Cav's Place

I had a passing thought to try to write a game review today, but there’s no chance of that, so I gave up after the first paragraph and, even if this is the fourth personal post in a row, I’ll add the rest of what’s already written, to finish bridging that gap of odds and ends from last summer, until I started posting everything regularly again. So I’ll pick up from where I left off and continue with July 16, when I shaved, made up for putting off doing the squats the previous day until I forgot to do them at all by doing 200, if not 210, since I lost count at one point, then ate lunch, and went out a little after 8:15 PM, with the recyclables with the deposit symbol, a bag of trash that I dropped down the chute, and some cheap cat food which had apparently expired, having been left on the balcony because dad didn’t want to give it to Liza after trying it once, and which I left for the cats behind the building. And I picked up a couple more recyclables, along with a couple of labels, on the way to that store that offered more for them, where I allowed a woman who only had a few to use the machine ahead of me, then put in almost everything, being left with the labels, since I still hadn’t also picked up suitable bottles to place them on, and two glass bottles that weren’t accepted, one of them from a trash can that was near that store and the other having actually been left next to the machine, and cashing in the three vouchers that I had ended up with, since the machine reported that the bag was full early on but only required one of the employees to come and shake it, and then I had stopped after being done with “my” recyclables, before moving on to those from my parents.
I put those remaining recyclables in a cabinet when I reached Kaufland, then washed my hands, using the room for disabled people after seeing that there was no soap in the men’s, and entered the store at 9:20 PM. The evening discounts I saw at that point weren’t too good and they didn’t increase later, but I still took a lettuce that was pretty large and seemed quite good, four bundles of huge radishes, one kohlrabi, and a few tomatoes that looked unusually “natural”. Then I also took three pieces of processed meat products that were among the discounted ones, but two were oily and I wondered whether the QR code would be readable, so I tried to scan them at a price checker and it seemed to be able to read something, though it obviously said that it was an unrecognized product. Either way, since the toilet paper that we use was on sale, I took a whole lot of that as well, needing to give in and take one of those large baskets to put it in, and then I also added two of those cheap yogurts and a box of bio (organic) Gala apples which had appeared among the spoiling products when I got back there, even if they were imported and expensive even with the discount.
Well, I couldn’t get the self-checkout machine to read one of those processed meat products, and it said that the second one wasn’t correct, so I called over the employee from that area… Who swore under her breath before coming over and overriding the error, and when I asked whether she could get that other product to scan she just quickly waved it in front of the scanner, said that it won’t work and took it away… Only to need to come right back, because the machine didn’t accept that third discounted product either, and after logging on she asked what else I had and entered everything, without checking the vegetables from my bag and even saying that the tomatoes were from elsewhere when I pulled them out and realized that I hadn’t weighed them. But it was just that the bag had been used in Carrefour and you can’t peel off those price labels without tearing the bag, so I dashed to the scales from that area to weigh the tomatoes, then scanned them myself before she added the toilet paper as well. And walking away with all of that toilet paper was a problem, since you can’t leave the checkout area with those baskets, so I initially just stepped aside from the machine and arranged the purchases just enough to allow me to walk out of there, the closing announcement coming as I did so, and then took my time to arrange them better before finally walking away and retrieving those recyclables. But I still hadn’t done a good enough job, so after walking out I stopped at a table and had another go at it, managing to get four packs of toilet paper in the large backpack, albeit without closing it, and finally walking away when it was almost 10:40 PM.
On the way back, I picked up quite a number of recyclables and checked those two Mega Image locations, reaching the first one just before 10:50 PM, and that one closes at 11 PM, so I left the bags behind the cabinets, entered with the backpacks, and grabbed a bunch of bakery products that were discounted by 90%, paying for them and then dashing back to also have a look at the non-refrigerated expiring products before taking a moment to arrange those purchases. That meant taking off the backpacks to take out the bag that hangs from my neck and then putting them back on, so it was past 11 PM when I grabbed the bags and walked out. On the other hand, checking the non-stop Mega Image was a waste of time, so I put three bags into two cabinets, entered with the backpacks and the other bag, where I had some of the toilet paper, and then just retrieved those bags and walked back out.
It was almost 11:45 PM when I got back, then I cleaned the litter box and went to drop some trash down the chute, put some of the purchases in their place, ate quite a lot of watermelon and a sweet pastry on which I added honey, and it was 2:10 AM when I went to shower and a little over half an hour later when I was done. Then I also picked out the radish leaves that were clearly unusable and put the remaining purchases in their place, sliced dad’s bread and took quite some time to slice the small baguette that I was going to use as bread, also used what little I could salvage out of the worse lettuce leaves, plus a few small radish leaves that were usable but had fallen away when I had picked out the others, without boiling them, and finally ate dinner between 4:45 AM and 5:40 AM, albeit with over ten minutes spent gathering what was stuck on the plate at the end. I got in bed at 6:35 AM.

