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Good Day Bad Day Good Day

I got out in time for a comfortable McGriddle this morning, but the day quickly turned south as I encountered sudden and unexpected issues with one of my domain controllers, I guess. One of the newer computers I’d imaged had been deleted from Active Directory somehow, and I had no logs to show how or why. I did find my secondary DC was completely out of disk space though, so I had to figure out how to remove a recovery partition and expand the volume that was full to make room. Hopefully that fixed that issue, but it still took a couple trips across the entire campus.

Today started teacher appreciation week, so a bank grilled burgers for us. Overall there aren’t nearly as many offerings as I’m accustomed to in a larger area, but they were no less appreciated. I just wished I had gotten more than one cookie.

After work, I fed the fish and took a handful of stuff home. Eaddie was wasting away while Summer baked a cheesecake. After the cheesecake, she was craving a leftover brat, so she encouraged Eaddie and I to go out together. We ended up at La Huerta and had a good talk. When we got back to the house, she had questions about credit and interest, so I got my laptop and we learned some stuff on the TV in the living room.

You gotta keep ’em medicated!

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Cursed Carousel

I was up way later than I planned last night, and though I almost got out of bed early, I let myself fall asleep again and didn’t wake up until late in the morning. I got up and tried to make an omelet but forgot how, so I had scrambled eggs and Summer had an omelet. Eaddie had a concert at Tech in the afternoon, so we lounged for a little while and then had to get across town.

The Tech concerts are always way better, not only because the bands are better, but because they always keep them relatively short. They get through the music, and don’t waste time thank-circle-jerking the administration for their “support” by not axing their already successful program. Eaddie had a nice solo, but I was having trouble focusing with how loud the band was, plus I didn’t have a line of sight to her, so I was a little spaced out while she played.

Afterward, Summer and I went by the Neighborhood Market for a few things and then made it home where we ate some leftovers and mostly lounged. Eaddie went to Eli’s all evening and came home late to chat about her experience with the band. We all did a fair job of getting to bed at a reasonable hour, and next is another week of rain.

Scarry-go-round?

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The Stumble Guy

Summer decided she needed to go terminate some folks in Greenbrier today, so we thought we’d make a day of it. I got cleaned up and left Eaddie home since she had some work to do. I got us to the wash, and we only barely escaped being sideswiped once. Summer would be a while, so I had to kill some time. My first stop was McDonald’s, but I couldn’t get anything there because they said they were struck by lightning and had a couple fires in the kitchen. I offered to help if the problem taking orders was with their computer system, but the “owner wouldn’t let them use the fire extinguisher,” so they wouldn’t let me help either.

I drove around the parking lot and found Dollar Tree, and I managed to spend enough time there that Summer was ready to go just as I checked out. I picked her up and we headed to Conway where we tried to eat at Los 3 Potrillos. They had a 20 minute wait to be seated, so we left there and headed downtown where by complete luck we stumbled into Toad Suck Daze. We ate at a place called Salsa’s that was super good.

After we ate, we walked around downtown to see what was there. It seemed like it was mostly vendors, but then we found a bunch of carnival rides. Just as we decided we were finished, we ran into Ernie while he was taking a smoke break from hanging out at the renaissance festival tent.

We eventually made it out of downtown and headed to Kohl’s for some shopping. Summer wanted to look for some shoes, but was misguided by the purposefully difficult pricing there, so we stopped into Shoe Carnival and got her a couple pairs. By then it was time to make it across town for our movie. As we pulled into the parking lot, I thought we’d have a moment to stop at Bargain Hunt again, but we ran out of time quickly and the checkout line was long, so we ran out of there and made it to the movie.

Without a doubt, we thought The Fall Guy was an awesome flick. It was paced well, and we had a good time the entire time. Afterward, we headed straight home and settled in pretty quickly.

What is a Toad Suck, anyway?

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I Have Reservations

I woke up before my super early alarm this morning with a shin and calf cramp. I managed to walk to my office so I could try and book some dining for Disney, and it was surprisingly a cinch in spite of the fear Julie had instilled in us. All day, there were still reservations available everywhere. While I was confirming all of that, I called a couple different numbers to find someone that could fix Eaddie’s age in the app, so hopefully that experience will work correctly now.

