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Donut Be Late

I left the house quite a bit earlier than usual today, so I thought I’d stop for donuts on the way in. I hadn’t accounted for a Friday rush at Shipley’s or the train on the tracks that I normally don’t have to cross, so I ended up being several minutes late. To make matters worse, Heather had also brought donuts, but managed to show up before me. I felt stupid, but nobody seemed to care.

It was a pretty mellow group day, and almost all of us went to Cracker Barrel for lunch. I had the rainbow trout, which was really good. After lunch, I got to visit my buildings to wrap up whatever I could. I ended up staying late to help Summer set up some rooms for quiz bowl.

When we left, I came home and sat in pain from my upper back. I’ve started to think it’s from coughing, but when I’m at home and sat quietly, I don’t cough that much. I’m running out of ideas to fix it, and sleep only seems to make it worse.

Chiropractic is sustained by pseudoscientific ideas such as subluxation and “innate intelligence” that are not based on sound science.

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Beta

It was overall another pretty productive day. I stayed busy until lunch when I joined the girls in the library for cafeteria salads, chicken nuggetstrips, and mac and cheese soup(?). The salad was pretty good.

After work, I went by my parents’ house for dinner, then stopped by Walgreens to pick up a FedEx package and some more cough medicine.

I finally committed to the Android beta channel for my Pixel 2 XL, so we’ll see how that goes.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that I’ve been having trouble with my web host since it’s been free all this time. I should probably make a decision on whether to start paying for some real hosting soon, because I’m tired of never knowing whether or not the site will be up, and whether they’ll lose my data.

Cheapskate…

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yarrr.

I still woke up super stiff in my upper back this morning. I’ve tried sleeping in every reasonable position I can think of, and nothing has helped. I don’t know what caused this, but I hope it works itself out soon.

I was between buildings quite a bit today, but I feel pretty good about what I accomplished. I’m back down to single digit work orders, and as far as I can tell, nobody’s complaining yet. I thought I was making plans to watch Star Wars with my sister on a vendor’s dime, but the time didn’t work out favorably enough, and I would already have seen it the night before anyway, so we just scrapped the whole idea.

I actually found another soul that enjoys Long John Silver’s, so I used my BOGO coupon and split lunch with Ronda in the library. Then after working a little late, I went to my parents’ house and had some asparagus soup.

I had to get gas on the way home, and then from there I stopped at AT&T to visit with Kevin since they didn’t look busy at all. The new store looks pretty nice on the surface, but is not without some really retarded design choices – and that’s not including the wheelchair gender.

When they closed up, I came home and sat around uncomfortably until bedtime. I’m gonna have to start yoga or something if my back doesn’t fix itself soon.

*laughs nervously*

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NOvember

The Murano was charged again by this morning, but it was so nice out that I decided to take the bike to work. It was cool in the morning, but not uncomfortably so. I predict bugpocalypse in the spring and summer.

I felt pretty good about the things I got accomplished at work. Then I took the Murano to AutoZone to replace the battery after I got home. I had forgotten how much of a pain in the ass it is to replace, but I managed.

That’s enough for today, I suppose.

Are we still on this?

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La-la-la-la-lasagna

It’s a little weird changing my phone charging routine. I hope it makes a difference in battery life over the lifespan of the new phone. I got a promo email this morning offering $100 credit to purchase a Pixel 2 and activate it on Fi, so I have an email in to customer service to see if I can get the credit.

I spent all morning at Oakland resetting phones, then went to the junior high for lunch. Jessica made a lasagna and pineapple upside down cake for a bunch of us there, but didn’t think about some people’s aversion to deer meat. As soon as she said she made it with ground deer meat, like half of the people there noped right out of it, which was both a shame and a delicious bonus for me, because I got to take leftovers. I thought it was delicious, and I had to poke fun at those that opted out of the lasagna but ate the cake, because the cherries were really made from Rudolph noses.

I spent the rest of the afternoon there playing catchup and blasting mad bass tunes after setting up a scrapped subwoofer in my office. After work, I stopped by my parents’ house and munched on some leftovers, but left because I needed to get a replacement car battery. By the time I got home, I didn’t feel too smurfy, so I settled in and watched the rest of Valerian and just put my car on the charger. Tomorrow should be nice anyway, if I hate to take the bike.

Ay, you getting too skinny, you gotta to eat. Ay, mangia, mangia!

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Oxygen Not Included

I caught up on sleep last night, and managed to wake up before noon today. I spent most of it playing Oxygen Not Included, but did manage to get a load of laundry done in the evening. I started Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, but didn’t have time to finish it before bed after I spent forever trying to get PowerDVD to output proper 3D to my television. I with one of my existing media players would recognize the content properly so I wouldn’t have to use PowerDVD at all.

I’m too old for this shit.

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Sleepless in Sea Prattle

I had a bit of trouble falling asleep last night, so I got up when Jennifer wanted to come hang out for a while. She made me watch Salt while she mostly fell asleep on the couch. I finally got back to bed around sunrise and managed a few hours of sleep.

When I awoke again, I had a tremendous knot in my neck and back that I carried all day long. Clint texted me when he and his friend got to town, and the came by to visit for a bit. Afterward I played some Oxygen Not Included that I picked up yesterday on Steam. I had just started to get the hang of it when Bâc Ván called with a craving for Ci-Ci’s.

After I ate too much there, I came back home and continued my game for a while until the sleeplessness and back ache got to me.

I’d heard about nervous breakdowns due to flan depressurization, but the fact that Houston would lump me in the same categories as those intergalactic amateurs was both hurtful and suspicious.

Reviews

Technophile: Pixel 2 XL

I was surprised how much it warmed up today. I wasn’t expecting it after this past cold week.

