Tag: dog

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Pieman, Pieman

I got out a bit late this morning, but it didn’t matter. I spent the whole day poking around with my task sequences. I also started my escitalopram, I suggested a place called “It’s Time to Eat” for lunch, but was basically shot down. I thought I might skip, but then Randy wandered back toward my area and asked if I wanted to go to Taco Bell. Maggie overheard and wanted to go, so we all loaded up. As Randy was pulling out of the parking lot, he proposed Shotgun Dan’s. Nobody objected, so we met Kyle there.

The salad and pizza were both good. I’m always astounded at how much they mound the toppings on their pizza. Their lunch special for a seven-inch pizza and a small salad is easily one of the best deals you can get in Little Rock for lunch.

The afternoon was relatively quiet and short. I stopped at the liquor store in Morrilton, and then again in Blackwell because they didn’t have any larger bottles of pure grain alcohol, which is the cheapest way to wherever you’re going. I got home with a stomach ache that took some time to resolve, and then Summer got home from work and hung out while I took Muad’Dib out for a run.

We headed toward Casey’s for a free slush and ran into Mom at a stop sign on Phoenix. Then we stopped at Ridgewood Brothers where we ran into Grant while he was taking a smoke break out back. He ran in to get some meat for Muad’Dib, which he promptly gobbled down. Then we got to Casey’s and I got my slush. I set it down on top of the propane tank cage while I unhooked Muad’Dib, and forgot to pick it back up when we left, so we had to circle around to retrieve it.

We came back a slightly different way, but encountered the same group of people taking photos at the tiny tennis court by the bike trail. Muad’Dib took a bath in the basin creek, and then we stopped to visit with Dad for a while before we made it home.

Summer was on the couch, so I laid with her for a bit as she cried a bit about how nervous she was for her biopsy. I hate that I made any of this time any more stressful, but I guess the alternative could have been even more messy. We talked for a bit before Eaddie got home, and Summer went to bed while I went out back to chat with Eaddie and Muad’Dib for a while. Summer had another race in the morning, so I made myself a Dark and Stormy and got to bed as quickly as I could.

happy anniversary

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Irreason

My days are creeping back and I’m arriving at work just a little bit earlier every day. I did fairly well in the morning, and finally started tinkering with TFTP block and window sizes to troubleshoot my slow boot image issue at the office. Wouldn’t you know, I fixed it on my first try. I was able to test multiple iterations of my task sequence the rest of the day.

Maggie and I rode with Randy to Gadwall’s for lunch, and I had some fairly disappointing nachos. I did like the cheese dip though. I think Maggie said it was Mexico Chiquito, but then she also said that was another restaurant, but I thought it tasted a bit like Stoby’s.

I slowly lost myself in the afternoon. I got home and ran Muad’Dib to Walgreens to pick up my escitalopram while Summer finished making a pork chop dinner. He did great on the run, and after dropping my meds off at home, we ran an abridged version of our normal route to see Dad. Eaddie was home and we ate when we got back to the house. Then we all had to go to the high school arena for the band awards.

The awards took a while, because they read off every single activity in which each senior participated. Eli had a super long list. Eaddie’s was long, but not long enough to beat his. She did get one of the three big awards at the end though, which was exciting for her. Eaddie stayed out, so Summer and I went to wash my car and then headed home to go to bed.

happy birthday

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I Bleed Blood

I got up early for my appointment this morning, and Summer went with me just to get my blood drawn. The nurse couldn’t find the vein in my right arm, so she switched to my let and ended up taking it from my forearm instead of the inside of my joint. She got her fill, and we were done without another word. Summer went on to work, and I went home to a big, spicy glass of orange juice after feeling feelings all week long.

Eaddie and I watched some Daredevil clips until she got up to go to school, but she didn’t stay gone long. I don’t know if they actually kicked her out, or if she just decided it wasn’t worth her time, but she came home and surprised the heck out of me. Much later in the afternoon I picked up Summer from the carwash to go to Mulan’s for a late lunch.

I made it back home and crashed on the couch. The kids were around somewhere, possibly after having gone and come back. I wasn’t clear. Eaddie did have an awards ceremony to attend, so I got up and took Muad’Dib for a quick run before Summer got home.

We only stopped to see Dad briefly, then I saw Mark and his family out walking as we made it home. Summer was outside waiting on us, so I put Muad’Dib out back and quickly changed. We got to the Center for the Arts just in the to find a program and get seated, and they kept the house lights up the whole time for some reason. It was just a big to-do about awarding scholarships to the kids, which we’d never had to attend before. They packed it all in to just over two hours, and then we headed home.

