Shabbat, 30 November 2013

I got up early this morning and got in a good walk and work-out. It was a bit chilly out, but my light wrap get me warm.

I did more work on my project for my class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. The major changes had to do with the percussion. First, I increases the frequency of various drum hit to give it a bit more energy. Then I did something quite interesting but perhaps a little bizarre: I used the clap audio clip, played very rapidly (every 50 milliseconds) to create the effect of a machine gun. Then I spawned a separate programming to bring it in at randomized times and from random directions (left to right). Although there's a lot of randomness, the average time between blasts gradually trends shorter as the piece progresses, and they also tend to get slightly louder. The title of the song I'm using for the main melody is "L'Homme Armé" which is French for "the armed man". So, our armed man has moved into the 21st century and now has a machine gun (we're just lucky he hasn't yet acquired nuclear weapons, because that could have destroyed the whole piece!). Somewhere along the way, he apparently also visited India, because his melody is played on a sitar.

For lunch today, David and I went to Mike's Place. We had been there once or twice before, but it used to be difficult to get to. Now that some construction has been finished, it's shorter and easier. We got there a bit after 1:00 but found out that the kitchen wouldn't be open for at least 45 minutes. The bar WAS open, though, so we both had drinks while we waited. David had a Bloody Mary, and I had a Strawberry Mimosa. I had never had one before, and it really was rather too bitter for me, so I don't think I'll order one again. When the kitchen opened, we ordered Tex/Mex dishes: a veggie quesadilla for David and a veggie burrito for me. They were good but certainly not the type of Mexican food one gets in Southern California. I don't know if they're like you'd get in Texas or not, having never had Mexican food there, I think.

After lunch, we drove up the Arava as far as Samar, then returned home and talked for a short while with David's sister in Ohio before going over to Ice Park for frozen yogurt.

Friday, 29 November 2013

I got up a little late this morning and so didn't go out for a walk. I did, however, take the cardboard down to recycle and bought challah at the bakery.

I had only 4 units of Berlitz lessons scheduled today, and the first student (half of those units) turned out to be a no-show: 10:30-12:00 and 12:00-1:30. After that, we went and had lunch at Il Pentolino.

I did a lot of work on my project for this week for my class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. In fact, I think it's almost finished. It's an abbreviated setting of "L'homme armé", a French secular song from the time of the Renaissance. These days, it's mostly famous because so many composers of that time, including most famously Josquin des Prez, wrote masses (of all things!) based on it. My setting is limited (by the requirements of this project) to 16 measures (of its full 32 measures), so I only do the beginning and end, basically. I use a sitar (a classical string instrument of India) for the melody, and it's accompanied by a walking bass line (played on a double bass-like instrument) and a fast, constantly moving descant, played by a modified sine oscillator and a flute. There is also some percussion accompaniment. The net effect is pretty good, but I think I need to find a way to liven it up a bit more.

In the evening, we lit candles, drank a bit of sweet wine, and ate challah to welcome the Shabbat.

Thursday, 28 November 2013

I woke up early and got out for my walk to the gym, work-out while there, and even full stretches on the way home. And it was lovely out this morning, too! I wore only sandals, jeans, and a t-shirt and felt very comfortable.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:15-10:00, 10:00-11:30, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, 4:00-4:45, and 5:00-6:30. Next week will be considerably less busy since today was the last of day of the 2-week special classes for the WHO (World Health Organization). So, today I said goodbye to students in Egypt, Thailand, Nigeria, and Mongolia! The most interesting moment was when we did a role play of labor negotiations with a woman in Nigeria representing management and a man in Egypt representing the union (and they did a great job, too!).

We ate lunch at home today, but we went over to Ice Park for frozen yogurt after my last class.

Wednesday, 27 November 2013

I slept in again this morning because I felt very tired. I think I'm fighting some sort of cold or sinus infection, but I don't have any other symptoms.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today (although the 2:30 group was a complete no-show): 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, and 6:00-7:30.

We ate lunch at home, but we went to Ice Park for frozen yogurt around 4:00.

