“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 766 (Thursday) – what the Twix

The workweek is flying by but is hasn't exactly been easy. It's involved a string of days filled with an overabundance of short-notice requests, insufficient information, miscommunication, and an abundance of annoying crap that makes the simplest thing ten times harder. 

By the time I logged off today, since Monday morning there had been, by conservative estimate, 1,257 utterances of “What in the actual hell?”. Today was the worst, but I won’t get too comfortable with that idea because there is still tomorrow to shatter the record.

Survival rewards.

This morning, a newspaper forgot to run our carefully crafted ad that was specially designed a month ago and strategically timed for today. Another newspaper, after three weeks of running ads, suddenly started asking questions about the rest of the lineup that got me so spun around I was second guessing the entire campaign ad lineup. 

After three or four rounds of back-and-forth emails it was finally settled with the ads at the second paper running according to the original schedule sent before the inquisition began and I still had no idea what prompted the entire thing. There was no time to ponder it, because it was one of those days with fires erupting everywhere.

The sudden media madness might not have been that bad if not running concurrently with a juggling act involving pricing comparisons and multiple not-so-clear projects and shifting and conflicting priorities. This consumed the first couple hours of the day until my chest was tight from not breathing or maybe the not breathing was because the chest was tight. A real chicken and egg philosophical debate, but again, there was no time to analyze it. This can be done during one of the 1,000 times I wake up all night long.

The flood of incoming emails and Team chat messages didn’t let up until around 4:55, meaning there were five whole minutes all day long in which to catch my breath before it was time to log off.

Over in the plus column, well, my head didn’t actually explode, even though it felt like it might. It was not my favorite work day by any stretch, but it was also probably not the worst and at least it finally ended. The prize for survival was impersonating a hungry jackal and devouring all six mini Twix bars from a package bought the other night when getting baby diapers for Winston. The day was not fun, but the Fun size candy certainly helped.

“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 765 (Wednesday) – walking

New garage.

There was walking today. After arriving downtown a few minutes early, the path taken to the office was the long route. Instead of walking left out of the garage, there was a turn to the right, then a right on French Street, right on Bridge Street, right on Merrimack and straight to the bank. Crazy early morning doings. 

This afternoon, the temperature was in the 60s. There was a walk from the Bank over to the Hamilton Canal district where the Niki Tsongas bridge was dedicated last week. It was a bit less of a dedicated walk and more of a walking photo tour in the area with the new garage, cool apartment buildings, and a path around the canal. 

It was a solid 25 minutes of semi-brisk walking with frequent quick stops to take approximately three dozen photos with the new cell phone. The clouds were interesting, and not having been out in the area since 2019 or early 2020, it was all new and fresh. Plus, since the last time I was there, quite a lot was quite literally new and fresh -- the bridge, the new 201 Canal Apartments, the Courthouse, the sculpture near the canal. 

Sculpture near the canal.

Even though it was warm-ish, I was chilly when first starting out and walking faster seemed to be the remedy. Walk fast, take a photo. Walk a few feet more, take a photo. Repeat. It was a good break from the desk that I too frequently fail to leave all day except to visit the loo.

The Spring ’22 plan is for more walks in the warm weather. Pre-pandemic, there was regular lunchtime walking tracked with a fitness app I couldn’t find in the Google Play store today during the entire one minute I spent looking for it. Maybe next time. Once the novelty of the scenery wears off, the focus can shift to time, distance, and tracking the personal bests.

“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 764 (Tuesday) – scrabble chat

Too much stuff.

It was an exciting moment when it was discovered that Scrabble GO worked on the new phone. Scrabble is my favorite game on the planet, and I never quite recovered from my sadness when it disappeared from Facebook. Now I can play before work and in the evening. 

Unfortunately, the Scrabble GO app by Scopely is a big, big disappointment. There are flashing and throbbing blocks of color. There are ads for Publishers Clearing House, Tik Tok, and other games that take multiple clicks to make go away. There are ridiculous adventures and awards and levels and charms and tools in the game.

