Tag: depression

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Blessed Graduates

I had a rough start this morning, but I knew I’d be working late and didn’t have a problem showing up late in the morning. Kim was away chaperoning a trip to Magic Springs, and Denice had people in the back office for meetings the entire day, so I was left to my own devices. It was nice, lonely, productive, and stressful all at the same time. I spent most of the morning tinkering with the sound system in the gym. I got it to sound pretty decent, but I still think it was hooked up incorrectly.

My daily schedule was a bit messed up, so lunch came and went, and the day was over before I knew it. The leftovers I brought for lunch had gone bad, so I went to the workroom with the hope that there would be some barbecue left. All that was there were lemon bars, so I took a couple of those and grabbed some “puppy chow” that I found in the front office.

As I got hungry, I remembered that I had a package of ramen and Kim had brought me some fresh eggs, so I boiled some water in the kettle and dressed that up the best I could. It was actually pretty good. Graduation went without a hitch as far as I could tell, and I was surprised to hear a student lead an unmistakable prayer, “amen” and all, at the start of it.

I ended up leaving with everyone else because I got into a project I had been working on. Traffic was stupidly slow on the way home, but it was just a couple people driving well under the speed limit. When I got into town, I got some gas and fed the fish. Then I stopped by Sonic for some cheese sticks. Their speaker box didn’t work though, and they didn’t have a sign up, so I sat there for a while looking like an idiot before I pulled up to the window.

When I got home, Eaddie and I went outside to try and see the northern lights, but we didn’t have any luck. Summer was fast asleep so she could go to work in the morning, so I stayed up a while on the computer before bed.

Ickier every day.

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I Have Reservations

I woke up before my super early alarm this morning with a shin and calf cramp. I managed to walk to my office so I could try and book some dining for Disney, and it was surprisingly a cinch in spite of the fear Julie had instilled in us. All day, there were still reservations available everywhere. While I was confirming all of that, I called a couple different numbers to find someone that could fix Eaddie’s age in the app, so hopefully that experience will work correctly now.

It’s been hard getting into anything too serious since I feel like I won’t be sticking around long. I still haven’t heard anything from Harry or Blake, even to say they don’t want to meet with me. Maybe they’re just both busy, or maybe they’ve just already made up their minds. Maybe I have too.

My parents wanted me to meet them at Georgia Carpet Mills to pick out some flooring for the old house after work, so I did that and then went to feed the fish before going to Little Caesar’s to pick up dinner for the kids. I had placed my order an hour and a half in advance, but still had to wait for over 20 minutes for them to make and bake my order. I haggled the girl for some dipping sauce, and she kind of gave me side-eye, but I wasn’t having any sass after their miserable operation. I still want to open a store next door called Big Brutus.

Eaddie had a house full of teenagers by the time I got home, and Summer was busy with work calls for a little while. My parents stopped by to eat too, and then Mom sat down on the couch and watched the entirety of X-Men Origins: Wolverine. It was a little warm in the house with so many people there, so Summer and I sat outside for a little bit to cool off after my parents left. I felt sleepy all night, but didn’t really want to go to sleep with everyone still there. The lack of sleep from the night before has made the day a struggle though.

Great, now I don’t know where anything is.

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Life Auditor

Traffic was super bad in Dardanelle this morning, but luckily I was early enough to peel out of line and duck into Burger King for a biscuit. Denice had visitors in her office for nearly the entire day, and Kim was in and out between personal calls as usual. It’s burnout city there this week.

I ended up staying late because the auditor needed some help in the front office, and evidently she was just continuing to work past everyone else leaving. I don’t even understand why she had to be on-site if it didn’t matter whether anyone else was there. She got super chatty, and apparently had to look me up after I had talked to her weeks ago because her son knew Julie back in school. She was nice, but didn’t seem to fully grasp all of the bureaucratic crap she was there to do. After I gave her any and all insight I had to offer, she started telling me her life story.

I finally made it home about an hour late, fed the fish, loaded up a few things, and found Summer at home grilling brats for dinner. We ate our really good, no-frills dinner, and then I sat on the couch and watched YouTube with Summer for a while before everyone was off to bed.

