PLOG 71: Summer Break Ending

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Teachers in 2020.

What a summer break, unlike any ever before. Just so you know, my summer break is coming to an end. As a teacher, I have some online training that I need to get done and they are asking us to go back next week. The good news is that we have been given the option to stay home and do our teacher training online for our teacher work days (or go up in person and sit in our classrooms doing the online training). Thank goodness!

But that's still lots of work for me to do. With so much in up in the air, with parents choosing either online or in-person school for their kiddos, the school districts have been thrown into chaos. The schools had to throw out the master schedules and are redoing all of the assignments for which teachers are going to teach which classes and which students will end up in those class sections with different teachers, etc.

Locally, here in Texas, I saw the rhetoric being used by school districts. While they wanted to qualify that they cannot guarantee anyone's safety from the pandemic, the rhetoric clearly made the online learning options sound much worse for students and for teachers (when given the choice). Despite that rhetoric, I was one of the teachers who volunteered for teaching online.

Admin has said they are surprised that more than half of the students at most of the schools around here have signed up for online learning. That means more shuffling around than they realized they would have to do. 

At this point, I don't know what courses I will be teaching for the school year, but we will be getting started soon. That means I will need to spend the first 2 weeks of August kicking it into high gear figuring out what school will be like for the year and what they are going to assign to me. During the 2nd half of August students will be doing online classes, no matter what they signed up for when their families were given the choice. As of now, we are scheduled to begin in-person classes about a week into September (for those students who signed up for that; the rest of them will continue online).

I've enjoyed doing the mostly daily Personal Log (PLOG) during the summer, but I think it's time to switch to a weekly system. Maybe on Sundays? That will free up my time to focus on my work, but it should also give me more to talk about with each weekly entry. We will see what happens. Just like with the school system, it's all up in the air now. I'll be happy to go with the flow. Who knows, maybe I'll miss the daily therapeutic writing and come back to it sooner, rather than later?

In the meantime, I'll keep organizing the Lego, playing some Minecraft, and maybe even get back to that Sims 3 family Legacy Challenge I started this summer. I'll keep reading books too, especially being around (virtually or in-person) my fellow teachers.

Take care. Seriously. If you've been reading this, know that I appreciate you. It's nice sharing my thoughts.

Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home (as much as I can, but - OH MY GOODNESS - I'm going to have to go back out into the world). OH MY. I've just been getting the mail and putting out the trash. I'm actually going to have to go out into the world in August. Ok. I can do this...

PLOG 70: Lego Storage Plan

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Oh wow. My PLOG has made it to 70 entries! WOOT! I should celebrate with some more ice cream.

I've thought a lot about my Lego storage over the years, especially after having moved so many times in my life. I have huge plastic bins that I use to store sets. I used to have unsorted Lego in those bins as well. Then I got shoebox size plastic bins for sorting. That helped a lot. So have the reused gallon ice cream buckets.

One of the most important parts of my system is my set of bookshelves. Over the years I have bought a bunch of the tall $20-50 bookshelves from Wal-Mart that you have to put together yourself, that have 5 shelves. I now have 5 of those tall bookshelves next to each other across one wall of my bedroom, with extra shelves from old ones that I cannibalized and trashed.

I have already re-organized the bins for the main bricks, plates, tiles, and slopes that compose the majority of the first 3 bookshelves. I have drafted how I want the last 2 to end up, but I still haven't moved all of the bins around for that one. What you see below are screen captures from my Google Docs spreadsheet where I am keeping track of the storage; it's what it working best for my collection:

Your collection is likely very different, but feel free to use my system if you wish. It's constantly changing, but it works. I'll eventually get some actual photos up, but for now know that I use sticky notes to label the bins.

That's it for now.

Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home.

PLOG 69: Forever Sorting 2

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Believe it or not, the people at The Lego Group (TLG) continued their inside joke with a tile for the movie "Forever Sorting 2" as part of the Joke Manor set in 2017.

I've made great progress with the Lego sorting and organizing this week. I'm down to just half of the 21 ice cream buckets full of bulk storage that I started with a couple of days ago.

