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They See Me Rollin

It was the last day of testing, and the most exciting issue to come up was a kid trolling with a picture of Donald Trump set for his lock screen in the computer lab. I didn’t have any real legitimate issues come up, save for one computer that had to be re-imaged. The junior high really is pretty self-maintained now with those counselors.

Allen wanted KFC for lunch, so I met him there in the drizzling rain. I started to get a chicken pot pie, but talked myself into a buffet when I saw they had something similar on the bar, but with biscuits instead of crust. It wasn’t quite as good as a pot pie, but it was tasty. The real problem is the overeating though. I just get so excited about the variety.

After lunch, I finally got registered for my 3-day HSTI conference. Evidently Ben and Ryan never actually got a confirmation email letting them know they were presenting, so I guess it’s good that I’m preparing early. At least Ben said I was the go-getter on his team, which is something I don’t think has ever been said about me. I still feel disorganized as hell, but it’s been a fun ride so far, and confidence is only improving. Tomorrow sometime, I should be talking to Rachel about esports, which is almost like talking to administration.

I ended the day at the junior high so I could take the girls to my parents’ house. Summer picked up Noah after the gym and met us there, and Mom made spring rolls with some pork loin that Dad smoked. Everyone really liked it, and Autumn appreciated that I swiped a leftover cheese pizza from work for her. I appreciated that she begrudgingly tried a bite of spring roll between slices.

When I got home, I spent a while trying to get Grey to eat anything. Eventually she licked at the food a little bit, but still not enough. She feels so bony, and just wanted to lay in bed with me. Exhausted, I was happy to oblige.

Ampersand

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Bos Ludus

We’re halfway through testing today, and I spent the morning cleaning up a bit more between working on a couple laptops. I kept missing my bell breaks to get into classrooms, but testing has made it so relaxing that I didn’t really fret at all. I met Dale, Allen, and Zach at Taco John’s for a cheap lunch before going back to the shop for a bit.

I ended the day at the junior high with another esports practice. It was pretty quiet, as everyone jumped into public games to level up their accounts. I took the time to mess with our Discord a bit more, and finally cleaned up the #welcome channel to more clearly funnel new members into their proper roles. One of the kids was a little late getting picked up, but eventually I made it to Brown’s Catfish for my birthday dinner with the family. The girls went to Karate, but Summer came along and we stuffed ourselves with too many fish.

Back home, I got to build out a custom team category in Discord, so we can finally see how that works out for my players. I’m a little anxious to see if my proposed “Discord for Esports” session that I submitted this morning gets accepted for HSTI. In either case, Ben’s letting me go for three whole days just for submitting it. I’m not sure anyone else cares to go because they’re too shy to submit their own breakout sessions, but I won’t turn down a $40 per diem for dinner, and I hear the Embassy has a free bar.

How’s Google going to go down on the birthday of the internet???

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Double Down Loaded

The junior high started testing this morning, so I took that time to start cleaning out my office. I got some white space on my desk, which felt really good. Then I got some tech tubs over to the graveyard for storage, which freed up some floor space. I met Allen at New China for lunch, and he brought along a surprise Gary with him. I had to pregame for my birthday dinner at Brown’s Catfish tomorrow.

After lunch, I ran by Oakland for just a bit, then spent the rest of the afternoon at the junior high working on a few things. I ended the day working late to get Sandy’s lab ready for my first esports expansion. I kind of hope I have even more kids there this time, but a part of me thinks we won’t completely fill up the first lab tomorrow. I’ve done zero advertising for this week, so at this point I’m kind of just finding out whether these kids have this programmed into them automatically for weekly meets. I still need to meet with Al at the high school to see about gauging interest, and hopefully finding some help for coaching.

When I got home, I tried to get Grey to eat a little something, but neither of them really love the new can of food I opened. I did get her to eat a bunch of treats, but as soon as I put them near her wet food, she ignores it all. I should probably just give up on her fattening up, but she’s been so sweet.

The girls had leftovers for dinner, so I came up to join them. I finally got some of the spaghetti Summer made while I was sick. Then I played some Breath of the Wild until the girls went to bed. Summer and I finished the evening with a couple episodes of Parks and Recreation until she wanted to pass out.

We’re taking back HSTI!

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No Spring in This Step

I woke myself up this morning with a cough, and decided to just stay up so I wouldn’t have trouble sleeping tonight. I didn’t feel it until much later, but only having a couple hours of sleep really sapped me.