Gary, Gary, Ben, and Terry

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I Need a Vacation

I had to go in early again today for testing, though nobody needed me. It was super slow and quiet, aside from Kim. I’ve been feeling the burnout as time runs out to sign next year’s contract, but it looks like Green Bay is hiring for a different position. I don’t know if one of the others left, or if this may be a new position. I’ll need to reach out to Gary to see if he’d like to talk about it.

I left after my requisite eight hours and made it to the old house to feed the fish. Then I got home and Eaddie was getting ready for some band concert that I guess wasn’t open to the public, or at least we weren’t attending. I changed clothes so I could go out on the Onewheel for the first time since my big wreck. It was much more difficult to accelerate since I was still feeling so much pain in my arm. I was constantly afraid of nosediving.

My only plan was to go to Arby’s for a free sandwich, but I stopped by my parents’ house to visit with them first. Julie and Kevin were there for dinner, and I had a little bowl of some sort of taco cornbread casserole that Dad made. I stayed a while just to visit since Julie was there, but then she started talking about a show on Netflix, and Dad mentioned having trouble watching it on the TV. For some reason, Julie was immediately triggered and started yelling at me progressively louder about sponging off of them and letting them pay for a service that they “couldn’t even use” until I finally snapped back at her. Every single person there just sat in silence while she continued to berate me for being a worthless parasite, so I just left.

I slowly rode across town and had to stop behind the forestry service to sob on a park bench for a little while. I only fell down in the street once along the way, at a super slow speed on a super small bump. My wheel just spun up and spat me out, so I laid in the middle of the intersection in defeat.

After pulling myself together downtown, I continued to Arby’s the long way, because I was pretty sure every law enforcement officer in the county was blocking off Detroit under the bridge. I never could see what was going on, but they were there the entire time I rode across town, ate a roast beef sandwich, and rode back home.

Summer made it home after a rough day of her own, and went to bed. Eaddie got home late from her concert and went to bed. I took some blood pressure medicine, and went to bed.

I change my mind. I’d rather plan a vacation.

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Twelve Mile Island

I woke up with a bit of a headache and made some coffee this morning. Summer got started on her taxes and was in the living room all morning. I put on some old Disney tunes and took a shower, and then made tuna pitas for everyone.

Summer wanted to clean house without us around, but most of the afternoon was burned doing nothing. I eventually left on the Onewheel and rode to the old house to box up some more small stuff. By the time I was done, it was late and dark. I rode over to Arby’s for something to eat, and then lollygagged through down on the way home. I picked up a Snapple at Casey’s and stopped to take a couple pictures at the new co-create place, the middle school, and the Waco Detention Basin.

I stopped by to see my parents briefly, and Dad was outside looking at the moon while Mom dehydrated shrimp inside. Then I circled the neighborhood a couple times before finally landing at home for the night.

I have scaled these city walls.

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AppLocked

I was actually early for work this morning, and I got my steak bagel that reminded me of the gristly mess that they used to give me. I spent the whole day tinkering with my Group Policy and task sequence to restrict Microsoft apps without causing annoying messages about things being blocked.

Lunch was a pretty miserable sandwich with two thin slices of lunch meat ham on a big wheat bun. The afternoon dragged on forever after that, even though Kim disappeared for most of it. On the way out, I loaded up some empty boxes to help move, and headed to the old house.

There was a ton of traffic crawling over the bridge, stretching from toplight to stoplight. I couldn’t tell whether something happened or if traffic was just that bad due to the eclipse. As I got closer to the old house, some old lady got cut off while she was flying down the road the other direction, and she nearly hit me when she tried to pass the offending car in the turning lane. I unloaded boxes and headed home to wait for Summer.

It took her a while, but she eventually showed up and took me to the Neighborhood Market for some things. We didn’t really have a clear plan for anything, but we spent some money. When we got home, I left for my parents’ house on the Onewheel and finished up the chow mein.

I called Mitch on the ride home just to check on his status. He said he probably wouldn’t be coming past Little Rock. Things were quiet when I got home, and everyone just kind of dawdled alone until we eventually all made it to bed.

Crap. Tax season.

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How Now Brown’s Cow

Summer went to work for a bit this morning, and I did my best not to sleep all day after not making it to bed until three. After she got back, we went to Brown’s for a late lunch, and had some great catfish at a surprisingly reasonable lunch price. She had a headache for most of the day, so we didn’t do anything else for the rest of the day, but sit in front of the TV.

