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Winter 2023 (Dec-Feb)
Not mentioned when I could have during the final weekend prior to the close of the Previous Quarter, I'd managed to confirm the name of my worksite ''Pussy Prospect'' as being ''Paula,'' as was uncovered during the earlier Web search, finding it associated with an unused ''Instagram'' account: this information was confirmed during a conversation with a woman named, ''Jeanette'' (sp?), who identified herself as Paula's niece, who had come by to pick Paula up and have her spend the night at her place, as Paula hadn't the means to return to her home in Spring Hill. Prior to her niece's arrival (whom she had been on the phone off-&-on with, trying to give directions to the work site because of some supposed issues with GPS), I'd been fiddling with her phone in a further attempt at setting a personalized ring-tone for her during this ''uncertain'' period until it can be verified that she would definitely advance to becoming a ''Pussy-Eating'' recipient FWB; but since I was incapable of figuring out how to set a separate ring tone for such a purpose, I relented and simply assigned her number to share the ring tone with I'd set-up for that ''on-call'' purpose, which was still only associated with ''Mimi's'' number.
And it seems that every time I'm close to making final announcements regarding the full recovery status of my overworked arms, something guaranteed crawls right back out of the woodwork to prevent any such declaration from ever happening.
December 5 - 11, 2022 (Monday-Thursday)
After dropping-off the few grocery items I'd picked-up en route to the apartment after work on Monday (Dec. 5), I then continued on to the Post Office to retrieve my ''Amazon'' order of the 32-inch computer monitor I'd ordered two weekends prior (Fri., Nov. 25), the cost of which I'd managed to mostly cover with my credit card ''Rewards Points,'' along with my repurchase of a second electric frypan to serve as a ''pseudo-replacement'' for the one I'd managed to let get broken all those months ago, which I'd now planned to keep on hand to serve strictly as a ''grill/griddle,'' while designating the newer pan to handle all other ''fluid-based'' cooking duties.
My huge concern of course was about how I was going to manage the transporting of both large packages together on the motorcycle, until upon my arrival I was informed that neither of those packages had arrived, despite the tracking message from ''Amazon'' assuring me that they had been delivered two days earlier (Sat., Dec. 3). After some searching in the back and coming-up empty, and after being told that the tracking number I'd received from Amazon was not a USPS tracking number and that it might've been part of a scam (despite how often I'd tried to explain that both the item orders and the delivery confirmation contact messages were all legitimately from Amazon), I went back out into the main open lobby to try to navigate Amazon's ''Help'' system and not getting any satisfactory answers until I'd placed a call with their stupid automated voice-recording ''assistant,'' which finally informed me that the package had been mistakenly reported as delivered but was in actuality delayed and would likely arrive the following day: when I returned inside to the queue to inform them of what I'd been told, they instead informed me that they had indeed managed to locate the package... one HUGE package, which contained both large items together.
In trying to cut open the outer box with one of the P-38 ''C-Ration'' can openers I keep on each of my key chains, I'd finally managed to accomplish the inevitable by cutting a small yet bleeding gash into my pinky finger. I then had to remove the frypan from its dedicated box in order to get the entire unit to fit underneath my motorcycle seat, then managed to my own amazement to neatly and effectively strap-down the computer monitor box securely onto the back of the seat.
After returning to the apartments, and preparing to secure & cover the motorcycle, I again noticed huge oil splotches on the pavement at the spot where I keep my motorcycle parked, and then confirmed again the extremely low oil levels in my receptacle and the appearance of oil leaking through the oil level observation window.
I really wasn't expecting too much of a size difference between the current and exchange computer monitors when I first placed the order for it, only for me to be quite surprised at how wrong I was, realizing that the extra size would definitely make all of the difference when watching DVD/BD movies and streaming content, while albeit making other ''productivity'' usages a bit uncomfortable and more than a little bit disorienting: the only thing to upset me about it though was the fact that it was not designed to include a VGA port (which I'd somehow overlooked before placing the order for it), which if my current computer did not have a DVI connection would've meant that I'd have been pretty screwed.
Finally decided to update my ''HealthCare.gov/Obamacare'' information Tuesday (Dec. 6) Tuesday (Dec. 6)''GoPro''-like ... later that day I finally did some perusing of ''Amazon'' in search of a decent ''GoPro''-like helmet-mountable video camera, especially in light of the most recent attempt of somebody trying to run me down as I was making a left turn from another of these upcropping of annoying 4-way stops this stupid city is insisting on installing all over the place of late, and found one that from all observations (posted video reviews & tutorials) seemed like it might be reasonably effective and reliable, which Amazon was similarly hyping as a ''Best Seller'' in tandem with a supposed limited-time ''Countdown Deal'' which I'd mistakenly ordered then canceled after I'd seen it selling a few hours later at a lower price, only to embarrassingly learn after trying to reclaim it at the ''lower'' price that I'd forgotten about the sales tax assessment that had to be factored into the final total.
I gave those heavy semi-loop corkscrew earrings a final try by wearing them overnight Thursday (Dec. 8); by the morning found them still painful to wear, so I will essentially be canceling them and trying to figure out a how/where to discard/transfer them.
I finally got around to photo-cataloging the entirety of my DVD/BD library Friday (Dec. 9), as part of my preparation to upload my first new content on the replacement channel that ''Who?Tube'' essentially forced me into because of their pretentious and selectively enforced B.S.
