juliebarkley

I was woken up much earlier than I wanted to be by phone calls from the public health unit. My son had been turned away from his school vaccinations because the new township we live in didn't have the necessary records. Since he was homeschooled, he had gotten all of his immunizations done at the doctor's, and they were never automatically entered into the system. If they gave me little papers as a record, I lost them long ago. I had tried to get the records from the doctor before the clinic came to the school, but the receptionist was dismissive and pawned me off to a website with no info (the receptionists at my doctor are consistently rude). However, this phone call was much more productive - the doctor had faxed her a record of the shots within a day or two of her request, and she just needed to know why there were no records from before he was five. Since that was while we were living abroad and I actually had those records, I promised to take a picture of them and email them back. And I did. Eventually. The book they were recorded in was not where I had expected, and I went through all of my piles of paper in an effort to find it. In fact, I went through most of my piles, and my filed items, twice or more. And this reinforced how frickin' much paper I have in useless piles, how I do not want these piles, and how I will have these piles forever unless I do something about them. So I spent a couple of hours sorting. Sent a little pile off to the recycling, filed some, and set a few as things to check tomorrow. It's a dent, anyway. And since this is a task I hate doing, so my brain will try to convince me on every single paper that thinking about this is too hard and I should do this some other time, I'm trying to celebrate what I did rather than look at what's left to do.

It was my birthday today, so I was lazy and mostly just played games all day. I did attempt to get my backup system working with my borrowed USB hub, but alas. I think I will need to purchase a new Airport-Extreme equivalent thing and hope that that will work. I also did some small unsubscribe things, and those small unsubscribe things I've been doing on the less exciting days are now noticeably adding up. Need to get back on the short story wagon. The last author needed file transfers, and because I had left the drive they were on near the cursed backup system, I had avoided going into that area, noticing it, and being reminded. I have it now, so back to reading!

What did you choose for your flexibility program and devotional pattern?

Oof, and just as the rest of you were getting over it too! I'm glad that the heart pain is a normal, non-dangerous(?) symptom. I'm sorry to hear that your release from the bunker keeps getting delayed.

I think the recipient thought so too. It's working really well. Definitely recommend if you have cats that don't let you close doors. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- My one-time action today was to order some smart plugs. I have a little indoor fountain that I got for Christmas (to help out with a habit, actually), and I keep forgetting to plug it in when I wake up, or unplug it when I go to bed. I would like to pass this remembering off to an electronic pet plug. We have a lamp downstairs that often gets left on too, and I'm sure there will be other use cases, so I got four. Below the spoiler I complain about my shoulder.

Not a lot accomplished today. I may try to knock out something small, fast, and easy. But I do have kind of a funny story. My son dropped by to pick me up from work today. He came into the library very briefly, about two minutes before closing - right about when we try to hide our "get OUT!" faces from customers. He poked around a bit, left right at closing, and I joined him outside once the closing procedures were done. It was snowing a bit and he's a new driver, so I tried not to distract him as we left. A few minutes into the trip, we heard a chirp/squeaking noise. At first I thought it was my phone (I have an alarm that sounds like a bird chirping), but it kept coming back. It was hard to hear clearly over the music, but we figured there had to be a mouse in the car, probably in the glove compartment. I prepared not to flinch should the mouse run over my feet at this point. I pull out my phone and try to turn on the flashlight but fail. (We had a "flashlight" talk when we got home. 😅) He started telling me to open the glove compartment, and I argue back that if I can't see into it there's no point, it'll let the mouse get out into the main car, and anyway we should be on the side of the road to shoo it out if that's what we're doing ... when he realizes. The squeak. He can control it. It is from his wet shoe on the gas pedal. 😄

Unsubbed some more things, set up a weekly work schedule (don't want to count that as my one-time thing because it might not take, but I hope it does), and now I'm going to sit down and sew some bags to hold small items - a project that is very boring but much needed.

It's been a crappy day and I'm just plain worn out. Moved money. It's all I had the energy for.

Was boring today and my only one-time action was to unsub from a few more email lists.

