Tag: frustration

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The Secret Life of an Alien

I had an anxiety attack in bed while I was trying to go to sleep last night, which was a rare occurrance. At least I went to bed early, and got an above-average amount of sleep. We got out of the house and tried the other McDonald’s, but still got stuck in line again. It seems to be completely luck of the draw. I took my coffee and made it to Morrilton to order a biscuit for breakfast.

It was more deep-dive into the AI exploits of the fraudster technology manager, and I am one billion percent positive that he is an alien from another planet. I have begun collecting evidence. If I disappear or am found dead, then dear reader, do not believe anything they say about me. It was no accident. They got to me, and silenced me the only way they could.

I went down to help Elizabeth with something, then took a walk with David to investigate our two fence controllers. It appeared they had blocked the safety sensors to keep the back gate open, which seems counter to any security protocol. It had clearly been that way for some time.

We went back to McDonald’s a third time for lunch and had to argue with the staff about my order. The two low-level staff were as friendly as they knew how to be, while admitting complete ignorance. The manager on duty absolutely refused to make eye contact or respond when I spoke directly to her. I wasn’t ugly in any way, and I see her five days a week, so I could not fathom the stress she was under. I was eventually fed and went back to work.

The afternoon went by fairly quickly because of how late I went to lunch. I texted Kyle since I remembered he used to work at Acxiom, and he actually replied pretty quickly. I talked to him about our resident alien, and as if by mysterious forces beyond our universe, he was actually working for the company that Brandon moved to. We shared several laughs over text throughout the evening.

Muad’Dib and I made it back to town and I ordered tickets for Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox. Then we went on a great run in the crisp air before it got dark. Summer and I ate when we got back, and then I took my car for a good washing. The new FSD release gave me all kinds of fits this morning, and even fussed quite a bit on the way home, so hopefully this helped.

I vacuumed some more to end the night, and got to sleep just a little bit early again.

⏁⊑⟒ ⌇⟒☊⍀⟒⏁ ⌰⟟⎎⟒ ⍜⎎ ⏃⋏ ⏃⌰⟟⟒⋏

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Fall of Man

We went all the way across town for a smoothie this morning, and that McDonald’s was way busier than the other one. I don’t know if it was the timing or location, but I thought it would be a shorter and faster detour. We got to work and had a bit of productivity in the morning until I started reading more of my predecessor’s old ChatGPT logs.

At this point, I am completely convinced that Brandon was not real. He was not human. He was an alien, or some kind of lizard person with primative knowledge of our species. I’ve seen the memes about AI, but I could never imagine such intense and immediate reliance on “artificial intelligence” for literally every aspect of seemingly everything he was doing. Every email, every presentation, and every written interaction from him was constructed by ChatGPT. He didn’t even write his own “heartfelt” resignation letter to the company. It was entirely crafted by ChatGPT. What really sent me over the edge was the fact that he asked it to “tell me about 4th of July.” He asked about things that should have been muscle memory for anyone that has been even tangentially interested in IT as a hobby, much less as a career.

Flabberghasted, we went to McDonald’s to decompress. I took the whole hour.

The afternoon wasn’t much to speak of. I wrote some more documentation. I wrote it myself. I didn’t ask ChatGPT to write it for me. That’s what I got from Brandon. Literally a roadmap written by AI to tell me how our network is set up. Even I know what a /24 subnet is. Asinine.

We ran into traffic on the way home and took the Atkins exit just in time to pass Summer, who was stuck due to a wreck ahead of us. I took Highway 64 the whole way home and beat her by just a couple minutes. She had a “beef stroganoff” with meatballs going in the slow cooker all day, so I took Muad’Dib for a quick run and made it back to eat outside with the girls. Eaddie left again for band, Summer went to bed, and I did a bit of cleanup before crashing myself.

This is how AI takes our jobs – not directly, but by empowering those that are simply not qualified for the jobs they conned themselves into.

