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Occam’s Cable

Today was to be warm, with a high in the 60s, but starting with some light frost on my car. I made it through my morning quicker than I expected, which got me to work about five minutes early, even after stopping at Casey’s for a free slice of breakfast pizza.

I kept busy all day, first on my own, then by going to the high school to help Brody with Jazz’s chips. After everything, it really did turn out to be the USB cables causing the trouble. I’d lost count of how many hours we worked on that, all for it to be the stupid cable.

I wasn’t at all hungry by the time lunch came around, nor did La Chiquita sound like a very good choice, so I just stayed in my office and tinkered for an hour. When everyone got back, Gary made his way back to my office and had me run through some other configuration changes for the new domain controller, or more specifically, the new Server 2019 VM template I created. That got us through to the end of the day.

Eaddie called me just as I was leaving work, and asked me to pick her up at Oakland. We went back to my house just long enough to change out of work clothes, and then we headed up to their house. I stopped for my daily taco along the way, and then we ate and chatted about her day.

Summer got home and had to do more work stuff. Autumn got home after doing some homework with her grandparents. Then everyone shuffled off to bed pretty quietly.

Microsoft Endpoint Manager Configuration Manager just has too many managers. Like us!

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Bloody Sunday

I tried to sleep in just a little bit today, then woke up to Summer’s pancake breakfast. We broke out the bottle of Fruity Pebbles Mrs. Butterworth’s syrup, and the flavor was spot-on. We pretty much coasted the rest of the day though. Summer eventually went to the gym while I took a really long bath. The girls stayed in their rooms all day. Summer came back home and made some yeast rolls. I played some Don’t Starve in the evening. Summer somehow motivated Autumn to play a round on Ring Fit Adventure.

What a waste.

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Mario Cam Live

Autumn had a PT event with JROTC this morning, so she was gone all day. Summer got up and made eggs for breakfast, and then we got out the Ring Fit Adventure game to try it out. I think Summer was a little surprised at the workout she got from it. Then Eaddie got out the Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit games to try setting up a track. It was actually really cool, though the cars were a little bit bigger than I expected, which meant they didn’t have quite enough room to make a really good track in their house.

Eventually Summer went to work out, and I took Eaddie to get her phone that she forgot at the junior high, and then to drop her off at her grandmother’s house so she could work on Eaddie’s dress. On the way, we stopped to pick up my “free” taco from Taco Bell, along with a burrito for good measure. Eaddie ate the burrito, and I dumped my taco in the floorboard. There was just enough of it left in the wrapper that I could eat, and then I cleaned up what I could to throw away.

After I dropped Eaddie off, I went home to clean up. Eventually I made my way back up to Summer’s to take her shopping. We went by Lowe’s, then Walmart to pick up dinner. I wasn’t really successful in finding any interesting deals. We picked Eaddie up, then headed home to make tacos.

Summer made all the fresh veggies while I cooked the taco meat and cheese dip. Dinner was great, but I ate way too much. Afterward, we got Mario Kart Live out again and Eaddie played some more. Then Summer went to bed and I laid on the couch with Eaddie to watch Romeo + Juliet. I started dozing off pretty early, and Eaddie decided to save the rest of the movie for tomorrow, so we went to bed.

“Hoes.” That’s what we call a group of women now. Feminism won.

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Down Loading

I made it in to work on time for the first time in several days. It felt like we were missing more people than we really were, but it was just Thomas and Greg. We got a really slow start to the day, and burned about an hour just hanging out. Once we got up from that, I got started working on my project for Jazz. That went even slower, on account of how large all of the installers were for the four required pieces of software to make the stupid chip work.

It was a quiet lunch, too. Gary, Zach, and I went to Taco Bell for significantly cheaper than the sit-down restaurants we usually visit. I was frustrated by the app again though, because my order was never made until I went to the counter to ask about it. Last time they had already made it at the other restaurant. I just want to know what the expected protocol is to get my food.

The afternoon went by pretty quickly as I found some success in getting the S7 chip to work. Then I went to Oakland to take care of a couple work orders, and then ended my day early to make up for coming in a couple weekends ago.

I hung out at my house a while, just kind of piddling around until Summer got home. Then I went up to her place for the evening. We chatted for a while, looked at cars and boats, and then went to bed.

If you’re not better, you’re worse.

