Evie Day 336

Good morning, I hope you are well. Today is 15 February 2024.

Yesterday there was a tragedy in Kansas City at a celebratory event. The Kansas City Chiefs won the Superbowl this past Sunday, and today was the parade in downtown Kansas City to celebrate. A couple of jackhammers decided to have a shootout while there were still Chiefs players up on stage, one person dead, and 20 or more people injured, including nine kids.

For those who are strong second-amendment advocates, no need to worry. I don’t expect laws to change. We’ll collectively send thoughts and prayers, and then compartmentalize it, push it into a corner, and eventually just accept it as one of those things like we always do. Seriously. We didn’t change a thing after Sandy Hook, and we won’t change anything now. We’ll just accept that the freedom we have to own firearms requires that sacrifices must be made, and they will.

My class is going ok. I took some time last night to focus on time with Lisa on Valentine’s Day. I excused myself from our Wednesday night game to focus on being present with my wife.

I should take a look at my book recommendations over on my Headway app. I need to listen to another executive book summary. I’ve been focused on my workshop deliveries this week, and haven’t listened to any books since last weekend. Time to remedy that.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 335

I wish you all a happy Valentine’s Day. It is Wednesday, 14 February 2024.

I’m currently snacking on a new cookie style my wife experimented with – a crispy almond cookie made in her little heart-shaped waffle maker. These cookies are so good.

The cookies are heart-shaped… the waffle maker itself is circular, sorry for any confusion.

I had my first of eight generative AI sessions yesterday, and we had a lot of fun. It was primarily a West Coast audience, but folks from other time zones were sprinkled in. I did the intro, got into the exercise, and folks were getting into the prompt-building and editing. I look forward to getting back into it today.

As you might expect, we had tacos for dinner last night, then turned on “Chopped” on the Food Network. We always like to see what basket ingredients the chefs get saddled with.

I can’t say I have much to get into today. There’s stuff happening in politics, but if I get into that stuff, I’ll get sour and whiney. There’s no need for that on a day like today.

Oh, yeah… it’s Ash Wednesday, too. The beginning of Lent. Time to take a look at the Friday lunch sushi offerings at Moriki.

I’m going to get this into the can and get on with my day.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 334

Good morning! I hope all are well. I’ll pause here and send some positive intentions to a couple of y’all that I have on my mind who are dealing with stuff. Today is Tuesday, 13 February 2024.

What a glorious day this will be – tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, which means that today is Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday… and it’s also Taco Tuesday! It doesn’t get much better than that!

It might be better if the Kansas Jayhawks hadn’t laid an egg in Lubbock last night. Two-day turnaround, on the road, without the leading scorer in the conference. Some might call it a trap game, but it was more of a recipe for disaster… the Jayhawks could’ve hit the broadside of a barn last night, while players for the Red Raiders had career nights.

It might be a better idea for me to just ruminate on the Super Bowl instead.

I’m back in my virtual classroom today for a series of generative AI workshops. All are West Coast times, so I’ll start at 10:00 in the morning for the first, and 3:00 for the second. I participated in this workshop last November at a work retreat, and it can be a lot of fun helping folks with their AI prompts. There is a lot you can do with a few adjectives, and tossing in a few colorful details can add to the fun.

I’m currently wondering how many tacos I should order for dinner tonight. For me, probably anywhere from 4 to 6. I do love my tacos.

We’re a Catholic household, and we’ll start Lent tomorrow. No red meat on Fridays for six weeks. My son and I will likely grab sushi for lunch a couple of days, and there will be shrimp and fish tacos a couple of times as well.

Time for me to get to work.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 333

Good morning! I hope all of you are well. Today is 12 February 2024.

Two days until Valentine’s Day.

This weekend my beloved decided to try something new. She made these almond cookies in her little heart-shaped waffle maker. They’re a little thick for a stroopwafel, but crunchy and flavorful. I think there’s an opportunity to drizzle a little caramel of frosting over the top of the little delights. They are a bit indulgent.

But don’t call them indulgences… I don’t want friends thinking I’m gnawing on the toe bone of St. Ignatius.