Autumn beat us all up and was watching Criminal Minds when I got out of bed. Summer got up and around just a little bit later, and then she had to drag Eaddie out of bed in order to get them all home. I had a bit of a stomach ache that kept me from being too active, but I did get my bills paid, and I arranged a meeting for Clint to taxi some fish from Fayetteville for me.

Summer came and got me after she finished at the gym, and we went to Walmart to get dinner. We ran into Bác Vân and Doug there and only stopped for a moment in the busy aisle before we were off. I tried finding some more wet food for Grey, but she’s so picky that I even got a bag of treats to see if she would eat those.

Back at Summer’s, she fried up some veggies that Tammy brought me to go along with some grilled cheese brats and corn. The girls had a bit of trouble getting along, but also suffered from their own negativity or inability to focus. It’s tough to discipline them at this age because they’ve already grown into habits and personalities. Conversations work sometimes, but I feel like I really missed out on the belt phase of the child rearing.

I tried having some fun with New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, which is frankly just a stupid and ridiculous name for anything. I don’t think anyone was prepared for the amount of cooperation that was needed, and the fact that the whole screen froze when someone took damage made it that much more difficult to control things. Eaddie was eventually sent to bed for having an attitude, and after finishing the second level, Autumn left Summer and me to watch a couple episodes of Parks and Recreation.

I started falling asleep in Summer’s lap, and headed home to try and feed Grey one more time. She ate the treats, but not much of the gravy. She doesn’t act sick, but she’s just a fuzzy skeleton at this point. It won’t be much longer.

SUPERHACKER

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Captain Overpowered

I got up this morning and came home through the drizzle to take care of the pets and clean up while the others got ready at home. Then I picked them up to go to Conway for the day. We made it to Old Chicago for lunch, which was a treat. Not only did I have a birthday discount, but they accidentally made the kids’ pizza on the wrong crust, so they gave us the extra wrong pizza for free. There weren’t any complaints about it, and I even had a slice myself that was delicious. They had some pretty good looking brunch menu items that I wouldn’t mind coming back to try. I even got a free ice cream with some cookie dough bits and a cherry on top.

Stuffed to our ears, we loaded up and headed to Sam’s to look around. I had a $45 credit from my promotional signup that I used to stock up on a bunch of bulk meds, and then I grabbed a bag in a box of Coca-Cola on the way out. After doing the math, 2-liters of Coke on sale are quite a bit cheaper than the syrup from Sam’s, but I wanted to try it out at least once with the SodaStream to see how I like making diluted, super-fizzy drinks. The kids got restless and ended up waiting for us in the deli area, where I also ran into a pair of my esports parents. They said they were really excited about it getting their kid out of the house, which is a phrase I literally never would have associated with video games. But it’s 2019 and esports are genuine high school athletic sports, you can pick your own gender, Donald Trump is the president of the United States of America, and I am a coach in a public school district.

We had time for two more quick stops before the movie. First it was Books-A-Million, and then it was Five Below. I had to cut it short at the last stop because I wanted to make sure we could make it all the way across town without incident. We had a little time to spare, but I also didn’t feel like we were really missing anything for it. The parking lot was super full, but it didn’t seem like the theater was as packed as I’ve seen it in the past. There were still plenty of open seats around the ends of the aisles. Autumn wanted a collector’s drink cup and tin of popcorn, and the girl at the register told us she could make it a combo with a shirt for the same price, which was pretty awesome.

Noah was the most upset at the movie’s faults. I didn’t love that they broke the Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division gag, and it was weird that Fury called it SHIELD right off the bat when he met Vers. I was also a little fuzzy on the timeline for the tesseract, but some Googling after we got home made me feel a little better about it. Most notably though, the character is unapologetically overpowered. I agree with critics, and think that flying through enemy spaceships to destroy them was a bit too easy.

When we got back to town, I dropped Noah off at home, and the rest of us came back to my place to watch Man of Steel after talking about how bad Justice League was. I guess we just needed to crack the DC universe. At least I really liked this first entry. Autumn passed out before we even got started, but the other two seemed to like it alright.

Did my washing machine just travel through time?

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Down with the Sickness

There weren’t a whole lot of projects to do today. It was Jason’s first Friday back, and he was still on half days because he gets “tired” after a while since he “got sick.” It was pretty clear that some of us were pretty full of the crap we get from some of the people there. In the words of Allen, “it don’t confront me none.” I went on about my morning at the junior high until lunch.

I called for Firehouse since I had a free sub. I pulled up just before a busload of softball girls, but fortunately my order was already made because I ordered online. Brice beat me there but didn’t get his food ordered quite as early as I did. Allen met us there but then walked to New China after he saw the line of girls.