I grabbed a ziplock bag to put in the weird pieces I was finding; it turns out I had more old Tyco and Mega Blocks (and other weird brands) mixed in than I had realized. It's not too bad considering how much Lego I have, but it's still way more than I had expected to find in there. 

I wanted to share out a tip, since I keep finding small pieces stuck inside of larger Lego pieces. They end up jammed in there from being stored together and the regular Lego tool can't get them out because of the angle and such. For that reason, I have been keeping a flame piece handy; it's got a small enough extension with the flame to get in and catch the inside of a stuck tile. Then I can get the smaller piece out.

That's it for today. I have to get back to sorting, after all. I'd like to have all of the sorting done before my summer vacation officially comes to an end.

Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home!

PLOG 68: 150,000 Deaths

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

from The New York Times

The US death count has reached 150,000.

It's so sad and tragic to think how much of this could have been prevented.

That's all for today.

Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home.

PLOG 67: Forever Sorting Lego

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Lego made an inside joke years ago by including a fake movie poster as a sticker for the Palace Cinema modular building set, with the movie called "Forever Sorting." That concept seems to now be the story of my life.

I am forever sorting my Lego collection, but by "forever" I mostly mean procrastinating and not getting the job done.

Here's part of my history with Lego. When I had a house with a huge living room area, I had a plan to make the most amazing Lego City ever. I had combined my Lego collection with 2 others that I had acquired over the years and the parts had all been put in plastic tubs. When I went to sort them, I went with the amateur decision of sorting by color.

I actually had my entire Lego collection at the time sorted by color, but guess what? I couldn't build with that system. For me, I realized I needed to take the more time consuming option of reorganizing my Lego pieces by type. This realization came about mostly because of my frustration of looking into a plastic bin of all black parts and not being able to find what I needed.

With moving multiple times, and having to store my Lego collection for several years, I just didn't get the sorting job done. My awesome Lego City never became the reality that I wanted it to be. I kept collecting the modulars over the years; I also bought a bunch more sets either because I thought I could modify them into modulars or just because I liked them (super hero stuff and awesome vehicles).

Now I have even more plastic bins. Some of my sets, such as vehicles are stored in large plastic bags inside of bins. Other sets are just in little shoe box size bins. I also have a more recent addition to my collection - gallon ice cream buckets. Please don't think of me as a hoarder, but I have kept my plastic ice cream buckets from the last few years and cleaned them out and used them to organize stuff.

Now I can proudly say, inside of giant plastic bins waiting to be organized, that I have 21 gallon ice cream buckets worth of Lego to finish sorting. Something that motivated me to recently start sorting again was deciding to sort twice. First, I'm sorting into 6 major categories: plates, bricks, tiles, slopes, minifig stuff, and other. I've been doing this during the last couple of days while watching TV.

Then, I will sort them out into the individual bins (such as 1x2 plates, 1x4 plates, 1x6 plates, etc.). That step will be easier than my original method because they will already be together by type. Even though this system may seem like more work, it makes the organizing less intimidating. It's also nice to just sit and sort while watching movies or the news.

I wonder how long it'll take to sort the 21 ice cream buckets worth of blocks into my main collection. I guess we will find out... eventually.

Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home!

PLOG 66: Lego Collectible Minifigure Series 16 Review

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Lego put out their Collectible Minifigure (CMF) Series 16 as a celebration of "10 Years of Lego Minifigures" 2010-2020. I think it's great. Here's the entire set, which I was able to add to my collection today (thanks to an Amazon seller offering a complete set of all 16 minifigures). That seller is doing the work of angels since these items are sold as blind bags in which you normally have no idea which figure you'll get and thus you end up buying more than you need and getting duplicates.

Thank you Amazon (and Amazon Prime for 1-day shipping). If you're looking for a complete set of any series, you can try searching online (but they get more expensive the longer they have been retired). You can also purchase them individually from 3rd party websites such as Bricklink and BrickOwl.

Here's the mini-poster with all 16 figures in Series 16:

The back of the mini-poster shows how to put them together and celebrates the 10-year anniversary of the CMF line.

Of the 16 figures, I divided them into tiers. Tier 3 is my least favorite, with the more generic looking ones. What is there to say about there? It looks like Lego ripped off a Power Ranger. There's a raven knight with a cool shield. Random martial arts boy, random viking, and random female athlete.

