Transcription Test

I'm a fairly fast typist, but I also am extremely short on time most days, so I wanted to test if I could get some sort of transcription software working.  Years and years ago I used Dragon, when it was good but still had a ways to go.  Anyway, pretty much all computers have various types of free transcription going, though you do somewhat inadvertently give away all your data into the cloud to be scraped.  But I figure this blog is scraped all the time, so why not give it a try.  So what follows is taken directly from the transcript of a recent Teams chat, and I'll see how much I need to clean it up.  If this works, I have something else I need to try, and then maybe I can get through a severe backlog of blog posts.

Start>>

I'm only going to talk for a very short bit, then I'm going to launch something on the isolated laptop, and then I go over to the gym.  So let me give a very quick rundown of Saturday. I had a somewhat frustrating experience trying to get the cats into the cage and over to the vet.  Toby, as usual, was not really a problem, though he was banging very hard against the cage door once he was locked in there. I simply couldn't catch Rho. Rho hid under the couch and then ran upstairs into the bedroom and was under the bed.  After 15 or 20 minutes of futility, I gave up and called the vet and said I just was bringing Toby over. So this is going to probably be an ongoing issue. Rho has trust issues to begin with and this doesn't help!  Still, I will try to get them used to the cage and just leave them outdoors for a bit, so that everything they are in the cage they aren't going off to the vet!  Still, I don't really see how I will get Rho over the vet in the next couple of weeks to keep him* on the same vaccination schedule as Toby. 

Anyway, after that I came back. I spent a very short time with my daughter getting her started on some math problems and then I decided to go head out for the rest of the afternoon. I was going to see the exhibits at 401 Richmond, which I did. I double-checked that most of the galleries were going to be doing something interesting on Thursday evening, and indeed most will be open. So my plan is to go back to 401 Richmond on Thursday, do this open house and then go to the Rex. I've been checking the Rex website, and and so far it looks like Friday and maybe Saturday at the Rex are selling out (for Thompson Egbo-Egbo's dates), but Thursday is not, so I'll probably just wing it and not reserve a spot, though I may change my mind.  I didn't have time for lunch, but I grabbed a few things at the Bulk Barn and I went in to see an anime movie called Angel's Egg, which sadly was just terrible, though it was only one hour wasted out of my life. There was almost no action at all.  Just mopey wandering around an abandoned city.  I think the point was there was some kind of a spaceship controller or an alien that had forgotten its purpose and was just hanging out in this abandoned city.  But then some soldier came around and found this controller (taking the form of a little girl with this egg) and finally took the "angel" egg away and cracked it, which led to the controller realizing what its purpose was and went back to, you know, running the spaceship.  (This was done in a better way in Zelazny's Roadmarks.**)  Anyways, completely stupid.  I had a series of micro naps through the whole thing, as just nothing happened. I probably should have just left early.

Then I hit BMV.  I was able to sell one book back.  They didn't want these jazz CDs I had with me, so I think I'll try Sonic Boom and maybe Kops.  I don't think I'm going to try She Said Boom, as I don't think they take jazz, so if either of them aren't interested, I'll just put them outside. 

Then I grabbed a wrap from Freshiis on Spadina. I really don't like biking up and down Spadina, but it just seemed the easiest way to get there (and obviously I survived).  One of the workers apparently just hangs out right there in the doorway and smokes, which not only is illegal, but it's completely disgusting. So I had a word to the other guy working the counter and then took my wrap and split for work. I didn't have much time at work. I had basically 40 minutes, so I didn't get that much done, but I ate my wrap and dropped off some stuff that I didn't have to carry the rest of the evening.  Then I went back up to Bloor (up University this time, and then cutting through Queens Park to Harbord).  

