Author: Chris S.

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Bittersweet Sixteen

Hi, Mom.

It’s been 16 years since I held your hand and felt your last breath leave your body.

All things considered, I’m doing okay right now.

I had a hell month in August with a kidney stone.

I’m currently in the office, working on a couple of laptops and a desktop.

It’s been a crazy year.

There’s a guy that just arrived up there that you may want to say ‘Hi’ to, Chadwick Boseman.  Dad knows who he is.  He can tell you about him.

I just wanted to drop a note and tell you that I love you and miss you.

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Celebration Weekend

In a normal world, Nelson and I would probably be heading back to the Bay Area from Anaheim, on the last day of Star Wars Celebration.

Instead, I made a Target run to see if I could get anything from the new Galaxy’s Edge Trading Post items that went on sale today.

I went to one Target and they had no such items out.  I saw another customer with a basket of figures, asking an employee if they had a particular figure in back.  I asked the customer if they had put up their display anywhere, and he said no, he found the figures in the regular Star Wars display in the toy section.  I told him that other Targets had end cap displays for the new stuff.

I then went to the other nearby Target, where I was greeted with this:

That same customer from the other Target came up behind me and asked if this was what I was looking for, and I said yeah.

To be honest, the sight of this made me feel sad that I wasn’t in Anaheim, because I had planned to visit Baatu and Black Spire Outpost and even build my own lightsaber.  But it wasn’t meant to be this year.

I almost bought the cheap Jedi Blade Builders saber that they had, but decided not to.  I’ll build mine at Galaxy’s Edge, someday.

Instead, a porg and a LOTH CAT jumped in my basket.

They brought along a deck of Sabacc-shaped cards to keep themselves busy.

The majority of the other merchandise was rebranded Blade Builders sets, Q’ira’s blaster from Solo rebranded and recolored as a Mandalorian blaster (Double barreled?  No.), droid factory action figures and plush droids, and some masks and books.

And yeah, I’m wearing yet another Star Wars shirt today.

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Post-Game

I have no memory of this, but when I was really little, maybe even before I was born, my Dad would play chess in the company chess club.  He’d play on Friday nights, and according my Mom, when he’d get home, late, he’d still be down in the living room or dining room, setting up a chess set, and studying it, looking where he made a mistake that cost him a match.  I don’t know how long he would do that, couldn’t be more than an hour.  Or two.

Flash forward to now:

We played Dungeons and Dragons online last night, and the first thing I do when I get up this morning is futz around on Roll20 and DNDBeyond, looking at my newly leveled character and figuring out how to make spells work correctly from the online Roll20 character sheet.

I did that for about 2 hours before I realized what time it was, and took a shower.

Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, I guess.

* * *

I do like the online tools for D&D, but I miss face to face interaction.

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Stones

So I’ve been nursing a kidney stone at home for the past few days, and yesterday was by far the worst day.

The pain wasn’t as bad as I’ve had in the past, it was just THERE.  Constant.  Throbbing. And no amount of water drinking or ibuprofen seemed to make it go away for more than 1/2 an hour or so.

Because of the pain I was pretty lethargic, trying to fall asleep and nap throughout most of the day.  I think I did manage to nod off a few times, only to wake up with the dull pain still there.

I also watched the pilot episode of The Greatest American Hero on Peacock.  That show hasn’t aged well.  Or at least the pilot didn’t.  That used to be one of our ‘must watch’ shows back in the day.  Dad loved it.

I kept moving from my bedroom to the living room throughout the day to find a comfortable spot to sit or lie down.  I managed to watch both the Red Sox-Mets game and the Padres-Giants game.

I didn’t really eat much during the day, either, just some cottage cheese and Belvita biscuits for breakfast, the last slice of frozen pizza from the night before for lunch, and for dinner, some shredded chicken from the chicken broth I made the night before.  Don’t ask.

I tried to fall asleep after the Giants walk off win over the Padres, but I couldn’t, so I decided to stay up and watch Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. which I probably would have done anyway.

During the episode the pain faded, but came back almost at the end of the episode, so I took another ibuprofen with a cup of milk, and that seemed to do the trick, though I did get up around 2 am to pee.

This morning?  Pain is much more manageable.  I think it’s about to pass, like its about to drop into my bladder.

Here’s hoping.

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Justified: A Celebration

It started with a news article saying that Timothy Olyphant was going to play Cobb Vanth in The Mandalorian, Season 2.  Vanth, according to the Star Wars Aftermath books, is the man who found Boba Fett’s armor some time after Return of the Jedi.