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Promoted

Today was super cold, but dry enough that there wasn’t a speck of frost on my windshield. I rolled in a little bit late, but got right to work on the hardware I brought with me from yesterday. It wasn’t very long before I got sidetracked with other projects though, and I spent the rest of the day juggling at least three different things for different people. It felt good to be busy and useful, but I hated that it took me away from fixing the real issue I wanted to address.

Four of us went to Western Sizzlin for lunch, which of course filled me up for the day. At least I didn’t leave hurting and worthless for the rest of the day. Gary actually came back and spent most of the afternoon with me, showing me how to promote a new domain controller that we had built before lunch.

After work, I went to my parents’ house for a while to show them some visualizations from engaging-data.com. Mom had duck soup, but I still couldn’t eat at that point. We chatted for a little bit, and eventually I went home for the night. I perused some educational YouTube, peeked back into upcoming EV credits, and tinkered with my Hue controllers again, and ended up crawling into bed a bit late.

The tail end of the week sure didn’t stick around long.

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Frederick’s

I was cold and tired again this morning, so climbing out of bed wasn’t easy. The girls made it out of the house early, and it was warm enough outside that I didn’t have to waste any time defrosting to make it to Oakland on time. I made a couple quick stops there, then made my way to the shop.

It was mostly uneventful there. Zach was back, but out doing things most of the day. I saw Greg a couple times, but not for long. Kyle was in and out while Josh stuck around the shop and worked on the Mac stuff some more. I think we’re all a bit annoyed that the person with the most Apple computers hasn’t really done any of the work here.

We went to Sumo’s for lunch, and the tempura chicken lunch box turned out to be more food than I was expecting. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t supposed to get the fried vegetables and the chicken, but it was awesome that I did.

I went back to Oakland for a quick stop after lunch, and then went to the high school at the end of the day to help Brody with something in Jazz’s room. We couldn’t figure anything out there though, so I left for the day and picked Eaddie up from Oakland, then went home.

Summer was worried about a banging sound she heard on the drive home from Conway, so I met her at the shop to investigate. She thinks it’s a part of the rear wheel well, so we don’t think it’s catastrophic yet. It’s still approaching the time to really consider buying a new car though.

When we finished at the shop, Summer went to the house and I went through Freddy’s drive-through for some frozen custard. The line just barely creeped along, but by the time I thought to time the wait for each car to get their stuff, they had sped up to just a couple minutes per car. I wasn’t very impressed with the volume of custard or toppings though, and the chili cheese fries left a lot to be desired.

It was a pretty short evening after we ate. Eaddie has been staying in her room, Summer watched TV in the living room, and I washed a bunch of dishes before getting ready for bed.

Were you ever in tune with the song life was humming?

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Peak Waste

I just barely crawled out of bed this morning after waking up really stiff. I even considered calling in for at least a partial day, but instead I made it in about five minutes late. Several were still out, so it was quiet again downstairs. I went to Oakland for a couple hours before lunch and took care of some stuff there, but otherwise the day was a wash.

I’ve almost eaten enough tacos to make up for my subscription pass. After lunch, Josh came downstairs and built out the Kerberos settings to try and help Kyle, so all the reading I did yesterday was basically for nothing. Kyle was still a real no-getter, and I’m not sure that’ll ever get any better. Maybe he’s just feeling the burnout.

After work, I just went home and waited to hear from Summer about Eaddie. Evidently Autumn burned another COVID test to try and prove she could go back to school. Fortunately they still had one left for Eaddie to take before she came over for the night.

I was still concerned about false negatives and the possibility of a late exposure simply not showing up on the test yet, so I stayed in the bedroom the rest of the night. Summer brought Eaddie over, along with some burgers from Freddy’s. Eaddie was upset that she didn’t buy any custard, and I was inclined to agree. The burger was better than I expected, but it’s still not the reason you go.

With everyone winding down pretty early due to staying separated, I got out a projector to tinker with in the bedroom. It worked as a proof of concept, but really just made me dream about turning the whole bedroom into a theater again. Maybe someday.

Level up.

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Ring That Bell

It was really frosty out this morning, but I made it in to work. A bunch of people were out, leaving me in charge for the day. We met up at the shop briefly, discovered that we couldn’t do the one thing Gary asked me to do, and then sent everyone off to do their own things.

