Done last week (20171008Su - 14Sa)
2017-10-15 10:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mdlbearOn the whole a pretty good week. (I was going to say, "not a bad week", but it may actually qualify for good this time. I'm really bad at evaluating subjective stuff like that.)
I got my taxes done. Probably still some things missing, but since I only owed $117 over what I estimated back in April I'm not going to complain. Much. I'm still in a world of trouble over the lack of withholding on some of the pensions. That's going to bite me. Well, I'll put in an estimated payment for the quarter; that will help.
Naomi came home Sunday with the scooters, and we got one of them out of the van. (G and I got the other out last night with the help of my folding ramp.) And yesterday on the way home from dinner out we stopped at the bike shop in Bayview and ordered Colleen a (purple, of course) helmet.
Meanwhile, I have reconfirmed my dislike for the Mac user interface (Windows would be worse). The main reason is the inconsistent bindings for control, meta, and super (the "logo" key). It's almost tolerable with a Thinkpad keyboard and x2vnc, but the key bindings in Emacs are wonky and cut-and-paste doesn't work between the two systems.
Also, of course, Raven's handling of its external monitor is broken, and the desk isn't wide enough for it plus the monitor anyway. (It is wide enough for Cygnus to the left of the monitor, so I may end up doing that.) I have Raven on a tray table to the right of the monitor, which isn't ideal because, oh, yeah: my newest Thinkpad keyboard has started dropping keystrokes. Basically unusable at this point, and it's only a year old. Lenovo's QC has really tanked -- I miss IBM. And I can't find the box with my other keyboards :P Unlike the drill and the router, I know that one is in the garage because I saw it there. I blame the cats.
The cats are all doing okay. Even Bronx, who remains a bit fragile and isn't eating all that well.
We are making progress toward making the room over the garage into a usable living space. By not making large structural changes, and not making it an official ADU, we can probably save a lot.
1008Su
* up 6ish; W=197; shower
* UC: taxes: tracked down Exxon 1099. It was, of course, attached to a check.
* M/C: set C-M-L as a start screensaver shortcut on the mac. Not really very
satisfactory, but better than putting it to sleep. C-S-eject works if your keyboard
is an Apple one with an eject key.
: Flush Mac DNS cache: sudo dscacheutil -flushcache;sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder
* Lunch: Charmers in Freeland. Lobster omlette (for me) and Benedict (for C)
* grocery shopping
: N came back with the scooters. Impressive. They're not exactly travel scooters --
they fold a little but don't come apart, and they're pretty heavy, but they're
designed to be roadworthy. 18mph with a 25-mile range. We'll probably have
to replace the seat on one for Colleen to be comfortable, but... She can definitely
ride to Freeland and back in one. One problem I can see is that the motor is in the
front wheel hub, so it doesn't get a whole lot of traction on gravel. The seat's
forward of the rear axle, but not by much.
: emacs on the mac is flaky. Both Aquamacs and GNU, but in different ways. Probably
some of the problems are due to desktop key bindings, but still.
: not clear to do with Raven's disk. Both the Windows and Linux partitions are unhappy
from having been moved from Cygnus. Linux has a separate home partition so a
nuke-and-pave would be pretty easy. Windows is another matter:
@ Transfer your Complete Windows 7 Installation to New Computer there are lots of
caveats around using sysprep. The restore partition might work, but since
the target machine has newer hardware it might not. Worst case, an image backup
could be restored onto Cygnus. Or I could just install a new (larger) drive as
Ubuntu only, and keep the old one for backup. Possibly Win7 under VirtualBox, since
that would give me the best of both, and Raven has enough RAM to support it.
* Sunday: Leftovers; x Hot + Sour Soup
% Actually a pretty good day. Nice outing with Colleen; got some stuff done.
1009Mo
* up 5:35; W=197;
@ Down and Out in R’lyeh - Catherynne M. Valente - Uncanny Magazine
@ Installing Linux on a PC with UEFI firmware: A refresher | ZDNet
: Amex's year-end summary doesn't have a PDF version with the categories separated out.
They're probably assuming you'll download the CSV and do it yourself. They also don't
flag payments to nonprofits. Grump.
: Can't find my check register from 2016. Charitable deductions will be sketchy.
* UC: Finished filling out taxes - I owe $145. Now I have to submit the payment
(easy), figure out my estimated taxes for this year (hard), and make an estimated
payment to compensate for the fact that I didn't start withholding on some of the
retirement accounts when I should have (painful). That's going to hurt.
-> Figure out how much 3/4 of the year's worth of retirement payments I haven't had
tax withheld from. Send 20% of that. Send the other quarter in January. Total is
going to be about $20K
* Spent an hour or so in the garage. Found quite a few things,but the drill and the
router are still missing. Did find the RR painting, the large TV, and the metal tree.
* Monday: cheese tortellini in pesto sauce (added cream to the sauce; left it separate
because j wanted tomato sauce. There was a partial jar of that in the fridge.)
@ Revenge of the Nerds Lisp
* Started tomorrow's beef stew.
