Tag: family

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T-Give

Dad’s new cat is weird.

Summer had her 5K this morning while the rest of us slept in. I got up earlier than I thought I would, considering how late I was up. I ate most of the questionably cooked bánh bao for breakfast before anyone else was around, and then started soaking the potatoes before washing them.

I ended up fiddling around in Oxygen Not Included for a while until I had to get cleaned up to go to my parents’ house for an early Thanksgiving dinner. Eaddie started feeling sick and was down on the couch for a while, and then threw up on the way there. Luckily she had me pull over just in time to throw the door open and spew in the middle of the street. We ran through McDonald’s to get her a Sprite, then made it to my parents’ house where she started to feel a little better for a while before coming down with a fever again.

The rest of us ate a pretty awesome meal while Eaddie got some rest in my old bedroom. Then we played some Jackbox games for a while. We had a few really great laughs with some of them, but overall I’d only recommend picking any of them up on a sale. Eaddie eventually felt well enough to have some dinner, then joined us for a few more games before we left.

I had to run by my house on the way back to Summer’s to pick up a few things, and then we settled in for the night. Eaddie’s fever came back, so she went straight to bed. Autumn wanted to stay up late and watch Supernatural, and I got Summer started on Torchlight II again. I got stuck catching up on deals, but we’ll be able to play together again soon.

It’s okay to admit you’re grouchy as long as you’re actively trying not to be a complete asshole.

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Thanksgiving Pregame

Summer went to work at the shop today. I got up a little early to get ready for lunch with Jesica. She said there aren’t any good Chinese buffets in Fort Smith and was craving Mulan’s. I saw Ronda’s car there, but couldn’t find her in the restaurant, and then she passed by us on her way out and stopped by to say hello.

After we ate, we ran by Tropical Smoothie to get lunch for Summer, and then we decided to walk off a little of our food at PetSmart. She didn’t get any treats for her new dog Harris, but I spotted an aquarium plant that was just cheap enough to try out, and the guy even let me keep the hitchhiking snail for free since he didn’t belong in the tank. From there we went back to my house to drop the plant off, but were too lazy and fat from lunch to get out again. We watched a weird vegan YouTube cooking video, and then I drooled over a couple aquascape build videos.

We headed to Walmart to pick up some dinner materials a little before Summer got out of work, where I ran into Bradley and chatted for just a minute. When I found out the girls wouldn’t be home until late, we skipped that stuff and I just picked up a couple things I needed and we made it the rest of the way to Summer’s for the evening. I surfed Netflix for a while before landing on Red vs. Blue, which always seems to surprise the otherwise uninterested with laughs. The girls got home just before we finished the first volume, so we wrapped that up before Jesica left.

Summer was the only one around with any real hunger, and she needed to carb up for her 5K turkey run in the morning, so I called in an order to La Villa and brought her some chicken parmesan. I burned a bánh bao that Bác Vân had given me earlier while I was at home because it seemed to be raw in spots. Summer got a migraine and went to bed early. Autumn landed in her bedroom on her laptop for the rest of the evening, and Eaddie binged some more Arrow until I made her go to bed. I got lost on the internet for a while, then found myself tangled up in the can of worms that is Please, don’t touch anything!

If you put him on an F150, he would be Harris on Ford!

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Tip Squad

Summer got up a little early today to pick up Autumn. They brought breakfast back, and the girls all watched Criminal Minds while I started cleaning up the kitchen. Eventually they had to go home to get ready to visit with their father, and I continued cleaning and started some laundry.

When Summer finally came back in the evening, I ordered dinner from the food truck Spices via Bite Squad using a discount code I had. The service was pretty polished, and the fees showed it. Each restaurant had a fee that seemed to be based on how far away it was, but then they also suggested a percentage-based tip of 18% of your order total. I remember being happy about $2 tips back when I delivered pizza for a living, so the $6 tip they suggested during my ordering process really rubbed me wrong after being charged a $2.99 “booking fee.” Comments online seem to indicate that drivers only actually get 50% of the tip if you put it on your card too, which is downright evil. It was cool being able to track the whole process though, and I guess under $10 to have food delivered from a non-delivery restaurant isn’t grossly unfair to the customer.

