One of my favorite purchases ever, several years ago, was a dozen foot-long extension cords from Monoprice; they came in a single bundle in the shipping envelope. We’ve used quite a few of them over the years, and gave a bunch away. My second dozen arrived today, and they were each in their own plastic bag, each with a tightly-zip-tied warning tag literally the same length as the cord, all in another bag, all in a shipping envelope: so much wasteful packaging that’s manifested in that time. I still love the idea of these extension cords, but I won’t buy them from Monoprice again.

Walked from the water taxi (passenger ferry) dock over West Seattle and down to the edge of Lincoln Park, then around along the shore back to the dock: 21k steps, 11 miles, something more than three hours. Adding up other walking getting there and back and in the neighborhood totaled 29k steps and 15¼ miles. Still not in great walking shape, but not bad.

Farmers’ market with the kids; Mom’s air conditioner doesn’t work after being used for one season; mowed the lawn after two months.

Last day of school for the bambina.

I have a handful of pile.org posts cooking: one perhaps-intemperate one about AI training, and one about coffee which has somehow become three. We’ll see if I end up posting any of them.

Finished rereading The Raven Tower by Ann Leckie. I love this fantasy novel, about gods and bargains and thoughtfulness, and its casual queerness is the cherry on top.

The dude graduated from high school today. Grandmas and aunts and uncles were in attendance, and we couldn’t be more proud of the guy. He’s off at a PTA-sponsored all-night party; we’ll pick him up at 5:30am tomorrow.

The dude’s last day of school was yesterday. Today he and his classmates returned to their middle and elementary schools. He’s a little dazed by it all.

Finished reading The Design of Books by Debbie Berne. This is a casual overview of the process of, as it says on the cover, designing books, from cover to page layout to interacting with authors and editors. Very interesting, though of course not especially relevant to my life.

This evening is perfect weather, and everybody is taking a walk, and it makes me think of an Italian passeggiata, and so I’ve decided (I’ll come to my senses and/or forget about this by tomorrow) that when I retire from software I’ll open a combination espresso bar / nut-free gelateria up near the new bookstore.

The bambina is at a neighbor’s house watching The Goonies in the driveway with a bunch of other kids.

The dude is off to his senior prom.

Tried to fix a problem with Mom’s email, and ended up on a 45-minute call with her ISP. Eventually achieved victory.

Getting my first new suit in … decades? Today: consulting on fabric and details, and measurements.

The kids marched in Portland’s Starlight Parade, so Meghan and I brought our moms down to watch. We all had a good time.

We stayed in the Alberta Arts District, where I’d never been — a super cool neighborhood.