Tag: family

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Fifty Dollars an Hour

I’ve been having so much trouble getting out of bed all week. I really think it’s just the time of the year, the temperature, and the daylight hours, because I always get this way coming out of summer.

Allen and I were supposed to meet at Long John Silver’s for lunch, but he ended up ditching me because he couldn’t communicate effectively. I decided to try McDonald’s for another dollar burger, but then Ronda messaged me and said she had a soft taco left over for me. I went ahead and got the Big Mac, then went to the junior high to eat everything.

I wanted to get back to Oakland for a bit, but I got busy fighting with their sign computer at the shop until quitting time. From there, I went straight home to get the gas lawn mower to make an exchange at Walmart. For some reason I thought it might be best to park by the garden center, but I ended up having to walk all the way back to the service desk. It took another couple trips across the store and some explaining to a manager, but he ultimately agreed to give me an additional $50 discount to the already low negotiated price bringing my total to $200 for both mowers. It wasn’t an awful way to spend an hour, but now that I’ve mastered the art of negotiation, I want to see if McDonald’s will sell me a Big Mac for 75 cents.

Just as I got packed up and climbed into the car, Julie said she was on her way to Pasta Grill for Dad’s birthday dinner. I pulled up just as my parents did, and Julie came along a bit after we were seated. We were sat right by a large table full of some Asurion folks, and Ben waved to me as we left. Most of the rest of them can go to the hot place. The jambalaya pasta was amazing.

When I got back home, I started a load of laundry and then headed to Summer’s with my leftovers. I couldn’t stay long though, because folding socks is another thing my smart house won’t do.

That cow is staring right at me!

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Bargain Hunters

I tried not to sleep all day today, but we still didn’t get out of the house until the afternoon. We went to Walmart for a bit of grocery shopping, but hung around long enough to do some perusing through any clearance we could find. I very nearly picked up an electric lawn mower, but I’m glad I didn’t, because I think I may be able to haggle it down to an even lower price anyway.

We grabbed some deli food on the way out, then went back to Summer’s to put things away and eat. Dad made kolaches, so we went by there for just a little while before heading back home to receive the girls.

Autumn brought home three goldfish and a bowl after Summer told her she couldn’t have a fish in her room, so we put them in with the turtle instead of going to the pet store for more feeder fish. Then they got to the chores they skipped out on before they left the night before. Just after they both went to bed, Apollo ate all the fish. Somehow I feel like the lesson was lost somewhere.

#nomeansno

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On Frugality

I tried not to sleep in too late today, and got up to clean the kitchen before Summer got up to cook breakfast. She made little ham, egg, and cheese pucks that tasted really good, but I think made better sense for a weekly meal prep. It’s super convenient to grab and go during the work week, but on a lazy weekend, for not much more work and an easier dish to clean, I’d rather have custom individually fried or scrambled eggs in a pan.

The girls wanted to watch the last bit of Split from the point Eaddie fell asleep, so we did that through breakfast/lunch until they wanted to go pick Noah up for his 16th birthday. I had fleeting moments of frustration with how wasteful the girls can be, or how they’re unnecessarily messy, or how they can’t seem to correctly put a single fucking lid back on any goddamn thing. It was nice to start and end with a clean kitchen though, so I guess I have their messiness to thank for that. This lid thing is seriously going to awaken the beast pretty soon, though.

After I got my shower, Noah’s pick for a birthday dinner was CiCi’s, so they all came back to pick me up. To contrast how money/waste conscious I am, I had us split into two groups to pay so we could double up on coupons. Everyone got their fill, and then I ran the circuit of dropping everyone off at home for the evening.

This is going to require everyone’s buy-in.

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Split

While Summer woke up early this morning to go to her 5K event at the high school, Eaddie and I slept in until nearly noon. When she got back, I got up and had a shower. She and Eaddie went to pick Autumn up, then I met up with them at their house for a late lunch.

The girls were going to spend most of the evening with their father, so Summer and I met up with Ronda and Steven at Fat Daddy’s for dinner and drinks. After that, Summer and I went to Davis Pet Store to pick up some feeder goldfish and mealworms for the turtles. Back at home, I had lost internet due to an outage in the area.

When the girls got back from the tailgate event at the high school, we watched Split. Those that weren’t too terrified fell asleep on the couch. Summer, though trembling from broken nerves, said she thought it was a good movie. I’m just excited for a different kind of hero movie.

