix that. Hahaha, like they will. But at least they responded. Woo hoo!

I have the whole costume!

Sometimes I surprise myself. I was thinking I would need to find tights and gloves to round out the costume. But no, everything was all together – sort of. The main part was on a hangar at the back of the closet so I didn’t see it until yesterday when I moved all those clothes out of there. The tights were with the coat. The gloves and shoes (which, if I remember correctly, glow in the dark) were together with the mask. My current plan is to wear it all day Tuesday. I don’t think I will wear the shoes all day as they have fairly thin soles and I don’t like having feet that are cold. And I will definitely be going to the bank to see M and S in their costumes.

The whole enchilada!

What else did I find today? I found the long sleeve flannel shirt that I thought was lost forever. It was at the very bottom of the pile of all of the shirts that I hadn’t hung up in the closet. I put those away today and found the flannel. So happy that it was found at last.

My guests left around 11 I think, to go to a brunch. Sniff sniff. They were both very good people. Easy to tell since they were nice to me about me and the house. They said we would keep in touch, but that rarely happens. We shall, of course, see. I’ve remade the bed in there already. And I discovered that, being out of practice hosting, I had forgotten to turn their radiator on!! I hope they weren’t too cold. Silly Augustus.

I’ve done a load of laundry. Except for the fun part – the folding. I’ll do that later tonight while I am watching stuff on the TV.

Oh, I’ve had a thought about that. I think I am going to rearrange my room slightly. I would like easier access to my sheets trunk. Right now it is under the TV. I will move that to underneath one of the windows in here. And use my computer desk for the TV. I might even, gasp, buy a sound bar for this set up. Speaking of the TV, I tried to use the remote app on my phone to control the Apple TV, but it seems to have a hard time finding my TV for some reason. Very frustrating.

Bad host, Augustus! I also forgot to tell them about the wonders of the towel warmer. It wasn’t that cold today, so I don’t think it would have mattered. But they might have liked to have tried it. Sigh.

I wallowed most of the day. I will get over the rejection soon. But I was really hoping that I would get to at least try that other delivery app. Oh well, life is that way sometimes.

Tonight, breakfast for dinner. Again! So excited. I forgot to take the bacon out to thaw, so I guess a little microwaving will be called for. I think I have enough hollandaise for dinner tonight. At least one egg.

Tomorrow, left over wings and pizza. The wings turned out well. Though I couldn’t really discern a difference in crispiness between the three methods: cornstarch, flour, flour and cornstarch. Though I will refry the three I fried on Friday and maybe that will make them closer to the extra crispy wings I like most of the time.

Guess what I found?

I started cleaning out my closet a bit so that I can use it as a studio for voice over recording. Gotta start somewhere, right? I decided to move all the clothes that I rarely wear (but may wear someday) into a different closet. In so doing, I unearthed a few things that I had forgotten about. A few nice bathrobes. my tuxedos. (Yes, I have more than one tuxedo – what is wrong with me?) A cool winter coat that Alice bought for me and I have barely worn. (I wear the other one a lot. She had great taste a lot of the time.) And, I found my Grinch costume!! Woo hoo! I guess I am dressing up on Halloween after all. Good thing it is fairly warm. Now, if only I can find my tights…If worse comes to worse (or worst?) I guess I could use my long johns. Do I have black leg thermal underwear? I know I have black shirts…hmm…Anyway, I really look forward to the day I have the money to empty the house entirely into storage and then bring back only what I really like and need and jettison the rest – hopefully in a way that isn’t detrimental to the environment and might actually bring me a few shekels. Anything is possible! Dream huge!

When I was sitting in my Tesla the other day, I noticed that there were three dots under the picture of the car and over the displayed info at the bottom – which, if I recall, was just telling me that my iPhone was connected. I didn’t know what those dots were – though usually that sort of thing means that there are more screens available by swiping. At the time, I couldn’t get anything to swipe. Later, I did manage. There was trip information and tire information under the other two dots. Cool! So much to learn about these cars and their software. Speaking of which, I am hoping to buy a Highland (if they ever become available in the US) and will therefore be selling my current Model 3 (at that time). Does anyone think that they may want it? They are great cars and if I could afford it, I would keep both and put one on the Robotaxi network if that becomes a thing in my lifetime (which it well could…depending on how soon I kick off of course…)

Potential window for the side porch

I did a good bunch of stuff today. Yippee! Paid bills. And I have more money stuff to do tomorrow. I signed up for Upwork and put up a profile. I will go back at some point and tweak it. On a cursory examination, it doesn’t look like there is a ton or work that I might be right for. Oh well. Maybe I will put myself up on Fiverr, too. Though I don’t really like having to sell myself and fight for jobs, so this whole thing might not be right for me. At least the closet got cleaned out a bit!

