Done last week (20170528Su - 0603Sa)
2017-06-04 10:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mdlbearI'm really glad we got Colleen's medicare coverage straightened out (or mostly -- her Part D (drug) coverage is not fully functional yet, nor is her supplemental policy). Because she went in to Shoreline Clinic for lab work on Tuesday after her visit to the SSA office, and Wednesday we got a call telling her to go to the ER and get IV fluids, because her creatinine level was high. That's related to kidney function, and in this case indicated a problem with her catheter.
So she spent the rest of the week in Northwest Hospital; she was discharged Friday. And Medicare covers it. I spent much of the week doing medicare-related paperwork; being retired may be relaxing once you get to actually do it -- retiring sure isn't. I'm still not done with Colleen's.
Meanwhile, I've been reading. I finished Counterexamples in Analysis, which is a really fun read. It had been used as the textbook for Advanced Calculus up until the year I went to Carleton, so there were enough copies lying around for me to get intrigued by such perverse creatures as "a space-filling curve that's almost everywhere almost nowhere". In the process, supplementing it with Wikipedia dives, I've finally gotten a little more comfortable with ring theory.
Last night, between John Baez on the number 24 on YouTube and a bit of digging on Wikipedia, I also started getting the hang of the Monster Group and E8. They turn out to be related to the Binary Golay code, a 24-bit error-correcting code invented by Marcel Golay, who I knew of because he'd collaborated with my father on the Savitzky–Golay filter!
I've also been reading Operating Systems: Three Easy Pieces - it's mostly review for me, but it's a good presentation and there are a few good nuggets in there. The Codeless Code, a collection of software-development koans, is also worth of note, and of everything I've mentioned here is probably of the most interest to people casually interested in the sociology of software development. Or possibly Zen Buddhism.
I've also been looking around Don Knuth's home page -- Don was my favorite professor at Stanford -- which eventually led me back to Surreal Numbers. I see that I don't have a good set of links for those.
0528Su
* up 7:04; W=200.2
* more reading in Counterexamples, supplemented by Wikipedia. Finally getting the hang
of integral domains and ideals.
Naturally, ideals led to monoids, and free monoids to Turing machines, lambda
calculus, and functional programming, thereby getting to monads the long way around.
@ Racket is a teaching language derived from Scheme, and has an interesting-
looking curriculum around it.
* a little noodling
~ tried and failed for the second time to set up an online SSA account for Colleen.
online medicare application also failed. There is something in her records that isn't
matching. Or possibly the fact that she has social security now. *SCREAM*
% Being retired may be relaxing. I wouldn't know. The process of retiring
sure isn't.
* Hazmat disposal. Since I already had it all in a box, it was trivial.
-> oil, batteries, wallpaper stripper, cleaning stuff. Done.
Picked up bucket opener, coverall, and dropcloth at Home Despot, and cat litter at the
nearby PetSmart.
* made hummus. Had to go to Wallgreen's to get a can-opener.
# I think I'm going to have to figure out a way of tuning out or avoiding phone
conversations. It's hard to concentrate when I'm in the same room as someone who's on
the phone.
@ Emacs is sexy
How to Learn Emacs: A Hand-drawn One-pager for Beginners / A visual tutorial –
0529Mo Memorial Day
* up 7:04; W=200.2;
@ Awaiting Final Editing Before Publication – Learn How To Program – Medium (Q)
Learning resources for Smalltalk
* 1:30 DONE with the paint. The two heavier buckets weren't as full as I'd feared, so
that was fairly easy. I did the four cans by pouring them into a yard trash bag
sitting in the third bucket, which wasn't nearly as full. But even with the
lightweight cat litter, which thank goodness I had sense enough to get yesterday, they
were more than I really wanted to lift. Did anyway, and my back _doesn't_ hurt. so...
@ Don Knuth's Home Page
Knuth: Fantasia Apocalyptica (work in progress) - must give this a listen.
@ @ Surreal Numbers (writing the first book) - Numberphile interviews Knuth
@ Music Animation Machine
@ MetaPost; MetaPost on TeX Users Group
MetaFont-style declarative graphics for Postscript.
@ melannen | NOTE TO SELF (siderea | [psych/anthro])
YOU CANNOT ACTUALLY DO ALL THE THINGS
0530Tu
* Up 5ish; W=201.6
@ The Harry Potter theme, but it's an incredible fugue - Classic FM
~ we get the kids about 9am`
: G' will take Colleen to social security office to try to get her signed up for
medicare. We'll see. Followed by labwork at UW if there's time.
