Tag: anger management

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Constructing the Shittiest Laptops

It was really slow this morning, so I broke down and started pulling good parts off of any laptops I had in for service. Then I put all the broken, shattered, wet, and otherwise malfunctioning parts back together to make the shittiest, grossest laptops for shipment back to Lenovo for repairs. My Safelite appointment got moved to the afternoon, so I went to Wendy’s for lunch with Allen. Then we went to the middle school for some ice cream cake Charlotte got for one of her employee’s birthday.

Just as we finished up there, Safelite called and I headed to my parents’ house so we could have the repair done in the garage. Luckily it started to rain quite a bit just after I got there, so I made the right call. The repair didn’t take all that long, and though the crack is still very visible, at least now I don’t have to worry so much about it spreading. I went to the shop for a little while to check out some toothpaste Oreos that Melinda brought. I think Gary was the only one to be had with that prank. I wish I had gone to get some regular Oreos before I got there, so I could pretend to eat and enjoy them in front of her.

I spent the rest of the afternoon at the high school working on a few work orders that had come in. Then I managed to brick a Newline touch panel on the way out, which kept me there a bit late. By the time I finished up, I had to go get Eaddie from her activities. We went back to my house for a little bit before heading up to her house.

I started cooking some of the last of the chicken for salads and then we all pretty well called it a night.

Quiet contemplation over Gravity

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Taco Boat It

I slept in as long as I could this morning, then laid around all day in various levels of discomfort. When I finally got us up and ready to go back to my house in the middle of the afternoon, I decided to stop by Harbor Freight to use a couple coupons, and then I took Summer to her car and went inside to clean myself up. She went to get stuff for taco salads, and made dinner for the two of us since the girls were going to dinner with their father.

I was pretty sluggish at home too, but eventually got back up to their house, and we had these tiny little flour tortilla boats that weren’t quite cooked. They didn’t have the satisfying crunch of a taco, nor were they as compact and convenient as a burrito. I broiled some quick nachos in the oven to spice things up a bit.

The girls came home as we were watching Parks and Rec, and then we watched a John Mulaney special while the girls finished chores before bed.

Burnout Season

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On Free Hosting

Yesterday I showed up at work expecting a meeting and didn’t get one, and instead spent my day being productive with Brice. Today I did not expect much of a meeting, but everyone was at the shop and Jason was in a talking mood. He didn’t have any actual team-related meeting stuff to say though, and he basically talked about things with individual techs while the rest of us sat around staring at one another.

I stuck around the shop all morning, accomplished a few things that needed to be done, and then spent a considerable time trying to make my email signature look better for the Gmail app dark mode that was recently activated for my phone. It’s been a minor annoyance seeing so many emails come in expecting a white background, and I didn’t want mine to be one of those for anyone else sporting dark mode.

Just before lunch, I decided to go to the high school to get some laptops for Jason to take to central office. Zach was headed that way to look at some doors, so we just rode together. I got a couple more things done, and then we met back at the shop. He, Allen, and I convinced Gary to come along with us to Ruby Tuesday for $5 salads. The food was really good today, and Gary got a really good looking quesadilla. He seems to eat a whole lot of those. Ronda came strolling in with a crew from the junior high as well.

After lunch, I had a call with Jamf about my iPad Pro again. This was the second or third tier of support, and the guy was super friendly and super helpful, though we still didn’t get the issue completely resolved before we were let off work at 3:30. I got home closer to 4 and trimmed the shrimp tank some more. I wanted to sit down and play some games again, but I just kind of zoned out watching the tank. It really has become my zen place.

When Summer got home, I left to get some gas and met the girls at their house for dinner. The girls went to bed pretty early, and then Summer and I watched two more episodes of Battlestar Galactica. With only two more left to watch, I’ll have to dig into the extra content that was added to that universe over the years. I know there are a bunch of webisodes as well as a couple really long special features.

To end the evening, I sat down to write this blog entry when I found my site had been turned off again for overuse of system resources. That still doesn’t seem possible, but I figured I’d gotten enough out of 000webhost for free. I don’t mind so much upgrading to some paid hosting, even for a do-nothing site that I maintain for my own entertainment. The migration to Hostinger was relatively smooth, and at a buck a month it’s really not bad for a four-year term.

