Tag: frustration

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Bathroom Blitz

I ran behind, but got out of the house early enough that I didn’t have to speed quite so much on the way to work. It was pretty chilly out, but that wouldn’t affect me in the office. Maggie was hungry, so she talked me into trying Panera Bread for breakfast. They had a four sandwich deal that worked out for the two of us and Charles.

It was a fairly leisurely day, but I still feel like I’m not really prioritizing correctly. I spent a lot of time rearranging PRTG again until Kyle came to the office to go out to lunch. He, Maggie, and I went to Eat My Catfish, which tasted good but had pitiful portions. The single catfish fillet I had was basically a quarter of a small fish.

The afternoon got a little bit exciting when the inbound DID numbers quit working, at least a part of the time. Maggie got on the phone with Windstream and IK Electric to see if anyone could see what went wrong. Kyle hung around the office for the rest of the afternoon too, but nobody in our department carried any stress over any of it.

Dad said the restoration people would be coming over the next day to start working on the bathrooms, so I ran home as quickly as I could and took the dogs for a quick run. They were super good, and then Summer got home just as we finished, so we went to the old house to bring the last remaining fish tank to the new house. We got it set up, moved the water and everything. Then I went back again to clean out the rest of both bathrooms. It took me a while, and I was up about two hours later than I wanted to be, but I guess I can nap on the way to work.

Are you ready Steve? Andy? Mick? Alright fellas, let’s go!

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Productive Household

Summer had to go to Greenbrier this morning, and I woke up with a pretty bad stomach ache before she left. I just stayed up, hoping I would be able to get to bed early in the evening, but procrastination finds a way. I spent the morning paying a bunch of bills and then trying to clean up around the house. Summer wasn’t gone terribly long, and then we hung the towel rack in Eaddie’s bathroom.

I made burritos for Eaddie and myself since Summer had already eaten and was cleaning her side of the house. Noah came over after work and generally made himself at home. I took the dogs out for a run around the block a couple times, and eventually got wound down for bed after everyone else beat me to it.

Sure, help yourself.

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I Am the Director Now

I had another chicken biscuit this morning on my way to work. Conference food made me pretty queasy all night, but fortunately today went okay. I was surprised to see Maggie in the office when I got there, and further still that she was still there when I left. I felt the pressure of more people needing me today, plus I had a couple of conference calls scheduled. I only went to one of those because the teacher was unable to reproduce an issue for a vendor.

I had placed an order for a Reuben at Arby’s the night before, since I had a discount code. Randy and Jim really wanted to go to a place called North Bar, so I picked up my food and then met them there. It was a more expensive place with a variety of burgers, wraps, and such. Jim’s chicken sandwich looked pretty good because the chicken was more than twice the size of the bun. Randy’s order was put in wrong, so his got comped and we split my burger, and then his when it eventually came out. I liked his bologna burger better than my blueberry one, but both were pretty good. Overall I thought the flavors were great, but it just wasn’t worth the price for the portion size. Everything being à la carte didn’t help, because I had to pay extra for fries with the burger.

I stopped by Target on the way back to the office to get an online order of Tide that I had placed a few days ago. Randy left in the afternoon, and said he was leaving me as the de facto director. I laughed that I was the newest hire, but he responded that I was the one with the most experience in his role. After that, Maggie had me sign a bunch of data privacy agreements. I told her it felt like he was leaving so they could use me as a fall-guy on some sketchy paperwork.

I was a bit hungry after lunch, so I actually ended up eating my Reuben before I left work. Then it was a dull ride home to find Summer in the kitchen and Eaddie and Eli watching TV. I took the dogs out for a run to my parents’ house and then spent some time with them when we got back. I skipped the chicken Alfredo because of the dairy, and drank some dinner instead. I had to rearrange the dishwasher after the girls poorly cleaned up the leftovers, and I kind of stewed a bit until bedtime.

unappoint

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Do Not Be Alarmed

I was a little late to work today, but I passed Randy along the way, and he was groggy anyway. Strangely enough, I’ve got the hour drive to wake up, so I arrive all bushy-tailed. Nobody jumped into anything right away, but I poked at PRTG some more. Then I got an email reminder from Ben that he was leading an APSRC call, so I hopped on that to listen in. It was all the same stuff that everyone has been screaming at us for years, but evidently a lot of people don’t even know their districts are members of the APSRC, so they wanted to highlight themselves as a resource.