The guests are really nice. They sat and chatted for about an hour about this and that. Then they got ready to go to their family wedding. As soon as they left, I headed over to S’s. She had some things she wanted me to do and made us dinner: spaghetti, a spinach salad and an apple crumble type desert. All yummy. I carried some things, picked some apples, helped with some paperwork and set up her home alert type thing. There is more to do. We set an appointment for Wednesday, November 1. Yippee!

I am a little dismayed. I signed up for that company that does larger catering orders and they said that I wasn’t right for their company. I have written and asked them to say why. I hope it isn’t ageism. We shall see. I don’t really expect an answer until Monday.

So, I will chill out and hope that tomorrow is another day above ground.

A Happy Dashless Friday!

Ok, a happy day except that my brother died from complications arising from Alzheimer’s. My half brother Ernst was 86. He is survived by his wife and two sons.

Floofy post shower hair

I spoke with a guy who said he had been banned from del Lago for winning too much money at Blackjack. Could be the case. Who knows?

I could get used to not dashing again. But I don’t think I can make enough from room rentals alone. If I had both rooms, and I was fully booked (at least five nights a week) that might do it. Barely. But that is unlikely. And having a boarder would only cover about a half of what I think I need per month – so unless I figure out some other sources of income, I will still have to do some dashing. Woo hoo.

J and his helper R came yesterday and did most of the work to turn the back entry way from dismaying to tremendous! There is some painting I could do if I ever feel so inclined and motivated, but even as it is, it is such a joy to walk through now. It was a tad more expensive than I had in my spreadsheet I think. And I want to quibble about the washing machine – I mean, I didn’t use it that much and it died. So…but honestly, it is just money. Anyway, they were here all day yesterday. Then came for a teeny bit this morning. And added the faceplate to the new light switch later in the afternoon (I think – he can be stealthy – and I am feeling a little deaf again because my left ear is clogged up with glunk. Sigh.). I’m pretty happy with how it turned out!

Oh, J put up a motion sensitive light in the back foyer. Luckily I found the box and the instructions in my trash can. I think I can set it to different colors! That would be nifty. I wonder if it is network enabled. I don’t think it is, but I can look.

Next up, and the last part of phase one, I think (since I have put “jacking up” the house on indefinite hold), is the side porch being converted into a three season porch. J and I looked at windows and I think we came up with four that will do the trick. Still not sure that the plan is for the two doorways. J mentioned plexiglass, I suggested new walls and doors. We shall see. Not too worried about it. No idea when he might actually get to it. After I pay him for this bill – which I will do as soon as money comes from the HELOC to my local account – I will ask him about time frame for the porch. So excited!I might have to get rid of the pew that is on the side porch…or at least put it in the barn for now and maybe use it in either the barn remodel or in the storage unit. We shall see.

I finished All Systems Red. Turns out that there are lots of books in this Universe. I think I will put off thinking about reading them until after I have read the other two Library books I have. And have at least looked for the other seven on the list that Penny shared. I liked the book. I wonder if the protagonist was actually in one of the other books. Could be. I guess I will find out one day.

My to do list shrank by half. Most of that was getting the house ready for my Airbnb guest. She is here and is very nice. It is kinda weird to have a guest in the house again, honestly. The next set of items are more about me. Like paying bills. I was going to do that today, but I will do it tomorrow instead. Damn Big Debt people waited until yesterday to cash their damn check. Grrr. I wish they would do it as soon as they get it. Double grrr.

I did a load of laundry. It was so nice to be walking through the redone back foyer! I need to take pictures of it. I took pictures of it before the remodel. I think if I do take some after pictures, I will post a set up on instagram. Someday. Hahahaha.

At Wegman’s, I bought some raw wings. And I cleaned my deep fryer. The plan is to make the bread pizza things again – I still have a lot of artichoke hearts that need to be eaten – and some wings. I want to try three different coatings and see if there is a substantial difference in crispiness between them: cornstarch, flour and cornstarch and flour. I also bought garlic powder, which I might just have to sprinkle on the wings or in the dry goods…

Happy Friday!

Weird Day

Weird day is better than boring day, imho. And today was kinda weird. Not bizarre, but certainly not average or normal.