On July 20, after doing the day’s squats, cooking something, without also eating from it, and posting that day’s post, I left a little after 7:45 PM, jogging first to Carrefour, entering that mall through the parking lot, putting the two recyclables which I had picked up by then in a cabinet, and getting what I had gone there for, onions and chickpeas, even if I saw that, despite being marked with the Romanian flag in the catalog, the chickpeas were actually from Moldova. Then I put those purchases in the backpack, retrieved those recyclables, picked up some more and a paper bag to carry them in, since I had forgotten to take any of the bags that I use for that, put that bag in a cabinet when I reached Kaufland, and entered the store, with the backpack, when it was almost 8:40 PM… And I saw that watermelons were cheaper than they had been two days earlier, when I had bought that one that I hadn’t even touched yet, plus that I had some doubts about it. Then again, I did have to hurry that evening, the closing time being 9 PM, so I don’t know if I’d have had the time to pick a better one, but seeing as I only got a few tomatoes that had a good evening discount, I could have spent the remaining time checking watermelons. But what was done was done, so I eventually made my way to the self-checkouts, the closing announcement coming while I was waiting for a machine that accepted cash to free up, and then I added the tomatoes in the backpack and retrieved those recyclables.
On the way back, I gathered some more recyclables and made a small detour to check that Mega Image that closes at 10 PM, putting that bag in a cabinet that I didn’t lock, entering with the backpack and then just retrieving that bag, since what was discounted by 90% wasn’t interesting. But I still wanted to find something else to get, so I also checked a Shop & Go and a Profi, once again putting just that bag in a cabinet that I didn’t lock and then retrieving it in the first case and entering with everything in the second. And when I got here I also checked the nearby Mega Image, and that time I left that bag outside, and it’s a good thing that I just hid an expiring sandwich, discounted by 50%, that I found there, because the people who had been using the recycling machine when I got there had just picked up that bag when I walked out, putting a couple of their remaining recyclables in it, but they took them out and handed it back to me when I said that I had left it there, though I’m not sure how much they actually understood, since they seemed to be talking in Ukrainian. Either way, after getting back here and dropping off that bag, I asked dad whether he wanted that sandwich, going back to get it when he said that he did… And despite thinking that I had taken out the exact amount even before walking back out of the building, I somehow ended up giving the cashier 1 RON more, which she handed back.
I was back for good a few minutes after 10 PM. Then I ate a banana, cleaned the litter box, went to drop some trash down the chute, picked up two plastic bottles without labels from the garbage room, since they were the correct size for the labels with the deposit symbol that I had, put the few purchases in their place, and ate a large doughnut brought by dad, adding jam on it, and lunch, also consisting of something brought by dad, so if I’d have known that he was going to bring something, I wouldn’t have cooked that day. Either way, since I spent more time at the computer after finishing that lunch, it was past 1:35 AM when I went to wash, being done just after 2:10 AM. And then I moved two things into jars for dad, selected some tomatoes for him to take in the morning and rearranged the vegetables in the box from the fridge, and found that freezing my remaining small baguette hadn’t prevented it from getting even worse, so it was really hard and crumbling and I spent quite a lot of time trying to carefully slice it into slices that were quite a few times thicker than what I’d normally cut and still ended up with pieces that broke apart even more when I picked them up, so I only started eating dinner at 4:10 AM and finished gathering what was on the plate at 5:05 AM, after going back to the kitchen to do so without having breadcrumbs end up all over and around my desk. And I got in bed at 5:50 AM… And the following morning I ended up getting in bed at 5:25 AM, after getting carried away playing The Witcher 2.

On July 25, I left a couple of minutes before 3 PM, picking up a recyclable on the way to the metro station, since I had dad’s metro card, and taking the metro to return the book, getting there a few minutes after 3:30 PM and using the machine. Then, after just missing one metro and waiting for the next, I went to the main location of that slightly cheaper pharmacy… Only to be told that they didn’t have the tea that I was mainly looking for, even if it was listed as available for on-line orders. At least I got some tea of another kind and another one of those nose sprays, but I could have bought those from other locations as well. However, the even bigger waste of time was caused by then deciding to keep going to the main location of Tei, picking up another recyclable on the way, putting my things in a cabinet when I got there… And finding that, while they did indeed have that tea in that location, they had just increased its price, since the old one had still been listed when I had checked before going to bed in the morning, and in fact the employee whom I asked to check it for me was just printing new price labels for teas, so I assume that they jumped the start, considering the increased VAT from August 1. Either way, that made me decide against buying it at that point, just getting some of another kind that I didn’t need to go there for, then retrieving my things from the cabinet, picking up a few more recyclables, and taking the metro to Obor, once again putting my things in a cabinet when I got to that Auchan… And forgetting the empty bag that I meant to use on the cabinets. But it was still there after I bought the two teas that I got from there, not finding the third one that I wanted, for dad. So I recovered that bag and what I had in the cabinet and took the metro back, also picking up a label with the deposit symbol.
