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Strike First

We got up this morning and had a Wendy’s breakfast before Summer left. I cleaned up after the cat, but couldn’t ever really get him to eat any more. He seemed to bounce back this week, but I’m guessing it won’t last much longer.

When dinner time came around, I headed up to Summer’s and we had some chicken salads. Then she helped me load the deck box into the back of the car so I’d have someplace to store the cushions for the outdoor chairs. I took her car to get some gas and a freebie from Casey’s, and waited for her to get back to my house.

Once she got there and we unloaded the box, she had me make some popcorn. That’s when the power flickered, and my computer’s UPS died. I pulled another one out of the garage and let it charge while we watched Cobra Kai.

It’s the story of a hopeful, young karate enthusiast whose dreams and moxie take him all the way to the All Valley Karate Championship. Of course, sadly, he loses in the final round to that nerd kid. But he learns an important lesson about gracefully accepting defeat.

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Welcome to Back to School

I went by the shop first thing this morning so Ben could help me move a whole truck bed full of parts for the old leased Lenovos to the junior high. We didn’t actually get out of the shop until a while after 9, but the loading of the truck was pretty straightforward. We did get stopped in the hallway by a chatty Karen, but I think we still made good time.

We met up with Jessica and Ronda at the junior high to deliver all the stuff. Then we spent a little time reassuring Jessica again that everything is just awful, and that’s normal. It was okay though, because it was lunch time.

I left Ben at the shop and took a late lunch to get some Burger King for the girls. I dropped Summer’s off at the shop, then went to eat at home where the girls were up in the living room. Autumn was fully into TikTok while Eaddie was very focused on schoolwork. I told Autumn in no uncertain terms that she needed to put more energy into something productive, and that if her grades weren’t good, she would have absolutely nothing to defend herself.

I went back to work and pondered a few things but didn’t get a whole lot closed out. I really wanted to get Autumn’s timesheets done so she could get paid, so that rounded out my day.

I played a little Overwatch at home until Summer got there, then we went to my parents’ house for some leftovers. Eventually we made it back home for a quite night without the girls. Summer spent most of it on the phone, so I read the first chapter of Winnie-the-Pooh. I couldn’t remember the last time I picked up a book. I probably won’t finish this one either.

Tut-tut, it looks like rain!

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The Brown’s Autonomous Zone

CenturyLink’s PRI line was down at the high school and London today, so I was the guy that got to call in the ticket. I’m getting pretty good at navigating that IVR and deciphering the support techs’ accents.

I spent all day, skipping lunch, running around the building and closing tickets. I got a fair amount accomplished, but there’s still so much to go.

After work, the family all met at Brown’s for Dad’s birthday. Mr. Brown seemed more aggravated about the mask mandate than anything, but they had things under control. They were definitely less busy than usual, but that didn’t stop me from eating way too much.

When we got back home, everyone just sat around all night until bed.

Spend 15 minutes with everyone for maximum chance of quarantine!

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The Boys Are Back in Town

For the first time in over a week, I went straight to the high school this morning. My first job was to deliver a box of hotspots they had been screaming about for days. Al said some parent was blowing them up on Facebook about not getting her free internet from the school. I told him to snap back at her that she must have internet if she’s on Facebook. I think he appreciated the irony.

It was overall a pretty relaxing day. I caught up on a few things, but didn’t wear myself out trying to get to everything. I still have plenty of rooms to visit in the near future. Lenovo shipped me three huge boxes of parts, so I ended up taking a late lunch. I just picked up some Burger King to eat at home so I could check on the cat. Autumn was still there, but Summer picked her up before I left for work again.

I went back to the shop in the afternoon just to see some people again. That ended up being an adventure in charging cart deliveries with Ben. Then I wrapped up the day back at the high school.

After work, I went by the house for a little while until Summer got home from work. Then I went up the hill for a dynamite spaghetti dinner that Autumn threw together. Then we played most of a game of Phase 10 before I headed back home.

