Tag: family

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Sous Apprécié

We slept in a bit this morning, but not too much considering when I went to bed. Summer made a few pancakes for breakfast before we headed to Walmart to pick up the things for my first attempt at some sous-vide ribeyes. Autumn wanted to go to her grandparents’ house, so Summer dropped her off while I got the potatoes baking.

Once I had that started, we packed everything up and headed to my parents’ house to re-learn how to cook a steak. Mom started fussing over cooking things differently, so I left a couple steaks out for her to grill traditionally. The rest were salt and peppered, then vacuum sealed with some shallots, garlic, rosemary, and thyme. I had never used my vacuum sealer before either, so that was a little bit of a learning process. Overall everything went pretty well, though. As soon as I finished sealing everything and dropping it into the water, it was time to go home and get the baked potatoes.

I brought the potatoes back to my parents’ house and gutted them for twice-baked potatoes. They turned out really great, but the steaks were the real belle of the ball. After two hours at 138ºF, I pulled the steaks out and finished two of them on a hot cast-iron griddle in the kitchen. The high heat and butter smoked up the whole house almost instantly, so I moved that step outside to the charcoal grill instead. It didn’t finish them quite as perfectly, but it worked and I didn’t have to worry about airing out the house or burning my lungs with all the smoke. Next time I think I’ll cook the steaks at a slightly lower temperature, but these turned out pretty great. I definitely need to season them earlier, and probably with more seasoning next time, but overall I think it was an excellent first try. I can’t wait to try it again to see how I can improve.

After dinner, I took the girls home to pack some things, then met them back to my place for the evening.

Now if I could just figure out where the rest of my weekend went, I’d be in good shape.

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Life Aquatic

I had a rough start this morning, but it worked itself out in the end. Summer was worried about poor weather, so we skipped going to Clarksville and went to the Russellville Aquatic Center instead. I was still coming out of my local anxiety, so I told them to go separately and met up with them a short bit later. When I got there, I didn’t realize she had already paid my way, and ended up paying separately. We couldn’t get a refund, but after a bit of rigmarole, we were able to spend the credit on concessions that weren’t obscenely overpriced.

It was an interesting place, but it’s hard to understand how Clarksville can have such a better one. There was a floating obstacle course the kids got to take turns running, but otherwise it wasn’t much more than a couple of indoor pools. It’s not surprising to see they’re having trouble keeping the lights on.

After the swim, I went to my parents’ house to take a look at their home theater receiver and TV. So far it seems like they have a couple bad HDMI ports from a surge or something, but I’ll have to mess around with it a bit more before I know for sure.

From there, I picked up some things from work, then made it up to Summer’s for dinner. She grilled some big, thick burgers, squash, and zucchini that all turned out great. We finished with the Game of Life, then settled in for an episode of Stranger Things before everyone was pretty well tuckered out for bed.

This is annoying.

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Do you even lift, bro?

We split into uneven groups at work today. I, as usual, was on the heavy-lifting crew with Dale and Ryan. We spent all morning removing SMART boards and projectors from the middle school. We ended up taking down one we weren’t supposed to, but that’s just another day in the hood. While we were there, I ran into – or rather was trailed by – an old classmate, Mark. He stopped me to say hello and let me know he had just moved to the district. It was quite the blast from the past.

My foot had been bothering me quite a bit, so when we took a break for lunch and everyone went out, I decided to stay in and have some leftover pizza from yesterday. After lunch, the three of us went to the junior high to do more of the same. The difference there was that I knew my building and stopped us from doing the three extra rooms that weren’t supposed to be done. We even had some extra time to hang one TV because we didn’t have to wait for painters. Once we got back to the shop, I got to hear Jason complain about how heavy the one sever battery was that they lifted. I was quick to let him know that we lifted every single one of them when we unloaded them from the truck, moved the pallets to the correct building, and then unloaded everything into the server room by hand.

I left work and went to Summer’s as she got some things packed for the evening. I picked Eaddie up at karate and was recognized by an old acquaintance, Kyle, that was an instructor there. He was missing all the hair I knew him by, though. From there, we went to my parents’ house to swim for a while. Summer met us there and swam until it was time to eat. Mom made bún bò Huế, which I guess isn’t really atypical for their anniversary. It is summertime, after all, and there’s mint to be eaten. I wrecked Eaddie’s face in some foosball before we headed back home for bed.

