What's it all about, Alfie?

This year of the coronavirus is going to yield a lot of firsts, and today is one for the record books. Today, the price for Crude Oil May 20 future dropped to -$1.43. Yup... you get the oil and $1.43 from the seller. That's similar to the negative interest rates we've seen in Europe, but thankfully haven't hit the US yet.

I've never been a commodities trader, but still... to see the OPEC/Russia price war in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic is wild enough... but to see the demand drop, and the price plummet... that's just amazing. I still find it hard to believe.

This year is going to be a wild one to tell stories about! 🙂

UPDATE: as I watched the rest of the day, they actially bottomed out at -$38.47/bbl... that's stunning to me. Sure, it's May 2020 delivery, and that's right around the corner, and the storage tanks are all full, so it's got to be moved somewhere... but I never thought I'd see more production than demand.

We are heading into week 5 of the lock-down, and things are really settling in to a routine with the isolation. There is a lot of material to read - some is good, some is fluff, and some is outright dangerous. But that's the purpose of being a critical thinker. If you believe what you read from one source, and don't hear it repeated - ever... well... then it's likely something someone wanted to be true, but wasn't. People make mistakes, and that's fine - but we can't get carried away these days.

I've really enjoyed finding Gitpod - it's the web-based development environment where you can build your own Docker containers for development, and you get a pseudo-VisualCode editor to work in. It's pretty much exactly what I was looking for to code Clojure on my iPad. There's no way Apple would allow a real JVM-based environment on the iPad, and as long as I have some kind of network connection, which is pretty universal these days, so it's not bad. And the ability to customize the Docker image is really very nice... so that's a great find in the last week.

There is an understandable increase in pressure at The Shop - people are seeing that this is going to last a while, and they need to make sure that things that were planned for 2020 need to get done in 2020 - even with the pandemic. It's understandable... companies make plans, and those plans are decades-long, in some cases... and so having to throw away 2020 would be a real issue. So the pressure ramps up. I get it.

But things aren't changing just because you increase the pressure. Everyone responds differently, and if we're all going to make it through this, it's better to show a little kindness and compassion, and take things a little slower.

So we fumble along, one step at a time... staying indoors as much as possible, hoping that the numbers fall off quickly, but knowing that's not really how this is going to end: quickly... and hope for the best.

In most regards, things are settling into a predictable routine. I'm not saying things are normal, but they are becoming a new normal, and while there is a lot to be concerned about, it's something that we all seem to be settling into... most of the time.

Today I had an exchange with some folks, and their nerves are clearly a little frayed, and they aren't handling the stress very well. It's hard to remember that in these times of stress - for whatever reason, people need to be given a little more tolerance. They don't realize they are lashing out at the people trying to help them. They aren't doing it on purpose - they may not even realize they are doing it at all.

I went to write a little code at repl.it, and I could edit the code, but it wasn't runing my Clojure projects. Probably something they've added lately, and I don't have to have it today, but it sure would have been nice.

Some day this is going to end... and we need to be clear with ourselves "What kind of people will we be?"... I hope to get better at that answer.

It's been a wild start to Week 3 of the shelter-in-place/WFH time, and things are slowing down to achieve a new normal that we'll have while we are all respecting the social distancing, and slowing the spread as much as possible. It's going to be a while yet, as the number of confirmed cases still appears to be accelerating, and the hospitals are still struggling, and the isolation measures are being extended. It's going to be a while.

Still... in the midst of all this, there are some really nice things to see. Some folks at The Shop are trying to keep things as "normal" as possible, and while I may not love every Pet Pic, it's nice to see people sticking together, and still having a sense of humor. And work is trying to be done, yes... slower, but still moving.

This is going to be a change for a lot of things, but it's going to get better.

This morning I was able to finish watching the first season of Start Trek: Picard, and I have to say I'm blown away! First, I was a little hesitant about signing up for CBS All Access because it was a lot more than the typical streaming service for what I'd get, and I didn't like that they didn't see some favorable partnerships with other broadcast channels like Hulu... but after this, I forgive them.

First, I will admit that I like to watch shows in my office on my Apple TV 4K, and the Apple TV app is just fantasic on that device, and when I'm traveling for The Shop, on my iPad. It's really pretty amazing to me. So there's that.

But it's Picard that made me a believer. This is the best show I've seen in many years. Right up there with the HBO Shows Newsroom and Chernobyl, and the Showtime Billions... just amazingly done. I can't really think of a single thing I didn't like about the first season.

It's got me thinking that I'll probably extend my Hulu subscription into a Disney+ subscription to see what's there too. We are all shelter-in-place, and this is a great way to see old friends, and find new ones.

Two weeks down, and it's clear from the graphs of confirmed cases by the CDC, and now the New York Times, that this is in full-swing, and it's unlikely we'll see the end of this acceleration for at least a couple of weeks, and the real safety will be months away. But that's what happens in a pandemic, so we do the best we can with what we have, and hope that the hospitals aren't over-run.

This week at The Shop was a little slower than the past week, and I've taken to marking my ToDo list weeks with the ? emoji, just to remind me of the weeks where we were all WFH and so it'd be understandable why things dropped off a little. It looks like The Shop is offering leaves for those that want it - due to sickness, or family issues - all related to what we are all going through these days. Kinda nice.

