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Pressing

In contrast to yesterday, I had much more trouble waking up this morning. I made it in to work, and the day went by fine, but I felt like I had to wake from really great sleep to get there. I ended up sticking around the shop all day again while others were out doing less desirable things. I didn’t have a whole lot to accomplish, but I kept getting pulled in other directions.

When lunch time came around, I convinced Zach to take Gary and me to McDonald’s where I went for something new in the way of their Quarter Pounder® with Cheese Deluxe. I was a little disappointed with the looks of it, but the taste was super unexpected. Even the tomato slices were fresh and delicious. It tasted so fresh and tasty that I could have easily eaten another one.

The afternoon was pretty quiet because everyone vanished. Thomas came through and asked me to keep an eye on the shop as he left again. I answered one unnecessary phone call, but otherwise it was super chill until I left.

The girls didn’t have anything going on, so I just went home and tinkered for a bit. Then I went to Julie’s to have her re-press the vinyl that had started to lift on one of the Disney shirts she made for me. We chatted for a little while, and then I went home to do some laundry until bedtime.

Absolutely ruining my chill.

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Three for Me

Even after such a long day and getting to bed late, I still had trouble falling and staying asleep. I got about three hours all night, but fortunately the morning wasn’t too bad after a cup of coffee. I didn’t really accomplish a terrible lot, but kept leisurely busy. When lunch time rolled around, Zach wanted Chinese. For some reason, we always try to go to Mulan’s on Wednesday when they’re closed, so we hit the interstate to get to New China. While he, Thomas, and I were eating, Autumn called and then came by to get her wallet out of my car. She asked for some gas money, but I told her a quarter tank would get her anywhere she needed to go.

When we got back, I went to the core closet to relieve Gary to go to lunch while I babysat a seemingly unconfident tech from Ritter. We’ve had such incredibly bad luck getting our new fiber connections up, and it’s not making me feel really great about them giving Suddenlink much competition.

After that, I went by the middle school to try and find Josh, but only found Annie shuffling laptops around in the library. We chatted for a bit, and then I headed back to my office. Not long after I got there, Greg asked for some help imaging a random bunch of lab desktops and laptops in the Adult Education area, and that finished up the day.

Eaddie had tennis early, so I ran home to change before picking her up and taking her home. Then we waited for Summer to get home from work, followed by Autumn from therapy and karate. Summer did some stuff for work while I ate a few gas station leftovers, and then everyone was pretty much off to bed.

Lou who?

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Gotta Live It Big Time

I had a couple projects I had to work on in my office today, so I didn’t get out at all. I was a little worried about getting devices into Destiny for the middle school, but I worked it out. I felt pretty accomplished with everything I got done. A big group of us went to Taco John’s for Taco Tuesday, and then I wrapped everything up in the afternoon.

When I left work, I ran home to change, got gas, and then picked the girls up to head toward Rogers for the Big Time Rush concert. We stopped at the truck stop in Ozark to have dinner in their little deli, and then we made the rest of the trip as quickly as we could. Traffic wasn’t nearly as bad getting in or out as I expected, especially with how packed the place seemed.

The girls absolutely loved the concert, and I think Summer danced more than either of the other two. I was given camera duty “because I have the zoom,” so I got a bunch of video. Spencer Sutherland opened for the group, and I thought he was pretty good. When Big Time Rush came out on their scaffolding, all I could think about was the knee damage from all the jumping around. The highlight for me was a nearly unused men’s restroom.

We split as soon as the encore was over, and though we missed out on some last minute screaming that may have been solely from the guys removing their shirts, we got to the car and out of the parking garage with relative ease. Then we hopped on the interstate and we were on a mostly-empty road home. I was absolutely astounded that we got out of there that quickly. The girls all crashed as soon as we got in, so I finished up my chores and went to sleep as quickly as I could.

Worldwide? Worldwide.

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Cannot Stop the Battery

We met for about an hour this morning since Zach was back and had to update himself with the status of everyone else. I loaded right up to go to Oakland, and then Gary gave me a couple new rack-mount batteries to install. It wasn’t too stressful yet, but the rain and humidity made me start pouring sweat.

I made it back to the shop for lunch with Zach, Brody, and Thomas at Quiznos. It was Thomas’s birthday, so Tammy brought cake for him when we got back to the shop. Then I spent the rest of the day finishing up what I could at Oakland.