The execution stage is fun, but the analysis paralysis can be a killer, especially if you are the kind of person who enjoys information-gathering a little too much. I'm going to build an elaborate system for selecting and evaluating things at some point, and I'll have great fun doing it. But I've wasted enough time on that sort of thing in the past and then left money sitting, so first I need to pick out good-enough things that fit my plan, make it happen, and have my fun later. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- My one-time task today solves a regular source of annoyance, so I am quite pleased with it. My cat spends nearly all of her time in my bedroom. Due to noise from other parts of the house, I try to keep the door as closed as I can. The cat will demand to be in (or out) the second the door is closed, so it has to be kept slightly ajar. But what with people walking past, air pressure from the heating system, and just general movement, the door sometimes wanders into a not-latched, but not-open-enough-that-the-cat-can-operate-it position. When this happens, she will try to scratch the carpet next to the door instead of pawing at the door (said carpet is in a sorry state), and then I have to go and rescue her. Day or night. It's annoying. So today, I researched the problem, and I found two possible things to try. The first suggestion, foam children's finger guards like this, would work, but if I could do it without spending any money, even better. The second suggestion was to put a small piece of foam on the hinge side of the frame, so that it could still be closed if need be, but would provide enough resistance that it would stay slightly open, and be almost invisible to boot. Perfect! I couldn't find any appropriate foam (they suggesting carpet underlay; I thought a makeup sponge would be perfect), but I had some knitting sample squares from when I was learning to knit that are just the right size. And it works! I didn't even need to pin it up; just tucked it into the gap at floor level and I don't think it's going anywhere. The cat will be a happy camper. And so will I, since I no longer have to worry about getting up in the night to let her out.

My one-time task for the day was to make an asset allocation. I had made this out to be a big complicated thing in my head. But I've read a LOT of personal finance stuff over the years, so I knew what I wanted when I saw it. It was really more of a quick google, a "yes, that sounds about like what I want - oh wait, I'll tweak it to add that", and done. Picking out the stuff to fill it will take longer, but I can now move on to the execution stage because I HAVE A PLAN, and that feels good. Feeling surprisingly energetic for it being midnight, so I shall be working on my todo list and trying to get rid of more items as well.

Got a tan yet, Mad Hatter??

I feel this. How is your challenge going?

It was a busy day and I got a lot done, but unfortunately none of the things I got done were one-time tasks. I did, however, come up with a bunch of them for future days and jot them down. But otherwise there is not much to report for today.

Welcome! Which of those things is your biggest priority right now?

It is a gift, so I hope the recipient thinks so, too! Neither actually. I left the PDF open on my computer and used the Dock as a cutoff point. The stripe above that was the active stripe. Then scroll up to the next one. Also made my internet window a little shorter than usual, so that if it was on top, only those two lines of the chart were visible. It worked very well. I only had one instance where I the chart must have been moved by mistake. And you are right, illusion knitting is really challenging to look at when you need to figure out where you are in the pattern. Indeed it was. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- About all I did for one-time actions today was unsubscribe from some email lists and YouTube subscriptions. I have an idea for another thing, but it needs one of those plugs that can be programmed to turn on and off at specific times, and I do not own one of those (yet...). I need to do a little research, I think.

Sounds awesome to me!

I will need to put an extender of sorts on the velcro portion of the shopping trolley, probably with a button attachment of some kind. It simply does not appear long enough to stay done up while the bottom rests on the frame, and will keep coming undone until modified. But the newly installed bottom works well! Today was an adventure with a very new driver. We were going to visit a new board game cafe in a nearby town we had never visited before, so the roads were unfamiliar. On the way down, we hit a VERY sharp turn that was completely unmarked, and both almost skidded out and almost missed failed to stop before the intersection right after it. On the way back, we got to navigate in freezing rain with only one headlight (and that on the passenger side) on roads with no streetlights. (At least everyone else was going slow too.) Trial by fire for the poor learner driver, who got us both home in one piece. My one-time task was finally mailing a package back to a company, which is also the last step to unsubscribing from their service. It had been waiting on one piece of information, which I finally tracked down. (Turns out it was on the mailing label on the outside of the box, rather than in the regular documentation. 🤦‍♀️) Glad to have that over and done!

Done. Bass was fun to watch too.

