continuing to enjoy life

Last night I managed seven hours of sleep, which was more than I might have gotten, but I had forgotten when I lay down that I had switched the dawn light from 05:30 to 06:20 the night before when I had stayed up rather later. So when I finally woke up at 06:15 and looked at the clock I decided that it would be wise to do only part of the morning phone app workout, so I could make it to work on time to meet my friend at the gym at 08:30 as planned.

Then, as I started my morning situps before getting out of bed, I turned wireless on my phone to read LJ, and saw a FB message from her, sent after midnight, saying that she wasn't sleeping due to a headache, and so didn't think she would make it to the gym. My first thought was "ok, I don't have to go". Then I thought again and decided that, no, of course I was going.

Then I got up, got dressed for the phone app workout (bra out the outside of yesterday's shirt, so that should I sweat, it isn't on the bra, and I can still wear it the rest of the day), went to the living room, opened the app, and discovered that it thinks today is a rest day. For all four categories of exercises. This was a bit of a surprise, since for weeks now it has been a rest day for three of the four at once, and the fourth gets a different rest day. However, having gotten dressed to work out, I deiced to do a little anyway, and spent 10 minutes moving. Then I got dressed for work, posted to the Phire FB group that even though the one friend couldn't make it, I would still be going to the gym if anyone wanted to join me, had breakfast, and spent 15 minutes shoveling snow till lord_kjar was ready for work, and then I rode in with him.

As an aside--the downside of yesterday's long day at work and then having fun with friends on campus is that meant that no one was home yesterday to do the shoveling when we got the first decent snowfall of the winter. Not that it was much snow this time, either, but at least it was deep enough that one wouldn't want to wear low shoes in it. To make matters worse, after weeks of lovely temperatures (read: -10 to -30 C, or "cold enough not to melt and get slippery), today it warmed up to 0 C, so after sitting in the warmth the snow was getting a bit heavier than it was when it fell. Needless to say, I didn't get much of the driveway done in the 15 minutes I had before work.

Arriving at work I took my computer to the lab, turned on the plasma on the ICP-MS, and then went to the gym, where I was met by another Phire person I had only seen one time before. We had a nice workout and enjoyed chatting while we did. I did only a short 30 minute session, as I wanted to be certain I was ready when my lab technician arrived at 10:30 or 11:00.

I was, and spent a couple of hours with him, as he looked at the laser and checked a few things, explaining as he went. I now understand why it was that when I asked for the laser to deliver a fluence of 7 J/cm2 it was only giving about 3.5 J/cm2, but if I asked for 50% output I could get 7 J/cm2. It turns out that when the laser was installed the technician opened up the sample chamber, turned off the safety feature that keeps the laser from firing when the door is open, set in a sensor, fired the laser on it, and took notes as to how many J/cm2 it delivers at each % of output. Then the computer looks at my request, compares it with that table, and sets the output level at that given by the table to yield the result I want.

Expect that sometime between installation and when I first noticed the problem something has gone wrong, so that it simply isn't giving as much energy as it did when that table was created, so now when I ask for 7 J/cm2 it uses the 40% output that it thinks ought to be good enough, but really, we need 60% these days.

Eventually the technician had enough information that he was ready to actually open up the machine and get to work, but first he needed lunch. He didn't really want me present for the opening thing up and changing stuff with the optics, saying that I wouldn't be able to help, and he didn't really want someone else in the room when the laser was unshielded. So, it being plenty late enough to do so, I went home for the day, enjoying a nice walk through a forest of snow-covered trees.

That gave me time for a short nap (~20 min), some food (baked a yummy cornbread) and a good book, running a load of laundry, and a bit more snow shoveling, before it was time to head to uni for the Frostheim social/crafts night.

I brought my dulcimer, which seriously needed tuning after the temperature changes this week, and made some progress on my tunic in progress. This week there were four of us for most of the evening, but a friend who can't eat gluten dropped by on his way to his martial arts session to try the cornbread, since I had told him I was bringing it).

We had my senior apprentice working on her wool dress, the friend from Phire who didn't make it to this morning's workout, working on her wool dress, me working on my wool tunic, and a really cute new guy, working on some chain mail project he started working on three years ago (he is so in the right place!) It was a lovely time, and I was quite surprised when the apprentice's husband returned to pick her up, as I didn't think it was that late.

As we were packing up to go I looked at my phone, and saw that my service technician had sent me a text message at 19:30 saying he was finally done for the day, having found the root cause and started the repair, and suggesting that I meet him tomorrow at 10:00. I am glad I didn't stick around till he was done!

From there I went over to the local grocery store to pick up my package, since I had received a text message earlier in the day saying it was in. But we also needed a few things from the store, so I filled a basket first. Then, when I had found everything I wanted, I looked at the line to deal with the one human on duty, and went over to the self-scanning station, and checked myself out. Then I hopped in the car and went home, and it wasn't till I pulled into the driveway that I realized that I hadn't picked up the package. Oops! I have now added it to the calendar for tomorrow, so hopefully I will remember.

However, the self-annoyance at forgetting the package was completely overshadowed by the joy at discovering that lord_kjar, who had stayed home from Frostheim to finish up a few things for work, had finished up the shoveling while I was gone.

Now I should do yoga, before lord_kjar puts down that nyckleharpa he just started playing...