The shape of dreams half-remembered. Slip the surly bonds of Earth and touch the face of perfection.

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Crew Crumbs

There were only four of us at work today, so Zach took the role as leader to point us at Jason’s list of duties on the board. He sent Allen to do work orders and Brice to try and update a touch panel’s firmware while he and I stripped and rebuilt a large charging cart. We got about halfway through stripping it when Brice got back and helped us finish. Then when Brice went to get the second cart, we realized that the first cart could have been left as it was with the old chargers, because we needed one of each for old and new chargers.

With that major flub out of the way, Brice and I left for Oakland to swap his faulty touch panel. On a whim, I turned the old one on and we couldn’t get it to fail again, so we ended up not replacing it. We got the new firmware to install by reading the instructions, and then we met Zach and Allen at Brangus for lunch.

After lunch, Brice and I went to the high school to hang a signage TV in the STEM center. It went up without too much trouble, but then I couldn’t get the Airtame to talk to our cloud account for some reason. We spent a while messing with it, but never did get it going. Zach sent us home just a few minutes early, and I went to the junior high to wait for the girls to finish their activities. Once they came out, I dropped them off with Summer and went home to clean up. I’m pretty sure I saw a new shrimp spawn, and the first batch are getting big enough to see them all over the tank.

Mom had been boiling some phở broth all week, so I went over there and the two of us had dinner together before I had to go see Summer get her quiz bowl ring at the football halftime show. As soon as that was over, we headed back up to her house and the girls left with their father. Then Summer and I ended the evening with a couple more episodes of an ever-dramatic Battlestar Galactica.

Yeah, you point finger back far enough and some germ gets blamed for splitting in two.

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Pulled an All-Dayer Today. Pretty Rough.

It’s endlessly frustrating how much work I always have left to do these days. Then I go to the shop and hear someone watching YouTube videos a good hour before lunchtime. I spent a bit of the morning at the high school rushing to get some things done before my call with Jamf support. We never came up with a resolution, but at least I learned a couple things during the call.

Zach, Allen, and I went to Morelos for lunch, and then crossed the street to give Summer some lunch too. Then I made my way back to the high school to get as much other stuff done as I could. I ended the day dragging the ladder around the STEM center so I could set up their new Airtames. I still don’t understand why we’ll buy TVs for them, but not every other department. I file those under “nice to have, but ultimately pointless.”

Summer needed me to take the girls to karate, so I ran home for just a little bit before picking them up. Eaddie forgot her pants again, and fussed at me the whole way to take her home to get them. I told her it wasn’t about time, and that I had other things I wanted to do that didn’t involve driving all the way across town. Then as soon as I got to my parents’ house, Summer called to say that Eaddie had taken her car keys. So here’s me, driving back across town again to return the stupid keys.

Mom and I finished up some leftovers with some more of that weird, flavorless squash. I added a ton of fresh ground black pepper this time, which gave it a nice kick. After that, I started to head home but decided to go up to Summer’s instead.

When Summer and Eaddie got back from the gym, we let the little stray cat in for some cheese, then settled in for some Battlestar before bed.

to be continued

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Babysitting the Runaways

Summer started her leadership retreat today, so I was left to mind the girls as they did their Sunday chores. I figured I’d let them sleep in a while first, so I had some cereal and hot tea, and played some Oxygen Not Included. When they finally did come out of their rooms, Autumn informed me that their father was coming to pick them up. There was an effort to maintain control. Eaddie at least got up and started cleaning the kitchen. I think Autumn cleaned her room, since she shut herself up in it until their father showed up.

I left right after they did, and went home to take care of my own neglected chores. I did a bunch of laundry and some vacuuming between peeping in on my little shrimplets. Finally something I could actually be proud of. They’ll never leave me.

