Pokémon Go, Timed Investigation: Master Ball

Pokemon Go screenshot showing Timed Investigation: Master Ball goals

I mentioned a while ago – almost 5 years now! – that I play Pokémon Go as a way to motivate myself to get outside and walk. (In winter, that’s get into the garage and use the treadmill now that it can integrate with Google Fit.) Part of the basic functionality is research goals – timed, field, and special research. The field research comes from spinning stops when they’re nearby, whereas the special and timed ones are generated by the system. The timed ones vary from single day events to months-long challenges, like the GO Battle League challenges and this Master Ball challenge.

If you’re looking at the screenshot, you’ll notice some of those numbers (goals) are quite high… catch 1000 Pokémon! Complete 150 Field Research tasks! The reward is what makes it worth it… in addition to a bunch of stardust and experience points, there’s a Master Ball. And 80 days to complete all of it. (My timing was lucky, it started the day I went to a heavily Pokémon-ed area.)

There are three types of balls normally used in the game: Poké Ball, Great Ball, Ultra Ball. Increasingly powerful and increasingly rare, these balls are accrued by spinning stops and gyms and by opening gifts (received by… spinning stops and gyms) with your Poké Friends. The type of ball you want to use will depend on the level of the Pokémon you’re trying to catch and its difficulty (beyond the level – some are just harder to catch). As a general rule, I use a Poké Ball for anything under 400 CP, a Great Ball up to 800 CP, and an Ultra Ball above that. (For additional context, my highest CP Pokémon is currently 4248.)

Some Pokémon are just harder to catch… they’re elusive, appearing only occasionally, and likely to flee after one successful throw unless they actually stay contained. A successful throw means you hit the Pokémon with the ball and see it captured… it doesn’t always stay caught though. There are all sorts of calculations going on behind the scenes, with better throws (towards a diminishing circle) and curveballs adding bonuses that will help the Pokémon stay caught.

And then there’s the Master Ball… it has a 100% catch rate. When you get one, you save it for a hard to catch Pokémon.

Will I succeed at completing all of these goals? I have my doubts on completing 60 raids and the 120 Excellent Throws (that’s hitting a tiny circle on the Pokémon) in that time, but I’m certainly going to try.

A bathroom update, driven by necessity

The before shot: the old vanity and a space-hogging, dust-collecting radiator left over from when we had a boiler.

It wasn’t a terrible-looking bathroom, other than the bathtub that picks up color from the pipes and needs refinishing and a radiator that collected dust and anything that dropped down that narrow space between the vanity and the wall. But the sink drain periodically had issues, backing up soon after we cleared it. We hired a plumber, who disassembled the bits under the sink to clear it out with a “router” or drain cleaning machine (not to be confused with the router connected to your modem or the style used for woodcraft) and found that someone else had done that previously and left a broken metal rod in the pipe. Seriously, hearing the plumber exclaim “What the… ?” is never a good sign.

This metal rod was stuck in the pipe behind the bathroom sink, causing drainage issues. (Yes, the bathtub needs refinishing.)

The plumber put in a good effort, but ultimately said that he couldn’t get the rod out. The vanity would need to come out – outside of his scope of work – and in a worst case scenario, the pipe might have to be cut to get it out. I’m relieved to say that the handyman we hired did not have to cut the pipe to get this well-corroded chunk of metal out of the pipe. He did have to remove the vanity, and it seemed like a reasonable time to update that portion of the bathroom.

The fabulous looking bathroom after replacing the vanity & top, medicine cabinet and light, adding a door stop, and painting it dark blue.

The old vanity was 25 inches wide; removing the unused radiator from the floor gave us an additional 4 inches to play with on that side, so we updated to a 30-inch vanity with a 31-inch top. (We were told by multiple people that we could go as wide as 32 inches without interfering with the toilet, but 30 appears to be a standard size). In addition to the vanity, the medicine cabinet is significantly larger than the old one, the light fixture updated, and the walls are a lovely shade of blue. I keep poking my head into the bathroom just to smile at the overall effect of the change.