It’s been hard getting into anything too serious since I feel like I won’t be sticking around long. I still haven’t heard anything from Harry or Blake, even to say they don’t want to meet with me. Maybe they’re just both busy, or maybe they’ve just already made up their minds. Maybe I have too.

My parents wanted me to meet them at Georgia Carpet Mills to pick out some flooring for the old house after work, so I did that and then went to feed the fish before going to Little Caesar’s to pick up dinner for the kids. I had placed my order an hour and a half in advance, but still had to wait for over 20 minutes for them to make and bake my order. I haggled the girl for some dipping sauce, and she kind of gave me side-eye, but I wasn’t having any sass after their miserable operation. I still want to open a store next door called Big Brutus.

Eaddie had a house full of teenagers by the time I got home, and Summer was busy with work calls for a little while. My parents stopped by to eat too, and then Mom sat down on the couch and watched the entirety of X-Men Origins: Wolverine. It was a little warm in the house with so many people there, so Summer and I sat outside for a little bit to cool off after my parents left. I felt sleepy all night, but didn’t really want to go to sleep with everyone still there. The lack of sleep from the night before has made the day a struggle though.

Great, now I don’t know where anything is.

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Thanks for Nothing

Kim was out today, so I came in to an eerily quiet office this morning. Denice was there in the morning, but then left for the entire afternoon. I was relatively productive because of it, but I still felt the sting of burnout after never hearing anything back from Harry about a meeting. He at least opened my talking points document, but I have a feeling I’ll be more productive with the paper plant.

On the way home, Summer called and asked me to pick up Eaddie from the high school. Then we went straight home so she could clean up and go back for her appreciation concert. Summer and I ate some leftovers and then went to the arts center for the show.

The music was good, but I could see why Eaddie has burned out on Katahj Copley. It was too easy for us to spot just based on the descriptions of the music alone. Things didn’t get really bad until they invited the seniors from the concert band back on stage for The Stars and Stripes Forever. Things immediately fell apart for that song, but Summer wanted me to record it so she could just be in the moment.

Eaddie went out for dinner with her father, so Summer and I went home and started researching Disney restaurants, because why plan early? I finally figured that I could just look at the map and pick out a couple names of restaurants that I remembered hearing about ever in my life. For better or worse, I plotted a few to try and reserve in the morning.

Seat’s taken.

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Life Auditor

Traffic was super bad in Dardanelle this morning, but luckily I was early enough to peel out of line and duck into Burger King for a biscuit. Denice had visitors in her office for nearly the entire day, and Kim was in and out between personal calls as usual. It’s burnout city there this week.

I ended up staying late because the auditor needed some help in the front office, and evidently she was just continuing to work past everyone else leaving. I don’t even understand why she had to be on-site if it didn’t matter whether anyone else was there. She got super chatty, and apparently had to look me up after I had talked to her weeks ago because her son knew Julie back in school. She was nice, but didn’t seem to fully grasp all of the bureaucratic crap she was there to do. After I gave her any and all insight I had to offer, she started telling me her life story.

I finally made it home about an hour late, fed the fish, loaded up a few things, and found Summer at home grilling brats for dinner. We ate our really good, no-frills dinner, and then I sat on the couch and watched YouTube with Summer for a while before everyone was off to bed.

Gary, Gary, Ben, and Terry

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I Need a Vacation

I had to go in early again today for testing, though nobody needed me. It was super slow and quiet, aside from Kim. I’ve been feeling the burnout as time runs out to sign next year’s contract, but it looks like Green Bay is hiring for a different position. I don’t know if one of the others left, or if this may be a new position. I’ll need to reach out to Gary to see if he’d like to talk about it.

I left after my requisite eight hours and made it to the old house to feed the fish. Then I got home and Eaddie was getting ready for some band concert that I guess wasn’t open to the public, or at least we weren’t attending. I changed clothes so I could go out on the Onewheel for the first time since my big wreck. It was much more difficult to accelerate since I was still feeling so much pain in my arm. I was constantly afraid of nosediving.

My only plan was to go to Arby’s for a free sandwich, but I stopped by my parents’ house to visit with them first. Julie and Kevin were there for dinner, and I had a little bowl of some sort of taco cornbread casserole that Dad made. I stayed a while just to visit since Julie was there, but then she started talking about a show on Netflix, and Dad mentioned having trouble watching it on the TV. For some reason, Julie was immediately triggered and started yelling at me progressively louder about sponging off of them and letting them pay for a service that they “couldn’t even use” until I finally snapped back at her. Every single person there just sat in silence while she continued to berate me for being a worthless parasite, so I just left.

