Royals Lose, AirPods Lost, But At Least There’s Pasta... and Beer!

Another week, another weekend where I’m struggling to decide what to write about. Oh well—looks like it’ll be another rambling post.

I’m traveling for work during the first part of the week, heading to Philadelphia for a conference. It’s a short trip; I’ll be back Tuesday evening. My flight out on Sunday morning is very early, so I came over on Saturday to stay at a hotel nearby. I just finished spaghetti and meatballs at Old Chicago in Kansas City—pretty good! I miss the Old Chicago that left Topeka several years ago and likely won’t be coming back.

I left Carrie and Oliver this afternoon to head into Kansas City. I listened to the Royals game while driving to the hotel. We won yesterday to get back to .500, but lost today, dropping us one game below. Hopefully, we can pull off a win tomorrow and take the series against the Blue Jays. The Royals made a few moves as the trade deadline ended, which was good to see. I’m hoping some of the changes will help us start stacking up wins.

After arriving at the hotel and finishing my meal, I realized I forgot my AirPods at home. I had them charging on the table when I left. Carrie and I are never truly settled until we remember what we forgot. I use my AirPods all the time, so I’m pretty annoyed with myself for leaving them behind. I like using them on the plane to listen to podcasts or music while I read. Oh well!

Tonight, I’m planning to go to bed extra early—hoping to be asleep by 8. It’s an early morning to get to the airport for a 6 a.m. flight. I’m glad I listened to Carrie when she suggested I get a hotel nearby so I wouldn’t have to wake up even earlier.

This will be my first trip to Philadelphia. My parents went years ago, and I remember my dad saying they could never go back. Something about their car being towed and the city insisting they hadn’t paid the fees, even though he had. I don’t recall the whole story, but hopefully I won’t run into any similar issues while I’m there for the conference.

That’s all for tonight. Have a great rest of your weekend and a fantastic week ahead!

 

This Google Tool Turned My Blog Into a Podcast—Here’s What Happened

 It’s been a busy week for me with a conference I attended in Pittsburg, KS. I worked on Monday, then drove to Pittsburg on Tuesday. I was there from Tuesday through Thursday with a packed schedule full of meetings and presentations. Everything went really well! By Wednesday night, I was so tired after a full day of meetings that I just lounged in my hotel room watching shows—and I was asleep by 10:30.

While I was away, Carrie sent me a few pictures of Oliver enjoying the backyard. The image to the right shows him soaking up the sun while lounging in the yard. She also sent a picture of him chasing a rabbit—oh, the joys of being a dog!

This was my second conference in just a few short months. At both events, I heard about a site called NoteBookLM from Google. I first came across it at eLive back in April but hadn’t had much time to explore it. After hearing about it again at this conference, I decided to give it a try.

If you haven’t checked out NoteBookLM, I highly recommend it. You can upload a technical manual, notes, or other information, and the site can turn it into a podcast, a FAQ, or even allow you to chat live with an AI about the content. I tested it using my own website (https://blogger.haverty.net/) to see what it would do with my blog content. It turned my site into a podcast summarizing the past few months of posts. You can listen to the podcast generated by NoteBookLM below.

 

It did a great job scanning my site and summarizing what I post about each week. The audio file above was generated by NoteBookLM as if two (fictional) hosts were doing a podcast about my blog. I thought it was really cool and wanted to share it—not just because it was fun, but because it’s amazing how NoteBookLM uses AI to turn content into something so accessible and engaging.

Until next time, have a great week!

Weekend Trip to St. Louis for Food, Drinks, and Fun

 

This past weekend we took a trip to St. Louis which is turning into an annual trip. Greg plays in a fantasy baseball draft that drafts in-person, so we have made a trip of it the past two years. We headed to St. Louis on Thursday, March 16 and we returned on Sunday, March 19. We had a wonderful time and managed to get to two Italian places to eat.

 

We did go to a new Italian place to eat our first night in St. Louis. We went to Paul Manno's Restaurant. Great food, wonderful service, and had the best time eating there Thursday night. Our night here as a perfect evening where we continued to talk about it on our way back on Sunday. Wonderful spot!

Friday we had a long day of going to different spots around St. Louis. We started off with an early breakfast and then went through the day until we dropped Greg off at his draft. Erin, Carrie, and I found a good spot to eat as we knew it might not be a spot Greg would like, so we made reservations and had a delicious meal in a cool spot. The name of the place was jalea.

The drinks were good and then dinner was also delicious. I could not finish all of my food, so I took some of it home, but ended up not having the leftovers either. We loved the look of the place and our waiter was excellent. He shared with us that he played baseball in Kansas, so he was familiar with Kansas. It was good to eat some delicious food, have some fun drinks, and try out a new spot.

Carrie was doing some artsy pictures while we were in St. Louis, so a few of those to share here.

We are already looking forward to next year when we will go back and go to new places. I was able to meet with my friend, Mark, and his wife, Shauna, while were there. We met them for lunch on Saturday and had a chance to catch up.

Saturday night, we went to Charlie Gitto’s which we went to last year. It was good, but we had a better time, better food, and drinks at Paul Manno's. We look forward to trying a new spot next year when we return.

For now, this is all as I did not get this posted on Sunday as my regular schedule as I was so tired from the weekend, I slept most of the evening and went to bed early. Playing catch up on our weekend trip of staying up late, getting up early, and having fun.