Douche Bags, Two Pizzas and a Hot Tub

Last night we went out for groceries and stopped at the Walmart. When we opened the trunk to retrieve our reusable shopping bags, we saw my step daughter’s favorite toque. It’s a knitted affair in bright orange wool, thick enough to make your head look too big. So, I immediately grabbed it and plonked it on my head. The wife snapped a shot and sent it to her. She was devastated that she had gone all the way back to Halifax without it and even more disturbed to see it sitting atop my balding head. Today was my second day back at work, although I was working from home. I had some tutorials to go through; more seemed to appear as I completed the others. Then, I had a walkthrough of the new asset management software we use to keep track of all the moving parts that make up an animated show.

      The new software appeared to be user-friendly and had many features that I think will be useful to our teams. One aspect I enjoyed was the linking of all assets to a single shot. Meaning I can click on say, a prop apple, and the system will open the entry for the apple and from there I can see its status and location on the server. You can imagine how much easier it is to find something when they are connected like this.

     The person assigned to teach me the systems was super friendly and excited by the software and how it could help us. I’ll have a few more sessions with her to teach me more complex use cases for the software.

     After that, I started working on a background painting. It was an interior shot and was relatively simple to paint. I finished it by the end of the day, which was pretty good considering all the non-painting I had on my plate today. We are still working out some of the look of this show with the client, meaning some of the work I did today may change in the future. This fairly normal for this kind of show. The reason I am not mentioning the show’s name or the client’s name is because of the privacy rules surrounding productions. People have been fired at other studios or even lost the contract when a breach was discovered, so we play it safe. And even if I told you what show it is, all you would know is the code name we use for it and not the actual show name.

     It turned out we had a videoconference with the company's CEO that I wasn't aware of just before lunch. It was interesting to hear his perspective on the company and what directions they wanted to head in. Apparently, work had set up a lunch in the cafeteria for us with a television and microphones for us to ask questions. Missed out on a free meal, but it would have meant commuting all the way in to work, so I’ll take the trade-off. A free meal isn’t always what it is cracked up to be!

     I spent some of my lunch hour helping take one of our cars to the dealership because the heat is not working on the passenger side osf the car after they installed a new wiring harness. What do you wan to bet that they will charge me for their bad service. I guessing they will try to get something out of it.

     The roads were incredibly icy today with all the freezing rain we were getting. We nearly slid through the intersection at the corner of our street at one point. I made sure to shovel and salt our driveway just in case we had any deliveries. And to be honest I have an Amazon problem.

     It should make the drive to our friends' house for Pizza Wednesdays a little hairy, but we'll just take our time getting there. There is no rush, the show is PVR'd and the hot tub will still be warm whenever we get there. They have a large squishy cat named Wizard who often jumps up on the couch to get a scratch and a small wiener dog with a permanent head tilt named Penelope. Penelope is just as likely to jump for some attention too.

The danger coming over here is that someone might want to go get another animal for our house. I don’t mind a cat now and again, but I’d still like a little more time without one. It’s just a matter of time before my wife comes home with a kitten, and I won’t be able to resist its furry little face.

I’m hoping all the ice won’t impact my train ride tomorrow. The tracks are notorious for locking up in this type of weather. The track switchers freeze up all the time. A forty-five-minute train ride could last for three hours in that case. And then I still have the twenty-minute walk to the studio. I’m thinking I’ll take the streetcar from the station to the studio if the weather is bad.

In the past, I have stopped in for a greasy spoon breakfast at the ‘Patrician Grill’. It’s been around for ages and has a great deal of character. It’s frozen in time somewhere in the 60’s. I like the no fuss attitude and their cup of coffee might be the best in town as far as I am concerned. But tomorrow I have that lunch appointment, and I don’t want to fill up or spend too much money. Buying two meals is beyond my current budget.

I am writing this blog on the BYOK device today. I thought this might be a good test scenario for its use case. Not sure how well it will work without a table to put it on, but this is why I am testing it.

     I'll bring my laptop too as a backup.

     I'm scheduled to go into the studio tomorrow morning, so I have packed up some of my things I use there, from headphones to tea I like to drink. Not having the comforts of home can make it a less than enjoyable experience.

