Category Archives: doing it wrong

The Future Imagined in Albert Robida’s La vie électrique (1890) from thePublic Domain Review.

Have I ever complained about how cold it is on the bus in the summer? I surely have but can’t find a post about that right now.

As soon as the sun comes out and the daily high gets into the 60s, apparently the buses are mandated to crank the air conditioning.

I had this great idea to find a summer coat. I envisioned something very thin but also fleecy so it would be cozy but not a giant thing to haul around on a hot day. Numerous searches yielded nothing I was willing to buy. Anything that was close was too expensive or a weird color or too close to something I already had that I didn’t want to be my summer coat.

Then somehow I got an idea for a summer blanket and after searching around I found: travel blankets! And that cracked the search wide open. I had about 3 that would have worked but I narrowed it down and I bought 2. One for me and one for a friend or to keep in the car or whatever I decided.

I’ve been hauling it around and then the first time it was cold enough that I would want to use it – I was too embarrassed to take it out. I know. What’s wrong with me? I’d rather sit there shivering then get out my travel blanket that I bought specifically for when I’m too cold on the bus. Like all the other passengers would be looking at the weird old lady with her bus blanket.

The second time I was too cold it was morning. This particular type of bus must double as a meat locker when it’s not being used to drive people around. Just sitting in the seat I felt like I was getting freezer burn. I whipped out my blanket and cozied up under it and it was perfect. And I felt so smart and prepared. (This is what I got.)(Not sponsored — I’ve never sponsored anything but just in case you were wondering.)

Last post from the San Francisco trip. My husband wanted to do the tour at Internet Archive. This is about the 10 millionth thing that my husband wanted to do that I never heard of and wasn’t wild about and ended up loving. I don’t even know how he knew they did tours because I can’t find a link for you.

I didn’t take a photo myself but they bought the building they are in partly because it looks like their logo. More info here.

Remember these big fat computer books?

Internet Archive is an incredible organization that, as the name suggests, is creating a digital library of everything it reasonably can. There’s music and software and books. I didn’t take notes, I just listened so any info listed here will be from the website.

Alcove full of servers

A single copy of the Internet Archive library collection occupies 200+ Petabytes of server space and they store at least 2 copies of everything.

Among the many amazing features is the Wayback Machine which has the history of more than 1 trillion web pages on the Internet.

Here is the earliest capture of pamrentz.com on August 15, 2001.

Sample scanning device.

Their main thing is books. They partner with a bookstore and travel all around checking out books from estate sales or wherever.

Our tour guide told a story of being out with one of the founders and coming across a box of books left on a porch. The founder had to stop and go through it to make sure there wasn’t anything there that wasn’t in the archive. There’s an app they use for that. Maybe anyone can.

Look for Tony Vanza at Internet Archive events.

If any of this sounds even a tiny bit interesting to you — check the website. It is an overwhelming source of information.

And they are funded largely by private donations so if you appreciate what they do and have room in your charitable giving there is a link at the website.

Now you’re probably thinking, wait. What are those statues in the alcove photo?

Those are people who work at Archive.Org. The building they are in used to be a church and part of the tour is in the great room and as you walk in you see these statues everywhere. It’s a little creepy until you hear the story. After an employee has been their 3 years, they get a statue.

I’ve always enjoyed jigsaw puzzles but I never really did them at home. We usually do them during family holidays.

My sister-in-law gave me a puzzle caddy for Christmas and I have been puzzling away. I am dealing with some stress in my life and I find listening to podcasts or audiobooks and working on a jigsaw puzzle to be very restorative.

But I already finished all the puzzles in the house so my brother-in-law loaned me a five-pack of puzzles with different sizes.

500 pieces is a good weekend size but I also like the bigger ones.

This Florida one is a 750 and also a good size. This was brand new — I cut open the bag and look: missing pieces.

At first I blamed myself and crawled around on the floor and moved furniture in case the pieces jumped and ran to hid on their own.

But then I realized: how could I have lost just these pieces in the corner? Must have been a factory error.

Warning: I am planning to make some changes to the website which means it probably won’t work for a while. Stay tuned.

When I was at the bus stop I saw this little sign. I did not take it because I felt certain there are those who need more hope than I do.

I am kinda frazzled at the moment and really phoning in these posts.

I have a huge note in my phone with ideas and partially written posts but it seems like when I finally am seated here, ready to write something, I’m tired and in a big hurry and figure I’ll get to it later.

I will eventually. But not today.

If anyone is keeping track, next month will be 30 years since I started my blog.

I’m not sure if that is the actual original first date that I posted or maybe when I got my domain.

My blog had 3 phases. I did the HTML by hand — I was a very early adopter. But later when Blogger started, I used that for better archiving and RSS — I had reasons. But then something happened with Blogger — I know it still exists because that’s where my list of books read lives. (And now that I look at that, I haven’t updated since the beginning of the year.)

Maybe they no longer hosted domains. I don’t know. Then I started with TURDPRESS which I still don’t like — it’s constantly bugging me to update things. Sometimes I type into the search bar, leave me alone, just so I feel like I’m expressing my thoughts.

But here we are and I am not promising anything but I will try to re-post some old stuff and maybe reflect or something, if I’m feeling frisky.