Eaddie went out at one point to buy a new paint-by-number, but otherwise we all just lounged all day. I caught up on Jon Stewart’s Daily Show episodes, and then Eaddie and I watched about three more episodes of Better Call Saul while she painted, and then everyone went to bed.

How cudly.

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Slippery Dippery

We had some makeup testing today, so I didn’t feel super comfortable changing any more network configurations. I wasn’t super motivated to do anything at all, really. Kim wasn’t particularly useful, and Denice had guests in her closed office all day. I just passed the time. Slowly. With ham rollups for lunch.

I went straight home after work because Summer had dinner going. Eaddie and Eli were watching the new Cinderella movie while Summer barbecued chicken quarters. It was a nice dinner, but the chicken and green beans were both undercooked, and the potato salad was bland. I really don’t think she tries any of the food as she’s cooking, and then just sits down with everyone else at the table to find out for the first time how it tastes.

I put the larger pieces of chicken back on the grill and ate what I could, but I think I was hungrier after I ate than before I started. The kids left, and I went out on the Onewheel for a little while. My parents weren’t home, so I continued around to Ridgewood to see Grant for a minute.

Afterward, I floated through the neighborhood for a new path back home and thought I’d try the Waco Detention Basin Trail, which may not have been a path back at all. It also wasn’t dry. It was dark and completely unlit, and there was a layer of silt that I couldn’t see over the concrete trail. I narrowly escaped going down to the ground, but got a streak of mud up my jeans. I backtracked up to the road and made it home, but then rode over to my parents’ house to borrow a rat trap.

What I thought was a mouse yesterday looked a bit bigger on camera today, so I brought two larger traps home. I set them with some peanut butter, along with the little jar trap, and hoped I could catch something overnight. Summer was working late, but then I upset her with my own airing of grievances as she went to bed. I stayed up and did my load of laundry, periodically stepping out to listen to the rain.

bberry

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Unmake the Bed

Something sapped me yesterday, because I was sleepy all morning today. I slept super late and then got up to some black coffee, and I made tuna pitas for the kids. Eaddie asked about moving the bed again, but there still wasn’t a place to put it in the spare room. I don’t think anyone else realized how small that room really was, and certainly no one was super motivated to actually unpack what had already been moved.

The kids left every single light on in the outhouse after they got rid of the cat, and I had to send them back out to bring all the blankets and pillows into the house. It seems like things are always left half-finished, and they tell me I’m being mean regardless of how, or how many times I point that out. I assembled the little aquarium stand I bought years ago, and eventually got Eaddie to go through some of the stuff in the spare room.

Noah spent some time online looking for work. He’s been couch-surfing for a little while, which meant his truck has been parked in our driveway long enough for me to find the new tailgate handle we bought for him several months ago, and replace it. Unfortunately, Summer lost the accompanying trim screws that I had been keeping with the handle, so I couldn’t truly complete the job. With the tailgate more or less functional, we cleaned all the trash out of the bed of the truck, and took a tarp and some straps to the old house to load up my bed.

We got everything into the spare room and I started washing all of the bedding before I started dinner. Noah mentioned possibly taking Eaddie out to eat, but he had also been talking about trying to save up money while he doesn’t have a job. I don’t know whether he had considered the cost of food and smokes over time, but it didn’t seem well-prioritized. I reminded him that I had everything for burritos, so that at least took care of dinner.

Summer got home late and tired, but we had to have a family discussion. Eaddie had been a bit contrary for a few days, and mentioned earlier in the day that she had given our address to Beth so she could send gifts. I knew the adults would have to talk first, so Summer and I caught up, then brought Noah in to discuss his plans and expectations. Finally we brought Eaddie in to wrap it all up, but Noah went for a walk because he preferred to keep his conversations one-on-one with her, even though he mirrored our own concerns about Beth.

The family talk was kind of more of the same that we’ve all heard before. I’m a mean, old man that has to have his way, and I never compliment the girls. The floors are still dirty, and I’m the only one that notices the “handwash only” stamped on the bottom of the dishes. I wonder if I’d be happier if I didn’t care about anything.

I’m going to need a specific example of what constitutes a compliment if they don’t count when they’re in response to accomplishing expectations that were previously set.

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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.

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