18,500?

Any guesses what the number 18,500 represents? It’s the approximate number of words that I put in my blogs each year. Enough for half of a decent sized novel. If only I wanted to write a novel. Do I? Do I want to commercialize my writing? Hmm. I do have some story ideas, and some white papers and such that I would like to write. Making the time (carving it out of my “down” time”) is proving to be a challenge. Good ideas are only as good as their execution. Speaking of which, yes, I am still writing down 10 ideas a day. Do ideas about previous ideas count? I’m not sure about that one, but for now, I am saying yes.

Audrey’s little sister? Seen at Twisted on Thursday!

Today was a dashing day. My last for the week. And it was a surprisingly good week! Yay! We like those! More of those please, oh Universe! Oh, and if a lottery ticket I play could somehow win a decent amount of money (I’m thinking $25 million after taxes), that would be pleasant, too. Anyway, I dashed five out of five days. About seven hours a day I think, for a total of 35 hours. And if my calculations are correct, I beat my previous total earnings for a week by about $30! Woo hoo! I am rich, rich I tell you! Oh, right, debt. And next week is bill paying week. Sigh.

Nothing too exciting happened today dashing. I did get $10 in cash tips, which always makes me happier. One of them was on top of an already extremely generous tip. The other was on a tip that was ok at best and turned the trip into a decent one! My last ride for the night took me to Waterloo, but with a sufficient tip to cover my drive both directions! Woo hoo!

Actually, I was good to myself today at lunch time. I had made an appointment at First Choice (Andy doesn’t really do inspections) for the car to be inspected. I had asked Kevin (fellow Tesla owner) where he got his car inspected and he pointed me to First Choice. Anyway, I stopped dashing at 12:30 instead of trying to do “one more ride.” And there was Mombergers! So, I got myself a Reuben sub. Pretty good by the way. I did have the thought that it would be a little bit better if they toasted the sub roll first before putting anything on it. Maybe I will mention that to them someday. Probably not. Anyway, that gave me plenty of time to get to First Choice (just down the road from Mombergers) and to eat a little while waiting for my car to be done. I had forgotten to put the Tesla card key into my wallet, so I had to give them my phone so that they could do what they needed with the car. The inspection cost me $10. Literal highway robbery! (Ok, no, it isn’t that bad…) Dave said I would need my brakes attended to at some point – the pads were low and the rotors were developing some rust – poop on both accounts. And he also said I would need tires. I heartily agreed with him on that and asked him to give me a price range. We shall see if he comes through with that. So, that was something out of the ordinary.

My left arm (not my left foot) hurts. And has been hurting for a few days. I really don’t know why. And what, if anything to do about it. It isn’t like my heart seems to be straining or anything. It is annoying and a good bit painful. Stop it, arm. Hear me?! (Nah, probably not.)

It is the weekend! So exciting! I have a date with a scammer tomorrow. We know how that will go. And I hope to get a few things accomplished tomorrow and Sunday. Like: going through my reminders again, cleaning out and catching up on email, neatening the kitchen (I have no idea what’s for dinner Saturday night) and maybe turning on the furnace!

And now it is time to make some more food for dinner. I am having more of the pizza bread things. And some buffalo wings. And some salad. Sounds like too much food actually. Oh well, leftovers rock! Happy Friday night to one and all!

A mostly good day

Well. My sister-in-law sent my brother and me a message saying that our brother was not long for this world. That is very sad news. All I can do is send them all the loving energy I can in this not so happy time.

Today was a mostly good day, despite the above news.

I had a good dashing day. Really good, actually. Almost as good as Monday. And I have no idea why. Well, yes, I have a teeny idea why. I got a huge tip on one of my orders! Woo hoo! And I didn’t have too many long distance trips. Or cheap trips. Mostly just decent trips. I’m wondering if I should judge my hourly rate based on how much time I am actually “working” or my total time on the clock. Because when I am not doing a delivery, I am reading (yay), or coming up with ideas (yay) or napping (yay). Hmm.

Not a self portrait

J came to the house while I was out and about dashing. I am not sure what he did. Except he left his ladder here. I’m not sure if that is a good sign or not. I hope the bathtub got fixed…I guess we’ll find out!

My ideas are percolating along. I have a few that I would like to follow up on. And lots that I want to send to Door Dash and Tesla. I think I have a million dollar idea for someone who would like to pursue it. I am thinking of writing a document called (working title) The Trouble With Robo-Taxis. I think about them, and Full Self Driving (FSD) a lot. I use Autosteer in my car about 60 percent of the time. And I’m sure FSD is way better. Part of me wonders what code is running Autosteer. Does anyone know for sure?