The Soundstreams concert was at Trinity-St. Paul's.  I saw Linda Hutcheon was there as well. We chatted just a little bit.  I was tired, but did enjoy the program, which started off with Messiaen, then Murray Schafer's Wild Birds, and a short Arvo Pärt choral piece.  I biked along Bloor, which is always an adventure. humbler home. I thought I might be a little more energized with all that adrenaline, but I just did not get much done. I pretty much fell asleep and now I have some work to do for New Zealand (and get my stupid time sheet submitted).  I decided I will skip Jeanne Dielman, as I just don't have time, though there is a tiny chance I will check it out Tuesday after work.  If I manage to get everything else done (rather unlikely unfortunately), I will go see Total Recall at 10 pm tonight!

[I'd say this worked pretty well.  I will see about reading out some longer pieces later today after I get more done on the New Zealand project.]

* One of the main reasons to get Rho to the vet is to determine once and for all if it is a boy kitten or girl kitten.  The guy who sold me the kittens said they were all boys, but I definitely have my doubts!

** I just happened to run across this post that said HBO is turning Roadmarks into a tv series.  I would watch that.  However, this was 4 years ago(!), and while these things take time, I would say this probably means it isn't actually happening.  Nonetheless, I will try to check back occasionally to see if it ever gets off the ground.  I will probably have more luck figuring out when Hulu releases Futurama.  It does seem that "Season 13" hit fairly recently.  I will probably wait until Season 14 comes out and then sign up for Disney + again (or wherever we can stream Hulu shows in Canada).

 

 

Kitten Update #3

We ended up with more baby mice, but we think they are all gone now (and that the kittens caught the mama mouse).  It's sad, but we just were not willing to share the house with mice.  And ideally the presence of cats is a sufficient deterrent that we don't have to keep going through this.

Anyway, I did get a pretty good scratching post that they have been using, sometimes perching on the very top, even though it doesn't have a proper platform.  I haven't decided if I am going to get one of those large wooden things with lots of places for them to lay on.  I kind of doubt they would use it.

I can report that Rho, the silver one, has gotten much more used to being petted and generally likes it.  Now whether she warms up to anyone else in the house is unclear, but hopefully so.  I'll pause for a short comment from a Star article (on "black cat boyfriends"): "Dogs were bred to be attentive. Bless them, they cannot be any other way. But when a cat loves you, you know you really earned it."

Rho still doesn't like being picked up, and I am dreading the first vet visit, but I need to schedule that soon, maybe if we get a bit of a break in the weather.  The other day I bought a couple of break-away cat collars, so I guess I will need to try to get them used to that, as well as having their nails trimmed, which is also going to be a lot of fun and will probably end in tears (more mine than theirs).

There have been a couple of evenings where one or both will snuggle up to me on the couch, which is nice.  I even saw Toby jump up into my daughter's lap.  So the bonding has largely taken place.

One interesting thing is that I was back from the pool, and I still had some chlorine or other pool chemicals on me, and they went absolutely berserk.  For some cats, this is just about the same as cat nip or something.  They definitely were nipping me more than was comfortable, and it also put them into this drugged out state where they were really fighting each other, so I will need to try to wash off even more thoroughly in the future.  (Not easy when the water pressure at these pools is pretty low...)

So I have been enjoying them, despite the occasional annoyances when they jump up where they aren't supposed to be or knock things over.  This will probably be a recurring problem for the next 2 or 3 months. 

I have noticed that Toby (the orange one) stares wistfully outside, even when there is snow on the deck.  I really don't plan on letting him or Rho be outdoor cats, but it may be a bit beyond my control.  Even more reason to get them used to collars, so I can put a phone number on the collar or something.

Charity Ranking

It's getting towards that time of year when I ramp up my charitable giving, and this year I decided it was time to do more investigation into whether the charities were worth giving money to.  Naturally, there is a site that investigates them and provides grades and some rankings.

