iPhone

Thursday: A fitful sleep. Raining out. Up, and shower. Packing up the nano. Down basement for morning practices and drums. Ate some breakfast, but the milk was on edge. Fed Oscar. Drove out and picked up some sewing supplies. Noticed there's a skating rink over in that same shopping mall. To the galleria, and traded the nano and touch for an iPhone. In to work, and more on the dual updating problem with the add-on parameters. Stayed until about 9. Back home, and messing with the phone. Ate some dinner. Took out the garbage. Guitar. Now to complete the day.

6 Days of Christmas

Wednesday: Slept in. Unpacking. Breakfast of eggs and such. Fed Oscar (who seemed none the worse for my neglect over the last few days). Down basement and morning practices. Drums particularly good today. Headed off to work. Quiet day in the office, getting the remote variable control working correctly. Took a walk out and bought some CDs and a cup of coffee. Stayed until 11, listening to Led Zeppelin. A bit of shopping at the all-night grocery. Back home, and food. Down basement. Contemplating another use for the space under the stairs. Doing some research in the dairy archives. Now to complete the day.

Tuesday (Christmas): Up and cleaning up the apartment. Headed out to Grand Central Station around 10am. Not much open. Coffee at Starbucks. Caught the 10:07 to Norwalk. Mom picked us up, and back to her house. First course of soup and salad. Present giving. Nap. Over to K's for some more gifting. Back to mom's for dinner and dessert. Help mom change some light-bulbs. At 7:15 to Stamford. Ann headed to NYC and I headed to Boston. Chilly ride on the way back. Took the T to the office and picked up my car. Home around midnight.

Monday: Ann got up early, and headed to work. Cleaning up around the apartment. Did a load of laundry in the building's basement. Ate a breakfast myself. Ann came back early, reporting nothing was going on at the office. Played some music. Took the subway to her office. I got a tour, and we dropped off some stuff for later. Then to wait in line for midnight-mass. Met her friend Arliene. Lovely music. The three of us decided against taking communion. After the concert, back to the office with friends (Christine and mother Peg and friend Albert, Sister Rachael). Eggnog, cookies and presents. Back to the apartment and opening presents. Quite a late night.





Sunday: Ann went off to the gym. I slept in. Breakfast of eggs on top of leafy greens. Napping. Took a jaunt out to the Museum of Natural History, meeting Ann's brother John Clay, wife Anna and son Kim. Dinner at a bar near their hotel. The food was a bit salty. Ann and I walked back to the apartment. Chicken Run on the TV.






Saturday: Breakfast at the close-by diner. Wandering around shopping at Columbus Circle and the endless outdoor stalls in the park. Shopping for a flower vase in several stores. Bought some amazing bread and cheese, which served as dinner, along with the leftovers from the previous night.

Friday: Packing. Brief day at work. Fung Wah into NYC. Waited for Ann. Middle Eastern take-out back at the apt.

Mall

Thursday: My mom called and I answered the phone. Brief conversation. More sleep, much needed. Was afraid I was getting sick... but once I woke up I actually felt fine. Snow was falling, and I knew it had been since I went to bed. Luckily, not so much accumulation. Shoveling. Fed Oscar. Shower. Dropped a note in the mailbox of the neighbors, seeing if they could feed Oscar while I was away. Down basement and morning practices and drums. Quick egg breakfast. Headed out. Stopped at the video store and dropped off a couple DVDs. Drove to the mall. Picked up an iPod for my travels to and from NYC. Also bought a smaller suitcase. The saleslady was a nice Asian woman. I let her talk me into spending too much. Buyer's remorse.
In to work, and bug hunting. Found and fixed an interesting bug, caused by the addition of a bool argument to a function. The problem was, there was another function with almost the same prototype, with one fewer argument. There were a couple of places there were leaving off the bool (meaning to call the other one), and having a numeric value implicitly converted to a bool. Yucko. The bug list is looking quite tractable, meaning its time for another load-balancing. Stayed until around 9.
Back home, made a sauce out of some leftover vegetable/wine soup + a jar of spaghetti sauce + veggie "beef" + garlic + onions. Dinner. Cleaning up and made some ice-cream and cookie flambé. Down basement and making one last Christmas present. Now to complete the day.

many jobs

Wednesday: A fairly stock morning, putting off some chores until evening, but watering the plants anyway. Off to work the long way around. Dropped a couple of burned disks in the mail to MB's colleague. Figured out how to use the command-line interface to our bug tracking system, and shunted a bunch of bugs from an old release number, to a new one, en-masse. Still trying to reproduce a bug with our "render" feature. Did find that a couple of asserts were causing a massive system slow-down in long operations, so commented them out. Headed back home around 9.

An evening of many small jobs around the house: Took out the compost and managed to track shit back into the kitchen. Mopped that up, and hoping that it was Oscar-scat, deposited some of it off the bottom of my shoe, into the cat-box, hoping to prime-the-dump, so to speak. Put away laundry. Down basement and some small projects, then tidying and vacuuming. Back upstairs, and rapped presents while watching "Six Feet Under" and eating a microwaved vegetarian dinner. Put away dishes. Played guitar. Now to complete the day.

blacklight

Tuesday: Up, email, shower. Down basement, and drums. Laundry. Fed Oscar, who was looking a bit dusty, and ready to go right back outside despite the cold. Breakfast.

Stopped at the PO and mailed off a return (wrong battery for my laptop, they sent me) and a package to MB. In to work. A large amount of Christmas candy had materialized. Productive day, wrapping up my pre-set changes. Registered my complaint with Al and B about smashing all the languages together into one file. Took a break, walking out for some shopping and coffee. They were extra nice to me at the Starbucks, giving me free coffee and a free slice of cake. I got confused as I was leaving and picked up another customer's (bagged) cookie. The guy behind the counter called after me, and then the customer grabbed the bag back from me and playfully said "My Cookie!" The person next to me a the milk and sugar bar said "Trying to steal someone's cookie?" "Yes, I was so nervous, I almost made it!" "You should have walked faster..." Back to the office. Checked my stuff in. Shifted to looking at bugs. Left around midnight.

Back home, guitar. Putting the sheets back on the bed. Now down basement to complete the day.

4 days

Monday: Up around 10. Coffee cheese-toast and donuts. Talked to MM about funding a video project. Nap out the couch for a bit. Shower, down basement, and off to work. The streets were pretty messy today as all the snow and slush over the weekend had frozen. A school bus had skidded sideways on the side street that my office's parking garage is off of. I had to circle the block and drive through an ally. Mellow and short day in the office. Still trying to crack a nut with identifying pre-sets. Headed home around 9. Stopped at Whole Foods on the way. Some guitar. Down basement and watched "Six Feet Under" on the treadmill. Now to complete the day.

Sunday: Slept in as snow fell. Next door neighbor Bill had shoveled the sidewalk. I shoveled the driveway. Most activities, including a couple I had on the books, were canceled today. They didn't declare a snow emergency, so they couldn't really plow. In the late evening, took a slow-drive out to the video store. Watched "Rescue Dawn." Guitar. Cleaning in the basement, throwing out empty boxes that I no longer need. Consolidating the storage room.

Saturday: A relaxed day at home. A couple of long phone conversations with Ann. Late schedule continued. Missed the video store. Invented a new dish: pan fried pizza. Also, individual nachoettes made with the scoop style chips. Ah, the bachelor's life. Watched "Adam's Rib."

Friday: A late schedule + morning errands + needing to be home = I didn't make it
to work today. The snow emergency was lifted. I presented a class at my house with 7 participants.

Chicken & Biscuit (snow day)

Thursday: Woke to the sound of garbage being collected. The phone rang and I took it as a sign I should get out of bed. Just the video store thinking I needed to return something. Straight down basement and morning practices and drums. Packed up Shawn's cymbals. Fed Oscar. Out back and raking the leaves, in anticipation of the coming snow. Just as I completed, flakes began to fall. Shower. Was about to head out, but decided I'd be best served by having some breakfast. Kale, mushrooms and eggs.

Headed in to work, slow going with the snow. The guys from Apple had responded fessing up to a bug. Made a system for a new sort of add-on notification. Worked around the Apple bug. Looked into fixing one last bug of my own... which turned into quite a tough nut to crack. Mom called and we talked briefly. Around 8, (still snowing heavily) B suggested those of us still in the office go out for dinner at a nice local place, so the six of us did. A lovely meal by a (gas) fire. Geek humor: "Would would you get if you bit-wise and a chicken with a biscuit?" Don't worry, it doesn't make any sense. Back to the shop, and some more work. I left around 10.

Very slow going back home. Someone zoomed past me, driving aggressively despite the snow. I honked my horn at them and gave them the finger. Once home, lots of shoveling. Cleaning up. Listening to some music. Now down basement to do some little jobs I've been putting off, and to complete the day.

