On Tuesay and Wednesday at work we keep making great progress on analyzing parts of the space mission and making decisions on test flow and design features. Towards the end of Tuesday, after I have left, somebody sends out an email indicating that the models and simulations that we are using do not have enough fidelity and are missing design aspects that render them useless. Thus the last couple of weeks of work are wasted. I don't get the email until Wednesday morning and start feeling depressed that we've missed these aspects. I take a deep breath and know that we are on the right track and believe this other person is in error. I do not "stir the pot", but instead just keep working away on the project. Later on Wednesday my "ignore the email" reaction works because the other guy is proven wrong - our models and simulations DO have the features that we need to have a good design.
On Tuesday after a great heavy workout with the weights I go near Los Angeles International airport and pick up Karl for his visit. With more experienced travelers I will ask them to take the free shuttle bus out of the airport so that I don't have to go in. Thus I pick Karl up at the greenline train station after his shuttle bus jaunt.
After a three-quarter day at work, Karl and I get on the bicycles and ride down to the old yacht club and back. We take a detour on the way and stop in at my bicycle store to get Karl introduced to the people there. After cleaning up we head down to 2nd street for mediterranean food and we stop in at an acquaintances' clothing store to hang out and talk for a short bit.
After we get moving on Thursday morning we take the bicycles out again for a tour of Long Beach including riding right up to the Queen Mary and the cruise ship port and the Russian submarine that is dry-docked in Long Beach. After the ride we grab Person Ti_Ca and have lunch. In The afternoon and into early evening Karl and I watch "Butter" and "Flight" and then we go have Japanese dinner and stop by Person Ti_Ca's workplace for a few minutes.
On Friday Karl wants to go play some tennis with some local players so he takes my car to the Billie Jean King tennis center in Long Beach while I lift weights and mow the lawn. (Billie Jean King was originally from Long Beach.) Today the edger won't start so I just mow the lawn and will have to try and fix/start the edger when convenient. After showers Karl and I drive to Glendora and he drops off some information with past and potential future customers of his. We then drive to a restaurant and have 2.5 hour lunch with Person P_C. We cover a lot of ground and I've scheduled this lunch specifically for Person P_C to hear about Karl's career path (as opposed to mine). We drive back home, jump on the bicycles, and ride down to the end of the ocean trail. It is getting late and dark so we hustle ourselves back up the Los Angeles river and home - arriving after dark but safely. Later we walk down Atlantic where a First Friday is going on. We pick up Person Ti_Ca on his workbreak and go have pizza and watch people. We eventually get back home, relax, and then pickup Person T_U to go clubbing.
The thre of us drive up to West Hollywood and hit two clubs during te course of the evening. I have not gone out clubbing since last August and I enjoy the mingling with people and some of the music. I've reverted to old, shy ways and don't really talk to many people. Except that I run into Person X_P during the evening and we talk about his recent moves away from Long Beach and how our lives are going. When the club closes at 2 am we hang out in front to let traffic die down and the rush home - I'm getting down for sleep a bit after 3 am on Saturday morning.
I'm up at 6:30 on Saturday ad I water the impatiens and trim the roses as I wait for people to wake up and for the morning to warm up. Karl and I go riding and run into acquaitances andwe talk with a few during the ride. Afterwards the edger actually starts and I edge the lawn and clean up and wonder if the edger will start in two or three weeks when I need it again. Karl and I go visit Person Ti_Ca at his workplace, grab lunch, and hang out in Torrance at a Japanese mall. Later in the day Person Ti_Ca, karl, and I have dinenr at home and watch "The Wolf of Wall Street" and then collapse into bed.
I take Karl to the airport on Sunday morning and rush home to go out cycling. I jump on the mountain bicycle and ride towards the pier but get interrupted when I see Derrick (my usual riding partner) and Person P_C. So I take them over to the Queen mary and the dry-docked Russian submarine before we head north against a moderate headwind. Though I am on a mountain bicycle with intermediate tire pressures, Derrick and Person P_C let me pull until I get to a point where I should turn around and head for home. At home I relax and do almost nothing (except some housecleaning) and then then later I help Person Ti_Ca with homework before I collapse into bed.
It takes a while to get back into the swing of work on Monday morning, but I eventually help out a co-worker with difficulty that he has been having for a few weeks and make progress on my own tasks. It's a blah day in geenral, so when I get home I lubricate the chain on the Yamaha YZF-R1 and eat dinner. Maybe I'll get in some sort of workout later. But I don't.
I'm up early on Tuesday and get to work to make progress. I have conversations with a co-worker, also Ray, and we decide that we are finished with a few of the tasks subject to more information. And I help a couple other wo-workers out with their problems today. It is agood day! On the way home I stop in at Lowe's and return a door screen handle that was not needed and then rush home to have a heavy session with the weights. These same weights as last week and the week before seem a bit easier and maybe it is time to go up again in weights. Afterwards I have dinner and cook brown rice for the rest of the week and bake some corn muffins for the next few days.