Based on other things I have read, I was not terribly surprised that the Canadian Red Cross scored poorly, with a low percentage of funds actually spent in the field, though I was surprised that their impact grade was low as well, perhaps because more of the funding ends up cycled through for admin (and more fund raising!).  In contrast, Médecins Sans Frontières had a terrific score, one of the best across all categories and in the very top for international aid.  For me in practical terms, I think I will just cut out the Red Cross and redirect any donations to MSF.

I often give donations to the Heart and Stoke Foundation.  Their ranking was kind of middle of the road, with some softness around their impact and a slightly lower percentage of donations (65%) spent on programming rather than on overhead than I would like to see.  In practical terms, I will probably continue to donate but only in periods (like now) where there is a 2x or 3x match.

I was most surprised at their quite low ranking for the Toronto Star Charities (the Fresh Air Fund and the Santa Claus Fund).  While the percentage to programming and gifts is extremely high (94%!), they give it a D+ for not actually reporting much on the number of gifts given out and children sent to camp.  I'm not really sure why the reporting is lax, but I feel pretty comfortable in continuing to send money to them, usually twice a year (and indeed it's about that time again...).

Not too surprisingly my very local charity (Eastview) is not in the database, but I think I'll give money to them anyway.

I ran through some of the arts organizations I donate money to.  Not surprisingly, they were a mixed bag.  TSO and Soulpepper had reasonable percentages spent on programming (better than Canadian Stage certainly), though impact was a bit unclear.  Coal Mine and Esprit Orchestra weren't even listed. 

So in the end I probably won't change much of what I have done in the past, aside from stop giving to the Red Cross and give more to MSF instead.

Halloween (Cheat) Week

I think I will wait another week or two before getting on the scales.  I was a bit surprised a few days before Halloween that I had kept the weight off, though of course I hadn't lost as much as I wanted.  But we had pumpkin pie in the office as well as candy corn (a lot of people don't like this, as it is pure sugar, but it is hard for me to resist, so I can't buy it on my own).  We had a reasonable number of trick or treators come by (and I gave most of them two pieces of candy), but there was still a bit too much left over in the house.  (I'm not sure it would have mattered, but the trick or treating stopped completely at 7:45, as all the parents went home to watch the game!)

I don't know what happened of the photos I took of our block, as people usually go all out, but I have a few good photos of the streets just west of us, where there is perhaps even more Halloween spirit.  That's certainly where I would have gone trick or treating had I grown up in Toronto.

On a more positive note, I got in a few extra laps in the pool on Sat., I did a pretty full workout on Sun., even squeezing in 20 minutes of cardio.  I biked to work on Monday, despite it threatening to rain, and I got in 23 or 24 laps on Monday, even though the Jimmie Simpson pool was more crowded than I expected.  That said, I am sure I have gained a few pounds, so I want to get back on track before I see what the damage is.  I actually came across the loose fit jeans I was wondering about (that are one size smaller than what I normally wear).  I couldn't quite get into them (and it wouldn't have looked right even if I could have squeezed in).  I probably need to lose another 10-15 pounds.  So not an impossible task, but one that will be challenging given winter is coming up and I won't be biking nearly as much soon.  I clearly need to get more serious about not snacking at work if I want to keep making any progress.

I also biked today, though I probably will not bike tomorrow, as it is likely to rain.  I came very close to going off to see St. Elmo's Fire right after work, but decided it was just a bit too much of a melodrama for my current mood.  Also, I didn't get quite enough work done during the day, and I wanted to help my daughter with some math problems.  Also, I still have 100 pages to go in Mrs. Dalloway, and the TPL event is tomorrow!  So maybe another time, as Carlton seems to cycle through these 80s and early 90s movies with some regularity.  I actually expect to watch quite a few in the second half of Nov., so there's no point in getting too upset over skipping over this one (for now at any rate).

