mellowtigger | some progress (Reply)

Thanks to the rain, the fireworks are not as bad as usual for this July 4th holiday in the USA. I was still awake until almost 3am last night, hearing both fireworks and sirens everywhere. I caught up this afternoon on about 2 hours of that lost sleep, but I need a few more hours. Rain tonight will be scattered, so the noise may keep me up again.

I didn't post earlier, but I completed the painting on my house. The part that I will do, anyway. The quality looks only "okay" right now. I need to buy some Goo Gone like foeclan suggested, to see if I can loosen up all of the tape that's still stuck around the windows. But the painting is done. Now, I need to find a company who can paint the rest of the house. I probably shouldn't wait another year for that repair. Those eaves obviously need it now. The bright turquoise is growing on me. Now, I like it even better than the previously dark navy blue.

And the yard needs work. I've started reclaiming it, but it needs a lot more work.

After several weeks, workers finally finished installing the upgraded storm drain in the alley directly behind my house. They poured concrete instead of laying asphalt, and they finally added dirt back in around the sides after it dried. They also added grass seeds, which I don't want, so I threw out some more clover seed, and we'll see which takes over. I vote for clover. Anyway, I'm glad to see this improvement. To thank the government for this service, I just now signed up as an official volunteer to keep it clear of debris. This program has several sponsors, but I think I first learned about it through the city of Minneapolis. I'm not yet finding a way to link directly to "my" drain, but you can zoom around this Adopt-A-Drain map to see the kind of participation they have from other citizens. It's a nice idea, and it's sort of a citizen science issue too. They want regular recurring data about what is cleaned up, how much (in gallons or pounds), and how long it took to clean (in minutes). Here's the photo of the new drain.

Unrelated to all of that, I wanted to report some other minor good news. I realized yesterday that the box of wine in my fridge is probably a few months old. Which is okay, as such things go, since it's not fine wine to begin with. But then I realized that it means I have not been drinking to get to sleep. When did that change happen? I'm beginning to think that it's thanks to using the Corsi-Rosenthal box to get to sleep at night. There's more to that story.

My database administrator, from the mainframe programming job I had when I first moved to Minnesota a quarter-century ago, gave me one of those Amazon Echo spheres as a birthday or Christmas present. I had to go check my emails to remember, but I ordered an Amazon Smart Plug in mid-March this year. With it connected to the air filter, I can crawl into bed and say "Alexa, turn on plug 1 for 1 hour." This gentle noise from the fan helps me get to sleep, and it doesn't run all night either. Apparently the noise is very effective, because I have been sleeping better by not having to listen to arguments and gunfire as I'm trying to fall to sleep. I hadn't noticed this effective change, until I realized that old box of wine was probably bought around the same time. I'm sure that's good news for my liver.