It was almost 5:50 PM when I got back, and then I dropped off the purchases, ate watermelon, arranged the recyclables, including placing labels on some that didn’t have any, and left again a little before 7:45 PM, taking the metro to that store that offers more for them but still picking up a few more. And after getting there I could put “my” recyclables in the machine, minus three that weren’t accepted, but after letting it time out before moving on to dad’s, I could just put in three more before it said that the bag was full, and the cashier said that she couldn’t do anything about it then. And she was that one that uses that calculator that always rounds down to a whole number, and she clearly remembered me, because she asked how much she had to give me, and when I said that I hadn’t calculated yet and she used that calculator, she told me the total but then said that it was probably more, which was indeed the case, so I did the calculation on my phone and showed it to her and she added the coins that were missing. On the other hand, I saw her going to the machine and opening it after I walked out, but she just left it open, possibly after noticing that I was watching.
After making a detour to that location of that slightly cheaper pharmacy only to be told that, unsurprisingly, they didn’t have that tea there either, I went back to the metro station and went to Auchan Titan, picking up a couple more recyclables, putting them in a cabinet, washing my hands, and getting liquid soap and that tea for dad which I hadn’t found at Obor. Then, after arranging the purchases and retrieving the recyclables, it was 9:40 PM when I walked out of there, so I rushed to Kaufland Basarabia, just grabbing a crushed plastic bottle on the way, taking its label and dropping the bottle in a recycling bin. Even so, after putting the recyclables in a cabinet and washing my hands again, needing to dash to the women’s for soap, it was almost 10:15 PM when I entered the store, with the purchases from Auchan in the backpack, and at 10:20 PM a guard told me to hurry up because the checkouts were about to close, and when I said that there were ten minutes left he said out loud that it wasn’t quite ten minutes and then muttered that it wasn’t like I hadn’t had all day to make my purchases. Either way, I made use of good evening discounts to get radishes, white bell peppers, and the year’s first corn, supposedly from Romania, along with some olives, obviously being charged for the plastic box, rushed to the self-checkouts when the closing announcement came, then retrieved what I had in the cabinet and put the bags into two cabinets when I reached that Mega Image on the way back, entering with both backpacks and finding just the two small flatbreads that I was looking for, discounted by 90%. And I also found some coins that meant that I gained more than I spent there. And, after retrieving what I had in the cabinets, I picked up a few more recyclables on the way back, including one that didn’t have the deposit symbol, but which was the right size for a label that I had.
I got back a little after 11:30 PM, then cleaned the litter box and went to drop a bag of trash down the chute, put some of the purchases in their place, selected and discarded the radish leaves that were clearly unusable, ate a bag of corn puffs with powdered milk, did the day’s squats even if I was already a day ahead, talked to dad a little after he finished bathing, and it was 1:15 AM when I went to wash. I was done a little less than 40 minutes later, but it was ten more minutes before I went back to the kitchen, and then I used those small flatbreads to make something of a pizza, also selecting what actually was usable out of the remaining radish leaves and using them on it, finally putting the few remaining radishes and most of the white bell peppers in their place, and only eating what was a combined lunch and dinner between 5:25 AM and 6:20 AM. And I got in bed at 7 AM.

A little after 9:20 AM, as dad was getting ready to leave, I woke up, and a few minutes later I went to pee, mainly to let him know that I was awake and ask whether he had anything to say before leaving, and I only got back in bed at 9:55 AM, after Liza was also done with her second “concert”, since dad came back to drop something off and then left again… But I couldn’t get back to sleep, and a little less than an hour later I gave up and got up, making the tea and eating a lot of watermelon, getting back in bed just after 11:20 AM and actually getting more than an hour of sleep before getting up to watch the sprint race. And then I got back in bed, getting some three more hours of sleep, waking up just once, before getting up for the qualifying for the “proper” race. And I also did the day’s squats, so I continued to be a day ahead, ate lunch, and wrote a quick post… But I couldn’t watch the Formula E race, because the cable signal went out, returning just at the end of it, after I had given up, only noticing because dad came back and I wanted to let him know. But I didn’t want to watch just the end, since there was going to be a recorded broadcast the following day, and otherwise I stuck to the plan of rushing out after 8 PM, doing so at 8:10 PM… After bumping my head again, that time against the windowsill, when I wiped my face with the towel that’s on the heater.