Woolf Interlude

I was able to get through Orlando in time.  (I'm seeing a version of Orlando, dramatized by Sarah Ruhl, next Sat.  I have seen the film, but not in ages.  I might see if I can watch it some time this winter, assuming it doesn't show up at the Paradise.  It was one of the early screenings of the Queer Cinema Club at the Paradise when people were just emerging from the COVID shutdown.  I'm not entirely sure why I didn't go, and there may have been a conflict at the time.)

I am halfway finished with Mrs. Dalloway, and I should be able to read it by the TPL event on the 5th, as it is a fairly quick read, despite the stream-of-consciousness bits.  I hadn't remembered that the point of view skips around so much, over to Peter Walsh, one of Clarissa's former beaus, and even to Septimus Smith, a WWI veteran who was still suffering greatly from a form of shell-shock.  I also hadn't recalled just how morbid parts of it are, with Septimus saying repeatedly that he (and his wife) should kill themselves, particularly knowing that Woolf eventually ended her own life, so the death-drive (as Freud might put it) was strong in her.

Anyway, I will likely reread To the Lighthouse, which for me is her greatest achievement, at some point in 2026 or 2027.  I might eventually get back through all her novels and other major works.  I was looking over the list, and while I thought I had read everything in my 20s, I'm having some doubts now.  I am sure I never read her diaries or her letters, and I am still quite unlikely/unwilling to tackle that.

I guess I will put an x in front for anything I read as part of this cycle of reading Woolf as a middle-aged man, which is a very different thing from reading her in my 20s...

    The Voyage Out (1915)
    Night and Day (1919)
    Monday or Tuesday (1921) - stories
    Jacob's Room (1922)
x   Mrs Dalloway (1925)
    To the Lighthouse (1927)
x   Orlando: A Biography (1928)
    A Room of One's Own (1929) - essay
    On Being Ill (1930) - essay
    The Waves (1931)
    Flush: A Biography (1933) (being the biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's dog!)
    The Years (1937)
    Three Guineas (1938) - essay
    Between the Acts (1941)
    A Haunted House and Other Short Stories (1944) - stories
    Mrs. Dalloway's Party (1973) - stories

I'm sure I never read Flush, as I am just not a dog person.  I am somewhat inclined to listen to Prunella Scales read a somewhat abridged version when that comes off the hold list.  I don't believe I read On Being Ill, and while I think I read Three Guineas, I am not 100% sure.  Similarly, I'm reasonably but not entirely sure that I read The Waves.  I'm less certain that I read The Years, though I probably did.  I'm actually not nearly as sure that I read Between the Acts, as the plot doesn't sound that familiar (and, intriguingly, sounds a bit like something Barbara Pym would come up with).

My overall reading list is already absurd, but I will probably try to get back through Woolf, alternating with Pym, who I am also rereading (though I am far more sure that I did read all of Pym's novels once upon a time...)

Disappointments

As will be very evident as I move through the day here, the whole city is basically in mourning that the Jays couldn't get it across the line.  The baseball gods were particularly cruel in Game 6 where the ground ball double rule probably prevented them from tying up the game, and they hit into a double play.  Then in Game 7 where the pitching just wasn't good enough (and frankly the manager was an idiot for not bringing the rookie pitcher back in) and the Jays just couldn't convert on some prime scoring opportunities in both inning 9 and 11.  So heart breaking.  I am certainly disappointed, but not being a die-hard fan, I just don't take it to heart the same way  I'm already back, thinking about how to squeeze in even more culture -- and whether I will pay the inflated price of the ticket for Theatre francais de Toronto next week.

Another disappointment that hits closer to home is that the kittens found (and killed) a baby mouse.*  Honestly, it's not at all clear what these mice are eating, as there really isn't any food on the 2nd floor, and we believe the adult mice have been caught.  Anyway, the kittens are doing their part at least, and we probably need to bring the exterminator back around again.

I'm going to head over to the gym now and see how hard people are taking it there.  Either there will be lots of people there working out their frustrations or maybe the gym will be more or less empty.  I'll know soon enough. 