Learn Hindi from Bollywood Movies

Wednesday: Up, and email. Shower. Fed Oscar. A quick breakfast. Down basement and morning practices. The cleaning people arrived just as I was wrapping up, so no drums.

Long way around to work. D came up to my car and bummed money off me. He said he had just broken up with his girlfriend, and I told him "me too." A fairly productive day, adding some details to the pre-set feature, and fixing little bugs. Came up with a workable scheme for a category of add-on that does not support a feature I need. Headed home a bit after 10.

Stopped and shopped. Saw an old colleague Mk Dch. Just said hello and "happy shopping." Back home, and some food (kale and tofu 'wings'). Composted some food past its prime. Guitar, feeling out of practice. Now down basement to complete the day. The Earth is dying.

Meanwhile, an enjoyable podcast.

Swing

Tuesday: Woke and turned on the radio. Falling back to sleep, dreams about "The Golden Compass" being beamed in from the NPR commentary. Up, email, shower. Down basement, and drums. Fed Oscar, and some quick cereal.

Stopped at the Post Office, and dropped some video materials back in the mail to B.A. In to work. Things in the UI arrangement universe were still causing me grief, so I decided to stop using the new sub-system created by Al, and just code it up myself. This turned out to be a very good decision, and allowed me much nicer control. Got most of that squared away, and began working on some other related features. A "taco salad" from the Mexicanish place on the first floor.
Stayed until 10:45.

Headed home the long way around. The temperature has gone up again. Dropped a DVD at the store, and picked up another. Back home, down basement and a little project. Vacuuming. Watched Lost on the treadmill. Email. Now to complete the day.

The Grind

Monday: Slept in a bit. Morning practices. Quick breakfast. Fed Oscar. Email. Doing some tidying. Icy rain had fallen over night.

Off to work. I could see a long line at the PO, so decided not to mail back the DVDs that arrived on the stoop over the weekend.

Not a very productive day. Spent most of it trying to figure out why a particular set of built-in add-ons were misbehaving in our program, but not in other programs. Finally realized it was their bug. Fixed a bug of mine also. Bought some iron supplements. And a burrito. Stayed until around 11. Back home the long way.

Watching lost on the treadmill in the basement. Now to complete the day.

Back to Boston. Electric Flowers

Sunday: Ann went to the gym. Morning practices. Got some breakfast going, throwing "Axis Bold as Love" on the turntable. She returned, and a relaxed meal, some hanging out, and then off to catch the bus. Arrived at the station at the perfect time. More listening to "Don't know much about history" on the ride back.

Took the T to Harvard Square, and got my car, which already held my guitar. Drove to South Boston for guitar circle. Worked on L.I.G. with Dev, David and Victor.

Back home, the house cold. Pizza. Watched an episode of Six Feet Under. Evening practices.

New York Phil

Saturday: Spent the morning with Ann. In the afternoon, wandered out. Brisk. Browsing in Barnes and Noble. To the restaurant, and waiting for my mom. Her train was delayed, and she had trouble getting a cab. She arrived about a half hour late, having thought she would get there a half hour early. A lovely dinner, then Dvorak, Beethoven and Smetana across the street.

Iron, Heading to NYC

Friday: Up around 8, paid bills in bed, shower, and a busy morning, morning practices, packing, putting away laundry. Gave Oscar an extra heap of food. Headed out.

At the Doctor's office, the nurse that had taken my blood didn't remember me. The Doctor had wanted to talk to me about the results of my blood test. Everything basically fine, but I'm on the verge of being anemic. Probably because I'm vegetarian. He hadn't thought to ask me about my diet. But anyway, this was a relief, since it's not common for the doctor to ask me to come back in, and the nurse hadn't said on the phone why.

Short day at work, fussing around with the layout code. Still think perhaps not the right tool for this job.

Fung Wa to NYC, listening to "Don't know much about history" on my laptop. Met Ann, and dinner at an Italian place. The waiter seemed to be giving us a bit of an up-sell.

Phone calls

Thursday: A couple of phone calls with no one on the other end. Tried to call the alarm company to set up an appointment to have the system worked on. Down basement. Breakfast of cereal and tea. Laundry. The dr's office called to say that he wanted to talk to me, so set up an appointment for tomorrow. In to work, and trying to make use of Al's new system. Finding it harder than it was worth. Stayed until 8. Feeling a bit beat, headed home. To the video store for a new disc of Six Feet Under. Back home and watched an episode on the treadmill. Evening practices. Early to bed tonight.

L.I.G.

Wednesday: Stock morning. Cold. Long way around. Worked on fixing the display of a window using Al's new layout subsystem. Dinner with F&M at Christopher's. Returned some art to M. Back home, watched an episode of Six Feet Under (had to go back to the store to swap disks). Worked on the guitar arrangement of L.I.G. completing around 2 AM. Down basement and evening practices.

Tires

Tuesday: Slept in after a late night. Somehow the radio got switched on, and I had dreams modified by George Bush's press conference. He was running around a soccer field, hugging people people in wheelchairs, while talking about "enriched uranium." Breakfast with Oscar. Shower. Down basement and morning practices. Loaded my snow-tires into the car. Placed a craigslist ad for MB's tires. Drove to the tire shop and had them swap the all-seasons for the snows. Got a coffee while this was going on. In to work, and investigating the puny API associated with the "proxy icon." Listened to the Democratic debate. Sold the tires, and scooted home to meet the guy and complete the transaction. Loaded my all-seasons back into the shed. Found and fixed a bug I'd introduced a week ago or so. Got some nachos at the Mexican place on the first floor. The guy in front of me in line ordered something like 9 burritos. MB called. We got a bad connection and it sounded like she was in a wind-tunnel. IMing with Ann. Stayed until almost 1am. Back home, and some toast. Watched part of a Six Feet Under episode, but the disc was scratched. Soon to complete the day.

Physical Exam

Woke at 8:40, just before the alarm. Quick shower. Down basement and morning practices. Put on water to boil and shoveled the front walk. Thanks to Bill for doing half of it for me. Speed-breakfast. Headed off to the doctor's.

Arrived right on time at 10:15. Waited. Finally saw the doctor. We had a rapid-fire conversation. He palpated me, felt my nuts, and then stuck his finger up my anus in an abrupt fashion. Well, at least I think it was his finger. After peeing into a cup and having blood drawn, I was free to go.

Found a parking spot near the PO in H Sq. and dropped another package in the mail to MB.

In at work, continued fixing a window that had been uglified by side-effect of the recent changes. Fixed a problem with floating-windows-as-modal-dialogs, and key events. Al said later he had already fixed this. Feeling quite sleepy, left a little after 8.

Back home, and took a wonderful half hour nap. Continued porting the OCBC website from GoLive to Dreamweaver. (Just bought Intel native versions of Dw and Photoshop). Put away laundry. Shoveled a bit more. Tried to acclimate Oscar to the litter box in the first floor bathroom, but just succeeded in freaking him out. A quiet night at home.

MB departs... Catching up

Nov 30th - Dec 2nd. Ann visits. Saturday night we go ice-skating on the frog pond, then dinner at the Elephant Walk on Beacon St in Boston. We sit next to a fellow that I knew several years ago from a seminar series, but I don't say hello. Sunday, Ann departs on the Fung Wah. A donut on the roof-parking-lot of the bus terminal. Not able to connect with Frank. Back home, and soon time to go to Guitar Circle. Victor, myself, Dev (who had to arrive late due to other commitments), Alex and Chris. A possibly useful analogy came to me when talking about how one becomes better able to juggle all the various attributes of playing: When a chef begins learning to cook, he follows recipes. After some time he knows what the dish is supposed to taste like, and acquires a familiarity with how each ingredient contributes to the end result. At this point, he doesn't need the recipe any more, and can respond to the varying nature and quality of the ingredients. In the same way, at first we need to concern ourselves with counting, with our technique, with the pulse, with the music, with the fingering, with the expression, with maintaining contact with the group, and so on. Once we know the music, as a whole, we don't have to spend too much time thinking about these details on a conscious level, and can concentrate on responding to the needs of the moment. We can begin with the wholeness and work backward. The more each member of the team knows the wholeness, the more fully it may be realized.

Nov 29: After doing some code-cleaning and commenting, checked in my add-on management project. Picked up Shawn at 7:40. To Arlington and picked up cymbals. To my place, and a recording session with the new studio. It went pretty smoothly after I realized that the mix control on the Echoplex was turned mostly to wet. Dropped Shawn home. Went out for a late-night shopping run. Saw a family have to abandon a whole shopping cart full of food that they had selected, because no funds were forthcoming from the ATM. Back home, and made three pumpkin pies with the pumpkin I had baked last week. I really only had enough filling for two and a half, so the last one became half banana.

Nov 27-28: In the evenings, I completed re-wired my home studio. This involved hoisting the mixer module up into the air on a winch. Luckily, I discovered that going in through the front by loosening modules, was much easier than trying to go in through the back. This made the job I'd been dreading go rather quickly. Still, on Wednesday night, I was up until dawn.