The delivery guy passed my house and tried to deliver our food two doors away, but I yelled down the street to get his attention, then gave him a $5 cash tip since I opted out of the default 18% on my card. Overall the Bite Squad experience was good, but had a poor value, so I couldn’t recommend it without a promotional discount, or being too drunk to get out and buy your own food. Summer really enjoyed her noodles from Spices though. My rice and skewered meat dish wasn’t very good and seemed way overpriced for the amount of meat it had, but it did the job.

After we ate, we ran to her house to pick up my car and some things for her, then stopped to rummage through Kmart on the way back to my house for the night. I picked up a corkscrew for future conference shenanigans.

They’re off to find the hero of the day!

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The Crimes of Grindelteen

Autumn woke us up a little early this morning saying she needed to go home to shower and change. Summer wasn’t too happy about it after how she had already been acting last night, so she packed the girls up and headed home. I showered and headed to pick them up to go to the movies. We dropped Autumn off with her grandparents first as punishment, then went to Wendy’s for lunch.

We got to the theater plenty early, but it was unnecessary. The three of us nearly doubled the number of people in the auditorium. I was aggravated at how dim the picture was, and dark scenes were nearly indiscernible. I’m convinced that crappy theaters are responsible for killing 3D. The movie itself was alright, but seemed unnecessarily confusing at times. Whimsical flashes of fantastic magical creatures were interrupted by boring and convoluted conversations about the plot that was happening in the background. It all seemed mostly uninteresting in the end.

After the movie, we went to the Neighborhood Market to pick up a few things for Thanksgiving, then dropped them off at Summer’s. While we were there, we unpacked the things we got at Kmart the day before. Mom made chow mein, so after we finished putting everything together and away, we went to my parents’ house for dinner. I called Julie to try and plan Thanksgiving, and I think we’re relatively prepared.

When we finished there, we came back to my house to finish season one of Stranger Things before bed.

Should things at some point go terribly wrong, it’s good to have a place to go, you know, for a cup of tea.

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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.

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I’m the damn paterfamilias!

Summer and Eaddie went to judge an event at the high school this morning. I slept in a while, then got up and fixed some leftovers from last week for Autumn and myself. She mostly sat around watching TV or on her laptop, and I milled around fighting boredom. When Summer and Eaddie got back, they got a few things done before going to pick up their new eyeglasses. I loaded up Oxygen Not Included and played for a little bit before taking a shower.

When they got back, Summer left the girls with me and went to the gym for a while. I continued my game until she returned and eventually started on dinner. After we ate, we turned the lights out and put on O Brother, Where Art Thou? until one by one the girls fell asleep.

We ain’t one-at-a-timin’ here. We’re MASS communicating!

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Moocho Mango

I bummed a lot of favors today. Julie gave me a ride to work this morning since it was so cold out. Once there, I took the work truck to the junior high to babysit the testing. Nobody reached out to me even once, so I just sat in my office for almost all of it. I did manage to squeeze a little bit of work in though.

Summer didn’t finish with her testing stuff until the kids were already a bit into their lunch break, so she was upset about not getting to eat anything. I gave her a Soylent and then ran home to eat some leftovers for lunch, and dropped off some pallets while I was there.

After lunch, I stopped by Oakland for a little bit before going to the shop. The Murano was ready at the shop, so I had Zach give me a ride out there, and then I drove back to the junior high. The bill was quite a bit lower than I expected, which was awesome. I even got some replacement valve stem caps since mine went missing a few years ago.

When I finally left work, I headed home to change before heading to Summer’s to load everyone up to go have dinner with my parents. Mom made some mango soup, warmed up some leftover fried rice, and Dad made some garlic bread. It was all a bit of an odd combination, but everyone but Autumn found something they really liked. I guess she had filled up on hot dogs when she got home from school.

We all retired back at Summer’s for the evening, where I played around on YouTube a bit before bed.