I thought I was going to be late to trivia tonight because, as usual, I got a late long last offer. Sigh. (I was only two minutes late after all.) And we were two players short. They had other commitments. J and I were there. And V showed up at the end of the first round. Thanks to J we got the baffler first. And ended up in a three way tie for first place at the end. Griffin gave us all coupons! I don’t think the restaurant will be thrilled with that – but I think he was tired and didn’t want to go through the hassle of another tie breaker. I’m ok with that. We tied with the other two good teams. We tanked two rounds that we might have done better at if we had had our full team complement. Oh well. Life is that way sometimes.

Interesting factoid: The restaurant C L Luffy is a Japanese restaurant run by a Chinese couple, here in Geneva. I asked them about the name of the restaurant. It turns out that it is the initials of their two last names and Luffy like the main character in the Netflix show I just watched (One Piece). Apparently the husband is a big fan. Cool.

I remembered!

It was a good day, all things considered.

Dashing worked out well. The morning was a little light. The evening caught fire at the end of the evening. Funny, my last two deliveries both went to places that I normally pick up from!

And there we have it.

Oh, wait, there were other things. Like I finished another book. It wasn’t as good as the other book of his that I read a few months ago. But I’m still glad I read it. And I started reading a new book – a collection of science fiction stories. Fun stuff so far.

Cool Sky!

Tonight I have a bunch of stuff to do. I want to take a shower – it is Wednesday after all. And put the recycling out. I might actually do some other things, like work on a story (doubtful), clean my room (hahahaha) and that sort of thing. I’ll probably just end up watching High School Musical 3!

I’m listening to the Tesla Q3 Financial Results – audio only. Elon has to keep repeating himself, call after call. Don’t these people actually listen to previous calls.

My leftovers for dinner were really delicious. But I stopped eating and I still have some. The question is – do I keep it to snack? Or do I box it up and eat it for lunch tomorrow? I am leaning towards the former.

Tomorrow is trivia – but two team mates aren’t going to be there. So it will be just me and maybe J. And hopefully V. We shall see. But, it will still be trivia. Yay trivia!

Sorry this is so lumpy. I just don’t have a lot to say today.

Oh, I did realize what I was starting to say last night. It wasn’t about a grandmother, it was about my father’s first wife. The door to this bedroom had been cut into two pieces so that the kids (E and J) could look in and say hi to their mother while she was lying on her bed resting. It was just a weird thought I had last night.

Fuzzy Clouds

How many different types of clouds can you name? A few, as far as I am concerned.

Fluffy!

So, a word I would use a lot as a comedian, my sort of grandmother… I’ve lost my train of thought. Maybe it will go through the switchyard and come back to me at some point while I am typing.

I was having a nice evening and then this idea, that screamed out to be written down, came to me. And where was I? Who the heck knows. (The kitchen, of course.) Computers open and become available so much more quickly nowadays. And all of you all are spoiled by the responsiveness of today’s phones! It is so beyond words, I can’t even say how amazing it is. Soon, Siri won’t have to ask the web anything, because she will have stored the entire known extant knowledge of the internet on your GD cell phone!

A decent day all things considered. Though I think that Door Dash’s data is way better and way cleverer than they are willing to admit. Today was a Tuesday. I like to clock out around 6:45 if I can. So, today, like, it seems in many weeks past, the algorithm says – hey – here’s a decent (ok, not great, but I had been napping) ride which will ensure that you will be late to the trivia game this evening – take it or suffer the humiliation of turning down a mediocre offer. I took it. And then I forgot the drinks and had to retrace my footsteps, (Footprints?) adding a solid ten minutes so I missed the whole first round.

I doubt I could have helped with the first round. The team only missed two. The rest of the rounds were true team efforts. We did miss a few due to not believing J, but that happens in every game to one or more of us. That’s just the way that trivia goes. We started in a three way tie and then ended up, after many rounds, in a tie with a very good team. We tied on the first tie breaker question. Interestingly it was a social question that we both missed a different person on.

But, we prevailed. Thanks to M’s excellent Rock, Scissor, Paper skills!

And there we have it. I am going to eat an ice cream sandwich. And no, I still haven’t thought what I wanted to write about my sort of grandmother. Weird.

Can I save it?

When S and I went to dinner at Connie’s in Waterloo, she ordered eggplant parmesan. I understand why. She likes ordering things that are difficult to make at home. Sure, makes sense. Why eat something out that you can makes as well or better at home. I get it. But…this was the second time she had ordered eggplant parmesan at a diner and the second time she was thoroughly disappointed! I even hinted that it might not be the best idea to order that. Oh well. She ate about a third of it and sent the rest home with me. After I finish writing this blog post, I will go and try to salvage something edible from her leftovers. My thought is to re-bread it and deep fry it. Deep frying makes everything better!