Nov 24th - 25th. Feeling under the weather. Sun going down early. Sleeping. Some tidying around the house. Began re-wiring my home studio. Guitar circle on Sunday, with the first "all hands on deck" meeting since the course. Almost every single one of us in the circle has had some major life shift since then. I had prepared some of the piece I'm arranging for presentation, but we didn't find time for it. We sent MB wishes, imagining her in the air hurtling west.

Nov 23rd: A guy tries to con me by saying his car has been towed. My mom arrives and we have lunch. She compliments my new furniture. Opening presents. Good conversation about yoga. She forgot her directions, so I recreate them for her, and she heads out. Casting about for entertainment. Feeling a head-cold coming on.



Nov 22nd: Thanksgiving. MB wraps up her packing. A final breakfast, and she heads out for a swing through RI visiting friends, and then to fly to Seattle on Sunday. Cleaning up. Casting about for entertainment. Gutted the pumpkin that had been sitting on the front steps. Baked the seeds and flesh.

Nov 20th: Breakfast as the 7-11. Then flying back to Boston. Straight to work.



Nov 15th - 19th. My trip with Ann to Ohio. A cat shows up on the course. The camp runs out of water. A walk through the labyrinth. Playing the little travel guitar I had brought. Coming to have a vivid example of how my maps of another's emotional state can be completely wrong, and lead to misunderstanding. Flying back to NYC. Over the weekend of the 17th-18th MB spent time in CT with my mom.



Nov 14th: A moving van arrived early morning, and spirited away most of MB's stuff. There was more stuff than she had anticipated, and so there were extra charges. I completed my packing. The house-cleaners arrived. Off to work for a brief day, then few to NYC to meet Ann. We walked around Queens, and had a nice dinner in a Middle-Eastern hole-in-the-wall.

Gathering

Sunday: Nice sleep in after MB headed out to OCBC. Lazy morning. Breakfast of eggs. Was airing out the place when Wnd showed up. I had forgotten about our reflexology session. Downstairs for morning practices. Wnd helped me measure the outside of the house, gathering information for a form I have to fill in related to home-owners insurance. A sunny cool day out.

A gathering of 6. Talking, then a break. Practice, with some interesting stuff channeled in. Snacks. After people left, cleaning up. A little guitar warming up, then headed out to guitar circle just after 7 pm.

The circle tonight was a bit odd. Well, when isn't it, really? MB couldn't get her sound going, so we practiced without amplification. At the end, I began presenting Love is Green.

MB headed to the Middle East, and I headed home. Practices, then off to the Middle East myself. Arrived in time to see Drn perform. Then MB's turn. She only got to do about half her set, due to a near wardrobe malfunction. I gave Drn a ride home. Back home and more practices in the basement. Soon bed.

Used furniture

Saturday: On MB's suggestion, visited a used furniture store. Found some quite nice pieces and made purchases. The prices were better than new, as was the quality and character. A little grocery shopping. Picked up pizza and a slice of calzone for MB and myself for lunch.

Spent most of the rest of the day helping MB pack. Going through photos. Moved the secretary out to the garage. Ran a telephone wire through the wall into the kitchen. The new cabinet arrived just as I wrapped up that job. Loading stuff into it. Packing the kitchen stuff. Whipped the first floor into pretty decent shape.

MB went out to visit David and Jessica. Paid bills, and sorted through papers. Was about to head out to get some food when MB returned. We went out together, stopping at the close-by and sketchy Chinese place, then to the video store. Back home and eating. Watched an episode of Six Feet Under.

When you're trapped in the cage, all you can see are bars. Once the door has been opened, then maybe you notice, "oh there were nice pictures on the wall."

Furniture shopping and loops

Thursday: Woke around 9:30. Not enough sleep. MB working at home today. Shower. Down basement and morning practices. Drums. Put away laundry listening to NPR. Paid bills. Loaded up the car. MB wanted a ride to H Sq. so off together. Stopped for an egg sandwich at the donut shop. Feeling pretty wiped out today. Hands hurting. We parked in the office lot, and MB walked to her language class. I went looking at a couple furniture stores. Didn't buy anything, but gathered some good information. In at the office. Emailing frustrations about XCode to someone that might actually be able to do something about them. Conversed with Js and Jn about how to handle a change in our support for add-ons that will alter how we interpret existing files. We arrived at the conclusion that I had already reached. Went off and implemented the feature to help users make the transition. Easier than I had been anticipating. At 7:20, headed out to meet Shawn.
Arlington and rehearsal. Mostly focusing on improvisation and looping tonight. Good work... Recorded one of the more interesting loops in to Garbage Band. Dropped Shawn back at his apartment. I arrived back home just before MB got in. She'd been out having dinner with Stc and the Smoking Scotsman. Email. Now down basement to complete the day.

Dinner with Joe

Wednesday: Woke, then back to sleep... had some catching up to do. Finally up around noon. Email, shower. Down basement and morning practices. A bit of drums. Fed Oscar. Laundry. Was about to head out when I remembered that I had just enough for one nutritional smoothie. So, had that. Long way around to work. Sunny and coldish. Again hit traffic, which I now know is due to some roadwork that is ongoing. Detour through Comm Ave.
A good quiet day in the office. Got my "simulated continuously variable program data" feature working... lunch thanks to MB. Talked to my mom, who had tried to reach me several times. B called form CA to discuss any questions I had for Apple. Joe called, and we made plans to get together.
I gave him directions to just outside H Sq. He called when he was getting close, and I walked out to meet him. We drove back to the office lot, then took a walk around, finally ending up at a Malaysian restaurant (that had recently changed its name). After dinner, he followed me driving back to my house. Hello to MB. A look at my guitar (Joe has an interest in woodworking). Joe left for his hotel, and tomorrow CA. Copying MB's data from the home computer to a new hard-drive. She had had some wine with her drumming class. Another fringe benefit of the class: cupcakes. Took out the garbage. Guitar, working on my arrangement. Now to complete the day.

LoCG at the Somerville Theater

Tuesday: Up around 10. Email. Shower. Eggs and fed the Monster cat. Down basement. Packed up discs to return to N. Drove out, stopping at the PO to mail the discs. Went to vote. "Over voted" (picked 5 Aldermen, when I was only supposed to pick 4). Made the same mistake on my second ballot. Third time's a charm. They told me they'd see me next year, and to learn how to count. Around the short way to work. Didn't work much.
At 3, headed off, stopping in Porter Sq to pick up guitar strings. Found parking in Davis, and to the Somerville Theater to act as a FQM for the LoCG show. Vibing. Once an hour had to feed the meter until 6. Gave Luco his goodies. Hellos to many old friends and some newer ones. Quite a good show I thought. No flashes, but a couple of cell-phone snaps. After the gig, helping in whatever way I could. Quite hungry, I was briefly put-out that I had to watch the van... but then, I was there to help, and not to eat pasta. Stood around for 20 minutes until Alex L came to relieve me. Yum, food in good company. Then back outside, watching the two guys lurking by the back-door hoping to get an autograph. I wanted to tell them that we're all Robert, so they might as well sign the things themselves. Ha ha. Bif drove around front. Goodbyes. Gave Alex a ride to the T, relaying the story of the first time Igor met RF. Back home. Feeling wiped out. Ate a mini-cheesecake with MB. Then, completing the day.

Court and movie dates

Monday: MB and I were up at 6. Shower while she had a sitting. Down basement and morning practices. Fed Oscar. We went out and had breakfast at the dinner up in Ball Square. Obla-de-obla-da played as we ate our eggs. Then over to the Cambridge courthouse. We met our guy... first to the wrong court... but then settled on the correct one. A talkative officer got us water. We were first in line, and were done before 10am.
Back home, I took a nap in the basement while MB did some audio recording. On waking, off to work, the long way. A lovely sunny day.
A fairly quiet day at the office. Working on supporting a control function that users have long been asking for, but that is hampered by an Apple API, and our unwillingness to deliver a second rate product... but sometimes, users want compromise. Then, switched gears to, rather painstakingly, determine which formats work and which do not under 10.5. RT asked some questions about code of mine that he had pilfered. Headed home around 9.
Picked up MB, and over to Fresh Pond. Guys in the lobby talking about "great sodas of the world" The kid at the concession stand confessed he was going to study computer repair because he wasn't binary enough for programming. We watched Superbad. Very dirty and also quite sweet. Back home, feeling a bit drained, I helped MB burn a DVD of her audio recordings. Now to complete the day and get some sleep.

