Here is my November 2016, installment of what I had done at 8:16 PM each night during the month. I also found it helpful writing down what happened during the day as a small journal/diary of what was good, bad, or interesting.

Little Background

I started keeping track of what I was doing at 20:16 (8:16 PM) every day for the last month after reading Kitt Hodson’s Pastry Box article from Jan 1, 2015. Which was about how a year earlier she read Erica Douglass’s article about writing down what she did at 11:11 AM and 20:14 (8:14 PM) everyday.

November 2016 Events

Nov 1 – sitting in Cabin John at a buddies house drinking wine, talking a bit of politics and deciding what the meal will be next Tuesday for the election. Not that I’m staying late.

Nov 2 watching the Chicago Cubs play the Cleveland Indians in game seven of the World Series. I watched more baseball during World Series than I have watched in over a decade all put together. Before hand, I was making updates to phone numbers in nine cities the my Ate Here application. Still need to move all the changes to my servers.

Nov 3 – Watching “The Big Bang Theory” on TV. At work spent time looking into why a Dragon Naturally Speaking 12 user couldn’t user the Flash application. My guess is the application wasn’t built properly, so it was going to be a problem with any assistive technology. My problem was I don’t have an updated version of Flash, so I can’t see the application at all. So I’m waiting for the tech team to do that. In the meantime, I asked a friend who uses Dragon all the time if it could be an issue even if the application was built correctly and he said it would. Another friend at DOL said that maybe if the person upgraded to Dragon 14 (newest version), it might help.

Nov 4 – watching TV of some sorts and catching up on the day’s tweets so didn’t pay attention to what I was watching at the time. It was either “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives” or “Storage Wars”, since those were the two shows I was bouncing between most of the night while waiting until “Abandoned” came on the Viceland channel. Spent a good part of my day working with a co-worker on making updates to DEVELOPER.dol.gov pages that have broken or redirected links.

Nov 5 – I was sitting in Peter Chang’s restaurant eating dinner after ordering way too much food. We ordered four appetizers and three meals. We figured what we didn’t eat we could take home for lunch or dinner the next day or so. We ordered: pork pan fried dumplings, brazed cold tofu in a spicy chili oil sauce, a cumin crusted lamb leg, crispy pork belly, which was a thick cut bacon about two inches wide that was tempura deep fried. By the time we got through all that we were pretty much full and still had three main dishes coming which were pork riblets, Golden Mountain Chicken (crispy fried chicken strips with orange type sauce. And finally, Hot Numbing Beef Hot Pot.

Nov 6 – can’t remember if I was busy watching reruns on TV or reading Twitter after being gone for the day. My guess is I was reading Twitter to catch up on the day after being out at the Shen-Valley Flea Market in White Post, VA, with an old co-worker while watching TV. I ended up buying five or six knives, mostly chefs knives, and four cast iron skillets. I bundled three knives for $50 instead of the $70 the guy was asking, another one or two I bought cheap. I got an expensive German chef knife for $8 after they were asking $10 and it’s worth way more than that. I got two cast iron skillets cheap and then bought an 8 inch Griswold and a 10 inch one from what the guy says was made in about 1870 that were so clean you would think the were never used. The guy was asking $30 and $40 for the skillets I offered $50 and he said now after a very long time thinking about it. He replied with $60 and I countered with $55 but he wouldn’t budge so I took them for $60. Both are worth at least that much individually.

Nov 7 – watching last week’s “American Pickers” while waiting for the new episode to start at 9:00 PM. Previously, to watching TV, I started creating the November EventBrite event which I would finish a few minutes before 11:45 PM when I would be sending out the first batch of invites since EventBrite only lets you send 250 invites per day and our group is about 450 people currently.

Nov 8 – In Cabin John eating breakfast for dinner while drinking red wine and watching the United States Presidential election results come in. At this hour they were slow because a handful of east coast states pools had closed at that point. Ended up being a long night and didn’t it was going to end they way I had hoped. I knew things were in trouble when I was back home watching MSNBC and James Carville the “Ragin’ Cajun” face started contorting, and his tone changed after someone announced the President-elect was leading or won a state that fails me now. IT could have been when they announced he was winning or they were uncertain Hillary would win Michigan or Wisconsin. At the point, I knew it was probably over. Knowing this information, I persevered until I called it a night at 1:16 AM. Have felt a bit lost today with everything that happened in the presidential election. Wasn’t ruling out the outcome but thought the country was smarter than they were to vote for what our President-elect stands for. I guess I will leave it at that because it will only make me angry and who knows maybe he and his followers will change by coming together as a nation.

Nov 9 – I was copying the November 16th, EventBrite event to Meetup so I could notify that group about our talk this month. After that, I watched TV mindlessly which was an old episode of “Jay Leno’s Garage” while I was waiting for the new season to start. Was a long and confusing day at work yesterday after the election.

