Planted hawthorn Sunday, 03-Dec-23 22:12:01 CET

The road was finished! Sunday, 17-Dec-23 20:03:13 CET

Sunday, 10-Dec-23 07:18:57 CET

Started on the staircase hall

This week, we started on the staircase hall project. I played a DJ set at work and showed my visual effects program to an audience for the first time. It was great! The roadworkers were busy with the road at our house this week.

Monday 4 December

Last week, I started blogging on Saturday, which was late. This week, I started blogging on Wednesday, which is much better.

It was still a little snow on Monday morning. I worked from home, and DW went to work using public transport. It was not easy for her to get to work. I had a busy day. The road workers are approaching. When will our driveway be blocked?

Tuesday 5 December

Today, I went to the office. I walked between properties to our neighbor's, where we kept our car. The driveway is still accessible, but not for long, I suppose. Since I anticipate that I will not be able to reach our driveway on Friday, I decided to bring the heavy parts of my DJ gear to work today. I loaded the speaker and the subwoofer into the car from the driveway. They are both cumbersome to transport. Later in the week, I will take the rest.

It turned out so that I was able to go home earlier today. My employer values family traditions; the Netherlands celebrates Saint Nicholas on 5 December. This is a kids' tradition, and our kids are grown up, so we are not into that anymore. Nevertheless, it was nice to get home earlier.

I started preparing for the DJ set. I practiced with the DJ controller. I found a solution to a mystery I had. It is so that when you change the speed of a track, you are supposed to do it on the master track. However, sometimes, you can get into a situation where the speed controller can no longer change the speed. The BPM is displayed in orange. I found out that in such case, one first need to turn off the sync and then change the speed fader, which often need to be set to a slower tempo, and at some point, the fader is set to the "missing speed" and the orange field is gone, and you can slowly bring the speed up again where you want it.

Another thing I figured out was that I can keep the tone sort while changing the tempo of the track, which is nice.

Wednesday 6 December

I worked from home for half a day today, and DW had a day off. The roadworkers reached our property but stayed just before our driveway.

Last week, I started removing the wheels of the tiny house. In the afternoon, we decided to go to a hardware store to get a pneumatic impact wrench. It is "Slagmoersleutel" in Dutch, but I could not remember it. That caused embarrassing situations at a couple of counters. Asking for a tool without knowing what it is called gives away "amateur" a long way.

On the other hand, the knowledgeable salesperson (as a result of this) also provided extra insights into choosing the right tool. The compressor needed to have sufficient airflow and pressure. I had no idea how much airflow and pressure our compressor was producing. I have to check that first, and then I can shop for a proper impact wrench that fits the compressor. If that does not exist, then I buy an electric.

We also fetched a package. The idea was that the package would be delivered to us, but the road is under construction, so that will not happen. We got the package delivered to a pick-up point. It's all fine, in theory. In practice, it was less pleasing. The package was heavy, and we parked far away. I had no little trolley for the package. It would have been excellent if I brought that.

You guessed it: we also went to the second-hand shop. On 24 September, when I bought the bed, we got a coupon for coffee or tea. This was a perfect moment to sit down, rest, enjoy a cup of tea, and use that coupon. The coffee machine was broken, so that was not an option.

In the evening, I practiced with the DJ controller. Tonight, I figured out how to change the speed of the tracks without changing the tone.

Thursday 7 December

Thursday was not that spectacular. I must say, for a long time, nothing has been very spectacular. The weather is reduced to various forms of rain. We got rain falling from the sky or droplets hanging like fog. I had been delighted with snow, but that was short-lived. It is as if in the light part of the day, it is not really light but dusk. It is challenging to take sharp photos when it is not light. Here is a photo of a sea buckthorn covered in frost this morning.

DW worked from home, and I went to the office.

In the evening, I practiced more with the DJ controller. I

Friday 8 December

This was the day I was playing a DJ gig at my work. I was excited about it. I still had things to bring, so I carried these on slippery, muddy paths between properties. My feet slipped at one point, and I almost fell in the wet clay. It was exciting for a short moment. I had to walk two times back and forth to the car.

Then, the day at work progressed as usual. DW worked from home. In the afternoon, I set up the set. When the time was right, I started playing songs and mixing them. Initially, I was struck with a bit of nervousness, but that was only how I felt inside. I think the crowd did very well. It is not a dancing party, but more of a sitting socializing. After a while, all went smoothly. I added many more slower tunes, and that worked out really well. It is slightly more challenging to mix slower tunes, though.

The visual effects did fine! The most popular scene was the cartoon camera scene.

I started at about 70 BPM and worked up to 126 BPM. Then I mixed back to 80 BPM and worked up again. The second time, it was much faster. Then, I did the reverse, slowly decreasing the BPM. People liked it; at least, it appeared many did. I had hoped someone would dance a little, but I was the only person dancing. Apart from you, you cannot dance much when operating the decks.

After the gig, I tucked away the speaker, the subwoofer, and a box of things in my office at work. There is no point in bringing them home because I will not carry them over a muddy clay field. The road workers will be busy next week as well. No worries, the things can stay at work. I brought home the DJ controller, though. I might want to practice more.

Saturday 9 December

In the grand scheme of things, I would be working on the staircase in our house, but it has not happened until now. We started talking about how to do this. I had an idea about building the scaffold and doing everything with it, but DW pledged to borrow the small scaffold on wheels and work from it as much as possible and then build the large scaffold when that was done.

We asked our friend if we could borrow it, but he was busy and did not answer immediately. That did not stop us from starting. We began clearing the staircase hall from stuff. It needs to be completely empty before we start. It is the usual work of making a pile to throw away, one to give to the second-hand shop, and another with things to keep. It takes so much time and energy.

On the positive side, we started on this project. It has begun!

We also wanted to do something else, like taking a walk. DW has a new app on her phone where she gets to walk three times per week. So we went to the shop. Then, from there, we took a walk. It was raining, and we usually would not put ourselves through this. I had my rain pants on, so I was okay. We walked to a nearby forest. It was getting dark already.

 

It was a windy evening, and I do think it almost stormed during the night.

Sunday 10 December

After a slow morning, we continued with the staircase hall project. As part of this, we created more clutter by bringing forward seasonal decorations. They were nicely tucked away, but now they are brought to the front, and worse, they occupy space in the staircase hallway. You cannot live without seasonal decorations, so here they are. My straightforward stand on this has to subdue.

For the rest, the space is almost empty. We found a solution for drying washed clothes. It will happen in the hall on the ground floor outside the washing room.

Then I went out to do maintenance on the rain roof. It survived the night, but I believed it could be fastened a little better. Some time ago, I bought wire for this purpose. I also bought little stainless steel brackets with bolts for the purpose. I found that the brackets could not hold the wire rigid enough. I had to bring on extra rings to make it work. I got it working; that was nice, but why can it not just work immediately?

While working with the sheep on the rain roof, I discovered Hannas's left hoof was torn again. Hoofs work like nails; if your nail gets torn, it can worsen. It is also like a bag of crisps. Once torn, it is easy to keep tearing up. I finished the rain roof activity, and then we immediately treated her hoof.

I filled a bucket of water that I could dip her hoof in. I could clean the hoof with plenty of water to inspect the situation. Then, I cut off the loose part and made rounded edges. That was it; it was over in a few minutes. Now, we will see how she progresses. She is walking fine and has no pain, which is good.

Then, immediately after Hanna's hoof, we prepared for a birthday party visit. That is in another town 30 minutes away, but first, we had to go through the wet clay field to get to the car.

In the evening, after all the have-to-do's, I decided to program on the visual effects program; I had a new idea for an infinite mirror effect. To my surprise, I could not find my monitor glasses. Where could they be? I got DJ stuff at work. Are my glasses still at work?

This week's blog ends with this cliffhanger. Will Jens be able to sleep with this worry that he forgot his glasses at work or, even worse, that the glasses were left behind in the garage at work?