Things that didn't happen

Sunday: Up around 9 (after the time switch). MB up and getting ready for OCBC. Shower. Made us some breakfast (eggs, hash-browns). MB headed off to church and other activities. I cleaned up, then morning practices. Began tearing apart the recording studio. Need to do a bit of rewiring and debugging. Called Shawn. Got a message back he had gotten confused about our meeting time. Guitar, working on an arrangement. Feeling a bit at lose ends. Plenty to do, but not feeling terribly motivated. More arrangement, working with the original in the computer, and then overdubbing my guitar parts. Email. Message from Victor: no circle tonight. Carried boxes out to the garage. Drove out to the shopping mall, and bought a few items. Back home, setting up a small stereo, hanging a mirror. MB returned. Our running joke has been to pointedly ask each other "What are you doing?" We processed some emotion relating to her upcoming departure. Such a good friend she is. More packing work. Luckily we have many treats. Her large antique secretary has been unloaded and is ready to be moved.

MB packing/Vinyl rack/NH party

Saturday: MB and I slept in a bit. She did a sitting as I lazed. Shower. Down basement for morning practices. Breakfast (sunny side up eggs, etc). We continued our packing work on the first floor. Going through pictures, DVDs and VHS tapes. Fixed the vinyl rack in the basement. Around 4pm I went out to run some errands. Blustery rainy day; the remnants of hurricane Noel. Picked up cat food. A couple of things at Home Depot. Packing materials. The guy at the packing materials store said "Enjoy the game tomorrow!" I said "What game?" He couldn't believe I was serious. Got a veggie sub at Leone's. Home, and eating food with MB. Down basement, put little no-skid feed on the vinyl rack. Personal practice. Upstairs and some guitaring.
Wnd showed up a little after 8, and we headed up to NH for a party. Fun, but not really "my people." Got back in around 2am... which is now 1am, since daylight saving has ended. Ate a fast food veggie burger. Oscar came in for a brief visit. MB on the phone. Now to complete the day.

This is yours, this is mine

Friday: Slept in a bit. Previous plans had me feeling unsettled. Email. Shower. Downstairs, then down basement and morning practices. Drums. Called Wnd and rearranged things. Much better. Some tidying. Breakfast of eggs and such. Fed the Oscar beast. A sunny day, drove the long way around to work. Hit traffic but was able to take an exit before I came to a stop. Comm Ave to the BU Bridge to Mem Drive.
J had reported a memory leak with my new stuff, that I promptly fixed. Began some new design work. Moved my recent code back onto the "new feature" branch. Some talk with Al and B prior to their departure for the camp in CA next week. Also Dv. Stayed until around 9pm. Picked up Indian food on the way home. The situation with the environment was weighing on my mind today.
Back home, dinner with MB. She had bought some lovely little pastries when we sampled. Guitar with the two of us: Third Relation, Askesis and Eye of the Needle. Then, we played "this is yours, this is mine" with books and CDs. Now down basement on the treadmill, and to complete the day.

Voodoo Dick

Thursday: Up around 9. Email. Shower. Breakfast. Hello to Oscar. Down basement and morning practices. Some hanging around and drums. ST stopped in and conversation. Headed to work, across town. Slow going... lots of traffic. A somewhat short day in the office. Confirmed my new alt in stuff was working, with an actual add-on. Ripped out some debug code, and checked my stuff in. MB had made me a lunch. Headed home earlyish, around 8. Watched Lost on the treadmill. MB came home, and hello. Some food. She told me a joke that Taylor had told her: A pirate walks into a bar with a steering-wheel protruding from his pants fly. The bartender says "Hey buddy, did you know you have a steering-wheel in your shorts?" to which the Pirate replies: "Arrrgh, matie, its drivin' me nuts!" I told her about "Voodoo Dick". Guitar. Working on some arrangements of classic instrumental rock music. Now down basement to complete the day.

Departure plans

Woke around 8, back to bed until 9. Downstairs and email. MB working at home today. Shower. Made breakfast for us (mushrooms red-pepper and eggs). A bit of guitar, then down basement. Morning practices. Drums. Reconfigured the wires around the music room computer.
Off to work, the long way. A sunny day.
Productive day at the office. I got the alt in feature up and running. Lots of little details. To the pharmacy, and picked up a burrito. B and Al continue scheming about Cocoa. MB wrote with details about her departure. Most of her belongings will leave on the 14th, and then she herself will head off on the 25th. The last day I'll see her for now is Thanksgiving.
IMing with Ann, she had concern about a recent dream. Worked until about 10:30. On the way back home, stopped at the bank. Hello to MB. Putting out the garbage, recycling and compost. Down basement and watched an episode of Lost while walking on the treadmill. Now to complete the day.

Fred's Gas

Tuesday: Bad dreams about work and home life, waking me around 4am. Back to sleep, and some disturbing dreams, but not of the previous magnitude. Woke around 9am. Email. Shower. Downstairs and breakfast with Oscar. Guitar practice. Down basement, morning practice, brief drums, and some tidying.
Headed out stopping to have my car inspected. No problems. Then, over to Porter Sq. Finally settled up with the music shop that gave me only half the number of strings I ordered. Friendly guy gave me strings.
In to work and continuing with the new side-input project. Nachos. By the end of the day I'd connected up almost everything... a fair slog. Al and B discussing plans for moving to Cocoa. Enjoying the new Siouxsie CD. Left just after 7pm.
Over to Deerheart's house and a brief meeting with him and An. Realized there was a time conflict with next week, so good thing I wasn't feeling called to co-lead.
Back home, email and IM. Now to complete the day.

Dentist and slog

Monday: Woke around 9. Slept well, but feeling groggy. Brief email. Shower. Fed Oscar (who didn't want to come in, despite the cold). It took 20 minutes to cook eat and clean-up breakfast. Down basement, morning practices. Headed out.
At the dentist's by 11. Waiting, listening to the Moody Blues piped in over the sound system. Cleaning. The dentist said my teeth are in pretty good shape.
In to work, and a long slogging day hooking up a new system for add-ons. Got quite a bit of it done. Mid-day took a walk around, picking up Yerba, black licorice cats for MB, and some chocolate, as well as a burrito for lunch. Sunny and chilly. B bought a copy of Leopard. I installed this on my spare computer at the end of the night. Headed home around 10pm.
At the house: personal practice in the basement. MB came home from her language class. Some hanging out, and discussing her plans. Guitar for about 40 minutes. Soon bed.

Lovelock

Thursday: Woke in the am. Email. Back to bed, sleeping until around 1pm. Much needed. Email, shower. Downstairs and fed Oscar. Some cereal and tea. Reading about James Lovelock's distressing assement of the future of humanity, while they talked about the California wildfires and Huricane Katrina on NPR. Frightening. Down basement. Morning practices, drums. Loaded up the car and headed out. Across town to work.
Again not a terribly productive day. Checked in the window opening work from yesterday, and did some research on a feature that I may soon implement. Got some nachos. Dev came by and picked up my old Ovation to be used as a spare on the LoCG tour. Headed out around 7:30. Met Shawn at the DD in Porter.
Arlington, and rehearsing with Shawn. Using the new Echoplex to mostly good effect. World of difference just being able to begin and end recording with the foot pedal. Some other rehearsing. We're at the point where rehearsing isn't what's really necessary. Dropped Shawn-o at his place. Back home, MB got in just after I did. We hung out a bit, eating a little. Then down basement and email. Soon to complete the day.

Paperwork 2

Woke at 8:30, MB up also. Down basement for morning practices. Rainy out. We drove up to the bank. After a minor eternity (half an hour) she signed some papers. As her pen met the paper, Sting's "If you love someone (set them free)" played on the bank's canned music system. Hugs. I said goodbye as she left for work, then walked back home. Drove over to Everett and dropped off the papers, then back home. Breakfast, eggs and so on. Fed Oscar. Shower. Decimated a pile of papers, and scanned some photos of my (no-longer-with-us) cats from when they were kittens.
Made a deposit back at the bank. In to work. Not terribly productive. Feeling sleepy, and my hands hurting. Had another phone conversation with the 3rd party people. Consolidated some changes on two different branches. Reformed a bit of window opening code.
Back home, and down basement. MB had a belly-dance class upstairs. I took a nap.
Later, she had gone out. I walked out and picked up an eggplant sub and a piece of pizza, which I ate back at the ranch, flipping between game 1 of the World Series, and an episode of Lost. The Red Sox trounced the Rockies 13-1. MB came home, and a little hanging out. I went through the lead of Askesis checking with her if there was anything I was missing. Some more guitar practice, then down basement to complete the day.