 

* The disappointment being that there were still mice around, not that the kittens were doing their job in catching the things...

Edit: Well, they just caught a second baby mouse, so maybe the hunger is driving them out.  Anyway, we are trying to get the exterminators to come back round today...

Edit 2: I guess I need to apologize (slightly) for calling the manager an idiot.  He did put in the rookie pitcher, but he just wasn't sharp enough and gave up run 3.  Who knows if he would have settled down (and not given up run 4 in the next inning!), but he didn't get the chance.  This definitely was a game of inches, and the Jays just came up short.  Several commentators are saying this was the best World Series ever, but that is cold consolation to Jays' fans.  The gym was pretty light today, very likely because people were having trouble getting motivated...  Frankly, I would have put up big signs at the gym and the bars that this would be a sports news-free zone for the next 24 hours!

What I really hope doesn't happen is this serves as a portent that, despite being plucky and trying to forge new trade partnerships, the Orange One keeps up the pressure and industry in Canada just crumbles, sending the country into a recession.  The signs are not great, frankly.

Nov. book news

I guess I am jumping the gun just slightly, but I am already looking ahead.

One of the annoying things about getting busy (and now having to deal with kittens and their needs on a daily basis) is that I do let some things get away from me.  I never did make it over to the Trinity book sale, though honestly I just don't need more books at the moment!  I guess Art Toronto was last weekend, and I didn't do that either.  Maybe I would have if I hadn't been off in Stratford on Saturday.

I finally managed to make it through Woolf's Orlando.  It was fine, but I don't think it is as strong a novel as Mrs. Dalloway or To the Lighthouse.  I don't really expect to read it for a third time, so I did put it out front.  (No takers so far...)  I decided to try to get through Henry James's The Turn of the Screw by Halloween.  It will be a close thing, but I think I'll make it.  Now whether I will make it through Mrs. Dalloway by Nov. 5 (when I am attending this TPL celebration of Mrs. Dalloway) is definitely in question.  It certainly means that Empire Falls keeps getting pushed off.

Also for Nov., I should try to get to Miéville's The City and the City, as this is being read in a book club at work.  It turns out that all the TPL copies are on hold already, so I may need to get it through Robarts.  But since I can only keep it for two weeks, I might as well wait until I am actually ready to read the book straight through, so probably the second week of Nov.  After this, I need to try to wrap up Empire Falls and Canetti's Auto da Fe and then I'll see about reading Austen's Persuasion before the Austen anniversary celebrations in Dec.  If I get through this, then really the only Austen left to read will be Emma, and I might see about putting that on the list for 2027.  (Interestingly, Prunella Scales narrated an abridged and unabridged version of Emma that was very well received, though you have to buy the unabridged version on cassette(!) or CD.  I am toying with the idea of ordering a copy and putting it aside until I have actually read Emma first.)  

I decided just to buy Shteyngart's Vera and have him sign it (at his Dec. TPL event) rather than trying to read it in advance, particularly as this is a case where one really ought to read Nabokov's Ada, or Ardor first!  That was never going to happen.  I had thought I owned a copy of Ada, but it turns out that I don't, so I started hunting a copy down.  I went to the BWV near the Eaton Centre, but they didn't have it.  On my last outing to Tafelmusik, I had time to duck into Seekers Books.  They didn't have it either, unfortunately.  The BWV on Bloor did have one copy, so I snatched that up, then went off to hear a terrific concert, mostly of Vivaldi and some of his contemporaries.  I don't have a specific time-line, but I would like to try to get to Ada in early 2026 (and maybe my next trip up to Ottawa on Jan. 20 is a good opportunity to at least start the novel), and then read Vera at some point after that.  If I am successful in following through with this, maybe I should put Atwood's MaddAdam trilogy in the 2nd half of 2026, and slot War and Peace and Lessing's Children of Violence cycle (and Emma) into 2027.

