I got all kinds of free food today. I started off with breakfast at Oakland. Biscuits and gravy, cheesy eggs, sausage, bacon, blueberry scone, and some fruit. Then I had to run home to meet a guy from Dependable Air Conditioning. I texted Melissa yesterday, and she said she probably couldn’t get anyone out for a couple days, but then he called me first thing this morning. It took a couple hours, but after cleaning up and replacing the connection to the compressor at the bottom of the unit, along with a capacitor and switch at the top, I’m back in business.

I ended up eating leftover spaghetti and salad from Pasta Grill, along with a small sandwich from wherever those came from. Then when I went to visit with Sara for a bit, she gave me an extra soft taco from Taco Bell. Fat and happy, or seemingly cranky according to Sara, I left for the junior high.

I finished the day with some actual work, and then went to my parents’ for dinner. Mom made some great curry that’ll probably melt potatoes and become soggy tomorrow. I took the leftover chow mein to Summer when she got out of the band concert, and we watched a couple episodes of The Office to wrap up season four. Then it was home for the evening.

The chocolate isn’t really gravy. And what the hell is a scone, anyway?

I had to spend most of this morning at Oakland sitting next to the counselor while she made a phone call about an error with their testing software that didn’t involve me. It gets really frustrating having to oblige these types of requests when it’s obvious there’s no problem on our side, but evidently it’s not obvious to everyone involved. While I was there, I texted Librado to help break into a teacher’s car because she locked herself out. I didn’t even get a chance to go out and talk to him though, because I was stuck on the phone.

Our whole group met up at the junior high where Simmons Bank grilled cheeseburgers for teacher appreciation day. It was really nice of them, but it seemed like a much smaller crowd than last year, and definitely a smaller spread than when Beacon Tire did it. It was a great day to be outside, though.

After work, I went to my parents’ house for some leftover chow mein and actually ate it this time. Then it was home to clean the tadpole bucket, and finally a game of PUBG with Aaron before the servers went down.

Waddle waddle, till the very next day…

Teacher appreciation week continued today with a ton of sweets. I didn’t swipe anything from the break room today because I still had my apple fritter that Summer got me yesterday. I spent all day finishing up work orders until lunch time. Ronda and Steven met me at CiCi’s for a free buffet for teachers. Jason and Allen were already there because I went half an hour late.

After work, I went to my parents’ house to try and eat, but I was still just too full. We watched the Google I/O 2018 keynote, and Mom got super excited about the Assistant stuff, but quickly lost interest and understanding as the presentation went on. She and Dad were both excited about Morse code being added to Gboard. Dad was creeped out by the robot overlords.

When I got home, I was hot and moody enough to turn on my portable air conditioner in the bedroom. It got me cold pretty quickly, and the rest of the house isn’t too bad. I should probably call someone tomorrow anyway.

Robots use filler words now?

I’m still dealing with a pretty bad head cold. Or maybe it’s allergies. I should get tested, because my head has been killing me lately.

I cleaned up a bunch of work orders today, because I was in the double digits. I still have a few more to go, but at least everything has progress. I never got super hungry, and I never heard from anyone for lunch, so I scavenged a leftover sandwich from teacher appreciation week.

About teacher appreciation week….

Teachers get a whole week of celebration just for showing up nine months out of the year. They already get paid more for working fewer contract days. Teachers are super important, and the good ones deserve the recognition. But then I got an email from one of the admins announcing that he had forgotten to award the classified staff of the month for the past three months. One of our months didn’t even get awarded, because our staff is small enough that they wouldn’t allow repeats, but also wanted to avoid awarding someone who had been written up within the past few months. Best not to give anyone a $25 gas card than have someone feel too appreciated.

So I stole my sandwich, and I ate it with bitterness in my heart.

After work, I came home and did all I could to cool the house down. I didn’t have any new ant infiltrations, which was nice. The bar is set pretty low.

Jack eventually got online and we played some doubles in PUBG. Several quick games, and a couple longer ones. Nothing to write home about. Just as he got off, Aaron got on, so I played one with him before bed.

Can’t I just drill out my sinus cavities?

Testing wrapped up this morning. I tried to get some work done remotely, but I’m not sure how much I actually accomplished. Lunch was cold Sumo’s with Zach and Sara before spending all afternoon with Ben and Ryan while they fixed phone issues. They had to call 911 several times to verify what phone numbers and addresses were presented in their system from each of our lines.

Dad called with an electrician at my house, so I ran home for a few minutes in the middle of the afternoon because my internet was down and I couldn’t turn my air conditioner on to test it. When I got there, we found the fan would spin but the compressor wasn’t working, so I still won’t have A/C this weekend. At least it’s nice out.

When they finished, I headed to the junior high to test my phones there and to finish up a couple other things I couldn’t get to earlier in the day. Summer was there late with some kids to set up for the quiz bowl car show tomorrow. When I finally left work, I was feeling super tired and a little sick, so I went home and took a nap for a couple hours. I had a small fever, but I started feeling better after I ate some leftovers.

Summer came by to visit for a bit, but otherwise the rest of the night was mostly a bust after having had a nap earlier and dealing with sinus issues.

*Crickets*

I still didn’t have power this morning. I didn’t figure it would change on its own, but I was hopeful. I showered in the dark, then went to work for more testing. I got to play with a new duckling that the kids had hatched, and then clean up one of the three tadpoles that had gotten stuck in the little tank and died.

I met Jason and Allen for lunch at Arby’s, then went to the junior high to take care of some work I had there. Hannah got me a replacement switchblade comb because mine didn’t work well after they had been playing with it. I ended up working a bit late, then had dinner at my parents’ house when I finally got out. I finally made it home to find that most of my power had been restored after Entergy had come earlier in the day, but my air conditioner circuit was still tripped and couldn’t be reset.

I picked up Allen and stopped by to look at a Scion FR-S for sale down the road. I was curious when I first saw it, but after some inspection, I was pretty sure it had been taken off roading at some point in its life. Definitely not worth the payoff they were asking.

I finished the night in a fortunately cool house with some PUBG, then went to bed with an open window again.

You’re pretty smart for a white boy.
I’m only half!
That’s right…

I took three little tadpoles to Oakland with me this morning and set them up in the windowsill. It turned out quite nice with all of the duckweed growing in the top. I’m pretty happy with it. That’s about where productivity stopped.

I spent the rest of the morning parked in the office playing This War of Mine on my phone until it was time to meet Jason and Allen at Ruby Tuesday for a $5 salad bar. Aaron and Stephanie came in shortly after I got there and ate across the aisle from us.

The afternoon was spent running between my buildings after a couple problems popped up at Oakland. Then I went to my parents’ house for some chow mein that Mom cooked up.

Back home, Aaron and another friend of his joined me for some PUBG until bed. I was rocking suppressors all night, but we still never really got very far.

I miss Strawberry Passion Awareness…