I completed my ''ObamaCare'' update application Saturday Morning (Dec. 10), then checked the oil level situation on my motorcycle before heading to the Post Office to retrieve my latest deliveries, which included the shelved bathroom mirror I'd ''Vine-ordered.'' Because of the off-set spot where I'd left the motorcycle parked I was able to absolutely confirm the leakage problem and from where the leak was occurring before topping the level off with some of the cleaner old oil from a past change I'd still held onto.
I decided not to delay and proceeded to assemble and hang the mirror immediately, even though it meant that I'd be missing out on grabbing an extra little nap before having to leave for work.
After clocking-in at the jobsite, I learned while in conversation with one of the short-order cooks at the sports bar behind my work location that the new restaurant that was in the process of being established on the East corner was offering free salad bowls to customers as part of their staff training, so he and I went to take advantage of it.
While on my ''lunch break'' at work Sunday (Dec. 11), I responded to another ''chat request'' from someone who claimed to be interested in my ''Pussy-Eating'' offer I'd posted on ''reddit,'' where I've resorted to the strategy of identifying myself as a ''Woman'' (since in a very ''technical'' sense we're all basically ''female'' anyway as a result of the so-called ''X-chromosome'') and making the requests under the ''Female-seeking-Female'' category -- in an attempt to test the waters of self-identifying Lesbian and Bi-Sexual as well as Heterosexual women, as ''Straight Men'' routinely get widely skirted around. This time the response to one of my ''reddit'' Personal Ads actually resulted in a pretty decent back-&-forth text conversation, which I broke off after a few exchanges in order to get back to work and to attempt to get away from phone texting by giving her my old terminated ''Who?Tube'' email address so I could converse more freely and easily stationed at the PC.
Also learned (inadvertently) during the weekend, first at work, then back at the apartments, that letting my motorcycle rest on the side kickstand, instead of the center stand, greatly minimized the leakage of oil, so that this would then become my temporary solution to the greater problem until I got around to getting it fixed properly.
Unmentioned Highlights from Previous Quarter...
''Full Week in Review''
December 12 - 15, 2022 (Monday-Thursday)
On Monday (Dec. 12) I hung the new curtain that I use for my bedroom doorway, which I'd ordered as a replacement for the original one I'd hung there when I could no longer tolerate the ''hair grease'' stains that stood out as an unsettling distraction -- especially in light of all of the aesthetic improvements I'd been making to my living surroundings thanks in largest part to my actively participating in the ''Amazon Vine'' product reviewing program.
I'd decided to go this ''replacement'' route due to the fact that past scrubbing efforts had proven fruitless, causing me to conclude that the stains had become so deeply entrenched that any attempts to remove them completely, or even moderately, would be a lost cause. Even so, I decided to see if it might have still been possible to salvage the original item at all by cutting away the white liner backing and washing the main colored portion in the bathtub/shower. To my amazement, using only the ''hand soap'' I use as my normal body wash, those stains ''appeared'' to be washing out, but it would not be until after I'd allowed the panel to sit soaked overnight and performed a follow-up wash & rinse the next morning Tuesday (Dec. 13) that I realized that I probably did not even need to bother with ordering a replacement, as the thing came out as clean and clear as when I'd first put it up. Even though I was to learn that the re-purchase was ultimately unnecessary, it still served me in the sense that I could clip the older panel to the newer one and have the aesthetic benefit of showing the exact same display facing both ways-- from both inside and outside --instead of having it set-up to where I was always going to have a single side of a ''white'' liner always facing in one direction.
Not much else going on throughout the remainder of the week, apart from paying off my credit card statements and periodically retouching the photographs I'd taken of my DVD/BD Library collection, thanks to the B.S. color grading of the camera I was using, which actually wound-up requiring me to color-/contrast-correct every single image. I also decided to switch my healthcare plan after mulling over the fact that I'd probably more likely benefit from a ''No Deductible'' because I could not envision any (precognitive) medical situations where I'd be able to rack-up out-of-pocket expenses to meet the $550 deductible (...at least, not this year going in).
I received a call/text from our Account Supervisor Thursday (Dec. 15) informing me of a change to my work schedule which, at first glance, might actually work out a lot better to my benefit, as it relates to my commuting period and sleeping strategy, although I'm none too thrilled with the idea of having to arrive to work three (3) hours earlier... but then it also has the trade-off benefit of allowing me to ''ha'alele'' three hours earlier and better avoid other traffic during my return trip.
...And, of course, the ''reddit'' pussy-eating prospect from over the weekend never follow-up and ''ghosted''... as expected.
''Week in Review''
December 23 - 25, 2022 (Friday-Sunday) x December 30, 2022 - January 1, 2023 (Friday-Sunday)
Was working Friday Night, Dec. 23, on finishing the production on my DVD/BD library ''Who?Tube'' video project, which was mainly designed to entice Paula's attention, making sure I'd littered it throughout with various memes which made very blatant references to pussylicking activity. I'd wanted to get the project completed and posted before the turn of the night, but wasn't able to wrap-it-up fully until close to around 2:00 the next morning, Sat., Dec. 24.
Before heading out for work later in the day, I'd finally decided, practically at the last minute, to commit to trying to figure out and assemble that helmet cam mount so that I'd be able to use that opportunity to put the camera to an actual in-the-field test in order to get a feel for how it would/should work and what tweaks/adjustments needed to made to help me get optimal use out of it.
