Two more days to knee replacement surgery and it’s all I can think about.

I should’ve taken Monday off because I’m going to be distracted all day. 🤔

Found this brand new little feller this morning slowly moving its little wings.

Today’s podcast queue should get me through the jungle I’m gonna tackle outside our backyard fence today, and then some.

Pictures of the boys; Kolbe and King.

Kolbe is the yellow one. He’s five but acts like a puppy.

King is 10, I think, and is a distinguished gentleman.

They’re both Australia Shepard mix.

I’ll bet Ms Deer and her little spotted baby visit us tonight. 🦌

We’ve been waiting for these little aliens to hatch for a while.

I finally decided to pull the fern down and look inside. 🐦

Dreaming

A wonderful bouquet of flowers.I have pretty vivid dreams. Most of them center around a few places with certain people.

I dream a lot about Exeter, the town we called home for years and years. Exeter dreams typically center around the home Kim and I brought our girls up in. It was an old farm house that was built in the early 1900’s and is one of the oldest homes in town. In those dreams the house is much larger than usual, has a really long hallway, and is full of family members. The land surrounding the house is vast. Now, the home in the real world is nothing like that, but in my dreams I know it’s our old Exeter home.

I also dream about Lindsay, my childhood home. In those dreams I’m typically with my Mom or my Grandfather. They are the two most influential people in my life. Both had immensely beautiful hearts and loved everyone. Mom’s home was full of love, we didn’t have much, but we had her love. That meant everything. Grandpa was definitely the patriarch of the family. He was a great man who loved his family more than anything. He often helped Mom pay the bills and kept us fed. They were both selfless and gave their all to family, friends, and strangers.

Mom and Grandpa would take us to a joint called Bob’s Drive-In. It’s a burger joint that also made fresh donuts daily. Their cinnamon rolls were to die for, crunchy on the outside, chewy in the middle. My dreams in Lindsay always include them and Bob’s, amongst other things.

I’ve shared many times how often my dreams are about being back with the Visio team. In those dreams Seattle often takes on a futuristic city you might see in a sci-fi movie. Huge, really crowded, with trains, and buildings taller than anything we have today. I typically end up in the building on the floor occupied by Visio. It’s almost always my first day back and I’m usually walking around the engineering area talking with old friends and meeting new people.

That sets the stage for last nights Visio dream.

I was with part of the old Visio gang. They’d started a new venture and we were adjusting everyone’s pay down to get through the economic downturn. My brain was definitely weaving my recent concerns into the mix. I was working with Richard, an old Visio friend, on new contracts for each developer to sign outlining their reduction in pay. Some employees, like myself, signed the contract without issue. Others were not so happy. It’s at that point, Kolby, our doggie, decided it was time for me to wake up. Poof. Dream gone.

Wonder which dream I’ll have tonight?

Beauty in Kim’s flower bed.

Kim and Taylor had to take a little detour and visit Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo.

They’re having a great road trip! 🥳

Update from Taylor and Kim on the road to California. 🤣

It looks like a deer visited us last night. Yesterday the green stuff in the middle of the picture was a day lilly with a bunch of flowers on it. 😂

We just got back from BBQ and fireworks with our kids and grandkids. Had a lot of fun. 🌭🎇

Now I’m on the porch, having a beer, listening to the critters and watching fire flies. 🍺

Oh, and the temperature is perfect with no noticeable humidity. 🌡

A perfect day. 👌

Freedom

There are plenty of wonderful people in states like Florida but their leadership is pathetic, same with Texas.

Perhaps Democrats need to migrate into those states to flip the vote instead of luring folks out. 🤔

Saturday Morning Coffee

FrapThe United States Supreme Court continues to be a complete mess whose only job appears to be dismantling prior rulings and dialing our nation back a century.

Golden Hill Software: “I am excited to announce that Unread 3.0 is available now from the App Store. Unread 3.0 adds Unread Cloud, a new syncing and article retrieval system for Unread.”

John Brayton, the person behind Golden Hill, is a friend and competitor. Unread is a beautiful, highly functional, and very stable application. With the addition of Unread Cloud, John has taken Unread to the next level.

Checkout the Golden Hill Blog for more details on Unread Cloud. There’s some great content up there.

Of course I’d encourage you to use Stream as well as Unread.😃

The New Yorker: “Regardless of this detail, Hutchinson’s testimony appeared to strengthen the criminal case against Trump. One of her revelations was that, a few days before January 6th, Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, had explicitly warned that if Trump did go to Capitol Hill on January 6th he could potentially be implicated in the crimes of obstructing justice and obstructing the electoral count.”

Trump is a criminal. A poo spouting, lying, criminal, who’s a real threat to our democracy.

Swift.Org Developer Spotlight: “I learned Swift by porting Graphing Calculator’s core computer algebra system. It started as a learning exercise, then became a feasibility study. The pandemic played a role in that decision, as this became my pandemic shelter-in-place project. The refactoring could have been done in C++ and Objective-C++, but it would not have been as effective, nor as much fun.”

