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Zero Productivity

I was early to work today, but that was about as good as it got. I pretty quickly got sucked into doing other peoples’ jobs. The one task I set out to do for myself ended up breaking a switch again, so I had to factory reset it. Fortunately that didn’t take down the entire network like what happened on Monday.

People keep calling or stopping in, which is throwing off my flow too. At least Denice wasn’t there for most of the day, but being cramped in half as much space has also made things more frustrating. I’ve just been having a bad time overall.

I tried watching the Pixel launch event, but struggled with that too. I ended up ordering a new phone and watch since my S21 Ultra has been on the struggle bus for a while now with its battery. I guess two and a half years is about the best I can hope for these days.

I thought I might sneak out a little early, but somehow still ended up a little late instead. The stupid kids hit my car with a basketball again, and it infuriates me that the teacher just sits there rocking in his chair the whole time. There’s still no damage, but I don’t want any more scuffs or dents. They just don’t respect peoples things.

Summer made dinner, so I ran home to change, stopped at my parents’ house for some moving boxes and eggs, and then made it to the new house for dinner. Afterward, I tried showing Summer how to load the dishwasher better, took care of my plants outside, cleaned up in the bathroom, and tried removing some more screws from the stupid extra cabinets in the laundry room. I still have one super stubborn screw to get out of one side, and then possibly more on the other side before we can take that thing out. Once we do, we should have plenty more room for the spare refrigerator.

Down the review rabbit hole.

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Could Should

I went home for my shower this morning and let my car charge for a bit. I was early for work, but then ran into directed traffic at the Scenic 7 junction, so I just showed up on time. I wasn’t too worried about the aftermath of yesterday’s snafu, but we did have a couple wireless shots that went down. Luckily a power cycle fixed those issues, but in reality, at least one of those should be a fiber run anyway. I don’t really know what else I even got into. I rearranged my desk a little bit more because it was super cramped where I was sitting. The front of that office simply isn’t big enough, and I’m mad about it. I’m trying to give them a fair shake, and Denice has been nice enough for what it’s worth.

Lunch was mid with a side of chips, but at least it was filling. I went home a little bit late just because I was busy catching up on a bunch of crap. It’s so hard to juggle everything I have to do, and by the time we’ll be slow enough for me to actually accomplish things, I don’t think I’ll care enough.

I spent a little time at home before meeting Julie and Kevin at my parents’ house to cover the pool. I hated to see it go, but this is just the way of our summers. Underutilized and undervalued. Afterward, we all sat down to eat some leftovers, and then I left to wash my car and then meet Eaddie at my house to try and dispose of an old mattress that wasn’t picked up for bulk pickup week. Unfortunately it wouldn’t fit into the Murano, so we left it in the garage as not to get wet in the eventual rain.

I finally made it to the new house late, and Summer was in a quiet mood. I tinkered for just a short bit, and then it was off to bed.

Cold Shold

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Different Kind of Downtime

I survived a morning routine at the new house because everyone else was asleep. I even slept in a little after staying up way too late, and made it home to feed the fish and change clothes to get to work. Ben showed up just after I did, and came in to help me look at some things. I appreciated having literally anybody there to chat about virtually anything intelligent related to work.

Denice and one of the other girls from the elementary were in the back, in my old office, working on who knows what for most of the day. It was annoying because they kept having to knock on the door because they didn’t have keys. Furthermore, I didn’t have any room to work with anyone else. I’m trying to give it a chance, but I really think this may have been the last shot for me. It’s too much frustration for not enough pay.

After we got my computer set up, I shoveled things around on my desk so Ben would have a place to land, and we kind of sporadically went through to try and fix some different things. The biggest thing was multicast paging on the intercoms. Everyone complained about static, but I don’t know if that was actually better or worse than not hearing anything at all.

We worked through cafeteria lunch, so Ben and I went to the Superette to eat. They had some pretty good “homemade” chicken strips, and we sat and chatted for a while before going back. Then we tried to chase some switches down in the building. Our last act of the day was to change a switch configuration at the elementary, which I should have known would end poorly. We basically turned off link aggregation, which broke half of the building for a few hours.