I had heard of Olyphant, but never watched his show, Justified.  My friends on Facebook suggested that I watch as soon as possible, and that I’d love it, and that they couldn’t believe that I had never watched it.

I binge watched it over 8 weeks.

Five years late to the game, but I now consider it one of my all-time favorite television series.

From the first episode, I felt that I related to the main character, Raylan Givens, in a few ways.

Raylan Givens: I guess I never thought of myself as an angry man.

Winona Hawkins: Well, you do a good job of hiding it, and I suppose most folks don’t see it, but honestly, you’re the angriest man I have ever known.

The show itself was well written, with snappy dialogue.  It reminded me of Firefly in some ways, probably because of the music and the fact that Raylan reminded me of Malcolm Reynolds in many situations.

This is a rare show that I can say had few, if any, bad episodes.  That said, season 5 was probably my least favorite, but only because of a weaker plot that other seasons.

Plus, Dewey Crowe is probably the stupidest character on TV in recent history.

How about some top 5(ish) lists?

Favorite Characters:

  1. Raylan Givens
  2. Boyd Crowder
  3. Art Mullen
  4. Rachel Brooks
  5. Tim Gutterson

Favorite Recurring Characters

  1. Ellstin Limehouse
  2. Dickie Bennett
  3. Bob Sweeney
  4. Winn Duffy
  5. Mike “The Hammer” Reardon

Least Favorite Characters

  1. Dewey Crowe
  2. Boon
  3. David Vasquez
  4. Wendy Crowe
  5. Danny Crowe

Yeah, I really didn’t like Season 5…

Favorite Big Bad (Season) Villains

  1. Mags Bennett
  2. Avery Markham
  3. Robert Quarles

The series finale ended the show better than most other series finales.  Better than Game of Thrones, LOST and Battlestar Galactica, even though I enjoyed the last two shows finales.

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Pause

After this next print job is done on my 3D printer, I’m going to try to take a break from printing anything in order to work on the stuff that I HAVE printed already, mainly Poe’s blaster.

And then I’ll work on the Darksaber, which still needs to be reprinted.

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3D Tales

*reads up on 3D printer’s mini-USB port*

Oh.

*deletes order for USB to mini-USB adapter cable*

Not needed.  The port is for connecting the PC directly into the printer, not thumb drives.

*3D prints housing for SD to microSD adapter*

Now that, I can use.

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Update?

What a month, amirite?

Aside from working at the office every Tuesday, I’ve been working from home every weekday.  The Tuesdays feel the most ‘normal’ since I’m at the office, though it’s weird walking the floors wearing a mask, with hardly any employees around.

I’m not quite back to playing my sports replay projects regularly, though I have played a game here and there.

I’m doing my best in utilizing home delivery for necessities instead of going out shopping myself.

I dove into yet another new hobby, 3D printing, and so far I seem to be enjoying it, stumbling my way through frustrations and successes.

I got to see my sister and niece when I dropped off a gift for my sister’s birthday.  I had also seen them when I picked up some cookie dough from the now-defunct Specialties Café.

I really miss baseball.

A crewed commercial spacecraft launched from American soil for the first time, and a first for a crewed spacecraft since the last shuttle mission in 2011.  I cried tears of joy.

June is here.

Everyone stay safe until next time, okay?  Love you all.

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Accomplishments

This is the first Saturday since the Crisis on Earth-Prime began where I feel that I actually accomplished stuff.

  • I cut my own hair.
  • I cleared out and recycled a lot of materials that had been sitting in my closet for about 30 years.
  • I reorganized and stored a bunch of board games sitting around the living room.
  • I organized my Battle Mechs into lances and printed up record sheets for them.
  • I made more Porto’s stuff in the air fryer.
  • I found a much more adorable Baby Yoda plush that the one waiting for me at the office.

And somewhere in between all this I watched The Andromeda Strain.

Overall I think this has been a rough time for everyone.  Like everyone I seem to have good days and bad days.  But I think I’ve learned how to mitigate the days.

And I saw something that was quoted by a couple of folks today:

You are not working from home. You are at home, in a crisis, trying to work.

Which is correct for me for 4 days out of the week.  That fifth day in the office is working at work in a crisis.  Which surprisingly is relaxing.  It’s as close to ‘normal’ that I think I’ll ever see in the near future, despite the lack of coworkers and traffic and places to eat for lunch.

Hang in there, everyone.  We’re in this together, for as long as it takes.