Do you still Wordle?

It’s been about 18 months since Wordle began appearing on my social media feeds, those green and yellow boxes asking for an explanation. I discussed Wordle variants soon after that. While I still play Wordle daily, the variants I play has shifted. I still play Daily Quordle, and its own variant Daily Sequence, which has four words that must be solved in order. While I enjoy Octordle (8 words) and Sedecordle (16 words!), I play on my phone, so managing 8 or 16 words was cumbersome.

Among the variants I’m enjoying are Connections, another puzzle hosted by The New York Times, and Keyword, hosted by The Washington Post. Keyword looks like part of a crossword puzzle – you’re given 6 vertical words, each missing one letter lined up in a horizontal row; your goal is to find the missing word in as few guesses as possible. (A perfect score is 6 letters.) It usually has a mix of easy and hard words. For example, “?ARROT” is probably CARROT, but “RI?E” could be any number of words. When you enter the correct letter, the square turns green; a wrong answer turns it pink. Either way, it shows a count of how many guesses you’ve taken on that letter.

Connections unstarted with the words: Jack, Press, Planet, Button, Plank, Squat, Snap, Obvious, Crunch, Buckle, Nothing, Curl, Zip, Kangaroo, Lunge, Nada

Connections takes a whole different approach, presenting you with a four-by-four grid of words. Your task is to determine what the connections are between the words, correctly grouping them in sets of four. What makes this difficult is the combination of overlapping categories – there’s usually a couple words that could fit into different categories, even once you successfully identify the categories. For example, yesterday’s Connections included the word “Duds” in the Slang for Clothes category, which was also a fit for the “Failures” category.

Connections solved with categories Slang for Zero, Fastening Verbs, Gym Exercises, and Captains

As you complete each grouping, the words move into a colored box; the different colors indicate the level of difficulty. You have up to four mistakes, so you want to be careful with your selections. On the plus side, it won’t let you submit the same erroneous group of four again. Sometimes the problem I have matching the categories is a lack of context, such as MTV shows or NFL players, which are both outside the scope of my fandoms and general knowledge.

Like Wordle, both Keyword and Connections provide a handy summary of your result that can be shared with friends without revealing the answers. Which are your favorite Wordle variants?

Cats and hairballs

Living with four cats, it’s not surprising that I have to periodically deal with hairballs. None of our are considered long-haired, though Diane and June do have slightly longer fur than Arwen and Zuko. Hairballs are part of their natural process since they constantly swallow fur, June more than the rest because she frequently bathes the other cats. Rest assured, there are no photos included on this post.

With only two carpeted rooms, unless the cat is on furniture, we mostly stand back and wait for the hairball process to be finished so we can clean it up. Well, to be honest, I mostly lay in bed, listening for the general location and assessing which cat is providing the hairball. For some reason, they mostly happen in the early morning hours. This is actually preferred, since it means they’re at the furthest point in the day from having eaten and the content is not likely to include food.

The listening phase is pretty important (if I can’t see it happening) as each cat has a different hairball style. Yes, really! Zuko seems surprised, leaving just a small spot, whereas June usually has more water with hers. The more distinctive ones that I have to watch out for are Diane and Arwen. Diane always produces two spots, the second one just a smaller follow-up to the main event, usually within a couple feet. Arwen… well, she’s unique, I have never seen a cat hairball quite like her. Where the other cats stay still for the process, Arwen actively backs away from what she’s producing, almost as if saying “What is this and why is it coming out of me?”

Needless to say, this affects my morning routine. I consider my room and bathroom to be safe zones – I generally wake up to that sort of noise in my room. I don’t step foot in the hall until I’ve turned on that light and checked the floor. I flip on the spare bedroom light to check that floor, though to be fair, most of that floor is currently being used as a storage area. At the other end of the hall, I assess the few paces between the hall and dining room light switches, looking for that reflected light glistening off liquid before I turn off the hall light. Taking as few steps as possible, I turn on the dining room light. It’s not that there are hairballs that often, I just don’t like finding them with my bare feet.