Shortly after arriving to the jobsite I found that prior to leaving the site at the conclusion of my most recent day of work I'd managed to drop my original (microphoneless) set of ear buds in the parking stall: I'd not realized that they had even been missing up until that moment... and of course, because of the continuous in-&-out of traffic in the area, they were noticeably smashed, and I'd assumed without bothering to check, damaged beyond operation.
During my mealtime break I used that time to review my recorded dashcam footage and discovered that as long as the camera is set to record in ''looping'' mode it will only continuously record files broken down into ten (10) minute snippets. The fact that I'd recorded anything at all was actually a huge surprise, because in my haste to depart from the apartment, along with my still confused unfamiliarity with the camera's features, I'd mistakenly believed that I was actually riding in video darkness.
I ran what I felt were the most pertinent from among the collection of clips I'd recorded ''To-Work'' (Sat.) and ''From-Work'' Monday (Dec. 26) through my video editing software and produced a series of videos documenting my on-road ''test runs'' and uploaded them onto ''Who?Tube'' the following day (Thu., Dec. 27).
The following Wednesday Night (Dec. 28) I discovered that my copy of the infamous horror movie classic, ''Silent Night, Deadly Night,'' was missing from my DVD collection... this only after I'd intended to snapshot a frame from the movie as a guessing meme for one of the ''reddit'' communities I interact with: my most logical assumption is that it got lost in transit when one of the boxes had gotten damaged and items spilled out as they were being shipped from Virginia to Florida when I was making that residential transition, apparently having been part of the same box which had contained my ''Special Limited Edition'' (metal ''Mars Face'' tin) of ''Total Recall'' which had also gotten lost (or destroyed?) in the process.
Ran another cam road test for the second weekend: the first (Sat., Dec. 31) being in the rain, testing out the ''waterproof case,'' which was going to require me to bring the second battery along for the ride, as being completely encased and sealed from the outside there was no way to attach the USB power supply cord running from the 12V ''cigarette lighter'' to the camera (something I'd learned the previous weekend would essentially have to be a requirement, as the batteries that were provided hold a charge for shit), only to learn that removing/exchanging the batteries forces a date/time stamp reset; then tried again after work the following day (Sun., Jan. 1) unshielded in heavy fog.
Sent ''Mimi'' a follow-up text about a half an hour after Midnight, using that whole ''New Year'' garbage as a convenient excuse to try reaching out again, hoping to get some information back on whether she's even still in Brooksville or has taken-up residence back in NY.
''Holiday Weekend -to- Holiday Weekend in Review''
January 6 - 8, 2023 (Friday-Sunday)
It seemed that some ''Forces'' out there in the Cosmos was giving me a series of the biggest ''Middle-Finger 'Eph-Yews'!'' one right after the other this entire weekend, beginning with the observation that when Friday (Jan. 6) rolled around I'd somehow managed to lose track of the passing of an entire day, having believed that I was actually only in ''Thursday.''
From there, things only continued to take a downward spiral, beginning with getting into a confrontational back-&-forth with a select handful of whiny crybaby ''Karens'' in one of the ''subreddits'' I've been participating in who decided to whip-up a pouty-faced display of Fake Moral Outrage in opposition to how I'd decided to title one of my post-headings, accusing me of racist signaling or some shit, which resulted in at least one of the ''Moderators'' taking their Fake ''Woke'' antics to heart and deleting said post... then repeating the process after I'd defiantly resubmitted the exact same post with no alterations, except to include a disclaimer that the clowns who were actually taking offense (whether they were genuinely ''offended,'' I sincerely have my doubts) were reading way too much into the title than what they should have. After this, I'd decided-- for the THIRD and FINAL time (''3-Strikes, and I'm Out!'') --that it's simply not worth me wasting my time and effort to keep wallowing in that pool of underlying toxicity always waiting in the wings to destroy somebody's [quote] ''Fun'' [unquote] ... so I made the decision that after the Weekend was over, I was going to flood the channel with every standby intended contribution I'd been holding in reserve up to that point, and then completely ''ghost'' their little clique altogether, not even responding to anything that followed in its wake.
Then after arriving at the jobsite on Saturday (Jan. 7) my phone kept giving me issues: I'd tried repeatedly to ''clock-in'' (then of course later ''clock-out'') at our ''check-in'' number, but every time it would go to ''dial'' the number the signal-strength bars would dip-out, no dialing would occur, then I'd get hit with an error message saying that the ''Network'' was ''Not Available,'' or something to that effect. This continued to be the case even as I'd tried calling various other numbers throughout the day.
I'd been having a few minor connection hiccup issues with this phone sporadically for the past couple of weeks, which I'd paid no real mind to, treating them as bit annoyances, but perhaps I should've considered the possibility of the existence of some other deeper issue(s) when a ''pic-text'' I'd tried sending Paula earlier in the day Friday (wherein I'd brought-up my currently ''depressed'' state and made sure to very deliberately mention to her how my not having ''Mimi's'' pussy to eat anymore was a strong contributing factor to my ''downer'' emotional state) never actually got delivered to her inbox until after I'd noticed later that night that the message had just been sitting there hung-up and going nowhere until I made a few ''connection'' tweaks and re-sent it.
