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Noggin Froggin

I slept in just a little bit this morning because I was going to Arch Ford for the day. I had time to get a carwash and breakfast at Wendy’s before making it to Plumerville before the meeting. Thomas and Ryan were there, but I sat at a table with Jason, and then we were joined by Randy from North Little Rock, and formerly Conway. The meeting itself wasn’t super useful to me, but it was nice to get my face out there some more. I actually talked to Sandy more today than I ever have before. I talked up Johnny quite a bit, so hopefully he gets the job in Dover.

Lunch was provided by a Lightspeed rep, which was boxed lunches from McAlister’s. I ended up grabbing the last box and ate with Randy, and then it was a long break until we all sat in on a video call with the Department of Education where they talked about cybersecurity response, and then FERPA. Apparently there’s no such thing as a FERPA compliance certification, which will be fun to know so I can call out vendors in the future.

We finished a little early and I made it home before anyone else. I chatted with Optimum and was referred to call instead, and then I called TCW to schedule an install. I’m dropping Optimum in any case, entirely due to their poor customer service. Then Julie called to say she would be going to Disney on the same flight we were taking, but coming home earlier. When Summer got home, we finished up the leftover chicken and then I went out on the Onewheel.

I went around the neighborhood and stopped to see my parents, and then continued straight across town to feed the fish. My board dumped me as I crossed over Knoxville, but I was able to run it out. It happens occasionally when I take off aggressively, but I didn’t think I took off that hard. I actually started to wonder if the motor was actually cutting out on me.

I saw Julie drive by as I was riding home. Then as I crossed in front of Oakland, it dumped me again as I pulled away from a dead stop. I had gotten fast enough that I couldn’t run it out, and I tumbled a bit on my left elbow and ended up hitting the top of my head somehow. I thought I had more rash on my side, but it was only a little bit tender. I got a little bit of a scrape on my left elbow, but overall not as bad as the last time. My phone actually detected the fall this time, and offered to call emergency services. My watch did nothing that I could tell. Fortunately neither were harmed in the process, but I did have to pick up the board and my glasses which were several feet apart.

I dusted myself off and messaged Summer while I gave myself a minute to make sure nothing was seriously hurt. It kind of took the wind out of my sails on the way home though. It was definitely harder to trust the acceleration of the board, not to say anything of how sore my legs were after a fairly long ride. I cleaned up my scraped elbow and settled in pretty quickly. Tomorrow will be fun having to go in early for testing.

Makin’ my own Mickey ears outta lumps.

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Wheel of Destress

They were testing this morning, but I was still early enough to grab breakfast on the way. It was a bit warmer, so I didn’t freeze to death on the ride in. It didn’t take them long at all to pass out an entire cart full of Chromebooks, because they hadn’t held kids accountable for bringing their own devices. Otherwise, it was pretty quiet for most of the day. Kim brought lunch, so I didn’t even look up when it was time to eat. I just skipped lunch and kept poking around in inventory, mostly hoping that I would have a good return at the end of the year. I did take a break for a minute in the afternoon when I got a text that the new Model 3 Performance was available to order, but I wasn’t impressed enough to jump on the first wave of ordering. I may wait on a few more reviews first.

The ride home was mostly unencumbered, and I came straight to the house where Summer was working on the couch and Eaddie was out again. Summer wanted chicken, so I ended up going to KFC to pick up the only fast food that comes in buckets. There were a lot of people in the back, but only one girl up front, who spent most of her time running to the back. Nobody looked to be in charge, or even in understanding. Michael was there eating with family after another parent night at the high school. Eaddie’s flute tutor, Kim, came in behind me and waited to place an order. Our food finally came out about 10 minutes late, wrong at first, and still wrong in the end with none of our requested sauces.

I got to the house where Summer and I discovered that nearly all of the food was old and dry, which made less sense of how much waiting I had to do. Then I went out on the Onewheel for about eight miles. I stopped to see my parents briefly, but then kept rolling around to decompress. I’d like to think I made some kid’s whole lifetime so far by giving him a high-five as I rolled by.

Once home for the evening, we wound down pretty quickly. I finally though to check my blood pressure, which was super high. I took some medicine for it, had a drink, and loosened up the best I could before bed.

Arch Ford in the morning makes for a short day. Maybe that will help.

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Stresscation

Eaddie wanted to drive today, so my fingers nearly froze off on the ride to work this morning. I picked up a McGriddle on the way, but had to microwave it when I got there. It was a PD day, and they had a visitor who needed to use the auditorium, so I was waiting for him in there because he was half an hour late. Then my big project was fixing printing for everyone. CentraQ was eating the print jobs and I couldn’t figure out why. I finally found logs, but it was so poorly documented that I had to call Wight Office Machines and get Thomas to remote in and help. He didn’t really have anything more than the setup guide, but he knew which check boxes to select and got it going again.

It was hard to get very motivated after that. They had a crane replacing air units on the roof, so there was lots of noise from up there. Kim ended up being out all day, and I only saw Denice a couple of times. I had some ramen for lunch, but there really wasn’t anything else going on.