Sub average – this whole week has been sub average in the number of offers I have been given. I don’t think I have broken ten once this week. When most weeks I get 12-14 offers in at least 4 of the ten shifts I dash. What the heck is up with that? Either there are too many dashers. Or there are too few offers. Or both. I think it is both.

Speaking of dashing – like I talk about anything else – so sorry, my life is kinda circumscribed just now – I saw a dasher I had never seen before. And he had a weird growth on the end of his eyelash! What the heck is that about? I thought eyelashes didn’t stay on your eye that long. Internet says six to eight weeks! That growth would have freaked me out and I would have pulled if off long ago!

And I had a couple of interactions with a dasher who I have seen around quite a bit. And who has the tendency to park right in front of my car when I park at McD’s. Pisses me right off. If I see someone parked there, I move along and park elsewhere. I am not that guy on The Price is Right who bets one dollar more than some other person. That is just rude.

Also while dashing today, I saw a place that was covered in bugs. The picture below does not do it justice. By their door, it was at least three times as thickly covered with bugs! Ick and blech! And they were small tippers. Sigh.

Ew, bugs galore

Trivia! It has been a while since I got to play trivia out. A whole week! I was jonesing a little bit. We ended up with our full compliment and eded up coming in second. Even with a few of the answers being changed back to the ones that M originally said, we would have come in second. Why? Because of the baffler. Anyway, We had a lot of money saved up from previous weeks. Somehow our bill skyrocketed, V offered to chip in which was nice. But we had a new bartender/Front of House Manager on the bar tonight. And she had problems with all of our saved up coupons. I ended up paying quite a bit – but really, it is only money and I don’t really care. I am bringing this up because even people in positions of power aren’t necessarily the best at what they are doing. Or something like that.

I haven’t been doing ten ideas a day. More like 5. I hope, when I expand my horizons again somehow, I will be able to get back to 10 a day. I have, though, because of the dearth of rides, had a lot of time to read, which is, obviously, a mixed blessing. I read a book called Fair Helen about the “true” events related to a Scottish song(lay?). It took place in Southern Scotland, the Borders, in the 16th century. (Marco Polo went to China in the 13th Century – is that crazy or what?!) Cool book which I liked way more than I thought I would.

I have started one of the 10 books that were recommended by P and a website. Murderbot series, book number one – All Systems Red. Good so far. Very space opera-like.

Ok, time to chill. Half day of dashing tomorrow. Then a guest arrives. And maybe a real “date” this weekend. That would be novel.

Grey Skies are Gonna Clear Up

I was in a few musicals in my time. (This is pseudo grandpa speaking.) One of the earlier ones was performing in the local high school’s production of Bye Bye Birdie. I played Randolph MacAfee. A decent little kid as I recall. Bit part really. I did have a reprise to myself. Anyway, one of the songs from that musical is Put on a Happy Face. Just saying…

Finding the microphone improved my mood. Is that weird? I hate losing things. Seriously. Which is why I hold onto so much crap. Or at least one of the reasons. I wonder if that is genetic. Or zodiacal. Or something. Anyway, not being able to put my little fingers on the microphone while looking in all the conceivable places had been getting me down apparently. I thought yesterday at some point, that maybe it was in the office at the back of the house. And this morning before heading off to dash, I peeked in there, and sure enough, Lo! and Behold! There the microphone, and my cool lap desk, both were living. Made my day.

Dashing, though. I begin to realize that it is getting really wearing. If I had a boarder, I would only dash the peak hours. Why not? Still the best damn dasher in seven counties! What would that be – maybe 20 hours a week? Hmm. Something to think about. It was a decent dashing day. Nothing too noteworthy to write about. Except…

One of my later rides in my second shift took me out to Fayette south of Geneva. On the way back, I drove on 96a coming into town. I had driven the other direction earlier for another long drive, well compensated for once, (though he has always compensated well – it’s the other long distance ones who rarely tip adequately. Sigh) and noticed that there was a new traffic pattern. I had been thinking that since they were adding lights at the West Lake Road intersection, they would need to add a turning lane. Little did I think it was going to be one of the two lanes out of the city. Grrr and sigh. Makes sense though, going that direction. Coming back I found that the other direction also had a dedicated turn lane. Something which is maybe needed one 12th as much as the one heading out of Geneva. In my humble opinion. But no one asked me. More the pity and shame. Shame!!

He keeps adding stuff.

