Full Price Is for the Birds

I woke up super stiff this morning with a tremendous ache in my shoulders. Somehow I’ve been sleeping poorly on my side with my arm up under my head, but I can’t ever seem to stay put sleeping on my back. When Summer got up, she stirred the kids and got ready for the gym. I headed home and messed with my one sleepy snail and finally got it to come out and eat some food after being sealed up for several days. That was a pretty good relief.

After my shower, I picked up Bác Vân and met Summer and the kids at CiCi’s for a BOGO lunch. They said something about national buffet day, but they had me at “free.” When Bác Vân finished, she decided she had to take Eaddie next door to Shoe Carnival, and ended up bringing her back with a new purse. When we all finished, we walked to Bath & Body Works for some significantly overpriced soaps. I had a coupon though, which knocked us down about 20%. Then Summer walked the kids to PetSmart while I gave Bác Vân a ride home.

I met them back at PetSmart to browse for a bit, but they were done by the time I got there. I picked up some baby crickets for the frogs at Oakland, took the others to their car, then took the crickets to Oakland to feed the frogs. Mollie had taken them home, so I had to just leave the crickets on her desk to pick up tomorrow. From there, I had forgotten to fill up on gas and had to drive back to the Shell. Evidently I had a pretty significant discount available, so while I trickled gas into the tank, I called Summer and had her meet me there to grab the last few gallons up to 20 that I couldn’t fit in my own car.

Finally, we all landed back at my house and played a game of Settlers of Catan. I thought I had the Seafarers expansion that would allow for all five of us to play, but it turns out it was only an expansion to the original game for 3-4 players, and I’ll have to buy two more expansions in order to make that work for 5-6 players. It was really tough getting everyone to listen to the rules, but once we got started they all seemed to really enjoy it. Even Eaddie got really into it, and ended up winning the game with an assist. We made one slight mistake with the spacing of settlements, so by the time we finished we were fed up continuing to play by our broken rules, but we’ll know better next time.

With the game finally done, the five of us settled in and watched Bird Box on Netflix. It was really good, really suspenseful, and perhaps a little too terrifying for the littlest. About two thirds of the way through, she gave up and went to the other room to play on her phone. The rest of us really enjoyed it though, and it’ll be interesting to hear in the morning if anyone has nightmares over it tonight. I think they likely pushed all of that out of their heads with their Mario Party as Summer and I went to bed.

Yes. It is exactly like tic-tac-toe.

Recreational Frustration

Summer took the kids home this morning and I eventually got around to doing some last minute deal hunting. First up was Shoe Carnival where they had advertised a free $10 gift card with the purchase of a $50 gift card. I couldn’t find any terms anywhere online, so I had to go to the store and read a sign that the bonus gift card would only be valid for a couple weeks, which made this one a bust for me.

Next I went to Walmart to hunt down an old, discontinued SKU for a Google Home Mini and Chromecast bundle. They had several of the newer SKU boxes in stock, but I couldn’t find any of the old cheap ones. The place was a zoo, but I managed to make it around to the groceries for a few things I needed before I left.

The last stop was Taco Bell to spend my last $5 bonus gift card before it turned into a pumpkin overnight. I just sat and decompressed over a taco salad before making my way up to Summer’s.

When I got there, she was baking cookies for the kids to decorate. Eaddie didn’t make as much of a mess as I expected her to, and we all had a good time. I made a Patrick starfish and a Thanos.

After the cookies, they all played Super Mario Party while I fought with trying to set parental management on Eaddie’s iPhone. It was super frustrating that we weren’t there to set it up properly from the beginning, and none of them really paid close enough attention to anything to really use it to its full potential. I eventually just gave up and played some Overcooked 2 with the others. That game stressed us all out, but I think Summer got it the worst. Eaddie was tired and useless. Autumn was the same, though less annoying about it.

Eventually the girls settled in and we called it a night. I played Breath of the Wild for way too long before I gave in to sleep.

You’re gonna sit down and have fun whether you like it or not!

TISTAAFL

I spent most of the morning working on a Google Form for Oakland. Then Ronda messaged me to ask if I could pick their lunch order up because they wouldn’t have a chance to get out today. I ran by Stoby’s for them, then went to Taco Bell for a free lunch myself. I figure I’ve got at least a couple more free meals there before the gift card offer expires.

The afternoon was a bit rough because I didn’t feel super well, but I made it. I went to my parents’ house for some leftover curry for dinner, then went home and messed with the betta for a while. Eventually I loaded up Zelda and finished another temple before bed.

Looks like they’ve been recalled for being too explody!

The Gift Card Investment Plan

Summer and Autumn slept in this morning, but luckily Summer jumped out of bed in time to get her up and out to the school for their quiz bowl trip. I tried not to sleep too late, but Eaddie still beat me to the living room. She wanted cereal for breakfast, but we didn’t have any milk, so I took the opportunity to try and pick up some Nintendo eShop gift cards that were on sale at the Dollar General right up the road. I must have looked like some kind of fool getting $200 worth of Nintendo gift cards, but I only paid $170, so the joke was on them. I did make a mistake though, and tried to scratch the first card with a metal file, and it chewed right through the ink on the paper. Luckily I called Nintendo, and after speaking with a couple guys, they were able to confirm the validity of the card and applied it to my account for me.

