15 years today since Obama was elected. Not exactly the first step on an upward path we all hoped it would be.
I finally caved in and set the heating to come on for a while a couple of times a day. Partly because Badger cat had taken to spending half the day sleeping under my duvet, which I assume was a hint.
On Wednesday afternoon I wandered into the kitchen and happened to spy the paddle from the bread machine (said machine being around ? through its programme). Fortunately it hadn’t actually reached the bake stage yet, so I shoved the paddle through the floury goop onto its spindle, reset the machine and it turned out fine. Worst. Anecdote. Ever.
We had another storm on Thursday. The barometer had dropped by about 30mb or 1″ Hg overnight, but I escaped unscathed again – possibly because I didn’t leave the house all day.
I got a new Chromecast, because it was almost free thanks to the store credit they gave me when I bought my phone, which was about to expire. This one comes with Google TV and a remote, but to be honest that’s not really much more convenient than just controlling it from my phone.
Speaking of my phone, it seems to have suddenly started refusing to work for contactless payments (possibly since upgrading to Android 14). Fortunately the first time it happened I had my wallet with me, which I hardly ever do these days. Annoyingly I don’t know any way to check whether it’s fixed itself other than by trying to buy stuff.
I thought my 17-year-old projector had finally given up the ghost, but it turned out I’d just disturbed a connection in the rats’ nest behind my AV unit. It is really noisy though, and its bulb is on about double its rated lifespan. I think the time has finally come to replace it and the small TV with just one massive TV, now it’s possible to get one bigger than the projector screen for a relatively reasonable sum. Like every purchase decision though, this inevitably leads to endless research and confusion.
I did finally make the decision to upgrade my Garmin from a 645 to an Epix (which I bought second hand from eBay so didn’t cost me quite as much as a new one). The screen is a massive step up from the old one – far more detailed than I can make out without my reading glasses on! It has all manner of probably useless new measurements and metrics too – it’s been generously keeping me on a training status of “productive”, but is balancing that today by telling me that my “training readiness” is in the toilet.