I evaluated last week's projects of 7 of my classmates in Introduction to Programming for Musician and Digital Artists. I am only required to do 5, but I was hearing a lot of interesting music, so I decided to do a couple more.

Tuesday, 26 November 2013

I slept very well last night, but, for some reason, I just slept in this morning and so didn't get out for a walk at all.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 10:00-11:30, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30.

Before and between lessons, I managed to watch all the video lectures for this week for my online class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. They just became available. This week is exciting because we are learning how to write programs that will run concurrently (at the same time), something which is especially useful in making music.

We ate veggie weenies wrapped in whole-wheat tortillas, coleslaw, and chips and salsa for lunch at home today.

Between 4:00 and 5:00, David and I enjoyed the perfect weather out today by walking over to the green strip and back. I've also had all the windows open nearly all day long today.

Monday, 25 November 2013

I got up early enough this morning to get in some great exercise.

I was scheduled for 11 units of Berlitz lessons today, but I actually taught somewhat less than that. My first lesson was a level check, so the first unit of the 2 was spent doing that. My next 2 lessons were both no-shows, so all I had to do was sit around a wait at hour for each of them. My last lesson of the day was supposed to be 3 units, but the student told me at the beginning of it that he could only stay for 2 units (an hour and a half) today. Here are the times I was scheduled to teach today: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, and 4:00-6:15.

Because of the 2nd no-show, we had time to go down to the local bakery for lunch today. David had pizza, and I had their platter of various kinds of bread (with butter and jam).

After my last class, we drove down to Ice Park for frozen yogurt.

Sunday, 24 November 2013

I got up early enough this morning for a good walk to the gym, a good work-out there, and stretches on the way back.

My first order of business after breakfast was to go to Maccabi (our health plan) and pay the bill for the ER, which they ruled we would have to pay ourselves since Maccabi offices were open at the time we went there. I don't like it too well, but it was only 807 shekels, and we were allowed to do it in 3 payments (without any interest charge), so we'll be fine. From there, I went on to Shufersal to do the weekly grocery shopping.

We ate lunch at Buddha Burgers today. David tried their rice noodles with tomato sauce, which were okay but not wonderful. I, on the other hand, had their hummus with vegan shwarma (which I had tried before), and it was fantastic! We each had a piece of their incredibly good vegan cheesecake, which is to die for! On the way home, I stopped at the Maccabi pharmacy to pick up some medicines that they had had to order (so I hadn't been able to pick them up last week).

I finished work on my project for this week. Perhaps I'll make another tweak or two to some parameters, but basically it's fine now. It's a short (30 seconds) 3-voice ricercare in the phrygian mode. A ricercare, for those of you who don't know, is an earlier predecessor of the fugue. Both of them involve starting with a single voice stating the subject. Then each other voice in turn starts with the same subject but in alternating keys. I'm pretty pleased with the way mine turned out.

This evening I talked for about 2 hours with my daughter, Amy, in California (via Skype, of course). It was really fun talking with her, and we both enjoyed it immensely, I think.

Shabbat, 23 November 2013

I slept in this morning; I guess I was just tired after a long, busy week.

We took a drive all the way to Mitzpe Ramon today. While there, we bought PespsiMaxes and candy bars, then drove back down into the makhtesh to eat them and the rest of the lunch we had brought with us: hard-boiled eggs, potato salad, and dates. Our average mileage for the trip was 20.5 km/l (more than 47 mpg!).

When we got back home, we talked with David's sister in Ohio. Then we drove down to Ice Park for frozen yogurt.

In the evening I did much more work on my project for Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. I still have some additional things I must add to it to meet certain requirements, and, of course, there's a lot of room for refinement still.

Friday, 22 November 2013

I got up very early this morning, got in a decent walk, and also later walked down to recycle cardboard, go to the local market, and go to the bakery to get challah and sufganiot (jelly-filled donuts, eaten for khanukah -- and for MONTHS before here in Israel, apparently!), all before breakfast.

I taught 6 units of Berlitz lessons today, the maximum possible for my Friday availability: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, and 12:00-1:30. Then we went to lunch at Il Pentolino and had our traditional dishes there.