Dinnertime eventually rolled around and I went to visit Mom. She was worried about Dad’s contraption to feed the semi-stray cats, because it had dumped food everywhere. I scooped up what I could and went inside to have a pork chop. Then I sat with her until Eaddie texted me wanting to know when I was coming back. They never said a single word to me all day, so I assumed they were still gone, but Autumn later told me they had been back for most of the evening.

With the girls off to bed for school tomorrow, I slid into a hot bath and studied some plans for Oxygen Not Included before eventually making it to bed myself.

There’s no time for better precedents.

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Shrimp Daddy

We had a pretty contagious day of not giving a crap about anything. Jason sent every last one of us to the junior high to do a few things, and then vanished as usual. He did stop in a couple times just to make his presence known, but otherwise he was as useless as ever with an attitude to go along with it. I stopped in to talk with Matt about esports again, so I guess that’s still on the table. Then we got a few lines run and found another that already existed. They fed us chili dogs there, and pretty much everyone came out for it.

I spent the afternoon with Brice, first going by Oakland to take care of a couple of his things. We ended up sticking around the office for a while just to enjoy a Friday afternoon. Then we finished up at the high school running a video cable for a troublesome display. I didn’t leave with an overwhelming feeling of confidence, but I guess we’ll see what happens.

Summer had me get the girls from the junior high, so I dropped them off at their house because they didn’t care to have me around. I went home to clean up a bit from all the ceiling dust. That’s when I spotted something new in the Imagitarium!

I finally have baby shrimplets! They were so minuscule that I had to get out the magnifying glass just to see any detail on them. Some of the bigger flatworms rival them in size. I’ll never know exactly how many shrimp I have ever again, because this is just the first of many population explosions. I’ll need to get some other tanks cycled soon for my genetic experimentation.

Mom called me over for dinner, so we sat and had some soup together. Dad had already left on his trip, but left us some fresh banana bread for dessert. Then I headed up to Summer’s where everyone had pretty well split up into their rooms. Summer and I watched an episode and a half of Battlestar before she passed out. I’m super happy about having a long weekend myself.

Alone she sleeps in the shirt of man, with my three wishes clutched in her hand.

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Just give me the damn password, Bob!

I forgot my phone at home this morning, which wouldn’t have been a huge deal any other day, but I was expecting a support call from the sign company. I hoped he would call sooner than later, but I guess his day went by quicker than mine. I spent the morning catching up on a few things, then met Allen, Gary, and Zach at Wendy’s for lunch. Wesley and a couple of his guys were there too, so we sat and complained about our absent coworkers.

We got some new work shirts in after lunch, and I ended up spending more time there than I had anticipated. It wasn’t a big deal though, since everything I really needed to do had to wait until the end of the day anyway. That’s when I finally got my support call. I had just gotten back to the high school and started to settle in when my phone rang. I had to run all the way across the campus, and then spend over an hour on the phone while this guy remoted into our sign computer so he could show me first hand how little he understood about what he was doing. On the way there, I encountered a brand new brick wall blocking my path, so I had to get creative and walk around the stupid place.

As he started digging into things, I kept telling him to upgrade the firmware. He kept getting his head stuck on version numbers that seemed impossible, and kept installing and uninstalling different versions of the software to get around it. All I wanted was the stupid admin password, which he finally provided, and I could have resolved the stupid issue in under five minutes. Instead I was stuck there, unable to do the other work I had planned for the end of the day. We did finally get the sign going again, which was only partially a relief. The real concern is how long it will last until it breaks again.

That wrapped up my workday, so I headed home to change before going to my parents’ for dinner. We cleaned up some super old burrito stuff and I sat there for a while messing with my phone again. I’ve about given up on fixing it, and I’ve made peace with just wiping the whole thing and starting over. Next Tuesday is the new Pixel announcement, so worst case scenario I can just get a whole new phone.

Get in there, Bob!
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What Prompted This?

I had a pretty rough start this morning, but with an iron will and the perseverance of someone with a powerful need to eat, I was able to make it happen. Work started out okay, but then I got to my office.

