Tag: cleanup on aisle 5

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Fired Up

I took the girls to school this morning, and Autumn pitched a fit when I couldn’t explain to her why she wasn’t allowed to have her car back while we were dropping her off at Dwight. I dropped Eaddie off, and then added a couple more details to my work timeline before going outside to try and clean up the back yard.

It was just warm enough for me to be slightly uncomfortable, and the constant bending over to cut down large weeds ended up making me feel a little sick. I’ve been thinking it to myself for a while, but I really need to find the motivation to walk on the treadmill for a bit first thing in the morning. Something just doesn’t feel right any more, and I can’t keep ignoring it.

Bác Vân wasn’t out much, but Doug was outside raking leaves out from the garden they planted around my house. I really didn’t do a whole lot of work, but tried to burn down the whole yard at once. Unfortunately the taller plants weren’t really touched, and the leaves just slowly smoldered across the yard. After a while, he said Bác Vân made lunch, so I changed and went next door for some kind of soup with pasta, rice, pork, shrimp, and at least a dozen different spices. She said she made it every day, but I’d never seen her make it before. In any event, it was pretty good.

By the time we finished eating, I had to get cleaned up to pick Autumn up from school. She said she had to go to the Navy recruiter’s office though, and wanted Robert to take her. I argued against it, but only because I couldn’t trust her motives. I ended up letting her go with him while I mistakenly took a return package to UPS instead of FedEx, then stopped by Walgreens only to learn they couldn’t print a return label. Autumn was still at the high school, so I went to quickly wash my car, and then caught up with them at the recruiter’s office right on time.

I wasn’t expecting a therapy session with a young adult, but that’s what we had. He didn’t strike me as an intellectual so much as a guy that talks to a bunch of shithead kids all day, but I figured he’s the best chance at a career path for Autumn that will more or less keep her out of trouble. As a 27-year-old, his parenting advice seemed to be, “kids are gonna smash.” In the end, I hope I at least gave him some background for the troubles we’ve had with Autumn.

From there, we swapped cars and I took Autumn home. Eaddie went to dinner with Gavin and some friends for his birthday, and then was dropped off at home. Mom called and fussed at me for not coming over to eat fish soup, so I drove across town to eat quickly, and tried to make it back in time to take Eaddie to a Tech jazz band concert. She ended up finding a ride with some friends for that too, so I just tried to wind down.

Summer made it home after opening the Greenbrier wash. Autumn came out for some math homework help, which was actually a nice change. Eventually everyone wandered off to bed, and I just hoped to crash hard after a long day following a night of restlessness.

Time keeps on ticking, ticking, ticking…

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Tank You

I got up this morning and started making some fresh refried beans in the Instant Pot. They turned out a lot spicier than I expected, and I think I need to come up with a new recipe. They’re not bad, but they’re just not what I ever expect when they’re done.

Suzanne texted out of the blue and asked about a fish tank, so I told her she could come and get the 55 gallon from Summer’s. She showed up about two hours later than she said, which pressed the rest of our afternoon. Summer went to the gym and Autumn took Eaddie to Gavin’s for a day hike. I ended up going home to dig out the aquarium hoods and lights for Suzanne to eventually show up.

Summer was summoned to Conway to chat with some girls from work, so I let her take the Model 3 for practice and fuel savings. Then as soon as Suzanne and Trent left, I headed to my parents’ house to help Dad mend his fence.

The fence was in pretty rough shape, but I guess Dad’s just not ready to do much to it. We pieced it back together the best we could, and left the gate for another day. I headed back home, expecting Summer to be back about five hours earlier than she did. I took a shower and just killed time at the house until she got there, and then we got gas on the way to her house before going straight to bed.

No tanks.

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Get Grounded

I got up this morning and grilled little burritos for everyone. Autumn of course only ate half of hers, since it had more than beans and cheese in it. Afterward, Summer made it to the gym. I should have left right away, because then I could have avoided Autumn asking permission to go out to eat dinner with their father. I felt like she was scheming as usual, so I left it up to Summer.