You can do many fun tricks with knitting. The only downside with illusion knitting is that you are bound to your pattern PDF. There are no repeats to memorize. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bashed away a little at the backup system. I have a good feel for how it should work, what it's trying to do, and how my systems are interacting with it. There is one last thing to try before calling this a defeat, but I won't get to do that until Tuesday. So this project is on hiatus until then. My other one-time thing was to put a solid bottom in my shopping trolley using an old cardboard box. The bottom was not rigid at all, and it was a pain. Anything irregularly shaped (which is everything) would push between the bars of the frame and cause the fabric to sag. This pulls the Velcro off the frame, making it sag more, to the point where it can drag on the ground. Not good. I shall test this new improved version out tomorrow when I go shopping. Then I will know if I need to permanently sew the Velcro closed to prevent it coming undone when it shouldn't.

Thanks! I don't wear it much either since it gets covered up, but it does make me feel happier and prettier anyway when I do. So I really should more often. Languages tell us so much about the culture, don't they? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- My evening got a little derailed before it really began. My son was trying to back into the driveway when he ran into a snowbank with the corner of his car. Shouldn't have been a big deal, but the parking sensors kept going off every time he tried to reverse. When we inspected the back, it looks like he's either broken a clip on the bumper or (hopefully) knocked it just enough to unclip it. Replacing the bumper over a clip from a very minor bump would be a real shame (and expensive), so I hope it just needs a bit of a shove back into place. For obvious reasons, this rattled him. So we played some board games for a couple of hours before he went to bed. I no longer had time to do the thing I had planned and was running low on ideas, so back to getting rid of some paper. Which I did. But I also, while trying to catch a thing that was falling, managed to hurt my shoulder worse than I ever have yet. The pain wasn't so bad, but my whole arm was nearly numb and I felt like I couldn't grip with my hand or move my arm properly. Kind of sucked the fun out of that activity. So I think I'm done for the day. Oh, and for @KB Girl, I finished the illusion knitting! Pictures under the spoiler.

Me too! Excellent! A contagion of good finances! Can you speak their language? Tell it it's had its fun, and it can stop now. Please. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I completely ignored the computer project of doom today and instead focused on a different project. One that went pretty well, even though it appears I can't hammer a nail straight to save my life. It's a bit full, but I think it still looks nice in the space, displays everything well, and yet still leaves it all easily accessible. Spoilered for hugeness. (Btw, the white line is the corner of the wall, not a weird line running down randomly.) So I made home decor that is also a storage solution. Now I just need to figure out how to store my bracelets.

The best ideas look obvious in hindsight. Doesn't mean they were obvious beforehand.

Hello and welcome! I will be making an appointment for my shoulder (and a few other things) tomorrow. Will probably be a few weeks before I can get in though. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- More fruitless bashing at the remote disk setup. Good news: I don't have to reformat any disks. Bad news: still can't get the drive to show on the computer that is actually important. I am trying a different thing. I will finish trying it tomorrow, as I am once again at the end of my patience. This was not, in on any level, supposed to be this difficult. I just want to share a hard drive to a network. WHY IS THIS SO HARD??? So, new one-time task for the day. This is an odd one. I have a stick. Nothing fancy, just a a fairly straight stick of appropriate length. I found it not too long after I moved in. My plan for said stick was to strip it of bark, put a row of nails in it, and use it to hang my jewellery (which is all currently stuffed in a box). I used to hang it all from a few pins in the wall, and it looked very nice in my own opinion anyway. So when finished, this should serve the dual purpose of making the room pretty and making my jewellery accessible. I finally stripped the stick a few days ago. So I will feed the stick with olive oil tonight, to make it prettier. Tomorrow I shall go get some nails so I can finish it up.

Fingers indeed crossed, but they will have to wait until tomorrow. I've been exhausted all day. My shoulder injury is making it hard to sleep, and I just couldn't face battling with the electronics again today. I can't face battling with much of anything today, to be honest. So I sent a few things from my try pile to the donation bin, shuffled some money around (another step in the process of sorting out my investments), and I think that's it for today. I will throw on a podcast I've been looking forward to and knit. And after that, read or sleep. My body and mind are telling me that I really need to rest right now, and I am going to listen.