Eaddie had tennis practice again, so I went home to change before picking her up. Then I went to my parents’ house to eat some spring rolls while I waited for her to finish. Autumn was cooking a surprise pasta dinner when we finally got back to their house, so they ate when Summer got home. Then everyone made it to bed pretty early.

It’s only like two weeks late!

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Basic Shrimp

I slept in a bit today before Summer got up and went to the gym. I tinkered a bit and discovered that my computer’s subwoofer wasn’t powering up, so I took the amplifier board out of the back to take to Dad. The girls were back in town from their father’s, but Eaddie had gone to a friend’s house. Autumn was at home and looked like she hadn’t showered all weekend. I picked Summer up and grabbed my aquarium water test kit, and then we went to Walmart before going back to my house to test my shrimp tank water.

After confirming my tank as shrimp-ready, we went to get Autumn and then Eaddie to go to my parents’ house for spring rolls. Dad smoked a pork loin all day, and the rolls were great. After we ate, Summer brought up the Big Time Rush concert, which got Eaddie super excited. Summer decided to buy tickets for the four of us, but then Autumn changed her mind and said she didn’t want to go because she had to do her karate test in a couple weeks and she didn’t want to miss class. I had to explain to everyone that the argument wasn’t at all about what we were actually arguing about, and that no amount of reason or logic would change her mind.

We eventually made it back up to their house, and Eaddie was still bouncing around with excitement. The other two wound down for bed pretty quickly, as I struggled to feel tired myself.

Where the deer and the antelope play?

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Had a Bed Day Again

Summer and I hardly left the bedroom today. We laid around all morning until she went to the gym. Even after we got showered for the day, we went back to bed and just napped or watched TV in bed. We eventually decided to just head to my parents’ house to see if they were ready to go, and pulled up just as they were leaving the house.

We met at New China and ate too much. They were really busy, and service was pretty slow. I wanted to go to PetSmart afterward, but we decided to just go straight home instead. There, we watched more TV in bed until I surprisingly felt sleepy enough to call it a night.

You wouldn’t understand.

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Cleared for Lunch

This was our last quiet Friday for a little while, since people are starting to filter back in next week. I spent the morning in my office tinkering with a few things before lunch. Then Gary, Kyle, and I met Brody at Zaxby’s for national wing day, where Brody and I both got BOGO orders of boneless wings. I ate way too much and still took some back with me.

I had to run to the middle school for a topcap before I could meet Kyle at Oakland to run a video and touch line in the new kindergarten alternative learning environment. I still can’t quite wrap my head around stuffing a bunch of poorly-behaved kindergartners into one room together. The 50-foot optical HDMI cable wasn’t long enough to go up into the rafters and back down, so we had to re-run it right on top of the ceiling tile. That kept us there quite a bit after quitting time.

After work, I went home and had to help Bác Vân add a new entry to her iPad’s address book. We couldn’t get it to recognize it as an iPhone number though, so I’m not sure it will work for her until we can figure out what kind of device that person has.

Summer went to the gym after she got back into town, and then I met her and my dad at the aquatic center, where the paramotorist he had been talking to was about to go up in the air. We watched him take off and then make a few loops around the area before heading up north. Then Summer and I headed to Linh’s for dinner. I decided to stop by the shop for some ice along the way, and happened to run into Melissa, who was giving Sandy some moving boxes out of the Transportation office.

I finally made it to dinner where Summer satisfied her craving for an eggroll salad and boba tea, and I had a fresh bánh mì. She wasn’t certain, but she thought she saw her ex, but she didn’t seem too incredibly bothered and the moment passed. We finished up, they started closing the place down, and we headed back home.

I ran back next door for some more iPad training while Summer took a shower, and she was in bed watching TV by the time I got back. She passed out pretty early, and I tried not to stay up too late.

Icy crunch.

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RTFM

It felt like Monday all day after being off yesterday. I never quite shook the feeling of it being the start of a new week, but I’ll appreciate that tomorrow. I had a Jamf call with Gary after a short meeting this morning. We were a small crew, so what was left finally delivered a bunch of computers to the new high school A/V lab. Our call with support was a bit awkward, but the guy finally sent me a link to a proper setup guide that resolved our issue. It was frustrating that it took a week of bouncing messages back and forth, but we were glad to be done with it.

I spent the rest of the day in the office tinkering with different things, because I didn’t want to drive anywhere after hearing my brakes grinding this morning. Summer ordered some new pads for me, and I planned to go to Superfast after work. Thomas took Gary and me to lunch and ended up paying for us, along with cheese dip and possum pie, so that was an awesome surprise.