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Clownin’

I got five orders into McDonald’s today. We started with a coffee before leaving town, then stopped in Morrilton for a chicken biscuit. I spent all morning documenting printers, and then we went for a late lunch and redeemed points for a free Happy Meal. The six McNuggets didn’t quite satisfy me, so I redeemed a free Double Cheeseburger, which was quite a bit heftier than I remembered. I was actually quite pleased. I wrapped that up with a free Apple Pie for dessert.

As I was finishing up, a young, very McMethed-out girl approached and asked if I had a hot spot. I was polite and tried to learn what she really needed, and she said she was trying to get a ride to her uncle’s place that was “less than ten minutes away.” I had to decline her at that point, and she walked up to a kiosk to order something before walking over to talk to someone else, who I think was an employee.

The afternoon went by quickly, and then we made it home so I could eat some leftover chicken before taking Muad’Dib on a run. I originally thought I’d run him to the high school to meet Summer for the marching assessment, but she wanted me to run him first, and then go with her for the entire time she would be there.

Muad’Dib ran well, but I had to zap him a few times when he kept trying to chase cats, or generally wouldn’t listen. He was mostly good, but just wasn’t being as obedient as I needed him to be. Summer and I had a chat when we got back, and then we went to the high school to watch a couple bands play before Eaddie would go out with the Tech band.

We brought Muad’Dib along, and he was immediately wound up and alert for all the noise and goings-on. He didn’t even wait to get out of the car, and sprung out as soon as I opened the door, which was very unlike him. As we entered the stadium, there was no one to turn us away. He got more and more anxious as we entered the crowd of people. We got seated and watched one band, but then I decided to take him off to the side of the field to decompress in the grass. We walked around for a couple of bands, and then he finally felt okay to come back for Tech.

Summer was straight to bed as I tried to clean up some stuff in the garage and kitchen. I didn’t feel great, but I eventually made it to bed.

Makin’ my way downtown, walkin’ slow, faces pass, and I’m homebound.

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On Worth

Summer had to work today. I slept in for quite a while, nearly straight through the entire night, for the first time since I can remember. I eventually got up, ate the last leftover hamburger, showered, and met up with Mark to finish up networking his new computers. It started raining before we left, and Muad’Dib and I got back to the house just as Summer was finishing up her bath.

We sat outside with her on the porch for just a moment while it rained. The kids were at an away game all day. We spent a minimal amount of time together, and then I went back to my computer, frustrated on multiple fronts by failing functions. I eventually got some laundry going while Summer appeared to be falling asleep.

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Enchiladas Good; Fire Bad!!!

I slept in kind of late whiel Summer ran a 10k in town. She came back and said she wanted to run another 5k this evening with Muad’Dib, which would be a glow run in the dark. Eaddie also wanted to have a fire with Eli, and I ended up responsible for dinner. After not much cleaning up, I went to the Neighborhood Market for stuff to make enchiladas.

The afternoon flew by as Summer helped me by making guacamole. I threw chicken into the Instant Pot and probably cooked it longer than I really needed. Summer helped me roll that into tortillas that we covered in sauce and cheese, and then broiled.

Everyone seemed to like dinner, and we had twice what we needed, so dinner will be ready for a day or two this next week. Summer took Muad’Dib for their run, and I tried to start a fire with the kids. Past Michael was a real bro and filled the fire pit with a bunch of dry starter, which went up super easily. Unfortunately, the wood I had been chopping didn’t want to take, so the fire turned into a smokey, smoldering pit that the kids didn’t want to sit around.

Dad came over for a little while, so I took the leaf blower out back to try and get some more flames, but they just wouldn’t last. The kids stayed inside after making pigs in a blanket, Dad lelft, and Summer went to bed.

I don’t remember.

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Chop Chop

Today needed to be Friday. I waited all morning for McDonald’s, and when the time came, the app wasn’t working and I had to go in to try and place my order. I tried several times to redeem a deal, but it wouldn’t let me. Without hesitation, I walked out and we went to Taco Bell instead. It was a nice day to be outside, but Muad’Dib kept wanting to eat some cinnamon twists that somebody dropped on the ground outside. It would have been fine, except that it was off the curb, so I kept having to spank him to keep him out of danger.