Nov 10 – Driving back from Five Guys where I got a cheeseburger and a small fry. It was a bit of a slower day at work with a bunch of people off or working from home so they could start their long weekend earlier. Ended up testing the updates to the ILAB iOS “Sweat & Toil” application for changes to read out abbreviated words for VoiceOver (screen reader) users.

Nov 11 – Sitting in my South Philly AirBnB cleaning up my e-mail and sending out an e-mail to someone I was introduced to about possibly meeting to discuss accessibility issues or how I can help them learn about accessibility. I only slept into about 7:30 AM on my Veterans Day holiday. Read a bit of Twitter in bed then headed over to St. Elmo’s to see what people were doing. Of course, they were having a heated discussion about the election results. After left I worked on publishing one of my what I was doing at 8:16 PM posts along with getting two more ready since I’m a few months behind posting them. Once I was done with that around 11:00 AM I headed home to pack for my trip to Philly for BarCamp on Saturday. After packing both my new and old laptop so I could make updates to my website’s skip navigation, along with the updating the Accessibility DC one for the first time in close to or over two years. I went to Pho 75 for a small bowl of Pho with fatty brisket and raw round eye with extra noodles and extra fatty brisket. Lunch was relatively quick, so I stopped over at Bocatto Lounge for some cherry and fig tea while making those skip navigation updates. My websites still had the skip navigation anchors pointing to in page anchors instead of an ID with and additional tab index equal to negative one. Updated them and then place all the code in Dropbox so I could grab it on my old make Macbook laptop and then FTP them to my server for each of the different websites. Once I’m done writing this and checking my grammar using Grammarly I’m to send the Accessibility DC, Accessibility Camp, and Accessibility Camp DC code to Dropbox to then FPT from my old Macbook.

Nov 12 – laying on my bed reading Twitter to see what happened during the day at my AirBnB after a tiring day at BarCamp Philly. Ended up giving my “Is Your Website Accessible?” talk to about a dozen people. There were a lot of talks about how to run for office, what to do now that we have a President-elect. One was even entitled “What if You’re Mr. Rogers in a Trump World”. The most interesting talk I attended was how to use iMovie on an iPad or iPhone given by a 10.5-year-old girl. I learned the general way to make a trailer type movie. This was her third Philly BarCamp giving this talk which she must have been 7.5 years old or so when she gave it the first time. I wanted to make sure she had people at her talk to keep her interested and motivated to continue with movies or other creative endeavors. Ended up getting interviewed by her at the end of the day.

Nov 13 – watching a few videos on my computer in my spare bedroom after a day shopping and eating in Philly along with a slow long drive home. First went to South Philly to stop at Forinalli’s for Italian sausage, then Di Bruno Brothers for cheese and hot sopesotta, next stopped at Superior Ravioli and Pasta for some frozen cheese and meat ravioli along with fresh spaghetti. The final stop in South Philly was at Isagro’s for a few cannoli’s. Headed to Reading Terminal Market where I picked up cured German sausages, five kinds of pate (house blend, pork liver, curried goat, head cheese, and I can’t remember the fifth one). I also went Golden Bowl for pork lo mien and a breakfast sandwich. For the road, I grabbed a Tommy DiNic’s roast pork sandwich with broccoli rabe and aged Provolone along with a Train Wreck (chopped beef, onions, cheese, and spicy  Italian meat with spicy mayo/ranch dressing.

Nov 14 – sitting in Buzz Bakery with an old co-worker talking about accessibility improvements to the new version of ARMY.mil along with possible new CMS ideas and accessibility things to think of before designing/creating.

Nov 15 – home watching TV instead of Cabin John having dinner and drinking wine or beer like most Tuesday nights.

Nov 16 – walking from Naan and Beyond on L St. with four samosas after leaving Blackboard and the monthly Accessibility DC event.

Nov 17 – talking with Rochelle and Benno taking new jobs in healthcare UX and the like.

Nov 18 – driving into Baltimore with Zac Gordon the night before for WordPress Camp Baltimore. Then went looking for my AirBnB which was what ended up on a side street that was more like an alley. It took the time to find street parking near by. My place between three bars. Thanks, goodness I was staying on the fourth floor above the hair salon.

Nov 19 – listening to Jacob Panic play an excellent banjo set at the WordPress Camp ice cream social. Attended a few talks and took notes about A/B testing and learning JavaScript.

Nov 20 – I was watching the previous week’s episode of Parts Unknown with Anthony Bourdain while unwinding from two days of Baltimore WordPress camp. Attended a few talks and took notes about what plug-ins the United States State Department use with their WordPress websites along with some about responsive images.

Nov 21 – I was watching the previous week’s “American Pickers” because I was at Buzz Bakery with old Army co-worker helping figure out a few accessible options to create their new CMS along with going over accessibility issues with the new design/code for ARMY.mil.

Nov 22 – Driving home from Wegmans after going there to have a bit of turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing a few days early for dinner. Also picked up four bottles of Hardywood Gingerbread Stout for myself and a few friends. Didn’t go out to Cabin John today because the rest of the old retired guys started early and had had enough plus we will be gathering at around noon on Friday for an organic snow day.