* 15min: fixed strike plate on the bedroom door so that it latches reliably. Required
putting a Spax screw behind it to force the plate further out.
1010Tu
* Up 5:45; W=198;
@ Librem 5 – A Security and Privacy Focused Phone – Purism
The phone i $600; the dev kit is only $300 and ships 2018-06 rather than 2019-01
Home | Matrix.org Encrypted communication
Purism's Librem 5 Linux phone will likely feature NXP i.mx8 processor
* 11am j DBA - call teacher
: the "s" key on Cygnu is having problems, and rebooting Raven didn't help with the VGA
problem. But it's not at the OS level -- the screen switched from main to VGA when I
booted. So it's most likely either a BIOS problem, or a BIOS setting.
: N has a quote on her bus project. High end of what we wanted, but doable.
Buses are depreciated as 5-year property. See IRS Publication 946
" N: I'm a tired goat.
Me: I'm a tired bear. I'm also a retired bear. Feeling more retired than
tired, actually.
N: Are you an entire bear?
Me: Partially. "
* Tuesday: -Stew-_soup_. -lamb or- _beef_, barley
-> Colleen didn't think it would need as much barley as I'd wanted to put in it. Could
have taken it with no trouble, but it came out ok anyway.
* car loan late; paid from household checking, which was the only BECU account with
enough in it.
1011We
* up 0635; W=198;
: The thing I've been looking for to make a VNC instance work as a second monitor is
xdmx. Unfortunately nothing will work well with the second monitor on the
left, but it would work ok with, e.g., a tablet.
$ Northwest Hospital, for Colleen. $1316. Paid by Amex. Premera didn't pay as
secondary, because I was stupid. conf# 68353561
: Meanwhile, my thinkpad keyboard seems to be deteriorating. Keystrokes are getting
droppd (sic). Apparently the recent ones are crap. No idea why. The keyboard on
Raven appears to be similar, and it's doing ok. So far. Actually the culprit appears
to be uneven desk surface; the keyboard flexes! Seems to work better on the tray
table. Grump. So let's see whether putting something under the front edge, with the
legs flipped up, works. Apparently. So that's actually a design flaw. And it
doesn't fix it completely. Foo.
* out for a drive with Colleen - Langley Loop and Coupville. Nice.
% The grocery shopping afterward was sort of a disaster; C insisted on going off-list to
get ingredients or s'mores, croisants, and some other stuff that wasn't on the list.
I overreacted and am still, an hour or so later, shaken at my reaction, and rather
fragile. The real problem, on analysis, is that I completely failed at telling C hat
we were only there to pick up things on the list. She had _her_ list, but it wasn't
on _my_ list and none of it had been discussed.
-> do not go shopping with Colleen - I don't think I can handle it anymore
% Can't find the wood ears, which Colleen insists she remembers being unpacked
-> locate *all* ingredients before preparing shopping list
@ Moo Shu Chicken Recipe coleslaw mix instead of Chinese vegetables. According to
Wikipedia this is a thing.
@ American Kakistocracy (The Atlantic Confirms It) (ysabetwordsmith)
@ Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E535 Laptop BIOS Update Download
There's a bootable CD version; I don't trust the Windows 7 on Raven. But using it
would require a blank CD.
% 9:28 drifty
% p=4 or so; that may have something to do with my mental state.
* Wednesday: Stir-fry. Moo Shu chicken. x Add egg flower soup?
* Humira
1012Th
* up 6:40; W=196.8
* 8am make sure N is awake
* World's Most Popular API Framework | Swagger
(dw_dev | API wishlist?) (siderea)
* 9:30 leave for Field trip to kangaroo farm. Swap teaching with Friday
Fun. Great conversations there and back; taking every advantage of teaching
opportunities.
@ AmazonSmile: Pre-fabricated Tiny Home: Home Improvement Never thought I'd see
Amazon selling tiny homes. Silly me. Of course they do.
* Thursday: Mac+Cheese, ~ salad (only made for Colleen)
% 7:19 cold. I really just want to curl up in bed. Maybe for a couple of days.
1013Fr
* pu 6:15; W=198.4;
* 7:30 -expect- call _with_-from- Jerad ~ some crossed wires, but connected around 7:45
-> the massage bus(iness) needs a business plan. Remember to include fuel and
insurance costs in expenses. Might make sense for me to own it as business
property, and lease it to N. Financing might make sense.
-> life insurance doesn't make sense. It's a pure expense, and since our household
income will only go down by the amount of C's social security, C et.al. should be
able to get along on it without me.
* j school (from Th)
* Filed final tax return -> pin 27182
-> Your federal return was successfully transmitted on 10/13/2017 01:38:01 pm.
-> The IRS accepted your federal return on FRI OCT 13, 2017 03:47:11 PM.
Submission ID: 440076-2017286-3577810
* Walk: just down Skyline to Middle and back.
% Badly out of shape, plus a left QL muscle knot that I trigger-pointed, but not all
that successfully. That, and probably depressed.
