A Weekend With My Girls

On Saturday, we had another Chicago Adventures day. Anna, Nadia, and Kira came to Chicago for a day. I bought two tickets for “Peter and the Wolf” in CSO, and this time, I went with Nadia, and Anna and Kira explored the Art Institute while waiting for us.

The day started a little bit catastrophic. The CSO requires all unvaccinated patrons to show a recent COVID test. For PCR, it can be a day old, and for antigen, it has to be three hours before the show. Anna took Nadia for the test the day before, but the results were not ready by the evening (and neither did they come Saturday morning). Anna called the CSO guest service, and they assured her that there are several pharmacies very close to CSO, where they could get a COVID test right before the show. I was a bit skeptical, knowing that many places in the Loop are closed during the weekend, but there was not that much choice.

The train arrived on time, so we had an hour and a half before the show, and we started walking in the direction of the CSO. We didn’t see any opened pharmacies on the way, so we headed to the Walgreens closest to CSO. It was open, but we saw that the pharmacy itself was closed for the weekend when we came inside. That was concerning, but we still had both time and hope. I asked an associate where the closest Walgreens is to get a COVID test, and he said: two blocks North. It was in the opposite direction to the CSO, but at least we thought we would get it done. Nadia was doing great walking with almost no complaints.

When we reached this other Walgreens, it turned out that… yes, their pharmacy window was closed, too! We had no time to go anywhere else, so Anna bought an at-home test from Abbot’s Lab, installed the app on her phone, and we opened it right there on the pharmacy floor :). Anna swabbed Nadia’s nose and started the test. We didn’t have time to wait for the required fifteen minutes, so we started walking towards the CSO, and I was trying to hold the test horizontally :).
The test was ready just when we reached the CSO. It was not so easy to show the test results on the phone while the phone had to stay with Anna :), but we managed.

There was one very tall person in front of us, and we was leaning left to his three children – all the time!

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The Weather And The Music

We have had a severe weather warning for today since two days ago. It was supposed to be 7 inches of snow and strong wind, and it was all supposed to last from Wednesday evening till Thursday evening.

The winds part was there. As for the snow, it was all rain yesterday, and today the snow only started after 2 PM (and it was over before 9 PM).

When I heard on the radio that there were going to be high waves on the lake, I ran out of the house to see them. It turned out I was not alone, and other people were taking way more risky positions to take pictures of the waves.

I didn’t want to risk my life, but I think my videos are still very impressive :).

Also, tonight was a CSO concert I was going to. I was fine taking the CTA, but my friend and her husband were driving from the burbs, and it took them twice longer than they planned. Good thing we planned a pre-concert dinner! And good thing I suggested we would meet at the Gage two hours before the concert, so even with the weather-related delay we were fine.

It looked like many people chose to skip the concert due to the weather; there were many empty seats in the audience. When maestro Muti came on stage, he addressed the audience: all of those who came – you are brave people, and you really love music!

The concert was fantastic, with Mitsuko Uchida in Beethoven’s 4th piano concerto, and with the first time performed by CSO Glass’ 11th symphony. (In fact, this concert was a part of “By the Glass” series advertised by Siskel Center). It was such unusual music… and it was so Muti! It felt like it was written just for him to conduct it!

Postgres Person of the Week

The World of Data

Usually, I reblog from this platform to LinkedIn, but today it’s the opposite. My interview with Postgres Life was published on Monday (yet another Valentine’s Day gift), and was already publicized on LinkedIn before I knew, so I had to reply on LinkedIn directly,

Still want to keep this link though 🙂

Person of the Week Interview

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Valentine’s Day

I can’t remember when it was the last time Boris and I spent Valentine’s Day together. And it was even longer since we had such a beautiful Valentine’s Day.

Many years ago, back in Russia, when Valentine’s Day was one of many things from the West which we didn’t have, it felt very special to say “be my Valentine” and go for a long walk in the park, and then for coffee and cakes celebrating something very intimate.

Later, when we were already in the US, it was shocking to see the commercialized version of this holiday. We still tried to celebrate for a couple of years, and I was picking up the cards, but then Boris could not stand all this pink and red, and we started to keep it low.

This year, it felt unbelievably good, even though I could not take any time off work, and Boris had to leave to the airport earlier because I had to take mom to the doctor (and Igor had an assignment).