The broken are the more evolved.

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Hunger Crank

I tried getting everyone up a little earlier this morning so they’d be able to go to sleep tonight for the first day of school. The only plans we had were a bit of shopping. There were so many leftovers in the refrigerator that we didn’t bother making any breakfast.

Autumn was finally in enough of a helping mood to clean the 55-gallon turtle tank for Apollo. I showed her how to siphon the water out, and we went to my house to look for some old driftwood I had gathered some years ago. It will take some time for the wood to soak up some water and sink, but hopefully the turtle will be able to climb up on at least one of the logs we threw in there.

We left my house to go shopping, and all three of the girls were pretty cranky. Autumn had a fashion meltdown, and Eaddie just wanted to eat. We didn’t end up getting any new overpriced fashion sneakers for Autumn’s marching band, and all we did at Penney’s was return a ridiculously oversized 2XL shirt I picked up a few days ago. I was pretty hungry by the time that was over, so I let the girls talk me into some CiCi’s for dinner. I guess it was just hunger, because they were all playful and lovey as soon as they had some pizza in them.

Summer was feeling quite a bit worse, so we all headed back to her place for a while before I took Autumn back out to Walmart to pick up some groceries for her school lunches. The trip took way longer than it should have for the few things she had to get, but I wanted her to lead the way and pay attention to what she was picking up so she could keep a mental note of how much it was going to cost. She only went over her $30 budget by $4, and that was because she picked up a clearanced phone case while we were there.

As we finished our trip, it started to pour outside. We heard the thunder from inside, but we had no idea how much water had actually flooded the parking lot. Luckily I parked on a bit of a hill, but several others weren’t so lucky, and had to trudge through several inches of water to get to their cars. I dropped Autumn off, then came home for the last night of the summer.

They will see us waving from such great heights.

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Meet the Girls

Summer got up and out this morning to pick up Autumn. Eaddie slept all morning until they got back to the house. Jesica texted and said she would be in town, so we decided to meet up for a quick lunch and then some shopping for dinner.

Summer, Eaddie, and I went next door when Bác Vân called with some mashed melon. It was strange and tasteless, but the sugar made it better. Jesica got there and met Autumn before we made it back inside, which I have to assume was awkward and hilarious. From there we went to Burger King for a quick lunch, and then to Walmart for groceries.

We ran into Brandie on our way to pick up kabob skewers, but Summer and Jesica just kept on walking like a pair of awkward children when adults start having a conversation. Eventually they made their way back around so I could introduce them. I think they were mostly shocked that Brandie already knew who they were from my talking about them.

We rounded the girls up and made our way out to start prepping the shish kabobs. We decided to grill at Summer’s house so the girls could get a couple good nights of sleep at home before school starts on Monday. Summer and Jesica had some wine and chatted while I prepped the food. It was a good way for them to get to know each other, and it gave us plenty of time to get hungry again after such a late lunch.

The kabobs turned out pretty great, and the girls all ate over Dinner for Schmucks. Autumn couldn’t finish the movie before passing out as usual. Eaddie had to be told when to go to bed. Jesica was ready to pass out by the time the movie was over, so we let her sleep on the couch. I guess it’s leftovers the rest of the week.

You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not.

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Every Tech for Himself

It’s the last week before school starts, and we’re still occupied with summer projects. I spent most of the morning delivering Chromebook carts with Dale and Amanda. It was a bit aggravating to fully indispose three people for such a task, but such is life in the district. I’d had enough when it came time to deliver a single tech tub with five Chromebooks to my elementary campus while towing a trailer and two extra bodies, so I had them drop me off at my car.

I was just in time to help unload a short pallet of laptops for Jason. I would have thought we would finish imaging mine before he started unboxing his, but the moment I touched my boxes, he had Allen help him unbox all of his and stack them up under one another in all of the imaging stations in the shop. I managed to squeak four extra lines in and ran power so I could continue imaging my own, but it was super frustrating that he had come along and disconnected mine when I was already two thirds done.

Everyone expected to have to go to a presentation with Ben in the afternoon to learn how we would work with non-touch displays in the classroom, but I opted out since all of my teachers were good with the change. Dale, Allen, and I went to Subway for lunch early though, so the two of them could go. When I got back, I continued imaging all of the laptops, both mine and Jason’s, so he could take Amanda to do something else.

