Tag: anger management

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Closet Racism

Jason was supposed to spend half the day with me “in the field,” but he ended up having me cover his campus for testing instead while he went to work on some of Allen’s stuff. Just as we were discussing that, our usual Dell service tech showed up to replace a power cable in one of my teacher’s computers. I took him over to Oakland and walked him all the way to the back of the building, panting and wheezing. Luckily she was super nice about the random, unexpected interruption, and I took her computer to a nearby closet for service.

As we situated ourselves, the tech learn-ed me about the “Vietnamese Squat” he had to perform to sit in the unusually small elementary school chair. I commented back that yes, my Vietnamese mother had spent many a night squatted over a giant bowl of egg roll ingredients. From then on, it was mostly comments about how the white man had wronged people like the Indians. It was still less awkward than the OSHA presenter that joked about submitting a new hazard pictogram of a guy with a turban to warn of explosive chemicals.

I spent the rest of the morning trying to wipe Summer’s mother’s iPad that she had activation locked, since I had to sit around to babysit testing anyway. A big group of us went to Mulan’s for lunch, and then I eventually made it to the junior high to close a few work orders.

After work, I ran home to get a few things before heading to Summer’s for dinner. She made chicken salads, but we didn’t quite get to eat before her mother showed up to retrieve her iPad and finish the unlock process. I was really impressed with the proximity setup process, and even the camera authentication that would normally show a QR code was made to look more stylized and futuristic. You know, I disagree with Apple on many counts… But you cannot deny they’ve got style.

When everyone finished eating and acting up, we managed to quiet everyone down for the first half of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Evidently Noah watched it recently, and he was upset that Summer decided to stop us right before The Tale of Sir Lancelot.

Why can’t you guys settle down and obsess over your repressed depression like normal teenagers?

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Batting 100% of 1000

I’ve been nailing lunch suggestions this week. Monday it was Wendy’s. Tuesday, we had Mexican. Wednesday was Asian. Today, a huge group of us went to Firehouse. It was super cold for being bike-riding weather at the beginning of the week, so I think everyone just liked the idea of a hot lunch. I shouldn’t have eaten my whole sandwich, but I was so hungry and it was so delicious. It was totally worth ordering and customizing ahead via the app.

Since I spent all morning mostly wasting in the shop, I had to get some time in at the junior high, but not before having a decently productive gripe-fest with Gary while everyone else was out. Then I just closed as many work orders as I could before quitting time. I ended up two minutes shy of my eight hours today since Jason and Allen made me two minutes late getting back from lunch.

I headed home while Summer went to the gym. We were going to go to Ruby Tuesday while the girls went to dinner with their father, but he broke down and we ended up going to La Plaza together instead. They had all-you-can-eat enchiladas for $6, so Summer and I gorged ourselves. Then our waitress offered dessert, and brought us the biggest slice of trec leches cake she could find. I really didn’t expect to feel this miserable after it was all said and done, but here I am. To top it all off, I feel a pretty big head cold coming. I just hope I can kick it quickly without too much after-muck.

Unfortunately all of the CO₂ leaked out of my first paintball tank, so I tried filling up the other one. It may leak a bit as well, but at least not nearly as fast as the other. If it loses much more overnight, I’ll just trash them for a new one.

I’m so proud that you’re disappointed in yourself.

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That’s What She Said

I took the morning off but decided to work in the afternoon. I ran by Burger King to get Summer some lunch on my way in. Nobody else was there, so I headed on to Oakland to pull some old cable out of the ceiling in a couple rooms. Zach let me know that central office was closing a couple hours early, so I really only had to work an hour and a half before getting off.

Brice eventually showed up back at the shop and we ended up chatting for a couple hours about how terrible and corrupt and stupid the place is. Then he said the school board overturned the limit and hired him on at step nine when everyone before has always limited to step five, and we both just kind of sighed again at the whole “you can only get ahead if you know somebody” after he had gone on about how he goes to church with the district CFO.

