Although our daughter took 1 college class in HS and another this summer we didn’t get the “our daughter’s in college” feeling until today. Her first day going to the actual campus is Monday and we’ve been finalizing the details and helping locate her classrooms. Exciting!

It was fun watching Nottingham Forest playing in the Premiere League today. Good on them! But they’re not getting much respect I guess because they don’t even have a jersey sponsor yet. ⚽️

Today’s workout: re-upholstering 4 of these

Tonight’s sushi dinner

While picking up fish for tonight’s sushi dinner we fell to temptation and bought a piece of wagyu beef to cook tomorrow. First time using wagyu at home. Hope it is worth it!

Catan, Seafarers expansion, in progress.

Our backyard garden this year has been a huge disappointment. We’ve been able to water it sufficiently but the incessant 100F+ days and overnight temps in the mid-80s have prevented plants from pollinating. They’re otherwise healthy-looking but produce little to no vegetables😩

Seen on the road: teddy bear abuse?

We had a family board game day today and played Catan with the Seafarers expansion. Catan has turned out to be our favorite family game. It holds each person’s interest and we always end up fairly evenly matched. 👍🏼

I watched the Women’s Boulder World Cup Finals, an event I’ve never seen before. I was surprised that of the 6 finalists 4 were asian. I didn’t know this sport was so popular there. Very cool 👍🏼

Since I’m trying out Digital Planning, using my Apple Pencil, I’ve at last temporarily switched back to the first generation iPad Pro keyboard because it can fold completely flat for writing/drawing. It’s taking me some time to adjust to not having a trackpad.

Shortly after the armadillo there was a ballon crossing.

Armadillo crossing

The case for my AirPods Pro has gotten pretty ugly. The majority of it is now a sort of light grey but it is made ugly, rather than just dirty-looking, by the fact there are pure white splotches scattered randomly. It looks a bit diseased!

I am frequently tempted to buy a Steam Deck. But then I come to my senses and realize I would get tired quite quickly of holding something this large and heavy.
Valve says it will ship all current Steam Deck reservations by the end of 2022

I watched a video on Digital Planning w/the iPad and was intrigued. It uses GoodNotes which looks like an excellent app. I am experimenting with adding this to my workflow. I like that it pulls together info currently in Things, Calendar and Day One. Promising so far.

It seems rare to have a great customer service experience but I sure had one today. I broke part of a cutting tool and called Kreg Tool to order a replacement. They answered right away and said they’d ship it to me for free, via FedEx no less! Hooray! 😀

Today I modified the shelving I built for my amateur radio ancillary gear by cutting, staining and adding a back panel. Then I mounted a couple of antenna switches and cut a few coax to custom lengths to connect transceivers and antennas. Now 🍷

Cool clouds. Not cool weather.

The World Athletics Championship was great fun to watch this week The athleticism was amazing but what impressed me even more was the obvious depth of character of so many of the participants. Gave me a real boost of hope. 🏃‍♀️

If you have any interest in track and field the World Athletic Championships have been great and yesterday was the best. In particularl Syndney McLaughlin shattered the world record and won going away. Watch here.

With the heat wave of the past few weeks dawn skies have been a total meh. But yesterday we had a bit of rain (less than a 1 tenth inch) and it had a lingering effect. Dawn today looked awesome!

After 47 days of no rain and 100F heat we are finally getting a tiny break. I’m on the back patio this morning listening to a very gentle rainfall and soaking up the sounds (and humidity!). We’ll still hit about 100F today but this rain is a sign of hope for an eventual break.

Good news, bad news. First the bad: wind is blowing after days of calm and since it has been over 100F and so dry (going on 2 months without rain) we now have a red flag fire danger. The good news: wind turbines can start helping electricity generation to keep the grid alive.

I’ve seen a lot of amplification of the bogus plankton report. Often by people who never read past the headline. Breaking my own rule by posting a reply. Feels justified this time. Beware of bad science reporting: No, we haven’t killed 90% of all plankton - Ars Technica