Kyle stuck around the shop all day, and basically had me reading manuals on how to set up Kerberos for his Macs. I took a lunch break and ran through McDonald’s for some fries and Taco Bell for my taco subscription, then went back to the shop to eat it by myself. Right after lunchtime was over, the main office told us to shut down at one, unless we took a lunch, in which case we had to stay until two. I wrapped up what I could, and then we all left early.

As I got home, I decided to climb up the extension ladder and hang my big wind chime. I was a little concerned about the screws pulling out of the tree, but I put it up anyway. The bell is super heavy, but I liked the deep sound of it. I’ll still have to come up with a way to hang the smaller ones right outside the door, but I’m glad to have the big one up now.

Summer had called while I was at work to let me know that Autumn and her father tested positive for COVID. Eaddie tested negative, and Summer insisted that they come home. We talked it out, and decided to let them stay home for the night, and then have Eaddie go to school in the morning. We’re hoping that they stayed separated well enough that Eaddie isn’t carrying it, and as long as she tests negative for it again tomorrow, we’ll let her come over after school to let Autumn quarantine by herself the rest of the week. I’m not thrilled about any of it, but it seemed like the best way to minimize any new exposures since Eaddie basically has to go to school.

I put some time in on the treadmill, and eventually Summer came over after packing and going to the gym. I had her pick up some Little Caesar’s since she needed dinner. Then I had to run some stuff up to Eaddie, since she was stuck at home. We watched an episode of Modern Family when I got back home, and then it was off to bed.

Wow, a test she could pass.

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Taco Subscription

I made myself stay up when I first woke up this morning, because I knew if I went back to sleep I wouldn’t wake up for several more hours. We struggled to get out of bed though, and finally got up when Summer went to work on her laptop. I eventually took a shower, and then we left to meet back up at her house after I picked up some Taco Bell for lunch.

I decided to try the $10 30-day taco subscription, since the Doritos Locos Taco Supreme was on the list of options. I figure I can eat $10 worth of those in a month without any trouble. I didn’t get a taco with the purchase of the pass though, so I’ll have to go through again another time to redeem my first one.

We ate, and then Summer went to the gym after she got her laundry started. I thought I’d play a game or something, but ended up piddling on my phone while intermittently letting the cat in and out of the house repeatedly. She just didn’t want to stay in one place, and I kept obliging her every whim.

When Summer finally got back, we met at Harbor Freight to shop for some deals. I finally got a longer level and a multi-tipped mallet, and she picked up a bunch of stuff for work. I warmed up some leftovers for dinner, and then we laid on the couch for the rest of the evening until bedtime.

Minimum effort!

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Fire and Ice and Smoke and Mirrors

We got up this morning and tried not to dawdle too long, because we wanted to smoke some ribs for as long as possible. It was snowing, but we didn’t expect it to snow for as long as it did. I don’t think it ever really stopped all day.

Our first stop was Walmart to pick up what we needed. I got a huge bag of mixed fruit wood pellets, which will last years if I only ever use them in the little A-Maze-N tube smoker I got. Then we had to go to Summer’s to get the ribs and some other things, and finally we headed back to my house to set up the grill with a new tank of propane.

The smoker pellets took better than I expected, even after I dumped them off of the grill while wrestling the propane tank onto its holder. We used some of Summer’s Larry the Cable Guy wild game rub she had stockpiled years ago, which proved to be a mistake. I used way too much, but we wouldn’t know that until we ate them.

The ribs smoked for about three or four hours before I covered them with some old leftover barbecue sauce and wrapped them in foil. Then I let them cook another hour or two while I baked potatoes and made some bacon. Summer made broccoli salad, and then we called it a day instead of making twice-baked potatoes.

It was still snowing big, fat flakes, but the roads were clear enough to get to my parents’ house. We ate and visited for just a little bit, and then headed back home to clean up. We only ate one rack of the ribs, and they were extremely salty. The rub was overpowering, so I couldn’t even really tell that it had a smokey flavor. It may help to eat the next rack with some plain rice to cut the seasoning.

As we settled in for the night, I got Summer to stay up late and watch The Prestige. I’d been wanting to watch it again for quite a while, so I was glad to check it off the list. Summer didn’t feel great for most of the evening, so we wound down pretty quickly and went to bed.

Are you watching closely?