At candle-lighting time, we lit candles, drank sweet red wine, and ate challah and sufganiot to welcome the Shabbat.

This afternoon and evening I began work on my project for this week for Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. It has to be in the Phrygian mode, so I decided to write a 3-part ricercare (an early predecessor of the fugue). I've got it prototyped in Digital Performer (so I can see the notes and hear how they sound); now I've got to get it programmed in ChucK, to be followed by lots of editing, no doubt.

Thursday, 21 November 2013

I again got up early and got out early on my walk. I decided to walk a different route and explore some of the area southwest of us. Much of the construction there has now been finished, and there are a lot of nice apartment buildings and a few villas (single-family homes). Unfortunately, my toes were hurting inside my shoes for some reason, so I returned home a little sooner than I had planned. Still, I got some pretty good exercise.

I taught 9 units of lessons today: 9:15-10:00, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30.

I started today on evaluating last week's work of 5 of my fellow students in my class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. I actually looked at all 5 of the projects assigned to me and wrote about them, but I haven't submitted my evaluations yet. I think I'll look and listen one more time before I finalize my evaluations.

We had hard-boiled eggs and potato salad for lunch at home today.

Between 4:00 and 5:00 we took a short drive down the coast, just to get out of the house a bit.

Wednesday, 20 November 2013

I woke up very early this morning and got out onto my walk before 5:30. I wore shoes (instead of sandals), jeans (instead of short pants), a t-shirt, and a light hoodie, and that was just the right amount to keep comfortable. I walked to the gym, worked out there a bit, and then headed home. Eventually, I needed to push the sleeves of the hoodie up my arm a bit and unzip it partway to keep from getting too warm. In fact, for the last couple of blocks, I took the hoodie off completely.

I taught 11 units (8.25 hours) of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, and 6:00-8:15.

We had veggie hamburgers and coleslaw for lunch at home today.

After 4:00, we drove over to Ice Park and had frozen yogurt.

I listened to the rest of this week's video lectures for my online class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. It's quite exciting, especially the stuff about physical modeling of musical instruments and even noise-makers! There is a LOT of power in the ChucK programming language!

Tuesday, 19 November 2013

I woke up a bit late this morning, and I felt that I hadn't slept very well. Somehow, I just wasn't relaxed, but I don't know why. Anyway, I did not go out for a walk at all.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 10:00-11:30, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, 5:00-6:30, and 6:30-8:00. Three of the 5 classes were groups of WHO employees from various countries. Unfortunately, the internet connections in some developing countries are not very good, and this caused some serious problems for some of the students. The most common is lengthy delays, both in hearing what others in the class say (including me) and in us hearing what THEY say. This can be quite frustrating all around and often leads to nearly no participation at all.

We ate lunch at home again, and one more time we had veggie weenies wrapped in tortillas. However, today we had whole-wheat tortillas, which were definitely better although smaller.

Today I managed to watch several of the videos for the new week of my programming class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists, and they were excellent. The regular teacher of the class brought in his former professor, Perry Cook, from Princeton to do the lectures this week, and he is really great!

Monday, 18 November 2013

I woke up a bit late and somewhat tired this morning, so I didn't go out for any walk.

I taught 13 units (that's 9.75 hours!) of Berlitz lessons today, although the first student (2 units) was a no-show: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, 4:00-6:15, and 6:30-8:00.

We ate lunch at home, including trying some nice mini cornbread muffins that I had found yesterday in the frozen section at the market.

My class at 2:30 has 3 students, one from Burkina Faso but who is currently on a business trip in Niger (both in West Africa), one in Mongolia, and one in Washington, DC (who is originally from Nicaragua). All work for the WHO (World Health Organization).

Sunday, 17 November 2013

I woke up very early this morning but didn't let myself get up until after 5:00. Then I walked to the gym, worked out a bit there, and walked back.

This morning I did the weekly grocery shopping. Then we drove together up to Yotvata to buy 2 kilos of dates, and, when we returned to Eilat, we ate lunch at Buddha Burgers.