The cat still seems to be eating pretty steadily, but he’s still really loose. At least he’s enjoying getting outside more, and I’m not going quite as crazy cleaning up after him.

Should I stay or should I go now?

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The Suits

I went to the shop this morning to find that Gary had returned to work. He survived the Coronavirus, and all he got were the dadgum antibodies for that crap, man.

I went straight to hotspots again, and spent literally the entire day doing nothing but that. Bryan was there for a little while asking me things and kind of trying to pawn some of that work off on me, but then even he had to leave to visit with other people for the rest of the day. I soldiered on through the day, stopping only to eat some old, wilted fruit that was left in the fridge. In two separate instances, Mark and then Danny stopped by the office to check in. I think they were there looking for Bryan, but in finding only me, just thanked me for washing my hands.

After work, I had to get the girls to band and karate, and then I stopped by my parents’ house for some leftover shrimp soup. We recapped the Master Plan again, and then I went home to clean more carpet. The girls eventually showed up, and we had to have another heart-to-heart with Autumn about who gets to make the decision on whether she’ll be attending school in-person, and why we were doing so solely to make her miserable.

With step one of the Master Plan underway, it won’t be long before I’ll finally be able to harness their misery and turn it into a magical elixir that will let me defy the effects of aging.

And your little dog, too.

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First Day of “School”

Today was slow to start and slower to finish. I didn’t even bother going to the high school. There was enough randomness to sort through that I just stayed in Melinda’s seat all day. Jason came downstairs to help us out since there wasn’t really anything for him to do pertaining to an auditorium, so I got him going with imaging more laptops. Heather was out running around some more, doing who knows what.

I actually got a little annoyed that Ben went through my work orders and just reassigned a bunch of them to close, because it was all stuff that I had purposefully left open for some sort of action later. Him closing them would serve nothing more than to reduce my numbers on work I had already at least partially done. It didn’t really help with the stress of my work load either, because I’m still having to ignore things that I genuinely want to prioritize.

By the time lunch time had come and gone, Bryan decided he wanted to take a break, so he, Jason, and I all went to Morelos. It was cool getting out with someone new for a change, especially getting to know Jason a little better. He didn’t have much to gripe about, which seemed about right when you actually compare our jobs and our compensation.

After lunch was a bit more scattered for me, and probably not as productive as it could have been. It did put me in a good place to wrap up with hotspots tomorrow though, and then I’ll be left with figuring out how to get around the high school to start closing my own work orders.

I went home to change, but forgot to finish my Lenovo claims during the day, so I had to run back by the shop to get my laptop. Then I grabbed a free cinnamon roll from Casey’s on the way up to Summer’s. I spent most of my time there wrapping up my claims for work. I didn’t really get to spend any quality time with anyone.

On the way home, I had to stop by Walmart for some more cat food. Then it was an early evening to bed.

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The 35 Year Plan

I got up this morning and cooked some sausage and eggs for breakfast. Then I tried to stay at least a little bit productive all day while Summer went to the gym and home to do a bit more cleaning herself. I got a few things picked up and did some more laundry while looking at some real estate listings just to get an idea of what’s out there.

Summer got back in the middle of the afternoon and started looking at some houses too, but it was all just sort of dreaming about the future. I rehashed the multiple stages of my plan with her, and then again with my parents over a shrimp soup dinner. I think it helped get everyone on the same page again, and I think we’re in a good place for steady improvement.

After dinner, we came back to my house so she could collect a few things before going home to the girls. I started my last load of laundry and did a bit of work to prepare for tomorrow. For better or worse, it’s the first day of school, and I’m mostly going it alone. I’ll just have to churn out what I can, and ignore the rest.

The Plan isn’t a step-by-step path to what you wanted today. It’s to maximize the opportunities for you to learn , and be in the right mindset to take advantage of new opportunities as they arise.