Paperwork

Tuesday: Woke around 7:30... which seemed much too early. The alarm monitoring company was supposed to come by and replace part of the system between 8 and noon. MB headed to work. Down basement and morning practices. Moved stuff around to give the technicians access when they arrived. Shower. Email. Breakfast of eggs and such. Lost. Worked on learning the lead line to Askesis... All quite familiar. I must have learned this before. It was noon, and nobody had shown up. I called to assess the situation. They said "he's on his way." Spent an hour fussing around. At 1 pm the guy shows up. He told me he had no idea how long the job would take (in spite of the fact that every single house is having this unit replaced... so you'd think there'd be a rough estimate). I told him to leave and cancel the work order. Then I called the business and gave them a piece of my mind. I'll just do without that feature, the bastards. Feeling sleep deprived, and in a lousy mood, I set off for Everett.
Arrived with time to spare. Walked up the street and got a protein shake at a convenience store. Then back to the office. I was briefed on some paperwork, and signed my name a few times. Went to the drug-store and bought hand sanitizer. All the talk of staph infections in the news lately is triggering my OCD. Avoid doorknobs.
In H Sq, a parking spot opened up so I got a burrito. As I was heading back to my car, Al showed up. We talked about how someone had left the company without any mention being made of it. Not a terribly productive day in the office. I bought some gear for a friend. Worked on addressing a couple of other issues for a 3-rd party. Yerba. Stayed until around 9:30. I was the last one out.
Back home, and going over paperwork with MB... which brought up a bunch of stuff. But somehow it all got resolved in the end. Goodnight and down basement. Email. Now to complete the day.

Echoplex

Tuesday: Woke around 7:30. Called J Mackey. Not in yet. Back to bed for a bit, but not much sleep. Called him again around 8:10, and we spoke. MB headed to work. No getting back to sleep. Email. Shower. Eggs with mixed greens for breakfast and hello to Oscar. Watched "Lost." Down basement for morning practices and drums. Some tidying. Drove the long way around to work: a lovely day.
In at the office, spent the day trying to reproduce, and deduce a crash in the OS. Finally decided it must be an OS bug involving custom window definitions. Lots of talking today... Al and B. The three of us. Me and B. MB made me a lunch. A box containing a toy I purchased on Ebay arrived today.
Back home, worked on spooling off old video for Shawn. Some practices, then installing my toy in my rack while talking to D. MB returned home, so hanging out with her. Had some toast with Brie and mixed greens. Back down basement and playing with the toy. Fun! Now to complete the day.

Orange Cupcakes

Sunday: Woke around 8. Shower. Bowl of cereal. Down basement and morning practices. Said goodbye to MB as she headed off to church. Back down basement, and a nap. Strange dreams of people canceling appointments and rescheduling.

Took a walk out to the store and bought some stuff for the gathering. People began arriving a little before 1:30. Began around 2... And a lovely time. Snacks and beverages afterwards, people staying until almost 6. Cleaning up...

Showed MB a bit of Flying Home. Down basement and some practices.
A little after 7, off to circle.
Martin, Victor, Chris, Alex, MB and myself. My hands continue to hurt. Some discussion at the end about goals and aims.

Back home, noodles with stewed cherry tomatoes. Down basement to complete the day.

Three Frogs, Combinations of Rubbings

Saturday: Up around 10. Hello to MB. Down basement and morning practices. Breakfast with MB (scrambled eggs and mushrooms. Waffles). MB and I re-installed the attic stairs in the basement, again featuring her famous isometric stretch. I bolted the bottom part of the ladder back on, trimmed the ladder, and then devised a way for it to rest on the landing. The first trip up and back down was take. It was about 3 PM by this point.
Wnd arrived with her reflexology chair. I took the first spin while MB did audio recording. Nice catching up with Wnd. My feet felt crampy, probably due to the green-tea. MB had her turn, and I went out, to the bank, then picked up some ice-cream and a few other things at the store. Pizza. Back at the ranch, MB was still having her feet massaged. Down basement. A little later, we shared some of the spinach calzone I'd picked up. Then, and improvised apple pie/crumble that MB had created earlier in the day. Dee-licious. Gave Wnd a massage while MB got back to audio recording. More hanging out with MB, talking. We took a spin through the house. For some reason, a lot of emotion about a statue of three frogs. Liberation. We carried the ficus tree outside so it could rid itself of some dust, and soak up some water. Down basement, and to play guitar and complete the day.

Rain, last one at work

Friday:
Breakfast, eggs, and some rice -pudding. Debugging a reference count problem in an add-on. Sometimes reference count schemes are more of a pain in the neck than simple allocation, IMHO. Raining. Some pizza, waiting for things to build. Still can't figure out the bug... Beginning to think it's an OS problem. A pedestrian almost jumped in front of my car, but thought better of it. I stepped on the brakes, and was almost rear-ended. Drove the long way around. Two cars facing the wrong direction.
Earlier than usual evening practices. Hello to MB. Back down basement. Guitar. More practices. Working on video importing. One DVD was bad. Somehow, still up quite late.

Filming with ST

Thursday: Woke around 9. Not really enough sleep, lazed until 10. Email. Shower. A bowl of cereal. Gave Oscar a brushing, since MB had already fed him. Down basement, and morning practices. Drums. ST left me voice mail that she wanted to wait an hour before getting together. Setting up video equipment. At 1, picked her up, and was introduced to a house-guest named G who was familiar with the work of Osho. Back at my place, filming and hanging out. Dropped ST back at her place (well, near), and headed for work. Burrito. M was strangely complimentary, as if he felt bad about being negative yesterday. Spoke with G from an add-on company and tried to figure out some crashing behavior. Hard time getting their stuff installed, as usual. Cleaned up my virtual desktop. Ridiculous number of test files I've made over the years. Had to leave at 7:30 to meet Shawn. On the ride to Arlington I talked about maybe shifting the focus of the band. He wasn't so keen on the idea. A sloppy rehearsal on my part. Lack of sleep is not good for accuracy. Dropped him back at the supermarket near his house. Back at the ranch, hello to MB. Talking about her plans. Watching the funny shredder guitar with overdubbed horrible noodling that is making the rounds. Email. Hoping to make an early night of it and catch up on sleep.

Returned pop-tarts, a small act of quality

Wednesday: Up around 10. Email. Shower. Eggs with Oscar. Down basement, morning practices, drums. Headed out stopping at the P.O. to pick up a package, and mail another. Stopped at the music store in Porter Sq, and got a refund on some strings. Turns out, I had been short-changed even more than I thought. In to work... Spent most of the day running the program in sludge-mode trying to find a memory trasher. Eventually I did. Some code was using a fixed size array, and running off the end. It hadn't been expecting the vertical size to change. Some talk with M and B about icons. M made a scowly face. Wrapped up the feature by the end of the day and checked it in. Back home around 10:30. Hello to MB, who was waxing. Some soup and a cheese/avocado sandwich. The house smelled strongly of perfume from one of MB's belly-dance students. Down basement. Email. Now guitar and to complete the day.

Long day at work 2

Tuesday: Up around 9, but lazing. Email. Shower. Eggs, hanging with Oscar in the kitchen.
Down basement morning practices, drums, email. Headed out the long way around. Clear and cool today. Not quite as productive today, but still good progress working on my resizing feature. At the end of the day, working on tracking down a crash bug. Some sort of memory dart or double deletion. Connected with someone who had some interesting religious experiences early in life. MB called asking for more tech support. Back home: Zoomed too far out so the wiper was not obviously moving. A frozen burrito, rice pudding. Down basement, changing guitar strings. Now to complete the day.

Long day at work

Monday: Up around 9. Shower and downstairs for a bowel of cereal, while Oscar ate in the kitchen. Down basement, morning practice and drums. Email. Tidying. Grabbed the lunch MB had packed for me, and headed out, the long way around.
In the office, some fussing around, then a phone call with some folks that want to use an SDK that I designed. Sharp and not so. The rest of the day I spent working letting something resize, that never had before been resized. That was fun and rewarding. Got a call from MB around 1 am.
Driving home, Somerville Ave all torn up, looking like a disaster area. Back home, hello to MB, some soup and grilled cheese. Cleaning. Down basement, and to complete the day.

Fung Wahhhhhhhh!

Rain

Thursday: Slept until about 10. Up, shower, fed Oscar and had some cereal. Oscar explored the house a little, but I put him back outside when I saw him scratching. Fleas probably. Down basement morning practices and drums. Email.
Dropped DVDs off, and then to work the long way around. Spent most of the day fixing the list selection behavior to match OS X's. It's pretty embarrassing we waited this long to fix this, but the code it lives in is pretty hard to figure out. I heavily commented it, hoping to help the next poor soul who has to muck with it. Cleaning up headers to remove stuff that is not needed anymore. Tofu burrito. Some talk with Al, Dv and B.
Headed home around 8pm across town. Rainy today. Leftover Chinese, and Lost (First of S2). MB came home, and chat. She went upstairs and I continued my entertainment experience. Down basement, email, guitar. Researching looping boxes. Now to complete the day.