I made good time on the roads both ways, and went to the old house to feed the fish after work. Summer had been home early, and had spaghetti on the stove when I got there. Julie came over to help plan and book a Disney vacation, and if I had realized we were basically just booking everything on the site without any extra needs, Summer and I could have dedicated a day over the weekend to get it done. I just kept feeling stress and anxiety even thinking about it, and the total cost will probably be close to double what I really wanted to spend.

Eaddie and I ate, and then she had Eli come over to eat and hang out a while. I left on the Onewheel to get some oranges, and then rode the long way around the basin to see my parents before making it back home. The whole Sign Hub family was out walking and Onewheeling the neighborhood, so I went back out to talk to them for a minute before finally going back inside.

I continued to feel fairly stressed all evening, so I made sure to get to bed early.

I’d rather talk to my sister than plan a vacation.

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The Productivity of Our City

I kept dawdling last night and stayed up super late, but then got up pretty early this morning. I made some French press just as Summer was getting around, and fortunately I made enough for the both of us. She wanted to mow the lawn and be productive for the day, and I was fairly ready for it in spite of being kind of tired all day from the lack of sleep. She had to go to work for a bit, so I had my shower and then rode to the Neighborhood Market to get some milk and eggs for her and Eaddie so they could make a tres leches cake.

Not long after that, I met my parents’ at the old house to move some things out to the curb. We decided we didn’t want Eaddie’s old twin bed frame, and I finally got rid of the old love seat that I got from Chelane’s grandmother or whoever, years ago. I loaded up some potting soil I had in the garage, and my parents poked around Bác Vân’s garden a bit. I hated to see that Doug cut down the big fig tree. Maybe he was worried about the roots being close to the house, but he left anyway.

I headed back to the house and unloaded while Summer mowed the lawn. I hadn’t eaten anything all day, so I ran to Arby’s for a weekly free sandwich. I ate at home, and then I went out to clean up the grass clippings for Summer. I got her on the Onewheel briefly, but she had a death grip on me. Then we took the Shadow around the block for some gas before coming home to look around the yard a bit and try to make plans and get ideas. We cleaned up some branches and thought we’d have a little fire outside since it was cold, but the fire pit was rusted out.

We went to the old house to get the fire pit from there instead. The cover I had over it was all torn up, so I threw it away and we’ll have to go back for the chairs later. I tinkered around outside a bit more while Summer took a shower. Eaddie had been out for most of the day, I think at some band practice. I never know any more. In the end, we never had a fire. When Eaddie got home, they watched Hannah Montana: The Movie for some reason. I guess they had history.

Tomorrow will be a cold ride to work, so it’s off to bed early.

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Bustin’ Makes Me Feel Good

Summer really wanted to go to the movies today, so we got up and ready to go to Conway for the day. Eaddie wanted to stay home, so we ran the mouse trap by for Dad to fix up and then headed out of town. We went to China Town to eat first. Then I really wanted to go to Sam’s to see if they had anything worth buying a membership for. Failing that, we circled back to Home Depot and picked up a whole bunch of planters on sale for my parents and ourselves.

We got to the theater with plenty of time to load up on popcorn. The auditorium itself was pretty small and I was frustrated by the number of people that were literally just talking through the entire movie. Summer had decided on Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, which I didn’t think was bad, but neither of us felt super strongly about it.

Once we got back into town, I rode some planters over to my parents’ house, and then came back home to test some placements around the front entryway and the back deck. Summer got cold outside, so we came in and watched The Marvels since she had never seen it. Eaddie was out a little late, but came home just as the movie was finishing up. It wasn’t too long before everyone was off to sleep.

Puppies. Love them or kill them?

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Print Nightmare

We struggled with printers all day after my driver snafu yesterday. Whether it was trouble printing in color, or retrieving jobs, there was always something wrong. My only real accomplishment for the day was talking to Barry to schedule Chromebook pickup, and even that took multiple emails after a face-to-face conversation because he didn’t actually know when his staff would be finished using their devices. Denice and I spent a bit of the afternoon venting about the different idiots we had to support.

I got my contract offer for barely any more than I made this year, so I immediately started looking for work again. I found a couple jobs that may interest me, so I think I’ll be challenging myself to apply to one a day for a while to see how it pans out.

I eventually made it home after getting stuck behind people driving well below the speed limit again. People either fly or crawl down that road. There’s no middle ground.

I got to the old house to feed the fish, and I brought a little bucket pond kit to the new house. Eaddie had Eli over, and Summer was making dinner. I went out back to fill my bucket and got the fountain working. It was pretty disappointing, but I can upgrade it later.

After dinner, we played Phase 10 before bed. The kids stayed up pretty late. I kept getting sidetracked myself, but eventually made it to bed.

Control P

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0.00000000037%

There was a threat of rain again today, but it never happened. I got to work a little bit early and made an iced coffee out of some leftover from the day before, and tried to replicate the general mood of the office as well. I finally fixed my printer deployment issue, so I spent the rest of the day tinkering with an automated task sequence that even Kim won’t be able to screw up.

