New Years Eve 2019
Well, I didn’t complete all of my objectives today, since I needed to recoup sleep after waking up at 4am for an early departure to the mountains. Today was one of the few days where I slept for only 4 hours, but had enough sleep in reserve to function sans energy drinks. Admittedly, I was a bit regretful leaving the cozy warmth of my comforters–but that’s only because of my parsimonious tendency to leave the heater offline.
So, once I climbed out of bed–which is basically the floor with a dog bed memory foam cushion–I drank a grape Powerade Zero, loaded up my car with sundries, and headed off. The first leg of the trip always involves frequent glances at my gas gauge to see how long I can drive before needing to fill the tank. Usually somewhere along the 210 near the Campus shopping center, I find a gas station to fill up with an agreeable price. Today was no exception. Since the wind was blowing ferociously this morning, I was eager to take a break from driving for the unfortunate ritual. (The windy conditions were not as extreme as the day that I saw five tractor trailers tipped over.) Given habit, I caved in and replenished my energy drink arsenal from the gas station shop–anticipating the need for acute sensory functioning while navigating along icy mountain roads.
Once my tank was filled up–I continued onward. Since a Toyota silver hatchback something slammed into my rear right wheel earlier this month (along Washington Blvd.), I left the music off during the drive, listening for any signs of distress and unbalance for caution’s sake. Obviously I had no time to bring my car into a shop for an assessment–so this trip as well as others have been attended by prayers to luck (and many imaginary sacrifices of unblemished lambs).
After dealing with the chains checkpoint and making my way along tortuous roads, I finally arrived at the Quiz Cottage. Since I was supposed to meet with Ludecke’s Electric at 8:30am–I shoveled my driveway eagerly, trying to clear as much ice as possible to prevent injury from visiting upon the vendor–and to give him room to park where his truck wouldn’t be in the path of the plow.
For me–respecting a hard-working tradesman who drives an hour to do an assignment warrants the aforementioned efforts. Granted, the ice was too thick to clear entirely within a reasonable timeframe–but enough was removed to ensure safety.
By 9am, the vendor arrived and began working on installing an emergency light and Ring doorbell. Just as I surmised, installing the doorbell involved more effort than most would expect. I decided to pay for the additional work for routing the wire to the doorbell–since the design and location was not terribly accommodating. I figured it was important to maintain the convenience of having the Ring doorbell at its traditional location for visitors and emergencies.
While the cool bearded dude fished wire, I popped the register covers back on the forced air system. (Earlier I cleaned the vents to cut down on allergies–since I bloody hate suffering from them and figured the guests would appreciate not having interior air quality issues from dust pouring out of those babies.)
After a little pyrography on the bamboo serving spoons and some other miscellaneous tasks, the Electrician wrapped up, and the doorbell was officially programmed and went online. Huzzah!
Then naptime…
Since today is New Year’s Eve–I missed my window of opportunity to visit the local gym for physical therapy–which was a grand disappointment. Thus, I spent the evening attempting to navigate traffic for drywall screws and a ruler–and then returned. My next tasks are to install locks. The cordless drill ran out of juice, so I took a break and VOILA–content added to Quiz Cottage page…finally…at last.