What happened to making the words, logging the points, and tracking the statistics? The flashing and moving crap on the screen is enough to trigger a migraine, seizure, or spontaneous case of rage. But maybe it’s just me.

Perhaps the worst is the chat feature. Apparently, a lot of people are in the Scrabble game to chat, and during my limited time in the game a few too many have wanted to chat with me. I, however, am not there to be all chatty. Unless I already know you offline, I just want to move tiles and make words.

In a space of two days, there were several instances of players wanting to chat me up. There will be a flurry of messages in a short span of time and then “Why aren’t you answering me?” Holy hell. For one, I usually play a turn or two and then head off to work. In one case, I said I wasn’t in the game to chat. After that exchange, the person resigned from our game. Quitter. Geez. 

Since changing the game profile photo that auto-populated from an old Facebook profile photo not used in a couple years to a picture of Winston, thank goodness, the chat attempts have stopped. 

Maybe the other players think I’m a game bot like Sinbad or Djinn who are always available to play with no delays in the action and no insipid chit chat. In any event, the peace and quiet is delightful. Now, if only the flashing crap could Scrabble GO away.

“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 763 (Monday) – national pet day

According to the official calendars of made-up holidays and commemorations, today, April 11, is “National Pet Day.” The National Today website, the chronicle of all things national days, notes that national pet day was created “in 2006 to celebrate the joy pets can bring to us.” Sheesh, that took long enough. Did it take until 2006 for pets to become delightful? Maybe pets were not as charming in the earlier days. Of course, I am the pet parent who often forgets to post the public pet adulation on National Pet Day, so what does that say about me?

At The BungaLowell, the pet doting is not restricted to just one day of the year. Doting and pampering occurs on most days, and especially now that Winston is the only official pet on site. When Moose was around, the attention needed to be balanced. Spread around. Shared.

Winston!

If one pup saw the other receiving a snuggle or a head scratch, there would be repercussions. The second pup would snuggle in for some love. Maybe there was a low-level growl with an Elvis-like lip lift or some full blown teeth exposure.  

Doggy snuggling also required extensive peacekeeping skills, usually motivated by the fear of expensive veterinary bills. It was a juggling act worthy of an International Juggling Association Award. Yes, it’s a thing.

Now that all the attention is heaped upon Winston whether he wants it or not and he has me all to himself, he no longer cares. Without Moose to shove aside, Winston is no longer interested in snuggling near me on the couch. It's hard to not take it personally.

Since Moosie left us last summer, Winston now prefers cookies to cuddles and generally curls up all comfy in his bed on the floor. Alone. It’s fine. I know my place in the pet universe, and it's provider of food and opener of doors.

It's okay. When Winnie is on the floor in his bed ignoring me, the distance makes it easier to admire his canine perfection more easily. Or so I tell myself. 

“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 762 (Sunday) – raindrops and coffee mugs

The morning was sunny and bright and thank goodness for sunglasses. The drive back from dance class involved some channel jumping on the radio which led to the discovery of a college station that was playing show tunes, a delightful break from the usual two stations that are usually alternated.

After dance the immediate focus was food. The measly and meager granola bar or piece of toast barely lasts for the one to two hours of dance and I usually leave the studio ravenous. There were lots of ingredients available at the house and nothing to nuke quickly, so it was ramen with frozen mixed vegetables, queso, and Korean hot pepper paste with for the win, as the fastest thing I could think of to make.

Once upon a time in the 1990s.

The after-lunch plan was to read. This did not happen. Not with books anyway. There were several Scrabble GO games in process and the usual daily feeding of the social media addiction with the review of the Facebook feed. 

Facebook memories delivered a couple photos from past “National Sibling Day” posts with photos of my sister, brother and me. One was from when we were really young and went to visit Grandpa Ray in Texas the first time. The other was from around the 1990s. The reminder of life with my brother sucked the air out of my lungs, much like a hard punch to the gut. 

Instead of the previously fantasized reading, Gilmore Girls season 7 played on TV. Winston signaled he wanted to go outside. A light rain was falling and at the same time, the sun was shining. I checked the parts of the sky I could see from the front door and then went to the side deck in search of a rainbow. Surprisingly, no rainbow was found, but there was a package encased in a sheer white trash bag laying on the deck. The delivery folks function like stealth operatives these days.

While carrying in the parcel, the receipts were running through the mental review process. The order with the fry pan, electric blue summer shoes, and ladies’ unmentionables from Kohl’s had arrived in three separate deliveries during the week. The phone had arrived from Verizon. The car vent mount and phone case from Amazon had arrived. There were no outstanding deliveries, so this was either a misdirected package intended for a neighbor, which hasn’t happened for a long time, or a surprise of some sort for me.

Gilmore "graduation" gift.

The outer protective bag was untied. The name and address in the inner package were confirmed to be actually intended for me before the scissors were extracted from the kitchen junk drawer to breach the industrial strength plastic shipping envelope and remove a brown box and a note. It was, indeed, a surprise in the form of a Luke’s Diner mug. The timing of its arrival is near perfect, as the beloved mug from Customs House Museum where I used to work has lots of rusty spots on the bottom as was recently retired from the coffee mug rotation, leaving an opening. 

In addition, and more appropriately, Season 7 of Gilmore Girls is approaching its end in the big binge. Rory just received the offer for her first writing job and is excited about someone paying her to write. I remember that feeling from when I landed my first official job as a writer. It was exhilarating and validating and nerve-wracking all at once. It was the same feeling when I landed my second job with official title of "staff  writer." Those were grand days when I had it all – a younger brother and a job with business cards that proclaimed I was a bona fide, official, professional, paid writer.

The note in the package mentioned it was to celebrate the near-completion of the steady binge of all seven seasons and the attainment of “official Gilmore Girl” status. The surprise of the Luke's Diner Gilmore Girls graduation gift coffee mug was the perfect counterpoint to the low of National Sibling Day.

“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 761 (Saturday) – books and friends

The day began with an oil change and tire rotation at the Jeep dealership, where the hospitality included a coffee machine that also had mochaccino, cocoa, and other fancy coffee options, bagged salty snacks and a dish with bagged M&Ms and bite-sized Snickers and Milky Way bars. Swanky! I had a book with me and read during the wait for the car. A car wash was included in the service, and of course it began to rain immediately afterward. Had I check the weather forecast, I would have declined the car wash.

Yum, John Henry milk stout

Back at the house, Gilmore Girls played on the TV and Scrabble GO was being played on the new phone, when it rang with an incoming call. Friends were out and about and soon they were headed my way. We made a quick plan for the afternoon. Scrabble GO is great and all, but seeing friends in real life is definitely much better. 

It began to rain steadily as we headed downtown to see the famous 120 foot On the Road scroll typed by Jack Kerouac. It is single-spaced with narrow margins and no punctuation or paragraph breaks on 120 continuous feet of paper. Oy. The gallery walls were covered with an exhibit of photos of Jack and sites related to his life and books and prints of drawings by Jack. It is a great exhibit.

While at the Kerouac exhibit, we chatted with a man in a National Park Service ball cap who told us about Jack’s typing ability of 120 words a minute, which, to someone who can barely type at all is hugely impressive. I remember admins at old jobs talking about typing tests and targeting 60 to 70 words per minute.

He told us about the changes of names and omission of some events required for the book's publication in 1957. He also told us about the more recent publication of On the Road The Original Scroll, “the legendary first draft – rougher, wilder, and racier than the 1957 edition,” which became our quest item at a planned visit to the book store.

After the scroll and photo exhibit we lunched at TreMonte. Adult beverages with margherita pizza and perfectly crispy fries with cheese and a side of gravy were the perfect gray day lunch. My beverage selection was John Henry milk stout which is one of the beers that come in the fancy little glass. Mini cannoli and tiramisu followed for dessert.

