Sunday 5-18-25 Dancing Plus, New Challenge, Jukebox Project & More

 

Smile and be happy

 

We had a great day of keeping busy doing this and that.

Larry started the day working on his jukebox. He received his LED light strip this afternoon and will work with them tomorrow. Today he worked on a plate for the monitor, which he built out of foam board. The jukebox is looking great.

 

Jukebox so far

While Larry worked on his jukebox I played games. 

I did the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: World Tour Mini of 10 games. It took me 36 minutes and 12 seconds, which put me in 15th place in my group. Then I played Angry Birds.

 

Angry Birds

Today was the beginning of a new week so I got a new weekly pinball challenge, which was Elvira; Scared Stiff. We already had the game loaded so Larry just needed to change the number of balls from 5 to 3. Then he played the game. While playing the game he realized it didn't have a ball save. He went into the ROM and fixed it. Now it's more fun to play. 

Before playing the new challenge I played last week's challenge of Big Bang Bar. I wasn't successful in getting a new high score but had fun trying. My final high score of 118,619,020 put me in 55th out of 73 participants. My first high score of Elvira; Scared Stiff was 3,158,560, which put me in 14th out of 14 participants but I still have 6 more days to play better. I also played three other, which were The Addams Family, Black Rose and Elvira Party Monsters.

 

Big Bang Bar score from today

 

Black Rose

 

Elvira Party Monsters

 

Elvira Scared Stiff

 

The Addams Family

While playing Black Rose and The Addams Family I was having trouble with the color DMD. Larry looked at the games. He removed the color DMD in Black Rose and hopes this will work. The Addams Family wasn't that bad so he didn't fix it. But he had a great time playing The Addams Family. 

I worked on my diamond painting. I should finish it tomorrow.

I played one game of Asteroid Outpost on Bounce Arcade. I earned a silver trophy and earned an extra ball. I played a couple of multiballs and mined the asteroids five times and was successful two times. I had a great afternoon playing games.

 

Asteroid Outpost

 

In evening we drove to Sun City Georgetown to dance plus with the Sundancers. Gary hasn't been in town so they haven't met on Sundays in over six weeks. The dancers were a little rusty so Gary spent the time working on moves the dancers were having problems with. The dance was from 6:00 to 7:45. Everyone had to dance, including Gary to make two squares. Larry and I had fun dancing to Gary and with friends.

I got home at 8:40. After relaxing we watched an episode of Elementary. When Larry went to bed I watched The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. I ended up doing 13,500 steps.

We had a busy day but had fun. 

  

 

 

Saturday 5-17-25 Jukebox Project, Games & Working Out

 

Overcast Day

 

We had an overcast day with the high of 95 degrees.

Larry started the day out doing an experiment to see if the controller from the new blinds could also work on our old blinds. He found out it wouldn't work. 

Then he moved onto working on the LED light strips on the jukebox. He has two sizes of light strips. With the larger Led's only two rows will fit in the area where he's wants to use them. The other Led's are a third the size and can put four layers of lights. He decided on using the smaller lights. He wasn't sure if he would be successful in soldering the ends. He was successful. He glued the lights on the plate he wanted them on. He found out one of the strips was broken and he didn't have any more to put in it's place. He went on Amazon and ordered another strip of lights. They should be here tomorrow. 

The mini LED light strip

 

The large LED light strip

After ordering the light strip. Larry played Dark Chaos, Mission Impossible and Transformers on the mini pinball cabinet. He came in high score #2 in Mission Impossible. He was playing a super game of Transformers when the game crashed.

 

 

 

Mini pinball cabinet

 

 

I worked on my diamond painting.

 

I did the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: Two Game Tango Mini of 6 games (3 Klondike and 3 Pyramid). It took me 13 minutes and 49 seconds, which put me in 15th place in my group. Then I played Angry Birds.

 

I worked out on the Wii Fit for a half hour. I worked out for 45 minutes with Just Dance 3.

 

 

 

Working Out

 

 

I played one game of Gunpowder Gulch for a half hour and earned a new high score and earned a silver trophy. I played Saloon multiball, Jailhouse Breakout multiball two times and Crack Safe multiball. I was successful in two events they were cracking the safe and shoot out with the deputies. I played the barrels event twice and quick draw twice and all four times failed.

