2020 Life Logs, Day 274: New Month, Full Moon, Good Life
Date: Thursday, October 1, 2020
Weather: Mostly Sunny; High 71, Low 58 Degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, Falmouth, MA

I love the first day of the year and the first day of every month. Just like refreshing your PC, the beginning of the month gives you a chance to start anew. In September we see the end of summer. But in October, we always hope for a period of unseasonably warm weather that we refer to as Summer. This new month is beginning with a full moon. I don’t think there is any significance to that other than it is a lovely night outside.

This first day of October was filled with activity. At noon I headed to Karen and Peter Baranowski’s to meet with my Newcomers Dining-In Group. Before Covid, we met monthly inside. We didn’t meet in the early spring, but then we started meeting outside on decks. Last month we met here on the deck next door at 4:30 pm, but we realized that the shortening days and cooler late afternoons were not going to continue to work for gatherings. So, we decided to try meeting in someone’s garage at noon. Karen and Peter volunteered their garage which is always cleaner than my house and we took them up on the offer. What we didn’t know was that Peter decided to pour a new Epoxy-based floor in the garage and clean it from top to bottom. It felt more like being in a fancy restaurant than it felt like being in someone’s garage. When Olivia and Terry White arrived, Olivia said she didn’t know she was being invited to the Taj Garage. That brought a smile to everyone’s face and I think the term will stick. With all the garage doors and windows open, it was almost like being outside and we felt Covid-safe. It was so successful that we are going to try it again in November. We all bring our own food, but today Karen made one of her famous carrot cakes for all to share since Jane Woodin’s 75th birthday is coming up next week. We had a lovely luncheon and birthday celebration in the Taj Garage. Happy birthday to Jane. And thank you to Peter and Karen for hosting.

I got home with just enough time to play a round of ball with Shadow before the first meeting of the year of the Newcomers Technology Tips group on Zoom. Today we focused on bank apps, paying by phone, and money transfers. Each meeting ends with a bonus app and today it was an app called Frameo. You get your children to buy you a Frameo digital frame as a gift. Then you use the Frameo app which allows your kids to send photos directly to the frame that you put on a timer so that it is rotating photos all day and goes to sleep at night. You can then enjoy up-to-the-minute photos of your grandkids without doing anything. The photos just slip right into your current rotation.

And speaking of photos from your kids, today I saw some current photos of Justin, Jo, Ziggy, and Coco that Jo had posted on Facebook. If the photos are an indication of how they are doing, they are doing great while living in what looks like paradise. I also followed a link from Jo’s Facebook page to watch a video accompanying Silvermouse’s newest single release called Imagining. They hung an iPad from a tree to video the four of them making a mandala together while the song played. A mandala is a geometric configuration of symbols and the video showed JJZ&C clearing a space on the forest floor and then building a beautiful design by gathering and placing leaves, sticks, and flowers in the space they cleared. The result was awesome, as was the accompanying electronic music produced by Justin and Jo. You can see the video on YouTube by clicking here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6OdsU58f74&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR0WFiukBjm682gyZMWVNAjfMlblOixpwRnAHmU9gw_JInQASNq6OLmJBsQ