Friday afternoon I went to my primary care physician to talk about the state of me. We’re trying a new medication for my anxiety issues, and we’re hoping that the medication will address one issue, and then do the opposite of a domino effect and fix a couple of interrelated issues, mainly my slight bump in blood pressure. My family history is full of folks who have had hypertension issues.

The other thing I did at the appointment was get a couple of shots in each arm. I’m glad I got my COVID booster, and I’m glad I got my shingles vaccine, but it sure made sleeping hard the last few nights. I tend to sleep on my side, and it was hard to do with the pain in my shoulders.

Kansas held court at home on Saturday without their lead scorer in the lineup. Tonight they’ll have their hands full with a trip to Texas Tech.

I told Lisa I would take care of dinner tonight… cheeseburgers, I think. Something in honor of Andy Reid following the Chiefs win in the Superbowl last night.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 330

Good morning, and a happy Friday to you all. Today is 9 February 2024.

Coffee is going to taste very good when I make it today.

Lisa and I wrapped up Season 5 of “Money Heist” last night. It was enjoyable. Sometimes dubbed series from non-English speaking studios can be a bit of a challenge to me. I sometimes get caught up in the synchronization (or lack of it) between the audio and the lip movements.

Just had a little laugh here… some talking head was talking about how President Joe Biden sometimes messes up names, and in the same paragraph messed up the name of Joe Biden’s late son.

I find it interesting that people like to focus on the minutiae of memory. I think there are a lot of things we forget over time and it’s completely natural. I used to be able to rattle off the hexadecimal values for service broadcasts available through the old Windows Internet Name Service, but I don’t remember them anymore. Is it cognitive decline? Is it early onset of some malady that requires medical treatment? Or perhaps I just had to kick some penguins off the iceberg to make room for new penguins.

What was your favorite book you read in 2016? How many books did you read that year? Can you recall any title accurately without checking the Goodreads website?

My oldest daughter is a voracious reader. It’s not unusual for her reading to get close to triple digits over the course of a year. Even with her extraordinary memory, I wonder how many books she can accurately nail down to a time 8 years ago – granted, she’s 27 years old, and I’m 60.

Oh well.

I’ve got to spend a little time covering generative AI and network security today. After that, off to the doctor for a physical. Time to talk about some of the things that are on my mind both from a physical and a mental health perspective.

This weekend will be exciting as well… the Kansas City Chiefs have a chance to win back-to-back Superbowls when they play the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday. Go Chiefs!

I get to spend some quality time with my grill this weekend. 😉

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 329

Hi everybody! It is 8 February 2024.

Not a lot of February birthdays in my immediate family. Dad was at the end of January, and Evie turns one in March. I certainly have some of friends with birthdays in February, but the highlight of the month is my folk’s anniversary, Lisa’s and my anniversary, and a couple of holidays. It is a 29-day month, which throws me off for 24 hours every four years. It just seems like, after a cold January, February is just sort of a launch pad for the rest of the year.

My class went well yesterday, but I’ll admit a stumble at the start of the day. I was going through review questions with my class, and I tell you what, it seems like they used the same AI prompts to generate the questions for the three modules I reviewed. The same question showed up in every single review, and it also showed up twice in the same module. I’m going to have to point that out and wave an angry finger of judgment at somebody. That – and all of the answers were “C”. That leads to some interesting commentary from the folks in attendance – “Will the certification exam have ‘C’ for all of the answers? 😉 “.

That can lead to instructors cringing on camera.

Tried to smoke a couple of small pork tenderloins yesterday on the Ninja Woodfire Grill. They turned out alright, but I probably should have pulled them off the unit sooner, as the pork loins turned out a little dry. I’ll take a run at it again this weekend with some chicken wings prior to the Superbowl.

Time to make some coffee and grab a bite of breakfast.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 328

Hi everybody. It’s Wednesday, 7 February 2024.

I have to admit, I can’t think of anything I really want to talk about today.

One thing that I have found to be fun is generative AI. I regularly head over to https://www.bing.com/create and write a prompt or four. It has become an interesting toy, and I have brought it up on multiple occasions with my classes. They say a picture can paint a thousand words, but with this technology, a few well-chosen words can create a pretty good picture. Give it a shot if you haven’t tried it… be sure to add a few descriptors and adjectives to your prompt.

