Once again, time is flying past. But hey, I’m not complaining – we’re still boots on the ground instead of in the ground and that’s a good thing. Plus, I made it to the second Sunday and managed to eke out this blog post.
The last week has been quiet with a fair amount of wind and rain, some serious, plus a tornado watch near the end. We never lost power, other than two quick blips, and had no damage from the wind, so no complaining about the weather here.
That said, we have been having an issue with mud on the dogs, especially Cooper who loves to run up and down the fence line as our neighbors go in and out. He’s worn a path that gets quite muddy when it rains. Stu tried putting hay on the worse parts but that didn’t last long. He even bought an under bed tote to keep on the deck to fill with water to wash their legs. That helps but it’s a lot of work.
A couple days ago he had the bright idea to put down old wood planks and even after the heavy rains the last two days, we saw a major improvement. We have planted Leyland Cypress trees along the fence line but it will be a couple of years before it becomes an effective barrier, both for sight and fence access. Until then, this helps.
Funny thing, while he was scavenging boards from the horse barn, he discovered this nest behind a wall. By the size and location, we suspect it was a barn owl nest, long abandoned.
In other news, as I posted in my author blog, my new (what a deal – back to full price now) laptop arrived via Fedex on Wednesday. Although late in the afternoon, I started working as soon as it had a charge and spent Thursday through Sunday getting it set up. Apple makes it relatively easy to move files, including applications and basic settings, from one computer to another.
But I learned the hard way to not move files and photographs if I wanted to maintain their original creation date. Apple takes the approach that the creation date is the date the file is “created” on the device. That’s a no-go for me, having learned that lesson when I migrated my old PC laptop to my first Mac laptop.
Instead, I bought a 128GB memory card and manually copied/moved those files. It took more time but the effort was well worth it. Of course there are always those new accessories, some must-haves and some want-haves that I picked up on Amazon as well. Here’s my list thus far…
- Purgo USB C Hub Adapter with 4K HDMI, Thunderbolt 3 5K@60Hz, 100W PD, 2 USB 3.0 and SD/Micro Card Readers – adds all the missing ports
- ISMARTEN Slim Dual Mode Optical Mouse with USB Receiver, Bluetooth and 2.4GHz Rechargeable – no more big bumps in the laptop case
- 3 Pack of Fast Charger Cables (10ft+6.6ft+3.3ft) – I can leave one in the living room, one in the office, and the short one for travel
- JSAUX USB C to USB Adapter – for when I don’t need the extras offered with the hub
- Anker 30W PIQ 3.0 Power Adapter – compact size, perfect for keeping in my bag for travel
- tomtoc 360 Protective Laptop Sleeve – I’m in love with this case! Padded with a Velcro strap inside, large outside pocket for accessories, and a telescoping handle.
I spent probably close to two days cleaning up files on my old MacBook Pro, a much needed task and one that I had put off for a long time. I used an app to help identify duplicate images (I still haven’t done duplicate files, mainly because I know I have a lot in my writing folder) and clean them up. Then I did some major reorganization so in the future it should be easier to find what I want. I also ran all my apps that I hadn’t run in a while and either updated them or ended up deleting them. Something else that I should do more often.
Once the applications, settings, and files were all moved over, it was time to sign on and see how it went. Oops, forgot I needed to change all the app preferences, setting them to what I was used to on the old computer. So Saturday was spent with the two computers side-by-side as I made them look the same.
A couple of apps gave me hiccups and I sent off support tickets, not expecting a reply until Monday. One got back to me this morning and the app is now up and running. The other isn’t critical. I need to run a bunch more apps but that can wait a bit…my old laptop is still functional and will remain an active backup. My 11″ MacBook Air (non-retina) is already sold, I just need to purge it and get it ready for sale.
Today I have exclusively worked on the new laptop and I’m really enjoying it. The keyboard is different but I love the feel, even better than the old. The mouse took a little getting used to and I find the Bluetooth blips every once in a while so I run it in USB mode most of the time.
This is a busy week with my medical tests that were rescheduled from December start this week. Tuesday is liquid diet day and Wednesday is test day. Just a pain in the….nevermind. LOL!
Of course the #2doods are never-changing, as you can tell by these pics.