I jogged almost all the way to Kaufland, except for a little while after realizing that I had taken a wrong path as I meant to cross through this park, and while I walked at that point I also grabbed a crushed plastic bottle, keeping the label and then dropping the bottle in a recycling bin on the way… And then I missed a turn, though that only meant having to walk back a few steps to the crossing. Either way, after spotting two carts with the coins in them in Kaufland’s parking lot, connecting them to others and retrieving the coins, I entered the store a little before 8:30 PM and saw that evening discounts had already been made. While I thought that the one for beets might have increased further at a later time, not having done so at 9 PM, I nevertheless took four small ones, plus the three remaining cucumbers that still seemed usable and two of those small boxes of germinated wheat, and then I had a look around the store while waiting for 9 PM and got a few more things, including a 5 kg bag of salt for dad that wasn’t in the plan, and which was going to make it impossible to jog back and either check that Mega Image that closes at 10 PM or catch more of the match that I wanted to watch. But it did allow me to finally recover what I had lost as a result of one of the recycling machines from there “eating” something, since I carefully placed that salt on one of those boxes of germinated wheat, in my bag, and then scanned the salt after I was done with everything else and placed the entire bag on the scales, and I guess that the error margin for those bags of salt was enough for the scales to ignore the additional weight. And everything looked fine, so on top of feeling entirely justified, I wasn’t even worried when I called over an employee to authorize the sale of beer, since I had grabbed some for dad.
With all of the purchases just thrown in a bag, only taking a moment to pull that germinated wheat out from below the salt, I then rushed to Carrefour as well, putting the purchases in a cabinet and looking around a little, but just buying the little garlic that I had gone there for… And there was a significant amount in coins in the self-checkout machine that I used, some in the change tray and others apparently placed in it but not pushed enough to actually slide inside. Either way, I then retrieved what I had in the cabinet and arranged everything… And as I meant to rush out, I somehow ended up losing my way even inside that mall, missing the escalator and then having to go back to it.
I tried to rush as much as possible on the way back, but I still picked up a few recyclables… And I also spotted a 1 RON bill obviously left behind by a few girls who had just walked away from the bench that it was left in, so after thinking about it for a moment I turned around and hesitantly took it, but I wanted to check for a reaction, since I had seen those girls move to another nearby bench, and they immediately started telling each other, loudly, that somebody had taken it, so I just put it back down on the bench and walked away, and when I had a look I saw that they had returned to that bench, I imagine in order to once again place the bill in instead of on it. Either way, I was back at 10:05 PM, and later, after a shower that was really quick for me, I ate a couple of cream biscuits and opened a large bag of bagels, eating some and putting the rest in a box. And no visits were recorded that day.

In the morning there was the summer’s first longer power failure, actually starting a little after I had woken up and decided to check something on the computer, so after waiting for just about 15 minutes before turning off the computer, I took the opportunity to finally move the UPS in its proper place, in the desk, behind the bottom drawer. And later, just after 12:40 PM, I got back in bed… But I couldn’t quite get back to sleep, and the UPS briefly kicking in a couple more times definitely didn’t help, so I was mostly in that state that’s in between asleep and awake, only catching a brief nap or two, until 2:30 PM, when I decided to pee again, just in case it’d help, and it actually did, since I did fall asleep after that, with the alarm set to ring at 4 PM, for the race… Only to be woken up a little after 3:40 PM by another power failure… And after turning off the computer I moved the old UPS to the kitchen and plugged that TV into it, fortunately seeing that the race was being red flagged, since it gave a low power warning within minutes, so I wonder how much that TV uses. But at least the race was delayed long enough for the power to finally be restored, so I could watch it. On the other hand, I saw some more errors in my computer’s event logs, starting with six VSS errors, four when I turned it off the first time and two more the second time, that seemed to indicate that it was trying to start something related to that and couldn’t because the system was shutting down, and there was also an error about Immersive Control Panel not registering in time, though this seems to have happened before, and one stating that it couldn’t install the Defender update, the error code apparently meaning that it was not applicable, and after the power recovered the second time I manually updated it and it worked, the version being higher than the one which had apparently failed…

On July 28, after doing the day’s squats, I left just before 4:55 PM, dropping a small bag with what I had gathered from the litter box down the chute and taking the recyclables with the deposit symbol to that store that offered more for them, and that time I also took those which hadn’t been accepted before, to try them again, that campaign ending at the end of the month. And, after picking up a couple more recyclables on the way, I apparently got there just at the right time, because a guy, who must have been either someone they knew or even another employee, was using the machine and the cashier, who rolled her eyes when I entered, couldn’t say that it wasn’t working, though it became clear that she’d have really wanted to. So I had a look at some expiring products while waiting for that guy to finish, then moved the sign which he had immediately placed back in front of the machine aside and started putting in what I had, that guy coming to tell me to put that sign back after I’ll be done. However, while I was trying those recyclables that weren’t being accepted again, the cashier asked whether I had many more and then snapped at me to hurry up because they had no time to wait after me, and that the machine was supposedly broken, which was obviously not the case, the issue obviously being that she didn’t want someone else to come while I was using it and see that it was actually working. And I couldn’t get any of those older recyclables to be accepted anyway, and one of the newer ones that was one of those oddly-shaped bottles wasn’t accepted either, but at least I could put the rest in and, after doing what I had been told and moving that sign back, I cashed in the vouchers, since I had waited for the machine to time out before moving on to dad’s recyclables. And I picked up a couple more recyclables on the way back, in fact right after walking out.
