UPS delivered the Mac mini this afternoon!

Setting it up was a little more trouble than I expected – I had to dig out a wired keyboard and touchpad (an old Cirque Smart Cat) to be able to pair it with the Apple wireless keyboard and Magic Trackpad I really want to use.

Then I realized that a Mac mini doesn’t include a microphone or a decent speaker – the webcam I’m using has a microphone, so that’s OK, but I’m going to have to figure out what to do about a speaker. I have an old Cambridge Soundworks system that I can use, but it includes a very large woofer that I’ll have to put somewhere, and the tweeters will take up some precious desk space, too. Or I could use headphones.

It’s going to take a while to figure out how to set things up properly – right now, there are wires all over the desk, some of which are probably unnecessary. I haven’t quite gotten comfortable with the placement of the monitor, keyboard, and touchpad yet – I’m sitting closer to the monitor than I did before, and it’s a big monitor.

It’ll all work out, right?

It was nice not to be waiting for any deliveries today; I did a bit more consolidation, pruning, and labeling of photos from 2002, which will make the eventual migration to the new machine a few seconds faster.

This morning was a special occasion – my first cousin, Sharon, turned 75 yesterday and her children arranged a surprise Zoom birthday party for her. It had been a long time since we’d talked, and it was good to see other family members, too.

This evening, we attended a Sheloshim service for Rabbi Aron’s mother who died a bit over a week ago; that was a reminder of the other end of the cycle.

The waiting resumes tomorrow.