After work Sunday (Jan. 8), I got hit by another cute little surprise in that while my helmet was being stored inside my motorcycle's underseat compartment the camera mounting had detached from the helmet. At first, I was almost ready to accept that I might have actually been somewhat at fault in that development, perhaps as a result of having not been particularly careful in my positioning it inside the storage compartment... but when I switched out the old ''double-sided'' adhesive (which came as a standard part of the kit) with a fresh one before making the return trip back to the jobsite for my next workshift, the whole assembly once again detached on its own just as I was crossing the ''Hillsborough Ave.'' overpass on ''Dale Mabry Hwy.''
After not being able to check-in again, or make any outbound calls at all, I finally decided to text my Mother to get her to try to call my number to see if this was a two-way street regarding voice calls, as EVERYTHING ELSE associated with the phone and its ''networks'' (apps, texts, Internet, all that) continued to perform as they should -- and none of the ''troubleshooting'' suggestions I'd come across did anything to correct the problem. She sent me a text later in the night informing me that when she did try to call, she'd get sent straight to ''voicemail,'' which I've still not bothered to set-up.
''Weekend in Review''
January 23 - 29, 2023 (Monday-Sunday)
I've been ignoring and avoiding updates to these entries as well as not addressing the living-life issues I've been up against for two main reasons: (1) the cold... and the tuned-out lethargy and melancholia that accompanies it; and (2) just the shear frustration and practical surrender I've been feeling following the blip-out of my cellphone.
Became aware of the unseasonably warm (outside) day Wednesday (Jan. 25) only because I was startled awake by the sound of my chimes being tampered with, so I'd decided to quickly investigate, only to learn that what I'd actually heard were not any of the chimes I'd had hanging outside but had come from the ones hanging inside in front of my access doorway (which explained why they'd sounded mysteriously odd and ''unfamiliar''), which had been disturbed by a large ass gecko, which was still hanging on the chime pipes at the time of investigation, which for some inexplicable reason had managed to find its way inside my apartment unobserved since God only knows when. After I'd smacked the creature back outside and took note of the pleasant weather, it was decided that I should take advantage of the pleasant conditions by opening all of the windows, allowing some fresh outside air to circulate through the place, and using it as a 'no-more-excuses' opportunity to re-sand & [try-to] polish my motorcycle windshield and to do ''some'' cleaning/clearing-up inside the apartment.
I let slip my ophthalmologist appointment for Thursday (Jan. 26),
using as my convenient excuse that I'd not received my ''reminder'' email as I'd been promised when I'd stopped in to inquire about getting a refill on my eyedrops the previous weekend.
Prior to my grocery shopping running-about Friday (Jan. 27) I went to retrieve packages from the Post Office, which included the pair of ''DC Superheroes'' ceramic coffee mugs I'd ordered from ''Zazzle,'' whose print work was BARELY any better than that of the Justice League ''Snyder Cup'' I'd ordered & received during the prior weeks, which was such a trash job that I don't even want to acknowledge the cursed thing, nor care to recall the name of the company I'd ordered it from.
It was during this visit when I finally broached the subject about one of my ''Amazon Vine'' items that had been recorded as having been delivered to the mailroom but which I'd still not personally received a month later. The P.O. staff (manager?) claimed that they could find nothing in their records to confirm the delivery had been made, as this item-- a dash-mounted cellphone holder --was apparently delivered by one of Amazon's in-house or ''contracted'' delivery services, since it had inadvertently been addressed to be delivered to the ''physical building location'' rather than directly to the P.O. Box via USPS. Yet in another ironic twist, during my after-work stop into the Post Office to retrieve more mail Sunday (Jan. 29) there was a slip informing me of an item that they were holding for a limited amount of time before it gets ''shipped back'' -- an item which I could not associate with anything I'd recently ordered, as I could not match the tracking number with anything I'd requested... at least not anything I'd ordered through Amazon... not even from among the pair of items from the order that had been ''canceled'' because of having been reported as ''undeliverable,'' leaving me completely stumped as to what in the world could've been awaiting me.
''Full Week in Review''
January 30 - February 5, 2023 (Monday-Sunday)
I finally decided to get around to trying to address my ''network'' issues with my ''TracFone'' Monday (Jan. 30). After however long spent in an online diagnostic chat session, I was advised to change my number to a ''local area'' provided number, which I'd doubted would fix the problem, despite being hopeful all the same, only to once again wind-up having another of my suspicions proving to be correct.
I decided not to follow-up on the issue again until later in the afternoon on Thursday (Feb. 2), shutting off the chat with the first two Customer Service Reps who constantly kept leaving me hanging and who really did not seem all that knowledgeable about anything relating to my phone or its operation, until I'd connected with a third Rep who did seem quite knowledgeable, or who knew perhaps how to ask someone else in the System to provide her with answers & suggestions which seemed pertinent and geared toward some genuine troubleshooting. After what felt like it had to have been over an hour in back-&-forth and exploring all of the options we could consider, she then advised me to go to ''Walmart'' and have them assist me in connecting with an over-the-phone technician there, since I was told that I'd need access to an alternative number (which I no longer have, due to my ridding myself of the landline) in order for them to contact me and guide me through the issues. After the requisite four-hour wait, I went to the ''US-19 @ Ridge Road'' Walmart to do just that, but was informed that the ''Tracfone'' rep/tech, who's actually an ''on-site'' person, was pau hana for the day, but would be back the following morning.