Summer and I sat out on the porch for a bit to talk, but it a bit too heated to be particularly productive. We just feel stuck, and I don’t know where to focus our energy. I put her to bed and stayed up way longer than I wanted. I discovered one of her wine spigots had been dripping onto the rice dispenser, and leaked into the lid and down into the rice, so I had to throw out a handful of that. Eaddie came home after catching up with Maristella and talked to me briefly before going to bed. Tomorrow we’ll get to see how fast I’m dying, or maybe at least why they don’t think I have enough blood.

You can bet that I’d let you walk all over me.

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Costly Affirmations

Today was mostly fighting parasitic thoughts after a fairly rough night. An attempt was made, to be sure, but it was all rumination on betrayal and disillusionment. Summer’s been unreasonably supportive throughout the entire thing, but that’s not without problems as well. We did manage to have a pretty good breakfast of pancakes, eggs, bacon, and sausage, but I could hardly keep myself from staring into space.

Eaddie got around and left for church and Summer went to the gym while I tried to draw focus. I cleaned up a little bit, broke down some boxes, and took out some recycling. At some point I did manage to get a shower, and later installed a light strip in the trunk of my car.

Summer got home from the gym and did some deep cleaning of her own, but things got really tense when I called out her poor substitutions, like cleaning with apple cider vinegar when she couldn’t find any white, and leaving furniture polish streaks on glass. I never try to make her feel bad, but she just doesn’t seem to get things, and I feel like I’m drowning.

The kids went out for a band picnic, so Summer thought we’d have some old frozen salmon fillets for dinner. I took over for her and thought I’d steam it and some veggies over some rice. I couldn’t find my steamer basket though, so I ran to the old house and ended up grabbing a different rice cooker that had its basket. While I was on the way over, I got a voice message from Mitch that he was in Little Rock for work. I called and talked to him for a bit, but ultimately decided against driving out for just an hour or so before he had to go to bed.

I started the rice and salmon, then ran to the Neighborhood Market for some quick frozen veggies to steam, then took Muad’Dib for a run. We went backwards to avoid an old lady walking a tiny dog, which was fine. We visited my parents, then went through the basin and back home. It was a bit chilly and quiet out, which might have been more peaceful if I hadn’t already felt incredibly uncomfortable.

We got home and Summer came out to eat. Dinner wasn’t great, but it was edible. At least the fish cooked all the way through. I laid down in bed with Summer for a while just to try and relax, and I started to pass out while she was scratching my back. I got up to wrap up the evening, and then Eaddie came home and wanted to chat with us for a bit before we all went to bed.

Sold Here

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Toad Eye Four

We got up early and Eli came over so we could head to Conway for Summer’s Toad Suck Daze 10k. We got to the high school and dropped Summer off, and once the race was started, I took the kids to Sonic for a snack. We ate at the picnic table outside, then got back to the race just in time to find a place to watch Summer coming in for the finish line. We waited around for awards, but left once she found out she wasn’t getting anything.

I thought Randy was going to meet us, but we missed him. We went downtown early, before the festival was officially open, and wandered around the block for a bit. We finally landed at the Toad Dome where Summer wanted to watch baby races. The kids went to get a funnel cake, and then we all made it into the tiny bleachers to watch the toad races. They called for first-timers, and Eli got pulled up to race in the first round. He ended up getting a tiny toad though, and came in next-to-last place.

After that, we wandered down the block again and ended up having lunch at R&M Southern Eatery. They had a Cajun menu that pleased everyone. Eaddie got a huge pasta that she shared since she wasn’t actually that hungry. My gumbo was heavy on the rice and light on the gumbo, but tasted great. Eli had a pretty small looking chicken sandwich, but he said it filled him up. Summer was going to get chicken and waffles, but I talked her into chicken and beignes instead, which she loved.

After we ate, we headed across town and let the girls shop for a dress at Cato while Eli and I went to Dollar Tree for some snacks. That got us to the theater just in time for Thunderbolts*. I thought the movie was pretty good, but I wished they had spent some time explaining how they made Bob.

We left the movie and went across town so Eaddie could do some dress shopping for graduation. I got a pair of shoes to use an expiring reward, and Eaddie finally found some dresses at Old Navy. We headed home after that, and then I took Muad’Dib out for a run as the sun started to set. It was nice and cool out, so he was practically flying. We visited my parents for a little while, and made it home where I sat with Summer in front of the TV just briefly before she went to bed.

I want to be the one everyone can rely on if they make a mistake.

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Chasing Lightning

It was a bit rainy on the way to work, but the drive wasn’t too bad. Lightning rippled through the clouds a few times, creating a fishing net of light cast across the sky. I arrived fairly early and Randy was already hard at work with the domain controllers. I mostly sat back so we didn’t have too many hands in the cookie jar, and instead fought an issue for our Cenergistic guy who couldn’t figure out how to remote into the system I set up for him. He eventually came by the office so I could take a look at his laptop, and it looked like he just couldn’t save the connection because of rotating credentials.