After lunch I went to the pharmacy for the monthly prescriptions and then to the post office to pick up a package we had ordered from Amazon UK. Unfortunately, I went to THREE different post offices before I finally got to the right one, a new office located only about 4 blocks down the street from us!

I finished tweaking my project, added the necessary commenting, and submitted it today. It's quite a jaunty little setting of the Dreydl Song.

In the early evening we drove over to Ice Park for frozen yogurt, then returned home to update the software on David's iPhone, to load a bit more music onto it, and to buy 3 new books for him to read.

Shabbat, 16 November 2013

For some reason, I was tired and just slept in this morning, so no morning exercise.

I forgot to mention in yesterday's post that it was my birthday, but maybe it's just as well. You see, I was actually born in California around 6:00 p.m. on the 15th which here in Israel would be around 4 a.m. on the 16th. Putting that together with the fact that the earth actually takes about 365 and a quarter days to go around the sun, I deduce that I actually completed my 61st such trip sometime around 10 a.m. this morning, local time. So there!

We had intended to take a drive to Mitzpe Ramon this morning, but David's bowels had other ideas, forcing us to turn around before even making it up to the first checkpoint on highway 12. Perhaps it's just as well, since I then was able to get more work done on my project. In fact, I thinks it's just about finished now, though I won't submit it until tomorrow so that I'll have a few more chances to listen to it.

The project is our 4th assignment for my online class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. For this one, we were required, among other things, to use the mixolydian mode, to use functions, and to use a tempo of 100 beats per minute. I chose to do a setting of the Dreidl Song, a popular chanukah song in the U.S. My arrangements includes a countermelody and a simple bass line that begin before the main melody. It also has a bit of percussion using samples.

We ate lunch today at the Aroma in the south beach area of town. Although we have, of course, eaten many times at Aromas around the country, we had never eaten at this particular one before.

In the afternoon, we talked with David's sister in Ohio and then drove down to Ice Park for frozen yogurt.

Friday, 15 November 2013

Last night I happened to be awake enough to notice that David got up to go to the bathroom around 3:00 a.m., which is not at all unusual. I went back to sleep, but when I woke up around 4:30, I noticed he was still not back in bed. At first, I didn't realize how much later it was, but when he didn't return for a number of minutes, I decided I had better get up and check on him. It's a good thing I did, because he was lying on the bathroom floor and had obviously fallen sometime earlier, although I had NOT heard it as I thought I would (and have, on previous occasions). He was conscious and seemed find other than some pain and stiffness and a little blood from his arm. My concern was how to get him up. I knew that the blood would make the floor slippery, so I had to clean that up first. It looked like his hand had a cut on it, but we later found out that was just dried blood from the arm. Anyway, I didn't panic, and eventually he was able to get up on his arms and knees and then use the bathtub to stand up. After he had sat for a bit on the plastic chair in the bathroom, we got him safely back to bed, and I went back to bed, too. Of course, I did NOT get up early at all this morning, but I did have time to do the cardboard recycling and buy challah at the bakery before breakfast.

I taught 6 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, and 12:00-1:30. Then we went over to Il Pentolino for our traditional Friday lunch.

We lit candles, drank sweet red wine, and ate delicious challah to welcome Shabbat. Even our cat, Pascal, gets in on the act -- he likes the tiny, dark seeds and the pieces of rolled oats that are on the crust of the challah. I put some of them in a small dish for him, and he eats every last one of them! Our other cat, Katom, sometimes checks to see what he's eating, but Katom isn't interested in those seeds at all, and he seems to think that Pascal is crazy (which he just might be, LOL!).

This evening I began work on my next project for my online class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. These week, we are required to use the Mixolydian mode on Eb, and the tempo must be 100 bpm. I'm doing a short setting of the Dreidl Song (a favorite chanukkah song in the U.S.), with an oom-pah bass line and a countermelody about the main melody. The countermelody actually starts several measures before the main one in order to make the piece the required length of approximately 30 seconds.

Thursday, 14 November 2013

I got up early this morning and walked to the gym but didn't work out there. Instead, I walked by a different way in order to buy more Snickers bars for David.

