Weeknotes for week 27, 2023

The week of July 3rd.

Summer working is still delightful. No meetings; rarely anyone needing my help.

I've had undisturbed time to focus on tasks. I was two debuggers deep at one point (Xcode and Safari Web Inspector).

I sometimes wonder if I should pursue more of this.

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The carpet cleaning was less satisfying than expected. The carpet did come out a bit cleaner, but nothing to post to r/oddlysatisfying about.

The process was enjoyable, though! I listened to an episode of "My Favourite Murder" while cleaning. It's my second episode and I'm coming around to it.

When we picked the carpet cleaner up, it still had some dirty water that spilled on another carpet than the one we intended to clean, imparting the funk of 40 000 years (in my partner's words), so we cleaned that one too.

I made sure to return the machine a lot cleaner than we got it. I may have used tweezers at one point.

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Reading-wise, I'm trying to get into "The Darkness that Comes Before" by R. Scott Bakker but it's not grabbing me. I suspect I may DNF, but I'll push on a bit more. It has some nice worldbuilding, but it's somewhat dull and tries too hard to craft a poetic metaphor.

I'm also reading (well, mostly looking at pictures) The Fantastic Gustave Doré. Incredible artist and a nice book. (If poorly edited.)

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I've kept immersing myself in modern Mac development and having a lot of fun with it. Kind of missing a proper project, though, especially one not related to work.

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The mastic sealant that goes between our century-old sash windows and the stonework is not in the best shape. I meant to redo it last summer but kept putting it off, since I didn't know where to start.

This week I watched a few videos, talked to my handyman neighbour, and then darted off to the builders' merchant before they closed for the weekend. Big bag of mastic sand, small can of double-boiled linseed oil.

I've only done a small bit so far – figured I'd start with a small repair on a back window – but it went well, and now that I've started, I feel good about doing the rest.

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Sunday morning was beautifully sunny. I decided to mostly stay off my phone for the day, which I should do more often.

Had breakfast down the pub, outside.

Then did more work on the back window – cleaning it and doing some caulking. Looks so much better; can't wait to do the rest of the windows.

It was all so pleasant that I had to keep doing outside work until the rain clouds rolled in.

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We've been trying to locate the source of a decaying-prey smell for days and my partner finally found a decomposing bird behind a picture on the wall. I found an ex mouse behind a curtain and another behind the fridge.

The OnlyCat can't come soon enough.

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On our rewatch, we finished Mad Men season 1 and started on season 2. Keeps blowing me away with how well crafted it is. And I'm sure I pick up on different things watching it in my very late 30s (a few years older than Don!) than I did in my 20s.

I started watching the Interview with the Vampire (2022–) series and I like it! I didn't expect to. Deviates from the book but with Anne Rice's (dark) blessing. Well acted, well written. Packs a decent emotional punch, which I feel is where most shows fall flat.

I watched 12 Angry Men (1957) (after those Sunday rain clouds rolled in). Also excellent! I appreciated the stoic juror #4 for not actually getting angry.

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I enjoyed: