Catch-Up

As my next post will recount, I have been dealing with some hardware issues that have taken up most of my free time, but various other things have happened in the meantime that also contributed to a few densely packed weeks.

I changed my prescription (and glasses) for the first time in seven years or so, and can actually read comfortably again. This had been bugging me since Christmas, but I’ve finally fixed it (at least temporarily).

Since I have high myopia and am already experiencing the usual age-related vision changes, going years without new lenses was sub-optimal (to say the least), but I have always stuck to biannual checks.

But with the insane pace of work, the pandemic and the fact that it is extremely hard to find frames for me (for various reasons), it had just been too long since I actually changed glasses, and I was having trouble making out small type on my iPad mini, my Kindle, and (most especially) my phone and watch.

I’m sad to have foregone my petite, extremely well engineered metal frames (thank you Giorgio Armani, they were insanely expensive but I certainly got my money’s worth) for newer, bulkier ones just because small round frames have fallen out of fashion for the last five years, but the key point here is that the latest prescription led us on a merry chase through pretty much every sizable optician in Lisbon for a few weeks, because apparently people like me are not a sizable enough market to justify making frames for.

It’s done, but I suspect I will be focusing (if you’ll pardon the pun) on spending a little more time away from screens, or at least small screens.

It’s been intense, far too much for this time of year. Some stuff has happened, started to happen, or is nearing the finish line depending on outlook (apologies, couldn’t resist another pun), but the gist of things is that I’m still in the middle of a re-org, travel is starting to be talked about again and all I really want right now is to go on vacation and spend a few weeks almost completely offline.

I honestly don’t know what (or where) I’ll be returning to, but I’ve been focusing on wrapping up things.

Part of the reason for that is that I have essentially spent a year and a half in the same room and that I really need to do a major spring cleaning, which includes tossing out a bunch of outdated gear, cabling and whatnot.

I need to unclutter my desk, get make more room for pacing around (something I have started doing in lengthy conference calls, since standing isn’t enough to keep minimally fit) and generally keep less stuff. I’m not a packrat, but I do hold on to ancient hardware for far too long, and my current goal is to get rid of half of it, optimize physical storage and make my home office an even nicer place.

Things seem slightly better than what I expected, but that seems to be largely because people are going on vacation without a care in the world (and, in some cases, trying to fudge testing or ignoring symptoms).

Vaccination of ages 12 and up was publicly discussed, but things are still uncertain and I don’t really know what will happen in September except that the government continues to skid along thin ice with nary a care in the world and has announced another “reopening” plan that seems too optimistic to me.

The practical upshot of it all is that, like in the UK, people are getting too sloppy, so we’re not going out at all unless we can help it.