Lee.org

You might enjoy the Video Speed Controller Chrome extension.
Get it here.

I use it when I’m trying to find the good part of a video: tap “Jump 10 seconds forward” or “jump 10 seconds back” a few times! Or when Hulu forces me to watch ads, I fast forward through them at 16x speed. And of course, when I’m watching a boring video, I’ll turn up the speed so I can “watch faster”. I’ll turn it to 1.2x speed when I’m trying to watch a slow drama that needs to kick it up, or 2.5x speed for poorly cut Youtube videos!

These settings work very well for me:

Also, since no one should ever fully trust a free extension to not snoop on you, I set it to only run when I click on the icon, like below:

I’ve been thinking about and working on making a wildflower Meadow at Abigail School for about 11 months now. I tried starting too late last year so I just had wait for the weather. Here we are! I put down clear UV resistant plastic with the help of a friend for a month to solarize the soil. In a few weeks I will take up the plastic and throw down seed.

It’s a simple project but has taken some will to get it done.
– Approval from school (which meant I had to write up a detailed plan)
– I initially laid down the wrong plastic, with help from Eduardo. The photo on the Farmtek website showed clear plastic but the description was a little vague and I couldn’t find any other plastic sheeting on the site (my bad?) so I bought white plastic which turned out to be the perfect amount of light for growing grass. IE. the opposite of what I wanted.
– laid down the second sheet of plastic with help from Duncan!
– had a weird interaction with the Dad’s Club / Handy Helpers who argued that I shouldn’t ask for volunteers for my project on the main list because 4 events/year was the limit for the organization. :-(
– Lots of waiting for the rainy season
– I’ve got lots of California native seed from Larner Seeds ready to go!

Duncan and I getting the plastic down on a foggy evening

RVing is in our future! We’re renting one in 2 weekends and taking it to a redwood forest campground in Santa Cruz! We’re considering the joys (and pitfalls) of owning vs renting! Have you considered RVing? I’d love to bend your ear.

Abigail’s life as a second grader has been pretty awesome!

Laiden with a backpack on her way to Mr. Prather’s class!

Oh yeah, she’s learning to drive.

The family had a great time seeing “Elephant and Piggy We are in a Play!” last weekend!
During the play, we got a thrill when Elephant was talking about realizing that they were in a play (a classic Elephant 4th-wall-break, ha!) and he said… “they have stuffies!” clearly talking about Abigail’s stuffies. After the play, we were walking in the farmer’s market with Elephant and Gerald poking out of my shopping bag and I heard a voice over my shoulder whisper it again, and there was the actor who plays Elephant with a big grin on her face! Great fun!

I offered a friend help with managing credit card offers. Here’s my letter to her:

Now that you’ve made your spend with your Chase Sapphire card, don’t you think your husband should get a card?

When the new card arrives, stick your old Sapphire card in a drawer and make sure you’ve set an alarm to cancel your first card about the 10 months after it first arrived, you don’t want to accidentally get charged $95 for the yearly renewal! (I have a suspicion that if I cancel my cards too quickly, the credit card company won’t want to issue me another one)

When cancelling, tell them, “I’m cancelling because I don’t want the temptation of spending money I don’t have”. They shouldn’t pester you at all about maybe keeping the card.

I’m pretty sure that you earned about 60,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points. I’d recommend that you not try too hard to get the extra bonuses, just turn it into cash money. For example, your points are worth 10% more if you spend them on internet or cell phone charges. I say, “yeah, whatever, just give me my $600 free money!”

You won’t be able to get another Chase Sapphire card and earn a bonus for 4 years, it’s in the contract. They also stipulate something like “you can’t get a card if you’ve opened more than 5 other cards in the last 2 years.” They do that to prevent people from doing what you are doing :-)

So set an alarm for late 2026. You -might- be able to get another Sapphire card, or you might just be relegated to getting other cards. Don’t worry, there are lots out there!