My Tier 2 selections are an upgrade from Tier 3, with more interesting items and hair and such. The llama girl is so weird that many Lego YouTubers have wondered where to put her in their cities. The pirate girl has a great hat with hair attached; I got an extra sword in my pack. The pajama girl with her bunny-bear would have been in my Tier 1, but they put yellow printing on her torso (which means I can't use it for a flesh-colored figure). I really like the girl jamming with the cool hair and hat combo. The pea in the pod actually has an awesome shirt-torso print under the costume.

My chosen Tier 1 figures are by far some of the best ever released. The swimmer is there because of the turtle. The space girl has an awesome hat piece with hair, as well as the most accessories by far. The iron boy is super cool. The green Lego man is great. Piñata boy really needs a better torso, but the hat and piñata make up for it.

And my favorite minifigure of this series is the 80s rock musician, with his awesome hair, torso print (which says "Tour" on the back of the jacket), and special musical instrument.

Overall I would recommend the series if you're able to get them all at once like I did, or if you can buy them knowing which one you're going to get. I wouldn't want to get them randomly though.

Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home!

PLOG 65: 145,000 Deaths

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

I've been trying to escape into video games and Lego, but the news and numbers are impossible to ignore. In the US we are now at more than 145,000 deaths (probably at 146,000 by the end of today), with more than 4.1 million people infected right now. There are so many people who need help and the government seems ambivalent; instead of passing stimulus directly to the people, the US Congress continues to stall and are about to let the unemployment pandemic benefits expire.

The first major hurricane of this season is about to hit Texas. The combination of the pandemic and a hurricane means really bad news; storm season has heated up with lots of dangerous possibilities. People who may be in quarantine and self-lockdown are now going to need to potentially evacuate and get help from the community. And if the hurricanes don't get them, then the coming tornadoes might.

As for the protests, it sounds like Trump's administration is going to take its act from Portland (with the hired private security forces) to more cities. The plan seems to be to intimidate the protestors with these illegal grab and snatch operations.

Meanwhile I've got teacher work/prep to do, but I also have some Lego sets and some Minecraft goals. Oh, and I have some ice cream. I think this would be a good time to cook up some jambalaya and have some ice cream. The stress eating continues. The night time anxiety and difficulty falling asleep continues.

Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home!

PLOG 64: Lego Jack's Beach Buggy Review

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Here's another short review to help me catch up for falling behind on the blog the last 2 days.

The Lego Group (TLG) recently announced the end of the Hidden Side series, which has had 2 waves (1 in 2019 and 1 in 2020). It was short-lived, but really interesting. They used lots of bright colors and the theme's story seemed to focus on a group of kids who were like Ghostbusters, finding and revealing people who were possessed by what I assume are evil spirits or ghosts of some kind.

I like the hats and hairs and interesting clothing for the minifigs in the series. They also had interesting locations and vehicles, like a school and a school bus, that I wish we would have gotten normal versions of instead of the monster versions in this series.

In honor of the end of the series, I give you a quick review of a Hidden Side set called Jack's Beach Buggy. Here's the set:

My thoughts:

THE GOOD:

*Fantastic hat/hair pieces and outfits for the minifigs.

*Fun, interesting colors.

*Extra stickers!

*Interesting use of rubber bands for the buggy suspension system.

*It would be easy to convert into a regular beach buggy (with no Hidden Side stuff).

THE BAD:

*Goodbye Hidden Side.

*Awkward free-standing Octan gas tank.

That's it for today. Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home!

PLOG 63: Lego Captain Marvel Polypag Review

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

It finally happened; I fell behind on my personal log by 2 days. Here's a short and simple one to make up for it.

When I put together a grocery delivery order, I noticed that they had the Captain Marvel polybag with Nick Fury in it so I got it delivered with my groceries. What a great deal!

Here's the set:

My thoughts:

THE GOOD:

*The set comes with the blue version of Captain Marvel's outfit, which (other than this largely distributed polybag) is rare.

*1990s Nick freakin' Fury!

*The VHS tape is a printed 1x2 tile!

THE BAD:

*Were you really in need of a yellow phone booth in your Lego City?