We went down and worked on it together for a while, but I eventually had to let him leave for another obligation. I stayed behind and worked it out myself, which ultimately resulted in a factory reset switch. I thought that had everything going again, but after I got about a mile down the road, I started getting constant notifications that devices were going offline. That continued all the way home, so I knew I had to remote in and get it fixed again. Before I went inside, David drove up from next door and chatted with me for a while. I told him about the move, and apparently he wasn’t aware that Bác Vân had passed. He had a lot to talk about, so I stood by the truck for a while before going in.

By the time I remoted in and got the school network fixed, it was pretty late. I headed to the new house where Summer said I had a surprise waiting. That surprise was mowed grass, which I appreciated, but maybe wasn’t worthy of “surprise.” She had also moved the lawn mower just enough that I didn’t notice, so I bumped it with my car. I don’t think it scuffed anything, but I was further annoyed by the tiny garage. I continued to become more agitated by the moment, so I went out to water the plants, shut down the old refrigerator, and spent the rest of the night on the computer.

Apply yourself.

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Good Mourning

I woke up several times with a pounding headache last night, and then I was the first one up in the morning even after sleeping in for a little while. I took a shower and eventually headed home to change before picking up some donuts and coming back to the girls. Summer and I had to go to the store for some flowers for Lelan’s altar for Bác Vân, so we sent Eaddie to my parents’ house to pick up some stuff separately.

Eaddie beat all of us there, we arrived just behind Dad and Doug, and then Mom came along way later. Lelan already had most of the food done, but waiting for Mom to shower and show up an hour late put us behind. Randall and Danielle were already there, and Julie and Kevin eventually showed up. Eaddie had to go to band practice, so she left before we could eat.

We had a good meal and great conversation. Julie talked about flying a lot. Eaddie finally finished and showed up just after food had been mostly put away, but I made her a bowl with some of everything. Summer left early to start some laundry, and after Lelan finished cleaning everything up, she and Stephen, my parents, and I went to the cemetery.

I dropped Eaddie off at the house and then took Julie the sticky rice pot she forgot at Lelan’s, and then we were at the grave for a little while to burn incense and arrange fake flowers. We chatted there for a while before everyone parted ways.

Earlier, Summer had gotten a text from her old landlord about the couple of things we left behind, and the state of the property. She had been in the home for nearly a decade, without a lease, and she wanted us to do a better job of cleaning and mowing. Summer had no expectation of getting her deposit back, and was even ghosted when she asked about only paying for half a month of rent, so she just paid for the full month. Even Lelan thought the text was a little silly, but I still had to go to the house anyway to get the plant cages that I forgot.

While I was there, I started to move the TV stand and cabinet we left in the house. Then I noticed the neighbors outside, so I walked over and asked if they wanted any of that stuff. They were super stoned stoked to get free stuff, so I put it outside and told them to take the grill and chairs out back as well.

When I got back to Summer’s, I got on a roll cleaning up some things and did a load of laundry. The dryer made an awful racket, so I wondered if something was jostled in the move. I’ll need to take it apart and check sooner than later. Eaddie came out to vent about English class for a bit, and then it was off to bed, late as usual.

Filian obligations fulfilled.

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Settling

We milled around a little bit this morning, and then Summer and I got the washer and dryer into place. I wanted to get a stainless steel hose to replace her old rubber one, so we headed out to run some errands. We were hungry too, so we stopped at Zaxby’s for lunch. Then she had to check on the wash for a bit to see how the crew was doing with some cleaning tasks. Next up, we went to Lowe’s for the washer hose. They had a couple tiny orchids on clearance that we picked up as well. Then we went by the old house to get the last couple of things we wanted. We left a small cabinet and a little TV stand there, and I felt a little bit bad for not just disposing of them ourselves.

I forgot to go back for my old plant cages, so hopefully we can swing by and they’ll still be there tomorrow. We got everything back to the new house and unloaded. With the washer and dryer done, that should be everything the girls need. I’ll start bringing some things over, but most importantly I’ll need to get the ceiling fixed.