Moving forward

Wednesday: Woke around 10. MB working at home today. Good-morning to her, shower. Downstairs and fed Oscar. A bowl of cereal. Downbasement morningpractices and drums. Packed up a box of VHS tapes and DVDs to send back to MM. Put away laundry, answering some questions for MB for a tax form she was filling out. Off to work, stopping at the PO and mailing the box. Chilly and overcast. At the office, doing some design work. B helped me figure out why something I had checked in wasn't working. Some back and forth with Apple about Carbon and Cocoa. Big mess. Caught a discussion of some new UI stuff that has been under development, and added a few comments. Began looking at a small but satisfying project involving list selection. At 7:30, drove up to meet Shawn. To the space, and an electric rehearsal, focusing on improvisation. Need to overcome some technical hurdles in the electronic realm. Dropped him near his house. Back home, unloading, hello to MB. Had some cheese toast and a milk-banana-honey smoothie watching Six Feet Under on DVD. Now to complete the day.

Back to work

Tuesday: Woke around 9, MB heading out. Email. Felt like bumming around. Realized we didn't have any canned food for Oscar. Fed him some dry. Shower. Down basement.
Morning practices, drums. Walked out, mailing a new copy of the DVD off to the duplicators. Picked up some cat food, milk, bananas and such at the store. A guy approached me offering to buy my food for me with food-stamps, if I would give him the cash. I declined, but gave him a couple of bucks. Back home, fed Oscar, some breakfast watching Lost. Headed out. Remembered I was going to do laundry, so back. Long way around. A chill in the air today. In at the office, mostly working on tracking new extensions to an add-on API that we host. Some argument with Al about floating windows and such. Stayed late, checking in a batch of code. Home around 10, MB had just gotten in as well. Some hanging out. Tea and yogurt, watching Lost. Now down basement for some guitar and to complete the day.

Tracking at Bill and Ruby's

Monday: Woke around 9:30. MB was working at home. Up and shower. Downstairs and fed Oscar. Smoothie and some green tea, while MB worked. She sketched some diagrams of starch molecules for me. Down basement, and email. MB headed out to OCBC to help host a celebration for the completion of the restoration of a large Tiffany window. Morning practices. Drums. Upstairs and composted a bunch of old food.
Off to work, across town. Bright day, on the cool side. At the office, working more on the Carbon Cocoa integration issue. Got some nachos for lunch. Worked until 6:30. Quiet day.
Drove over to JP to the home of Bill and Ruby. Did some tracking on the song that Christine had done the vocals for a couple weeks back. Lovely. Easy. They told me how they had a special drain system installed in their basement to prevent flooding. Drove back home. Always manage to get a little lost on the way back from JP. MB was still out when I arrived. Started doing some important, irksome, paperwork. A quick burrito. Now guitar and evening practices.

Satsang 1

Sunday: Woke around 9:30. MB heading out to OCBC. Email. Shower. Downstairs and fed Oscar. Breakfast of eggs and such. Spent a little time petting him, then gave him a brushing. Huge hairball extracted, I sent him outside. The time got away from me while emailing, and suddenly it was almost time for Wnd to come over. Down basement and morning sitting. Wnd arrived at 12:25. She's studying reflexology, and used me as a practice subject. D from the workshop arrived early. Hanging out. People slowly arrived for the workshop reunion gathering, and we began at 2pm. After our session, chatting and snacks. MB returned home. The last person left around 5. Some more hanging out with MB. Down basement and some practices and web surfing. Left for guitar circle at 7. Got to the space a bit before Victor. A good session: Victor's new piece. Flying Home. Askesis... MB, me, Victor, Chris, Dev. Moving Force and headed home around 10.
Made some bruschetta, soup and salad while MB showered. Eating down basement. Now to complete the day.

LRS Dedication, Future plans

Saturday (Mom's house CT): Woke around 9:30, then back to sleep for an hour. MB and I both had dreams about breaking the law, hers involving Angalina Jolie and stolen jewels, and mine involving bogus credit card transactions with MB as an accomplice. Sitting, while MB showered, then the reverse. Downstairs and hanging out while mom cooked breakfast. MB talked to her about future plans.

We drove down to the garage mom's been renting. I helped move some boxes around up in the elevated storage area she had constructed. Then we moved a piece of exercise equipment up to a friend's condo. (The friend wasn't up yet, having had a late night.)

Over to Koky's. We hung out a bit, then MB and I played some guitar, standing. MB said she felt rusty. I played a bit of a new piece I've been working on. Rug cleaning people came and left. The bill was settled during Asturias.

Back to mom's and a snackish sort of lunch, with humus, tofu salad, almond butter and so on. We took Max the dog out for a walk around the condo complex. When we arrived back at mom's it was a little before 5. Email. Upstairs for some personal practice.

Slightly dressed up, we headed over to my old Alma Matter, Long Ridge School. This evening was a celebration of the school's 70 years of activity, and the dedication of the new large gym facility. A tour around, me pointing out memories from over 30 years ago. We saw mom's new office. Then to the new building for the do. Didn't see many old classmates, but met many people who were very complimentary of my mom's work with the students (she's a reading specialist, and quite a good one). She began teaching at LRS in 1971, and here she still is all these years later. Some noodles and salad. A band began playing, but it was a bit too loud given the acoustics of the room. We saw the building's architect wandering around checking on things. He said "the room's too loud." I saw my old teacher Guy Bailey. We stayed until 9:40. Goodbye to mom. Hugs.

MB dozed. A largely uneventful drive back to Boston. Settling in, and now to complete the day, and bed.

Early morning, down to CT

Friday: Woke to MB's alarm around 6:30. Didn't find sleep again, so up a bit after 7:30. Email while MB was in the shower, than a shower for myself. She headed off to work. Fed Oscar. Cereal and a smoothie. Watched an episode of Six Feet Under. Down basement for morning practices. Brief drums. Skype conversation with A & R. Printed out the GCNE repertoire list. Victor showed up on his scooter around 11:30. A good session, going over what we need to do for the performance project. Chrysanthemum, Flying Home, Lifelight, B2A etc. He left around 1pm. Found myself on the couch, and napped for perhaps a half an hour.

Headed off to work, the long way around, a lovely cool sunny day. Got more pieces of the Carbon Cocoa hybrid working, through bailing-wire and duct-tape, mostly. Got some nachos from the place downstairs. MB called and we made lose plans to hang out, since she was coming into the square, but then she got caught up in other stuff. Worked until 7:30 or so.

Back home, email. Evening practices, concluding around 9. Packing. A little guitar, and MB came home. We packed the car. A quiet drive down to CT, arriving just before 1am. Hello mom. The collapsible bed collapsed, much to my surprise. But I didn't startle.

Meeting in Everett

Thursday: Woke around 10, finally having had a good night's sleep. Email. Shower. Down basement and morning practices. Drums. Email. Tidying. Fed Oscar and had a smoothie. MB had made me a lunch. Off to work across town.

Still playing with Carbon and Cocoa. Messy and undocumented. At 3 I took off and went to a meeting in Everett. A cop stopped me and forced his helpful directions on me. Quite odd. Interesting meeting, looking forward to a big shift. Back home briefly to pick up guitar. Ant called and we spent some time talking about how to incorporate some suggestions into the L3 DVD, then set up a phone call for tomorrow morning.

Back to work, more of the same. At 7:30, met Shawn on the bench. He's back to his bald look. Told him about life changes. Across town, taking back roads to avoid traffic. Good rehearsal. Things are feeling pretty strong. Ready for some gigging. Gave him a ride home listening to some political comedy... Only problem is, nothing about the Bush administration seems funny to me anymore.

At the homestead, MB had just gotten in. We had the last of the eggplant and some potatoes and salad. Explaining the results of the meeting to her. Hugs. Then down basement for email, and now evening practices.

Dee

Wednesday: MB woke me as she headed out to work. Heard the sound of my car being repeatedly locked and unlocked with the key-fob. Couldn't get back to sleep. Email. Yogurt. Oscar. Lost. Back to bed for a couple more hours. Shower, and down basement for morning practices. Drums, feeling strong. Email. Headed out, the long way around.

At work continued with my Cocoa/Carbon integration experiment. Called a lawyer. Pizza. Talked to B about my progress, and the bigger picture. Stayed until 6:30. Talked to Ht on the way out, who was borrowing a smoke machine for Halloween.

Back home, MB was teaching a BD class. Down basement. No one showed up for the little gathering I had suggested. Took the time to work on the KKC image gallery. My mom called, and a brief conversation. MB checked in, and we had some dinner together: boiled potatoes and salad. Talking about where things stand and the future.

Down basement and evening practices. More email. Now guitar.

Is silence happy or sad?

Tuesday: Woke somewhat early, MB needing to talk a bit. Couldn't get back to sleep, so some yogurt and cereal. Watched an episode of Lost. Back to bed. Slept in.

MB was working at home today. Shower. Down basement. Hooked up the audio interface for MB. Off to work, stopping at K-Mart to buy lamp oil.

At the office, mostly concerning myself with integrating Cocoa and Carbon. The way these two APIs coexist is not particularly well documented. Eventually found a solution, perhaps. Left around 10.