Back in the apartment, I finally proceeded to pay-off the remaining two bills which stemmed from my getting run-into and knocked-over into the street in October, with the ''ER'' bill this time finally deciding to accept my credentials and permitted me access to their site so that I could pay it off online, instead of through mail or over the telephone.
I'd had every intention of getting an early start on my last-minute errands run Friday Morning (Feb. 3), but yet again found myself making excuses and delaying until practically the last possible moment, first leaving for the Post Office somewhat after 15:00 to claim my ''Vine-ordered'' curtain rod and to find out what the ''held delivery'' notice was in relation to, only to be told that it had been sent in mistake and that I'd already retrieved that package (meaning it was likely the ''Zazzle'' coffee mugs order, since none of my ''Amazon'' orders matched the tracking number), as well as to [finally] ship off that box of gifts I'd intended to send to my Mother, which had since expanded beyond the Nat ''King'' Cole DVD I'd purchased from the ''Dollar Tree'' DVD/BD movies section to include a car ''cigarette lighter'' phone charger, a set of LED light bulbs, two pairs of gold-plated (supposedly) silver ear rings, and a ''Birth-Year'' celebration ceramic coffee mug -- all of which were items I'd received as part of my ''Amazon Vine'' participation (all totaled, the package cost over $13 to ship out).
After dropping off my package at the apartment I then continued on to renew my motorcycle's registration for the next two years.
By the time I'd completed those tasks, it was too late for me to be able to meet with the ''Tracfone'' rep at Walmart, so I was going to have to delay it until Monday...
...or so I thought. ~ As it turned out, after I'd contacted (texted) our Scheduling Supervisor, inquiring about why no one was on site to hand off the ''work phone'' after I'd arrived at the worksite Saturday (Feb. 4), I was informed in response that our services were no longer required there and that he'd tried both calling and emailing me to inform me of the change: I'd explained the incoming/outgoing phone call situation to him, but he insisted that whenever he had tried to email me, those email messages would get sent back to him as undelivered/undeliverable.
So on the trip back, I used that opportunity to stop into the ''Florida 54 @ Little Street'' Walmart location, as this was where I'd been informed during my first visit at the ''Ridge/19'' location that this was where the in-store Tech/Rep be working on Saturdays.
After informing her of the issue, and as she discussed the problems with outside Tech Support on another phone line, we were stuck there in the ''Electronics'' department for damb-near a full two hours trying to get it all squared away. Literally right at the very seconds that I was ready to suspect that they were going to call the process off and instruct me to follow-up with it after a 24-hour period, the store Rep revealed to me that this was what the Tech Support people had actually told her... and literally immediately after she had just told me this, the final ''test call'' she'd placed on my phone had finally managed to call out and complete a connection right then and there -- a couple more ''outgoing'' test calls, both inside and outside of the store, confirmed that the repairs had at last been completely successful (at least as far as ''outgoing'' calls were concerned). The whole process had resulted in the store Tech having to stay over past her pau hana time for something like between a half-hour to an hour.
As the store tech/rep would also go on to explain during the investigative process, problems such as this were far from being unique to my particular case: she'd stated that Tracfone customers have been having all sorts of connectivity issues ever since the company had instituted a switching-out of their SIM cards to become exclusively compatible with ''Verizon'' network towers. So the following morning (Sun., Feb. 5), as I was looking further into the various different makes & models of other phones, as this situation had become my inspiration to give serious consideration to replacing or supplementing my current device, I would discover that Tracfone had been entirely purchased by ''Verizon,'' which perhaps helped explain some of these issues.
I did ultimately decide to purchase a Motorola model ''Moto G Power'' via Tracfone's website, asking a hella bunch of questions re: transferring my apps, contacts, data, minutes, etc., as well as asking about retaining and/or changing phone numbers.
I put off following-up my initial previous evening's contact with our Scheduling Supervisor, deciding to take the day to myself, choosing instead to update Paula and ''Mimi'' about the number change via text, and was surprised that I'd gotten an immediate response from Mimi, to which I sent a follow-up message trying to tease from her whether she'd actually relocated to New York or if she was [actually still?] in the area and was just laying low, to which I did not receive any response.
I also chose to put a delay on updating any of my personal accounts and such until I'd had a chance to port everything over to the new phone.
''Full Week in Review''
February 6, 2023 (Monday)
Texted our Scheduling Manager early this morning, then went back to sleep, unaware that he'd sent a reply text some two-and-a-half hours later, having only become aware of it when I was awakened two hours after than by an email alert. I called back right away, and he gave me a few but not very detailed bits of information about the site he'd considered me for, also explaining that it was essentially the same ''total hours worked'' as previously, less a half-hour (which I'm assuming will involve an obligatory ''lunch break'' of some sort) and at a dollar-per-hour lower pay, but which will largely be on a ''direct'' route down Florida Highway 54 with a commute time cut at least by half.