When I got home, I started pulling switches apart and climbing up into the attic to trace wires. There was only one line of Romex coming into the garage light switch, and it went straight up to the light, which then went to either western outlet. This confused me, because I couldn’t find where it went back to the breaker box. After some poking around, I figured the northwest outlet went to the outside light and then up to the breaker.

Summer showed up for a bit, and I showed her what I was working on. Then she left and Dad came over to help. We continued poking around the outlets and eventually pulled three unconnected ground wires out of the north outside light switch. With them disconnected, I have absolutely no idea how the outlet ever worked at all for charging my car. If it was never ever grounded, then it should have always failed.

Once we had that all patched up and at least reporting correct, we moved inward. Most of the outlets inside the house reported some kind of issue, either with an open ground, or voltage where there should be none. We did a bit of trial and error, but never actually got anything fixed. It did make me feel quite a bit better about doing the work ourselves, though. It shouldn’t be terribly difficult to fix it all ourselves. The trick is to not wait until it’s hot.

Eventually Dad headed home and I went back to Summer’s for the evening. The girls went out for dinner, so Summer warmed up some leftovers for us. When the girls got back, we had to get on to Autumn for talking back and sneaking around with Adam, who she took to dinner with their father. It’s clear she’s still manipulating information, but that entire side of the family is TA.

Summer and I watched a bit of YouTube comedy for a bit, and then I took a shower to get some of the grime off of me before bed. I’d love to get a good night of sleep for once.

Srsly, YTA, literally, no cap.

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Not Grounded

Both of the girls had school stuff today, so Summer and I had the day to ourselves. Autumn left to help at an away robotics tournament, and Summer had to get Eaddie to the high school for all-state band in Conway. She wanted to go to the movies, and we couldn’t decide whether to go here or in Conway. Eaddie thought she might finish super early and be bored all day, so we leaned toward Conway, then to go here, and ultimately not go to the movies at all.

I went home and climbed up into the attic to investigate wiring. It looked like both of my wall outlets in question went straight up to the outlet above the garage door opener. It showed to be an open ground as well, and I could trace it back to right around the light switch. It may be a super easy repair after all.

By the time I got cleaned up and ready to go out, Summer just wanted to stay in. I pressed her, and we met at Shell for gas before going to Colton’s for an early dinner. I didn’t think I overstuffed myself, but I felt super full the rest of the evening. We came home and she watched TV on the couch and then in bed until she fell asleep.

Eaddie ended up making sixth chair in the first band, so we were pretty pleased with her. Once they got home, we wound down pretty quickly. Eaddie had a bit to chat about, and then it was off to bed.

It’s like it has its own field of McGravity.

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You’ve Gotta Be Shirtin Me

I woke up to a call from Thomas this morning, and apparently the robotics tournament was completely offline with a lot of cranky people. I got around and headed home in case he needed a hand, but he said he got things going, so I started some laundry.

I finished all of six loads for a total of 75 shirts washed before I made it back up to Summer’s. I got a few other things cleaned up as well, and then Summer made spring rolls for dinner. They turned out pretty good for her first time, and Eaddie enjoyed them as well. Autumn was gone to a school dance for most of the evening.

As bedtime grew near, Eaddie and I decided to start Breaking Bad as we waited for Autumn to get home. She tried to stay out later after leaving the dance early, and claimed to make it home half an hour late because she fell asleep at Adam’s house. I had no interest in listening to her excuses, but our second episode was nearly done anyway. Then it was off to bed.

Absolute Parasite

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Fleeced

Summer went to work in Conway today, which meant Autumn left the house first thing to spend most of the day at the pet store. I reminded her to straighten up the house a bit, so Summer would be less likely to gripe at her for not having chores done. Then I went home to get some of my own chores done.