I eventually made it back home and waited for Summer to get off work so we could go to my parents’ for dinner. The girls were staying another night with their friends, so it was just the two of us joining my parents for egg roll salads. Then we ran to Walmart to hunt for a big stock pot that I could use to cook up some apple pie moonshine. They had a cheap looking one that was super dented up, but they were only willing to come off the price by a couple dollars, so I decided to go back and just get a different brand of pot that looked to be of slightly better quality.

Back home, I got everything mixed up and cooking while we watched the last two episodes of The Office. I don’t remember where I stopped watching before back when the show was actually running, but I definitely know that I didn’t finish, so it was nice to wrap the whole thing up. They did a really good job of recapping the show too, to show how everyone had grown and changed. Now it’s time to find something new to watch.

I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.

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Save it for the Blu-ray

I delivered one more frog at Oakland this morning, then stopped by the shop for just a little bit to see if anything was happening. It was pretty quiet, so I went to Crawford to take a look at something Allen was having trouble fixing. It didn’t take me long to realize we were on the completely wrong path, and I left there to go to the junior high and work on it.

The junior high had their Christmas lunch potluck today, and I stuffed myself. There was just so much food. I couldn’t really even eat dinner after all of that. Everyone was pretty much just wandering around aimlessly because most of the kids were gone from having finished their tests. I chatted with Dustin and Haley for a little while, but then school let out an hour early and quickly became a ghost town.

I stopped by the shop again, but everyone was just sitting there waiting to be told to go home. We never really got anything official from central office, but Ben let us go just a few minutes early. Gary was there helping Zach look at something though, so I ended up hanging out until the usual quitting time anyway.

Summer and the kids were getting ready to go to Conway, so I met them at my house right after I left. The kids were hungry when we got there, so we took them to Red Robin for some burgers. Summer and I still weren’t hungry, so we just shared a tower of onion rings. Afterward we went by Sam’s to walk it off, and then made a quick run through Academy to look for paintball canisters, and then to PetCo to see if they had anything cool.

Finally at the theater, I collected my five comped tickets at the box office, loaded up on popcorn, and made our way to the XD auditorium for Aquaman. I wish they would re-cushion that front row of seats, because they’re starting to get pretty rough, and they lean back too easily. Then the theater filled up and we had a clapper/knee-slapper on the left and some guy that thought he was at a sporting event behind us. Neither would shut the hell up. Honestly I would have listened to the whole Pitbull song if these guys would have shut up. It was so annoying. Theaters need ushers again. I’m just glad I didn’t care so much about the movie, because otherwise I would have raged at the distractions.

Seriously dude, you’re going to the special hell.

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I know it’s Friday, but it feels like Ciderday!

We didn’t really have much of a meeting this morning. Dale finally convinced Ben to get the trailer roof vent fixed since it’s been completely shattered and leaking water since last year. Jason was incapable of getting it done, and I thought the 25 minutes it took them to completely repair it was going to make Gary’s eyes roll so far into the back of his head that he’d be knocked unconscious. It wasn’t very much longer until Jason couldn’t tell that his own phone was ringing, and then said he didn’t care enough about answering it to remember what his own unique ringtone sounded like.

I spent most of the morning working on the lunch form I started on yesterday, but ended up just editing the live version instead of creating a new one. That got me to lunch, when most of us went to Fat Daddy’s in London. It was raining quite a bit, so I was annoyed at parking in the muddy gravel on top of having to drive to an inferior restaurant in the first place. When we got back to the shop, I headed to Oakland to take care of a few things before catching up at the junior high.

Matt brought apple cider to the lounges, and I guess they had some other snacks in there as well. I actually didn’t get a whole lot done the rest of the afternoon, but I stayed busy with the lunch form I broke. I think I got it working properly before I left though.

Summer went to work out, then out to eat with Autumn while I went home to take care of the fish. I still felt bloated from the rest of the day, so I mostly read up on the Walstad method of planting an aquarium. When they got home, I went up to meet them and played Breath of the Wild while Autumn watched TV and Summer made deviled eggs for quiz bowl tomorrow.

Must resist urge to Google recipes….

