Tag: dog

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Chicken Potato Bowls

Today was a long day of picking up the house. Summer went to work. Eaddie came out eventually and took a shower while I was running all around the house. I thought Summer would be home around lunch time, but that wasn’t so. At some point, Eaddie asked if she could go to her father’s house for the night since I guess one of her half sisters had a kid with a birthday. These people propagate like mint.

I warmed up some leftover mashed potatoes and frozen chicken strips for lunch, then continued picking up and organizing randomly until Summer finally got home. She started on some deviled eggs and then took a bath, and I took the dogs out for an early run. We did nearly five miles after stopping to see Dad. He was worried about the new fiber internet provider after they cut their existing cable line trying to run fiber to the house. I just told him to find a place to leave a negative review, and someone would probably reach out rather than have him fight with incompetent customer service trying to direct him to an insurance company.

The dogs did really well, and Stilgar didn’t seem to care about how cold it was. He still wanted to be an alligator in the creek. I ran them all around the neighborhood and then brought them home for hot dogs. I had several more packages at the door, which brought the total to four separate deliveries for the day. I brought them inside and Summer started opening them. I wasn’t double checking what she was doing, and evidently she threw out a bag that still had a watch band in it. That wouldn’t have been bad, except I had just taken the recycling out to the curb just seconds before the truck picked up the dumpster.

I was furious at her negligence. I picked up a bit more before leaving to get some McNuggets for dinner. I didn’t want to go home, and considered that I might want something more to eat, so I ended up stopping in the Wendy’s parking lot. I ate the nuggets, and then remembered a deal for half price Famous Bowls from KFC, so I drove across the street and ate one of those in the lobby. I dawdled there for a while and then got back in the car and had Full Self Driving take me across town. It didn’t get adventurous, so I pointed it up the mountain before having it drive me back home.

Summer went to bed and I stayed up late picking up the ceiling-high stack of boxes she had shoved into the corner. There was a lot of junk there that she had just shoveled out of the way instead of letting me handle it. I sulked some more before eventually taking a shower and going to bed.

Let me remember the ways.

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Newly Guests

Summer went to Conway for a run this morning, so I got up to take a shower before she got back home. When she did get home, she said she decided to subscribe to the monthly Full Self Driving for me for Christmas. I felt like that was a fair compromise for her wanting to get me something, and me not wanting to receive anything. Even if I don’t commute in the long term, we can always cancel the subscription.

Eaddie got home a little after that, and we all got ready to go to Chris’s house for Thanksgiving. I loaded up the drinks and Summer brought her broccoli salad and some deviled eggs, and we headed up the hill. We arrived at a full house just behind my parents, and I think Julie and Kevin were the last to arrive. The only other people I knew there besides Lelan and Steven were Seth and Danielle.

The inebriated Chris gave a little speech and then we all got to eating. We found the proper dining room table and crowded around that with some other strangers. Julie got into a fight over Disney Adults with the one small, loud-mouthed child that showed up. It was a fine time.

After we ate, Lelan was making rounds and stopped by to talk. I ended up taking her and Kevin for a ride with FSD. Kevin babysat in the driver’s seat, and we rode to the Neighborhood Market and back. As we made our final turn, the car took a left in front of a blind hill and then stopped in the middle of the lane when an oncoming car appeared. Kevin gunned it and we all got out to kiss the ground.

We stayed for a little longer, and then the girls had to get home. I took the dogs for a run before it got dark, and we caught my parents just as they got home. Then I spent the evening sending texts and submitting Vine reviews. My bedtime shifted way too much, so this weekend will be a treat trying to get it turned back around.

Like Thanksgiving in a hotel lobby.

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KPOT

Randy had been talking about going to KPOT for lunch for the past couple days, so we looked forward to that today. I got in pretty early again, but didn’t get into anything. Javier hung out in the dark with me for a while after Randy left for the high school. Then Jay left me to run an errand until nearly lunchtime. Kyle and Randy showed up and we all chatted for a little bit, and then we all met at KPOT.

I’d tried the hot pot at Linh’s before, but this was a whole different experience. Jim met Jay, Randy, Kyle, and me, and we got an iPad to order food, and there was one shared grill in the middle of the table. Then we each had our own cooktop sitting right in front of us for soup pots. They had a bar for making your own sauces, but many things weren’t labeled, and I didn’t really think it needed any of it anyway. Randy did most of the ordering and cooking at first, but then I started ordering things. My soup base was pretty spicy, but it was good. I wished we had started by just dumping all of the meat on the grill to cook, because I was left without meat for a large portion of the meal. I made up for it by the end, but then everyone got up to leave while I was finishing my last bowl.

