#373 - Just A Regular Day

I stayed in bed until 9 AM this morning, feeling very luxurious in my warm bed and a cool breeze coming through the window. The desire to get up and face another day of the show I really don’t care for battled against my sense of work ethic.

My first task was to make myself something to eat, and Robyn had bought some microwavable breakfast bowls that have bacon, potatoes, cheese, and egg. Not sure how healthy these are for me, but they certainly are delicious and only took three minutes to make in the microwave.

I got to my desk and started right away making revisions on paintings that I didn’t have the energy to attack yesterday. I was able to get quite a few paintings finished before noon, when Robyn and I decided to go for a walk in the park. Outside, the weather was extremely cool, probably the coolest it’s been a while. However, that made for great walking temperatures, and there were plenty of dog walkers out and about this afternoon.

To our delight, someone had gone through the trail with a chainsaw and cut through all the logs that were blocking the path. This was likely done by cyclists because they are the ones most affected by the blockages.

It was nice to get back from a walk and not be covered in sweat, particularly since I had a meeting almost directly afterwards with the design and layout team to go over how things have been going on the show lately. Our aim was to tell them exactly what was working, what needed more work, and what wasn’t being supplied. We also made sure to tell them that we understood their position from a historical point of view, but now that we were moving into a spot where we were all catching up that we are going to need more work from them on a per episode basis.

My colleague had put together a presentation with examples, and we let her take the reins.

But overall the meeting went very well, and everything was well accepted by the other teams. This was to be expected, as we are all professionals and experienced in the art of animation. Following that meeting, we went straight into another meeting about a specific episode where we get to ask questions to the director and the client so that there is no miscommunication before we start an episode. This was my second meeting on this episode, and I had already asked all the questions previously and received answers. It was too soon to know if those answers would be created by the design team, but certainly after our meeting I imagine they will be on it.

Robyn had to leave early to attend her school at the college. I worked until 5:45 PM before stopping to relax and watch some videos. A video caught my eye today about a young man who travelled with his brother on a ship from Seattle to Alaska, where they plan to disembark and take a trip to you very small town with no population. It’s interesting to see the different ships and modes of transportation this fellow takes all throughout the world. In the previous video, he stayed in a sleep pod on a Japanese ship, and it was interesting to see the food options and the tiny accommodations.

I was too busy today to listen to my audiobook while I worked, sometimes when I’m doing logical type work I can’t listen to anything other than music and they often don’t think to put it on because I’m so involved in what I’m doing.

I did stop to take a break a few times and make myself a warming cup of tea to soothe myself from the pains of being a background paint supervisor.

After relaxing for an hour I went downstairs and made some meatballs in the oven so that when Robyn came home she’d have a nice warm meal of pasta and meatballs. There’s a very good chance, based on the lack of hunger from my stepson who is dropped off by Robyn on the way to her second job, that she already ate before she left.

I snacked on meatballs and sauce while I was waiting for everything to finish now into full to eat a proper meal. That’s normal for me when I’m cooking for other people, I like to sample the goods to make sure they taste all right and I end up getting full.

Having said that, I enjoyed every bite of every people.

Today was supposed to be a day off from Robyn from her extra work, but they called in and asked if she could come in today just for an hour. Normally she goes from 7 to 8 PM, but they were desperate to have anyone come today so they agreed that it was okay if she came at 8 o’clock after she finished school. I think my wife gets a great deal of satisfaction from helping out the man she takes care of. She seems to have grown fond of the old man and I think when he passes it will break her heart. And judging from her descriptions of him lately, he seems to be on the decline. But at least my wife was able to make him laugh.

Three people just entered the house, and it initially caught me off guard. I forgot that kiddo number one has two friends staying over tonight. That should make for a noisy evening and I’m glad I’m getting my writing done via dictation earlier in the evening.

I’ll probably end up watching movies downstairs in the living room and playing at full volume. At least one of them, at least has very loud laughter.

At this point in the evening I’m waiting for Robyn to come home and pondering whether I should go back to work and do some more approvals or try to get up early tomorrow and work on them before work starts. The procrastinator that I am those me to get up early in the morning, but the realist in me knows I don’t like getting up early and probably won’t.