I was back right at 6 PM, and after having lunch it was 7:55 PM when I left again, with the plastic and metal, which I dropped off in a recycling bin on the way. Then, after picking up an order from a pharmacy, which dad had paid for on-line, entering with the recyclables picked up until then, I put my things in a cabinet and bought two expiring products from Carrefour, one of them being a carton of six eggs that I just managed to put together out of the two that were available, since there were cracked eggs in both of them. However, I then ended up waiting for an awfully long time at the self-checkouts, the people who were in front of me needing a long time and/or having problems, and I moved between three machines and apparently always at the wrong time, employees finally coming to sort things out at one machine soon after I moved to another.
After I could finally buy those things, I retrieved what I had in the cabinet and continued to Kaufland, once again putting my things in cabinet, washing my hands, and entering the store just before 9:15 PM, at which point the evening discounts weren’t good, though I picked up two lettuces, mainly in case the discount would improve later. And it did, so I kept both, and since other good evening discounts appeared as well, I also took white bell peppers and parsnip roots. And I got some other things as well, and as I was wandering around, waiting to see whether any discounts would improve even more at 10:15 PM, I saw that the macaroni that were on sale had just been restocked, so I got quite a lot of those as well.
After retrieving what I had in the cabinet and arranging everything just enough to allow me to carry everything, I rushed out, still before closing time, and ended up leaving my things next to the cabinets at that Mega Image, the guard telling me to do so when he saw me trying to make the fullest bag fit in a cabinet. And, even though I assume that the 90% discounts had been placed quite some time before, I could still get quite a number of products that had that discount, though some were imported and only one, a small flatbread, was from the bakery area. Either way, I then grabbed everything again, went to that bench where I usually arrange my things after walking out of that Mega Image, and took my time to do so.
It was 11:25 PM when I got back, with 13 kg, including a bag that was almost full of recyclables, also containing one without a label that seemed to be the correct size for a label that I still had. Then I cleaned the litter box and went to drop a bag of trash down the chute, put most of the purchases in their place, talked to dad a little, and it was 12:30 AM when I went to wash. I was done a few minutes after 1 AM, but then I talked to dad a little more, selected peppers for him to take to mother, ate some cherries and something sweet, washed what was in the kitchen, also scraped what was stuck on the bottom of the pot that dad had made himself something in and put what I gathered on the plate with his other leftovers, put the remaining purchases in their place, which also meant rearranging things to make everything fit, salvaged a few tiny bits from the worst lettuce leaves, and spent a lot of time struggling to slice the small flatbread that I used as bread, which had obviously hardened even more after I microwaved it, so I only finally ate dinner between 4:30 AM and 5:15 AM. I got in bed at 6:30 AM.

At least I slept really well, only waking up around 2:30 PM, and then getting back in bed after peeing, and while I had a hard time falling asleep again, at some point I must have done so, since it was past 5:20 PM when I finally got up, though I had been awake again for a while by then. Either way, after that I finally installed the month’s Windows updates, not noticing any new issues, though the errors that appeared before in logs reappeared, so I once again had two instances of that error with id 2545 that tends to appear after updates, the error stating that Secure Boot is not enabled still appeared twice, and that VSS error also appeared again when I rebooted, albeit just once.