This morning I checked the peer evaluations I did yesterday and then submitted them for my online class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 10:00-11:30, 11:30-1:00, 2:30-4:00, 5:00-6:30, and 6:30-8:00.

We ate lunch at home today and had vegetarian shnitzels and potato salad.

Wednesday, 13 November 2013

Last night my mind got to thinking about my new project, and so I had trouble getting to sleep. Unfortunately, this caused me to get up very late and not have any time to go out for a walk.

I looked at the code and listened to the pieces of the 5 students whose work I was assigned to evaluate for my Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists class, but I only saved drafts and didn't submit any final evaluations yet.

I taught 11 units of Berlitz lessons today: 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, 2:30-4:00, 4:30-6:00, and 6:00-8:15. And now I'm exhausted!

We ate lunch at home today, since we only had one hour. We had veggie weenies wrapped in flour tortillas, chips and salsa, red cabbage salad, and pickles.

Tuesday, 12 November 2013

I got up early enough to walk to the gym and back this morning, but I didn't work out there at all.

This morning I watched all but one of the lecture videos for the new week of my Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists class.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, 3:30-5:00, 5:00-6:30, and 6:30-8:00. You may notice that most of them were back-to-back, which is particularly challenging and tiring, since we have to fill out an information card for each class before we can enter the next one, and we get an rating of "unsatisfactory" in the punctuality category if we are late entering a lesson even ONCE during an entire YEAR!

We ate lunch at Buddha Burgers today. David had their Buddha burger (gluten-free), and I had a nice mixed stir-fry dish, with rice, quinoa, cabbage, bell peppers, onion, and pieces of gluten and tofu.

Monday, 11 November 2013

I got up a little late this morning, but I still managed to walk to the highway 12 kikar and back and thereby get some good exercise for the day.

I taught only 4 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30 and 4:30-6:00. In many countries, today is a holiday marking the end of World War I, but, as I found out from my first student today, not in Germany. Hmmm... I wonder why (NOT!).

We ate lunch at Café Café at Ice Park today. David had a sort of salmon shwarma burrito (talk about mixing it up!), and I had a "Vitamins, Health, and Iron" salad: lentils, purple onions, sprouts, walnuts, a few pieces of dried fruit, and tsfati cheese. It was okay but nothing all that special.

We had popcorn at home this evening, something we haven't had in forever!

Sunday, 10 November 2013

I didn't wake up until 6:00 a.m. this morning and was surprised to have slept until it was light. But I also still felt tired, so I didn't get up until after 6:30 and so didn't go out for a walk at all.

After listening several more times to my project this morning, I submitted it. There is so much randomness in it that it's different every time I run it. However, there is a certain sameness that testifies to the successful limiting of the randomness. I'm quite happy with it. I call in "Random Dorian Techno", and I hope my classmates in Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists who get assigned to evaluate it will like it, too.

I did a little shopping this morning. First, I went to the pet store to get more food for the cats. Then I continued to the health food store to get more peanut butter. Finally, I drove on down to Shufersal to do the weekly grocery shopping.

We ate lunch at Buddha Burgers again today. I had vegan shwarma hummus, and David had a baked potato with various sauces.

In the early evening, we drove down to Ice Park for frozen yogurts and a walk around the circle of the mall.

Shabbat, 9 November 2013

I got up early and was out of the house by 5:30. I walked to the gym, worked out there a bit, and then walked back home.

I continued work on refining and commenting the code for my current project for my class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. I think I've got it sounding pretty good now, and my comments in the code are very extensive, describing quite precisely what is going on at each point and why.

We drove up highway 90 to highway 40, highway 40 to highway 13, highway 13 to highway 90, and back down 90. We stopped at Yahel, expecting to have our now-traditional Shabbat lunch there, but we discovered that the Kakao restaurant was closed! Have they gone kosher? Probably, but there was no sign at all. Luckily, I thought to test David's blood sugar because it turned out to be 49! Normal is between 70 and 126. Fortunately, the convenience store there WAS open, so I quickly went over and got him a Snickers bar, which, of course, brought his blood sugar up to where it should be. After that, we drove on back to Eilat and had a very late lunch of soyaburgers at Barbis.

