Tag: family

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Number Crunching

We weren’t expecting rain today, but I wasn’t going out on the bike after those early morning storms. I managed to get quite a bit done before lunch, so I was feeling good. I met Zach and Allen at Arby’s and saw Erika there. My King’s Hawaiian Sweet & Spicy Luau Chicken sandwich was way messier than I expected, and I felt like the flavor of the ham really overpowered the chicken, which otherwise would have been really tasty by itself.

After lunch, Gary helped me wipe a few carts worth of Chromebooks at Oakland. I didn’t originally think of it, but many of them are going to be returned on a lease this year, so it may not have been completely necessary. I still felt better having them updated though. Our little $1500 box for mass enrollment seemed less good than I imagined it, but I suppose for a one-man show, it would help.

Once school let out, I spent some time trying to estimate how many hours I’ll need to put into esports to really make the program what I want it to be. Matt said he was trying to get me paid, so I had to really dig in. The end goal is to come up with a position overseeing it, but not coaching every day. Only time will tell what really happens though.

I didn’t have much time to clean up at home before I had to run to Summer’s for dinner. We made some pork fried rice out of some leftover pork chops she grilled. I mostly just chopped up vegetables. It was really good, and afterward the girls wanted to watch some TV, but I had to run to take care of my own chores.

Back home, I started some laundry and got my taxes put together. I ended up with a net payment of $37, which was pretty damn close. I call that a win.

Occupation: Spy

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Bumday

Our greatest accomplishment today was breakfast. Summer got up and made eggs, sausage, and bacon, and I broiled a loaf of French bread with mayo on it, which I divided into equal sized sandwich portions. The bread turned out great and had a perfect squish to it. Almost surprisingly, there were no complaints as everyone had something they liked.

The girls started out pretty moody in the morning but mellowed out over the course of the day. Summer left a couple times to do some grocery shopping and then to get her nails done. I spent a large portion of the day cleaning up my Google Calendar and Gmail. I did at least take a shower, and I think I successfully removed a couple flow-limiters in Summer’s shower, though it didn’t seem to make a huge difference.

We kind of picked at leftovers for dinner, and ended the night with a little Switch time and then an episode of Parks and Rec.

Oh, I didn’t realize there were things you’d rather be doing!

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Shazam!

Summer got up early this morning to pick Autumn up at 8 from her lock-in, and took her to the gym while they were out. I felt a little sorry for her at first, but later found out she went to sleep after midnight, so she gets less sympathy now. That’s just a normal amount of sleep for any regular human.

When they got home, I left to clean up and pick up Noah while Summer made lunch here. Summer had Autumn take a shower before she passed out, and we let her sleep until just a bit before we had to leave for the movie. It rained a bit on the way to Conway, but it was never really too bad. I tried to set a leisurely pace.

We got to town a bit early, so we stopped by Harbor Freight for a minute to see if they had something on sale. Evidently I had mistaken the date on the flyer I had at home, so we left with nothing and made our way to the theater to see Shazam!

The movie was pretty great, and in fact was probably the best recent DC movie I’ve seen. Noah didn’t like that reviewers said it was a “fun” movie because he didn’t understand what that meant, but I thought it was a perfect way to describe it. It was lighthearted in all the right places, but still told a story with some feeling.

On the way home, Autumn’s cup lid split and she got soda in her lap. Then when we got home and dropped Noah off, I did the same in the 10Box parking lot. We ran to my house to clean up before going to Walmart to pick up some extras for dinner. They didn’t have the asparagus Summer wanted, so we ended up having chicken alfredo instead, with dinosaur-shaped pasta. I spotted some french bread on clearance that turned out great too. Summer had a really successful week of meal planning and cooking at home.

After dinner, Autumn wanted to watch Coco again, and this time Summer and I stuck around to finish it. I still would have preferred to see it in 3D at home, but I guess I’m glad to have at least seen it by now. Autumn fell asleep in the middle of it and went to bed, and then the rest of us went to bed after it was over.

You’re going to burn in a very special level of hell. A level they reserve for child molesters and people who talk at the theater.

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Getting High and Talking About Our Feelings

We had a meeting this morning, and Zach kind of took over with a CPPC vote. The board approved a new position for an Assistant Technical Director for the Center for the Arts, and they’re trying to approve a pay scale that’s significantly higher than ours. In fact, it would be a raise for most everyone in our department. As usual, I felt the need to be contrary and convince everyone to vote against approving the pay scale. There was another issue regarding creating a new pay scale for another existing employee, which I also lead the charge to decline. Later we found that every other department except the nurses voted against, presumably because they don’t feel the “classified squeeze.”