Later in the afternoon, I kept trying to access the transit/delivery status of the package I'd sent, but the Postal Services website kept kicking-up non-connection issues as I'd repeatedly kept entering ''tracking'' information, and direct calls to the area Post Office proper kept not getting answered. By the time I'd finally managed to connect via the website, there was only a little less than an hour left before the Service Desk closed for the day (as the tracking information stated that the package was ready for ''pick-up'') -- so I called my Mother to inform her of the package's arrival and that she should go out and grab it right then and there, but she'd informed me that she was waiting on a callback from someone at her bank because they've been continually sending her ''late payment'' alerts on her loan repayments, which had not started becoming a problem until some outfit that can't seem to be able to spell the word, ''TRUST,'' gobbled-up her bank in yet another of a long-line of Corporate Mergers she's insisted on riding out without doing as I would've long ago done, which would be to sever ties at the completion of the first proposed takeover/merger and open an account elsewhere, just I'd done back home when our little local operation called, ''City Bank,'' told a false bravado bald-faced lie by saying they'd been fighting any sort of takeover attempts and had absolutely no intentions of ever agreeing to any merger deals, only to proclaim later that they were indeed selling themselves off to ''Central Pacific Bank,'' which spurred my withdrawing my funds & closing my account with them before the transition even got started and reopening an account with ''Bank of Hawaii,'' with whom I'd been with originally before allowing myself to be enticed over to ''City Bank.'' In any event, by the time she'd gotten off of the phone with her bank Rep, she called back just at the very same second I'd completed a text to her informing her of the time the Post Office Service Desk closes; she texted back saying that she felt the office would have already been closed by the time she arrived there (having about 15 minutes remaining) and that she would check into it in the Morning.
23:45, Eastern Standard Time
February 7, 2023 (Tuesday)
Left the apartment and subsequently arrived a few minutes late for the newly scheduled job site; turned out that I would be relieved early by the same supervisor who'd familiarized me with the location and duties only six hours earlier, saying that the Scheduling Manager had informed him that I was being considered for an alternative location where they'd supposedly needed people to be staffed; once I'd returned to the apartment and called for a follow-up however, I was informed that he was still looking into finding a spot for me -- so I have no genuine idea why he felt it was necessary to cut me loose early as he did (I would subsequently pass on a request to cover a fill-in shift for Thursday that would've taken me to some boat dock location clear on the other side of Tampa).
Back inside, I took advantage of the milder weather outside to ventilate the apartment again and to hang the ''Vine'' ordered rods & curtains in my bedroom.
22:00, Eastern Standard Time
February 8, 2023 (Wednesday)
Just now completed my Tax Returns, after a couple of hours of bouncing around from website to website in search of information relating to this whole ''Amazon Vine'' cluster@#$& regarding that ''1099-NEC'' form they send out, where nobody seems to be able to answer the simplest questions about it or clear-up any of the ''Bureaucratese'' gobbledygook related to it, for which ''Turbo Tax'' tried to get sneaky about by making it a ''paid premium'' service. In the end, when all was said and done, I'd been assessed with a ''bill'' for $222 ~ fun times....
23:45, Eastern Standard Time
February 13 - 16, 2023 (Monday-Thursday)
Confirmed on Tuesday (Feb. 14) that my motorcycle's left handbrake had completely given out, which I'd first become aware of when I made a Post Office run two days earlier to retrieve my ''TracFone'' replacement and ''Amazon'' orders: I've still yet to actually examine whether it was as a result of something related to the hydraulic line or if it was because the brake pads had worn down, and propping the cycle up onto its center stand for the first time since identifying the leaking oil problem did not correct the situation, as seemed to have been the case after those lucky bastiches got away with running me down in the road.
Spent God-knows how much time on Monday (Feb. 13) between three different TracFone ''support chat'' reps: the first of whom had cut me off (I suspect deliberately) shortly after the session had started, then the second one losing the connection after the Rep had placed me on hold supposedly to inquire about a particularly specific question I'd raised, which then recycled me back into the waiting queue before I was able to reconnect with a third person who'd assured me when I'd asked that she'd managed to pull-up the chat log from my interaction with the previous Rep (which I'd still had displayed on my PC screen), only for her to persistently pester me for my Activation Codes, which I kept reiterating to her were already provided in the chat log which she claimed to have had access to, along with continually frustrating me by constantly refusing to give specific answers to any questions I'd raised at her anytime she'd instructed me to follow through on something for which I'd demanded CLEAR and unambiguous specific answers so I could know what, when, and how to do a particular action. Everything related to this whole fiasco would've been so much simpler and a helluvalot more quickly handled if instead of having me running around in all sorts of circles they'd all simply understood and could answer my major concern, which was about how to transfer my files & apps over from the current phone to the newer ''replacement'' phone in light of the fact that I'd not then yet activated the new phone nor deactivated the old one: the simple and quick solution would've been to explain to me from the get-go that it did not matter if I'd had an active ''service plan'' or not... that as long as I'd had access to a Wi-Fi station, I could still use the phone as an active ''Internet Device'' for anything and everything related to the 'Net, including transferring, downloading, and using device Apps, and that I'd only be required to sign-up for a service plan if and only if I'd intended to use the device as a ''mobile communications'' device (i.e. ''cell phone'' and ''text messager'').
I then later used several different methods, using their own in-house app, the phone's own built-in file-transfer ''wizard,'' and (God forgive me) even Google's ''One Drive'' or whatever the #@$X they call that thing, to try to affect the transfer of all of my apps and personal files & information across phones, only to be met with the disappointment that not everything (in particular, my apps library) would transfer over successfully, which would then lead to my focusing on scouring the ''App Store'' for every program I'd had installed on the original in order to (re-)establish on the new phone... which even then could not be entirely duplicated, given the fact that quite a significant number of the ones I'd installed on the first phone were no longer available on Goo-Goo's App Store, forcing me to track down and install approximately close substitutions.