I had just gotten into a little work order to install a minor upgrade in a computer lab, which seemed petty and annoying at first, but became fun when I realized how easy it was. Halfway through that, my favorite regular customer walked in asking if I had gotten her email. I guess she thinks I just sit in my office playing Minesweeper until a little notification bell goes off. As it turns out, work orders and emails are a relatively small part of my job. I fashioned a response for her and the handful of people she addressed, and made a mental note to proceed with my next troubleshooting steps for her at some point ever. Then I continued on with my more pressing matters.

The rest of the morning went by pretty quickly. I texted Allen to reserve a lunch date at Taco Bell for a Toasted Cheddar Chalupa before they went out of fashion. When we got there, we felt encouraged by the marquis advertising the object of our yearning. Even the Taco Bell app was working just as it should. Things couldn’t be better. I had just selected the $6 box for my order when the girl at the counter told Allen that they no longer carried the toasty, cheddary treat. With that, I sat down and ate the saddest bean burrito I’d ever eaten.

When we got back to the shop, I spent a little time there on my iPad Pro again, with no additional luck. I ended up back at the PAC to try and downgrade the sign software, but got stuck again when the support rep refused to provide the password for the hardware we purchased. School let out just as I gave up, so I had to ride through that traffic to get to the other side of the building to my office. I wrapped up a couple more work orders to finish the day, then finally made the call for my vision exam.

The later it gets in the year and the more I read about what my EyeMed benefits actually are, the more upset I get over having waited so long, and also having purchased the insurance at all. It seems like a complete sham to have a provider that only has three local providers in their network, especially when one of them is the CFO’s wife, and another has a 2.7 star rating on Google Maps. I half expect them to poke me in the eye with a sharp stick and tell me I’ll just have to be blind for the rest of my life. I wonder if my insurance will even cover a sterile stick.

I didn’t have much time at home before I had to get Eaddie from her after school activities. We headed up to her house and killed most of the time until Summer got back with Autumn. I cooked some chicken strips for salads, then burned the rest of the evening fighting Google systems and their sign-in prompts. I should be able to get a two-factor authentication prompt on my phone, but it’s been broken for what feels like forever. I’ve reset more things, more times than I can count, and I’m just sick of it.

I took a break to watch an episode of Battlestar Galactica with Summer, and ended my night in another disappointment without my prompts.

Well, this is embarrassing.

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Blockin’ out the Scenery, Breakin’ My Mind

It was quite chilly out this morning. My fingers felt the sting of the autumn air on my ride in to work. I got out of the teens on my work order count, not counting any of the 1:1 laptop stuff, so I felt pretty good about it. I got a response back from 000webhost about my site and got the suspension lifted. The first thing I did was make a backup, but I have a feeling this is ultimately going to end in me paying for hosting. They’re cheap enough though, and the support response was fast and helpful. I’ve definitely gotten my money’s worth so far.

Gary said he was going to Tropical Smoothie for lunch, so I met him, Zach, and Heather there. I had a coupon, but it was “Pick 2 Tuesday” that got me the same thing for a buck less. The flatbread was really good, and the pumpkin smoothie was delicious and larger than I expected to get in a twofer. It still wasn’t cheap, but I felt pretty good about it. I couldn’t believe how busy they were though. The drive-through line just didn’t quit, and there was hardly any room for other traffic to pass through. It didn’t bother the bike any though.

After lunch, I met with Ben and we worked on the LED road sign. We were out there for nearly four hours working on the damned thing, and we really didn’t do anything to fix it other than reboot it several times. Once we got it working, I screwed it up again by updating the publishing software to a version that evidently isn’t compatible with our sign’s firmware, so that’s another call in to the company that no longer supports our sign. I have a feeling they’re going to just have to replace the stupid thing anyway, probably with an even stupider thing. The whole time we were working on it, I just felt like maybe if there was only someone that worked specifically at the Center on their very technical things, that we wouldn’t have to be out there. At least the weather was nice, and I even got some closeup time with a black widow mamma and her sack of eggs.

Once home, I spent a little time cleaning up before going to get the girls from karate. Then we met Summer at my parents’ house for bún bò Huế before heading home for an early night.

ESPORTS REGISTRATION NOW OPEN
J/K