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Exhausted, Smelly Teenagers

I didn’t sleep great last night on account of the awkwardness of sharing a hotel room with awkward teens. Eaddie didn’t help either, since she immediately crashed on the couch in the opposite room. I woke up well before my alarm and took a shower. Then when Summer got out of bed, we went downstairs for a pretty good breakfast.

I couldn’t convince a single other person to take a shower, which was kind of my main reason for stopping to get a hotel in the first place. If I hadn’t started to get super dizzy the night before, I might have tried to drive straight through. In any case, we loaded everyone up and headed toward Memphis after a quick stop at a Supercharger just outside of Nashville.

Eaddie had been talking about how she wanted to visit an Ikea, so we went there for lunch. Summer was a little cranky, and the girls mostly wandered around looking at the showrooms by themselves. This was the first Ikea I’d seen that didn’t exist on multiple floors, but it was still a maze to get back to the restaurant. Everyone except Eaddie had a big plate of meatballs. Eaddie ate old, dried out salmon. We spent way more money feeding and taking care of the other kids than I expected, but I wasn’t sure if Summer had a plan for that.

It started to storm really hard while we were eating, so we waited that out before going across town to the same Supercharger we started at on our trip toward D.C. The charge didn’t take very long, so everyone just sat in the car, and then Summer drove us to Brinkley for another charge.

By that time, I had been drinking enough that I was having to stop relatively urgently to find a restroom while we charged. This time, I found myself in the back of a grocery store. Luckily it didn’t take long for us to get enough juice to make the last leg of the trip. We got back to town and stopped at Superfast so Summer could get the Murano home. They left me with the other two, so I took them home before making it up to Summer’s.

It was a pretty quick and quiet night for everyone after that. I watered the plants and stayed up late updating my résumé and dawdling for a while. Hopefully I can sleep in tomorrow to catch up.

Pay closer attention and be more cognizant.

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C U L 8 R D C

I wanted to sleep in this morning, but Summer really wanted to get to the dorm to pick up the girls’ stuff at 7:30. We got everything loaded up and we made it there a little later than that, but still with plenty of time. The girls decided they wanted to go to a “parade” of all the participants, but not the awards ceremony, so we picked up a couple of them and dropped them off at the arena. Then Summer and I went upstairs and actually had to find them in the bleachers anyway. The groups were all separated out, but then were called down to the floor where they swirled around in a chaotic mix of way too many teenagers.

After that, we went back to the dorm to check them out, and we were on our way. Traffic was terrible, but luckily our first stop wasn’t very far away. We topped off while we ate at a place called Oriental Café. The food was decent, and the lady that served us was super nice. I actually didn’t love my General Tso because it was too sour and not hot enough, but at least it seemed fresh. The car kept charging past our set charge point, so we went down a couple doors of the shopping center and the girls got ice cream and cookies before we left.

Our next stop was a charger behind a hotel where we encountered several others charging as well. Then we were on to another charger that appeared to be kind of alone with nothing much around. Across the interstate was a Buc-ee’s that I wanted to visit, but it wasn’t until after we finished charging that we realized there was another set of Superchargers in the same parking lot. I started getting super dizzy and my head felt like I was drunk, but we went inside and it was astounding. Especially for being so late, it was very much alive inside. We picked up a few things, I cleaned the windshield, the girls ate popsicles, and Summer drove us to our stop at a Comfort Inn.

I was pretty disappointed to learn that the charger was networked at roughly the same price as a supercharger. For the cost of the hotel, it could have easily been free. I plugged in and just left it not charging out of spite. The girls had already gone up to the room, so I came up and tried to quietly finish up and get to bed as quickly as I could.

This is why I wanted to power through.

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Air and Space Between

I got up early to meet the girls this morning, but didn’t wake Summer up in time to get us both across town. We ended up just meeting the girls at the Museum of American History. I found an exchange that would get us a little closer to the museum, hoping that we could intercept them, but we missed our first train and then exited the station in a rainstorm.