I gave up shortly after that since I had to get home to launder my newly stained shirt. Pulling noodles out of the hot pot was unnecessarily difficult. Traffic was pretty rough, but I made it through Morrilton for some more drinks to take to Thanksgiving, and then I wasn’t home long before Summer showed up with some groceries. I thought we’d go together, but she picked everything up on her way home.

We got a couple new watch bands in, and I immediately messed one up because I tried to push a pin out the wrong direction. I broke a couple tips on the extraction tool, and was eventually able to pull it out far enough to grab the pin with pliers. The band looks and fits great now though.

Summer started making food for Thanksgiving, and I took the dogs out for a long run in a completely new path. We circled the block, then went up the hill and down the sidewalk. It was a pretty decent run, but they seemed mostly deaf to my direction callouts. We got to my parents’ house and Mom fed them a couple little tomatoes she pulled off the vine. Then we went around to the pond before eventually making it home before dark.

Eaddie spent the evening with her father, Summer spent most of the evening in the kitchen, and I ended up taking a long bath to warm up. Summer started watching Loki when she went to bed, so I finished up and headed to bed myself.

Cook more efficiently!

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Slow, Short Days

I got out really early this morning, and got to the office a few minutes before seven. The cold sapped the battery a bit, so I pulled into the shop to charge before going into the office. I wasn’t there long before Randy and Jim came in and took me on a ride around the city to check network connectivity at all the campuses. We only got a couple done before we had to meet with a Windstream tech to troubleshoot an issue. From that moment on, we were especially not busy.

The morning dragged on as we eventually made it to the annex and then the high school to move some more equipment. DIS would be coming in the afternoon, so the three of us and Kyle went to Larry’s Pizza for lunch. I’m still amazed at how they operate with such a tiny bar, but keep the variety of pizzas flowing. With the kids out of school, they were packed.

The afternoon especially dragged on forever. I got the car and went to Target to pick up an order. After I made it to the high school, Krissy showed up along with one of her techs, and I basically sat around trying to stay out of the way. Near the end of the day, I mentioned leaving before my phone died, and Randy just said, “bye.” I headed home nearly half an hour early, stopped for some beer in Morrilton, and made it home in time to take the dogs out during the last few minutes of daylight.

We visited Dad briefly, but then I got them home in the cold. I couldn’t believe Stilgar still wanted to take a dip in the creek, but he seemed fine. They got fed, and Eaddie and Summer spent some time on the couch watching videos about tornados. I did a little Christmas shopping, and then it was off to bed early.

Good apps can’t be that hard.

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Core Progression

I was in and out of sleep all night, so I nearly got out of bed around two or three and just headed on to work with the others. I ended up falling asleep until about four and just got up half an hour early, yet still somehow ended up a few minutes late.

Randy, Kyle, and Jim were at the high school core closet and had already moved the core switch and firewall. Evidently Gary texted about the network being down, even though they’ve been talking about this move since before they hired me. I helped route some fiber, and then they decided we were going to go out for breakfast.

The four of us met Jay at BJ’s Market Café and I had a surprisingly small omelette. It did come with hashbrowns and a biscuit and gravy though. Jay’s pancakes were pretty big, and overall it was one of the cheaper meals I’ve had in Little Rock so far.

From that point, we stopped by the annex where I started to tinker with the sign maker before having to go back to the high school where we sat and waited for Windstream to fix the stuff they didn’t have configured correctly. Around lunchtime, I went and got some Sonic drinks. I would have gotten a snack if I had realized we weren’t going to get lunch later. After that, it was a very long and boring afternoon for me listening to Kyle on a phone call with the engineers doing the fixing.

At the end of the day, I left Kyle to sit on his call while I drove home. The Full Self Driving trial was over, so I had to be a lot more involved. I did not like it at all. I really didn’t think it would be that big of a difference, but I had trouble with the cruise control stopping whenever I changed lanes. Around Atkins, I tried to fix it and accidentally disabled Autopilot entirely, so I had to drive the rest of the way to town.

Eaddie was out doing things on holiday break and Summer had already eaten, so I picked up some Burger King on the way home. The fried pickle Whopper was super disappointing. I shoved it down, but still had to take the dogs out in the pitch black. They did okay, but seem unaffected by the directions I called out. I really think I’ve just been getting lucky when they go the right way. We stopped to visit my parents and then weaved through the neighborhood to get home.

Eaddie was out late and Summer was working on her laptop in the living room all night, so I watched a little bit of YouTube after commandeering her cooking shows playing in the background. Once she went to bed, I summoned Eaddie home and then went to bed.

