Yesterday I used up the last of the coffee beans that Jeff at Teeko’s shipped to us in Quartzsite in late February so this morning I transferred the beans we had roasted last week into our airtight containers and started using them.  Grinding our own custom roasted coffee beans is how my mornings usually start and is just another small thing I like about being retired.

We rarely made coffee at home in the morning when we were employed outside the house.  It took too much time and made a mess that had to be cleaned up later, including the travel mug that we had to remember to rinse out at work and then bring home.  Besides, Linda got free unlimited coffee and tea at the office and I found it easier to stop at Panera and get a large coffee to go; half hazelnut and half decaf.  It was part of my morning routine that I found comforting and the cup was disposable when I was done.

I had a follow-up appointment and evaluation at the endodontist today, so I did not work in the bus this morning other than to take a few pictures of the old dinette corner, where I removed the mirrors yesterday, and the area under the bed, which I also worked on yesterday.

After morning coffee and breakfast I went to my office to work at my computer.  I off-loaded the pictures I just took, selected a few, processed them, and copied them to the folder for this blog.  I then downloaded and installed Adobe FlashPlayer in order to view the Gilbreath Upholstery Service website.  The download also installed a McAfee virus checker that I did not ask for or want and I don’t recall being given an option to opt-out.  I really dislike it when programs do things like that.  In fact, I think it should be illegal and companies who do it should be subject to heavy fines.  I tried to download the PDF catalog but Adobe Reader said it had an unrecoverable error.  Arrrgh!  I e-mailed them to request one that worked.  We will see if that results in anything.

I was responding to a few e-mails when Butch called.  He was trying to figure out the best way to connect up the eight L-16 6 VDC batteries he bought in Quartzsite to make a 24 VDC battery bank with a 12 VDC center tap.  Working only from verbal descriptions we finally ended up with the same diagram of a series-parallel interconnection scheme with equal electrical path lengths through all of the batteries.  The difference between series-parallel and parallel-series is not important when the batteries are operating correctly but each connection scheme is vulnerable to a different battery failure mode.  I happen to prefer the series-parallel scheme as I think it results in better battery charging, but that’s an often debated subject.  The equal path lengths through the batteries, however, is something that is worth accomplishing if at all possible.

By the time we were done talking I needed to leave for my endodontist appointment.  Dr. McWatters said the root canal they did on my upper right rear (tooth #4) last September looked good.  They tested the upper rear teeth on my left side but did not find any indication of a problem.  That would normally be good news, except that I had an intermittent problem in that area all winter so I know something is wrong and will eventually require attention, most likely when it is least convenient for me (middle of the night on a weekend).  But for now there is nothing more to do.

hen I got home I had a few pretzels and hummus and some red grapes and then got back to work at my desk.  I copied my blog post drafts for the 17th through the 26th from e-mails to Word and started editing them.  I took a break to have some tea and write while Linda cooked dinner.  She grilled two veggie burgers along with the rest of the asparagus we bought on Sunday and served the potato salad she made earlier in the day.  Most of the asparagus was mushy except for the tips which I attributed to the plants not the cook.  These were very large purple stalks, not the usual somewhat thinner green ones so maybe that had something to do with it.

After dinner I returned to my desk and finished editing all of my blog posts for May 10 through 26.  Somewhere in the middle of that work Phil Jarrell returned my phone call from yesterday.  We agreed that I will call him back after the GLAMARAMA Rally and he will bring his laser level and we will shoot some elevations.  With a little luck and a bit of perseverance we may get a gravel driveway connecting the 3rd (westernmost) culvert to our concrete driveway with a level spot for one or two guest RVs to boondock. We will also get a dozen tree stumps removed, get a French drain installed to remove water from the western end of the property, and get a hole dug for a ham radio tower foundation.  That last bit of digging will also require a rebar cage, hinged tower base, and coordination with a supplier that can pump concrete immediately after the hole is dug.

When I was done editing my blog posts I logged into our WordPress site, deleted 181 spam comments, and installed an update for our Fast Secure Contact Form plugin.  I started creating the post for May 10 but half way through the Chrome browser became non-responsive indicating that it might be out of memory.  That seemed unlikely, but I closed all of the program’s I had open, shut down my computer, and restarted it.  When I logged back in nothing was responding so I sat and waited until I was eventually able to do things.  The first thing I did was uninstall the McAfee Security Scan app that got installed along with the Adobe FlashPlayer earlier today.  I then proceeded to download three updates for Windows and MS Office, or tried to.

The three updates were only 27 MB total, but after 35 minutes they were only 53% done.  My guess was that the data rate on our AT&T “High Speed Internet” (DSL) connection had slowed to a barely usable trickle, perhaps because of all the rain we had the last few days, but whatever the cause it was almost midnight so I left it to finish at its own pace and went to bed.  I worked on this post and played a few games by which time it 12:45 AM so I got up, put on my robe, and went back to my office.  The download had finished and two of the three updates had installed.  The third one reported an error but Windows Update needed the computer to be restarted to finish the installation so that’s what I did.

Windows updates normally install during shutdown and finish installing on startup and that is precisely what happened this time as well.  I let the system startup completely (until the hard drive light was not on) and then downloaded, installed, and ran the latest version of CCleaner.  It downloaded much faster so maybe it was the Microsoft update server that was slow, or perhaps the McAfee app was causing the problem.

We had rain yesterday and more rain today, including some thunder.  The lights flickered a few times both days but the generator never came on.  If out Internet performance is still sluggish in the morning I will reset the AT&T gateway and see if that helps.  I also noticed that our home refrigerator was suddenly showing 45 degrees F instead of 40.  Linda had loaded it up with food yesterday, and added the potato salad today, but the temperature should not have changed by that much and should have returned to the 40 degree set point within a few hours.  Even adjusting the thermostat down did not rectify the problem over the course of the day so perhaps something else has changed, such as a blocked vent.  I will have to check for that tomorrow.  Hopefully the power blips did not blip some control circuit.  I think I will pull the fridge away from the wall and cycle the power.  We can vacuum off the back while it is out.  If it still won’t hold the temperature we want Linda might get a new refrigerator for the house sooner than expected, although a call to AAA Appliance Service Network in Howell might a more prudent first response.