Tag: family

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Purgatory

I didn’t go to work today, and instead woke up and did some remote work. Duvall’s Air Conditioning came out early to replace Summer’s air unit, both inside and out. Eaddie stayed in her room the whole time, which was a few hours. I took breaks to eat and make more hummingbird food, since there was nearly a cloud of birds buzzing around the feeder. I managed to get all of my network equipment updated, and now I feel a little more comfortable in the Ubiquiti software.

After the guys left and we had some cool air flowing, Eaddie came out and cleaned up some leftovers with me. Then she left for band practice and I started to head home. Mom called just as I was getting ready to leave, and said that Lelan was having them over to pray for Bác Vân’s 49th day in purgatory. I hurried home to clean up and then got there just as Julie and Kevin arrived.

On the drive over, Ben called to chat a little more about work stuff. I didn’t have anything too exciting to share with him, but we talked for a little while. Then I went in and socialized with our small group of family for a few hours.

I forgot Eaddie’s band family event was tonight, but Summer went to learn how to march with her. I eventually made it back to their house, but didn’t feel super Smurfy. I eventually got settled in though, and made it to bed around midnight.

Twice a day, five days a week.

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What Hindu

I woke up early this morning to get home for a shower before our day in Little Rock. On my way to the shower, I heard rainwater dripping into the bedroom where the roof still hadn’t been repaired, so I had to stick a bucket under it to prevent any further damage. It didn’t really seem to be storming, but while in the middle of my shower, I heard three or four loud pops outside as transformers blew one-by-one. My lights flickered for the first couple, then went out for a couple seconds for another, and finally went out for good after the last bang.

I finished my shower without power, and then struggled to find a way out of my home. I haven’t been able to find a door key in ages, so I ended up manually opening the garage to leave, hoping things would be back on quickly enough to lock things up again.

My parents picked us up at Summer’s, and we headed to meet Julie and Kevin at Costco. I worked on my Google Slides presentation for the whole drive, and felt like I had some pretty good topics to cover with the teachers for tomorrow.

I was pretty hungry, so Julie got us all hot dogs or pizza at the deli, which was super cheap and pretty tasty. I was surprised at how much of the store we covered, and we picked out a couple things to bring home. After that, we went straight to the IMAX for Oppenheimer.

I think most of us liked the movie alright, but Eaddie and I probably enjoyed it the most. Mom and Dad ended up going toward the back of the theater because Mom couldn’t see the screen well enough from the seats I picked. I think Kevin thought it would be more about the Manhattan Project than just Oppenheimer’s life, but I had a pretty good idea of what to expect and felt good about what we watched. It definitely felt more like a biopic than anything else, and didn’t drown the audience in the science.

After the movie, the girls had to thaw out a bit. We walked partway down the Promenade before turning around to find something to eat. Nobody seemed really excited for food except for me, because I knew that was the plan and was going to eat regardless of how I felt. It almost devolved into a full-blown argument choosing where to go, because nobody wanted to just call the shot. I finally picked Star of India after we discovered that Julie’s pick of Three Fold Noodles + Dumpling Co. was closed.

We tried to order full-sized orders of everything in the Chef’s Special, thinking that it would be way more food than what we actually got. In the end, I think it was pretty close in portion size, so I was left wondering if we had inadvertently ripped ourselves off. I just couldn’t quite remember how much we got the last couple of times I got the special. In any case, the food was good and everyone got to try something new that the girls and I have really enjoyed.

I poked around my slideshow a bit more on the drive home, and then had my parents drop us off at my house so I could take my car to Summer’s for the evening. My water bucket hadn’t overflowed, and it was a quick and quiet evening until bedtime.

Impromptu Best Presentation Ever

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Three Early Five Me

Julie finally fell asleep last night after screaming at me for an hour about how early she had to get up. I showered at night so I could just jump out of bed at 3:15, giving me 45 minutes to do any last-minute packing, and then we were off to the airport. There wasn’t really any traffic because of how early it was, and we ended up waiting at the gate for a couple hours before boarding. The trip back to Fayetteville was even faster than the trip up, at about an hour and 15 minutes.

We got to the car and headed toward home, stopping at a Sam’s Club and then a Vietnamese place called TyPHOon for lunch. The phở was pretty good, but the bánh mì was really lean on filling. From there, we made it to Ozark so Dad could take over driving from Julie. I just played my Steam Deck the entire way.

Once home, I unpacked and decompressed for just a little while before heading up to Summer’s. Eaddie has been driving herself around in the Murano, so I guess I’ll be taking the Model 3 up there overnight now. I should be able to charge up fast enough in the morning while I shower, to keep up with my usage throughout the day.

Summer made a turkey breast in the slow cooker, along with mashed potatoes and broccoli salad. I ended up taking over the gravy, which turned out super salty from saving all of the drippings. I kept trying to fall asleep after that, so I popped an iron pill and went to bed early.

Oh, man.

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Fish and Family

We slept in a little bit today, but the fire alarm went off shortly after I got out of bed. Mom and Dad evacuated, but Julie and I never got to that point. I got dressed and picked up some breakfast to bring back to the room, and then went down for some oatmeal once my parents were ready to eat. We killed a bit of time in our hotel room afterward, and it was all I could do to mask the loud TV with my headphones until we were ready to leave.