Back home just as MB arrived. Hello. And down basement for evening practices. Email. Now some guitar and to bed.

MB returns

Monday: Couldn't sleep due to late night green tea... So slept in, eventually. MB returned from her trip to So. Carolina around 2 PM. Shower. Down basement and morning stuff. Drums, feeling powerful. Put away some CDs, and off.

Dropped off DVDs. Veggie burger, and the long way around to work.


Worked until fairly late. Back home, arriving around the same time as MB. Some hanging out and talking. Down basement.

Frith and MB's car breaks down

Thursday: Woke a bit after 10. Downstairs and breakfast (cereal smoothie). Watched some Lost. Down basement and morning practices. Drums. Shower. Laundry (finding some towels that had been abandoned in the washer). Headed out, slightly warmer today, and still nice and sunny.
At the office, finding and squashing bugs. Many had been already squashed, so punting the reports back to the authors. B and J were discussing hardware plans. Slice of pizza. Richard called. Good to talk to him: planning the next course. Met Shawn at 7, and took the number 1 bus into Boston. Jordan Hall, a lovely old room, with gilt trim and a large pipe organ in the back. The music of Fred Frith. The first three pieces were all tightly composed, for small ensemble. After an intermission Frith performed a solo for prepared electric guitar, which then bled into several larger group pieces. A good retrospective of his work. The student players seemed quite excited (some of them confused) to be on stage, playing this material. We also saw our friend Olivia (Cth's house-mate) and "Mr Curt."
Took the bus back. MB had left me a message saying her car had broken down on 93. Called her, and all was OK. Gave Shawn a ride back to his place. MB called just as I arrived home saying she was at the mechanics. Picked her up. Leftover pasta, and talking about future plans. Down basement, for guitar and to complete the day.

Ploting with Nayano

Woke around 9:30, dozing... Web, shower, down basement for morning practices. Called my friend in Florida to plot and scheme. Breakfast smoothie, and fed Oscar. Pulling things together for the day. Sunny and cool again. Stopped to buy sunglasses and an iced tea. Long way.
Arriving a the office, Mk was extolling the virtues of hope, which I commented was rather out of character for him. Bug fixing. Bought some gear. Shawn text messaged saying he was running late, and hadn't reserved the studio. Met him at Porter a little after 8:30.
Back to my place, and rehearsal in the basement. Not terrible, and I felt the unusual sonic environment was a good change of pace. Gave him a ride home, and returned his video equipment. Home again, watching some videos and rewiring my MIDI rack. MB returned from her language class. Hello. Watched the rest of "Curse of the Golden Flower." Goodnight. Down basement. Seem to have fried a circuit on a surge protector. Now to complete the day.

MB returns

Tuesday: Was up late last night working on the recording project. There's nothing that quite puts me into that timeless creative space like recording. If someone would bring me food, days could pass, and I'd stay at it until I fell over. Woke around 10: 30. Web, shower, downstairs and a smoothie and yerba. Fed Oscar and gave him some pets. Down basement, morning practices, drums. Began a back-up of the Mac mini. Email. Off to work.

Drove across town. Walked to the barber shop and got a haircut. Picked up a tofu burrito. Fairly productive day, hunting down a couple bugs, and working a bit more on documentation. Stayed until around 9. Drove the long way around heading home.

Back at the ranch, hung out for awhile watching vids. Made a big pot of pasta and sauce. MB came in while I was watching Lost. We ate some while she told me about her various adventures in Seattle. Sounds like she had a really nice time. Some more Lost. Making plans for another trip. Now some guitar and to complete the day.

Dead flowers

Monday: Slept in soundly. Wonderful. Web. Shower. Breakfast with Oscar (I had eggs, he had cat food). Down basement, email. Installing software on the Mac mini. M showed up to do some yard work. Morning practices, drums.

Locked the house. Had forgotten a jacket. Locked the house. Had forgotten some equipment to return. Finally off. Lovely clear and cool out today, driving around on Storrow. At the office, tracked down some bugs that seemed to have already been fixed. Worked on documentation, and porting an example add on to take advantage of a new feature. Stayed until 9:30 or so.

Back home, threw out some dead flowers. Fed Oscar. Headed out to the video store, then for a few groceries. Back home and some frozen lasagna, while watching "Lost." A little guitar now, and to complete the day.

Recording with Christine

Sunday: Woke at 9. Shower. Fed Oscar. Basement for brief practices. Headed to KKC. I'd missed the first few minutes I guess. A transmission, ending in half the alloted time, which was perfect, since I was going to have to miss the second half. Scooted out just after noon.
Back home, got directions. Picked up a temporary replacement bit of audio gear.
Picked up Christine near the Mt Auburn Cemetery. Cool and clear today. Recording project "The Rose." She did an excellent job. We also did something brief for Cath, ending with time to spare.
Picked up Shawn in Porter Sq, then over to the health food grocery store near the Charles in Cambridge. Got some food from the salad bar. Over to Cath's, for another one of her wonderful wine and cheese parties. I brought a lovely goat cheese with honey and nuts... mmmm. Many interesting people. A shift occurred listening to Christine's story of beginning to incorporate meat into her diet. She is such a dear friend of mine, my heart can almost not hold it. Goodbyes. Dropped Shawn back at his place. Home around 11:35 PM. Conversation with AE. Now to complete the day.

Casting a circle

Saturday: Had a mellow morning, enjoying a smoothie, shower, morning practices and so on. Drums, and then headed out to go to Newton for a pagan ritual sort of thing I'd been invited to. This was pleasant, and I made some good connections.
Heading home, I stopped for a couple of slices of pizza. Almost went to a chain "health food grocery store", but decided it looked to busy. Had a long phone conversation with AE, about some weighty philosophical issues, like how humans come from apes.
Headed out to Lizard Lounge, and caught the last half of the first set, and all of the second set of Ziaf's last performance of this North American stint. Eating tater tots. Great seeing Christine, Shawn and other friends. Cirkestra wrapped things up.
Back home, and began working on some backing tracks for Sunday's project with Christine. The gear failed me, so evening practices, and to bed.

Please place your bones in the nearest receptical

Friday: Woke again in the basement. Feeling quite a bit better. Upstairs and hello to MB. A shower. Yogurt. Food for Oscar. Back down basement. Morning practice. Drums. Cleaning up the sickroom. I wish the last act of being alive could be to clean up one's body. It always has seemed a shame that others have to care for your remains. This is the flip-side of "you come into the world alone, you die alone": Others created you, and others will lay you to rest. Hmmm, watching too much Six Feet Under, I guess.

In to work, the long way around. A very lovely and moderate day with the sense of autumn around the corner, but not here yet. Looked into some more Leopard issues. Conversations with Al about a composite windowing implementation. Talked to B about cell-phones. Stayed until 8 pm or so. Feeling almost all better today, just a little tired.

Back home, tried to resurect some leftover Chinese food by stir frying it with some noodles. The vegetables weren't so good, so I just ate the noodles. More SFU. MB returned from a belly dance gig in CT, now she's packing for her Seattle adventure.

back to work

Thursday: Cat napped all yesterday. Woke in the basement after a few hours sleep. Some more video watching. Eventually upstairs for some yogurt. Fed Oscar. Shower. Down basement again and morning practices. Hanging out upstairs and watching a Jethro Tull DVD which had been sitting around unopened for several years. Ian, the salty old dog. Headed in to work, driving the long way around. Van blocking my spot, so parked in Rs space. About a half day, fixing part of the build process under Leopard, and fixing a bug. B and Al were having rambling and slightly heated conversations. With Al around you don't need caffeine. Fixed the little lamp, which I've had sitting on my desk for 10 years by cleaning off the contacts and installing a new halogen bulb. Drove home stopping at Sam's and dropping off a DVD and some exercise equipment. Seems like she's doing well with her work. To the video store again. More pizza. Back home, munching and watching. "Lost." MB returned from a night of dancing at the Athenian Corner, smelling like grilled steak. Guitar, working on an arrangement for some recording work I'll be doing with Christine over the weekend.

Sick day

Didn't go into work. Spent most of the day in the basement watching videos on the laptop. Took a drive out in the evening for some essentials: DVDs, pizza and soda. MB's friend was over pruning. I put out the garbage, which seemed like a major accomplishment.

Reentry

Monday: Woke around 10 feeling sluggish. Web, shower. Gave myself a half a day off to take it easy. Oscar. An egg and some cereal. Down basement and sitting. Drums. Some emailing. Drove to Union Sq and dropped a check at Third Life, and did a little more tidying. In to work. A quiet day, looking into a bug, and getting some other stuff building. Back home around 8:30. Setting up the new monitor with the Mac mini. Victor called asking for opinions about the direction of the circle. Evening practices. MB returned. Hanging out in the kitchen talking and watching some Bill Maher clips on youtube. Now a little guitar, and to bed.