And just my luck. When I had nowhere to be and the traffic was light and the light was ok, a bunch of kids came up and stood taking pictures of themselves at the house. Sigh. I am not a big Halloween person – I appreciate it but am not a devotee. I did think that maybe Geneva needed a house decorating contest about halloween. I think this house would be a top contender!!

I’ve been watching a video series about Speed Puzzling. That looks stressful but fun!

Cropola Sort of Day-ish, Kinda

Ok the weather was great! It was in the seventies, a lot of sun for most of the day. I mean, woo hoo! Who needs to live where it gets super hot when we get days like this? I mean, you know? Sadly, the great weather did not make the day any better in other ways.

Not today, just a pretty-ish fall picture

I did two dashing shifts today and boy howdy were they terrible feeling. I did ok in the end, not great, and not as abysmally as it felt. The first shift I got seven trips. 7!! Even worse than yesterday’s 9. What the hell? And then the afternoon shift…well, I got a lot of rides, but mostly what I call hand me down rides. The rides that no one else wants to take. I had to reject one of those. I took lots of others though. Thankfully none as Meh as the one I declined. I, again, got a late last dash, but it actually had me back in time for trivia.

Or so it would have, if, another reason today was not optimal, trivia had not been cancelled. I wish B well, I hope she is ok. We are also not having trivia next week as Halloween proper falls on the 31st. I’m surprised there hasn’t been a constitutional amendment to make Halloween fall on a Friday or a Monday. So lots of trivia cancelled. And so far P has said she can’t play on Thursday. SIgh.

Instead of trivia, what did I do? I went to Krispy Krunchy Chicken and bought a two piece with a bisquit. I brought that home and made myself a little (medium sized, actually) caesar salad with my homemade dressing. So yummy. Such a fine little meal. I will need to make more of the dressing soon. Maybe tomorrow night!

Oh, I have guests coming this weekend. And J thinks that there is no leak and that it was user error that caused the deluge in the kitchen. That could be the case. I hope that no one would be that stupid to put the shower curtains outside of the tub when taking a shower. But they could have been. Scary. Anyway, I will reach out to my incoming guests tomorrow to check to see if their plans have solidified. I have no idea who is coming from where. Not a clue. I guess I will have to look at the listing at some point. Oh, and if the leak really is no leak, that means I can think about renting out my one room for long periods of time!

Frosty Monday? Not Quite

It was certainly chilly this morning. No frost. Not yet. But I did break out the big winter coat. And a scarf – which definitely needs washing – hand washing. I don’t recall where it came from. I think my mom. Or my sister. Anyway, it needs washing. My coat could probably do with a cleaning as well. Heck, everything in the house and in my life could use a cleaning. And I have guests coming this weekend.

Speaking of which, I sent a message to J asking him what was happening. Still haven’t heard. I will hear one day, I hope. If the bathroom has been fixed, I can try to rent it long term now. Sigh.

Cool Sky, don’t you think?

Two dashing shifts today. The first was kinda slow – ok, really slow. I hope to do at least 12 rides in a shift. This shift I only had 9. And I didn’t get started much later than usual. Monday’s are that way, it seems. The afternoon shift went nicely. And ended up nicely and weirdly. My last ride was from McD’s to somewhere downtown. I got there and called because the delivery was set to “call and get directions.” The person who answered the phone was someone I knew. Yes, Geneva is tiny! She and her husband came down to say hi – I actually “know” them both! They seemed genuinely happy to see me but I really don’t know what to say. They thrust more money at me – the tip on the app had been fine. But when I counted it, it was $13! Yay! Made the day, I think. In the long run…

Did anything else exciting happen today? Oh, yes, I finished my book and started another one. And I reserved three books at the library. P had post a link to a list of the Top Ten science fiction books of 2023. I asked for the first three. Sadly, they are all starts of series. What is up with series? Can nothing stand alone? (Says the guy who has a fantasy series in the deep recesses of his mind…)

Tonight I had leftovers for dinner: the penultimate piece of my reuben sub, french fries out of my lovely deep fryer (that could use a clean – see above), and a tasty caesar salad. My dressing is really, if find, delicious. Probably too much garlic for most. Overpowers the anchovies a little bit maybe. Anyway, yum.

S has asked for some help, which I will happily grant her. We are aiming for the weekend. I hadn’t planned on working anyway, due to the guests. (See above) So that works out ok. I do have mild concerns about the driveway. This will be the first time I think that I have had guests since I have had the Tesla. Weird. Weird to think that most of my income came from Airbnb before. And now almost none of it does…

Ok, time to wrap it up for the night!

I guess it’s towel warmer season!