I keep busy, so it's not all bad. I'm still doing the same things, so it's nice to know that even in a pandemic, people are people, and the craziness that I've known for years didn't evaporate. 🙂

Well... my HP Color LaserJet Pro M255dw arrived today and while I was in a meeting, my daughter was kind enough to sign for it, and then I had the task of moving out the old HP LaserJet 1200, and putting the new color printer in. I could not have been more happy.

I knew the toner cartridges that ship with a printer are on the smallish side, so I went ahead and got the "high capacity" ones as well - and I can keep them in the closet until I need them. I also picked up a new pack of paper on my weekly Target run, so I have paper and toner for a long, long, time. 🙂

Other than color, the thing I wanted in this printer was really Network connectivity. I've always had USB-connected printers, that is, after the Centronix parallel cable was phased out. And while that was a significant step-up, and PCL and Postscript are great, the idea that I had to be physically connected to the printer was something I really wanted to get rid of.

So I followed the admittedly sparse instructions and juse added paper, hooked up the Ethernet to the hub in my office, and then plugged in the power. It took a while to get ging, but then I had a nice little display to configure the printer. Nice touch - no need to really download any software... though, they recommend it - I think I'll pass.

Once I made sure it was using DHCP, the default, I was then able to go to my MacBook and just Add a Printer. It was right there in the list of available printers, and while I'm not quite sure exactly what I was expecting, that simple fact filled me with wonder and awe.

I guess I haven't lost that sense of wonder about these machines, and I'm grateful for that.

I then knew I'd be in good shape on the computer, but I also wanted to make sure AirPrint was working from my iPhone and iPad. I went back to the printer's Network Config screen, and accessed the WiFi settings, but it told me that because I was using wired Ethernet, there was no WiFi accessibility. For a second I was worried, so I pulled up my iPhone, and figured out how to print a note. It worked like a charm!

That made me even happier! Because it meant that I didn't have to leave my printer "open" on WiFi, and worry about attack vectors from drive-by attacks. I could stick with nice, reliable, wired Ethernet, get great speed and reliability, and protection from the bad guys. Sweet.

In the end, it was a breeze to set up, and looks to be working every bit as good as you'd expect an HP printer to behave. What a joy! 🙂

Yesterday morning I updated my 16" MacBook Pro laptop to macOS 10.15.4, and this morning I noticed that one of the nagging problems with my LG 5K monitor was gone! In the past, this new laptop and the LG 5K weren't really happy with one another. When I'd wake up the laptop in the morning, the attached display would not wake up, but it also wasn't unattached.

The windows were still "on" the LG 5K, but I couldn't see them, and I couldn't move them because I couldn't see them, and that meant that I have to unplug the LG 5K... let the laptop rearrange things... then plug it back in. It wasn't the worst thing in the world, but it was annoying.

Well... after the update this morning, it's now working exactly as expected. 🙂 That's a wonderful development! Now things are just working exactly as they should... very pleased.

Today has been interesting because some folks are starting to show some really strain about all the forced confinement of the shelter-in-place orders from the local states. I know it can be tough... going out just feels risky now, and I'm profoundly grateful that I don't have to. But some aren't handling it well, and they aren't reaching out for the help they need.

It manifests itself in any number of ways, and I make sure yo make myself available for these people - to talk, or video chat, or listen... It's the little things that we can all do to help those that are struggling a little in this wild, crazy time. What I never imagined was that I would be one of the people offering comfort to someone else. This is a reversal I would never have seen coming.

On the up-side, things are going well at The Shop, and work is proceeding, at some sense of pace, to move forward. People generally are being kind to one another... there's a ton of pet pictures on Slack, and people are making shared Hnagouts to meet, casually, as a group. It's the evolution of what we have to do.

It's hard to imagine that this could go on for months... but the data from other countries is clear - this needs to stay in place for 4 to 8 weeks, and that helps to spread out the curve and buy time. Crazy days indeed.

My daughter needed to have about 18 pages printed out for a school assignment, and because the only printer we have is a very old, it's connected to my laptop by a simple USB cable. Sure, it's still working fine, and the pages are fast enough, and sure, it's only Black and White, but for an HP LaserJet 1200 that's more than a decade old, it's doing pretty well. Or so I thought.

I got about three pages out, and then it started making a screeching noise that didn't sound good, and nothing I could do was going to bring it back. It had printed it's last page. I tried power cycling... removing the toner cartridge... opening it up... nothing was going to get rid of that screech, and so I had to let her know that the pages weren't coming, and to let her instructor know.

So I started looking around, and the review sites seemed to really like the HP Color LaserJet Pro M255dw - it's color, double-sided printing, WiFi and Ethernet, as well as USB, and works with Macs as well as AirPrint for iOS and iPadOS. Just exactly what I was looking for, because with this I don't have to be The Print Man in the house, and she can print from her desk and just pick it up in my office.

I was a little surprised that it was only really available from HP Direct, and the larger toner cartridges as well. But it wasn't really that much more than some of the online sites were advertising. So I ordered it, and will press it into service as soon as it arrives.

I'm looking forward for it lasting another decade... 🙂