The beer menu required access via QR code which resulted in my reinstallation of the Untapped App on the new phone. In case the actual beer drinking out in a restaurant wasn’t exciting enough, that one beer also earned four beer badges. The last recorded beer on my account was an American porter from March 13, 2020, right before the world fell apart. Once it was realized that being "remoted" was going to last more than a couple weeks, I deleted the app due to the lack of quality beer drinking and tight space on the old phone. 

Today's book haul.

At LaLa Books we browsed, flipped through pages, and bought books. From the new books section, two of us got the recently learned about, suddenly coveted quest book, and I also got Kerouac’s Desolation Angels on the recommendation of my friend. In the used book corner I found Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs, which I may already have, but couldn’t remember for sure. For $2, it was a low-risk purchase. I may need to schedule a week’s staycation dedicated to reading.

For a day where the highlight was expected to be an oil change (before I even knew about the coffee and snacks), it sure took a spectacular turn. 

“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 760 (Friday) – BTK queen

The activation of the new phone took place today. There was professional help and thank goodness for the knight in armor who rode in for the rescue on the sleek horse. Otherwise, the new phone may have met an untimely demise after a dramatic encounter with the new cast iron fry pan.

Official headwear of
the BTK Queen

The protective screen cover was applied despite the comical and poorly translated picture instructions and now I understand the need for the video on the website for the phone case. 

Photos transferred over safely. Yay! Apps came over, including all those deliberately deleted from the old phone for space and lack of interest. Yay?! Contacts came over. All of them, including those deliberately deleted earlier this week specifically to clean up the list. Errrr, but certainly not the worst-case scenario, and maybe I will suddenly want to talk to an insurance agent or banker from when I lived in Tennessee 10 or 15 years ago. Authenticator apps for work were set up and verified. Online banking was installed and verified. It felt like success.

After the miracle of the data transfer, the phone was set aside and it was back to the glamorous and exciting desk jockey grind. Ads were reviewed, copy written, projects sent for review, blah, blah, blah. It was the end of the work day before I realized there had not been a single email received on the phone for four solid hours. No text messages, including the usual flurry of routine stupid texts for Michael's, Joann, and Kohl’s discounts.

Once at home, the Edge and its silence was investigated. Nothing was logging in. Not email. Not Facebook. Not text messages. A text was sent. It failed. Attempts to make calls resulted in "call cannot be completed as dialed" recorded messages. The old phone, however, was still able to receive texts, emails, and make and receive calls. Thank goodness, or I would have missed a call from Mom about a thing tomorrow.

Clearly, my long, rich, and colorful history of bad technology karma (BTK) continues.

It was back to the laptop and Verizon.com for a tech chat, where I was informed the SIM card was not activated. That wasn’t even a specific step in the multistep phone activation process instructions on the phone itself. 

Before the SIM was activated by the tech, there was an attempt to upsell me, as, and I quote, “a **premier** customer,” some whole home device protection program for “just 83 cents a day, $25 a month.” This bold-faced BS made the entire SIM situation seem like a ruse devised to force an opportunity for people to be subjected to yet another sales pitch. My response was along the lines of “I can’t even get this stupid brand-new phone to work, so no, I’m not spending another dime, thanks.” 

It took an hour for the SIM to be activated, the highlight of which was, and I am not even kidding, a “technical issue” during the tech chat to fix a technical issue with a new phone. After the phone adventure, logins on the laptop were screwed up. As in, some were gone, including the one for blog posting. Blogger on the phone? A-OK! Blogger on the laptop? Needed a password I couldn’t remember in order to transfer the words from a word document to the blog platform, which about gave me a heart attack. What in the actual hell? 

I swear nothing is ever, ever easy. Often comical, but rarely easy. And I shall enjoy my continued reign as the Queen of BTK.