Microblog

Flew to San Francisco, then BART to Downtown, then ferry to Sausalito for the night. Behind us, Downtown, and the Bay Bridge. Tomorrow we take a Marin County transit bus further north, then we start walking, ending up back in San Francisco on Friday.

Upon arrival at San Francisco SFO, an Easter bunny marshalled us through the gate area.

Our bedroom smoke alarm started chirping at 4:00 am, demanding immediate attention. Our only option was to crawl out of bed, fetch the ladder, temporarily remove the alarm, then make a pot of coffee. We replaced the battery yesterday, so further investigation is required: we’ll deal with it later.

Packed backpacks for an undemanding multi-day hike.

It was the last day of class before a break for Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr. The student worked through a reasoning exercise and continued writing an essay about her uncle who escaped war in a boat that sank. He was in the water a long time, but eventually was rescued.

Woke up to the news Elon Musk may buy Twitter. Spent much of the day developing a replacement microblog capability in WordPress. When I add a micropost with WordPress, a Tweet automatically posts to Twitter.

Something different on my walk: picked up Italian sausage from a butcher that doesn’t sell meat products, The Herbivorous Butcher. It was good on a pizza for lunch, and the rest will go into our weekly Sausage Saturday cabbage braise.

Cycled with a friend to St. Paul’s Lake Como where swan pedal boats clustered offshore.

The setting sun bounced off a prototype LEGO pneumatic machine I’ve been building. Today, I finally got it to go through all the correct motions. Now, comes refinement, which may involve taking the whole thing apart and starting afresh, yet again.

When Dwight drives up to Fargo to visit his mom, I cycle out for tonkotsu ramen, or watch a musical, or fly to Chicago, or some or all of the above. Today I cycled to moto-i for tonkotsu ramen, with sumo on the side. Next up: a musical.

Cranked up the endorphins with sun, warmth, and the first cycle ride of the year. (Garden of Iron Mirrors, University of Minnesota, East Bank Campus.)

A mechanism was not working to my satisfaction this afternoon, so I worked on improving it. One step forward, two steps back.

Yum. Breakfast at Farmers Kitchen and Bar: ingredients from MN farms, owned by the MN Farmers Union. Dwight then went to his Thursday gig (volunteering in a University of MN greenhouse) and I went foraging for best prescription medication prices for both of us at two pharmacies.

Met friends at the Mall of America to walk the three main levels, about 3 miles, chatting all the way. I last visited in 2011.

At the furthest point on my walk, the heavens opened. Kept my head down as I headed back home. A hot shower made it all good.

Connected a friend’s VCR to her new TV using a video-to-HDMI converter so she can play one tape: an exercise routine she enjoys. The aspect ratio is wrong (stretched) but it’s not distracting: Richard Simmons has had many girths over the years.