After lunch, Allen, Gary, and I mostly chatted at the shop until it was time for us to hang a touch panel at the high school. Allen remembered seeing some styli on the box, and sure enough there was a pouch of a bunch of them taped to the outside of one of the touch panels. They were a little silly looking, being made of only wood that was just a tad thinner than a pencil. I would have expected more at that price. These didn’t have an embedded magnet or anything, because they were made of one seamless piece of wood.

After work, I went home and killed a little time cleaning up before picking Noah up and heading to Summer’s for the evening. She picked up Taco Bell for everyone, and then I played a bit of Zelda until we settled in for some Parks and Rec before bed.

Soda math is annoying.

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A Steakhouse by Any Other Name

My voice came back just a little bit today, but it was still a bit of a struggle. By the end of the day I could at the very least speak out loud consistently, but the tickling cough is here. It was actually a pretty slow day, so I spent most of my time messing with Rocket League trying to make sure it would run for the kids in the lab.

Gary, Zach, and I went to Colton’s for lunch because I had a BOGO birthday coupon. Allen was going to meet us there, but somehow drove himself to Brangus and sat at a table for four by himself, and had food ordered before Gary called him to ask where he was. We really do wonder sometimes how he functions at all. I’m betting his service was much faster than ours though, as we couldn’t make it back to work on time. I even boxed some of my food up, and we still couldn’t make it.

After work, I stayed late to help Jullie with a new laptop she thought she messed up. It really didn’t end up being much, so I told her 20 bucks would cover the time to help her get Office installed.

Once home, I spent some time in frustration trying to get a Sam’s Club membership going. I was going to share with my parents, but Julie said she already had a membership for them all. It would have been nice to be a part of that conversation originally, but instead she fussed about dealing with family being a headache she’d rather avoid. I feel like she’s usually the least common denominator there, but whatever. I finally got mine done, and shared with Clint, because he’s a pal.

We should make him drive himself every time just to see what percentage of the time he shows up at the correct place!

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Above the Fold

My voice was still gone today after losing it last night, and it never really got any better all day. I had to run to the high school to pick up something from Dale’s office, and Al caught me in the parking lot to ask for some personal PC care. I offered to come by his place since he’s not far from my parents’ house for a measly 20 bucks, which he giddily accepted. Then he mentioned that the esports article had already hit today’s paper. I ran into Karen as I made my way inside, and she made a comment about me being a celebrity, so I stopped by the library to take a look at the paper there. She let me keep a copy, and I made my way back through Oakland and then to the shop to show everyone.

Jason was finally back to work, at least for a half day. He seemed much softer spoken than before. I didn’t notice the weight loss the way Gary had, but hopefully it helps him kickstart the changes he needs to make in his life anyway.

When I finally got to the junior high, Ronda and Jessica called me down to give me a collage they made of the newspaper clippings. Jessica even designed a gamer cow clipart, complete with a little cow patty. It didn’t stop there, though. After a quick lunch at McAlister’s with Zach, Gary, and Heather, I came back to a shirt with “DIRECTOR COW” on the left breast, and “CYCLONE ESPORTS” on the back. It was really all a bit much right off the bat, but I was excited that they were happy.

I finished up the day by wrapping up a bunch of work orders, and even took Autumn with me to Oakland to do a couple before picking up Noah. From there we met Summer at CiCi’s for dinner. We ran into Karen again while we ate, and eventually I headed home for the evening where I did anything I could to clear my congestion before going to bed early.

I don’t know anybody that’s ever been in the paper and said afterwards, “yeah, I said that!”

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The Interview of a Lifetime

I woke up this morning congested with all kinds of crud, but felt just barely well enough to get home and showered before work. I went to the shop to call Rachel so she could coach me for my interview with Travis at The Courier. We joke about it a lot at work, but it was kind of funny to hear someone actually tell me in an official capacity that my role was to promote the district and myself as the esports coach. Obviously we’re selling something here, but some of our guys give it such negative light because it seems like it’s the same few people parading about as though they have some idea what’s going on, and those are the ones that always seem to get paid the most while the hard-at-work get whatever pickings are left.

I had only just made it to the junior high when Ben said we could meet up with Johnny. I did a quick work order, and then went to meet them. As if it was to be a day of only poor timing, I no sooner shook Johnny’s hand than Ben asked me to drive across campus to pick him up. We eventually got settled in, and Johnny had a lot more to say and lead the conversation than I expected. I actually didn’t even really break out the list of questions I had been curating, particularly after he got to the point where he said classified staff likely wouldn’t be payable in a coaching role. There are loopholes that we may be able to jump through, and different things that may be possible to offset my time out, but it seems like things are going to have to change quite a bit before what actually happens aligns with that which is right.