Somebody found a different boat tour with a paddleboat instead, and we met everyone there for a 45 minute ride down the river. It wasn’t terribly hot out, and we saw a bald eagle in a tree on the edge of the water. When we finished the tour, we headed straight to Two Brothers Roundhouse for a distillery tour and tasting.

By the time we got there, I needed the drinks. It was like competing for oxygen in the car. It was a neat building that used to be a turning station for trains. A couple of the spirits were really good, and after a slightly extended tour with the bar manager, we found a table at the restaurant for an early dinner.

The food was really good, and we had some great conversations. We parted ways with Aunt Diane, Brandan, and Nicolle, and the rest of us went to a downtown area in Geneva for some ice cream at a Kilwins and a brief walk to another chocolate store before we headed back to our cars. We said our goodbyes, and made our way back to the hotel so Julie could get her beauty rest.

I’m still waiting to be impressed by how quickly you can fall asleep and quit bitching at me.

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Melodical

I got up earlier than I really needed to this morning for my shower, and then went down for breakfast by myself. since Julie had already brought food back to the room, and my parents weren’t awake yet. I went down again with my parents once they were ready, and by the time they finished up, it was time to head to the church.

We made it to the St. Michael Romanian Byzantine Catholic Church, which had the longest name of any church I’ve ever seen, to meet up with the other pallbearers before the service. There weren’t a ton of people there, but it was nice to see so much of Thea’s family show up. We didn’t really speak to any of them, but later we talked with the cousins about how family is such an important part of Asian culture.

The service itself felt long, partially because we spent much of it standing while the priest melodically spoke or sang the prayers repeatedly. It was an interesting experience, and then John gave a great eulogy at the end. The burial was short, and then we returned to the church for the reception luncheon. Thomas came to sit with us briefly, and I think that was the most I had ever talked to him in my entire life. I was really happy that we could start closing the gap between all of the cousins.

After the reception, we headed back to the hotel for a while. Julie really wanted a Chicago-style pizza, but just as she and Dad were deciding where to find one, Tom called and invited us all back to his place for the evening. We ended up taking pizza with us, and we ate and socialized for a few hours. It really was a good time, and seemed much less stressful than yesterday as everyone was still kind of waiting to get everything done. I learned that Angela was into pottery, and I showed her Suzanne’s Instagram. I brought my Steam Deck to show Brandan and John, discovered that Nicolle knew Shang Tsung, and then had a laugh at my laundry routine.

We tried coming up with plans for the next day, but nobody committed to anything. We ended up leaving late and getting back to the hotel, where everyone promptly went to bed after a long day.

One’a thems.

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Good Jhaab

I got everything loaded up this morning and my parents picked Julie up, and then had her drive to get me and head to the Fayetteville airport. The timing worked out fairly well, and we didn’t have to wait too terribly long before we could board the plane. Then the flight was only about an hour and a half to O’Hare. From there, we took a rental car to a sandwich shop called Al & Joe’s. It was predictably complicated to order food for the four of us, but it was decent food. I had a pastrami sandwich which was heavily center-loaded and not cut all the way through. Mustard got all over my hands, so I just had to thoroughly clean up afterward.

From there, we made it to Tru by Hilton, which seemed like a small, “trendy” hotel. They had a pool table in the lobby, so after a little bit of rest and then fighting over who would talk to whom about when to go where and what to eat, Dad and I went down to play. We were both pretty equally bad, but it was fun. Then we ended up going to Thomas’s house to gather for dinner.

It was great to see the cousins we hardly knew, and meet all of their partners or otherwise. Brandan spent most of the time grilling burgers while the ladies got everything else ready. We really didn’t want to make anyone host, and had hoped to take them out to eat, but after two events in such a short period, maybe this is just how it goes. All I have to say is that people had better expect a potluck for our parents, because we’re not hosting a bunch of judgmental family in our time of grief.

We had a reasonably good time in spite of the added stress, and hopefully this weekend we’ll have some time for fun. It sounds like nobody really expected us to be around for this long though, so we’ll just see what happens.

I think we were pretty much the last ones out of the house, and we made it back to the hotel reasonably quickly. Julie and I stayed up chatting for quite a while, which turned a 10-minute blogging routine into a two hour ordeal. We’ll be up early for breakfast and a funeral tomorrow, so hopefully the bed will be comfortable, but not so comfortable that I won’t be able to get up in the morning.

One, big, happy.

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Switching Cart Wheels

I had a Soylent today for the first time in a while, and it served to keep me going. I spent the morning tinkering with the switch, and learned that link aggregation set at the core was preventing our downstream switch from talking. Once I had that fixed, I was able to get the fieldhouse working again, and spent some more time factory resetting the old fieldhouse switch. Once I had that done, I felt like I really showed some ability to some of those guys. Unfortunately it doesn’t sound like they’ll be doing anything to keep me around, and I hate that because I really love the job.