We started on Sunday night – I made a steak dinner and tiramisu, and we had s long conversation about one professional project we are trying to do together (moving slowly because of lack of time). Having how busy I was with work for this whole week, it was a real treat to talk about something professional which is not work. But then, most people do not understand how talking on professional topics can be so loving and intimate. I am not even trying to explain “why,” let’s say it’s our feature. On the day itself, we had heart-shaped cheese for breakfast:

And then we had an afternoon tea – I ordered it from Vanille the moment I knew that Boris was coming (which was almost the last day I could order!) We substituted tea with coffee, and I made prep and assembly.

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My Talk at NY Pg Conf 2021

I often hate my recordings, but I liked that one!

The World of Data

This talk was so unprepared! I was scared to look at the recording, but to my surprise, I liked it!

Good news: I will deliver the same talk in Helsinki at Nordic Pg Day, and I promise it will be much better! The code for the DIFF utility is almost ready; I didn’t outsource it before the end of 2021, but I will outsource it before I come to Helsinki. Meanwhile – check out my December talk.

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Puddles Everywhere!

Thursday was warm, and there were puddles everywhere. Way more than I pictured; actually, I was so busy trying not to fall into these puddles, that I could not take pictures.

And this is not a puddle, that’s just a singing tree:)

Cultural Activities

The Illinois indoor mask mandate will expire on February 28, and it looks like the city of Chicago will follow suit. Masks will still be required in the hospitals and such, in schools (if the legal battles will get to some resolution), and on public transport (thank goodness!!!)

I will monitor the situation, and I guess I will act as I feel comfortable. What makes me really happy is that pretty much all festivals and celebrations are returning. I still need to copy the schedule to my calendar, but I already know that summer will be busy in a good way!

That being said, there were a lot of cultural activities in the past two weeks, as much as I could fit with the amount of work I had!

I finally went to see a movie in the Siskel center with Igor (they are running so many interesting programs, and I can’t find time for any!) We went to see a 1971 movie from the “Bad Romance” series “The new leaf.’ Nothing special, but it was very entertaining.

Then, there was a Hairspray production in the CIBC Theater. I tried to do a Broadway in Chicago subscription this year, and I am still unsure whether I like it and will do it in the future, but I am attending several performances this season.

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Skating Lesson!

I just had the first skating lesson after 50 years! Can you believe it?!

That’s how it happened. In Millennium Park, they have free skating lessons every Saturday morning. They start at 8 AM, and I just could not make it to the city that early on Saturday all the previous years. Also, originally they only had “learn to skate” lessons. Now, they also have the “intermediate,” which I needed. However, they are sold out quickly (free, but you need to sign up). I finally managed to catch the session for today. Then I learned that Boris was coming, and I told him I would skip and try to sign for another day. He said I should go, especially because he has a meeting with his students in the morning.

I knew that with the trains running on an unpredictable schedule these days, especially on the weekends, I should leave an hour before the lesson started. I tried, but I also tried to have a nice Saturday breakfast with quiche, and I ended up leaving at 7:05 AM. That was enough to see the train departing, and then I had to wait for almost 20 minutes for the next train.

I was late, and I almost wanted to turn around and go back home, but I didn’t. When I finally got on the ice, the instructor approached me and said that it was fine and please join the class. I realized that one skill I lost entirely was moving backward, and she even worked with me a little bit on that individually. I could practice all other movements, and I think I am getting a hold of moving backward.

It was cold and sunny, and it was so much fun! Unfortunately, all the other slots until the rest of the season are filled (I think they released them all at once), but I will try to practice what I relearned and do more lessons next year.

Onine Ordering

One of my New Year resolutions was to optimize the way I use my time, and as a part of this, not to hesitate to spend money when it saves time. Specifically, I decided to use home delivery more.

I was always very reluctant to let somebody else choose my produce. When I lived in Palatine and would drive my car, it just didn’t make sense – it was faster to drive to the store and get all I needed than spend time looking for the products online. Now the situation is different. Almost till the end of the year, I could bike to the stores. Then, it was not a waste of time, but exercising. But after the snow settled on the ground, the situation changed, and I decided to try something new.

First, I finally gave in to Amazon Fresh. I was surprised to see that 1) the prices were competitive 2) I could purchase some produce I didn’t see in the stores for a long time, such as non-fat siggis and skyr. My first try (a week before I left for Helsinki) was a success. Encouraged by it, I decided to pre-order some food for the evening I would be back. It looked like a great solution. My plane was scheduled to arrive at 6 PM, and it would be close to 8 when I would get home, so most of the stores would be closed. I ordered lots of fruits and dairy for the 8 PM -10 PM delivery window. At about 8-40, I received a notification that my order was out for delivery and that all items were available. Then I received a message that “my stop is next” and started to listen to the buzzer. And then, to my dismay, I saw another message: sorry, your order could not be delivered.

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