On August 3, after doing the day’s squats, eating lunch, and finishing and posting that day’s post, I went out at 7:55 PM, dropping what I had gathered from the litter box down the chute and the plastic and metal in a recycling bin on the way to Kaufland, putting the two recyclables picked up on the way in a cabinet when I got there, washing my hands, and entering the store when it was almost 8:25 PM. And the evening discounts for vegetables and fruits improved, and in some cases appeared, soon after that, so I pretty much stayed in that area, picking cucumbers, onions, carrots and bananas, plus a bundle of green onions and, out of curiosity, one yellow tomato. I had initially meant to also look at the cereals, since there was supposed to be a good discount that I had activated in the store app on-line, but I also meant to try to get to the self-checkout right after 8:45 PM and there was no way to do so, and I was in fact still using the machine when the closing announcement came, so I then tried to rush out with everything in one bag, though a little later I stopped to split the purchases into two bags, and also picked up one more recyclable. So it was no surprise that I reached that Mega Image that closes at 10 PM too late to still find any products with the 90% discount, but I still put my things into two cabinets and had a look, and then used the machine from there to buy a PaysafeCard code before retrieving everything.
I got back at 9:45 PM, then cleaned the litter box again and dropped what I had gathered down the chute, put the purchases in their place, also selecting the cucumbers that dad was going to take to mother, ate a banana and something sweet, and went to wash at 1 AM, being done a little after 1:35 AM and eating dinner between 3:20 AM and 3:55 AM. But I went to bed at the usual time and could sleep, since no work was done. Admittedly, I woke up at 9:05 AM, as dad was getting ready to leave, got back in bed a little after 9:20 AM and had a hard time getting back to sleep, in part because that bite on my left hand started itching badly again, but I eventually did, and by the time I got up the itching had pretty much gone away as well. And I caught another nap during the evening. On the other hand, I’ll also mention here that there were no visits recorded on August 4.

If on the morning of August 5 I seemed to have a hard time falling asleep anyway, things got worse when some irregular heartbeats startled me back to full alertness just as I was about to drift off. And the next time I was about to fall asleep, I heard something that sounded like the UPS kicking in. That didn’t seem to be the case, but I was alert yet again. And then Liza started meowing when I was just about to fall asleep for the third time, at which point I even considered getting back up for a while. But I didn’t, and eventually did manage to fall asleep, though a long time passed before that happened, and wanting to go out earlier that day meant that I couldn’t make up for it by staying in bed late either. But the great thing was that no work was done that day either, so I did eventually get several hours of sleep, and then left a couple of minutes after 3:30 PM… At which point I saw a fine stuck on the building’s entrance, because people hadn’t sorted their trash, which I actually expected to see, since it had been in the news that they had started handing them out in this sector, the problem being that they can’t know who’s to blame and who isn’t and fine the entire building, and I guess the amount is split between the apartments and added to the maintenance bill regardless of one’s behavior.
Either way, I first went to pick up an order from a pharmacy, then continued to Penny, entering with those products and just buying some corn puffs, stopping at a table, before crossing the street, to put them in the backpack before continuing to Tei, picking up some recyclables on the way and putting my things in a cabinet when I got there… Which was apparently exactly at the right time for the tea that I was looking for, since only one box was still on the shelf, but an employee was just placing more of that brand’s teas there at that point, so I asked whether they had more and she dug them out of a box. Then I retrieved what I had in the cabinet, picked up some more recyclables, and passed by that store which had offered more for them, confirming that the sign wasn’t there anymore, though I obviously didn’t want to walk in and have a look at the machine as well, even if that’d have been the way to make really sure that the campaign had actually ended. But the sign had stated that it would last until July 31, so I put those recyclables in Carrefour’s machine, when I got there, though I still ended up picking up one more before washing my hands, adding it along with the purchases into the one cabinet which had freed by then, since all were in use when I had passed by them on the way to the toilets. And then, after once again seeing that all of the bread of the kind that I’d have wanted to get from there was sliced, asking an employee whether they had any unsliced and walking away angrily when she said that they didn’t, I just cashed in that voucher. And I picked up one more recyclable on the way back.
I got back for the first time just before 5:45 PM, then ate plenty of watermelon, cleaned the litter box and went drop a bag of trash down the chute, put the purchases in their place, did the day’s squats, and at 7:20 PM I left again, with the recyclables with the deposit symbol, the paper, and the watermelon peels which I had forgotten to take when I had dropped that trash down the chute, so I dropped those in a trash can after walking out of the building and the paper in a recycling bin, doing my part even if we’ll obviously keep being fined along with everyone else.