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FailEx

It was a pep rally day at the junior high, so I didn’t start the day with a whole lot of ambition. I stopped by Oakland first to drop off the three frogs I pulled from my tank. Then I spent the rest of the morning in my office until lunch. I went to Wendy’s a bit late for a cheap lunch, but unfortunately the $1 fry deal was over. From there, I stopped by the shop for a bit and called FedEx about Summer’s Pixel 3 before heading back to the junior high until quitting time.

After work, I ran by Summer’s for a while to get Eaddie’s flute for her concert tonight. I stuck around for a bit to see if FedEx would show up, and then spent quite a while on the phone again to see if I could get an update on the trace. So far, we’re two business days behind, but that’s four calendar days without her new phone. While I was on hold, I chatted with a BestBuy rep to pricematch Breath of the Wild so I could use my $10 reward certificate along with two $10 gift cards to score the game for only $15.

When I finally left her house, Summer had already left the gym to get the girls and head to the concert, so I just took the flute to my house and met her there, then spent the rest of the evening smashing my head against the wall trying to understand why the Switch’s wireless is so horrible. Evidently forcing it into sleep mode gives you a huge bump in speed, even from an idle and docked status. That makes about as much sense as downloading faster while the console is powered off.

Nobody likes a smug plummer.

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Charade of a Parade

Today felt like Friday all day long. I had quite a bit of time to socialize throughout the day while having to move around through the building for work orders. Allen wanted to go to lunch but wanted someone else to decide where, so I suggested Wind Taste. My offer struck a chord with his newfound love for the place, so we both had the General Tso lunch special that was just killer.

The Christmas parade was happening, so we were released at 3, but I ended up sticking around a while anyway. Summer really wanted me to go to the parade with her, but every fiber of my being just wasn’t okay with being there. I got frustrated and angry on the way home as I encountered traffic and blocked intersections everywhere I went. I hate this time of year for it, and I feel like nobody really understands how much it really negatively affects my demeanor.

I headed home instead of finding a place to park, and found some warmer clothes to wear. It ended up not being as cold as I expected, or perhaps I was just dressed appropriately. I left to arrive just before the roads were closed and parked at Stoby’s facing the street for a quick getaway. There was a train parked right on the tracks downtown, but it backed out of the intersections after almost no time. I don’t know if they just had to reschedule it for traffic, or if it was unloading something, but they didn’t go anywhere. I made my way to the presbyterian church downtown and met up with Summer, who was surprised to see me. I was a little upset that she kept hounding me to go, then told me not to worry about it (probably out of frustration at me), told me she didn’t feel like going herself, and then planned to go without me anyway.

In the end, we were in a terrible spot to see anything. We were right by the road, but the floats were separated with way too much empty space between, and none of the bands we saw actually played anything in front of us. Autumn walked by as her father ran into the street to take a picture of her as though somehow being in a live mid-performance was better. She clutched her flag and marched ahead speechless, because that’s my luck. Overall the parking experience was less bad than I anticipated, but the parade was significantly worse than I expected. I hate them. I hate them all.

Summer was hungry, so we ate at Stoby’s before we headed home. A rollercoaster of anxiety and anger, followed by a downward spiral into madness for the evening. But I picked up Into the Breach for the Switch and played a tutorial round, and it looks freaking awesome. So there’s that to look forward to. I also picked up tickets for They Shall Not Grow Old for Dad and myself, which I’m excited to watch.

Pageantry is child abuse!

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What are the Chances

Janie freaked out this morning when all of her desktop icons weren’t available on the new computer I set up for her yesterday, so I spent the first couple hours of my day setting it back up for her. It actually went pretty well though, and I think overall it helped improve our working relationship anyway, which is something that hasn’t come as easily for me at the junior high.

I got onto a little bit of a roll and didn’t take lunch until about an hour late, and then just grabbed some super cheap Wendy’s to take back to my office. Kevin came in for some help recovering files from an old laptop while I ate. Then I hit a brick wall after lunch and just wanted to sleep.