Nov 23 – Driving home from Wegmans after going there to have a bit of turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing a few days early for dinner. Also picked up two bottles of Hardywood Gingerbread Stout for me to bring to Thanksgiving dinner and our organic snow day in Cabin John on Friday. Got a few things done at the office but it was a slow day with it being the day before Thanksgiving and the government sending us home early. Luckily one of the government bosses stayed and extra hour so people who had planned for getting sent home two hours early could get their eight-hour day in instead of only seven.

Nov 24 – Sitting around the small kitchen table at a friend’s house after an awesome Thanksgiving meal talking about politic, getting old, kids these days, and pretty much whatever came into people’s heads. Got up before seven 7 AM and read in bed a bit before going into Del Ray, VA, to have a hot cider and wait for the Del Ray five-mile Turkey Trot to start at 9 AM. After that went to Wegmans to grab a turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing lunch. Came home and read some more and then napped for an hour before heading to friends for Thanksgiving dinner at 3:30 PM.

Nov 25 – Sitting in my spare bedroom texting with an old co-worker about plans in Frederick, MD, on Saturday along with working on my computer.

Nov 26 – Sitting in a parking lot near the Vienna Metro while my buddy was in the Micro Center getting his phone replaced after dropping it earlier in the day and cracking the screen which made it unusable. Earlier in the day, I raked leaves for about an hour and a half. Came in the house and cut my hair and showered before heading to St. Elmo’s to meet friends. I left a bit before 11 AM because I was meeting an old co-worker to head to Frederick, MD, to meet another old co-worker for late lunch, etc. but my main original reason was to get my beard trimmed so I looked less homeless as some might say. Once done with the beard and lunch went to buy some cherry fig tea and then dark chocolate with roasted almond slivers. Next, we headed to Purcellville, VA, to my buddies house to get some more pork from the pigs he is raising.

Nov 27 – Sitting my leather chair and using the ottoman getting ready to read the Success magazine article(s) about legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden. I woke up around 8 AM this morning and did a bit reading of Twitter in bed before heading to the DuPont Circle Farmers Market where I grabbed a scone, some fucsisa bread, ramp mustard, along with a few other things. After that headed over to the Palisades Farmers Market next to MacArthur’s where I picked up a cone shaped cabbage, broccoli, and some turnips to make a veggie soup on Monday. I then headed home to drop off my purchases before heading to M.E. Swing Coffee Roasters for a hot chocolate. Worked on cleaning up my e-mail and added a few more issues to both of my GitHub projects. Once they closed at 3 PM, I headed to Boccato Lounge to start working on my “Ship in Six’ project. Went through the challenge from lesson #1 to answer the six or so questions on paper. Read through lesson #2 and stopped before the challenge because it was going to take more time than I wanted to spend there. Part of the reason I ran out of time was I responded to the challenge #1 e-mail with a bunch of stuff I guess I needed to get off my chest for some reason. I spent a little over 45 minutes sitting in a comfy chair reading over more of Twitter.

Nov 28 – Sitting on my sofa watching TV of some kind. Guess I was not paying attention, so I don’t remember what it was. Today I had the day off to make for a long, long weekend over the Thanksgiving. I slept in until about 8:15 AM then read in bed until 9:30 AM at which point I got out of bed to work on my 10k Apart and Ate Here code. I added two new restaurants to the Northern Virginia JSON file for both projects, along with writing out a few bills that were due. Once done with that I headed to Hoffman 22 movie theater to see JK Rowling’s new movie “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.” I enjoyed the movie and once done headed over to M. E. Swing Coffee Roasters for a hot chocolate and to work on reading through and doing the challenges from Amy Hoy’s “Ship in Six” e-mails. After being there an hour and a half, I headed home to spend about 45 minutes finishing up raking the leaves at my house which was the section of the yard where I park my car and most of the leaves end up. After that, I got a chance to relax and catch up on Twitter before getting a shower.

Nov 29 – Sitting in Cabin John at my buddies eating home-made shredded pork pasta sauce and drinking wine with friends. My day was spent creating JIRA issues for broken links in the header and footer of the DEVELOPER.dol.gov pages. I also was looking over a friends accessibility bookmarklets page and noticed it seemed he had duplicate links by the text, but they went different places. So I put in a GitHub issue for the page with a suggestion to add off-screen text to help screen reader users along with possibly doing that and placing the content/links in an accessible TABLE which might be easier for people figure out what they links do.

Nov 30 – Sitting in my spare bedroom adding e-mail addresses to both the “10k Apart” and “Ate Here” application footers. Figured it would be helpful to have them in case people had questions or suggestions of places I should eat when traveling. Another day at the office working on fixing broken or redirected links.

Conclusion

Hopefully, this has been helpful to you and gets you to keep track of what you do a particular time of the day, along with a short daily diary entry to see what you have done or can accomplish over the course of a year.

If you want to meet up to do something exciting at 8:16 PM some evening, please leave a comment. Or a suggestion of something that is not part of my ordinary life you think I should do.