Putting Things By

Morning routine. SESIG on Zoom. Smoked chickens portioned and frozen. Stock from the carcasses. Published the Fail Fest post. Grocery run. Walked to Suds. Afternoon with Cathy and Tim. Thanksgiving guest list and turkey order. Chicken soup for dinner.

A day of SESIG talk, smoked chicken and Thanksgiving plans

Events and activities that occurred on Friday, November 13, 2026

Friday the 13th began with SESIG on Zoom, the morning after Fail Fest, so I came with a report. Of the three failure stories told in Newport, the one that stayed with me was a grant-funded nonprofit fish processor. I want to understand its business model: who keeps it funded, and whether the fishermen it supports ever outgrow their need for it. Jon described his move to Kaiser after his doctor's office dropped out of network, and Jim offered the view from inside: excellent at routine care, slower when you need a specialized test. Larry is building a mold for a plexiglass fairing and weighing oak against Baltic birch for the blank. He also proposed a group outing to Exploding Whale Day next year, which seems only right.

The first real rain of the season steered the conversation toward geology. We talked about the jumbled terrain of the West Coast, how differently seismic energy travels through it, Loma Prieta and the San Francisco retrofits that followed. From there we drifted to SpaceX's next test flight and Ford's turn toward small electric and range-extended pickups, then closed on good news about Tom's recovery. I later assembled the group's newsletter around the weather and called it From Dust to Mud.

The rest of the morning belonged to the kitchen. Thursday's smoked chickens came off the bone. The breasts went through the meat slicer while still cold and into flat vacuum-sealed packs, the dark meat and wings into their own, and all of it into the freezer. The carcasses went straight into a stockpot. There is a quiet satisfaction in turning one long cook into a month of easy meals. Between packs I finished Thursday's journal and published Lessons From Fail Fest. Posting an essay about failure on Friday the 13th felt appropriately defiant.

After a grocery run I walked to Suds, using the walk to think through a household resilience playbook and to look up a few foresight frameworks for my psychohistory reading. Cathy arrived at four as promised, Tim joined us, and the afternoon passed easily until Cathy gave me a ride home. Michael and Mary had a show to get to, but Michael sent tickets for Alice by Heart next weekend.

Thanksgiving is now less than two weeks away, and this was the day the plan took shape. I found a working address for Quinn, who had missed the original invitation, and cleaned up the shared planning sheet so it reads well for guests. I also settled my own contribution: a fresh sixteen-to-eighteen-pound turkey from Winn Farms, plus gravy, wine and sparkling water. A few friends sent regrets. Ginger won't make dinner, but she promised to stop by and say hello.

Dinner was soup made from the day's stock, with angel hair, and it was the right way to end a day of putting things by. The rain had arrived, the freezer was full, and the next two weeks finally had a shape. Friday the 13th turned out to be lucky in the plainest way: nothing broke, and a good deal got put away for later.