Well, that was inconvenient

The guest suite in the garret is named for her

Well, Cookie has been through the wringer!

More and ongoing computer woes.  The hard drive in the 8930 died, and after a great clusterfuck, was returned to Cookie last Saturday.   So I spent all Easter resurrecting the beast.  Since I am here, you know, it has powered up and is working.  It has risen: a miracle.

This mark the FIFTH time in six months that Cookie has had to install programs, bother.

I am too cheap to pay money, monthly, for Photoshop CC, so that means going out, inputting all manner of byzantine information into Adobe to get the pass free version of Photoshop CS3 that is available to those of us who shelled out $799 when it was new, then jumping through more hoops to get CS5 Upgrade working.   Then there is Office, blah, blah and legacy programs.  Suffice it say, if you are reading this, then we are working at full steam.

On top of this, Cookie has been rehabbing our guest suite, which probably hasn't been painted correctly since 1965.

I don't know what Floyd and Martha painted with, but paint wouldn't stick to the depressing color that we called "Renter's Office White".    So we had to use a bonding primer on the walls, which are not plaster, not drywall, but something else that was manufactured in 1928.  It's panels, nailed up, and then had wooden straps installed over every seam.  And after 91 years, all those panels and straps had to be caulked.

So that was 32 panels that all had to be caulked, have cut in work done, then sealed and painted.  Three gallons of paint later (Ceiling, Trim, Walls, and Windows) one room of the "Edna Garret Suite" is finished.   That's right.  One week, three gallons of paint, one room.   But it is lovely and very metropolitan, very sleek.  The upholstered headboard is finished and mounted on the wall.  Cookie went beige, off white and white almost a tone on tone on tone to cut down the busy feeling.  The end result is restful, clean, inviting.

I had hoped to have both rooms and the stair hall done, but that will have to wait for May.  Cookie is FIN.

Coming up:  I am heading back to school for a class on graphics for three weeks in May.  Which will be fun, but its a concentrated course with classroom lab time an hour from home.  UGH.  But it was the only one I could find that wasn't "Distance Learning", which for a hands-on learner is a terrible thing.   Those of us who learn like this want on-hands time with the "thing" we are learning about and we like to ask questions. 

"Why is it doing this?"

"What if I do this?"

"Where do I find it?"

"How do I structure this, and who thought it was a good idea to do something counter-intuitive?"

That kind of learning doesn't do well with canned online lectures and screen time with your professor.

In other news, the latest on our City Hall mess, the Mayor of Baltimore, Catherine Pugh has disappeared.  MIA.

"She isn't lucid," says her attorney.

We feel like she is playing ("cough") Camille.  Her attorney says she is trying to recover.   Her pneumonia has turned into bronchitis, but after a month of this, she no longer in the hospital and is trying to recover.  But WHERE?

MEANWHILE, the FBI raided City Hall, her two homes and three other locations.

And then we learned that her consignment shop, a side business that we all knew existed, that was offering GROUPONS until it wasn't offering GROUPONS?  Well, it closed.  Kinda.  When it closed has been up for some debate, because her business partner, Baltimore Comptroller Joan Pratt - who used to be the only adult in the room at City Hall - first said it was open by appointment.  Now she has corrected that statement by saying it closed on December 31, 2018.  Which is it Joan?   Was it open by appointment until Holly Hit the fan in March when it was selling GROUPON, or did it close in December, (cough) the date your corrected statement said?

Now we knew about the store, but not that Joan Pratt was in a side business with the mayor. 

There is yet another conflict of interest.

Why?

Because the Comptroller and the Mayor make up two votes out of three on the Board of Estimates.

That's the Board that approves city contracts.  See why that is a conflict?

Cookie spent many years working in the consumer financial institution world, and the number one rule, aside from "Thou shalt not keep two sets of books," is "The auditor is never your friend, they can never be your friend." 

An auditor, or comptroller, is a neutral observer who is loyal to the law and the rules of accounting.   Always.

Sort of like your shrink.  You can never be friends with your shrink - ever.

So no - you cannot be friends with the comptroller.  Ever!

And also happening this week?  The head of Univerity Maryland Medical Center - when the mayor used to serve on the Board, and initially got caught with the first shred of Healthy Holly stuff broke, has resigned.