Appreciating my talented friends

We attended the Bristol Renaissance Faire over the weekend, which is always delightful… once we managed to get there, after spending an hour between the highway exit and the parking. If you plan well, the food line you stand in for too long will be near a show, or near an empty stage so you can sit down and catch the next show right after you eat. (That’s how we found a new act this year.) We also caught part of a Cirque du Sewer show and found great seats for one of Dirk & Guido’s shows.

But those aren’t the talented friends I want to talk about. Not that they aren’t talented, just that I don’t actually know the performers. I want to talk about the delightful creations available at the Bast’s Garden Menagerie, around the corner from the second set of real bathrooms.

When I began attending conventions in Chicagoland, these lovely ladies were almost always present with their adjustable shoulder dragons, winged plush, and beautiful, mostly anthropomorphic, drawings. We have some of all of those in our house.

In more recent years, they began experimenting with polymer clay, creating delightful dragons and cat versions of weeping angels. Then they started playing with their food, which inspired me to sing Cthulhu Sleeps Tonight.

Until this week, I didn’t own any of their amazing food sculptures. When I saw Nessie on Instagram last week, I hoped she would still be available when we made it to their booth. Looking at the bowl, a tiny blue and white Loch Ness monster is sitting in a bowl of soup, with corn, celery, carrots, and noodles around her. Nessie and every one of those food items is handmade, down to the crinkle cuts in the carrots. The opossum on the edge of the bowl is also one of their wearable creations – a pin combining polymer clay and fake fur.

If you can’t visit Bristol or one of the other faires or conventions they attend, you can find their amazing creations on Etsy here and here during the off season. Why not take home a bowl of ramen you’ll never eat or a squid-filled cup of tea?

Things I like about sunflowers

It’s no secret that I like sunflowers, especially in my own garden. They’re one of several plants that encourage me to smile when I look out the window. The sunflowers I planted this season are taller ones, though there’s a scattering of smaller ones planted by squirrels throughout the yard.

Up close and personal with a large sunflower and its' palm-sized leaves

I’d like to say they greet me every morning, but they’re actually facing away from my living room window, searching for that morning sun. That just means I have to step outside for the best vantage point, which is a prime opportunity for walking through the garden and checking on other plants, like the many pumpkins that have already formed and tomatoes that will hopefully ripen soon. I’m a bit dismayed that there are no flowers on the okra plants yet, hopefully that will change soon.

A small sunflower with narrow petals near a potato plant and some catnip

There’s a surprising amount of variety in sunflowers. This little guy, well, is little, and the petals are much narrower than their sunflower cousin in my previous photo. And it’s not just because they’re sharing space with a potato and the largest catnip plant in my garden (which has since been harvested to allow sufficient space for said potato and a couple tomato plants). What is missing, at least in my yard, is some more color variety in my sunflowers – there are some brilliant red ones, so I may look for those seeds next year. I’m sure I’ll still have yellow ones, between the leftover seeds I have and whatever volunteers and squirrel plantings I have.

The epitome of resilience, this sunflower was bent by a storm to the point where most of the leaves are touching the ground, still supporting multiple flowers, only one of which has opened so far.

This sunflower though… it’s the epitome of resilience. This sunflower was bent by a storm to the point where most of the leaves are touching the ground, still supporting multiple flowers, only one of which had opened when I took the photo. I have another sunflower with a stalk that looks like a chair, bent – but not broken – and then growing up from there as if it were undamaged. Short of having stalk gnawed off near the top (yes, I have a couple of those too), sunflowers put forth their best effort to open their blooms to the sun. It amazes me and always makes me smile.

Let’s talk about sex.

More specifically, let’s talk about how we talk about sex.