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Workin’ Truck

I took the Murano in to Orr before work this morning for an oil change and brake fluid recall. I missed my time to catch a ride to work with Summer, so I got Zach to come pick me up. Then I took the work truck to the junior high and worked until lunch. Summer and I grabbed a quick Thanksgiving lunch in the cafeteria, and then I met everyone at the shop so our Belkin rep could take us out for Fat Daddy’s.

After lunch, I helped Gary and Zach clean a bunch of stuff out of the server room before heading back to the junior high. I got several things done to be ready for testing tomorrow, so I don’t anticipate much trouble. I am however still aggravated with another reported 25 missing headsets in my computer labs. It’s insane and unnecessary.

Orr called a couple times throughout the day. First was to ask if they could service my in-cabin air filter. I noticed some foam blowing out of my air vents over the summer, so I had them go ahead and do that. Then I got another call to say they had to order a part, and wanted to know if they could keep my car overnight. Since I agreed to that one, and Ben couldn’t let me take the other work truck home for one night, I had to get a ride home from work. Daddy to the rescue. He picked Eaddie and me up at Gardner, dropped her off for karate, then took me to the high school so I could snag Summer’s car while she was at a quiz bowl scrimmage.

I ran home to change before picking her and Autumn up, then dropped them off at Karate and the gym before heading home to do dishes so they could eat here tonight. I guess I spilled some rinsing agent in the dishwasher the last time I filled it up, so I started to get some suds leaking out of the front and had to get the carpet cleaner out to suck it all up. Once it settled down, I went to karate to see if Eaddie wanted to go shopping with me. She didn’t, so I went to the Neighborhood market for some rolls, picked Summer up from the gym, then picked the girls up from karate and headed home.

We watched the ending of Scooby-Doo while we ate the leftovers, and then the girls headed home for bed. I decided I’d rather ride the bike to work in the cold than lose an hour of sleep. Then Julie called to talk about black Friday deals, and we ended up talking for over an hour before bed. She said she was working nights for the outage and offered to take me in to work in the morning after she gets off, which worked out perfectly for me because I don’t fit into any of my leather any more.

Look, I’m a man of substance. Dorky chicks like you turn me on, too.

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Get Lost

This morning was kind of slow because Dell sent a tech out to replace a power supply for me. I didn’t want to leave the shop if he was about to give me back my machine, so I stuck around. It didn’t fix the issue though, and in the end he thought there was a problem with the CPU or motherboard, so I didn’t even get to return the computer. I read up a bit on Lanschool – just enough to remind myself that I hate things, and then went to Quiznos with Zach and Sara.

I spent the afternoon at the junior high, mostly tracking down missing peripherals in one of the labs. It’s super annoying that teachers just let the kids do whatever they want, and I’m really only support for the equipment they do have, not the equipment they don’t have. They should never have missing equipment. It’s ridiculous.

Nearing the end of the day, I finally ran an HDMI cable for Matt and hooked his docking station to his TV. I couldn’t test it without his laptop, so hopefully it works right. Then the girls and I waited for Summer to get home from her trip so we could go eat at my parents’ house. We had to run by my house for some batteries first, and then we made it for bún bò Huế. Autumn had some leftover chicken alfredo, and Mom ate some seaweed.

I had forgotten again about my Murano service tomorrow morning. I never did hear from anyone after I scheduled it online, so I’m going to be upset if they don’t get me in. I didn’t want to leave my car in the freezing rain overnight because it would slow me down even more in the morning, so I dropped the girls off at home and then came home myself to clean up and go to sleep.

Can we just donate our tiny bonus to the PAC instead?

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What imperative does a grey box have to interact with another grey box?

Summer got up and took Autumn to an eye appointment this morning. I slept in a little while, then got up and moved her new TV cabinet into place and hooked everything up. Her TV didn’t fit in the cabinet, so it had to sit way up high on top of it. She made breakfast when she got back, but had to go help her mother because her car wouldn’t start.

After she got back and ate, I headed home to clean up and waited for her to come over. I played a little more Rocket League and had a shower. Once the girls’ father picked them up, she came over and we went out to New China for dinner. When we got back home, we watched an episode of Black Mirror, followed by Ex Machina. Both were pretty trippy, but I’m not sure they had quite the suspense we were looking for.

Actually that’s someone else’s quote.