Two things – wizards will always have weird ears, even when you specify “wizard with normal human ears”. It will always create beards with mustaches, even when you specifically type “no mustache”.

I’ll be back in my virtual classroom later today, talking about securing virtual machines, containers, apps, and SQL server instances.

Lisa has asked me to smoke a couple of pork loins today. I’ll get ’em started at lunchtime for a 6-hour smoke on the Woodfire grill. Set the temperature and the time, and let it go. I probably ought to prep them before I start class.

I love my wife. She was able to share some stuff with me last night that reinforces why she is the best person to be my life partner.

I’m going to get this in the can and get going with my day.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 327

Hi everybody! It’s my favorite workday of the week… it’s Tuesday, 6 February 2024.

Tonight, there will be tacos.

I walked through the comments section again this morning, as I did yesterday. The volume of misinformation is getting out of hand by economic historians from the firm of Dunning and Krueger. It is amazing how many gullible fools there are out there willing to buy into rewritten history.

Last night we settled in to watch the hometeam travel to Manhattan, Kansas. On paper, it looked like a trap game – Kansas was coming off a big win at home against Houston, then ranked #4 in the country. K-State was riding a four-game losing streak. K-State won in overtime as Kansas couldn’t overcome their mistakes. There were some other factors, as there always are. There were times that I thought KU was going to get out of their way and stretch things out a bit, but it just wasn’t to be.

Anyway, I’m not much for writing this morning. There’s stuff on my mind, and it’s stuff I just need to sort out before I write about it, if I ever write about it at all.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 326

Good morning, and a happy Monday to you all. Today is 5 February 2024.

This last weekend was a welcome break from some things, and it still was a little weird.

There was no football for me for the first time in months.

Granted, most football fans went through the same experience. Yeah, there was a bowl game for seniors that was a showcase for the NFL, and there was the NFL Pro-bowl (which is not something I ever watch anymore). Still, the big storyline is the two-week break from the AFC and NFC Championships in preparation for the Superbowl this coming Sunday. I look forward to the event, but at the same time, I know that the team I align myself with will be facing plenty of distractions. The Kansas City Chiefs play the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday.

The Kansas Jayhawks performed admirably against the #4 ranked Houston Cougars on Saturday, so that was nice. The Jayhawks will again face a road struggle tonight as they travel to Manhattan, Kansas to play the K-State Wildcats. The Jayhawks have played pretty well at the “Octagon of Doom”, but they have also been challenged as a road team this year, having lost more than a couple of road trips.

California is facing a lot of flooding. I hope people are safe.

I’m back in my virtual classroom in a bit, another security course. There was a little mix-up with my training partner, with a late switch on Friday. I’m confident that my training partner will be fine, it’s just a lack of familiarity that bodes.

I’m going to get this in the can and get going with my day.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 323

Hi folks. It’s Friday, 2 February 2024.

I sleep better when my wife is home. Apparently, so does she. Hotel pillows sometimes don’t get the job done.

I wrapped up my class yesterday, and started making some plans for the security course I’ll be delivering with another instructor next week. One of the silly things I did this last week was ask my learners to create my “background” for the meetings, which turned out to be fun. A couple were just old bald dudes on the beach eating tacos and playing guitar, and one was an interesting style – a guy hiking in the mountains, and one of the mountains was a giant taco.

If you want to experience AI-generated graphics, create a prompt and see what happens at https://www.bing.com/create. I have some fun on that site pretty regularly.

No football this weekend. There’s a week gap until the 49ers and CHiefs face off in Superbowl 58. I don’t know who the most famous #58 has been for the 49ers, but for Kansas City Chiefs fans, there is one #58 that stands out – Derrick Thomas. DT passed after a car accident about 24 years ago. He was probably my favorite player on the team at the time that he rolled his vehicle on an icy road while driving to the airport. He was left paralyzed and then had a stroke due to a blood clot a few weeks after the accident.

There will be a college basketball game tomorrow as the Big 12-leading Houston Cougars visit Allen Fieldhouse. This game could have a significant impact on Kansas’ chances to assert themselves in the conference championship race.

I’ve got a few meetings today, and plenty of work to focus on. AI, Visio blueprints, recordings of meetings I missed earlier in the week due to class… all on my schedule today.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.