Have fun with the free money :-)
Lee

(previously)

COVID suggestions keep evolving. I did a little analysis in July, mostly focused on the question as to how we should have lunch at work… inside, outside,  distanced, etc… Here’s what I came up with:

There’s no perfect answer but here’s what my research is digging up. My own input at the end.

CDC on “universal masking” in schools – If community COVID levels are “high”, there should be “universal masking”. Levels are high in Marin and most of California.

CDC on colleges and masking – Wear a mask when you’re indoors. When outdoors, you don’t need a mask unless you’re in “close contact” with people. “Close contact” is defined as within 6 feet of another person for greater than 15 minutes if you’re unmasked, or 3 feet if you’re masked

CDC on building ventilation To paraphrase a long page: more ventilation, more outside air is always good. Use fans to get rid of dead air spots but don’t blow air from one person onto another. HEPA filters are good in small spaces. Improving HVAC filters is good but not at the top of the list

A google search for “study covid restaurant” turns up lots of articles saying that dining is a risky activity. A notable issue: a case where a strongly blowing air conditioner infected people 21 feet away from one another with just 5 minutes of mask-off time.

Here’s a study with an important reminder, that all of the efforts help but none perfectly:

“COVID-19 incidence was 37% lower in schools that required teachers and staff members to use masks and 39% lower in schools that improved ventilation. Ventilation strategies associated with lower school incidence included dilution methods alone (35% lower incidence) or in combination with filtration methods (48% lower incidence).”

Here’s the guidance for UCSF hospital on dining and COVID. It’s a quick read. Paraphrased, I believe it reads, “Yeah, you could eat indoors but outdoors is a lot better”

What do -I- think? Dining outdoors generally automatically provides far greater ventilation than almost any indoor venue. I do not feel comfortable dining in a shared space with potentially stagnant air.

For our space, I’d like to figure out the airflow and consider maybe adding fans to remove any stagnant air spots.

Best regards,
Lee

I couldn’t fix my outgoing email spam problems without paying “big email”. Neither could this much-more capable guy. It’s a racket!

More discussion on JWZ’s blog and here.

Spam

For family that has been worrying about me living in Northern California with all the forest fires and such. I’m totally fine :-)

I blame the news. I just found some of the national news stories. One was titled “Mandatory Evacuations in Northern California Wildfire”. and it starts out, “Residents in three Northern California communities were told to leave their homes immediately as a fast-moving wildfire…” But that fire, the Mill Fire, is in Siskiyou County, a 4 1/2 hr drive north of me!

Yes, we often have “smoke season” where we live in the east bay but it hasn’t happened this year yet. We’re feeling generally prepared for it.

Where I live, in El Cerrito, CA, the seasons are mild (right now we’ve got a heat wave and it’s 85 degrees. 30 miles east in Concord it’s 103. 30 miles west in San Francisco it’s 75 degrees.

I live in such an urban area, it would be unheard of for a wildfire to reach me, though power failures due to wildfires are possible.

We’ve been using EcoEgg laundry detergent for about a year now and I love it.

– It gets our clothes clean. Long ago, I tried 7th Generation laundry detergent and dish soap and they didn’t do a very good job.
– Works as well as our other favorites, Trader Joes Laundry Detergent, Sheets Laundry Club, and All Free and Clear.
– I don’t smell it on my clothes at all. I have been steered away from many laundry detergents due to their strong scent. I can smell the horrid chemical stew of Tide detergent on a person from literally 20 paces. The EcoEgg itself has a slight smell (my princess-and-the-pea nose would say it’s a moderately unpleasant smell) but that smell doesn’t transfer to our clothes. Update on the smell 9-28-22: I refilled the egg a few weeks ago and for the first week my clothes came out with a slight off smell. But about 5 washes later, that smell is gone. I guess when the beads are new, they have a slight smell.
– Really easy to use: just throw the egg in the washer. No pouring, no measuring. You can take the egg out of the washer when you’re done but it’s not vitally important.
– It’s compatible with all the regular stain treating products. We use Oxyclean, Clorox Max Performance stain remover, and real bleach on occasion.
– Very inexpensive at ~$0.04/load instead of most detergents at $0.10-$0.20 per load.