I got the back porch cleaned up a bit and brought the extension cord up above the deck to see if the string lights would work. They did, but I was surprised by how rusty and gross the outlet looked. I’ll need to get that replaced sooner than later. As the sun set, Summer and I spent a little bit of time out on the deck. Eaddie wanted to get out of the house, so she asked to go to the movies. It didn’t seem like we did a whole lot, but I felt completely beat for most of the day.

Hope

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Consoling

After being late yesterday, I was actually really early today. I backtracked to Wendy’s for breakfast this time, and still made it to work several minutes early. I decided early on that I wasn’t going to get any work done, all to focus on moving things out of my office and into the front office with Kim. I started by moving some things around in our storage room, and I think I might have a reasonable plan for how to make the storage more easily accessible.

I skipped out on lunch because ham and cheese wraps sounded awful. I survived on coffee and lemonade and stayed an hour late until I got almost everything out. There was still one set of cabinets with some toner in them, but I don’t even know what they went to, so I figured that can be a problem for Monday.

We decided to keep the television console, so I queued Kevin up again. I thought he was going to be later than he was, so I started to go get some food. He texted me just as I left the house, so I turned around and went to the new house to pick up my straps. As soon as I got there, I realized the girls never took them out of the Murano after they unloaded, so I had to go back to the high school to get them while Eaddie was at a football game. I met Kevin at his place since I was already right by him, and we took his truck to get the console.

The power was already shut off, so we were working in the pitch black. Somehow we managed to get it loaded onto the truck, and I grabbed the lawn mower as well. There were still a few small things to get that Summer didn’t grab, but I figured that would wait until the next day. We got the console and mower to the new house, and then Kevin took me back to my car.

I finally stopped at Arby’s for some dinner, just as it approached bedtime. I’ve been a constant state of exhaustion, and the Big Game Burger I got was kind of a disappointment. Summer was up and mentioned a centipede in the bathroom, but all she did was cover it with a towel and surround it with shoes, hoping it wouldn’t get away. Then she got confused about what kind of bug it was. In fact, it was a centipede, and we were lucky it didn’t crawl away. I dispatched it and then took a shower, taking time to clean a whole bunch of gunk out of the crevices while I was in there. Of course water went everywhere outside of the shower while I did that, so I had to suck that up with the Bissell too. It was super nasty.

Frustrated yet again, I struggled to get to bed for the night. It wasn’t entirely fair, nor was it entirely unfounded. It feels like another week gone by, and not much closer to feeling like home.

It’s just not my year.

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You Don’t Have to Go Home

Somehow I lost track of time this morning after staying at the new house, so I was 15 minutes late to work today. I didn’t really accomplish anything again, because I was preoccupied with moving stuff out of my office. I still can’t believe they’re just fine with cutting my space in half. It would be a résumé-generating event if I hadn’t just updated it already.

Overall the day went by pretty quickly, especially the morning. There’s still a lot to move tomorrow, and if nothing else gets done, oh well. I messaged Kevin on the way home to see if he would be up for helping me move the last of the big stuff from Summer’s old house, and he said he could later in the evening.

I stopped at Casey’s for some free M&Ms before going home for a little while to charge. Then I stopped by my parents’ house for some phở for dinner before going to the new house to find Summer ready to settle in for the night. I motivated her to go to the old house with me so we could prep for Kevin, and Eaddie went to a Tech band concert.

We finally got Summer’s bed apart after taking out way more screws than were required. I honestly don’t even know if we’ll be able to put it back together properly. It’s going to be well and truly rigged at this point. The whole thing was really just supposed to slide apart.

Kevin showed up and helped me take two loads to the new house. We got the washer, dryer, and bed the first trip. Then Summer stayed home while Kevin and I got the deep freeze, kitchen table, and a couple other random things. Summer will have to go back for a little more, but unless we decide we want to bring a couple more cabinets home, we’re done. I just wish she had listed them for free so they could go somewhere useful.