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Small Drive

We slept in super late today and got up for lunch at Cici’s. I had another incredible spinach alfredo pizza with all the extra toppings on top. The kids filled up, and we headed back home so they could go ride their bikes for a while. Afterward, Summer took the girls home and Noah to work.

A little while later, my parents brought Nova over to borrow a laptop for college. When I asked about it, it sounded like something that I should be able to fix pretty easily, so they left to retrieve it. I had to remove just under 20 screws to get to it, but determined that the hard drive was bad. Luckily I had a spare to donate, and we got her up and running again.

At some point in all of this, I wandered around outside with the cat for a bit and lubricated my sliding glass door, which helped way more than I thought it would. Then I went next door and did the same for Bác Vân after such a positive result. Split seemed to be quite a bit better, and definitely had more energy than the past few days.

Both girls decided to stay the night with their grandparents, so Summer eventually made it back over by herself. We got sucked into some couple’s YouTube channel where they were building a beautiful A-frame house. I ran to Arby’s for a couple French Dip and Swiss sandwiches, and then it was a pretty late night to bed.

If they can do that in 20 minutes, imagine what we could do in 45!

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Can You Print Me Now?

I woke up about half an hour before my alarm went off and couldn’t fall back asleep because my mind was just racing. I didn’t really know what to expect for the day, but the rest of the week had been pretty awful. Ben wanted me to prioritize hotspots, so I started at the shop doing those. I actually found a bit of a groove and got quite a few done before I had to head to the high school for another call with PaperCut support.

I stopped by Casey’s for a free slice on the way, then made it to the high school with plenty of time to set up for the call. It was a pretty quick call, and the solution was simple enough. I just had to go to the settings for every single network printer in the district to stop rendering devices on the client computer, and disable bidirectional support.

Afterward, I went through and closed all the print-related work orders I had been sitting on. Then I wrapped a couple other things up and headed back to the shop. I had a wild hare to clean out the fridge since everyone had basically been snapped out of existence last week, so I shared pictures of all the gross moldy food, and ate Allen’s peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

The afternoon was frustrating because I had several hotspots that wouldn’t get the enrollment command. I got close to the number of required devices, but at the end of the day I was short. I was almost glad it was sort of a failure, though it really wasn’t.

I headed on home and started cleaning up house before everyone got home. The girls went out to eat with their father, so Summer brought Zalads from Zaxby’s for us. The girls arrived with Noah after he got off work, and they sat around while he ate. Then we eventually played some Cards Against Humanity, because we are bad parents.

Finally, another win for the week – Split actually ate nearly a whole can of cat food. Classic pate. He’s never really loved that stuff, so this is the first one I’ve even tried. Who knows if he’ll like it tomorrow, but hopefully this will help.

Technically, it does cover your face.

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Michael and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Today was easily the roughest day I’ve ever had at a job. My hair dryer blew up on me yesterday, so I went to the high school with wet hair to try and work on as much as I could possibly accomplish. It wasn’t long before I was sent to the shop to help Bedo with hotspots. All the while, I had people begging me to tend to their problems. Nothing was working. Everything was broken. I was the only person that could fix any of it.

I tried to pick at a couple of my oldest work orders just to accomplish anything at all, but I’m sure that just made others even more upset with me for not picking their issues. I just couldn’t win with anyone. Even Luke got my number and had to text me, on top of an email he already sent me, on top of the work orders I had already received, on top of the in-person harassment I’d already received.

The hotspots weren’t cooperating either, and any time I got into anything at the shop, I’d get called away by someone else needing something. It truly felt like I was just the sole face of the department. When I finally felt like I had a win helping Bryan with something, even my own team aggressively shot me down with hostility.

I finally left, late again, and utterly defeated. The girls had activities, so I had to pick them up. Autumn went to band, and Eaddie went to karate. Then I had to pick Eaddie up because Summer’s work meeting ran late.

The girls were going to stay the night, but ended up going home instead. I drank my dinner and cleaned more carpet. Zero wins today.

I think I’ll move to Australia.