Time flew by pretty quickly, and we went to Cotham’s for lunch. I almost can’t resist the hubcap burger there. I could normally take or leave a burger at a restaurant, just because I can make one at home for a fraction of the price, but there’s something special about the hubcap.

As we left, a girl came up to me to say that she had hit the Tesla. I hate that the alarm notification on my phone sounds exactly like every other notification, so I didn’t even realize something was wrong. I got out to look, and sure enough, she left a big, black streak across the front driver-side corner. We exchanged insurance information and phone numbers, and then Jim guided me back to the office “the slow way.” It was interesting to see some of those quieter roads that I’d never really traveled before, and to see how they connect to the places that I had.

The afternoon went by quickly as well. I took a bunch of pictures and filed an insurance claim. Otherwise it was almost more social than work until quitting time. I headed straight to the old house to get some things, then stopped by Superfast to show Summer the damage to her car. It wasn’t awful, but there may be some broken clips where the bottom of the bumper is out of place slightly.

On the way home, Mom called and offered bún thang, so we dropped the Tesla off to charge and then I drove Summer over there to eat. The soup was still frozen, so Dad took me outside to fly the DJI FPV. He said he had flown it up high over our house and up the mountain to John’s, so I took it up towards our house and lost the signal. It came back though, and we recovered it without any trouble. I got it up to just over 60mph and buzzed overhead before circling around and landing a couple times.

Summer was inside finishing up some work on her laptop. I helped assemble bowls and we ate quickly so I could get home to run the dogs. Eli was still there helping Eaddie with a project. Summer got ready for bed, and I took the dogs out for a run in the dark. Stilgar was significantly more rambunxious, but we made it back home alive. The kids finished up, and I did my best to make it to bed for as close to seven hours of sleep as I could.

I just… I have to have my few minutes in the bed watching my show.

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Smoked Meats and Drinks

Eaddie went out this morning to volunteer at a cat adoption event downtown. I got up just in time to take a shower and take Summer to pick up some Ridgewood Brothers to take to Diana’s house for lunch. Grant hooked us up with some heavy handed servings and sausages, which was awesome. I forgot to ask for some plates, and I wasn’t even sure they had any even for takeout, so we ran back to the house to get some and made our way across town.

It was a nice visit, and we chatted for quite a while. Lunch was great, and fortunately we seemed to avoid any trouble with her gluten allergy. I talked to her about my thoughts for the house, and she seemed really excited about it, so I think we may actually talk to the bank to see what kind of offer we can get there.

Summer left for the gym once we got back home, so I took the dogs out for a run to my parents’ house. Dad was getting ready to cover the pool, so I took the dogs back home and waited for Summer to get back. Eaddie was home when we got there, so I showed her the leftover barbecue, which was a mistake because she took it upon herself to feed her friends. She also wanted to go ride bikes with them, so I drove her to my parents’ house to get her other bike back, since not all of her friends had bikes. I’m not sure how I got suckered into that either.

Once Summer got home, we walked the dogs back to my parents’ house and covered the pool. By the time we got back home, I was sweaty and wanted to take a quick shower. Summer didn’t pay attention and left her leash outside where the dogs got into it, so I went back out later and found the rubber grip had been shredded all over the yard, and the poop bag holder was destroyed with plastic bags strewn all over the place. This caused a bit of a fight, because I’ve been beyond sick to death of her running around completely aloof, not paying attention to anything. I’ve got to get her back to the doctor to find some way to calm her mind.

Eaddie and Eli made it back to the house and hung out for a while, and then I got out my cocktail smoker and we tried smoking some Fireball whiskey for Summer and myself. The smoker worked great, and we didn’t even set off the fire alarm.

I ended the night submitting some reviews for my Amazon Vine products. I guess I’ve got to wait two weeks to be allowed to search for items again, because my review count dipped below 60% of the items I’ve ordered. The website only ever said I needed to review 90% by December, so I had no idea I was going to get suspended.