Jason came in about an hour late and met me at Oakland to try and trace back some speaker wires. I’ve had a work order open for just over a year to work on these speakers, and I was happy to finally get some help to wrap it up. I love using the lift, and I didn’t mind terribly much to be the one up and down the ladder the whole time. He did seem to question my plan and process quite a bit, but I questioned them myself anyway, so even that wasn’t too bad. We got about halfway through the project before breaking for lunch.

He didn’t want CJ’s, but Dale, Zach, and Gary came out just as we got to the shop, so we left to go eat. There was a bit of a line when we got there, but that was only the start. We got our orders placed relatively quickly, but being last, my order got held up waiting for fries. It was about that time that a bus full of high school girls pulled up and unloaded on us. Brice showed up just after they all finished lining up, so he ultimately had to get his order to go. I got my food so late that I had to scarf it down pretty quickly, which didn’t settle too well and left me gurgling the rest of the day.

After lunch, Gary helped me finish up the sound system, but we were still only using the wall speakers and had removed the ceiling speakers. I knew I’d want to come back to reconnect everything, but they literally started having an awards assembly while we were on the stage, so we slid out the side exit and headed back to the shop. I stuck around for a while there before going to the junior high to take care of a couple things. I didn’t get a whole lot done though, because it seemed like most of the teachers even beat the kids out of the building.

I went back to Oakland to finish cleaning up from our morning there, and finally got everything hooked up to my satisfaction. I hate that it’s not a true stereo sound setup, with only a mono amp, but it still sounds way better than before. Luckily I also remembered to get the serial number off of the projector before I left.

I got home from work late, and Summer dropped Eaddie off with me while she went to the gym. Autumn had a band event, followed by a church lock-in, so it was just the three of us for the night. Eaddie watched Supergirl while I worked on the aquariums. Then we went to their house where Summer beat us to grilling the pork chops and making fresh mashed potatoes. She didn’t feel super swell though, and went straight to bed with a headache after dinner. Eaddie went to her room to practice her flute and then likewise went to bed early, leaving me alone with the internet. I took the time to chat with Google Fi for a while about Summer’s Travel on Fi promotion, and got her case escalated so she can get her promo gift card.

Executive Director and Game Master of Esports, Emperor Supreme of All History, and Assistant Technical Director for the Center for the Arts

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Reverse Midas Touch

It lightly rained most of the day today, but I spent it all inside at the junior high. I was going to wrap up a bunch of work orders, but I ended up spending a while in the front office because everything I touched just broke even worse. I started with a printer connectivity issue and ended up replacing the whole computer.

I met Allen and Zach at Firehouse for lunch. They wanted to go to CJ’s first, but said there was a line out the door. I’ll never really understand why that place gets so busy when it rains. Or even when it’s dry. It’s just a mediocre hamburger.

At the end of the day, I took Eaddie to karate before getting Autumn a subway sandwich before going to her band event. I didn’t want her to eat in the car, and she didn’t want to eat in the park because of all the homeless and drug dealers, so we went back to the shop and I had her eat in the break room. Once she was done, we picked Katie up and I dropped them off at the Performing Arts Center. I ran home for just a minute before picking Eaddie up at karate and going to my parents’ house.

Mom made mango soup, which had Eaddie squiggly with excitement. Summer met us there after her workout. After we ate, she went to get Autumn, and I went home for the evening.

Some men like to hear – to hear the cannonball roarin’!

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Evasive Tax Form

The weather was supposed to be nice again today, but it was still super cold on the bike in the morning. I went back and forth between Oakland and the shop a few times trying to fix some issues before testing season arrives. It was still a mostly mellow morning though. I did run into Michael, who asked about borrowing my home theater speakers for a Dancing Through the Decades dance in a couple weeks. I just didn’t feel comfortable loading them up and bringing them out for use in public though.

I met Zach and Allen at Morellos for lunch, where I vowed to eat too many chips. I had been hungry all morning, and I absolutely loaded myself with fajitas and chips. Allen left us super early as usual, and Zach and I both still got to the shop separately, and well before our lunch hour was over. I really don’t know what his anxiety is about.

