2021-11-04:

Fri:
Not much exciting at work. Christina did come over to verify a bug.
Finished proofreading book 4, my 45th book. Need to think about the exact plot of the next one. I've fished a book about "winning" out of the trash, clearly highly thought of, I'll read that and then I can start "winning" using its winning strategies. Then on to the next thing.
Got cat food, groceries, and saw my parents. Won't see them next week.
Got home just as the rain started.
No game, Jon had a family thing.
Checked sites.
Did some 3D stuff, trying to print something. Had to cut it down at the back, which was ok. It's odd, it looks like it will fit on the bed, but the slicer wouldn't slice it. The cut part was just head supports, so losing them is fine. Almost a 10 hour print???
Cut a few songs out of a December Prairie Home Companion.
Just finished that and Sean wanted to do aliens so we tried it again.
It worked! We're getting close to the end of the thing, but we do have to do a few stages over to get the collectables. One was glitched I think, I'll need to do it myself? I'll have to check.

Sat:
Started the print, not the 10 hour one, the other piece. The original model I downloaded wasn't exactly accurate, so I changed it. Made it several pieces. I'm going to make a mold of the one piece and hopefully cast it in resin, so it looks a little better.
My 3d printer was misbehaving. It didn't want to print the gem piece it was doing it in the corner for some reason and was all weird.
Thankfully not the machine. It was Cura. When I used the PC version it was crap. Looking at the gCode directly it put it in the corner for some bizarre reason.
I used the Mac version and with the same stl file, it was fine. Thanks Cura, you're the "best."
Checked sites and videos.
Helped the lady I had switched to thunderbird over the phone. Half an hour. Ugh. Though I did once again forget the address book. Sigh.
Mixed up some resin and poured it. Spoiler, it didn't work out so much. They got all stuck together and it looked really bad.
Did some house stuff, cleaning up, getting rid of some things.
Worked on the Christmas CD before I left.
Then went to do game. Got a good way through I think, though we are still one session away from finding Zane. Well, maybe two, I don't know he's down there in the mine now, just that we saw him go in.

Sun:
Started the long print right after I got up, hope it works out.
Then I worked on writing up the next chapter of book 3. 4,500 words on that one, it was a long one. Nice! Took awhile.
Had lunch in the middle of it.
Print continues, looks good.
Oh, and the gem didn't work out. At all. I'll need to do something else. I've mixed up more of the compound and I am trying it a different way. I put the original at the bottom of a glass cup and let it harden there. This kept the shape exact, instead of just hoping it would. Silly. They should suggest that in the directions, but at least I know it now. Even if it's not the purple silcon stuff, put it in a box! Pulling it out the mold looks way better, hopefully this will prove to be enough and the resin will work out this time. Didn't get time to do that, I'll do it tomorrow. I was sanding after the print finished.
The print came out fine though. It's a tiny, tiny bit too big. (I was basically adjusting it by eyeball because I can't figure measurements out. I mean cura expands my models by 10,000% when I import them. I mean, really? I've tried all sorts of Blender settings, have no idea what I'm doing wrong.) Maybe some felt on the inside? I mean it would have to be held on by elastic I suppose anyway but it looks pretty good.
Correction, it is looking really good! I've been sanding it the rest of the afternoon, and I have a little more sanding to do (sigh) but it really looks good. Now let's hope I don't screw up the paint job, and it might turn out to be one of the better pieces I've ever done! That I just printed on a whim. Huh.
I'll post pictures once it's painted. There were some funny lines in it, but I've managed to sand them out. Neat. I should have taken a "before" picture, it was pretty bad. Don't know if it was the printer or just a characteristic of the shape or what. Oh well, they're gone.
Got ready for tomorrow.
No calls, that's a plus.
Then did game. We died. And we did some old stages to get collectables, and despite doing so it didn't register Sean got one. Oh, and it crashed for me once, and it did the sliding glitch for Mizzy. Great programming work!
No kiddos, I don't even think it was raining. More candy for me.

Mon:
Pretty standard at work today. Nothing new has come in so I finished up the book on winning, so now I'm a total winner and will do nothing but WIN from here on out. I'm a win expert.
Made a few notes for the next book, still trying to decide if I want a new character or not.

Got home, went about updating my credit card for everything I pay by credit card. Annoying.
Tried to call the place I pay for the car warranty, as I didn't have quite enough for that in the account at the time. I got a person, immediately transferred, that person couldn't help me and transferred me, so far 30 minutes on the phone! I had been transferred to auto zone? WTF?
Called the other number on the contract, she gave me 5470 instead of 8470 which is bizarre? Transferred again!Or not, because they are closed now! Neat. Do they want my money or not?