My Pixel 2 XL finally came in today after like a month of waiting. I finally split my Google Voice number off from my Sprint number and used it to sign up for Google Fi to compare coverage and quality of service to what I’ve been getting on Sprint. I figure it’s time to look at options now that there’s no incentive to stay with any particular carrier. The Pixel 2 uses an eSIM instead of a physical SIM card for service on Fi, so I was able to sign up and jump right into service without any trouble at all. I’m a little nervous about losing my account history from Google Voice, but hopefully it will all just slide right over. I get to continue using Hangouts with SMS, which will hopefully also eliminate the weird issues I had with group SMS and certain emojis or text strings when combining Google Voice with Sprint integration.

The first thing I noticed on the new Pixel 2 XL was the color shift when viewing off-axis. I kind of wrote it off when listening to reviewers complain about it because I thought I had a similar color shifting issue with other phones and didn’t mind it, but WOW this is bad. I absolutely would not have expected this quality from any flagship device even a few years ago. I heard others make similar remarks, but it honestly didn’t look that bad in videos. In person, you get blue-shifting almost immediately off axis when looking at a white screen. It’s not nearly as noticeable when looking at a photo or something darker, but anything super white is painfully obvious. So far I haven’t noticed any issue with image retention or burn-in, but it may be too early to tell, and I haven’t been watching for it super hard either.

I’ve tried to just use it as I normally would, and my biggest complaint aside from the screen is the size of the phone in conjunction with the indistinct texture of the power button and its placement above the volume buttons. The size of the phone requires that I completely shift my grip to reach the power button that is way up in the top right to turn the screen off. While shifting my grip again to put it away, I find that I often accidentally unlock the phone again as I graze the fingerprint reader. On top of that, all of this grip-shifting leaves me more prone to dropping the phone, which is terrifying now that I’m not getting them for free with a one-time damage replacement from HTC Uh Oh. I’m not even sure if I’m still eligible for an ADH plan from either Fi or straight from the Google store, but it hasn’t been offered to me anywhere yet.

I still find myself trying to unlock the phone by touching where the home button was on my HTC 10. The fingerprint reader on the back isn’t the worst placement, but I definitely felt better about gripping the chin of the phone to unlock it than I do finding the right spot on the back. Hopefully a little bit of time will get me used to most of these things, but the texture of the power button being indistinguishable from the texture of the volume button is going to be a thorn in my side. Things like this really show the attention to detail that I’m used to from HTC. Without tactile differentiation on the buttons, I keep fumbling the simple locking of the device, which is something I have to do literally every time I use the device.

The volume and clarity of the speakers is actually pretty disappointing for it to have dual front-facing speakers. I really expected more in this area. It sounds okay, but it’s no HTC Boomsound. While playing with the ringtones, I found that sound was only coming out of the bottom speaker. Music plays out of both, but the bottom speaker is clearly louder and harsher than the top speaker, giving you an unbalanced feel when watching videos with stereo sound. I also wish the Now Playing feature that shows the title of ambient songs playing in the background would work with songs being played on the Pixel itself. Seriously, why the hell would it show me song information for something I’m not playing, but not show me information for something I’m actively playing on my device? That’s just stupid.

Voice quality on Google Fi seems to be lacking quite a bit compared to Sprint. I’m willing to make that sacrifice since I rarely make phone calls, but it’s worth noting. I’ve never found a carrier with voice quality as good as Sprint in this area. I haven’t really done any speed tests yet because I’m paying per megabyte, but I guess I should spend a few cents to compare service while I can.

Overall I just need to spend some more time with it to see how I really feel. Next week back at work should be interesting. I really hope I don’t drop it, because I’m going naked. #YOLO

After I got the phone set up, I took a shower and headed to the theater to meet with Jesica to watch Murder on the Orient Express. She finally texted right before the movie was set to start to let me know she was just finished getting her hair done, so I abandoned ship and went to my parents’ house for a while. I ended up eating some leftovers there, then came back home to play with the Pixel some more.

Fulfilled Plans: 2/5
At least there’s a Steam sale.

Traditions

What are Traditions: Thanksgiving 2017

I woke up super late today with a massive headache after a long night. I didn’t actually get out of bed until the afternoon. I wasn’t really clear on what day the family would be cooking for Thanksgiving, so when Mom texted that food was ready, I still had to get out of bed and shower.

I guess Julie’s still in Florida, so it was just us with Bác Vân and Doug, and Dad invited a college friend. I showed up just as everyone else was finishing up their food, then left after all the guests were gone.

I guess I’m doing some things tomorrow, so I can forgive today being worthless.

Even though I really should, I knew that I never would.

Uncategorised

You’re Fired

We only had to work a half day today, and I actually got to finish up a couple projects at the junior high, so I felt good about it. At one point, I got the lift stuck without any battery charge way outside on the sidewalk. We let it rest then moved it bit by bit until we could reach a length of several extension cords, then charged it enough to put it away. Once we got back to the shop, Ben and I went upstairs through the Gardner building to reset phones. I wished I had brought some chains to rattle around while I was there in the dark.

From there, I came home and relaxed for a while before putting out the hammocks for a fire. Jesica came over and we went to Morello’s for dinner. When I got back home, Bâc Ván called and had me pick up a container of egg rolls from next door. Eventually, Becky and Jennifer came by for the fire. I was pretty happy with what I had built. It put off some serious heat, which was great for how cold it was.

After a while, Becky went home, and I introduced Jennifer to Bo Burnham on Netflix. After that, we flipped through a few movies before settling on Maleficent. I dozed off a few times, not even sure what made me so tired. After the movie, I ran her home, then came back home for bed myself.

What?