Speaking of dinner, I went to the supermarket to get a few things. Little did I think that perhaps the store would not have an romaine lettuce. But that is what almost happened. I bought the very last package of romaine. And it was a five pack instead of a three pack! I guess I will be eating a lot of salads for the next few weeks. Also at Wegman’s, I talked up electric cars to two people. It would be cool if they got electric cars. One probably will, the other probably won’t. Oh well. Life is that way sometimes.

Seen while dashing

Dashing day! And I was fortunate enough to get one of the extra good rides in the morning shift. That and a day full of decent offers and tips made this the single most lucrative day I have had in Geneva. Ever! I hope the rest of the week doesn’t suck. One never knows.

I started the Mastery book and I am not impressed so far. I think the other book I read by him was better. Oh well. This is a little and easy book. Even just reading catch as catch can I ought to be able to finish it this week.

What shall I watch next? I watched The Portable Door movie last night, which was fun. I just looked at the library’s web portal and they don’t have a copy of the book. Sigh. I’m not that motivated to read it. But would have if they had a copy. Anyway, maybe I will look and see if there is another interesting movie to watch. Skip watching series for a while maybe.

Wish me luck with the eggplant parmesan. Not my favorite dish on the best of days and under the best of circumstances!

Well, that wasn’t surprising

As some of you may know, one of my hobbies is writing with scammers and catfish online. Yes, it is frustrating, but my feeling is that as long as they are actually in writing with me, then they aren’t writing to someone even more gullible and ripping them off. And who knows, maybe one of them will turn out not to be a scammer (though i am pretty good at picking them out, generally). Hahaha. Anyway, one thing that a lot of scammers do is ask you where you live. When you respond, they say that they live someplace reasonably close. Most are not foolish enough to say they live in your town – though two have done that to me, so far. Well, today’s said she lived in Weedsport. Not impossibly far away. Though she said she didn’t want to meet there, because people she knew would gossip. Ok, we arranged to meet at the Montezuma Winery on 5&20. I preempted one of a scammer’s go to attempts to get money by telling her I was afraid she would say she needed money for gas to get to see me. She obviously had a second plan as a back-up – for which I am now prepared if anyone tries this again. She sent me a picture of a tire with a large bolt (which she called a nail) in it. Then a picture of a guy fixing a tire. Later she wrote me and said (already 30 minutes late) that she forgot her wallet at home and could I please send her $50 so that she could pay the nice man. Sigh. Oh well. Life is that way.

I too had a second plan. I went to del Lago and gambled my life savings away! Ok, not really. I went to see if I could see my friend who works there. And I did! Yay! While there, I also chatted with the parents of a friend of mine. And gambled a whopping $10 on a slot machine. And came away with $11(.02). Woo hoo! I am rich! Sort of. I guess.

It took a while, but I managed to come up with ten new ideas. Yippee! And I may transcribe some more tonight. We shall see. Right now, I am getting a head start on the blog. And I am going to do a little more Duolingo. After that, who knows! And tonight is breakfast for dinner night!!

And there went the afternoon. And I did: almost nothing! Woo hoo! I think. I am sure there are things that I ought to have done. Like go through my reminders. And through all of the open tabs on my phone’s browser. But I did neither of those things. I did do a little more Duolingo. And I called my sister and brother-in-law and had a chat to catch up with them. (Hi J!) And yup, that was about the extent of my excitement.

Next up, cooking – and some kitchen cleaning. The latter first I think. The kitchen isn’t that bad…Oh, I had peanut butter on toast for lunch – with a side of potato chips. Nutricious?

Somehow (user error – cough cough) this got changed back to a draft. Sigh.

Phew, it’s only Saturday!

Today has gotten off to a good start. I got to sleep in, which is always a good thing. Then I spent some time playing with scammers. The lengths they will go to try to get stuff is amazing. One scammer would have preferred a little money in hand instead of a large amount if we actually met. It is so sad. I just am not meeting anyone real online. And certainly not meeting anyone in real life. Such a small town, Geneva is. But I digress.