After Kevin left, I hopped in to try the shower to get some of the sweat off of me, and I’m pretty sure it took a couple layers of skin. It felt like I was drowning the entire time, and there was no way to adjust the water pressure down. It was so high-pressure that it was difficult to change the spray pattern.

Eaddie and I chatted for a little bit while I did my stuff on the computer, and then I did my best to squeak into bed by midnight.

But you can’t stay here.

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Eviction Notice

I had a fairly rough night and morning, and woke up hungry, so I stopped at McDonald’s for an Egg McMuffin. The first thing I did at work was assemble another Chromebook cart for our own use, so I could give the one we were using to the library for checkout devices. It wasn’t much later that I received an email from the assistant superintendent that the superintendent’s wife would be needing my office next week, and that I needed to get things moved.

The front of the office looks better now, but there simply won’t be enough room there for everything we have to spread out at different times of the year. Time will tell, I suppose. We had a plate of mushy “tater tot casserole” for lunch, and some guys came to install more security cameras without anyone’s knowledge.

I left a little bit late and ran to the new house to meet John so he could quote me on another Wall Connector install. He suggested we might want to update the panel as well, so we may be looking at around $2,500 for that, plus another $1,500 for the charger. We don’t have time to dawdle, but we also still have to get the last of Summer’s stuff moved, and some drywall guys in to fix the ceiling. Nevermind actually having furniture.

After he left, I cleaned up a little bit outside and sprayed some bug killer after I found a huge trial of ants leading up the deck and across the side of the house. They were on a mission to get somewhere, and I wasn’t going to have it.

Once Summer got home, I replaced her shower head, and then spent the rest of the night feeling incredibly uncomfortable in the dining room. I just didn’t want to be there.

There’s no place like home.

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Regrounding

I slept reasonably well last night in the new house, but it was still a hassle to go home in the morning. I was reasonably early for work, and the cafeteria lunch menu didn’t sound very appealing for most of the week, so I stopped at McDonald’s for breakfast. Nothing remarkable happened at work, and things were mostly pretty quiet. I still kind of feel like a temporary guest there most of the time, and I don’t know if that’s a good or bad thing.

The electrician finally made it out to the house, so I had Summer meet him there to test charging. The breaker never tripped, but evidently he tightened some ground wires while he was there. I’ll have to get my tools from the new house to see if that fixed the floating ground issue I had elsewhere in the house.

After work, I met Summer at the high school for parent-teacher conferences. The atmosphere there seemed to be about what I expected with the current regime. I’d love to take a survey to see if anyone has anything nice to say.

When we finished, I got tacos and went home. Summer didn’t want to get back out to help me with bulk item pickup after she got to the new house, so I just ended up staying home for the night.

Disapproval Ratings

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New Digs, Who Dis

I very nearly called in to work today because I was still in so much pain from moving yesterday. Even driving in to work was a struggle, but I felt better after some coffee at my desk. Kim wasn’t much use to anyone today, and she wasn’t ashamed about it. She didn’t feel the need to be there if the kids weren’t, but there were still work orders that could have been closed.

Todd said Harry called him over the weekend with some trouble with his PlayStation and the internet. Since the school pays for the superintendent’s house and internet, I guess that’s my job. It really seemed like we had a rogue DHCP server somewhere after the trouble I had last week, but I didn’t have much luck finding it. I spent all day learning about that stuff, but still didn’t feel accomplished in anything.

I was pretty hungry by quitting time, so I ran home and finished my hot wings. Then Mom and Dad came over to look at my drippy refrigerator water line. We went next door briefly so Mom could look through Bác Vân’s stuff, and then we met the girls at Morelos for dinner.

The serving sizes were awesome, but the food was super salty. We ate, and then I went with the girls to the car wash, and then Walmart for a shower curtain for Eaddie. When we left there, we stopped by the old house to get a couple of things, and then they dropped me back at my house to get a couple more things.

I met them at the new house and tried to get a few things done before bed. Summer helped me move the grills around outside, I fixed the refrigerator shelving and messed with the shower in the master bath. Then I realized I didn’t have a laptop to take care of the blog. Summer had hers in the car, so I made do.

Floor bed