 

 

 

Gunpowder Gulch

 

 

I played six games of pinball, which were Big Bang, The Flintstones, Theatre of Magic, Spiderman, Dark Chaos and JP Space Cadet. While playing Big Bang Bar I got a new high score of 118,619,020, which put me 40th out of 55 participants. When playing The Flintstones I became high score #2 and playing Spiderman I became Grand Champion. I had a super time playing pinball.

 

 

 

Big Bang Bar

 

 

 

Dark Chaos

 

 

 

JP Space Cadet

 

 

 

Spiderman

 

 

 

The Flintstones

 

 

 

Theatre of Magic

 

In the evening we watched Elementary. When Larry went to bed I watched The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers. I ended up doing 13,500 steps.

 

   

 

    

Friday 5-16-25 Pizza, Dancing & More

 

Let's dance

 

We had a wonderful Friday. The high temperature was 95 degrees.

Larry spent a big part of the day playing with the Onn streaming device on the television. He played with customizing the main screen to look the way he wanted it to. The main screen has the different channels we use to stream Amazon Prime, Freevee, Nova (our movies), YouTube and more channels.

I played my Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: Spider Adventure of 20 games. It took me 3 hours, 28 minutes and 59 seconds to complete, which put me in 17th in my group. Then I played Angry Birds. 

I worked on my diamond painting.

I worked out with the Synth Riders for a half hour. I played two games of the Monster Manor on Bounce Arcade. Both games I earned a bronze trophy and stunned the manor. During the first game I fought the jack-o-launders by hitting the clock three times. 

 

 

Monster Manor

I played seven games of pinball. They were Star Wars, Star Trek, Great Houdini, Tales of the Arabian Nights, Road Show, Transformers and Big Bang Bar. While playing Star Trek I became high score #5. I had a lot of fun playing pinball.

 

Big Bang Bar

 

Great Houdini

 

Red' Road Show

 

Star Trek

 

Star Wars

 

Tales of the Arabian Nights

 

Transformers

We watched YouTube videos.

In the evening I attended Ett McAtee's Weekly A2 dance at 6:30 for an hour. Ett was on vacation so Karin Rabe and Greg Moore covered for her. Karin and Greg called five tips together to 7 participants. I had a super time dancing to Karin and Greg and with friends.

 

Participants in the dance

After the dance we watched Elementary. When Larry went to bed I watched Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. I ended up doing 13,500 steps.

 

 

  

Thursday 5-15-25 Doing This & That

 

What should we do today?

 

We didn't have anything on our agenda.

We started the day going to town to do a little grocery shopping. 

The other day when Larry was changing the oil on the truck he burned himself. He burned a fairly large part of his arm and ended up with a large blister, the blister has been draining and he wanted to get some liquid bandage for it so off to Walmart we went. Before leaving Larry put the old oil in the back of the car to recycle it.

On the way we stopped by the Little Bohemian Bakery in Belton. We love their cinnamon rolls. We went by last week but they were closed but today they were open. Larry asked the lady, who helped him if they had day old cinnamon rolls. She said they had a lot of them. He bought a raisin walnut cinnamon roll and a cinnamon roll. The day old rolls are discounted. It cost him $5.00 for both. Their hugh so we share them. We had the raisin walnut cinnamon roll for our lunch dessert.

 

Dessert

After buying the rolls we continued our adventure to Walmart. Once there Larry dropped off the oil and oil filter to be recycled. Then we went to the UPS Store to check our mail. Next we went inside of Walmart and did some grocery shopping and get the liquid bandage.

 

Grocery shopping

 

On the way home we stopped and filled the car with gas.

By the time we got home it was time for lunch. I put the groceries away and then made lunch, which was one of the salads we had bought while in Walmart. 

After lunch Larry started worked on his jukebox. He is working on putting some flashing LED lights in it.

I played the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: Medium Mayhem Mini of 15 games. It took me 41 minutes and 14 seconds, which put me in 11th place in my group. Then I played Angry Birds.