There were a few exhibits I liked, particularly about electricity and engineering, and then travel. I could have passed on most of the rest of it. I had been pretty frustrated for a large part of the morning, so I wandered off by myself with ever-aching legs and feet for a while. We eventually met back up with everyone to have lunch in the cafeteria. The girls had sack lunches for the first time, and Summer and I had some cafeteria food for $17 per pound. I was disappointed when I realized that Summer had accidentally thrown away my cup lid when she took my tray at the end of our meal, but she went back and dug through the trash to find it.

From there, we walked back to the Air and Space Museum, which was much more my speed. About half of it was under construction, but I enjoyed that visit the most. We even took in a couple planetarium shows. We ended up closing the place down, and then walked back to the Metro for the trip back to College Park.

Summer and I left the girls to find their way back to the dorm again, while we headed to the hotel. I was a little hungry, so we tried going to Ikea for some meatballs. They were all out at the mini deli downstairs, so I made Summer walk with me through the rest of the store. There was a full restaurant upstairs, but they had closed an hour early for some maintenance. We ended up picking up some Potbelly from the little shopping center next door, and took it back to the hotel to eat.

I tried to get to bed early since Summer wasn’t going to let me sleep in as I had hoped. We’ll start our journey tomorrow with a low level of sleep, so it may be very optimistic to hope that we’ll make it halfway home.

Now everyone’s tired and cranky. I just had a head start.

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End of the Line

We slept in today, and then got out for lunch at a place down the road called Taqueria Habanero. The tacos seemed pretty expensive, but I sort of miscalculated the price when I suggested we share a platter of 15 assorted tacos. They didn’t go to waste, though. It was annoying that they basically brought us a salsa bowl full of chips, but more would cost extra. The green and red sauces they brought out were amazing though. We had steak, shrimp, and al pastor tacos, which were all incredible as well. We ended up saving one of each for Eaddie, though she wouldn’t have time to eat them until much later.

After we ate, we went to the university and struggled to find any valid parking. After driving around the campus a couple times, we finally settled on a lot that was actually right next to another bus stop, which worked out great for us. We actually got on the bus before it got to the stop where the girls were waiting.

We hopped onto the Metro and rode down to Chinatown so we could tour Ford’s Theater. That took quite a while just because of how much information they packed into such a small space with so many visitors. It was neat to see the theater itself, but evidently it was all a reconstruction anyway.

After that, we walked back to the National Portrait Gallery. I don’t think it was first on anybody’s list, but the girls wanted to go. It wasn’t my thing, so Summer and I mostly sped through a bit of it and then sat down until everyone else was ready to go.

When we got back to the Metro, it was right in the middle of rush hour and the first train we saw was absolutely packed. We walked to the end of the platform and waited for the next one, which was virtually empty. As we drew close to our stop, I wanted to see if I could ride around whatever loop they had at the end. The girls all decided they would go with me, but then instead of waiting on the train, everyone got off at the last stop, insisting that someone would make us get off. There wasn’t an employee anywhere to be found, so I was really frustrated that the whole point of the experiment was ruined. Then they were annoyed at me for something they volunteered to do.

We took the bus back to the car, and then Summer and I went to the most convenient Chinese buffet I could find, literally called China Buffet. It was a small, unassuming building with fair reviews. It seemed old when we walked in, and then they had us pay when we entered. I had to ask a kid that didn’t seem to speak any English whether drinks were included, and learned that we had to serve ourselves. This would have been absolutely fine if there hadn’t been a hand-written sign on the wall on the way out that asked us to “please tip the waitresses.” We literally spoke to no one. No one brought us anything. Someone periodically bussed empty plates, but not with any sense of urgency. Utensils and napkins were all on the food bar. I think I left four bucks. The food was alright.

When we got back to the hotel, we were lucky enough to be able to charge. Then we made it to the room, where the engineers had brought us an extension cord and surge protector for the things on our TV wall. Summer was excited to be able to watch television. I bounced around a bit between distractions and trying to plan our trip home. I scheduled a third interview at the mill for next week, which made me wonder if there was any competition at all, or if I had it in the bag. I’d kind of hate to leave Two Rivers, but I don’t know how I could turn down nearly twice the pay, especially if the school doesn’t transfer the vacation days like I expected.

That’s what “homesick” means, kid.