I only really completed two loads of laundry, but I rinsed my fleece jackets multiple times to get all the soap out. Other than that, I mostly just fought the cold all day. As Summer got closer to home, I started thinking about dinner. She wasn’t very hungry though, so I just went through Taco John’s for a bunch of tacos.

When I got back to her house, I realized they gave me an extra order of nachos on accident. Fortunately they at least got the rest of my order right, so hopefully it was extra, and they didn’t short the previous customer. The nachos were awful anyway. I ended up eating too much after all that though.

Autumn had picked up Eaddie to go visit their grandparents, so they came home after they had dinner. By then, I was cold and ready for bed.

No phone deals to be had.

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Kick ‘Em When They’re Up

Summer had to work for a couple hours again today, so I ate some leftovers and headed home myself. I did a bit of poking around the house, cleaned and sorted things out, and took a shower. It seemed like a good day to be a shrimp. After I got cleaned up, I did a couple loads of laundry.

It was a little later when I got back to Summer’s. I cleaned up some leftovers while they watched TV, and then everyone filtered off to bed. I made it to bed early, both tired and bored from a largely wasted day.

Kick ‘Em When They’re Down

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Bro

I squeezed in a minute late today, but beat Tammy by nearly 20 minutes. Thomas was apparently out on some (possibly?) surprise trip, so Zach set the guys out on some projects after Gary had a spiel about how the high school is being stupid about their guest WiFi access. I didn’t have to do any of that, so I spent some time in my office for the morning.

After a little while, I started getting phone calls. Kayla was still having trouble with transcribing her time cards, and then one of my old teachers at Oakland called asking for some help with a display issue. I kind of wanted an excuse to go back over there anyway, so I did.

Brody wanted to eat lunch with us since he was finally off on Fridays. We met him at Zaxby’s, and he did the surprised Pikachu face when he saw me pull up in my Tesla. He said he hated his new job, and had an interview with Ryan for a network engineer job in Clarksville. I guess Ryan didn’t remember having lunch with him when we picked up the carts from Bentonville, otherwise he might not have gotten the interview.

After lunch, I went across the street to spend some time with Kayla. She was still super stressed over the time cards, and Rebecca wasn’t really any help with her payroll knowledge. I did some more tweaking on the spreadsheet, and tried my best to make her job as easy as possible before going back to my office to send out the CPPC agenda.

After work, I stopped by to see the Ridgewood Brothers, and they had the restaurant ready to roll, with tons of staff everywhere. I thought I was helping, but didn’t realize they actually had an event scheduled that evening. I went home to get a tablet, but got sidetracked by picking up my blood pressure meds from Walgreens, and then cleaning up my new fridge so I could power it on. By the time I made it back to the restaurant, they had two parking lots FULL of people.

I went back home for a bit before meeting Summer at Arby’s for dinner. Then we came home and waited for the girls to get there. They both had to get up super early for school events the next day, so they wanted to stay close by for a shorter drive to the school. Summer watched some TV in bed as usual, and everyone was off to bed pretty early, except me, who was not at all used to sleeping at home.

Of course my refrigerator has a firmware update. How could it possibly keep my food cold without firmware?

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Fridged

I didn’t have as much trouble getting up this morning as I thought I would after going to bed so late. The bright sunlight probably had a lot to do with that. The girls all left for the day, so I eventually got up to some leftovers for brunch before heading home. There, I picked up a bit and made a path for my refrigerator later in the evening.

The refrigerator would be delivered to Ben’s house, where Sarah would be with the kids. He offered to let me borrow his truck to get it home, so I just went that route instead of having to deal with a trailer from U-Haul. The delivery timeframe was late enough that I knew I wouldn’t be able to get to Cabot for any meaningful time with Summer, so I just killed some time at home, and then went by Ridgewood.

Grant was there unloading a trailer full of wood. Robert eventually showed up, and then his father stopped by with a whetstone for the boys. We chatted for a bit, and I took him for a ride around town in the Model 3, which he enjoyed. I was glad I got to see him after such a long while.