That's it for now. Be safe out there and I'll be safe at home!

PLOG 62: Lego Ninjago Arcade Pods Review

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

I'm a little late to the party, but the Lego Ninjago Arcade Pods (Set Numbers: 71714, 71715, and 71716) are really interesting. They are also HUGE compared to the Lego minifig, but that's ok; I still think they could be used in a modular arcade build or something and it make sense. One of my cats is guest-starring in this review because he likes to be in the middle of things.

As you can see here on the backs of the boxes, not only does each set come with 2 minifigs for the same character, but they also come with some unique items and a bunch of copies of the same weapons.

I think it's hilarious that we go from guitar to dynamite to a baseball bat. These guys seem to have very different personalities. I'm going to start wit Jay, the blue ninja. He's the one with the guitar.

Each of the sets has a "Digi" version and an "Avatar" version of the Ninjago character. After giving Jay a chance to rock out, I opened up the box for Kai - the red ninja. I was saddened to see the twisted, wonky sticker sheet fall out when I opened the box. It's so sad to me that The Lego Group still does this with the packaging sometimes. They know how to secure sticker sheets and they do it in the really expensive sets.

I realized, while following the instructions, that it was going to be pretty much the exact same build for all 3 arcade pods; they were just swapping out the colors. I'm fine with that. I like consistency. Below you will see I gave Kai the little glowing daggers to hold because I didn't want him holding an open flame and some dynamite. The arcade pods are nice for storing those extra pieces though.

Up next was superstar Lloyd with the gold mohawk and baseball bat. What a punk! Thankfully, his sticker sheet was just fine.

The 3 ninjas look good together. I mostly wanted the sets for the arcade pods (to go into a modular build) and the hair pieces. Lloyd had an extra face mask so I gave it to Kai. They can use good practices during the pandemic. The extra 3 ninja minifigs create a great 3D screen appearance for the arcade pods.

Strangely, each set came with a row of extra stickers at the bottom of the sticker sheet. I don't know what to do with them. I suppose they could help decorate my MOC modular arcade that I want to build.

My overall thoughts?

THE GOOD:

*Each pack has 2 minifigs.

*Each pod has plenty of storage space.

*The stickers really bring the sets to life.

*The hair pieces and items are great.

THE BAD

*The arcade pods are really too big for minifig scale.

*There was no indication of what to do with the extra stickers.

*I wish the weapons were a solid color instead of the weird glow color.

*I wish Jay's guitar had some printed details on it.

I highly recommend these sets. They are fun and colorful.

That's it for today. Be safe out there (and I'll be safe at home)!

PLOG 61: REAL RISKS!

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Let's get real here. Listening to the news has become very frustrating. The US Congress has been debating the next stimulus bill (for a long time). It's insane. We're not just talking politics as normal. We are in an emergency, pandemic situation. People need relief yesterday. It's life and death for a lot of people; it's time for the government to take action and help people.

The politicians need to remember that they are supposed to be serving the people. The government should only exist to further the needs of the people. Instead, we are continuing to see clashes with protesters.

The situations we are facing seem to just worsen, which reminds me of the coutuniunig unknowns about starting the school year.  Some states are starting all classes online. Other have left that decision up to the local districts, like in Texas. In Texas we have some counties where the health commissioner is even stepping in and forcing in-person school to be delayed. But you know what's weird? People either don't seem to understand/know about the fact that teachers are still expected to show up in person - or people just don't care.

Studies have been done. Kids and teens get the virus. They spread the virus. Air conditioning systems spread the virus. Whether students are there or not, the virus will spread. What in the world are we doing? And because the details have been revealed so late, it's too late for teachers to be freely released from our contracts. Now if we decide to not show up for work in protest of the situation, or out of concern for our health, we will lose our certifications and potentially our retirement pensions.

I feel like it's all really obvious and yet we still have about (I'm guessing here) 30-40% of the population in denial of how medical science and virus infections work.

I can only spend so many days escaping into books, The Sims 3, Minecraft, and Lego. My summer vacation days are running out.

Wish me luck.

Be safe out there (and I'll be safe at home).

PLOG 60: Lego Bookshop 10270 Review

My PLOG continues during this time of pandemic and protests...