Zach insists it’s like this every year, but I maintain my belief that this is worse than last year. He says everyone always stresses out and hates each other, and that I was just working with the rose-colored glasses of being newly hired. Maybe that’s true in that last year I was more willing to just follow orders, but this year I’m really feeling the burn of my coworkers’ knack for slack.

After work, I stopped by the house briefly before heading to my parents’ to grill hamburgers. Dad already had everything ready to go, so I just had to patty the meat and throw it on the grill. Summer got there just as I finished grilling everything. I was pretty happy with how they turned out, though the buns could have been bigger, or else the patties smaller.

When we finished eating, we ran by JCPenney to spend some rewards cash that was due to expire soon, then headed home for bed.

P for Pie is somehow disappointing.

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Feeling Flushed

We got up this morning, had breakfast, and packed everyone up to go to the Alma Aquatic Park. They had half a dozen tubeless water slides and a decent sized pool with a climbing wall and diving board. There was even a toilet bowl slide that dumped you into a tiny, deep pool as not to crack your skull. It was pretty impressive, and we lucked out by accidentally visiting on a BOGO for $5 day. We expected to pay $50, but got everyone in for $15.

The lines weren’t bad on the slides, so the kids wore them out pretty well. It was tax-free weekend for back to school shopping, so I think that helped thin down the crowd. We stuck around for a few hours, then headed in to Fort Smith for an early dinner at Furr’s Fresh Buffet.

Once everyone finished eating, we decided to stick around town to get some shopping done at the mall since we wouldn’t have everyone with us on Sunday. Eaddie and Noah didn’t much want to participate, but after dragging them around for a while and then pumping them full of some sugary lemonade, they pepped up a bit. Summer and I were still super tired, but we all survived and made it out of Penny’s with some pretty great deals.

We headed back home after dark and opted not to go to my house for the kids to continue watching Lord of the Rings, even though Eaddie and Noah seemed to find their second wind with some more Arrow.

Wake up everybody, no more sleepin’ in bed.

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Easy Overtime

I spent all day working at the high school handout today. It was probably the best day I’ve had at work in a long time. Even when it was busy, things went smoothly and correctly. They’ve done a really good job of making the whole process pretty efficient.

Summer brought Noah in to get his laptop in the afternoon, and we were all done by 3:30. Central Office dismissed us at three, but I still had work to do at the junior high, so I stayed until nearly five.

After that, I went home to get some things and then went to Summer’s for the evening. She made sloppy joes with mashed potatoes and some asparagus that all turned out pretty awesome. Eaddie made cupcakes for dessert, and we played a game of Uno before the kids started watching The Fellowship of the Ring. I played a bit of Limbo before settling down for bed.

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The Handout

Today started the three-day process of handing out 1:1 laptops at the high school. I’ve secured my place for all three days because I feel like right now I deserve some light work. I’ve spent too long pushing other people this summer, so I don’t care to be selfish enough to do something I want to do now. It won’t get me any closer to getting my own work done, but technology be damned.

We were meeting at 10:00 for the handout, so I got a little bit of time in at Oakland to clean up a few work orders before then. I’m hoping that my absence in the buildings will motivate others to try a little harder at setting up their own things. It’s not hard to plug in a computer, even with all the peripherals they have. Once I got to the high school, it was a relatively easy day to deal with seniors that have all gone through this before. We actually handed out just under 300 laptops, so the next two days will be much crazier. It’s my kind of crazy though, and I doubt anyone back at the shop is breaking much of a sweat doing anything else.

Once that was over, I had to run to the junior high to take care of a couple things before heading home. Summer got there right after I did, and we went to my parents’ house to swim and have dinner. Julie brought a tiny hairless baby critter over, and nobody knew quite what to do with it. Most of us voted to euthanize it because it looked like it wouldn’t survive very long. She left to try and find someone to take care of it, and ultimately did. After she left, I guessed correctly that it was a squirrel, which made me regret not trying to raise it. I probably didn’t really want a pet squirrel, but I’ve always thought I did since I was a child. In any case, it’s got better odds now.

When we got back home, I started a load of laundry while we watched a couple episodes of The Office before bed.

But I’m the one that does that!