When we got back home, we talked for a while with David's sister in Ohio and then went down to Ice Park for frozen yogurt.

Friday, 8 November 2013

I got up very early this morning, walked to the gym, worked out, and stretched on my home. Later, after checking my e-mail, I walked down to recycle the cardboard boxes and buy challah for Shabbat, all before breakfast.

I taught 4 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30 and 10:30-12:00.

Shortly after noon, our landlord came over to fix a couple of lights for us, including a fixture in the bathroom that needed to be replaced. He also is trying to fix our living room blinds, but he's going to have to replace one of them in order to do it, so he couldn't do it today.

We had our usual favorite dishes at Il Pentolino for lunch today.

This afternoon and evening, I began work on my 3rd project for my Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists class. The title of this assignment is "Make Techno", and one of its main purposes is to practice using sample files. I think I've just about got it the way I want it now, although I may still adjust a few parameters to make it better. I also need to add LOTS of comments to help the assessors see what I'm doing and to make sure that they know I fulfilled all the technical specifications. There is a LOT of randomness going into this piece: choices of notes (from specified sets of notes, however), choices of samples, playback speed of samples (including reverse direction in some cases!), panning (left to right) of some of the sounds, and whether or not to play a clap sound at each step. It turned out to be even more fun than I thought it would!

Just before the start of Shabbat, we lit candles, drank sweet wine, and ate challah to welcome to Shabbat bride.

Thursday, 7 November 2013

I got up in plenty of time this morning to walk to the highway 12 kikar, feed our friends' cats, and walk back home.

I was scheduled for 9 units of Berlitz lessons today, but 1 1-unit class was a late cancellation: 10:00-11:30, 11:30-1:00, 3:00-4:30, 6:00-6:45 (the late cancellation), and 7:00-8:30.

We ate lunch at Buddha Burgers again today. David had their seitan (gluten) fingers, and I tried their weenie burrito. Both were, of course, excellent!

I walked over and fed our friends' cats again before my evening class. Our friends will be returning from the trip to Poland late tonight.

Wednesday, 6 November 2013

I got up early enough to walk to the highway 12 kikar, feed our friends' cats, and walk back home.

I taught 8 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, and 4:30-6:00.

We ate lunch today at Café Café at Ice Park. David had artichoke lasagna, and I had Italian shakshuka.

Our landlord came over this evening to check on a couple of minor things that need fixing: a loose light fixture in the bathroom that sometimes causes the light to suddenly go out and a broken rod on the blinds in the living room.

Tuesday, 5 November 2013

I got up early this morning, walked over to the highway 12 kikar, then to our friends' apartment (which is in one of the three 20-story buildings near there), fed their cats, and walked on home.

This morning I watched the videos for the new week in my class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists, and also assessed the second assignment projects submitted by 5 of my fellow students (as required).

I had 6 units of Berlitz lesson today, but the last lesson (2 units) was a no-show: 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, and 4:30-6:00.

We ate lunch at Il Pentolino today, but we didn't have our regular dishes. Instead, David had cheese ravioli with the sauce that I usually get, and I had whole wheat spaghetti with the "Il Pentolino" sauce, a cream sauce with peas, chunks of Bulgarian cheese, and croutons in it. Both were delicious, of course.

After my last class we drove down to Ice Park for frozen yogurt. I also watched the ice dance show, which began with 2 solos by young girls who are just learning and ended with the 2 regular, professional performers doing their usual solo routines. It was all very enjoyable. Then David and I walked together all the way around the circle in the mall before returning home.

In the evening, I drove over to feed our friends' cats again because I didn't quite feel like walking.

The weather here is absolutely perfect! We've all all the windows wide open all day, and I even left several of them, including the bedroom window, open all night last night.

Today would have been the 119th birthday of my father, since he was born in 1894. Of course, he died more than 40 years ago, in early 1973, when he was 78 and I was only 20.