The afternoon was quiet up until I left. I ran home to change, still expecting to do the brake change myself. Then I watched a video on it, and decided to pay to have it done when I saw what else was involved. Justin, Austin, and Alexis all three came out to knock the job out in about 15 minutes, and then I went to Sonic to get some drinks for them, along with a few extra bucks.

When I got home for the evening, I tinkered with a speaker and microphone bundle I picked up from work several weeks ago and had left in the trunk of my car while it was waiting to have the radiator replaced. I got the wired mic to work, but didn’t have batteries for the wireless one. Summer came over with some Taco Villa for dinner since the girls went to stay with their father. Then she took a shower and went to bed watching Rise of the Guardians while I tinkered on the computer until my own bedtime.

Maybe provide the friggin’ manual next time.

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Frustration = Family

Mitch messaged me just as I climbed into bed last night, so I stayed up until about two in the morning catching up with him. I awoke several hours later and tried to climb out of bed, but had a long-lasting charley horse in my left thigh. I got around for a bit and then watched a couple more episodes of Ms. Marvel, leaving the finale for another day.

I showered and picked Summer up at her house as soon as she got back from Conway, and then we went to Clarksville to meet with Autumn’s therapist. He was a few minutes late arriving back to work, and then left us in the lobby for several more minutes, so we didn’t get back to him until about 15 minutes into our session.

I don’t think either of us had the right expectation for the meeting, and it seemed much more like a touching base than anything else. We certainly didn’t feel like we learned anything, but hopefully our sharing gave him some insight. He showed us a printout on Choice Theory with the Seven Deadly/Caring Habits, and at the bottom was a pixelated clipart picture of a balance scale. I told him that Summer basically nailed all of the caring habits, which meant I had to balance the scales by enforcing all of the deadly habits. I think he saw the irony, but he laughed and told Summer to get me outta there.

I hadn’t eaten all day and made the assumption that we might eat out of town, but instead we had to get home to cook dinner. It was still a little early, so I fought my hangry urges and talked her into running through Walmart with me to look for any deals, and also pick up the peppers we needed for dinner. Unfortunately they didn’t have anything good, but I did finally remember to get Eaddie’s lava lamp bulb.

When we got home, we both started prepping the peppers, potatoes, onions, and kielbasa sausage for a pan-fried dinner. It turned out really great, though the potatoes mushed up in the time it took to prep everything else. Eaddie ate with us since Autumn was at karate, and then Autumn showed up later with some Tropical Smoothie.

While we were in Clarksville, the girls had some house inspectors come by to investigate for animals. Evidently another property had been hiding a dog that caused quite a bit of damage, so this left the girls in a panic to find homes for the cats. This frustrated me deeply, because I was the one to originally let the stray cats run through the house as a joke. After that, no amount of screaming or threats could get them to stop letting the cats in, and they just continued to acquire more and more pet supplies. They refused to listen to any reasoning that they could be evicted, and now the cats would pay the price. I’ve tried to re-home fully-grown cats before, and it rarely works. It’s anybody’s guess what will actually happen now.

Do it for the Graham!

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Marvelous

It felt great being back in the Murano today, but now I have muscle memory for the Montego. We chatted a little bit in the morning, and then all loaded up to go to the middle school and shuffle some TVs around. Josh struggled a bit with directing everyone, but I rode around with Greg to get other things we needed, and we got the job done before lunch.

Summer wanted to meet up for lunch, but I didn’t feel super. I ended up going to Taco John’s with the rest of the crew, but just felt even sicker as soon as we got back. I spent all afternoon at Oakland to finish up the building, but over half of the rooms were still not done.

I came home after work to change, and then went to my parents’ house to wish them a happy anniversary and invite them out for dinner. Mom was too tired to get out though, so I just hung out there for a while and had a little bit of eggplant soup with the hopes that it might make me feel a little better.

When I got back home, I tinkered a bit and then settled down to watch Ms. Marvel. I made it halfway through the, which was a tiny six episodes, and I’ve liked it so far. The style of the show is neat with all of the animations.

I think I may have inadvertently killed a cricket when I was digging around in the bedroom to try and find it. I heard it when I got home first thing in the morning, and then again in another corner of the room while I was watching TV. Hopefully it’s not too gross.

Cosmic!