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Bang a Drum

I was surprised to wake up first this morning, but Summer wasn’t far behind. She made some sausage, eggs, and biscuits for us. Eaddie ate with us, then left for church after a while. I sorted some Amazon stuff and did some reviews, but apart from playing with the dogs, things were pretty quiet.

Eli came over after church, but then they wanted to go to a Tech band concert in the afternoon. Summer and I got cleaned up and met them there. I wouldn’t be so opposed to going if I had more free time, but that comes at a premium these days. They’re better than Eaddie’s school band, and I love going when she’s playing, but this just feels like too much extra if I don’t have the time to actually enjoy it. The pieces today were also super long, and though the students played well, I just didn’t care for one super long, super aggressive percussion-focused piece. It was not at all pleasant to hear.

The kids went on doing their own thing, and Summer and I went home to change before going out to Mulan’s for an early dinner. Mollie spotted me getting food and gave me a big hug. She’s back on chemo, and I guess that means she can go out in public again. I invited them over for a quick drink after dinner, but she said they had to get home.

Summer finished up some laundry when we got back to the house, and I took the dogs out for a run in full darkness. They did reasonably well for not being able to see anything. We stopped to see Dad, then made a short run home for hot dogs and dinner. I tried wrapping things up quickly after that. Some of the guys are showing up at five in the morning to start moving the core servers. Randy said I didn’t have to, since that would mean waking up before three in the morning. I have no idea what I’ll be coming in to though.

In the Air

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The “Ga” is Silent

I woke up at 6:30 so we could make it to a nine o’clock movie in Conway. The girls got up after I was out of the shower, and then we were off. Summer drove so I could try and order snacks on my phone, but we ended up ordering there instead because I couldn’t redeem Movie Club credits for online orders.

Summer drove stubbornly and reacted poorly when I scolded her for not letting the car move out of the passing lane. Then when we got to the theater, she tried giving up after one horrible attempt at parking. I got out in a huff and waited in line to order snacks, then had to yell at them from across the lobby to come help me carry stuff.

We watched Wicked, which evidently was a Part 1, in a smaller auditorium in 3D. I think we were there with only one other person. I accidentally spilled a bunch of buttery popcorn and had to deal with a slippery floor for the whole movie. I also got super tired and struggled to keep my eyes open for part of it. Otherwise I thought it was pretty good. I think I liked the live show better though.

After the movie, we went to Brick & Forge for lunch. Our server was super weird and kept wanting to hover while we were reading the menu. Then he brought our food out before our appetizer. In fact, that didn’t come out until Summer had eaten all she could stand of her pasta entrée. Eaddie liked her burger, and my brunch quesadilla wasn’t bad. The pulled pork bread roll appetizer was pretty good, but simply came out too late. I nearly asked for it to be removed from the ticket.

Once we finished eating, we headed to Kohl’s and Shoe Carnival to do some shopping. Summer wasn’t feeling well, and Eaddie needed to get back to practice before her rehearsal, so we headed home after just those two stores. I drove this time, and stopped at Walmart once we got back into town so Eaddie could get some body wash. Summer waited in the car, so we were in and out fairly quickly.

I took the dogs out for a run as soon as we got home, and they did fairly well. They got treats and food, and then I tried to clean up in the kitchen a bit. I cleaned up some leftovers, then had Eaddie pick up some dollar McNuggets before the coupon reset. She ended up going to get Eli first, so there was a bit of a to-do. I probably spent $10 in gas for her to get those $1 nuggets.

Summer went to bed, Eaddie eventually made it home and did the same, and I wrapped up late, unslept and aggravated from more general negligence around the house.

Some things I cannot change, but ’til I try I’ll never know.

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Barricade

I snoozed this morning since I was up late last night. I wasn’t horribly late after my modified morning routine, but I still had to make up a lot of time on my drive. That meant I burned up a bit more power, so I ended up charging the car in the afternoon.

It was fairly social today because Jim was in the office working on building a “gaming” computer for EAST. Evidently their one good teacher died, and the new coordinator is a coach that knows nothing, so the kids are no longer capable of assembling the computers themselves. Randy and I tried to help with some of the assembly.

Kyle met us at David’s Burgers for lunch, and I found it to be a better version of CJ’s. I liked that they walked around with unlimited fresh fries, but they just didn’t come around with refills very often. It was also $15 for a combo that was just a basic double cheeseburger.