Kim came in and needed some help with a printer at the elementary. Then I drove us to Plainview to dig out some nasty carts. We found just enough for what we needed, so hopefully they’re workable. A few had broken wheels or doors, but we won’t really know until next week. It’s seeming more and more like we just won’t start school prepared.

I ended up leaving a little bit early so I could meet the girls at UEC to see Barbie. I stopped at Taco John’s for a little bit to eat first, since I was pretty hungry. Then I made it to the movie just in time to find a seat at the back of the floor section. I got us some “free” popcorn, and we really enjoyed the movie. I wished they had made the movie a little bit less inappropriate, but it really was a steady stream of laughs. It wasn’t until the very end that things got a little drawn out and weird.

After the movie, we went to my parents’ house so the girls could see what plants needed watering. Mom invited a little coworker over for dinner, and Julie was already there making rolls to take back to Kevin. I had a few myself, and then we headed home.

Eaddie did a great job driving across town in the dark, first with Summer to get her car from my house, and then with me to get back home. It was a bit sticky and hot in the house, but we settled in quickly. Summer went to bed while Eaddie stayed up to chat with me for quite awhile. I showed her the intro to 2001: A Space Odyssey that Barbie parodied. Then we went outside to listen to the super loud mockingbird in the yard for a bit before coming back inside where I showed her the original King’s Quest game. For some reason I couldn’t find a version online that had the bird sound effect in the background, but I thought it would be funny to teach the mockingbird a new tune. That may be a project for later.

Cause actually, my job is just “beach.”

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Where’d Y’all Brang Us?

I was a little worried that he hadn’t emailed us back yet by this morning, so I sent a text to Nick, the home inspector that Lelan recommended. Summer made breakfast again, but I was a little frustrated that she burned my Petit Jean bacon in the oven, and then let the bacon sit in the grease-filled pan after she took it out of the oven. She said they were out of paper towels, so we couldn’t soak it up with anything and it just made my stomach hurt.

I poked around a little bit, and then went home for a few hours. I took a shower and had a really bad anxiety attack that lasted quite a while. I had to open the shower door to breathe some cooler air, and my ears started ringing really badly.

I eventually made it back to their house after they had gone out into town for a bit themselves. Eaddie was going to see Barbie with some friends, so she wouldn’t be joining us at Brangus for Julie’s birthday dinner. We dropped her off a little early or the movie, and then arrived at the restaurant just moments after my parents, Julie, and Kevin showed up.

Dinner was good, and we stood around to talk for a bit afterward. When Julie and Kevin left, the rest of us went by my house so Mom could check out Bác Vân’s garden, and so I could give Dad some old bug spray I had. I took a small handful of peaches, and then we went across town to get Eaddie. We had a little bit of time to kill, so we drove down Sherwood just to check the place out at night. Then we waited in the UEC parking lot for Eaddie.

We headed straight to the house, and the girls went to their rooms. I was way more tired than I expected, so even I took the opportunity to crash early.

Peaches peaches peaches peaches peaches.

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Bank On It

I got in touch with Missy this morning about our loan application, and spent most of the morning after breakfast trying to decide on which loan to take. All of the rates were pretty bad, so I ultimately picked a 15 year loan just to keep the interest to an absolute minimum. It will be a little bit tighter than usual, but I should also be able to count on a raise pretty soon, one way or another.

I sat down to watch one episode of The Good Place with the girls, but otherwise I was feeling a little stressed being the only one paying attention to the loan information. As lunch time came around, Summer made some more spaghetti to finish up the sauce from the other day. Since we didn’t get out of the house, Eaddie decided she wanted to bake something. We dug out the Stranger Things pizza cookies we bought a while back and made those. We really didn’t get up to much of anything else.

Michael called me to ask about crypto trading bots, and as usual I had to tell him I just wasn’t paying any attention to that kind of stuff. We talked for a while, and eventually Summer decided she was ready to go to bed. Eaddie came in and we watched some Modern Family, and then everyone was in bed by midnight.

Such disinterest in comparing interest for interests.

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Housing by the Foot

Summer made sausage, egg, and cheese biscuits for breakfast this morning. I talked to Alisha sporadically throughout the day about the Sherwood house. Summer wanted to take Eaddie out on a hike, but I had to do some laundry, so they went to Haw Creek Falls while I went home. Summer’s car was still low on charge from our trip to Rogers, so I took it to my house to top it off.

Eaddie felt pretty cruddy when they got back, so we gave her a bunch of sinus medicine and she took a short nap. It didn’t take long for her to feel better, and we went to my parents’ house for spring rolls. Julie and Kevin were already there and watching TV. I tried to help out a little bit, but there wasn’t a lot left to do.

We had to split up into two tables, but dinner was good. Afterward, I showed Eaddie the World Book Encyclopedia I had growing up. Then Dad brought out a few slides to share. We hung out for a little while before heading back to the house.

Autumn tried calling late in the evening because she found out Rick died, but after the conversation with Beth last night and the subsequent unfriending she did on Facebook, nobody had much sympathy. She ended up hanging up on me, and then Eaddie came out to chat with me for about an hour before I went to bed.

Those tears are reptilian.