I was really happy about my score for the final running of the Almaniac when I got the answer booklet – I thought I had only missed one question of 81, and I was pretty sure I had earned a trophy (I didn’t see a footnote which affected the answer for the one question I missed).

So I was crushed when I got the final result booklet and found that I’d missed two questions and wasn’t getting a trophy after all. I asked the Old Maltese to rescore my submission and got a prompt response.

The final question on the Almaniac requires you to add up the last digits of the page on which you’d found the answers for questions 5, 15, and so on. Easy – the sum was 48. And I wrote 8 on my scoresheet – the last digit of the answer, not the actual answer. Which was wrong, and cost me a trophy.

Oh, well – I still have a plaque from my best previous finish in 1993!

We had to be out of the house this morning for our housecleaner; Diane had a dentist’s appointment, so the timing worked out well. While she was in the chair, I wandered around the area (near Westgate Shopping Center) to get a little exercise. The weather was beautifully clear and not too cold; I was surprised to see snow on the East Bay foothills.

After she was finished, we went over to the Los Gatos Creek trail for more walking; the water was muddy and flowing very briskly. We saw a lot more birds in the water than we often do; there were lots of ducks, as well as a few more unusual birds (I think these are cormorants).

This evening, I went to Toastmasters Club Officer Training. It’s nice to be able to do it from home – the food’s much better here!