After lunch, Randy took me on a ride to drop off hotspots for the food service people, and then we stopped in to see Jimmy at their little shack. Gary was out somewhere else. Not long after we got back to the office, Jim took Randy and me to his house to pick up some wood to barricade the core closet at the annex. The security folks called Randy because someone broke in yesterday afternoon, and he was worried they would be back over the weekend to steal the equipment we’ve been hoping to move to the high school core closet.

We used deck screws to board up the doors, then went back to the office to wrap up the day. The drive home was slow because of a number of stopped cars and at least one bad wreck going the opposite direction. I made it though, and had time to take the dogs out before dark.

Summer was already home and sent Eaddie out to a friendsgiving meal. I took off with the dogs and went the long way around the basin trail and to the roundabout. We got to my parents’ house just as they were leaving to take Nova out to Linh’s. I got the dogs home and fed them some hot dogs before having a burrito myself. Then Summer and I watched a couple episodes of Modern Family before she went to bed.

Eaddie came to talk to me for a little while when she finally got home. Her holiday break is filling up quickly, so we’re glad to be able to spend the day with her tomorrow.

Came in through the chapel and they’re
Gonna raid the server closet.
Came in through the chapel and they’re
Gonna steal our wiiii-fiiiiii.

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Just Watch

I still need to look for some more podcasts for my commute, because two new episodes a week isn’t going to cut it, and none of my streaming services are any good at presenting me with new music. I arrived at work just a minute early, right behind Jim and Randy. I parked inside to charge, just in case I needed to drive anywhere else in town.

It wasn’t long before I was left alone in the office. Maggie was off, and Randy left to work with Windstream or somesuch. I just sat in the dark until lunchtime. He called me for lunch, and then he and Jim came to get me to go to Cotham’s. We all had their fried chicken special, which was decent, though a little overcooked.

Charles was sitting in the dark when I got back, and I helped him re-image the two laptops he was given to deliver, since I wasn’t sure what they were named. He didn’t have a proper room number, but at least knew where they were going, which got me close enough. At some point he disappeared and Jim and Randy showed back up. We rode out the rest of the afternoon, but I didn’t leave early enough to get home before dark.

I had a ton of packages delivered, but I had to run the dogs first. They beat a 10 mile per hour average for nearly two and a half miles. They didn’t even care about stopping to dip in the creek because it was so cold. We just ran straight to see Dad, then made it home for hotdogs.

Summer was sat in front of the TV all night. I had a couple burritos, then unpacked somewhere in the teens of watchbands for the Pixel Watches. I had a couple for the old ones, and then many more for the new ones. I installed one of the two puddle lights I got for the Model Y, and then tried to get to bed. My stomach felt a little rumbly, and I slipped pretty hard on a slick spot in the bathroom, but at least I didn’t die.

I’m getting the bands back together.

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I Make a Penny

I’ve been bringing leftover Starbucks coffee to work lately, but having very mixed experiences with the USB heated mug. The Ember gets it hot once I get to work, but it’s annoying that the travel mug doesn’t work as well. We had someone from IK Electric and someone from Fortinet coming to set up some demo phones for us, but I wasn’t sure when they would be there. That meant we had a fairly slow morning waiting for them.

Randy had to disappear to deal with the Windstream folks, so I tried to lead some of the conversation with the phone guys. Maggie kept including herself in the conversation for some reason, which was annoying because it was difficult to get any more technical questions out.

Kyle and I met Randy and Jim at Shotgun Dan’s Pizza for lunch, and they appeared to be much busier than they expected, because there was only one server for the whole restaurant. She was struggling to get anything done, but at least the food was pretty good.

After lunch, Randy went with me to Central Office to “apologize” to Sonya. I expected to at least say something, but really he walked in and just started talking and never really quit. She didn’t seem very chipper, but maybe she’s just sassy like that. I couldn’t be bothered.

When we got back to the office, Randy realized his car was actually at the high school. We decided I could just take him back to his car after work, and we finished out the afternoon. I had to charge in the warehouse in order to get home, but it all worked out.

Summer made slow cooker chili, so I got home and ran with the dogs. It was pretty cool outside, and we were chasing daylight anyway. I was pretty frustrated when we got back, because Summer brought in Stilgar’s slow feeder that she had left outside. He literally chewed the whole food dish in half. I really liked that slow feeder, and I haven’t seen another one like it available on Amazon Vine. I don’t know how many times I’ve told her not to leave it outside. Stupid.

My new Pixel Watch 3 came in, so I spent some time setting it up. I didn’t love the color of the band, but I’ve ordered more from Vine. Otherwise than that, I spent some time on the phone with Johnny, and went to bed early.

My boss makes a dime.