-> so apparently she *is* signed up. Part D, too! WTF? So it was Colleen who was
right, after all. We still don't know what Part D plan she's signed up _with_.
@ The Gateless Gate - Wikisource, the free online library
The Codeless Code: Contents
Rootless Root
* plumber and someone else to fix the sink. The other guy is just here to detach and
reinstall the garbage disposal, because apparently the plumber doesn't do that. WTF?
-> declined. They can do it when we move out. Would have been a 3-day job.
: Apparently C has been enrolled in Medicare since March. Apparently it's all under
_my_ SS#, because she hasn't worked enough to have an account of her own. :P
@ The Codeless Code: Case 218 The Terminal Retrospectives/or, After the Deployment
* Checked on Premera - medicare supplement plan approved.
% Did I make a serious mistake by not letting them fix the sink? I will probably spend
the entirety of the next two months worrying about it.
@ Whidbey and Camano Islands Tourism Information
Electric Car Charging Stations on Whidbey Island
: Some idiot parked close enough to the corner that I couldn't get the van out.
Reasonably sure it's because there were a couple of maintenance peoples' trucks parked
along that wall, and the person parked behind them.
@ The Codeless Code: Case 36 Division
This department has gone 0 days without the need foran honorable suicide.
Some of the koans are quite subtle. (This came from one of the ones that aren't)
@ Islandweb Schools
teach? study? good way to find people.
% 10:30 sleepy
@ Daft Punk - Derezzed (GuZheng Cover) - YouTube (The Codeless Code: Case 132 Interpreter)
Guzheng: "Spring River Flower Moon Night" 古筝 - 春江花月夜 - YouTube
12 Girls Band 女子十二乐坊 Cloudy Sky in HD - YouTube
There's some weird, wonderful stuff out there.
0531We
* Up 6:11; W=199.8
@ Perfect Shapes in Higher Dimensions - Numberphile - YouTube
@ The Codeless Code: Case 143 Monolith
" Qi’s commentary Ironically, the Monad always has at least one side-effect: it makes
me feel like an idiot. "
@ The Codeless Code: Case 155 Don't Help *Helper classes considered harmful
@ The Codeless Code: Case 173 Lost Peer The last note made me laugh.
" It is theorized that his ten-thousand-stanza epic, _The Dromedary_, describes a
Perl-to-OCaml converter written in C++. No scholar can stay sane long enough to be
certain. "
@ Hacking the Mind / How art can help us talk (and teach) technology
@ Free Fonts! Legit Free & Quality » Font Squirrel
& Colleen's doctor's office called, saying that her labwork from yesterday came back
with elevated creatinine level, and she needed to go to the ER and get IV fluids. So
we packed up her and the kids, and are now in Northwest Hospital. (Much better
parking than Harborview -- I'm not complaining.
# Fortunately, we received her medicare card yesterday as well. She has apparently been
signed up since March -- although I suspect that they may have back-dated her
application when we finally came in with our marriage license a couple of weeks ago.
: They admitted Colleen to the hospital, so Medicare Part B should cover most of it.
* after receiving the above update, I took the kids home.
# UNfortunately, I hadn't had a chance to get her medigap insurance, and hadn't applied
for COBRA yet. I may have misread something; I _think_ COBRA will be retroactive to
when eligible, but if I'm wrong this is going to be expensive.
* applied for COBRA
-> turns out there's an employer subsidy for COBRA, which I would have found out about
had I applied sooner. BUT, it says coverage starts May 1, so I *didn't* misread
it. Whew! (I hope.) And I applied using the form that I received *yesterday*, so
it's also possible that the employer subsidy is new. Didn't get that far last time
% I think I'll have that gin now.
* Applied for medicare supplement plan F for Colleen. We'll see whether it goes
through; her medicare is under my SS# (B suffix) Maybe it worked, maybe it didn't.
I have it coming out of my checking account.
Premera Blue Cross
* 7:55 call from Dr. Fleet. UTI (probably; they're waiting for cultures), probable
catheter blockage, and dehydration. The diuretic she -is-_was_ on probably also
contributed.
* 9ish called Colleen. Room 515.
0601Th
* up 6:10; W=199.2
& Dive on minerology starting at Old Red Sandstone
@ siderea | [p/a/s, eldercare, Patreon] Retirement Women should be able to retire
from housework, too.
* Paid: xfinity bill
: email response from $HR_PERSON "so sorry this wasn't communicated to you...".