Randy and I met Jay, Charles, Kyle, and Hunter at Cotham’s for lunch, and I think my burger was even bigger than usual. It was great, and I tried to impart as much wisdom onto Jay as I could. I was feeling a little frisky, so I almost approached a girl for him, who he was eyeing, but I figured that would be best saved for another time.

Randy left for the day after dropping me off, and with Maggie out all day, things were quiet at the office. Time got away from me a bit, and then it was an aggravatingly slow drive home through traffic. The kids had just finished eating some leftovers when I got there, so I took Muad’Dib out for a run.

We went all the way out to Casey’s so I could redeem a free slush. We encountered an old lady walking a rather unruly dog, and she pointed at us saying it was bad because her dog didn’t like it. Muad’Dib stayed right by my side with hardly a look, and waited patiently outside while I got my slush. Tracy saw me walking out and said hello, and I thought the number of call center throwbacks has been wild this year. Muad’Dib and I rode down the sidewalk and crossed over without any trouble, and I decided to swing through the Ridgewood Brothers to see if anyone was home.

Failing there, we continued past Kroger, across town, through the basin for a dip, and down to see Dad for a while before we made it home. Seven and a half miles, and he loved every bit of it. The kids were gone, but Summer got home shortly after we did. She ate some leftovers, and then we wound down pretty quickly. Eaddie tried on her graduation gown when she got home, and it was off to bed before the Toad Suck race in the morning.

’cause the love that you lost wasn’t worth what it cost

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Rawdoggin’

We had a mid-morning meeting that would last through lunch, so Randy wanted to swing through McDonald’s for some pre-breakfast. I rode with him and grabbed an iced coffee, and not long after we got back to the office, we headed upstairs to meet with a couple of Acer Premier Support representatives. Maggie brought Chick-fil-A breakfast for everyone, and then we sat through a bunch of training that could have probably been an email with the YouTube tutorial link. It wasn’t really required knowledge for me, so I was fairly disconnected and possibly a bit jittery from all the coffee.

I skipped lunch again, and the afternoon was for unearthing broken things. I couldn’t tell if we had actual replication issues with our domain controllers, or if there was something else preventing communication, but we definitely had issues communicating with the domain controllers. Randy ended up taking over, but that wasn’t what I intended. That sort of left me hanging for the day.

I had a pretty big anxiety attack on the drive home, but I made it. Eaddie and I chatted briefly while Summer was in the shower. They had spent the day together after Eaddie’s signing day and made Oreo balls while I ate some leftover shepherd’s pie. I was still a little bit hungry and got to craving some Taco Villa, so I ran across town to get an assortment to share with the girls. Eaddie had to leave for her appreciation concert as soon as I got back though, so Summer and I ate and then I quickly ran Muad’Dib before we met my dad at the Center.

We got there between songs by the concert band, and then moved to sit next to Dad for Eaddie’s symphonic band. I thought they did pretty great even if Eaddie thought they were awful. Eaddie and Eli both had surprise speaking parts, so of course Summer was stunned. She recorded their speaking parts, but quit when it came to the music. Moss composed one of their songs, called Grawlix, which was awesome. Then Summer had me record The Stars and Stripes Forever since Eaddie would be first in the piccolo line.

The kids went out to celebrate afterward, so Summer and I headed home and shut down pretty quickly.

Weep not for roads untraveled.

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Shame on Me

I managed to lock in this morning and had all screens going for maximum efficiency. Each answer led only to more questions, but that is often the case with so many hands in the cookie jar. I brought some leftover pizza and munched on that throughout the day, so I didn’t go to lunch. I just kept digging for our unknown domain controller, assuming that our problems were due to misconfigured DNS, and Kyle wasn’t able to articulate anything to help. I think I’m on top of something big, though.

The afternoon went by pretty slowly, but there were people through the office all day to keep things from getting too dull. Traffic home was horribly slow. Just after I got into town, a storm blew through and I could barely see ten feet ahead of me. Within my last mile I saw several large branches go down, and our driveway was flooding into the garage when I made it home. If I had realized how high the water was, I would have left the garage door closed and just run into the house by way of the equally flooded front walkway. At least the step up there would have been high enough to prevent water from coming into the house.

Summer was warming up leftover spaghetti while I ran around trying to direct the water from the driveway around the north side of the house. Eaddie and Eli tried to help just inside the door as I ran for things like the leaf blower, squeegee, and eventually a towel to keep from dripping all over the house. I don’t think there was any real water damage after that, and I got almost all of it out the door.