It’s a tough job, but the chairs aren’t just going to sit in themselves.

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Nobody toucha my spaghet!

I got to spend all day at work on my own, and it was nice to only have to motivate one person to work for once. I spent most of the day at Oakland, but made some time for the junior high as well. The start of school casts an ominous shadow over what summer work has yet to be completed.

Gary, Zach, Sara, and I went to Morelo’s for lunch. Summer was at work right across the street, so I took her some on our way back to the shop.

After work, Summer came over and we went to my parents’ house for dinner. We stopped at Atwood’s first to see if they had any deals on kayaks, and then went to Kroger for a loaf of French bread. I’ve missed the garlic bread my parents made when I was a kid because they started buying premade frozen garlic bread slices. Mom watered her garden while I made the garlic bread, and then we ate when Dad got home. My bread didn’t come out as well as I remember it from the past, but I’m not really sure why. I think maybe the oven wasn’t hot enough at first.

Dad and Summer got on a Ray Stevens kick as we finished dinner. Then I snapped a picture of the moon on the way out.

At this rate, there won’t be any left!

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Ghastly Gasping

We got hit with a pretty bad storm last night that knocked out power for half the town for the better part of the day. I was fortunately only without power for a couple hours compared to some others, but it still wrecked my sleeping for the night. I tried sleeping everywhere from the bed, to my computer chair, to the recliner. I had the most luck in the latter, but even that was very sparing as I found myself waking up gasping for air just as soon as I’d get a little deeper into sleep. When the power finally came back on around 4:30, I went back to sleep in the bed and dreamed that I met Elon Musk and proposed an idea that he liked well enough to offer to send me to Mars. Summer wasn’t too happy about it, but I didn’t get to go anyway because I had to pee too badly. His loss.

When we finally got up, Summer and Eaddie left and I ate some leftovers for breakfast. I didn’t do a whole lot else on my own because I was still pretty run down from the mixed night of sleeping. Josh wanted to go out tonight since we missed last night, so once Summer got back from working out, we met him at the Dardanelle Club for dinner and drinks. Our waitress seemed like maybe she was having an off day, but we made the most out of what we had.

After dinner, Summer and I came back home and watched some TV while I did a load of laundry. Here’s hoping to no more surprises tonight.

Like the crack of the whip, I snap attack!

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Heated Rampage

This week really flew by. Half of the crew was out today, so the remaining five of us kept busy with the few things we could do. First thing in the morning, we prestaged 10 of the non-touch TVs at the high school for mounting once the wall mounts come in. I was ready for two more truck loads, but nobody else wanted to do it, so we killed the rest of the morning waiting for a FedEx freight shipment. It finally got there right before lunch, so we unloaded it before heading to Subway for a quick lunch.

I spent most of the afternoon taking care of a few things at Oakland, and then it was home to change into something cooler to deal with the 114º weather. My Yakima FullTilt bike rack came in, so I unboxed it and mounted it to the Murano to check the fitment. It was super heavy, but seemed really sturdy and came pre-assembled. I’m pretty happy with it. The Murano looks ready for so many adventures.

The girls came over as soon as they could, and we took Bác Vân to meet the rest of my family at Western Sizzlin for a birthday dinner for her and my sister. It was a bit chaotic with so many people, but overall I think it went pretty well. Once we parted, we dropped Autumn off at her grandparents’ house for the evening, and the rest of us went back home to watch Rampage. It was pretty silly, yet entertaining. The 3D was excellent again, and I really felt like they’ve started getting that right recently.

I can’t stay awake.

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Mush!

I had to drag Allen and Amanda along to do some work all day today. It was an easy task of blowing out computers and projectors on my campuses, but neither of them wanted to do anything. They both periodically ended up on their phones or sitting, and I had to drag them from room to room. Even pulling cable usually goes better with these two, but this was just too much for them.

We took a break for lunch at Firehouse, and I stopped by to give Summer some medicine at the shop. Then it was back to more dusting. We split up for most of that, so I’m absolutely positive they didn’t do it correctly while they were out of my eyesight. It’s things like this that make me want to just do it all by myself.

After work, I waited for the girls for a while until they were ready to go to the pet store. We had to pick up some more mealworms for the turtles. The floating ramp we found for Autumn’s red-ear was way too expensive for my taste, so we’ll have to come up with something from home. It shouldn’t be too bad, but it will take a little bit of work.