One very long novel (700 pages) that I think I will just skip is Kiran Desai's The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny.  I just saw her at a TIFA event, and they were talking about her novel and the long, long journey to get it finished (20 years in the writing!).  I think partly I was stressed over my tight schedule, and the fact they had a meltdown and couldn't actually sell any copies of her new book, and they started late (with a somewhat insulting explanation that they were having sardines on toast and lost track of time), but there really isn't anything that she said that makes me want to read this novel.  I mean never say never, but I have literally 500+ books I want to read ahead of this, including rereading The Inheritance of Loss, which is a terrific novel.  I had pretty much given up on getting any books signed (since I had a concert to go to that started at 7), but even though they started late, they ended at 6:31, and I somehow managed to get in line towards the front (probably in the first 10 people).  She signed my copy of Inheritance, and I scampered off and made it to the concert after all.*  (I suspect that had I paid the hefty sum for Loneliness and thus had more skin in the game, I would have been halfway back in the (very long) line and would have bailed in the end.)

The last thing I wanted to touch on before I run off, is that I just wasn't paying enough attention, and a bunch of holds I had at TPL simply expired, as I usually put them on inactive status for long periods of time.  I guess this means I should just use the save function rather than trying to put them on suspended hold.  This is pretty annoying, and I am trying to recall just what was on there.  Over the past few months, I had whittled the list down a fair bit.  I DNR Ghosted after I found out what a morally bankrupt book it was.  I ditched holds for Vera and Pick a Colour, as I will end up buying those books.  I ended up getting a copy of Do You Remember Being Born? ✓ which is about a older poet (based on Marianne Moore) interfacing with an AI agent that needs to be trained in understanding language.  So this is one I need to try to finish up between Mrs. Dalloway ✓ and The City and the City ✓, but at least I have it in hand and won't just forget about it.  There were a few still on hold where the expiration date was far enough away.  This includes Aliens on the Moon by Thomas King and You've Changed by Ian Williams** and Murakami's latest.  I remember I had one book about architecture on hold, but I am not as interested in that at the moment.  I was able to reconstruct most of the list that evaporated:
The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Chakraborty
The Pleasures of Exile by George Lamming
What We See in the Smoke by Ben Ghan
The Tale of the Missing Man by Manzoor Ahtesham

(The last one was particularly hard to find as it is a south Asian novel, not an Arabic one!  And I kept thinking it was called Lost Man or something like that.  I wasn't terribly far off, but it took a while to turn it up again.)

I think in general, I will try to get through this list in 2026, as most of the books are not all that long, and not risk this happening again.  I am sure there are a few books that I am not remembering, but these were the ones that came to mind right away and thus am apparently the most interested in actually reading (one day).

Edit (8/31): I did finish The Turn of the Screw and thought the ending was poor. 😞    I'm not a huge fan of unreliable narrators in general, though these sorts of books can be amusing, depending on how the author tips off the reader.  What I don't care for, and The Turn of the Screw has in spades, is stories that are full of radical ambiguity.  James apparently wants the reader to vacillate between thinking there is a realistic and a supernatural ending to the story.  I just don't like that at all.  Period.

 

* It certainly helped that the TIFA event was at Victoria College and the ARC Ensemble concert was practically around the corner at Mazolleni Hall, but it was still pretty stressful, worrying if I would be late.  The ARC Ensemble concert was very good, though of the 3 composers they featured, Frederick Block's pieces were clearly the strongest of the bunch.

** I keep getting blocked from seeing Ian Williams.  Last year when he was giving the Massey Lecture in Toronto, I had a ticket but had to travel for work so sent a friend in my place (and did get a couple of books signed at least).  Right after Kiran Desai (and at the same time as the ARC Ensemble!), Ian Williams was at TIFA talking about his new novel, so I missed that.  There was another recent event in Toronto where he was featuring his new novel, but I was off to see Bremen Town that evening and just didn't feel up to trying to switch the ticket.