I tried to get some tablets reset at the junior high before school let out, but I didn’t get them all done before Jason wanted Brice and me to help Amanda mount a touch panel. At first I thought we were all four going to be there, but evidently he helped Amanda deliver the touch panel, and we were to swap it with a previously mounted television and then bring that back to the shop. I got pretty annoyed at Brice, because Jason emailed us early in the morning with a scheduled time of 3:00, so I left my tablets unfinished to meet at the shop. Brice took an extra 30 minutes to get there, and then we still had to drive to the middle school. On top of that, Gary seemed to be bored at the shop, and Ben was going to be at the middle school to continue his walkthrough. It just felt like everyone was either already there or available to help, and I was annoyed that I couldn’t get my work done. It didn’t help that I was mad at myself for forgetting to complete a work order yesterday, but I really didn’t get any heads-up for that one anyway.

After work, I came home to gather some things before going to Lowe’s to hunt down some light bulbs. I didn’t even see a compatible LED like I’ve been getting from Walmart, but they had one single-pack incandescent for a little more than the LEDs cost. Hopefully it won’t burn out after just a couple days though. I wish I knew what the problem was. I went ahead and picked up a new fluorescent bulb for the 35 gallon bow-front tank as well since it’s been out for years. There were only a couple cashiers, and after waiting in line for quite a while, my guy couldn’t scan a gift card correctly and I ended up getting out of line to check the balance. Once I confirmed what I knew, I got back into the next shortest line and checked out without incident.

I finally made it up to Summer’s for just a spot of dinner and to visit. They had already eaten since I was still a bit full from lunch anyway. Summer and I went to the other room to talk about her offer from the shop, and I tried to help her calculate the value of her time. It really could go either way, depending on her negotiation. The best part is just that she has multiple options for now and in the future, so I tend not to fret too much over her choice. I spent a bit of time trying to buy tickets for Shazam, but had to give up after I met a hidden order limit that required a call to guest services to explain.

Eventually I headed back home for the evening and tried to take care of the aquariums a bit. Once that was done, I spent the rest of the night cleaning with the purpose of finding my W-2. I just couldn’t find it anywhere, and I started to get really aggravated. I felt good about getting so much stuff cleaned up and thrown out, but I was going crazy not remembering where I had put it. Eventually I found it in the living room, but didn’t have enough time to actually file my taxes. I guess there’s still tomorrow.

At least I got my watch shipped off.

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Subway++

I didn’t think I had much going on this morning, but we eventually discovered that I wasn’t getting work order emails properly again. I bounced between campuses in the morning to take care of some older things, including discarding a cart full of netbooks so I could repurpose the cart in the library. Then I met Allen for lunch at the Subway in the old Darrell’s building. He had suggested Subway, and I was curious about their other offerings. I got boneless wings and made it a combo with two bread sticks and a drink. The food tasted cheap, but I paid $9 for the meal. They did have a mini Coca-Cola Freestyle machine, but it had a weird lever that had a really poor tactile response. The inside of the restaurant was actually really nice though. I haven’t tried their pasta, but so far I can’t recommend anything but the Subway for their corporate-y goodness. What I had tasted like frozen gas station food.

The afternoon was partly spent catching up on newer work orders that flooded in after the Web Help Desk reset. Ben came by at the end of the school day and tested out LanSchool for Chromebooks in my APUSH class. To make a long story short, it was absolutely terrible. The limitation of features and the ease of a student making it annoying for a teacher trying to keep tabs on them were just too much. Another hard “no” from me.

I went home after work and spent a little time with the fish before heading to Summer’s for dinner. She had a roast in the slow cooker all day, and the girls ate in front of the TV while we sat at the table. Summer spent some time doing school work while I read up on the Travel on Fi comment thread on SlickDeals. Wednesday will be the 90th day since her phone activation, so I’m getting really antsy about getting the $799 travel gift card. I’m really doubting she gets it automatically, and I kind of dread having to contact Fi about it. They’ve always been pretty decent, but it’s just annoying.

And I still have to do my taxes…

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It’s Pizza Time!

I woke up with a fair headache this morning, but still tried to get out of bed early enough to have a useful day. Summer took Autumn out shopping, and eventually Eaddie and I left to go back to my house. I spent a while trying to fix the back seat recliner loop that came off last night. I’m really just lucky we didn’t lose the whole loop somewhere. It took me a while, but I was eventually able to use a length of wire to pull it back up into place.

With that done, we ran to Walmart to exchange my aquarium LED light bulb under warranty. It was a relatively quick in and out, and then we went back home where she watched Supergirl while I showered. Once we were ready, we ran by Harbor Freight to get a power splitter and magnetic tool mount for my aquariums, and then made it back to her house.