Today I want to share my building experience putting together Lego set 10270 the Creator series Bookshop (part of the modular series of buildings that come out once per year); this set came out at New Year's, but it took me a while to decide to pull the trigger and spend the money to order it. Since I got the set on backorder during the pandemic, you may notice that it has a white sticker with the piece count (2504 pieces) and such; I believe that means it was shipped from Europe to make up for the lack of production in North America.

Yesterday I spent many hours putting together this set. I found it to be a fun, simple build; it just takes a long time to put these buildings together. I also really liked the minifigs that came with the set. The back of the box shows how the set looks with the recent modular diner and gas station. I like the sunset on the box, though I hope it doesn't symbolize that "the sun is setting" on this series. I am hopeful to get plenty more modulars in the future.

As you can see below, someone from the Lego team has a dark sense of humor, putting the human head in the iguana terrarium. That's not how it's supposed to be. The iguana is really neat though, coming in a special color to match the bed.

These large sets have a lot of bags, but as usual, Lego numbers them into sets. There were about 2-3 bags of each number. When I build, I tend to open up the bags of the current number and dump them into a plastic shoe box container. I then sort out the larger pieces.

Below you will see a great, fun facial expression on the boy in the set. It's too bad they are still doing the yellow skin tones. I wish all sets were actual flesh colors. I do love the banana shirt with the plaid vest. The scarf is a nice touch too, but always makes me wonder why they blur the Lego reality with some accessories like that being 3d add-ons and others just being printed onto the pattern of the torso.

The "Moby Brick" book is a lot of fun. Nice brick humor.

I like this lady's hair and that the set also has the cool bluebird to sit in the tree.

In the following picture, you can see my plastic shoe box setup with how I build.

The "elderly couple" in the set are cute together. Clearly the woman colors her hair. LOL. As usual, I wish their torsos didn't have the yellow print at the top for their open collars; that makes it just about impossible for me to use the torsos with my flesh-colored Lego heads and hands.

In general, I like the buildings for this set. I'm not a fan of the actual birch tree though. It looks like something from the Lego Elves series. The bright yellow and orange leaves are just too bright in my opinion and clash with the realistic look of the street. You may also notice that it's strange that the blue window frames on the house are not the same color as the building; that's odd.

The backs of the buildings look mostly fine, but I would not have chosen green as a color to go with the bookshop. In fact, on the inside of that building I wondered if the designers were making a statement that the type of person who would own a bookshop must not be good at decorating or picking colors that went together; the green carpet on the stairs and such are just hideous and not something you would see in someone's home or place of business.

The modular series has been going on for over a decade and there are certain consistent elements that this set blatantly defies. Instead of each floor being a 1-piece removable element, they made it more like a dollhouse facade building with halves coming apart. It's weird. It's different. But I'm okay with it. It just goes to show that they are emphasizing more childlike play features, like with the bright colors, instead of just marketing the set for adult collectors like before.

Other than the ugly birch tree, my biggest complaint is that the designers left ugly sides viewable on the teal-turquoise blue building. That's more like an amateur MOC build than a professional Lego set. I expect the actual Lego sets to do a better job of hiding those elements. The huge black and grey elements really stand out, as do the off-color green pieces.

The people are great, if you want yellow-flesh Lego minifigs.

For my overall review:

THE GOOD: 

*It's great to have a split modular set like the Pet Shop.

*Nice minifigs and accessories.

*Nice animals with the bluebird and iguana.

*Interesting, detailed interiors for the buildings.

THE BAD:

*The birch tree.

*The weird off-color green pieces for what obviously should have been the teal-turquoise color but Lego didn't have them available at the time.

*The messy look of the sides of the home building.

*The home won't be an easy set to add floors to if people buy multiple copies of the set (and that's an expectation with these modular buildings).

*The home is too short for the modular series and has no bathrooms or kitchens.

*The bookshop has ugly color combinations and decorations inside.

How likely am I to recommend it? HIGHLY. Whether you collect the modular building series or not, this is a fun set. It is expensive, but it's one of those sets that I would regret not having bought if I passed on it.

That's it for today. Be safe out there (and I'll be safe at home)!