Yesterday I changed my Fitbit sleep monitor setting from "normal" to "sensitive." I got to bed last night at almost exactly the same time I went to bed Sunday night; and I got up this morning within 5 minutes of when I got up yesterday. But my Fitbit says I got 90 minutes less sleep last night. Here's Sunday night:
Here's last night:
This means either it's been overestimating my sleep, or last night it hugely underestimated it. Or, possibly, last night I just tossed and turned a lot more than usual.
I'll keep it on the "sensitive" setting for a week or so and compare it with how I feel in the morning. I definitely wanted to sleep in today, but it's also rainy and cold. More data is required.
The weather's perfect, there are holiday parties, and possibly some hiking. So not much blogging this weekend. There was also a small Ribfest nearby, but aside from Rod Tuffcurls & the Bench Presses, kind of disappointing (especially the vendor who ran out of ribs).
More later as circumstances warrant.
The Chicago Pride Parade staging area is at the end of my street, so Parker and I had to at least see it. Money shot:
That's the Stanley Cup, back in Chicago where it belongs.
And just think of the hundreds of couples breaking up this weekend:
"Honey! We can get married now!"
"...um..."
Last night at the Chicago Theater:
The unpacking continues, but I still have too many boxes cluttering up the place:
It is, however, a gorgeous day, and my office window is open to this:
My goals are (a) do my work instead of going for a long walk in the perfect weather, and (b) finish unpacking my living room tonight. I may succeed in both. Updates as conditions warrant.
Between unpacking, preparing for a party (which encourages the unpacking), and the regular business of working, I didn't have time to write this weekend. I still don't, but I did want to catch up on a couple of things.
First, a coronal mass ejection over the weekend is producing large aurorae today, which could be visible in Chicago, New York, Dublin, and Seattle—way farther south than usual.
Second, Rhianna Pratchett, Sir Terry's daughter, says the next Discworld novel will be the last:
The author, videogame and comics writer told a fan last week that her late father’s forthcoming novel, The Shepherd’s Crown, featuring teenage witch Tiffany Aching, would be the final Discworld book. And asked by a fan if she would be continuing the series herself, she ruled out the possibility.
“No. I’ll work on adaptations, spin-offs, maybe tie-ins, but the books are sacred to dad,” she wrote on Twitter. “That’s it. Discworld is his legacy. I shall make my own.”
She added: “To reiterate – no I don’t intend on writing more Discworld novels, or giving anyone else permission to do so.”
Good for her. As blogger A.J. O'Connell wrote today, "Forty-one stand-alone novels are an amazing gift to give a fanbase, and I feel like it would be greedy to ask for more."
More later. Back to a deck that's due this afternoon.
Unpacking continues apace. By yesterday morning I'd managed to hook up my A/V equipment, which also meant getting part of my living room in order:
Last night I finished my kitchen (except for part of one box), so now I just have to unpack a few more boxes in my office and about 32,768 boxes of books. Plus I still have to hang things on the walls.
Tonight I've cleared my calendar so I can just be done. I may not get all the books up, but I will at least finish everything else.
This is my past night in the place I've lived for more than seven years, and it's a disaster area.
I take legal possession of my new place in a little more than three hours, but all my stuff is not magically being transported there. I've spent the better part of today packing, using Cleveland Indians Duck tape to mark which drawers and closets are empty (file under "moving randomness"), so now every time I need something I realize it's in one of these boxes. Bollocks.
Under the heading, "This, By You, Is A Problem?", I've already transferred my Internet connection to the new place, so I can't even stream a movie. Of course, I can update my blog from my phone, so it's still the future.
Transitions are good. Transitions are growth. The process of transition sucks.
Next update from Inner Drive Technology World Headquarters 4.0, sometime tomorrow or Monday.
Today I'm going to get a salad from Whole Foods Market. But last Thursday, at Ristorante Arté al Lago in Lugano, Switzerland, I had this:
That is a venison tortellini in a broth that must have taken them two days to cook. The only pasta I have ever had in my life that topped it was the peacock ravioli I ate at Mistral the night before.
Why did we go hiking so much? So we could fit into the clothes we brought with us, of course.
Last Wednesday we had one of the best dinners of our lives at Mistral, in Bellagio, Italy. I don't have the ability at the moment to describe it, except to say that I will never look at a peacock again without salivating. We had 8 courses each, one set of molecular-gastronomy dishes and the other more traditional, ending with a batch of vanilla gelato made with eggs, milk, cream, sugar, and liquid nitrogen.
Oh, and we had a view:
Someday, I will have better words to describe the food. I think it was better than the other Michelin-starred restaurants I've been to, but I'm not sure. More field investigation is required.