My last stop before leaving town was McDonald’s for a new Smokey Quarter Pounder BLT with Cheese, which was actually quite delicious. The couple at the table next to me marveled at how good their food was too, but I was pretty sure it was just because someone from upper management was there.

I beat Ben home by just a few minutes, and Sarah came out to chat when she heard me pull up. The kids came out, and Ben and I got straight to loading the refrigerator into his truck. We absolutely could not lift it off of the ground and into the bed, so we ended up just laying it on its front side for the ride.

After we loaded up, I let Ben drive my car and we gave the two youngest a ride around town. Then I took Sarah and Eli for a quick jaunt before coming back to deliver the refrigerator at my house. Dad arrived with perfect timing, and we tore right into it. It would barely fit even without the packaging still on it, and we even had to take my front door off its hinges to get the fridge in. David walked over from next door and offered a dolly, but I didn’t think it would be quite as good as using the straps and harness.

I didn’t get a chance to inspect for any scuffing from bringing it inside, but I’m really hopeful that it turned out fine. At least we removed everything sharp from the doorframe. I had to leave the garage in a mess and get back to Ben as quickly as possible, so I took off as soon as we got the fridge into the house. The whole process took nearly an hour.

I topped off the gas tank and picked up a couple blueberry muffin KIT KATs that I saw in the gas station. Then Ben and I chatted for a surprisingly long time once I got there. When I made my way home for the evening, I decided to go straight to Summer’s to stay with the girls. I knew I didn’t want to stay up late cleaning out the garage again, though I still stayed up late trying to help Eaddie with homework. Autumn was in our bed, so I had to kick her out. Otherwise I made it to bed as close to midnight as I could.

Under Compressor!

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Stuffed Crabby

I woke up feeling quite a bit better this morning, after struggling with a full belly all night. There was just too much good food all day long. I got everything packed up and ready to go, but struggled to get out before 8:30, so I ended up skipping the first session. I figured they should have been recorded anyway, so I should get access to those copies.

I came down for the second session, and Gary and Greg were both just sitting in the atrium. The session I wanted to attend was actually held out there, since the guy had too much trouble keeping warm in the designated room yesterday. I didn’t think it was bad, but I think he may have been stuck under an air vent at the front of the room.

After that session, we decided to skip out on the keynote and lunch. I forgot that they usually have drawings for prizes, otherwise I might have protested a bit. We stopped in Conway so Gary could get an oil change and a carwash. While we waited for a quick detail, I took us back across town to Chipotle. I don’t think Greg was too impressed after the sticker shock, but Gary and I enjoyed it. When we got back to Splash, Summer convinced me to wait 15 minutes for her to get off work and ride back with her.

Nearly an hour later, we finally left and ran into some really heavy traffic due to a wreck right on the interstate. We made it home though, and Summer went to the gym while I went down into the shop to see how the week went. One of our new guys started that morning, and I just briefly met him on our way out for the day.

I went home to unpack, and then struggled with Summer to communicate that we should move some money around for Monday. I ended up meeting her at Centennial to try and withdraw cash, but they said they didn’t have that much to hand out. Frustrated with my explanations of what we needed, she snapped that she would just get a cashier’s check for seven bucks. I took that to Arvest, and was back out the door in mere seconds.

From there, I went home and shuffled things around in the garage for a bit. Autumn had senior night, and Summer wanted me to come record them walking onto the field. Somehow, Autumn convinced those in charge to let her have three people with her on the field. I was glad that Summer got to be a part of it, but it seemed like Autumn was only paying attention to her grandparents while they were out there.

As we left, I ducked out in a hurry and went home to continue cleaning out the garage. There’s still a lot of work to do, but at least I’ll be able to fit a car in there again. The girls went to IHOP after the game, so Summer was already in bed and not at all talkative when I got there. I waited up for the girls, and then went to bed once they got home.

You’re Not Getting It.