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Monumental Walk

I woke up super early today so we could go downstairs for breakfast. Summer had to wait a bit after taking her medication, so that set us behind a little bit. We still ended up waiting in the lobby for the restaurant to open. Once it finally did, several minutes late, we learned that breakfast wasn’t actually included in our stay. It didn’t look any better than what we had the prior morning, so we opted to save our $15 per head and just find something else later.

We met the girls at the dorm and contemplated driving everyone down to the metro station in the trunk. It was simply too many people though, and as luck would have it, there was a shuttle that would take us across the campus anyway. Summer went in to get a parking pass, and then we took the shuttle to the bus station, which took us to the metro station.

The metro was pretty neat, and I think it was my first real encounter with big city public transportation. I thought Disney World did it better, but overall it wasn’t bad. The worst part was actually just the fact that we couldn’t hear the overhead speaker at all. It was pure static, if anything at all. The stops weren’t advertised inside of the train either, so you had to look at the poles outside for every stop.

We got off at the Archives station, and evidently my metro card recharge didn’t work and I had to take the emergency exit out without paying. Once we emerged from the train station, we started walking for the rest of the day. I mostly hung back with the grandmother of one of the girls that came along. Summer went ahead with the rest of the girls. They went off our path to see the Smithsonian Castle. Then we went to the Washington Monument, followed by the World War II Monument, and then finally down the length of the Reflecting Pool to the Lincoln Monument. I was most surprised by the tiny gift shop inside of the monument itself. It just seemed out of place, and very much like a Disney ride.

I got everyone to go down a sketchy elevator to see the downstairs area of the Monument, and then we continued walking around through the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and made a huge loop around the White House. The Secret Service was out and about, and everything seemed pretty closed off, but the girls got a few pictures before we wandered toward a Potbelly sandwich shop for lunch. I thought my sandwich was okay, but it was still just a sandwich.

After we ate, we continued walking until we got to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. We spent several hours there, getting lost in nearly every exhibit. Some were way better than others, and I grew tired of looking at things that still existed today, like the skeletons of non-extinct animals.

As the evening came, we had to get the girls back to the cafeteria for their dinner. Both Summer’s and my phones died while we were on the train, so we had to exit through the emergency exit again. Then we got off at the wrong bus stop and had to walk up a big hill to get to the cafeteria. Summer and I went even farther to her car, where she had gotten an $85 parking ticket because nobody told her what lots were available to us.

We made it back to our hotel, where housekeeping cleaned up a little bit, but left the empty drug bags. We had new towels and a made bed, but the power on the TV wall was still out. I tried calling the front desk, but again nothing was done. Summer was hungry enough to eat again, so we went to a West African place called Koité Grill. They ended up not having dine-in service, so we took that back to the hotel and ate. Then Summer went to bed, and I stayed up late with a bit of a belly ache.

Should have gone with the dirtier shoes.

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I’m Not High, but I Did Stay at a Holiday Inn Express

Summer and I got up for breakfast this morning, which was pretty much the bare minimum for “hot” hotel breakfast. Then I showered while the girls went downstairs to find some food for themselves. We loaded up, and Summer took the first half of the drive. The girls slept some more, and even I started to doze off quite a bit. We stopped to charge one last time in Strasburg and shared a couple Junior Whoppers next door.

I took the final leg of the trip and had to sit through a bunch of stop-and-go traffic to get into Washington. We made it to the University of Maryland without incident, so I guess the trip has been a success so far. I dropped the girls off at the Student Union building to register while I parked. Luckily there were a couple chargers just across the street, so I parked there and went inside to find them.

Once they were registered, the girls were ready to go back to their dorm. They walked while Summer and I drove their luggage over. We ran into their other partner and her grandmother on the way, so after they registered, we went back to get them back to the dorm as well.

We ended up sticking around in the dorm longer than I wanted. Summer stumbled through the Metro Pass process and probably ended up spending about four times as much money as she needed to before I looked at any of it. I finally talked her into leaving the girls alone to decompress, and we headed across town to find our own hotel.

There was a mob of angry patrons in the lobby, and the staff were clearly frustrated, but handling the situation with absolute grace. When it was finally our turn, I told our girl that she was doing a great job, and Summer ended up going around the counter to give her a hug. We got checked in super quickly and then went around the building to find our room. We took everything up, but then found an ozone generator in our room, with the door ajar. I decided I really didn’t want to leave our stuff there, so we took it all back down to the car and went around the block to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner.