While playing with scammers, I also finished Blindness by Saramango. Definitely an interesting book. I can’t see my pile of books to read from here – but I think the next one is back to “self-help” or “improvement” or whatever. Next, I started a spreadsheet for tracking ideas I have written down. I haven’t done my ten for today, though. I hope to get to those soon. (finished them) When in doubt, put down something ridiculous and make it edible. I think I put down edible shoes the other day. It gets my brain flowing a little. I have transcribed two days’ worth so far. It is a shame that my hand writing is so atrocious. Even I can’t read it. And take into account that I am also usually in the car when I am making this lists…I have already come across some undecipherable words.

I like this picture of me – wearing a shirt I bought back in the 1990s.

Ok, I have dilly dallied all day. I did get some things done – printed out a lot of stuff for S, did some Ideas transcribing, fought (not really fought, more like refused to give them money no matter how hard they begged) with some scammers, and cleaned out my email. Tomorrow I will go through my reminders and see what all is there. I think there might be some “ideas” there that didn’t get a timer set on them. We shall see.

Off to dinner with S. We are going to Connie’s in Waterloo. A true diner experience. I hope it isn’t too busy!!

It wasn’t too busy. We got a corner booth. Arguably the best table in the house actually. I was surprosed that S had never been there. It’s been around for at least 50 years. (I also forgot that they just take cash – what is that about?) Sadly, I sat with my back to the restaurant. Oh well. It was still an enjoyable experience overall. S ordered eggplant parmesan, which I thought was an odd choice to be ordering in a diner – and it turned out that she thought it was bad. And sent it home with me. I ordered a patty melt and had them add bacon to it. It was pretty good! And the fries weren’t bad. I didn’t order a loaded milkshake but I do want to go back there and have one, one day. They have a special menu for them, which is cool. Anyway, I brought a lot of food home with me. Maybe enough to tide me over through Monday and Wednesday. Good thing it was wet and cold this afternoon – we didn’t have to pick apples! Woo hoo!

One of the many good things about eating with S is that she likes to eat early. So I am already home at 7! And that is where I am staying. Nothing to draw me out on this not so pleasant evening.

I was feeling a little sad because the day was over, when I realized that I have another day off tomorrow!! Yippee! I could get used to two days off in a row. So excited! I have a scammer date tomorrow – I already told her my fear of her asking for gas money before we meet. She said that wouldn’t happen. And I didn’t mention the money for a baby sitter for her child. We will see what excuse she comes up with by the time we are supposed to meet. But I know there will be one. Scammers suck.

Ok, what shall I do with my evening? I think I will watch more of One Piece. It is a weird show – but overall fun. And maybe do another day or two of ideas transcribing. Or maybe I will just do that tomorrow. Time will tell!

Aha Moments are Fun!

I nearly recreated my accident – but with my house and the other side of the car. But luckily I listened to the car’s warning sounds and stopped – my bumper almost touching the door post of the side door. I was thinking, wouldn’t it be nice if I could do what people do in their garages, hang a tennis ball that let’s them know when they have pulled in far enough. Or a cushion of some kind on the door jamb so that even if I do go a little too far, I hit the cushion and not the wall. Then I remembered that P and J had given me a wonderful present last Christmas – a buoy that they had found on the beach! Woo hoo! It’s perfect. I will retie it at some point, but for now, it is doing the trick! Aha!

I had an “aha” moment

Today was a decent dashing day. I did two shifts and altogether made my extreme stretch goal. Which leads me to believe that if I really want to make more money each week, I could. Luckily, I don’t think I need to right now. And as I mentioned before, I hope to not be doing Door Dash for a lot longer. If I can figure out other streams of income somehow. The lottery isn’t cooperating. Anyway, I did two shifts and both were decent. Nothing egregious. Oh, except that my first dash this morning (I think – they mostly all blur together) was an offer to go 14.8 miles (one way) for $4.75. Which means I would also have had to come back – at least 12 miles – so 26 miles for $4.75. No thank you. Not interested. I did get a lot of non-tippers the second shift – I still don’t understand the logic behind that. Though I had one ride that pretty much made up for them. All in all, a good week.

I stopped at 6 pm instead of 6:30 or 7. Because I had earned enough to satisfy my desires for the time being. And I wanted to come home and do my Duolingo (Spanish today) and then my blog (which I am doing now) and then try two recipes that I saw on YouTube (which I will do in a few minutes – so excited).

I am almost finished with the book Blindness. Very interesting. And if you can deal with a lot of graphic images, I would recommend it. And I am cranking along on my ideas daily. I wish that James had included an example list of his ideas list. My world isn’t very large just now – door dash, trivia and er, um. Door dash and trivia are about it it seems. So I am not sure where my ideas are going to come from next. Hopefully ideas spring eternal!