I slowly rode across town and had to stop behind the forestry service to sob on a park bench for a little while. I only fell down in the street once along the way, at a super slow speed on a super small bump. My wheel just spun up and spat me out, so I laid in the middle of the intersection in defeat.

After pulling myself together downtown, I continued to Arby’s the long way, because I was pretty sure every law enforcement officer in the county was blocking off Detroit under the bridge. I never could see what was going on, but they were there the entire time I rode across town, ate a roast beef sandwich, and rode back home.

Summer made it home after a rough day of her own, and went to bed. Eaddie got home late from her concert and went to bed. I took some blood pressure medicine, and went to bed.

I change my mind. I’d rather plan a vacation.

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Donut Be Discouraged

I was a little early out the door, so I decided to stop at the new donut place on the way to work. I ate a bacon, egg, and cheese croissant on the drive, and made some coffee when I got to work. Shortly after I sat down with it, I took a sip that went down the wrong pipe, and coughed into my cup. Coffee went everywhere all over my clothes and keyboard, so I spent a while cleaning that up.

I wasn’t at all interested in cheesy pull-aparts, so I just had a couple donuts for punch. There was an office full of people behind me all day, and Kim spent most of the day on the phone trying to find someone to come out and fix her washing machine. I tinkered with a laptop and eventually pieced one together for the stage that ought to really scream compared to the old piece of crap they’ve had out there.

After work, I tried to wind down quickly. I fed the fish and then came home to Summer making a really good shrimp pesto pasta. Eaddie didn’t have anything going on, so it was just the three of us for dinner. Then I sat on the couch and watched the first episode of Heroes with Summer until she went to bed.

Find something fulfilling!

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Nomentum

I had a terrible time getting to bed last night, and contemplated pulling an all-nighter. I didn’t fall asleep until after 3:30, woke up a couple of times, and almost stayed up at 7:30. Somehow I managed not to sleep the entire day, and got up to some coffee with Summer before she went to the gym. She was back and forth on whether she would have to go to work, but did end up going in for a little while between rainclouds. Eaddie went to a band concert in the afternoon, so I just bummed around the house all afternoon.

Mom made bún bò Huế for dinner, so the girls and I headed over as soon as Eaddie got back. We visited for a little bit, but then the girls had to come back home to do some laundry for the week. I had to go drain the sump room, and Eaddie was up a little late making chocolate covered strawberries since she had a late-start Monday. I’ll have to go to work extra early for testing on Tuesday, and I really need to request a meeting with Harry before contracts are due. The end of the school year just has me lazy.

I need a break.

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Ungentlemanly

Aches and pains slowly dissipated today, but I think getting up and moving around had as much to do with it as anything. I’d been wanting to see The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, so I convinced the girls to take a trip to Conway to see it. Summer went to the gym and then took care of something at work, and Eaddie went to a bake sale while I showered and got ready. By the time we got out and into Conway, I was pretty hungry for some lunch. I took us to Bulgogi for some overpriced ramen, which was tasty. Then we killed some time shopping until the movie. We went to Big Lots, Hobby Lobby, and then a junk store by the theater.

As soon as we got into our auditorium for the movie, Eaddie accidentally spilled our Coke because they gave us a really flimsy, crumply cup. Luckily it didn’t seem to get absolutely everywhere, and I just had to go wash my hands. The girls survived with only a little splash damage. We all enjoyed the movie pretty well, but I was a bit surprised by the way the screentime was split between the actors. It was a good movie, but I guess it was just how they filmed things happening in different places.

I wasn’t done in Conway after the movie, and I took the girls hostage for a night of walking down the strip mall from Kohl’s all the way down to Target. I think they shopped a little more than they would admit, and even stopped to hula hoop at Shoe Carnival for a moment. The weather and the atmosphere outside just reminded me of the summer after high school, and it made me long for a simpler time.

We pretty well closed down the shopping center, and then headed home. The girls went to bed while I chased down ants in the kitchen. I put out a whole bunch of Terro around the stove, and they absolutely swarmed to it. Hopefully they’ll be gone by morning, but I already had to give them a refill once.

BLUE M3?