After Eaddie and I had some cereal, I messed around on the Switch some more while she watched Legends of Tomorrow. Eventually I had to find a way to convince her that she probably didn’t take a shower last night, and that she definitely needed to take one today. It took some effort, but I eventually got her ready to leave the house, and we headed back to my house so I could clean up. On the way, we stopped at another Dollar general and I picked up another $180 worth of gift cards. We should be set for some games now.

Summer was already heading back from Greenwood by the time we got to my house, so I warmed up some food for Eaddie and then jumped into the shower. Once I was ready, we took the bike to Walmart to look for a Super Mario Party and Joy-Con bundle. We ran into Ana with her grandparents there, but Ana acted all shy, and I’m pretty sure her grandparents didn’t really recognize me. We continued on to the electronics, and luckily there were still three copies of the game, so I limited myself to just the one and we headed on to Summer’s house so the girls could pack bags for their stay with their father.

Hannah and Dylan wanted to meet us at Chili’s for dinner, so Summer took a shower and we both drove to meet up with them. My food was pretty good, but cold. Summer said she liked hers, but the other two both wanted to send their sirloins back to the grill. We had a good time though, and I got Dylan’s Steam info so we can hopefully join up for some Rocket League or other games at some point in the future.

When we finished dessert, Summer and I headed back to my house for the evening. We thought momentarily about visiting the remaining three Dollar Generals in town to clean the rest of them out on gift cards, but she was sleepy and I figured $380 should last until next holiday season when hopefully they’ll have another sale.

Motorcycle weather in December, but you look at our air and our water and it’s right now at a record clean.

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.

Harry Potter and the Prequel about a Book

The girls beat us out of bed this morning. Summer started on breakfast, and I grew my colony on Oxygen Not Included. After we ate and Summer got some chores done, she and Autumn went to the gym while I went home to shower.

I played a little Rocket League while I was waiting for them to get done, and then I went back to their house to help bring dinner back to my place before we all went to pick at Kmart’s Big-Karcass. We spent about three hours wandering aisle to aisle, picking up a few things. We didn’t get to cover the whole store, but I got hungry and gave up for the night.

We came back to my house and started heating up the chicken, broccoli, and rice casserole that Summer made, then ate while we watched Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Autumn barely touched it, citing a lack of hunger. Compounded with prior bickering about wanting to change the plans we’ve had for the past two days, she was left out of dessert, and likely won’t be going to the movies with the rest of us tomorrow.

Well, my philosophy is that worrying means you suffer twice.

In the Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Room

We slept in today, then left for Conway around lunch time. We were both pretty hungry once we got there, so we went straight to Logan’s and had their prime rib. Everything tasted pretty awesome, but Logan’s usually does. Then we went to Target for several hours.

First we picked up some clothes that were on clearance, and got a $10 promo gift card with our purchase as well. I was feeling super tired and thirsty after everything we ate, so we sat in the Starbucks/snack area for a while with an Icee. I saw Coylene walking up and beat on the glass to get her attention so we could wave at her. She stopped by for just a second, and then I put our clothes in the car before going back in to spend our new gift card.

We spent way longer than I expected in there, and just kept picking up more and more clearanced stuff. Then I saw Jonathan round the corner with his daughter, so I waved him down to chat for a bit. I hadn’t seen him or Dylan in years, so it was nice to catch up, if only briefly.

Once we finished up there, we went straight to Lowe’s to pick up the rest of my TIKI torches. Some of the ones there were in pretty rough shape, so after some haggling I got the girl there to knock the price down on some of them. Overall I was happy with how the transaction was finalized, and we loaded up to head home.

Back in town, Summer went to pick up the girls and head home, and I played a few rounds of Rocket League just to get one more golden pumpkin crate before the event ends tomorrow. Then it was a quick email to NVIDIA to try and return my two RTX 2080 Ti Founders Edition cards before bed.

The boys in the back are called macaws.
Because of their claws?
No, because they’re macaws!

Time Off

Summer left super early this morning for a quiz bowl trip, so I slept in until about 11. When I got up, Clint and I played some Overwatch until he left to get some food. I took the time to remote in to work to try and turn the bell system time back an hour for daylight saving time. It took me a couple hours to figure out something stupid, but it’s done and it’s documented now.

I spotted some TIKI torches on sale at Lowe’s online, so I bought out all of the Russellville and Conway stores and arranged for local pickup. Conway eventually got back to me when my order was ready for pickup, but Russellville never did. Everything was still showing available online, so I placed the order again thinking that maybe it was just a mistake.

Once Summer got back home, we went to the local store to see what was up. The girl that helped me said they normally contact the customer if something goes wrong, but obviously that wasn’t the case for me. We spent some time wandering through the outdoor area to find the torches, and eventually found them boxed up and ready to go into off-season storage. Some other lady had bought out all of the fuel I ordered, but at least I got my eight torches. Unfortunately, it turned my two gift cards into four gift cards once it was all said and done. We ran into Dale and Neletta while we were there and chatted for a little bit before loading up.

Mom made bún bò Huế for dinner, and I brought the TIKI torches in for them to use. We got lucky because they matched the exact same model that Dad picked up last year, so now we can set the whole back yard on fire in style.

After dinner, we came back home and I played some Rocket League with some of the guys I don’t play with very often until bedtime.

If I could turn back time… If I could find a way…