Tomorrow I have dinner with S which ought to be pleasant. Sunday – well, a couple of scammers are making noises about meeting – as long as I give them money first. Sigh. My plan for Sunday is to catch up on a lot of stuff as I mentioned the other day – email clean-up, reminder clean-up, kitchen clean-up, ideas list typed into a spreadsheet, etc. And then breakfast for dinner! I have a lot of frozen waffles to eat! I think I might use one tomorrow for the base of an Eggs Augustus. Cream cheese or not, that is the question. Maybe I will try very light cream cheese on one and see if I like it.

And that’s all there is tonight. I had more things to write about, but, my brain being mushy, I can’t recall them just now. And I am getting peckish. Happy Weekend Peeps!

Eeek. Scary. Run away.

So potentially scary but…

Saw this on a porch today. I thought it was cute. There is a little solar panel on it’s top that you can’t see. So maybe it is actually more scary at night. Maybe it is motion activated and does some spooky sounds and emits smoke. During the day? Yawn.

I am pretty amazed and impressed by the Halloween displays people have up here in Geneva. Is there a contest of some kind? That was the kind of thing that the FLT used to do. Back when it was the GT, the Geneva Times. I understand the reason for the change, but still…Anyway, is there a contest? There ought to be! it makes dashing a little more fun and interesting at least.

Speaking of which – it was a good dashing day. I managed to exceed my goals for the day. Yippee. And I am (not including cash tips) just shy of my four day super stretch target. Woo hoo! One weird thing that happened today. On my first pickup I think. Some dasher (who I think is a jerk for many reasons – see below) came in and bagged his own order. Sure, E was moving a bit slowly, but come on, dude! He also double parks at McD’s. Like why? And leaves his ICE car running. Ick.

We had a full roster at trivia tonight. Good group! I hope we last for a while. Everyone had great answers to contribute tonight. And it showed. We crushed the rest of the field. Not literally. No one was harmed in our win tonight. But still, we rocked it big time. Woo hoo! After the second round last week where I doubted that we ought to even be playing trivia, a win certainly improves my spirits.

I finished watching Erin Carter and all I can say is, um, ok. I think someone envisioned a sequel. And in this day and age I guess it is possible. But it was, overall, meh, imho.

I started a weird show about Pirates. Somehow I think the comic it is based on is loosely inspired by the Monkey King character and stories. I will watch another episode tonight if it doesn’t get too late.

Can one become a sommelier of Pot?

Friday, I hope to make a cool bread/pizza thing. And hopefully a test of the potato flower I saw on the internet. Though I will be dashing. So I might be too tired to cook on Friday. Which means I might not cook until Christmas time! Just joking, I have a Saturday dinner engagement this week, so maybe I will be footloose and fancy free on Saturday night next week. It could happen!

MWF

On Monday, Wednesday and Friday, I finish work late. Not as late as I finish my day when I do trivia (Tuesday and Thursday). But still late. Hence the late-ish blog post. After finishing work, I like to come home and eat something. Tonight, I had the last of my duck, some more pot stickers (I think I finally have the process down and can produce crispy on the bottom, soft on top pot stickers), some rice and a salad. So yummy. I think I ate too much. Sigh.

Today was a good dashing day. As we saw yesterday, they aren’t all that great. Today started well, with me being sent to a place I am not sent frequently, where I got to chat with a woman I have seen there a few time in the past. Way too young, etc, but it was still a pleasant way to start my day. Then, I made decent money on both shifts. I think I had $14 dollars in post delivery add on tips. And a $6 cash tip! Woo hoo! I don’t think I quite made enough to bring me to my extreme reach goal for the first three days, but I am not far off. With two days left to go. If I break my medium stretch goal for the week, I may not dash either day this weekend! A weekend off! Woo hoo!

Coleus. Everyone knew that, right?

What would I do with a weekend off? Transcribe my ideas from the past week would be high on the list. Clean out email as usual. And maybe do some reading. The current book I am reading, Blindness, (translated from the Portuguese) is good and very intense. I’d like to finish that and move on to another book. Which one, I am not yet sure. I can’t see the pile from here. Sigh. Piles everywhere.

Oh, J said that he might be able to start work for me on the 17th. That would be nifty. As long as the tub gets done, I will be happy. And the back entry way would just make life more pleasant. He says he is trying to find windows for the porch work – he thinks that is the best way to go. He’s the expert. What the heck do I know?

I’ve broken down and turned on a heater in my bedroom. I haven’t started the furnace. I am still waiting until October 15 for that. Brr, though.

Ok, time for some Duolingo. And I think I am up to watching the last episode of the so-so show I am watching. Not sure what I am going to watch next. Ted Lasso perhaps? 🙂