I ate with Summer while the kids studied in the living room, but she finished pretty quickly. As of last night we had plans to meet Shawna at Crystal Bridges on Sunday, but Summer said she backed out today because she has a new boyfriend with pictures to prove it. I wish that was more of a plot twist than any of us expected, but I just hope she finds what she needs.

Summer went for a bath while I spent some quiet time with Muad’Dib in the rain. I took care of some chores and then set up a new wireless microphone for Eaddie’s flute, which also involved testing out my old PA system. The kids played with that for a bit, then I cleaned up a bit in the kitchen before bed.

The sun doesn’t give light to the moon assuming the moon’s gonna owe it one.

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Two for Two; How ‘Bout You?

I went straight to the high school this morning, unannounced. That meant I arrived early enough that I didn’t see another soul for several minutes. I texted Jim to see where he was, and he eventually showed up after I had rummaged through Kyle’s office looking for some network ports. Jim and I went up to look at a couple of his tickets, and then we settled in the library again. I was there all day, quickly tweaking my task sequence to try and resolve the domain trust issue, as well as the driver issue after the OS deployment.

Kyle asked about lunch, and I found a place near us called Mr. Cajun’s Kitchen that everyone agreed to. We had one of the biggest lunch crews we’ve had, including Randy, Maggie, Jay, Kyle, Jim, and myself. Most of us got the blackened chicken and shrimp pasta at the recommendation of the girl at the counter, and it was super good. The lunch portion was a little bit small, but Maggie gave me her leftovers. Everyone really liked it, so that was a second win for my lunch suggestions.

The afternoon went by pretty quickly after that. Kyle came by to check out a possible DNS issue I found, but then didn’t really know what any of the forward lookup zones meant. I guess it’s an opportunity for me to learn more about the networking side since he doesn’t seem to have any interest. Jim left before I did, so I got a little bit lost trying to find my way out, but I eventually did.

The drive home was pretty raw and I got a bit jittery without anything to focus on. I took Muad’Dib out for a run to decompress as soon as I got home, but I cut us a block short to avoid some traffic. We visited Dad for a little while before making it home to Summer. She wanted to sit on the porch for a bit, so I sat with her there until she started asking about my day. That sparked a difficult conversation that we took inside, and eventually just had to step away for a bit until we both made it to bed.

Not me, feeling all these feelings!

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Alaska Dreamin’

An hour drive inside my head every day hasn’t been great. Between that and exhaustion, I don’t even remember most of the drive in to work today. I zoned out hard. Randy was back from his bereavacation and had a comically and expectedly foul reaction to being back at work. He confirmed my suspicions on the couple things I saved for him to look at, and then disappeared with Maggie for some meeting somewhere.

I had some coffee and tinkered for a while, but Jim needed some help with imaging at the high school. It was about lunch time, so Randy and I drove separately across the river to Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken to meet Kyle. The spice in that chicken was exactly what my soul needed to find peace for about twenty minutes. Then we split up and I headed to the high school to find Jim.

He had laptops spread across a table in the library where he was trying to image, and they would join the domain but then immediately lose their trust, so he couldn’t log in without dropping and rejoining the domain. I didn’t have much time to troubleshoot, but I had a couple of ideas before I had to leave to meet Summer.

I got through town as quickly as I could and met Summer at the Conway Regional Imaging Center for her breast MRI. The appointment was actually quite a bit faster than either of us expected, but of course we have to wait a few days for answers. She was super hungry after that due to fasting in the morning, so we went to Los 3 Potrillos for an early dinner. I parked at a hotel charger while we ate and got enough juice to get home. The food was good and reasonably fast, and I got out for less than half of what I normally pay in Little Rock.

After we ate, Summer went to pick up tickets to Eaddie’s graduation. I went straight home and took Muad’Dib to my parents’ house to see Dad, then over to Walgreens to pick up my prescription. On the way back, he got overheated and parked under a closed drive-through awning to catch his breath. I took the opportunity to return a call from Michael, who wanted to borrow some speakers for Oakland’s Dancing Through the Decades party. We chatted briefly, and then Muad’Dib and I made it back to our neighborhood where we stopped to chat with Mason for a minute.

Once we got home, I started hammering out reviews for Vine to get my ratio up. I’m almost at the point where I have to start unboxing things that I had stocked up on, like light bulbs, in order to give a proper review. That should be easy, but time consuming, so I’ve got to lock in. Unfortunately my lock-in juice appears to be causing some swelling, and I have blood tests incoming, so I’d probably do well to sober up.

That guy sailed away, man. He’s gone. Probably crashed into an iceberg.