I picked up a couple more recyclables, plus one label that also had the symbol, on the way to Auchan, putting them in the machine when I got there and splitting dad’s from mine, so I got two vouchers and then entered the store with those two glass bottles which hadn’t been accepted at that store and which I had taken in order to try there as well, still without success. And it was a good thing that dad called just as I was about to enter, since I had left him a note telling him to write me an e-mail after asking mother exactly what kind of cat food she wanted but he had called me while I was in Carrefour instead, and after hanging up I realized that, unsurprisingly, since my brain tends to shut down when I have to talk on the phone, I couldn’t remember what he said, so I had beeped him from the landline before leaving again and him calling at that point meant that I could get that cat food, one box of each kind for mother and another box of one kind for us, though they seemed to be out of the other cat food that I’d have also wanted. And I also took one of those whole wheat breads, seeing that the price had increased yet again, to cover the increased VAT, plus some cheap soap… But the bar codes on the soap were really hard to scan, so I couldn’t use a price checker and when I tried to scan one at the self-checkout, a message appeared that an assistant will soon come, and while I told the one who walked over that I’ll just enter the codes manually, she struggled to scan them instead, at which point I also saw that the price was marginally higher than what had been listed at the shelf, the tiny difference just covering the increased VAT, so that price label hadn’t been updated, but at that point I just shrugged it off. And I also used the vouchers received for the recyclables, and then I took quite some time to arrange the purchases.
Then I continued to Kaufland, picking up a recyclable just before I got there and putting it in the machine, though when I also tried those two they weren’t accepted there either. But after putting my things in a cabinet I spotted another recyclable, so I went back and put that in as well, then washed my hands and entered the store when it was close to 9:45 PM, only making use of the evening discount for a lettuce, adding some usable loose leaves on top of it. But I hoped the discount would increase later while on the other hand I didn’t want to leave later than I had to, so after also taking some cereals I went to the self-checkouts and only scanned those, to see what discount would apply, since the store app listed a 20% one for cereals and bars and a 30% one for croissants, cereals and bars, and I had activated both. And when I saw that the 30% discount applied, I bought them, also using the vouchers received for the recyclables. That meant that I shouldn’t have bought that other bag a month earlier, when the 20% discount for cereals had previously appeared, since the full price had only increased by the 1.7% caused by the increased VAT, but it’s not like I could have known it then. And that evening I couldn’t have known for sure that there would be no new or improved evening discounts either, so I wandered around until after 10:15 PM, then bought that lettuce as well, retrieved my things and arranged the purchases, noticing that they had set the doors to no longer open for people who wanted to come in some ten minutes before closing time, and even turned away a man who tried to enter then.
After picking up a plastic bottle that I could place one of the labels that I had on, I checked the Mega Image that closes at 11 PM, putting the bags in a cabinet, entering with the backpack, and seeing that they were actually just placing the 90% discounts for the bakery products, so I got a few things, then retrieved what I had in the cabinet and checked the non-stop Mega Image as well, once again putting the bags in a cabinet… But the first one that I tried wouldn’t lock, so I had to hit it until I managed to get my coin out, then moved the bags into another, which did work, one reason for concern being that a guy who kept sneezing and sniffling badly was using one of the machines from there during that time. Either way, a single product that had the 90% discount was left there by the time I entered, once again with the backpack, and it looked somewhat banged up, but it was a pretty nice sweet pastry, so I bought it, then retrieved the bags and picked up a few more recyclables on the way back.
I got back at 11:45 PM, with over 13.5 kg, and I only had 45 kg. Either way, I then put the purchases in their place, exchanged a few words with dad, ate a banana and that sweet pastry from the non-stop Mega Image, and only went to wash at 2 AM, being done just after 2:40 AM and, after also using what little I could salvage out of the worse lettuce leaves, as well as those loose ones, in the salad, I ate dinner between 4:25 AM and 5:15 AM. I initially got in bed at 6:25 AM, which was after dad got up, but a little later Liza went to the litter box, so I got back up to clean it and leave that little bag for dad to take and exchanged a few more words with him, actually getting in bed at 6:50 AM, the great thing being that no work was done that day either, so I could sleep. On the other hand, after getting up I noticed that I was signed out of my e-mail, which is unusual but may occasionally happen, but also that the sign-in activity had been cleared, the only entry being the one made when I signed on then, which was really suspicious. And, as a little thing, I then opened the large box of chamomile tea and found that it contained one teabag less than it should.

On August 10, after eating lunch, posting that day’s post and doing the day’s squats, I went out at 7:50 PM, with a small bag of trash that I dropped down the chute and a few recyclables with the deposit symbol, including two that I had placed found labels on, and I grabbed three recyclables from the garbage room and two more on the way to Kaufland, where I had to wait in line for a while before using the machine, which accepted the “proper” recyclables and one of those that I had placed a label on, but not the other, that label having come loose, and I didn’t try more than once, thinking of what had happened two days earlier, when a machine from Auchan had “eaten” such a loose label. So, after washing my hands, I entered the store with that one, at 8:25 PM, and just bought something for my mother, at which point I also used the voucher received for the recyclables. Since I had wanted to do that a little earlier, in case the discount didn’t actually apply to that specific product, I dashed back after using the self-checkout, to check whether there were any new or increased evening discounts, but there were none.