: The FN-F7 key on Raven (projector icon, I guess) actually does switch between several
different display modes; unfortunately none of them involve both screens
simultaneously. Cygnus works flawlessly; this might be purely a Linux poblem, or
perhaps a problem with not having done an actual install on the box.
* Friday: Chili or Chili Mac
* Tried re-seating the flat cable in the Samsung 10" tablet. May actually have worked.
-> it booted, at least once. probably best to reset it now, or tomorrow when it
actually has enough charge to stay up.
* I am seriously torn between getting a new tablet, chromebook, or phone.
: N had the left-over beef/barley stew as a late dinner - win. I think I'm getting my
cooking skills back. Or have gotten.
@ Don Marti: Notes and links from my talk at RJI tracking protection fixes ads
1014Sa
* up 5:30ish; ;
~ 8am make sure N is awake
& cleanup; laundry.
: Colleen took a shower all by herself. I was there just in case, and checked her back.
* 10am Bronx (N)
@ It’s Cybersecurity Awareness Month. Do you feel more cybersecure yet?
: Tablet at 42% charge, which ISTR is where it got to last time. Factory reset. The
thing that makes it practically useless is that when the display is on it draws more
current than the charging port can supply, so one can't leave it turned on. It would
probably benefit from a new battery.
# however, given that the tablet sort of works, I don't think I should get another one.
That implies that I should get a 5" phone and/or a chromebook. Only reason to get a
chromebook, though, would be to gain some experience on the OS.
@ Oddly, the Thinkpad X131E seems to come in both chrome and windows versions. The
chrome version doesn't support legacy boot, though; you have to re-flash the BIOS!
All Hail to the Penguin: How I Converted My Chromebook into a Linux Laptop
Sounds like a pain in the butt. Better to install ChromeOS in VirtalBox or USB stick.
How To Try Google Chrome OS On Your PC links for how to install virtualbox.
Creae a virtual machine image of your existing windows hard drive so there's that
but it's extra effort to make it bootable, and it counts as another activation.
# ... so the conclusion is that I should get a phone with a big screen.
OTGH there seem to be a lot of 8" and 10" Android 6 tablets with GSM around $100.
: Carpenters came over to talk with N (and me) about the sleeping boxes. Fun!
& chat with AT&T rep because I was on the site; got list:
LG: G6, G Vista 2, Phoenix 21, 2, Phoenix 31, V20, V10*, G51, K20, K10, G41, X venture
Samsung: Galaxy Express Prime 22, J7 (2017), J3 (2017), S8, S8+, S8 Active, S71,
S7 active1, S7 edge1, S61, S6 active1, S6 edge1, S6 edge+, S51, S5 active1,
Note ( 8, 51, 41, edge1)
the phones with the "1" on the end of the mean, "Indicated Android devices requiring
most recent Software Update to enable Wi-Fi Calling." Me: So G51 is a G5 that's been
updated? Yes.
* Freeland Cafe for dinner with Colleen. Stopped off at the bike shop at Bayview Corner
and looked at bike helmets (I caught them just as they were closing). She ordered a
purple one.
Menu 1008-14
* Sunday: Leftovers; x Hot + Sour Soup
* Monday: cheese tortellini in pesto sauce
* Tuesday: -Stew-_soup_. -lamb or- _beef_, barley
* Wednesday: Stir-fry. Moo Shu chicken. x Add egg flower soup?
* Thursday: Mac+Cheese, ~ salad (only made for Colleen)
* Friday: Chili or Chili Mac
* Saturday: date/scrounge
no subject
Date: 2017-10-15 07:55 pm (UTC)glad it was a good-ish week
sorry about the tax stuff, still kinda freaking out over my own
glad the cats are okay!!!
give them pettings from me, if they are up for it?
and *hugs* for you if you like
and to Colleen too
no subject
Date: 2017-10-15 10:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-10-16 04:25 am (UTC)Blaming cats
Date: 2017-10-19 09:02 pm (UTC)Re: Blaming cats
Date: 2017-10-19 09:48 pm (UTC)thoughts
Date: 2017-10-28 01:37 am (UTC)Phones: friends who've had Samsungs have generally liked them. I haven't had a *smart* phone, but I have an LG 495 text-capable phone with Bluetooth, which works *very well* for me. It's my third LG phone and I've been quite satisfied with the brand overall. Conversely, you couldn't give me a Pantech phone, even if it came with a 10,000$ gift card attached.
Re lack of check registers: can you download prior year's bank statements? BECU offers such, so I'd be surprised if your bank doesn't. I'd think you could reconstruct charitable donations from such records if you can get them. Filing a 1040X (I think that's the term for an amended return) is always possible if you determine that you have more deductions which would reduce the amount of tax owed.
*hugs offered*
Re: thoughts
Date: 2017-10-28 02:03 am (UTC)IIRC I can only get bank statements one month at a time; it's annoying. But, yes; it may be worthwhile filing an amended return if I turn up something big that I missed.
My last couple of phones have been Samsungs, but I'm having problems with the current one which I suspect are due to inadequate RAM. LG seems to have more, though I'll have to look again to be sure.