I was happy to see this morning that the hamster did not escape his cage and was not turning my papers into a comfortable nest. I’m not a fan of these type of pets but being half owner of the house seems to mean absolutely nothing when it comes to the children owning rodents.

So far, my microphone is not having trouble discerning my voice from the rabble outside my door were giggling and cackling away. Not a terrible sound, but just another example of how there is nowhere in this house to record anything.

I’ve often thought about starting a YouTube channel talking about writing and books and all the other things I like. Maybe fountain pens and notebooks. Even recipes and interesting historical facts. But there is no one place where I could record a video in this house noise reasons and having to set up all the equipment to record over and over again.

I think I’d have to rent the space in order to get anything done and I don’t see any reason to do that just now when I don’t have any videos to put it right now. I do envy people who have rooms that they can record in or children who are much quieter than our own. Mind you these children are grown adults of this point. Perhaps if we scale down and sell the house and get something like a condo there might be a room I could record in.

I saw a headline from the New York Post that cleaned the US military had lost over 81 planes, drones and helicopters said to be worth approximately $3.3 billion in the war with Iran. That’s a lot of losses for a country that has the most sophisticated war technology in the world. I can’t imagine Iran has the same technical superiority as the United States.

In happier news, it seems like Brandon Sanderson’s AppleTV adaptation of his storm light series is still in production; however, they are still searching for a showrunner before they can begin full production. It’s nice to see Apple TV once again taking a popular book series and making a show out of it. Having the author involved is always a good idea as well, even if it’s only as a consultant.

I can hear the three friends downstairs giggling away in the kitchen not far from where I’ve left the meatballs, sauce and pasta. There’s a very good chance will be none left by the time I get downstairs. One of them is a college student and the other lives alone, and they’re always up for a free meal that they didn’t have to cook.

I put on the first episode of Margot Has Money Troubles on Apple TV starring Elle Fanning as a college student who dreams of becoming a writer that gets knocked up by her professor and then decides to have the child. So far, it was an okay show, but I’m not sure if I’ll continue or if Robyn would like it.

Well, I think my wife is home, so it’s time to go down and make sure she’s had a proper meal.

As, expected everyone had already eaten so I packed up the spaghetti for tomorrow’s lunch or dinner. I had to spend fifteen minutes doing a husband repair job on the dryer vents. Kiddo #2 claimed he had to dry his clothes three time, but I suspect he was just over packing the dryer. The vents had a bit of debris in there, so I cleaned up the start and end of the pipe as well as cleaning the undersides of the vent louvres on the exterior. Sometimes lint sticks underneath and it weighs the louvres down and can restrict air a little bit. Either way, I tested the flow of air, and it was working just fine after I was finished cleaning it all out.

We retreated to the bedroom and put on an episode of Ted Lasso to add a little bit of joy to our evening. It was a bit of a heartfelt episode, and I think it must have been the season finale. It certainly had season finale vibes. It seemed like they were setting things up for another season as well.

Then it was the new season of Survivor. We’d missed the first two episodes and it’s the kind of show I can put on and not care if I miss any of it. It’s really Robyn’s thing and I don’t mind it. Although, I have to say that last year’s season was good enough to draw me in about halfway through to the point I was looking forward to the show and had an idea of who the players were and what was going on.

This new season is all about constant uncertainty. It should make for an interesting  season.

I read a news article about an airport IT manager that decided to figure out how 22 million in gold was stolen from Pearson Airport and managed to do it by thinking how he would go about it. Then he searched for any activities that he would have performed to know when a high target flight was coming in. I might do a bit of research on this because it could make a good heist story in the future. And I want some of my stories to take place in Canada. A little Canadian content isn’t such a bad thing these days in the entertainment industry.

I’ve surprised by some of the stories I’ve had to write for my mentor. She gives me the requirement that the story has to take place in my town. And I never thought anything interesting, even fictional, could happen here. But, this place seems to lend itself to all kinds of stories. I’ve also enjoyed learning about where I live. Soon, I plan to take a trip to the local museum which is an old estate built by the man who founded the town and built the harbour.

I ended the evening listening to a few chapters of my Dune audiobook to wind down.

Until tomorrow.