The restaurant was actually pretty busy, and the food was good. They still didn’t give me any celery or carrots, which I never understood. After we ate, we went back to the hotel and found a couple EV chargers. One was broken, and the other was in use. We made our way back up to the room instead, and unloaded before heading back to the university for the opening ceremony.

Traffic by then was horrible on campus. There were so many people, and the volunteers that were directing traffic seemed to be a little slow in that special kind of way. We made it back up the parking garage to charge though, and then walked down to the McKeldin Mall for the ceremony. Nobody was more disappointed by the use of the word “mall” than me. The “ceremony” was a relatively long and boring “thank you to all of these highly important people,” followed by a roll call of all 50 states and some international participants. They ended the ceremony with a parody of a One Direction song I had found the lyrics to earlier in the day.

Summer and I left for the evening and headed back to the hotel. We got settled in, but then the TV wouldn’t work and we had to call the front desk. They sent an “engineer” up to inspect, and he brought a little non-contact voltage tester that beeped at every outlet. In the end, still nothing worked, so he walked the mini fridge to the other side of the room to a working outlet. In his rummaging, we moved the TV and found a couple empty drug baggies under the stand. Several things about our room felt extremely sketchy, but at least our check-in clerk was nice.

I never thought I’d complain about being too cold in a hotel room.

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Drive All Day, Sleep No Way

I got to bed really late last night, slept super hard, and then crawled out of bed really early this morning to finish loading up for our trip. I was surprised that we ended up waiting about an hour and a half for Genesis to meet us at Superfast, where we left the Murano in an unused shop bay. She was supposed to be at Summer’s house at seven, but we didn’t leave town until about 8:30.

We hit the road, but then stopped early in Conway so we could wash Summer’s car. I used all of their fancy, foaming chemicals since she had a key to bypass the payment system. The Model Y had never looked so clean, even when it rolled off of the assembly line. We made our way out of the state, skipping the charger in Brinkley, and making it all the way to Memphis to stop and eat.

We had quite a bit of range anxiety since the arrival percentage just kept rapidly dropping, but we made it. The Supercharger was on the outskirts of a parking lot, and then we walked to a place called Kami Ramen Bar for lunch. The food was awesome, and the service was fast, straightforward, and friendly.

Our next stop was Nashville, where we walked through Target while we waited. When we left, I had Summer stop at Sonic so I could get a drink. What I got ended up being mostly ice cream though, so I stayed thirsty the rest of the day.

Our next stop was in Knoxville for dinner. We charged to 100% while we ate at Blaze Pizza. I wasn’t at all impressed with what Summer ordered, so I ordered another custom pizza online and ate that instead.
We powered on through the night, stopping one last time in Atkins at a Supercharger that happened to be in the parking lot of a Comfort Inn. Then Summer finished the last leg of the trip to get us into Roanoke for the night.

When we pulled up to the Best Western, two of the EV spots were ICEd out, with one of those vehicles being an SUV with handicapped tags parked over the line, nearly blocking the last available spot. I contemplated parking behind those two cars and running the charger out to ours, but I didn’t want to risk retaliation. Instead, we risked parking too close to a handicapped beater vehicle with the wheel cocked right into our car. I took pictures of the license plate and handicapped tag just in case we found their paint on our car the next morning.

As we got into the hotel, we were assaulted by a variety of smells that I attributed to body odor and weed. Luckily the room didn’t smell awful, and I was able to drop the temperature way down before we made it to bed. Genesis was the first into the shower, followed by Eaddie. I wrapped up my chores, and then it was off to bed for me.

I would get a ticket for parking in a handicapped spot, so why wouldn’t they get a ticket for parking in an EV spot?

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Sent Packing

Summer had to work a long day today. I slept in a little bit, but had to get home to do some laundry for our trip. Eaddie slept a couple hours later than I wanted her to, but it sprinkled on and off, so she had to mow in the dry periods. I cleaned up a bunch of leftovers, and once she finished the yard, I headed home.