Did a little more sanding, decided it probably wasn't going to get any better. Painted it, at least a first coat. It looks good. Mixed up more resin. That's not going to be perfect at first. The mold maybe had an air bubble or something? So it's not an exact copy of the print. We'll see what it looks like. I can sand them, of course, but it will take a lot of effort. It's hardening now, at least I hope.

One call, about Twitter. Which I am an expert in. No wait that's winning, not Twitter. Sorry!

Looked for intel in the aliens game. It's busted. I looked right at the two pieces I'm missing and it didn't give me the prompt. Thanks! Got enough money for the laser gun though.

Tues:
Similar story at work today. Nothing new came in. I wonder if we really will get some kind of D7.6 release with a feature in it this week?

Wrote up notes for the next book. I have up to chapter 7 mapped out. Will it take 7 chapters? I don't know. I hope more rather than less of course.

Got home, called the apparently correct number, and boom, 2 minutes later my account was updated. Nice. Why couldn't we have done that yesterday? Oh right, because I had the wrong number.

Sanded down the gem. It sanded almost perfectly. There's a spot, right in the center, of course, where there's a flaw. Sigh. Oh, and it doesn't fit. I'm going to ignore the flaw, and reprint a new holder because that's much easier than making another gem. Or trying to sand the edges of this one away enough to fit. I just need to stretch the model a touch in the middle. Like 3mm or less. But I'll do it. The paint on the tiara though, that seems really good. So the whole thing might just come out okay.

No calls, checked sites, watched videos while I ate dinner.

May do some aliens tonight?

We did. We beat it. And it had no ending. Nice.

Wed:
Actual work news! Maybe a week ago Kevin wanted me to put a code into the printer and see if the feature activated on the newer devices. It did, and he was satisfied. Now he wants me to put the code in and see if the feature actually works, or what it does. The printers were all signed out today but I did the test on the older device to make sure I knew what it did. Because I take my job seriously. Yo.

And a guy I know is leaving to work someplace else. Saw him on the way out to take the cats to the vet, he told me. Huh. Odd. Older guy, older than me. Why would he leave Xerox?

Otherwise not much else. Tomorrow I'll do the test and give him the results. Meeting day, should be the usual fun. Wrote up more notes, I'm up to chapter 12 now, that puts it at about half. Hopefully writing it should be easy, if I really do have good notes.

Oh, we got our holiday schedule for next year. There are different days, like Juneteenth and Mr. Luthor King Jr. day. Personally, I think us white folk should have to work that day while everyone else gets to take off. Racist? Possibly, but at least it might mean a little more.

Came back, got the cats, took Oliver in. They couldn't get urine, which is odd because he's the world's most thirstiest cat. So I have to go back.

Printed the new gem holder, sanded the old gem and glued everything. I had the old one, figured I might as well. Everything looks good, I should be able to get pictures tomorrow.

Checked sites, ate dinner, the usual stuff.

Thurs:
Finished up my task for Kevin. As expected, the new device and the old device had exactly the same behavior. I took logs, videos, and a config sheet download to aid in troubleshooting, should he share any of that with the customer. Apart from "it works here, you figure it out." Which I suppose could be legit.

More work on plot. Had a great idea for chapter 15, turning my monsterus universe into a super hero story (kinda). The monsters are going to clean up the night, as humans seem unable to do so. Honestly, if a whole bunch of magic users got together, actually used magic, and wanted to go after any crime in the area (it's NYC so there's enough people and probably crime there) they could probably do it.

Had the usual meetings, no new software dropped so no new work yet.

Came back here, checked sites, watched videos.

No calls either, what did I do to get so lucky?

I almost forgot the pictures of the thing I made!





Not too bad, right?

Looking towards tomorrow and the weekend, I want to bake more bread to use up more zucchini, and put my Christmas lights up. There's less than 60 days in the year, meaning there's probably only about 50 until Christmas. And not one leaf has fallen around here. Odd. Anyway, people that don't get me ideas get nothing for Christmas. Hint hint.

Otherwise, most of the usual tomorrow. Shopping, I'll probably go to the bank, I have checks dated a month ago! Whoops. No parents. Then home for game.

Hey, and we turn our clocks back this Sunday. *sharp intake of breath*





hurray






Or we could, I don't know? Not? Ever again? Just a thought. Anyway, see you on Veteran's Day. Which my calendar doesn't list with the apostrophe. Odd. Bye!