On the way back, I went to that Mega Image that closes at 10 PM, with that product in the backpack and without bothering to use a cabinet, seeing that the 90% discounts had already been placed in the bakery area, though it wasn’t it wasn’t quite 9 PM yet. So I grabbed a couple of things from there, and a few more after the cart with the other products discounted by 90% was brought out. And then I wanted to try to put that recyclable in that machine as well, but it displayed a message that assistance was required before the man who was in front of me finished and I didn’t want to wait… But ended up waiting at the checkout, because the cashier accidentally scanned one of the products at full price and when I pointed it out he thought that it was another, ending up calling over a coworker and, though she pretty quickly figured out what had scanned at the wrong price, they took a while to try to sort out the situation. I asked whether it wasn’t easier and faster to just cancel the transaction and do it again, and while that coworker initially said no, I assume that she eventually did it, since she scanned the store card again. But we had both calculated what should have been the total and when she ended up with a lower one she assumed that she had forgotten to scan something, walking away and letting the guy do it yet again… And he once again scanned that product at full price, which was admittedly easy to do, considering how the bar codes were placed, so I eventually covered the other scanner and kept my hand there even though he told me to remove it, which finally allowed him to scan it correctly. But he arrived at that same lower total, at which point he said that he won’t do it again, giving me the change according to it, albeit rounding down by 0.06 RON… And when I checked the receipt I saw that it was actually correct, two of the products having an additional 20% discount.
After finally walking away from there, I crossed back to the other side of the road, since there was a match and I expected to find plenty of recyclables, which I did, ending up with a bag that was almost full, plus one more label that also had the symbol… And eventually getting back with all of them, since I meant to use the machine from the nearby Mega Image, managed to get there before 10 PM, but found a note stating that the machine was off because the recyclables hadn’t been picked up, so I just turned around, seeing no reason to check the store.
I got back right at 10 PM, and since my mother was here, I asked her whether she could prepare something we had in the freezer for a long time, and she said yes, I took out that bag, which was at the back of the freezer, and then struggled to put back everything else, as well as her ice cream. Some time later, I ate plenty of watermelon and washed what was in the kitchen, and then dad called me over because his computer had suddenly showed nothing but a white screen, so I turned it off from the button and then back on, seeing that it started up normally, though there were many instances of an error almost 20 minutes earlier, and while he initially said that the problem had just happened, when I told him that he said that it might have happened then and he wasn’t doing anything on the computer when he noticed it. But I didn’t know what that error was about. Either way, I then talked to mother for quite some time, then ate a sweet pastry, and it was 1:50 AM when I went to wash, being done just before 2:25 AM and eating dinner between 3:50 AM and 4:40 AM, though I still managed to go to bed at the normal time.

The workers woke me up around 8:50 AM, and my parents were getting ready to leave for a while, so after they did I got back in bed and might have managed to catch a brief nap before they got back, at which point I woke up again, and a little later, around 10:15 AM, I got back up. I got back in bed right at noon, some time after my parents had left again, but I had a hard time falling asleep even though there was little noise at that point, and while I eventually did and the noise didn’t seem to be much of a problem later either, I was waking up at ever shorter intervals, so I only added some two and a half more hours of sleep, getting the total to some six hours or so, before waking up for the last time, a little after 4 PM.
After that, I turned the old computer back on, setting the date to July 13 and updating Emsisoft Anti-Malware on both Windows 7 and Windows 10, so it’ll see that the license was extended before it expired. Then, after synchronizing the date and time, I installed the Windows updates on it as well… And found that even that much newer version of Comodo Firewall which I had installed on that computer still forgets the HIPS settings, and apparently regularly, so it’s fortunate that I had exported them after installing it, but it likely means that dad won’t be able to use it like that if and when I’ll give him that computer, which is actually yet to happen. But what worried me even more was that the site for the free version of Comodo Firewall was giving an error, which had apparently been happening for months, and the versions page seems to indicate that no free version is available anymore, and I still haven’t installed it on this computer… Either way, that evening I also went back to my room while the water for the tea was on the stove and it spilled and turned off the stove, so when I got back there I rushed to open the window and wait a little before turning the stove back on, while later I got back in bed, though I only slept for another half an hour, if even that, before my parents got back again and I woke up.