Autumn had suggested we make homemade pizzas for dinner, so Summer was prepping a bunch of fresh ingredients she picked up. Eaddie and I went outside to dig up some dirt to plant a pineapple top until the pizzas were ready to make. The girls built their own simple ones, and then I made one for Summer and myself with every topping we had.

The pizzas turned out really great, the girls seemed to enjoy getting to make them, and even my over-topped pizzas stayed together really well. I guess after all these years I’ve still got it. When we finished eating, I played a game of Mario Party with Autumn before we all sat down to watch Parks and Rec before bed.

PMOGHRN LS

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Eureka!

I got up early this morning and went to pick up the girls to head to Eureka Springs. We went to Ozark and then took the Pig Trail north from there. We stopped at Turner Bend to check out the tiny waterfall, but Autumn didn’t want to get out of the car. The rest of us took a few pictures, and then we continued on our way.

Eaddie handled the drive pretty well, but it helped that we got stuck behind some slow vehicles for a ways. We made it into Eureka right at lunch time, found a parking space, and started to wander. We should have gone straight to lunch first, but things ended up working out alright in the end. I ended up buying some tea after the girls kept sampling a bunch of things. Then we walked to the other end of the strip and went to Local Flavor Cafe for lunch.

I had fish tacos on the waiter’s recommendation. The girls had burgers, and Summer had something with avocado instead of meat. Of course I couldn’t leave without a chocolate lavender crème brûlée. We shared it three ways because Autumn is weird, and then we started back down the strip to do some shopping. The girls got a few things, and I got us some chocolate dipped stuff at the candy store that’s always pulling taffy. After our four hours were up, we headed to the Inn of the Ozarks to meet my parents for dinner.

We went to The Bavarian Inn Restaurant as is tradition. They had us sat in a room with a bunch of other magic folk. Dad was super excited for everything, which was nice. Even Autumn found something she liked. My food was fair, but it always feels so overpriced and under filling. Even Summer agreed that it didn’t fill her up. They seemed to make up for that with gas though, because by the time it was all said and done, I did feel a bit bloated for a while.

After dinner, we went back to the Inn for the magic show. They put on a really good, if short show. Evidently they had split it up into like three shows this time, and Dad performed at the afternoon show today that we didn’t get to see. Eaddie got to participate in the finale with a really solid levitation, and then refused to smile as she left the stage. She really enjoyed it though, and continued to talk about it for the first part of the trip back home.

The drive back was uneventful, except that Eaddie got to feeling sick as we got into the tighter curves. The Dramamine didn’t seem to help her much, so I just slowed way down until we got most of the way back to Ozark. Then we hit the interstate and made it home just before midnight. The girls all crashed, and I eventually made it to bed super hungry.

Alright, already we’ll all float on.

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Tabmanian Devils

I had to spend most of the day fighting the tablet issue I had yesterday. I took a short break to meet with Rachel about esports, and again for lunch at KFC with Allen and Dale, but it wasn’t until after lunch that I got them working again. I won’t find out until tomorrow whether or not I’ll have to touch all of the classroom devices to fix them all.

Jason and Zach helped me hang a TV at the end of the day, and we really got it up in record time because neither of them were very excited to do the work. Jason actually looked to keep busy all day, but I’m really not sure what Zach did for most of it. We did a good job though, and I’m always for good, efficient work.

When I got home, I started trimming and replanting the bathroom aquarium and did a quick water change. We were going to get 50-cent corn dogs for dinner, but then Mom said she was making chow mein. We coordinated Summer’s gym time with me borrowing Allen’s truck to move the mattress from my parents’ house, and I grabbed some corn dogs for the kids on the way. I happened to pull in right behind Keith at the drive-through, and we hollered back and forth for a bit, and then it was off to dinner.

I don’t know how Eaddie ate so much, but Noah gave up pretty quickly on his chow mein after eating like five corn dogs. I think Eaddie only had about three, but she loved the chow mein too much to pass it up. Summer took leftovers for lunch, and then we loaded the truck up to get things moved.

We dropped the boxspring off at my house first, just to raise my mattress up off the floor a little bit. I don’t love it, but I’m so indecisive about a bed that I really don’t know what I want anyway. Then we took the mattress up to Autumn’s room for her. I topped off Allen’s truck and returned it, then headed home to put everything back together again.

Johnny and Jack were playing some Overwatch, so I jumped into a couple matches with them to end the day. The steamrolling was unreal.

Turn around, now you’re my A Team.