This is a really great read. The developer of Graphing Calculator walks us through his effort to port his old code base to a modern Swift/SwiftUI application, complete with AR features!

He also relays his SwiftUI experience.

“When SwiftUI works it is a nigh-magical delight, but when it behaves unexpectedly or when behavior outside the prescribed path is desired, it can be difficult to understand and work around its limitations.”

If you’re a developer take the time to read the post. I think you’ll enjoy it.

Some states in our Beautiful Union have become Gilead. It’s pathetic, dangerous, and extremely cruel.

Also, whoever impregnated a 10-year old should be put down like a rabid dog. Rape and incest are one of those things that makes me angry enough to commit murder because it robs the victim of their soul. It’s worse than murder in my opinion. They’re alive and dead at the same time.

The Podcast Index: “The Podcast Index is here to preserve, protect and extend the open, independent podcasting ecosystem.”

This is something I believe the podcast ecosystem needs. An open podcast directory. I’ve even written about such a thing

The big question for me is, will indie podcast apps make use of it? I’m thinking of Castro and Overcast in particular. Both run their own directories, as well as other backend services, but The Podcast Index makes me wonder if they could replace their directories with this?

I’m sure it comes down to a matter of trust and control. I know it would be really difficult to make such a bold decision.

SFist: “California is pushing for green energy and wants to avoid blackouts, but giving PG&E $75 million to handle radioactive waste at Diablo Canyon may sound like a deal with the devil.”

I love California but she has her problems. It’s crazy expensive to live in the Golden State and continued drought coupled with fire creates monstrous problems to cope with.

PG&E doesn’t have the best reputation. Their lack of line maintenance has caused numerous fires in California, including the massive Camp Fire that killed 84 people in 2018.

Apple announced and displayed a new version of CarPlay at WWDC 2022. Can they compete?

I also wonder if car manufacturers will have to pay Apple 30% of each car sale? 🥴

Tiny Apple Core

Pictures from around the house.

Flynn, just hanging out.

I love Daylillies, always have. At one point I had an entire flowerbed dedicated to numerous variations. As we’ve moved around, and we’ve move more than I’d like to admit, I’ve always had at least one.

I’ve been waiting on this beauty to pop for a year. 😍

COVID, Finally over it

It’s about darned time. Today would’ve been Day 15 with COVID if this test hadn’t come back negative.

I tested on Tuesday, June 21, and was positive. So sometime between then and now I finally got over the hump.

I still have a cough and my head is a bit fuzzy/congested and I’m tired as heck because I haven’t been able to sleep the last two nights for some strange reason.

All I know is I’m testing negative and I intend to keep it that way.

More of Kim’s flowers. They’re very happy.

Our magnolia has been blooming for the better part of the month.

I love it because it reminds me of my Mom.

Texas is going full nutters

Watch out! It's a blog fly!The Texas Tribune: “HOUSTON — Meeting at their first in-person convention since 2018, Texas Republicans on Saturday acted on a raft of resolutions and proposed platform changes to move their party even further to the right. They approved measures declaring that President Joe Biden ‘was not legitimately elected’ and rebuking Sen. John Cornyn for taking part in bipartisan gun talks. They also voted on a platform that declares homosexuality ‘an abnormal lifestyle choice’ and calls for Texas schoolchildren ‘to learn about the humanity of the preborn child.’”

Texas is getting more and more radical by the day. They may become the new Capitol of the next Civil War, at this rate. It wouldn’t surprise me if they started talking about secession again.

It’s gonna get really ugly in Texas I’m afraid.

COVID, Day Nine

This is going to be my final post on the matter unless I take a turn for the worse.

I seem to be in a fairly steady state at the moment; exhausted, foggy head, runny nose, and cough.

It seems it’s been like this for a few days. I’ve never had a fever, at least none I was aware of.

And, yes, I can still smell and taste things. I consider that a major victory.

Unfortunately I didn’t catch these at the height of bloom. They’re still beautiful and smell wonderful.

COVID, Day Eight

I slept until noon today. My wife had to send our daughter up to make sure I was still alive. Thankfully, I am. I probably would’ve slept longer if not for my wife’s concern.

I’m wiped out. Yes, I’m still wiped out.

My foggy brain is a bit less foggy. I think I can safely say that’s due to the extra sleep I’m getting which is helping me defeat this nasty bug.

I have no commercial interest in DayQuil or NyQuil but I am grateful for them. Suppressing some of the symptoms has allowed me to rest.

Oh, I sat outside for a while today. That made for a really nice change of pace.

After dinner I’ll probably drift off to sleep again. Another day in the books.

COVID, Day Seven

I’ve gone backwards.

I’m absolutely exhausted and my brain is really foggy. I thought by today I’d be feeling close to normal. It’s a very disappointing setback.

My younger brother got COVID and he said he was exhausted for well over 14-days from the time he had a positive test. I’m not thrilled with the thought of that.

The cough is better, body aches are gone. I hadn’t mentioned waking up in a sweat in the middle of the night. That’s happened every night since I tested positive.

I’ve taken Friday off in hopes a long weeked will help get me over the hump.

Here’s hoping.