The next series of those associated particular frustrations would all have to wait until after I'd returned from ''work'' Tuesday, the following day: I'd received a call from our Scheduling Manager on Monday informing me of a location he'd wanted to see if I'd be interested in working, and gave me the option of which day I'd wanted to go in to familiarize myself with the location and job duties -- and I'd chosen to jump the gun by agreeing to come in on this particular day, having forgotten that it was both ''Valentine's Day'' (as if I cared at all about it) and was my final square to stand on before my credit cards' bill payments deadline the next day (Wed., Feb. 15).
I liked neither the job duties nor the movement restrictions it placed upon me, and it was stressing me out early enough during the shift (especially when factoring in that I'd arrived on duty operating on less than four hours' worth of sleep) that I was seriously considering on bowing out of taking it on at all anytime after that, especially if it were to turn out to be a regular gig he'd wanted to assign to me, but I'd managed somehow to find a certain ''rhythm'' (as long as it was allowed to operate more-or-less on ''My Terms'') that would permit me to stubbornly face it down and tackle it for the most part... at least for the next while or so.
Shortly after returning from the jobsite, I finally made the decision to try that ''Italian'' Restaurant called, ''Joey's'' (at ''Southgate Plaza'' on US-19), to get a sense of what their ''New York Style'' pizza was like... and I was not at all impressed, not even slightly: meaning that for NY Pizza that's accessible ''Locally'' (in the rough vicinity), for the time being, until I'm able to come across another purveyor of that particular cuisine item that might prove itself better at it, I'll be making ''Sam's'' (on ''Little Road'') my go-to place.
I spent literally the entire day Wednesday, from waking 'til past Midnight into Thursday (Feb. 16) focusing all of my time and attentions on getting my phone's apps personal library stocked and installed, setting phone and apps preferences & permissions, and all that jazz, just taking a break long enough to later in the early evening clear out my credit card debts. I managed to finish-up to the point of near-completion later in the day Thursday, being left mainly with trying to track down & install/establish a new collection of ring tones to replace those one I'd utilized which were now an inaccessible part of the old phone's infrastructure, making them virtually impossible to transfer over (I've no desire to try to access something where I've little to no idea what I'd be doing only to wind-up breaking something beyond immediate repair), and thus by extension meaning my inability to re-assign them to their individualized ''Caller-ID'' numbers or alert/activity tasks.
It was sometime during the period of these later set-ups, while scouting around the Internet to learn how to locate and access certain operational features, that I'd learned that ''LG,'' the manufacturer of my original smartphone, was no longer in the phone production business, thus partially explaining why I was no longer able to find a replacement for my original phone with an identical or similar model... which really sux, because it was (and still is) a dambed good phone.
I also took time during this phase to contact Amazon's customer service to (finally) report to them that I'd not received the ''Vine'' item that was reported delivered but of which the Post Office has no record: suspecting that probably nothing will be resolved relating to it. I then proceeded to peruse the site again and noticed in my ''Wish List'' that the alternative/competitor ''GoPro-like'' camera I'd set aside in reserve when I was comparing several different offerings had been selected as one of Amazon's ''Lightning'' deals (or however they refer to those product-pushing promotions) and that it now had a significant discount applied to it, along with a ''coupon code'' that when applied would drop the price by an additional Ten Dollars ~ and I'd have never given even remotely serious consideration to this impulsive additional purchase had it not been for all of the continued flakiness and frustration-inducing of the one I'd initially purchased.
''Week in Review''
February 22, 2023 (Wednesday)
Spent the bulk of the Day's waking hours, beginning the previous night and including the post-Midnight and pre-Dawn hours, trying to render the video I shot of myself and Mimi the previous evening, having my most ''versatile'' editing program continuing to be my most ''problematic'' and conflicting program, in this case deciding to keep crashing and corrupting all of my exporting attempts at various inconsistent stages during rendering, regardless of personalized tweak attempts, lack of tweaking default settings, and shutting down of background-running applications. I wasn't able to finally get the file successfully rendered, along with the necessary ''color re-grading'' so that certain... ''details'' ...could be clearly seen after I'd resorted to my ''secondary'' back-up editing program. I then texted Mimi later in the early evening about its availability after I'd posted the edited version of the video into my newly downloaded & installed Microsoft ''OneDrive'' ''cloud storage'' locker, which turned out to be an extremely annoying & irritating ''Nag-Ware'' nightmare.
This also made the second day in a row where the outside weather was pleasant enough for me to open all of the windows to allow some fresh air to circulate.
(01:40, Eastern Standard ~ next-day overshoot late entry)
February 23, 2023 (Thursday)
Sort of a repeat of yesterday, only this time I kept trying to uncover a ''100% Free'' (i.e. ''freeware''... not some bogus ''Free-to-Try'' a.k.a. ''Freemium'') software program for my webcam, since I'd forgotten in my attempt to record my most recent Pussy Eating caper that the software which came with the first web camera I'd ordered through ''Amazon Vine'' can only record continuously only up to three (3) minutes! All of the rare few that I was able to find and install would not work; and even when I'd eventually given in and was going to give ''BandiCam'' a try, after determining that the requisite ''watermark'' was no huge deal to get upset over, only to later learn after installing it that it only allowed a maximum recording time of ten (10) minutes, I still found myself faced with the ''will not work'' problem! Eventually, I'd just given-up and proceeded to try to find one of the ''cracked'' programs, only to scan a pair of the seemingly more promising ones during the downloaded-&-extraction processes only to have them be quarantined for ''trojan'' infections.