Entering a new space

Friday: Up around 9. Thought about sleeping more, but no. Web. Shower. Smoothie. Oscar. Basement. Drums. Vacuuming the basement for house guest. Loading the car. Folding laundry. Headed out to work, driving around on Storrow. Hot out today. Stopped for pizza. At the office, playing with 10.5 alpha, and getting things building. Left a bit after 4. At the space, unloaded. No sign of R&A. Off to the market. A mad-house. Setting up. Evening session was quite successful. Afterwards, cleaning up, back to the house. A brief guitar performance for our house guest, she sitting on the floor between MB and myself. A microwaved enchilada. Shower. MB has taken the plunge, and will be visiting Seattle. Now to complete the day.

A successful intro

Thursday: I was up until 6 am, so slept in until 11 or so. MB was working at home. Shower. Fed Oscar and had a smoothie on the porch. Repaired the damage to the attic stairs in yesterdays accident. Down basement and practices. Drums. Emailing. Pulling things together for the evening. Drove out, stopping at the grocery for laundry detergent, bought tea-lights at the store of useless stuff, then made some photocopies at the office supply place. Back home, putting in a load of laundry, dropping off copies. Over to Union Square, and reconnaissance for a group dinner on Saturday night. Decided to go with the Chinese restaurant that I know. Back to the car, and remembered I'd forgotten something at home, and my shirt had an odd spot on it, so back home, then finally to work.
Quite hungry by this point, picked up a burrito which I ate at my desk. Looking into a weird crashing problem that only happens when a particular window is opened and closed in rapid succession. The crash is deep in the OS with no debug info to go on. It takes about a half hour of attempts to repro. Yuck. Left a little after 6.
Heavy traffic heading to Porter. Had to buy some blank DV tape. Picked up Shawn, then over to the evening. A little rushed getting things set up. Good turn-out. Quite a success, it seemed. Afterwards, Shawn Caro and I felt like going out for food. Called MB, picked her up and headed to H Sq. Japanese noodly goodness. Dropped Shawn back at his place (stop grabbing my ass dammit) then Caro. Back home, laundry, saying goodnight, and now to complete the day.

Comes crashing down / Slots filled

Wednesday: Woke around 9:20. Web, shower. Downstairs and smoothie + feeding the Oscar cat. Down basement, and handling some course related stuff, emails and so on. Morning practices. Drums, feeling strong today. Did some work on the attic stairs in the basement, trying to square up the framing a bit. Then I decided, since I had most of the screws out, I should reorient it so the stairs faced the other direction. Then the whole thing, with a rending, splintering sound, crashed down to the floor. Little harm done, but decided this would be where I'd leave it. Cleaned up a bit. Upstairs and shower again. Paid bills. Got a call from the guy I was buying the CD player from. Yes, I'm on my way. Headed out. Deposited money. Missed the spot I wanted to stop for pizza, so drove to Medford and got a slice there. Beautiful cool day out. Headed up 93 to the offices of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection, where I bought a CD player for $15 from a guy named Haung. Thank you craigslist. Around on 93 and in to work. Bug fixing and installing Leopard. Or trying to. Confusing conversation with Bn about his use of threads to amortize work. Took a break to register a participant for the course. Last available slot. Talked to mom, who told me of a kayak adventure that was bigger than she bargained for. Headed out at 7:30. No Shawn. He called me and asked me to meet him in Porter Sq, which I did. Arlington and CoFD rehearsal. Felt good to play. Not so accurate, but spirited, which often seems to be the case after a hiatus. After the rehearsal, gave him a ride back to his place (which is now on Somerville Ave). Then back home. Hello to MB. Left over Chinese food. Hanging out. Tested the CD player, which seemed to work fine. Out to the garage, and fixing the damage done in the AM to the attic stairs. Organizing and cleaning up a bit in the basement. Now this, and to complete.

running around, and yoga

Tuesday: Up around 9:30. Web. Shower. Downstairs and fed Oscar. Smoothie. Guitar (some sight reading). Down basement, email, morning practices. Drums. More course prep work. Attached the top section of ladder back into the attic-hatch in the basement. Phone calls. A sunny warm day, I headed into Union Sq. Made some arrangements with a local restaurant. Picked up a couple slices of pizza, which I ate. Headed to work. Got to work and realized I'd forgotten something. Back home. More emails. Back to work. Brief consult with Al (as these things go), fixed a bug. Left for yoga. Hit traffic on Storrow. Arrived a bit late. Wendy Cook had "saved me a spot" in front. Intense tonight. I'm probably just out of shape. Chatting with Wendy afterwards. Stopped on the way back home, and got a fast food veggie burger. Back at the ranch, a little hanging out and email in the basement. MB returns. Socializing in the kitchen. 100% pure unsweetened cranberry juice, yow! Faxing a cc auth to a company that doesn't like to ship to addresses other than your billing. Guitar with MB. Then just on my own, working through the 12 major keys on the fretboard, each in one octave. Soon to complete the day.

Attic stairs in the basement

Monday (labor day): Woke around 9:30, feeling surprised that I was well rested. Then I remembered I'd gotten to sleep at 2 AM. No wonder. MB was just returning from some dance practice at Third Life. Web, shower. Down basement and morning practices. Drums.
Had a nice breakfast with MB, eggs and soy-bacon. The Oscar. He was seeming less nervous being inside than he was last night. A little guitar, as MB prepared to do some audio recording (spoken word).
Began measuring the area that I was going to install the attic stairs into. The basement in this house is completely separated from the upper two floors. Because this was done after the fact, there's a large area under the first floor stairs that is largely unused. It's empty space above the door as you enter into the basement. My scheme is to put an trap door attic stair unit in this place, to make the entrance a little more presentable, and also to keep a ladder where its needed. Until around 4pm, I measured and cut the studs that would go into making the frame into which the stair unit would be installed. Took a little break, and had a smoothie on the back porch. MB came and said hello. We ventured out to do some shopping. I dropped her at the office supply store, and I picked up some fasteners at the Home Depot. Drove around the parking lot a bit waiting for MB. Finally went in to see what she was up to. We had a conversation about how poorly many people use their bodies, how you want to go correct their posture, and how this is a drive that is quite hard to ignore for an AT instructor.
Back home, and fabricating the extended stud. Then screwing them into the walls above the door. I got MB to help me hold the stair frame in place while I screwed it into the studs.
Then I realized that the stairs could not open because of the length of the middle section. Disassembled the stairs to trim this back. Started making errors, so I realized I was tired and stopped. Cleaned up. Called out for some food. Shower.
Drove out to Wang's and picked up some veggie dumplings and mixed vegetables with tofu. Picked up one bottle of Diet Sierra Mist and one bottle of Diet Sprite to see if I could detect any difference at all between these products.
Back home, food with MB. They'd only given us one fortune cookie, so I ripped it in half before reading it, so we each got a bit. The fortune was something like "You have identified the issue, now turn your attention to it." My half read "ed the issue, tention to it." A large, very well fed, Raccoon with a shiny fluffy coat, ate dry cat food on the back porch with his hands, picking up clumps and tucking them into his mouth. Guitar with MB. Then some guitar with just me. A little scrap-booking. Trimmed the middle section of the ladder out in the garage. Now down basement to complete the day.

course prep

Sunday: MB was up relatively early to go to OCBC. I found sleep illusive, so I got up also. Web. Shower. Down basement and morning practices. Drums. Had a solid breakfast of eggs, soy-bacon, toast and yerba. Fed flat-head Oscar. Computer work sitting on the couch, putting together a welcome letter. MB returned home. More computer work. Sending out emails. Updating a website, etc. Made a bunch of phone calls. A smoothie for lunch. MB had a long phone conversation in the back yard. Began pulling things together for the course. Quite a bunch of stuff. Took a break and cleaned a toilet. Later on, we decided I'd go out and pick up a vid. I took a drive. Nothing in the shop grabbed me. Back home, and we had some soup and cheese-toast thanks to MB. A tomato that actually had some flavor (from a local garden, so no wonder). We decided we didn't need to watch a video. Guitar togetherness. Thinking about key-signatures, the circle of fifths, and the fretboard. Some guitar on my own. Now down basement to complete the day.

I tooted at the sun!

Saturday: Woke around 10. MB had left for an OCBC gathering. Web, showering, downstairs. Blended my smoothie, then fed Oscar to avoid alarming him. Had a long talk with a friend on the cell. Down basement morning practices. Drums. MB returned. In a bit, we headed out... stopped at the bank machine and deposited my pay.

MB drove us down to Newport, and we spent a lovely afternoon with D&V and little Gnv. We drove out to the bay, and had a sail (yummy egg-salad sandwiches), then back on land, ice-cream. A little hanging out back at their house (where Gnv did a hula dance for us, and played fetch with Cosmo the dog (or cat)).

I drove back to Boston, MB dozing. A long and very good conversation about life plans and directions. A opossum appeared on the back porch.