Monday, 4 November 2013

I got up early enough this morning to walk over and feed our friends' cats before breakfast.

I had 8 units of Berlitz lessons today, but the first student (2 units) was a no-show: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 12:00-1:30, and 6:30-8:00.

We ate lunch again at Buddha Burgers. David had lentil soup with bread, and I had seitan fingers (breaded pieces of gluten) with dips and a small salad. Both were dishes we hadn't tried before, and both were delicious!

After lunch, we drove down to the gas station by the airport, filled up, and got the car washed.

Before my evening class, we went to to Ice Park for frozen yogurt. On the way back, I again stopped and fed our friends' cats.

Sunday, 3 November 2013

I got up late this morning and also felt quite tired, so I didn't go out for a walk at all. However, later in the morning, I did walk over to our friends' place, about a 15-20-minute walk from here, and fed their cats. Our friends are on a short vacation in Poland.

This morning I did the weekly grocery shopping at Shufersal. This week they had plenty of 6-packs of PepsiMax, but some weeks they have none, so I bought 6 of them instead of the 4 that we would typically use in a week. I'm trying to keep overstocked on this so that we don't have to drink Coke Zero, which we like less.

We ate lunch again at Buddha Burgers. David had their veggie weenies with sauerkraut on the side, and I had hummus with vegan shwarma and whole-wheat pita. Its was delicious!

I finished work on my project for week 2 of my Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists class that I described yesterday. I tuned it up a bit so things would be more balanced, corrected a couple of minor omissions, and added LOTS of comments to guide the assessors through what I did. Then I submitted it, even though it's not due until tomorrow night.

In the late afternoon, we drove over to Ice Park for frozen yogurt. After we finished eating it, we took a stroll around the mall for a bit more exercise. On the way back home, I stopped by to feed our friends' cats again.

This evening we got another audio book for David to listen to, using one of the credits we get eat month for being members of Audible, so we got the book, whose regular price is $28, for nothing (beside the monthly membership fee, which, I think, is about $10 and also affords us discount on other books we buy).

Shabbat, 2 November 2013

I got up a little late this morning and felt a little tired, too, so I only walked to the highway 12 kikar and back. It was still good exercise, though.

I spent much of the day working on the 2nd project for my class. It's a setting of an old French noel (Xmas carol) that I picked mostly because it's in the Dorian mode, a requirement for this project. The project also has a required tempo, so I needed a piece that would sound okay at that speed. There's a 4-measure introduction before the actual melody starts, and there are 2 additional fade-away measures at the end, which bring it exactly to the required length of 30 seconds. I start with noise that gets gradually louder (though never very loud) and wanders left and right in a random walk. There are also random 16th notes chosen for a full 3 octaves of the Dorian mode. When the melody starts, the noise continues to wander, though somewhat more quietly, and the random notes during this phase are chosen only from chords that match the melody. There is also a bass line that plays along with the melody. For the last 2 measures, the random notes are again chosen from the whole gamut, and every thing fades away to nearly nothing. All of this is accomplished by programming in the ChucK programming language. It's basically finished now, although I still need to add more comments, and I'll probably also tinker a bit more with the parameters that control everything and how it works together.

For lunch, we again drove up to Yahel. However, we went up highway 40 and came back on highway 13 to highway 90, continuing south to Yahel. After eating, we drove directly home on highway 90.

In the evening we went over to Ice Park for frozen yogurt and then talked to David's sister in Ohio after returning home.

Friday, 1 November 2013

I got up very early again and so got my usual great exercise.

Also before breakfast I walked down to recycle the cardboard and to buy challah for Shabbat.

I had no Berlitz lessons scheduled today. So I took advantage of the time to do several other things. I took the trash out, recycled the containers and plastic bottles, bought a couple of light sweaters with zippers, did 3 loads of laundry, and worked my second project for my class, Introduction to Programming for Musicians and Digital Artists. I've got it working acceptably now, but I want to make additional refinements to it to make it better.

We ate our traditional Friday lunch at Il Pentolino today.

In the evening, of course, we lit candles, drank sweet wine, and ate challah to welcome the Shabbat.