Hopefully it's worked out now; it should cover us until C's medigap policy kicks in
@ The third connection in Benkler's Tripod economics of open source. Not sure how
that led me to a wikipedia dive on lolcats. Oh, yes: Dancing pigs
* Paid balances for UW Physicians (mostly Shoreline Clinic; IIRC) for me and C.
~ expecting kids. N will pick up?
-> M decided to help me by staying home with the kids -- but neglected to call and
tell me. :P I was actually looking forward to seeing them, but...
% I seem to have been suffering from quite a bit of anxiety lately because of people
not telling me things. Not sure what to do about that.
* go to Post Office and pick up C's registered parcel.
-> it was, as she expected and I didn't believe, the dress she had ordered from India
: 12:30 N coming down after her dentist appointment.
* in to see Colleen. She needs dental floss and a small stuffy.
Arrived ~3 in time to catch Dr. Fleet on his rounds. Looks like she'll be in at least
until tomorrow; maybe Saturday. Depends on when the cultures come back.
@ TopoQuest Map Viewer - N48.04975° W122.49918° topo 1:24K
TopoQuest Map Viewer - N48.04975° W122.49918° satellite, 1m/pixel
: the hospital's caffeteria food is pretty awful. I sympathize with Colleen.
: 7pm back at home. Colleen didn't want me driving in the dark.
* 7:30 called Mom. She was at Jean's memorial in Boston, which is why she didn't call
last weekend. Was just getting home from dinner, so good timing.
0602Fr
* up 7:50ish; W=200.4;
@ Wear Your Resistance on Your Sleeve | Houston Press (stardreamer)
@ Resistbot (stardreamer)
This is simply brilliant. You send it a text and it relays it to your senators (later
your congresscritters) via email, and later fax and snail mail. Later == after you've
used it for a while.
* up to see Colleen a little after noon.
-> probably not getting discharged today, though no official word from the doctor. No
discharge date on her board. Yesterday he came in around 3pm.
% 2ish sleepy
: apparently Google no longer sells Nexus phones directly. The Pixel is $700. Looks
like the 5X is probably the best bet; 6P is still pretty expensive.
: 4pm Colleen getting discharged today.
I was mortified because I'd neglected to make sure that she had pants in her bag.
@ Judgements On Pain Medication In Chronic Illness - When Tania Talks +Rilla Heslin
% home. We had to miss g's meeting because I stupidly forgot to make sure that there
was a pair of pants in the scooter bag. Wasn't even one in the cat bag. And since we
got home I've been making other stupid mistakes.
! distressed. Is there another name for this? Can't think of one.
% sitting down and having a glass of gin, some ice water, and some dinner helped.
0603Sa
& awake 3 something.
* up 7:30; W=200.4;
@ Booleo - Wikipedia
Might be good for teaching logic. OTOH it's OOP and fairly expensive.
* To Walgreen's for (C's) prescriptions, pantsy, qtips
* Walk: down University to Campus Parkway (where the street signs all read
"Campus Park way")
* back via TJ's for chips, dips, bread, etc.
@ The Oceanides - Wikipedia
- YouTube
@ John Baez on the number 24
string theory, the sums of divergent infinite series, and the monster group. Eeep!
Binary Golay code error-correcting 24-bit code - each code word differs from all
others in 8 bits. Yes, same Golay as the Savitzky–Golay
filter. The monster group is also the symmetry group of the Leech lattice, which
is the lattice of close-packed spheres in 24 dimensions.
no subject
Date: 2017-06-04 06:19 pm (UTC)(I mean I know exactly why, but that just makes it more frustrating...)
no subject
Date: 2017-06-04 06:39 pm (UTC)(Ahem.) Wow:
«Savitzky and Golay's paper is one of the most widely cited papers in the journal Analytical Chemistry[6] and is classed by that journal as one of its "10 seminal papers" saying "it can be argued that the dawn of the computer-controlled analytical instrument can be traced to this article".»
no subject
Date: 2017-06-04 07:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-04 09:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-05 06:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-04 11:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-05 06:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-05 03:06 am (UTC)Condolences on bad hospital food. The local hospitals have awesome food (when the cafeteria is open, anyway).
no subject
Date: 2017-06-05 06:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-05 03:50 am (UTC)Also, does she like cards, would a card to your current snailmail address reach her, and (if the answer to both of the following is yes) would you be willing to PM me said snailmail address?
no subject
Date: 2017-06-06 12:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-05 08:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-06-06 03:04 am (UTC)