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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!

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Moorano

It felt great to sleep in a bit since I woke up at home. I made it to work, and we all sat around the table for nearly an hour before anyone got up. When I got into my office, I started feeling bug bites, and discovered a few random ants all over my desk. I could never figure out where they were coming from, and ended up leaving anyway to take care of some things at Oakland.

I got a few phones logged in, and then put my Pixel Buds in while I went room to room, hooking up technology. It was slow, but kind of Zen just wandering through the empty halls by myself. I ended up working a bit into lunch, and then just picked up some chicken strips with gravy from Dairy Queen. I took that back to the shop and ate in the breakroom, and then spent a bit of time in the afternoon in my office again.

Summer called to say the Murano would finally be finished by the end of the day, but he’d charge an additional 3% if I paid with a card, so I texted Dad to see if he had access to some money immediately. He came by to deliver that, and then I spent the end of the day at Oakland again.

I went home to change, and then went to Accurate Automotive to pay the younger Mike for the work. Autumn was home, and Eaddie had tennis practice, so I just had Autumn drop me off on the way so I could take the Murano home. It was super hot outside, and I couldn’t hear the engine well over the air conditioner, so I left it at the house and Autumn took us to CiCi’s for dinner while Eaddie played tennis.

It was super hot in the restaurant, and I never got any barbecue or spinach alfredo, so overall it was a very uncomfortable visit for me. When we finished, Autumn dropped me off again, and I met her at the gas station after she picked up Eaddie. They filled up and went home, and then I drove across town on the interstate before making it to my parents’ house. They were watering plants, so I didn’t stick around too long in the heat.

I stopped by the quarter wash and cleaned all the dust and water spots off of the Murano, and then made it up to Summer’s house just seconds before she pulled in from a day in Conway. Everyone settled in pretty quickly, except for me, who dawdled too long and made it to bed late. At least I’m tired from the heat.

Friggin ants!

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Scramble

I had to fight the urge to sleep in today. Summer slept hard, so I just laid in bed for an hour or so until she woke up. I finished up some leftover pasta from days ago, and then made her a big bowl of rice and egg. When Eaddie got up, we went into her room and hung out with her in there for a while and shared some music. She’s discovered alternative, punk, and emo from our generation, which is kind of a trip.

Summer eventually wanted to go to the gym, and since we were still without a second car until Autumn came home, I had her drop me off at my house so I could clean up a bit. I started some laundry and then sweat out trying to re-run a network cable so I could share my wireless with Bác Vân. I had an iPad ready for her, but wasn’t able to get signal much beyond my outside walls.

I planned to clean up and meet back up with the girls, but Autumn was headed to me, blind without a phone. It took her about twice as long to get here as I expected, so I held off on doing what I needed to do. As soon as she walked into the house, she looked around in shock and made a comment about how she hadn’t seen the place since I gave them my refrigerator. She started looking all around the house, and it made me super uncomfortable. Then since I never had a chance to clean up, Summer had to pick her up and leave the Montego with me. I ended up not feeling great and decided not to meet them for dinner so I wouldn’t have to deal with Autumn’s groans and glares for having to wait for me. Then I pretty quickly decided to stay home for the night because I think the bigger truth was that I needed a break from the hate, and I just wanted to be left alone for a while.

I took a long bath and ended up killing my phone in Into the Breach. Then I finally took the iPad next door and showed Bác Vân how to make FaceTime calls. The address book didn’t seem super intuitive, but hopefully she gives it a try and enjoys it. We talked to Lelan for a couple minutes, and then my parents. Nobody else would answer, but nobody else was expecting a call either. She gave up after that, and I went back to my den of recluse.

Like me, they are solitary creatures and deeply misunderstood.