When I get to work on Wednesday I see notice that I am supposed to be in Alabama for a meeting on Thursday morning and also supposed to be in Maryland on Thursday morning. Are you effing kidding me? How could you get to either worksite if you were told the day before? I ignore the stupid and degrading requests and proceed with my work and helping others. I'm frustrated by noon because a simulation is within one iota of finishing and has stalled out because of our computing facilities. And, to top this day off, I'm made aware of another screw-up on the part of our company and we are trying to keep it quiet and blame it on our subcontractor. Do any of these scenarios sound like the way to operate a business that will still be in business in a few years? I just completely ignore the idiocy and try to make progress on my own tasks. When I cannot take the absurdity of these situations any longer, I go home and go for a long walk with a grocery store stop near the end. When I get home I work on trying to get some grass to grow in some troublesome spots in the front yard and there happens to be a bottle of wine left over from Karl's visit and I start in on it. By 6:30 pm I might or might not know my name or my address or my birthdate, but I try to make progress on an indexing procedure for a website. During breaks I spend a few minutes dusting the hardwood floors and cleaning the stove. I return to the website indexing and finally send off for some help from the software vendor. And eventually, I don't really know how, end up in bed. The alarm is set for 4 am so that I can participate in 8 am east coast meetings via a telephone.
I get to work a bit after 5am for a teleconference with the east coast. I stay for two hours and then I go to a different building and a different teleconference with the east coast. I stay for two hours there and I move to a third building and a different review for two hours. What a ridiculous day! EVentually I leave work early and hope to lift weights, but Person Ti_Ca wants to go run for 30 minutes. So I skip lifting weights and we go for a run/walk for 32 minutes with Person Ti_Ca doing mostly walking. But at least we got out for some exercise together. I take a shower and Person Ti_Ca gets cleaned up and goes off to work.
I'm planning on a long Friday ride on the road bicycle, but I wake up and it just isn't in me. I mill around the house a bit and then ride the mountain bicycle down to the old yacht club and back home. These rides are almost two hours long and great rides, but they are not quite road bicycle rides. After the ride I trim the roses and spot water the yard (trying to fill in some bare spots) and then get cleaned up and run some errands. Person Ti_Ca and I head down to Cal State Long Beach where accounting majors are doing taxes for low income people. I take Person Ti_Ca down there to do his taxes (even though we could have easily done them) but also to meet accounting majors where he will be attending school in the fall. A nice accounting major from CSULAB, Jennifer, helps us out and spends time telling Person Ti_Ca about the program even though we have failed to brind Person Ti_Ca's social security card (which I didn't even think about bringing). After the informative time with Jennifer we go look at a Mazda in Garden Grive and miss a Scion which has been sold. The Mazda is kinda nice but has some oil leaks and has aftermarket parts on it and I'm worried that it has been abused and will not have a long, reliable life for Person Ti_Ca. So we've made progress today, but cannot show concrete results. When we get home I relax for a bit and then mow the lawn and then see Person Ti_Ca off to work.
Saturday starts with a dry and then wet qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix. Sunday's race will be entertaining since all of the new technology introductions could effect race reliability. I get out for a good mountain bicycle ride fr two hours where I do a fair amount of pushing throughout. I get cleane dup, have the car washed, pick up something for lunch, and then get two new books from the library. When I get home I spent a fair amount of the afternoon waxing the World Rally Car and then take a short nap and soak my feet in hot water. In the evening I relax and do some reading and ignore the web programming that I should be doing.
On Sunday I get on the road bicycle in the near dark conditions (since daylight savings time) and ride to the Whittier Narrows dam. I meet up with Person P_C and we ride back to Long Beach. Drrick is skipping today's ride in order to study for finals. When we get to Log Beach we see an asian lady cyclist that we always see and she has just finished repairing a flat tire. But we introduce ourselves and ride slow to start with so that she can ride with us. We also pick up Terry along the way until the slow pace is too much to take. So we give our regards and I pull Person P_C back up to Hollydale park and take a quick break and then go our separate ways. I watch the Australian Grand Prix and it is somewhat entertaining even if my favorite driver was way of the pace and drops out of the race very early. After the 55 miles of riding I'm a bit tired so I do small taks around the house with flowers and/or cleaning and then lay on the couch to get more reading done.
Monday is a pretty boring day at work as I have to sit through meetings. In fact, this week is almost completely filled with meetings. I will not be enjoying it at all. I certainly wear a green shirt today for Saint Patrick's day, but I don't do any celebrating of the holiday. When I get home I lift weights with one set heavier than before. Afterwards I trim roses, water impatiens, spot water the lawn where I'm trying to fill in some bare spots, and finally get a PDF to text file converter that works well.