Somehow I survived the afternoon, and dropped the girls off at karate on the way home. As I checked my mail, I happened to pick up a FedEx door tag up out of my front lawn by the street, and though it was completely blank and didn’t look like it was for me, something still drove me to look up the number. Sure enough, it was for me. I wish I could get those guys to ring my damn doorbell. It doesn’t do me any good to have a video doorbell if they never even get that close to the house before they turn and run.

I warmed up some leftovers and had a pretty crummy dinner, then headed to Summer’s for the evening. A call in to FedEx proved useless, so I’ll have to figure out a way to get the door tag to stick on my garage or something in the morning.

Why do I feel weird about accepting a free cheese dip after all that?

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Birthday Blunders

I woke up with another headache this morning, but fortunately I shook it off after a shower. There wasn’t much going on at Oakland, so I stopped by the shop to pick up some things on my way to the junior high. It was Ronda’s birthday, so I went with her to Stoby’s to pick up a bunch of lunch orders for those of us that were eating together for the occasion.

When we got back to the library, we discovered Janie’s order was missing, and I didn’t get my cheese dip. I let them eat and went back to Stoby’s by myself to pick up the rest, and the girl found Janie’s order immediately, but then told me the people in the back were “100% certain” they gave us a large cheese dip. I confirmed that they did, in fact, give us one out of the two that we paid for. She said she would check my order to make sure I was charged for it properly, but after driving back once already for what we clearly didn’t receive, I felt like she should have at least just given me the benefit of the doubt. It wasn’t until after I got back to my cold taco salad that I realized they also didn’t give me any chips for it.

Nearing the end of my meal, a guy from the home theater place that mounted our cafeteria media rack found me and wanted me to look at it with him. He didn’t seem to understand why we weren’t satisfied with their install, and insisted that there was no way the weight of the equipment could be held up properly in a wall rack. I told him we work with wall racks all the time, and that if the rack was overloaded, then they should have purchased a heavier-duty rack. I flat out had to tell him I wouldn’t allow an installation like that to pass in my home. I guess he works with a different set of standards.

A few work orders later, we reached the end of the day, and I ran home to pack up my NVIDIA RTX 2080 TI Founders Edition cards that I paid way too much for, and took them to UPS for return shipping. It was just a little over $40, which kind of surprised me. I guess that’s a fine lesson. I’m still not certain I made the right choice, and it sucks that my plan didn’t pay off better. There’ll probably be a shortage of cards closer to Christmas, and I’ll regret returning them.

From there, I went to Summer’s and scraped up some leftover dinner while she watched TV and the girls fiddled around. I had to head home for more laundry though, so I didn’t stay very long. Then I just surfed Cyber Monday deals into the evening long after I finished laundry. With any luck, I won’t go completely broke before I can find a new job.

People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.

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Get Lost

This morning was kind of slow because Dell sent a tech out to replace a power supply for me. I didn’t want to leave the shop if he was about to give me back my machine, so I stuck around. It didn’t fix the issue though, and in the end he thought there was a problem with the CPU or motherboard, so I didn’t even get to return the computer. I read up a bit on Lanschool – just enough to remind myself that I hate things, and then went to Quiznos with Zach and Sara.

I spent the afternoon at the junior high, mostly tracking down missing peripherals in one of the labs. It’s super annoying that teachers just let the kids do whatever they want, and I’m really only support for the equipment they do have, not the equipment they don’t have. They should never have missing equipment. It’s ridiculous.

Nearing the end of the day, I finally ran an HDMI cable for Matt and hooked his docking station to his TV. I couldn’t test it without his laptop, so hopefully it works right. Then the girls and I waited for Summer to get home from her trip so we could go eat at my parents’ house. We had to run by my house for some batteries first, and then we made it for bún bò Huế. Autumn had some leftover chicken alfredo, and Mom ate some seaweed.

I had forgotten again about my Murano service tomorrow morning. I never did hear from anyone after I scheduled it online, so I’m going to be upset if they don’t get me in. I didn’t want to leave my car in the freezing rain overnight because it would slow me down even more in the morning, so I dropped the girls off at home and then came home myself to clean up and go to sleep.

Can we just donate our tiny bonus to the PAC instead?