     I'll be meeting with an animator friend for lunch just to catch up and touch base. The animators have not returned to the studio as of yet and it will be a good chance to catch up and talk about the industry.

     But I have a night with friends to enjoy first before huffing it out to the train station tomorrow. And there is the wonderful pizza to be had as well as the fine company.

     I'll have to take care of most of the writing when I get home, I imagine, unless this new writing brick of mine works out.

              Or friends bought a chicken shawarma pizza, and it was delicious. They put on the show, Love is Blind, and I was able to keep most of my pizza down, even through the parade of douchebags hoping to fall in love.

I pulled the BYOK out of my bag, ready to keep writing this blog while the others watched the show. And then I went back for the Bluetooth keyboard, and I had forgotten to pack it into my bag. Oops!

Good thing I brought the laptop as my back up.

One thing I will say about this show is that the people who are on it say some of the funniest and dumbest shit. If you watch it for the comedy aspect I get it. The contestants? Are they contestants? All show up to this with more baggage than Samsonite.

I had my overnight oats for breakfast this morning, the ones with cocoa powder added. The flavour wasn’t terrible. Passable might be a good way to describe it. It was filling and that is half the point. I decided to have some extra protein, grabbed a pickled egg and boy was that a mistake. Pickled eggs and oat do not go together. Like having orange juice after you just brushed your teeth.

Speaking more of food, because why not? Our friends’ kids and their boyfriends went out tonight shortly after we arrived. They had the most wholesome night out planned I have heard in a long time. Their crazy plan was to go to Ikea and have dinner. Dinner date at Ikea. I don’t know why, but that makes me chuckle.  There is hope for the future generations, I think. They do have a really good salmon dinner, and their vegetable croquettes are delicious.

I was pleased to see my friend John posted two more songs on YouTube today. I get to hear them early and sometimes I even make suggestions. He made a few changes to the final cut using my comments. I think it sounded great and I love that I get to hear the songs early. John reads all my stories. I don’t even have to force him to read them, he does it of his own free will.

Soon, I’ll be dumping a 26,000-word novella on his lap to get through. I might use that story for my Sales Copy class. I’ll need to write sales copy for it eventually and getting an experienced writer, publisher and editor’s advice would be very helpful and worth its weight in gold.

Three episodes later and I feel like I lost some brain cells, my muscles are relaxed and my belly is full of two kinds of pizza. I decided to watch some episodes of Alex Cross when I got home. I was feeling wiped and knew I had to get up early the next morning to catch a train. It was nice to have an evening off and just hang out with my wife and friends. A low key, low stress event is needed now and again.

I didn’t get any time with our friend’s cat, Wizard. Normally he headed straight over to me jumps up on the couch and lies across my lap to get some rubs and scratches. He looked like he ws thinking about it a few times, but he had to cross my wifes lap to get to me and she was supplying all the scratches he could handle.

It seems more and more likely that she’ll be bringing home a new kitten some time soon. It’s just a matter of time. I have made it clear I would prefer, the next time we get a cat, if we get one, that it be a kitten so that it can bond with us at a young age. We’ve had to rescue cats now, so I think we deserved a newly minted one.

We left our friends what remained of our pizza contribution, which is strategic on our parts because we need to eat more vegetables and less pizza this week. I really do feel it when I haven’t had my veg in a while. My body starts to crave something; I can feel it all through my bones. The AG1 supplement definitely helps with that, but I prefer to get my vitamins and minerals from the real thing instead of a powdered substitute. There is no replacing the goodness of fresh vegetables.

The weather was better on the ride home, so I don’t believe the trains will have any delays tomorrow and that means I will probably walk from the station to the studio to get a little bit of much needed exercise. The main roads were pretty much clear of any ice and on the side roads the slush had frozen making crunching noises as we drove over them.

I did spend a few minutes getting things ready for the morning commute, including to remember my Bluetooth keyboard just in case I wanted to use the BYOK. Not sure if I will be able to use it one the train because it is often standing room only and even a laptop on my short legs is problematic.

I also have the lunch with a friend, so I won’t get any writing done at lunchtime. Seeing a friend is worth missing out on things for one lunch.