Come on!

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Review Bomb

I’ve gotten progressively less sleep throughout the week, but work has still been good. There was a lot more traffic and some rain today, but the drive was still straightforward and easy. I still wouldn’t want to do it without Autopilot though. I was a little bit more active today, and had a meeting with a vendor about our badge photo sync. Then for some reason, Randy wanted me to ride along with him to the admin office, where I didn’t really do anything for him. I met a few more people and looked at a timeclock that he couldn’t actually fix, but at least now I know it’s there.

From there, we went to a place by the office called BJ’s Market Cafe for lunch and met up with Maggie, Jim, and Jay. It was an odd place in what looked to be a very shady alleyway that was littered with potholes and standing water. Inside, it reminded me of Old South. It was packed with old people eating old white people food. They were all bragging about the beef tips with rice. I found it to be fairly bland, but the cornbread was good.

Sometime after lunch, Julie asked about my resume, and then I got a call from a local guy that may or may not be looking to actually hire somebody to do something that was never really made very clear to me. He just kept saying he liked to work with cool people, but all I really learned was that my sister doesn’t have a clue what I do. It’s not her fault, because I hardly know how to explain it.

Near the end of the day, Johnny called to check in and also said he enlisted the help of DIS for his SCCM project. We talked for a little while, and then it was time to go home.

Summer invited my parents over for dinner, but she didn’t give me any clues as to what she was cooking. I made it through unusually heavy traffic, then started a load of laundry as soon as I got in the door. From there, I started encountering aggravation after aggravation that made for a quiet night. I continued with laundry and took the dogs out for a short walk in the sprinkling rain.

Evidently I was temporarily suspended from Amazon Vine because I didn’t have enough reviews up, so I submitted several of those. Then I finished my last load of laundry for the night and went to bed.

Stop doing things.

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Roll With the Lunches

This morning was my roughest start, but I’d still had worse. Somehow I got out of the house with my undershirt on backwards, but I fixed that before I got into the car. I got to work a little bit late since I wasn’t sure anyone would be there to let me in, and traffic was heavier, but not really any worse or slower than when I’ve started earlier. I still got there in the same amount of time, or possibly even faster because all of the traffic was speeding.

I brought some speakers from home and got them set up for music, and then I got into the SCCM server. I have been constantly surprised by the lack of best practices, and I messaged Gary to tell him how good of a job he had done back in Russellville. I made a couple imaging drives for the techs, and it kind of astounded me how little any of them knew. At least they’re good-natured.

I was alone for most of the morning because Maggie came in way later than she told me she would be. Eventually people showed up, and then several of us met at Jacob’s Wings for lunch. The “boneless wings” were really just chopped up chicken strips with sauce, but they were tasty, and I actually liked that they had less breading. Jay showed up to lunch late with a new Kia that looked pretty slick. Then everyone headed back out and I wrapped up the afternoon in relative peace. It was basically a fraction of what I had been doing at Two Rivers, except most everything was still functional, and I had a team of people doing what Kim should have been doing so I could stay focused.

The drive home was fine with more of the Waveform podcast. Dad had offered spring rolls earlier, but Summer had to cook the food she bought for dinner on Monday for Eaddie, because she would be out late for school stuff the rest of the week. I got home and immediately headed out to return an Amazon purchase to The UPS Store, and then picked up some laundry detergent from Walgreens. Then I took the dogs for a quick walk through the neighborhood while my parents ran to the grocery store.

I dropped the dogs off back at home and then rode back to my parents’ house to eat. It got dark early, so I didn’t get to stay long. The girls were in bed when I got home, so I had to clean up the grill and put everything back in place on the deck. I spent a little more time with the dogs, and then came in to wrap up before bed.

Keys like butter.

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Fool Me Three Times

Midway through the week, things are still pretty calm. Teachers have been fussing about not having Chromebooks yet, so Kim sorted through handbook agreement forms. I had to give James a quick pep talk on how to keep track of what devices are going out, and I probably should have just let him struggle a bit. Between that and helping with the paraprofessional test, I just felt like I was doing too much.