I worked out on my Wii Fit for a half hour and Gold's Gym for a half hour.

 

Working out

 

I played one game of Pirate's Plunder on Bounce Arcade. I fought my enemies twice and won and earned a silver trophy. I also earned an extra ball and got two Jolly Rogers. I had a great time playing Pirate's Plunder.

 

Pirate's Plunder

I played four games of pinball. I played Medieval Madness, Transformers, Spiderman and Big Bang Bar. While playing Transformer I came in #4 high score and Spiderman I became Grand Champion. I had a good day of playing pinball.

 

Big Bang Bar

 

Medieval Madness

 

Spiderman

 

Transformers

I continued working on my diamond painting.

 

Diamond painting so far

We watched YouTube videos.

In the evening we watched a few episodes of Elementary. When Larry went to bed I watched Frozen II and Ice Age out of our movies collection. I ended up doing 13,000 steps, 

 

 

  

 

  

Wednesday 5-14-25 Two Dances, Projects & Games

 

 Have a great day

 

We had a great Wednesday. It was another warm day with the high of 86 degrees. 

Back in 2021 Larry built a couple of smart blinds. There were commercial alternatives but they were really expensive so he built his own using pieces from here and there, he also programmed them to work by voice via Alexa. They have worked great and are really convenient. We use them every day. One of the YouTubers he follows tested some new smart blinds from a company called SwitchBot, they are much less expensive than other companies and use a universal sizing. Larry decided to replace the ones he built with them. This morning he installed the blind in the dining room, it didn't take him very long. It looks great. Once it was installed he programmed it to work with our Alexa device. The living room blind is not suppose to ship until next month so that one will have to wait.

 

Smart Blind in the living room

 

New blind in the dining room

 

Yesterday, when we were coming home from Liberty Hill the air conditioner in the Equinox wasn't cooling as well s it should. When we got home Larry was going to add freon but he was tired so he did it this morning. He said the air conditioner now works great.

I attended two virtual square dances. First was Di Green and Terry McCann's Weekly Plus at 10:00 for an hour. Di and Terry took turns calling five tips to 10 participants. Di worked on Spin Chain the Gears, Coordinate and Track Two. I had a great time dancing to Di and Terry and with friends.

 

Plus dance participants

Second was Dave Eno's Weekly C1/A2 dance at 6:00 for an hour and a half. Dave called the whole dance by himself because Karin Rabe and Greg Moore was calling in person. The format was three tips of C1 to 4 participants, three tips of A2 to 8 participants and two trivia questions in between the A2 tips. Dave did a super job of calling the dance. I had fun dancing with friends.

I did the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: World Tour Mini of 10 games. It took me 41 minutes and 42 seconds, which put me in 25th place in my group. Then I played Angry Birds.

I worked out for a half hour with Synth Riders and a half hour on Bonce Arcade. Today I played one game of Asteroid Outpost and earned a silver trophy. I mined the asteroids three times and was successful once and I played one multiball. I earned one extra ball. I had fun playing on Bounce Arcade.

 

Asteroid Outpost

 

 

Afterwards I moved onto playing six games of pinball. The games were Big Bang Bar, Elvira Party Monsters, Goldeneye, The Godfather, The Big Lebowski and Rambo. I didn't get on th board but I had a good time.

 

 

The Big Lebowski

 

Rambo

 

Goldeneye

 

Elvira Party Monsters

 

Big Bang Bar

 

While I played games Larry worked on a electronic project. We have multiple devices to stream shows on our television. For years we have used the Fire TV device. Today Larry decided to try going back to an older device from Walmart. He found out someone developed a new menu system for it that allows you to customize the menu and remove the ads that play on the menu. He had to update the device and reload the programs we use. He spent the afternoon playing with the device, he had a great time. We can still can ask Alexa to turn the television on and off, we just have to use a different command word.

I worked on my diamond painting in between dancing and playing games.

After Dave's dance we watched a couple of episodes of Elementary. When Larry went to bed I watched The X-Files: I Want to Believe and Frozen from our movies collections. I ended up doing 13,000 steps. 

 

 

Relaxing in front of the television