Once everyone got here, we watched Tomb Raider, which was stellar. The 3D was spot-on, and the surprises and suspense had Summer wringing most of the blood out of my hands. I really hate that I missed it in theaters.

Shoulda bought two for when the first goes out.

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Sweat Child o’ Mine

I got up this morning and spent a while making a big egg and hash brown breakfast. Everything turned out pretty good, and I learned some things along the way. It’s all about the low, slow heat when it comes to the hash browns.

The girls got stuck watching The Flash literally all day long. Summer and I dug the 55-gallon aquarium out of the garage and started cleaning it up to take to her house for Autumn’s turtle, Apollo. We even managed to get her outside to help scrub the tank for a bit.

It was super hot outside, but it wouldn’t have been so bad in the shade if it weren’t for the humidity. Even my house struggled to keep up as the inside temperature reached four whole degrees warmer than the thermostat was set. I don’t know if it froze up, or if it was low on refrigerant, but it cooled off in the evening after leaving it off for a while.

After we dropped the tank off at Summer’s, we all went to my parents’ house for some hot dogs and eggplant soup for dinner. The girls got stuck there watching the finale of Harry Potter. I’m sure I probably have, but I can’t remember ever consuming that much passive entertainment all at once. They’ve just been completely gripped by this stuff today.

When the movie finished, I took the girls back home and headed home to a cool house. I’ll have to keep an eye on things tomorrow in the heat to see how it does. I didn’t feel particularly sleepy, and it was cool enough outside that I got the bug to install my Nest Hello. I finally found the correct breaker to switch off and got to work. Everything went pretty smoothly, and I’m pretty happy with the install except for the narrow passageway up to my front door. I’m pretty sure I’ll end up moving the whole installation to the gate next to the garage.

I’d rather live with the constant threat of my island blowing up than sweating to death every summer in this humidity.

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One Time at Band Camp

I got up this morning and had to get ready for Autumn’s band camp concert. I hadn’t been to one since my sister played the flute, so this was a bit of nostalgia mixed with a whole lot of anxiety. I made it out alive though, and we celebrated with La Huerta.

Summer insisted on mowing the lawn in the middle of the day, so I went to get her some Powerade, then went home to take care of my own house. I was so drowsy all afternoon that I had trouble staying awake, but I managed to get some stuff done. Summer and Eaddie came over once they were done, and I snooped around my breaker box for a bit to try and find the doorbell chime. I couldn’t ever get it to power down, so I’ll probably just kill the whole house tomorrow so I can install my Nest Hello.

They watched more of The Flash while I played some Overwatch with Clint and Jack until bedtime. Eaddie’s completely obsessed with the show, and I’m a little sad I didn’t get in on it with them, but there are plenty of other shows for me to watch.

Take two Advil and wake up in the morning.

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Won’t you take me to Junkytown?

Today had me beat. We spent all day taking down projectors and SMART boards from the high school, and almost every single room was really hot with no air circulation. The heat, plus lots of boards mounted to drywall instead of brick made for a difficult and sweaty time. We filled up two truck beds before lunch and had to unload them into an already full graveyard. Someone got wise and asked if we could take the projectors and mounting booms to the scrap metal yard, and we got a little over 30 bucks for it all. For technology that really probably wasn’t all that bad, I found that to be pretty frustrating.

After a quick lunch at Quiznos, we jumped right back into it at the high school. The guys at the scrapyard indicated to our guys with the first load that there needed to be more metal than what they got, so Zach and I drove to a different scrap yard in the afternoon. They didn’t want to pay anything at all, but they offered to let us throw them into a junk pile. It kind of broke me a little inside to be throwing that stuff away when presumably it could be sold or donated to someone in need. Summer gears are turning, though, and we have to move the merchandise.

When we got back to the shop, we were told we had a truck coming with several pallets of stuff for us, so we all had to wait outside and clean out more room in the graveyard to store the new stuff. That took us the rest of the work day, so there was no hope of going home early for most of us. Somehow Jason managed to disappear somewhere, and Dale waved goodbye as he drove off.

I went straight to my parents’ house to have a swim in the pool for a while. Summer and Eaddie came over to join me eventually. I left for a bit to get cheap Kroger gas with Dad and Julie, and then it was back to swim. Mom made pork and shrimp spring rolls for dinner, so we stayed for that. Everyone else was pretty tired by then, so we came back to my house to crash.

Where the heck did I put that box fan?