I read a fantasy novel recently (shocking, I know) that had some fairly explicit sex scenes between consenting adults. The scenes were well written, except for the male character – who has already acknowledged his promiscuity – periodically referring to his partner as aberrant or amoral because she was interested and actively engaged in their sexual encounters. And every time he did, it wrenched me out of the scene I was reading.

I can break down what bothered me about this into two main categories:

  • Barring any religious or personal beliefs on the participants’ parts (and there were none at play here) that restrict when they have sex or who they have it with, it is a natural process and should not be viewed as aberrant or amoral.
  • There’s the inherent sexism of a promiscuous male referring to his partner that way when they were both clearly enjoying themselves. Frankly, the concept that women don’t enjoy sex is outdated and detrimental to the survival of our species.

As a society, we need to accept that there are people who enjoy sex, just as we should understand that there are some people who have no interest in it. There should be no shame in either choice.

Thoughts on Yumi and the Nightmare Painter

Last year, I briefly mentioned Brandon Sanderson’s amazing, record-setting Kickstarter for the four secret books he had written during the pandemic lockdown. (This was in addition to the books he was openly working on.) Not surprisingly, I bought into that Kickstarter, receiving a digital copy of each book on the first day of each quarter this year. I recently finished the third book, Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, and realized I hadn’t mentioned any of them here. Brandon Sanderson states that this is his personal favorite of the Secret Projects; mine (so far) was the first one: Tress of the Emerald Sea.

In this novel, the protagonists Yumi and Nikaro (aka Painter) both have fantastical jobs, which means they have jobs that are specific to the world the story is written in; these are not jobs that are recognizable in our world. Yumi is a Chosen One, one of fourteen young women who through ritual rock stacking can summon spirits and bind them to different uses for society. Nikaro is one of many nightmare painters, tasked with guarding a city from the living nightmares that creep in and feed off people’s fear while they sleep. Nightmare painters capture the nightmares by focusing on them while capturing them on canvas as something harmless. Through a spirit’s cry for help, Yumi and Nikaro are linked magically and tasked with helping each other’s world through their struggles.

This is an easy book to read, especially if you have time to read it all in one sitting. It has all the unexpected twists and fantastical worldbuilding that fans have come to expect from Sanderson, all built on the “what if” concept of fantastical jobs, accented by Aliya Chen’s amazing artwork. It’s okay if you missed the Kickstarter, all of the released Secret Projects books are also available through his website.

A banana crisis

One recent morning, I turned around after washing my breakfast dishes and realized that several of our bananas had partially peeled themselves, falling from where they had hung on the banana stand. A single banana, I could have handled as a snack, but I was looking at four bananas with a stripe of peel removed. I had an early appointment, so I grabbed the entire bunch (including one unpeeled) and shoved them in the fridge. By the time I got home, the collection was down to three open bananas, which is a workable quantity.

Whole wheat French toast topped with caramelized bananas and mulberry compote

As I’ve said before, when life gives you lemons, make lemon meringue pie. In this case, life handed me a trio of bananas that weren’t overripe yet. Typically I wait for overripe before making banana bread. Instead, I considered banana pancakes or crepes for breakfast the next day, but ultimately decided on French toast topped with caramelized bananas and a mulberry compote.

My berry compotes are super simple: berries, a bit of water (add more as desired during cooking), and a dash of salt. Berries are naturally sweet, so I don’t bother adding sugar. They cook on low, stirred occasionally, while I prepare everything else.

The caramelized bananas are similarly simple: a tablespoon of butter and a banana. Melt the butter, add the sliced bananas, flip once or twice. Turn down the heat when the bananas start looking like they’re going to melt.

French toast has always been a bit of a challenge, finding the right mix between the egg and milk mixture and the absorbency of the bread. I ended up using three eggs for four pieces of wheat bread. I was eyeballing the milk, so I might guess a quarter cup per egg.

And that’s how I resolved my banana crisis.