Yes, I have used my towel warmer a couple of times so far this season. What a great thing! And it will be even better as the weather gets even colder. Woo hoo! Thank you S for having one and showing me how to use it! That was a great visit for so many reasons. Not the least of which was the notion of a towel warmer like that! Much better than the rack kind, imho.

A riot of colors!

There you are, a Sunday selfie. I am all clean. The kitchen has been cleaned (by me). Except for a few glasses. I need an empty-ish dish rack for when I wash glasses. And emptying the sink is top priority. And glasses don’t live in the sink as they are most easily broken by clumsy Augustus. My sheets are changed. I will have some laundry to fold in a few minutes. Woo hoo! Oh, and I vacuumed a little bit in my bedroom.

So, I think I am going to try the voice over thing. P put me in touch with K who had some good answers for me. My studio will be my closet for the time being. That is sure to deaden sound in there. I need to put a lamp in there. And a power strip maybe. We shall see. So excited. It would be fun to be doing voice overs for a living for a while perhaps. I wonder how to skip the line on this one? James Altucher? Any thoughts? Of course he reads my blog…hahahahaha. When, though, is the question. I guess maybe next weekend? I’m not sure how quickly I will get any work. If I will get any work. And do I put myself up on Fivrr and on UpWork? Hmm.

I got all of my ideas that I have come up with so far into a spreadsheet. Next, I need to collate them a little bit and give them to whoever they are ideas for. Mostly Tesla and Door Dash, since I spend a lot of time in one doing the other. I don’t think Door Dash has an “idea” email address. I will call tech support tomorrow and see if they can give me one. I think I have maybe thirty ideas for Door Dash. And maybe 20 for Tesla. I was surprised how few duplicates there were. Maybe three or four out of 200.

My brother is still dying. My sister is there with them. We shall see what happens.

I watched Part 1 of the most recent attempt at filming Dune. I thought they did a really good job. Paul is a little mousey I think. And I was surprised how mousey his mom is being portrayed. I always thought of her as really strong. Maybe I will re-read those books again. At least the first three. I don’t even know how many there are. I don’t think I read most of the ones after the first three. Hmm. Something to think about. So many books I would like to revisit. Sigh.

Time to make some dinner – breakfast. It will be eggs Augustus (though it probably should be Eggs Augustine) – poached eggs on a waffle with a thin layer of cream cheese, two slices of regular bacon, covered in hollandaise with a touch of lemon juice and a sprinkling of cayenne on top. So excited! Oh, and a hash brown patty. And a little caesar salad!

Eeek, Scary – Cool Spider!

Saw this while dashing! I really think the city or the newspaper or someone (me?) ought to sponsor a contest on house decoration for Halloween.

That’s a big spider!

Today has, overall, been a pleasant day so far. Yippee!

I got up and did a little work checking all the tabs on my devices to see what needed to be saved and what could be deleted. In the process I learned that it was really easy to see the tabs that were on my phone, on my laptop. Both with Safari and Chrome. Woo hoo! I discovered that about half of my tabs were not needed. Bye bye tabs. Others I put into their respective tab groups. Will I ever look at them again? I hope so!

Some time today was also spent transcribing “ideas” from my notepad to a spreadsheet. I am up to more than 100 ideas and only a few of those were duplicates. Yippee! I still have a lot more to transcribe and hope to get to some more done tonight and hopefully finish up tomorrow. I will let that count as my ideas for today. Though I think I did come up with one. Three actually. Maybe I will come up with seven more before the night is over. Anything is possible.

Sure enough, my lunch date was a no show. And she didn’t write me until after I said I was leaving, which I did, to express surprise that I hadn’t been patient enough to wait for her. I think 30 minutes is long enough to wait for someone, don’t you? Now, if she had written me at any point during that 30 minutes and said that she couldn’t meet until, say, 1 pm after all, I might have waited a whole hour. But she didn’t. If she wants to meet (which I doubt) I have told her that she has to now come over here. I don’t think that’s too much to ask of someone who messed up the first attempt, is it? Am I being too harsh?

I watched a fun movie last night – 3000 Years of Longing with Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba. Very enjoyable! Then I watched the first episode of a limited series called Bodies. I might do the same thing tonight – watch a movie and then watch another episode of Bodies. And transcribe a few more days worth of ideas…

Dinner will be leftover reuben sub, that I will adulterate a bit, french fries and a caesar salad. Yippee! I had a piece of pizza bread (so good) leftover from last night’s dinner for lunch today. Yay food!