The day went by relatively quickly. I got my laundry done and took a shower, but then I had to take Eaddie to Pasta Grill to meet some band friends to celebrate Kim’s retirement. I circled around to my parents’ house from there so I could visit before our trip. I ended up having dinner there, and Dad showed me the landscaping they had done.

I left their house to pick up Eaddie, but she decided she wanted to go to the movies instead. I went home and got caught up in deciding which vehicle to take to D.C. The Murano would be really straightforward, but I kept thinking the Autopilot on the Model Y would make the drive so much less exhausting. We’d have to stop a little more frequently and for longer, but driving for three hours at a time seemed like long enough for me anyway.

Summer stopped by after she finally got home from work, and I cleared up some confusion about the hotel. I couldn’t figure out how she booked the one she did, but it was twice the distance from the University of Maryland as the one that was actually advertised on the National History Day website. I booked the correct hotel and cancelled her reservation, and then we went outside to compare vehicles.

She went on home, but then I followed because Eaddie was on the way home from the movies. We needed to make sure her project would fit in the trunk, and it did, so we loaded it up and then I headed back home to charge and pack.

I didn’t get to bed until a couple hours later than I wanted, but I felt fairly confident that I had packed everything I should need for such a long trip. In reality, I was sure that I still overpacked, but travel makes me highly anxious.

It’s easier to unpack and repack than to do the Tesla Shuffle.

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Finding Priorities

I wasn’t quite as tired this morning as yesterday, but it was still rough getting out of bed. I even woke up a couple minutes before my alarm, but I was still just exhausted. I made it to work a little earlier today, and had my leftover croissant for breakfast along with a McCoffee I picked up on the way. Kim showed up and quietly did her own thing most of the day.

I had a couple people come in for some new RFID fobs for door access, and then I just grasped at random things throughout the rest of the day. At one point, Kim and I went to the elementary to get the last two iPads into my inventory spreadsheet, and near the end of the day she collected some touch panel serial numbers from the high school. Nicky was on the hunt for a bunch of asset tags, so I spent a while trying to figure out the tag printer.

I left a little bit late after penning a long email about Chromebook planning. I won’t be there to meet with the administration next week, but hopefully I made some good points and showed them how much money they’re bleeding out.

Autumn called as I was leaving, but I didn’t get to answer. Evidently she went by the house and bothered the girls to fetch some more stuff. Summer said she wanted a hug and cried a bit, but it wasn’t very effective. I made it home and took care of a few things before making it up to Summer’s.

As soon as I got there, I uncovered the grill and cooked some smoked sausages for dinner. Summer was mowing, so she came in to shower, and then it was a pretty quiet night after that. I laid down to relax for a bit with her, but then had to get up to finish my chores before bed.

We’re going the wrong direction!

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Good Answer

I felt like I was dead when my alarm went off this morning. I dragged all the way to work, through the Burger King drive-through for some coffee and croissants. As I neared the school, I passed a truck that I guess kicked up a rock somehow, and it sounded like I had gotten shot. I got a thumbnail-sized crack, nearly dead-center in my line of sight.

Once I got to the office, I felt pretty productive all morning. I hardly left my office, but I felt relatively focused compared to my usual days there. I remember fixing my one thing for the day pretty early, but I can’t remember what it was now. I also filed a glass claim with Progressive, and the girl said I qualified for a whole new windshield. I guess I feel better about that than a repair. Hopefully my insurance premiums don’t go up.

I took a break for some soft tacos from the cafeteria, and then the afternoon kind of dragged on. Blake came into my office to ask about spending the rest of some money, and I felt like I had some pretty good answers for him. Then Carla came into the office to look for Kim, who wasn’t working, and I learned of our shared disgust of the lack of accountability with Chromebooks. She seemed excited to help call the list of literally hundreds of parents to try and recover missing devices.

I left work a bit late, and last as usual. I went home to change, and then headed straight up to Summer’s. She and Eaddie had hiked down to the Petit Jean waterfall during the day, so they weren’t up to much when I got to the house. I made a leftover burger, and then struggled to get to bed early because Summer was on a very loud and gossipy work call in bed for what felt like hours.

Seriously, why do I even come here.