We wrapped that meeting up with just barely enough time for me to make my way to The Courier, where I met up with Travis, who I hadn’t seen in a decade. He was relatively cold, direct, and straight to the point, but relatively professional given our history. I still don’t quite know his angle on the story after trying to answer the questions he had for me, but I’ll have to trust that he’ll continue the “good relationship” Rachel spoke to me about earlier in the day. When it was all said and done, Joshua took my headshot and walked me out.

From there, I went to a late lunch. Solo, melancholy, free grand slam at Denny’s, as years and years past. I think it was good after a bit of a nerve racking few days. Nobody else from the team even mentioned lunch.

The afternoon flew by pretty quickly, and I found myself rushing to get back to the junior high for esports practice. Kids poured in like never before, and I ended up with one more student than computers. I’m not sure where they went, but at some point it evened out. I don’t know if maybe someone’s parents showed up, or what. I’m not even sure how responsible I am for that at this very volunteer point in time. Gary stopped by for a while and was impressed. Then Joshua showed up to take some pictures. Our conversation went much better than the first time. I think Gary helped, as he is wont to do. The highlight of the entire day was talking to a father of a student, and hearing him say, “no son of mine is going to be a filthy casual!”

Validation to my ears!

That wrapped up my work day, so I went home to do what little housekeeping I could muster, then ran the birthday freebie gauntlet all the way to Summer’s. Three free sandwiches with the purchase of two drinks. Not too shabby.

Esports! Will It Turn Your Teenager into a Mass Murderer? Click here to read more!

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Convenient Recovery

I woke up yesterday morning with a scratch in my throat that only meant one thing. I went down for the whole day with fever and aches. We went to Summer’s before lunch and cleaned up some leftover pork chops, but she brought it to me in bed as I spiraled downhill.

I couldn’t ever really sleep, and didn’t want to, so I never donned my CPAP as she went about her day. She cleaned house and eventually went to an Eagle Scout ceremony for a past student, and to take the girls something. She came back with some egg drop soup from Linh, which along with a healthy handful of black pepper, helped me feel better for a bit. I think I ate too much though, and eventually felt a little sick to the stomach when I finally tried to go to sleep.

She girls eventually made it home and milled around finishing chores before bed while I passed out. At some point, I woke up and fetched Summer from the couch.

This morning, I arose to my hour-early alarm with relative ease. I coughed up a bit of the darkness, and then headed home without too much trouble. I met Ben at 7 to make our way to Arch Ford for the ARKSTE conference. I didn’t feel too bad, and I think the DayQuil helped. The drive did feel like it took a super long time, but it really could have just been me experiencing that drive at the speed limit.

We got there just a couple minutes before they unlocked the doors, then made our way in. I saw some familiar faces from other conferences, and had a little better time putting them to locations. Things kicked off a bit late, which seemed to set the tone for the rest of the day.

My first breakout session was a bust. There was literally nobody there to teach the class. Shane came in, said it was “Powered by Howard,” and then told us to talk amongst ourselves. I left and had a donut, eventually meeting up with Ben for a minute before splitting off to an 8-bit computer session. I was a bit late, but I didn’t seem to miss a whole lot. It was a neat project though, for at least a couple of kids.

Lunch was late. David’s Burgers flipped the date or something, so we were told it would be a few more minutes. We continued through an awards ceremony, and ultimately to our next sessions while food was promised in the vendor area. The session I attended was no more helpful than the others, but did seem useful for the teacher that spoke at my previous one, so at least one of the four of us in the room got something out of it. I eventually made it in to a Minecraft session lead by some hippie from DC that didn’t seem to have much of a clue about anything other than the pH of the water he was drinking. It wasn’t wholly unentertaining though, as we broke into conversation a couple times for the laffs.

Neither Ben nor I won anything at the closing raffle, so we made our way back home with handfuls of leftover burgers. I chatted with Gary for a bit until quitting time, and then went home for a bit. I started to feel pretty bad almost immediately, so I didn’t really get any of the cleaning done that I wanted. Instead, I gathered myself and headed to Summer’s for the evening and crawled into bed.

I started to feel better after laying in bed for a while, but this fever just keeps coming and going. I guess we’ll see what happens tomorrow.

Maybe I’ll die from it all.