After work, I kept getting stuck behind people going under the speed limit. I got to the old house to feed the fish, and my check from Elon Musk had been delivered and left in my driveway. I immediately ran across town to Arvest to deposit it, since it was too much for me to do over mobile deposit. While I was there, I caught up with Aaron for a little bit, and took a few broken and battered coins that were discarded by their change machine. It was mostly chipped-up pennies, but there were a couple carwash tokens and something from Germany.

When I got to the house, Summer had gone out for a haircut and a meeting at work, so I went out on the Onewheel. I went around the neighborhood a bit, buzzing back by Arvest to see if I could show off to Aaron. Then I ended up over at my parents’ house and had some shrimp soup since Summer would be home late.

On my way home, I noticed Summer had stopped at the Neighborhood Market, so I thought I’d ride over there and catch her. I put my Onewheel in her trunk, but then somehow missed her as she left the store and drove away with my ride. I quickly called her to come back, and rode home with her. I took one more loop around the block before coming in for the night.

Eaddie had been doing schoolwork and practicing her flute, so we didn’t get to watch TV like I thought we might. Instead, I actually managed to get to bed a little early. I may actually get seven hours of sleep tonight.

That’s a pretty big wealth gap.

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Valet Point

Today was super humid all day, so it felt pretty gross in the morning. I struggled waking up, so I made a big pot of coffee in the morning that got me through the afternoon. Overall I tried to keep things a little lighter while I played music and tinkered all day. I ended up breaking printers somehow when I was trying to fix a deployment issue, but I think I got everything back in place before I left.

I missed the passing power of my Model 3 or the R1 on the drive home, but the Murano was no slouch. I made it to the old house to feed the fish and loaded up my valet tray to go to the new house. Summer was home early and cooking dinner after having a little cyst or something removed from her leg. I rode the Onewheel to my parents’ house and talked to them a little bit while Julie was there. Then I did a big loop around the neighborhood before going back home to clean up the laundry room.

Summer and I ate alone since Eaddie was with Eli after a long day of concert assessment. Then I rode a handful of things back over to my parents’ house so I could set my valet up on the dryer. I’ll be happy to have a place near the door for all the vehicle keys, glasses, and whatnot.

It was a quiet night after that. I chatted with Eaddie once she got home, and then it was off to bed a little earlier than usual.

Pen Island

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Ci’s

There was a threat of rain again today, but I don’t think I ever saw a sprinkle on my drive in. It took me the entire trip to finish my bagel, but I guess I was glad to have something occupy the drive. I made it in a few minutes early, but wasn’t any more productive for it. Kim was back, and she’s always particularly chatty after having a day off. I didn’t break anything, but I didn’t fix anything either.

After work, it was a relative breeze home to feed the fish and grab a box to take to the new house. I stopped by the high school to try and catch Eaddie so she could return the robotics toolboxes that have been rattling around in the trunk for the past few weeks, but she was just leaving as I was pulling in.

I got home and took a beat to relax before trying to take a bicycle over to Dad on my Onewheel. I got to the end of the street and had to bail due to uneven ground, and the rear tire of the bike just fell off! I struggled to get it back on, but eventually had it in place on the wrong side of the chain. That was enough that I could at least pick it up and carry it while riding the Onewheel.

After I dropped off the bike, I continued a long ride around the neighborhood before Eaddie and I went out to try and find some food. We weren’t super hungry, and couldn’t decide what to eat. We thought we’d just swing by the wash to see Summer, and then find something to eat on the way back. Eaddie decided on New China, so we drove all the way across town to find they were closed. I drove us back to town to get gas at Casey’s, which took forever because the pump was super slow.

We ultimately ended up going to Cici’s, which was a miserable experience. It was a little bit late, but not alarmingly so. There were no store hours posted on the door, but there were people inside. It wasn’t until after I had a salad that I went back up to the bar to find they had combined everything under one heat lamp. There was no variety, so I ended up with a plate full of pepperoni pizza. They’ll get a review for that move, because a relatively large family came in as we were leaving, and they weren’t opening the bar back up. There was no telling what that family ate.

We got home just as Summer did, and we settled in quickly. The week is flying by, but the work hours are crawling. I could really use a win.

Stupid bubbles.

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I DEMAND A REFUND

Kim was out today, and Denice wasn’t in the office for the first part of the morning, so I made myself some coffee and tried to concentrate on my Modern Driver Management in SCCM. Somehow, the server stopped responding to PXE requests, and then started working again after lunch, just as suddenly as it had quit.

The drive home was pretty fast, but that didn’t stop a jackass truck from passing me at over 70mph, and then end up parked in front of me once we got into Dardanelle. I’m sick to death of those idiots kicking road grit in my face and gaining nothing for it.

I was racing against the potential of rain, so I went straight home where the girls were just getting back with dinner. I went to my office and started working on taxes, determined to file on time. It took a trip back to the old house to find some paperwork, and then doing some math to make up for forms I didn’t have, but by the end of it all, I felt pretty confident in what I filed for both of us. Summer didn’t even add any of her interest accounts, so I was that far ahead already.

Sick of it.