My Week Ending 2020-11-01

Here’s a summary of some of the things I learned and published this week.

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Readings 

You can follow my daily readings as they happen here.  Below are a selected few, with commentary, from the past week.

Sunday

• You knew that this was coming – in this day and age, every operating system needs a browser so Microsoft gives you one. They aren’t going to give you Chrome when they had their own Edge.
• Ontario could learn a lot from Alberta and buy some goodwill with teachers by cancelling provincial tests right now.

Monday

• I do miss the Control Panel in Windows. It’s like an old friend and it seems to give me a feeling of control over my settings. But, it’s going, going, ….
• Why not? It probably makes good business sense and it does good for society. We learned early that we don’t have the capacity to make our own masks.

Tuesday

• I still don’t get the US president’s outrage about being asked “tough” questions. He has the toughest job in the world. Just make something up; we’ll understand.
• I have no doubt that my television and television services provider are tracking me so I didn’t find this really all that new.

Wednesday

• I’m always feeling validated when I find these lists of free software and I’m already using some of them.
• The perfect place to drink ice wine would be in an ice bar. Go away, COVID, so we can travel and enjoy this.

Thursday

• I’m surprised that we don’t hear of operating system vendors pulling back updates that break things more often than this.
• This map showing mythical creatures and where to find them should be on the walls of every library.

Friday

• Every now and again, you should read a post like this to find out what others are recommending to protect your computer from the bad people on the internet.
• This is a sad story about the drop in enrollment in universities but I guess we all saw this coming.

Saturday

• It was so sad to read of Sean Connery’s passing.
• Details about the latest scam from the bad guys to try and get you to click on malicious links.

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Blog Posts on
doug … off the record

My daily contributions to this blog are linked below. If you’re looking for a week in review for doug–off the record, you came to the right place.

• Sunday – My Week Ending October 25, 2020
  • Weekly summary of things around here
• Monday – In praise of multiple browsers
  • My story about panicking when the browser I was using wasn’t playing nice with WordPress
• Tuesday – COVID signs
  • They’re everywhere. Let’s celebrate them
• Wednesday – We are not all in this together
  • Our Conservative leaders are showing their true colours. Do what I say and not what I do
• Thursday – Lighthouses
  • Inspired by an Ontario Edublogger, I look at my personal experience with lighthouses
• Friday – This Week in Ontario Edublogs
  • My weekly look at seven blog posts from around the province
• Saturday – Hallowe’en playlist
  • Great songs for the season
• Sunday – Whatever happened to … tricks?
  • A weekly fun post to get you to reflect on things

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#FollowFriday – October 30, 2020

https://wke.lt/w/s/9m-MzS

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voicEd Radio

On this week’s show, Stephen Hurley and I chatted about slowing down, checking in, a month done, tribute to librarians, and two words instead of one.

The show is available here: https://voiced.ca/podcast_episode_post/positivity-posturing-pipe-dreams-pictures-and-programming/

• Michelle Fenn – @toadmummy
• Zoe Branigan-Pipe – @zbpipe
• Debbie Donsky – @DebbieDonsky
• Jessica Outram – @jessicaoutram
• Peter Skillen – @peterskillen

Intro Song:

Dedicated to the month of October

Closing song:

All of the podcasts are archived here. The show is broadcast LIVE almost every Wednesday morning at 9:15 on voicEd Radio.

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Technology Troubleshooting

With the renovation to the bathroom, I had to pull my computer desk out to paint behind it. Not, the desk isn’t in the bathroom but it’s close.

As part of the project, the shelves over my desk which have been there for years were torn down and replaced with what are called “floating shelves”. That might be old news to you but it was new for me.

Instead of having the wall connections visible, they’re now gone and I guess that’s what gives it the floating effect.

It was really important to make sure that I installed them into a stud instead of just into the drywall with anchors. The first screw was easy. Behind the desk is an electrical outlet and so that box is anchored to a stud. Easy peasy.

Then, I had to find a second one. In my mind, I seem to remember there’s a standard distance between studs which is important since I don’t have a stud finder and knocking on the wall didn’t return any definitive results.

So, I looked it up online. My brain is still functional. Sixteen inches (whatever an inch is). My measuring tape also has inches for a measurement and, sure enough, sixteen inches to the right and one screw later, I was into a second stud and the shelf was mounted.

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Video of the Week

Sleeping with an elephant

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Photo of the Week

Here’s where the magic happens. Right behind me is the bathroom which was just done over and I used the opportunity to tidy things up in my desk area.

Thanks for reading.

Please join me daily for something new and, hopefully, interesting for you. I honestly and truthfully appreciate your few moments reading my thoughts. Time willing, this summary appears every Sunday afternoon.

Be safe.

dp

This blog post was originally posted at:

https://dougpete.wordpress.com/

If you find it anywhere else, it’s not original.