Saturday, December 23, 2023
Medium bowl of oatmeal with milk, flax meal, cacao nibs, toasted slivered almonds, toasted shaved coconut, diced half banana; hot water. Wrapped a gift. Portable vacuum cleaner maintenance. Emptied the paper shredder. Attempted to repair one of my Volt Heat Lava Boots. A few weeks ago it started intermittently and unexpectedly turning off during use. While troubleshooting, I discovered that a wire had broken. I spent weeks researching which soldering iron to purchase, decided on and purchased a PINE64 Pinecil, purchased soldering supplies, and today attempted to fix the problem. I discovered that the red wire had broken at the point of the switch, which is covered in a rubbery substance which makes it hard or impossible to access the contact point I needed to resolve. I have deemed the boot unrepairable. The boots have only a 30 day warranty, and they worked for 6 months. I have long liked Volt Heat, previously 3Volt, products, but I have never loved them. They are the best products of its kind that I know, but they seem to fail to meet my expectations over and over again. Attempted to get some banking done by telephone but was told that to do what I wanted I needed to come into the branch office. Helped Patrick with much baking, mostly by washing dishes. Lunch with Patrick: Patrick had leftover fried chicken burger and fries, I had leftover sizzling rice soup, orange chicken, and beef chow mein. Began preparations for a bulky item recycle pickup. Again troubleshot file sharing connection problems with macOS Sonoma. The same fix that I used two days ago fixed it today: turn off file sharing, turn off computer, turn off router, turn on router, turn on computer, turn on file sharing. Researched replacement for the failed external drive, made a purchase. Continued troubleshooting problems with an external hard drive, decided to just buy a new drive to replace it even though it is still under warranty. Tagged Laurel Heights photos on Flickr. Dinner at home with Patrick: I prepared smoked turkey sandwiches on ciabatta and, for me only, leftover french fries. Water to drink. We both washed some of the dishes. Afterwards we watched holidays standup comedy on YouTube. Patrick went to bed.