Somewhere late during this process however, I'd come across a few discussions suggesting that I could actually use ''OBS Studio,'' a ''screen-recording'' program I've had on my system for quite some time already, as a webcam recording device -- so after all of the failures of the alternatives I'd tried (or tried to try), I looked at part of a tutorial video on how to do this, and after watching for a few seconds proceeded to give it the hands-on treatment and managed to figure out the setup for myself (which is currently in ''test recording'' mode as of this typing, so I've yet to determine exactly how effective it'll work, but THUS FAR it appears to be doing what it promises).
Also sent my scheduling manager a couple of texts, one inquiring about the position in ''Land O' Lakes'' where he'd already had me that one day, and again about the position in ''Clearwater'' I'd inquired about over the weekend -- both of which having been posted on the company's online Bulletin Board of Job Openings that I receive as email alerts that I've long been subscribed to.
23:55, Eastern Standard Time
February 24 - 26, 2023 (Friday-Sunday)
Spent almost the entire day Friday (Feb 24) setting-up and shooting the entirety of my DVD/BD movie library collection with the newer (''Fujifilm'') dejikame to replace the earlier crap job that I'd attempted with the old (''Canon'') camera; I would not realize until after work the following day (Sat., Feb 25) that every image had turned out completely dark, thanks in large part to the fact that all of my attempts to manually set the aperture, despite following the Instructions Manual, were not being permitted.
My first impressions with the new ''helmet cam'' (which I finally realized was not named ''WOLFGANG,'' but ''WOLFANG'' ~ 'wolf fang'), which I'd tested over the weekend, beginning Saturday, during my commutes to and from the currently assigned (and pressuring the Scheduling Office to make ''temporary'') worksite in the ''Keystone/Odessa'' area, were overwhelmingly positive, for the most part -- especially with regard to its rate of battery consumption, despite my recording, with microphone activated, in 1080p resolution at a 60fps frame rate. I was further impressed by its ability (discovered quite by accident) to record one unbroken ''continuous'' video file, instead of being limited to some pre-programmed set-length clips, even though, due to my negative experiences with the ''Akaso'' model's penchant for producing a corrupted file out of every five or ten ''10-minute'' clips or so, I let that paranoid conditioning dictate my decision to set the clip recording rate at 3-minute intervals (while allowing a ''5-minute'' maximum clip length, versus the ''Akaso'' non-optional ''10-minute'' standard)... and yet, to-date, file corruptions do not (as of yet, anyway) seem to be a problem I'm likely to be dealing with on this camera, at least not anything foreseeable on the current horizon.
Prior to leaving for work the next day (Sun., Feb 26), in yet another case of absentminded carelessness, I'd managed to pull my beloved ''Birth-Year Commemoration'' coffee mug that I'd ordered through Amazon's ''Vine'' program off from the kitchen counter top, causing it to chip and badly crack as a result of the drop... but not before slamming onto my sock-wearing foot, which was likely the only reason it didn't shatter into a bajillion shards & pieces. What pissed me off most about it was that I'd already known, even after I'd finished unpacking it, that it was going to become the main target of all of my collection of ceramic mugs to be met with such a tragic fate, simply and purely because of my deep affinity I'd attached to it, which of course had me fuming over why the catastrophe could not have happened to a more ''deserving'' cup, particularly that piece of shit hack job that its makers have the shameless gall to pass-off as a cup honoring the ''Justice League'' ''SNYDER CUT''! And as it to make matters worse, the injury was persistently painful and had interfered with me all throughout my workshift that I was beginning to wonder if I hadn't somehow managed to have broken the toe the cup fell on.
After work, I decided to continue down to get a ''Sam's'' pizza, then later in the night, again through the early morning hours, set-up and [re-]shot my entire DVD/BD collection, this time relying on an ''Automatic'' with forced flash activated.
''Weekend in Review''
February 27 - March 2, 2023 (Monday-Thursday)
Spent the week trying to get through editing/rendering alternately between the photographs of my DVD/BD movie library and my downloaded ringtones, completing the former task on Tuesday Afternoon (Feb. 28) and just finishing the latter around roughly a half-past Midnight Thursday (Mar. 2), immediately after which I sent a text to Paula partially to mention my progress with regard to the new phone set-up and partially to gripe about how I'm now convinced that my Scheduling Manager is deliberately obstructing my ability to transfer out to a different, preferred and more desirable jobsite than the one where he's seemingly trying to keep me locked currently, as evidenced by the fact that for the past couple of weeks I've been texting him constantly about certain job postings which appear in my email alerts that I either keep telling him I'm interested in (when I have some good idea where they are and/or what they entail) or asking him to get more information about regarding the specifics and to get back to me -- but he's always got some excuse as to why he's hesitant to look into it, or most recently telling me he [quote] ''forgot'' [unquote] and placed another person in the exact same position I'd been practically begging to be offered for two straight weeks! ...thus letting me know that if I'm ever going to have any chance to get out of my current job assignment, I'm going to have to start making some calls and ''go behind his back,'' as it were. I then proceeded to begin work on my replacement ''Home Movie Library'' video project right afterward, pleased to discover that I'd not hastily trashed the saved editing project from the previous one, thus saving me a LOT of time and additional effort in getting everything re-compiled and updated.
''Week in Review''
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