He ended up leaving early to help his father at a doctor appointment, and of course I was the last one out the door again. I’ll never earn enough for the time I’ve put in there. It was an easy drive home though, and I had to kick Eaddie and her friend out from their duo band practice so I could finally have my remote interview with DeepNet.

The joke was on me, because the chick cancelled on me again at the last minute. I scheduled one more for Monday, but at this point I’m not hopeful. Best case scenario, I can earn some good money in Little Rock and then find a home at Grace if they’ll pay enough.

Summer and I had some leftovers and then walked the dogs around a different path through the neighborhood. Eaddie was out until after dark, but then it was an early night for all of us.

Fool me four times, shame back on you actually. You are picking on a vulnerable man!

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Grand.

I got out of the house super early today just in case traffic was awful. There were tons of trees down along the way to work, and the house across from the school had like three trees blown right over. Of course I actually beat everyone to work, but Kim was right behind me to let me into the office. The day went by super fast, but ham and cheese wraps didn’t sound at all appetizing. I ended up taking James to the Junction Cafe for lunch, to needlessly build a little more rapport. I’m just too nice.

The afternoon went by quickly as well, and Kim and James both left at 3:30, which still shocks me. I don’t think he’s worked eight hours yet. I stuck around to get my hours, because I ain’t no cheater. I headed straight home, and Summer had veggies, potatoes, and sausage in the oven. Eaddie had Eli over, and it didn’t take long for me to get generally irritated.

Stilgar chewed the water hose apart, so I spanked him with it. It didn’t stick, because he was right back on it after I went inside. I wasn’t in the mood for company, and there was food rotting in the fridge, so I didn’t eat any of the new food. Summer wound down early, and I took the dogs for a walk to my parents’ house as the sun set. We got home with the last little bit of twilight, and then Dad wanted to come over to update his new DJI FPV drone. Their cable has been out for a few days, and I don’t know if there’s an ETA for repair.

We eventually got the drone updated, and the Roomba suddenly wasn’t fussy about being on my account, so I left it alone. Dad went home, and I wound down as quickly as I could.

It’s complex.

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No, but Maybe

I forgot to grab a banana for work this morning, so I started off hungry. It was pretty quiet, but I still had plenty of time to vent about the surrounding idiocy. I was a bit more helpful today, and it seemed like James was getting into a little bit of a groove. I still don’t know if he’ll stick around, but I guess he is making more than I was. I could see him leaving for Russellville, since he evidently lives just a few blocks away from us.

I did get a call from Grace Manufacturing, which was a bit of a surprise. They turned me down for the job I interviewed for, but liked me well enough to call back because one of their IT guys is retiring in a few months. I laughed a bit that they were actually able to get ahead of that and train someone before he leaves, unlike schools where they just play catch-up forever. I’ll get to have a real interview next week, so I feel like I have a pretty good chance of getting an offer from them. Tomorrow, I’ll have my call with Moodle too, so I really need to study up for that one in the morning.

I was the last one out of the office again, this time messing around with SCCM. I should just leave it, but I also don’t want to make it seem like I didn’t actually have it working. I need to be able to image at least one computer to prove it works before I go.

After work, I took care of the fish and made it home to eat some of the leftover tacos Dad brought over. Then I was pretty quick to take the dogs out for a run. We got to the end of my parents’ street when my Onewheel just died. Luckily I was coming up to a stop, so I just tipped forward and stumbled off of it, but all the lights went out and I could never get it to wake up again. I ended up carrying it, a water bottle, and two bags of poop, all while trying to keep the dogs from pulling me over all the way to their house.

Dad got the DJI FPV drone in, and unboxed it before he had to go water the plants. I had Summer bring my swimsuit over so I could cool off, and we played with the dogs by the pool. Stilgar really wanted in, so I splashed him a bunch to cool him off. Then Summer took everything else home so I could walk the dogs back. It was a struggle, but we made it through the humidity of the evening.

Eaddie got home a little after I did, and spent some time talking to Summer while I wound down for the night. Muad’Dib really doesn’t seem to like the Ol’ Roy that we’ve gotten for them, so I guess I’ll have to keep buying something better.

Pay the bills!