We ate and then rode out a long afternoon. When we got to the house, I went out back and assembled the wood rack I ordered a while back. It was really cheap and flimsy, but hopefully it will hold up for a while out of the weather. I chopped a few logs up and had the kids wheelbarrow them to the back yard, but it got dark fast and I got stuck on a log with a big knot in it.

Everyone else wound down pretty quickly after that. The kids made some tomato and milk (???) soup, and I had a couple cold brats. Then I played a few rounds of Please Fix the Road before I decided it wasn’t for me and requested a refund.

Time to suck it up.

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OneMany

I finally heard back from David at Howard today, and he set me up with a different rep that supports our category of business. Beyond that, I just haphazardly chiseled away at my understanding of Azure. We hit up McDonald’s again for more Monopoly pieces, but neither my Big Mac nor my medium hot tea had pieces. That was pretty upsetting, but I did learn that I could request up to ten game pieces per day by following the alternative method of entry, so I did that to make up for it.

The afternoon dragged on a bit as I spent much of it waiting for systems. Julie called to offer bread, so I stopped by her place when I got back to town, and chatted with her and Kevin for a little while. As soon as we got to the house, I made a sandwich out of the leftover chicken and then walked Muad’Dib to my parents’ house. Dad was at church, but Mom gave me some meat for Muad’Dib, and then we walked back in the dark.

It was a relatively quick night to bed after that, aside from my shitty Blink camera in the basement harassing me with notifications for absolutely no reason.

irritare

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Doggy Jail

We swung through a busy McDonald’s for a free biscuit this morning, and then Muad’Dib had to take care of business before we could go into the office. As I was going back to the car for a bag, he ran out in front of a big truck that was coming through the front parking lot for some reason, so I had to discipline him for running around and not listening. He sulked all morning as I made him lay by my side, but he was much better behaved the rest of the day, walking right by my side any time we went anywhere.

I’ve come to hate Microsoft cloud services with nearly every fiber of my being as I try to work out what we have and what we need. Licensing is a mess, and it feels almost beaurecratic how much documentation you have to understand to make any of it work. We finally took a break and went back to McDonald’s for more Monopoly pieces. I’ve been doing pretty well with the small stuff, so maybe I’ll get lucky with something big.

The afternoon dragged a little bit as I struggled to maintain focus. I finally just had to throw my hands in the air at quitting time. Summer had burgers and brats for us when we got to the house, and then I had to run to Walgreens for a prescription and some more nonstick gauze pads for my arm.

Muad’Dib and I took a long walk to my parents’ house and visited with Dad for a little bit, and then got back right at dark. I cleaned up a little bit and wrote a few reviews, and then it was off to bed.

Doggy Directions

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R.O.U.S.

I slept hard with vivid dreams last night, and had to drag myself out of bed in the morning. We got to work and Joel had brought Dexter, who didn’t take very kindly to Muad’Dib. It didn’t help that Muad’Dib just wanted to eat his food, so I had to shoo him up the stairs. I did pretty well in the morning, but after another Monopoly run, I found the afternoon to be pretty dull. I did discover that I could get hot tea to drink for an extra game piece, which was cool.

I remembered to call TCW to schedule another service call, and they somehow managed to make it out the same day. Luckily Summer was home early to cook dinner, so she was there for them to complete the job. It was rats again, and they threatened to charge the next time they had to come out. My response would have been for them to run rodent-proof cable if they’re going to leave bundles of it lying on the ground like that.

The kids were basically sitting at the table ready to eat when we got there, so we sat down for a quick dinner. Then Summer and I went out back to investigate the basement situation. Dad showed up to join the party, and the two of them wandered back farther than I could go. I actually had some spare PVC pipe sections from, I think the kids’ History Day project, so they ran the fiber through that, and I coiled the rest and hung it up in a place that hopefully a rat won’t find. While they were down there, they looked for a doorbell transformer without any luck. They did find a cat skeleton, but Summer said it looked like it had been down there longer than we have been here.

It was a short night after that. Just more frustration and bed.

|floodgates|

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Show and a Dinner

I made a half-successful French omelette for Summer this morning, and just had some messed up eggs for myself. I thought we might go under the house to investigate the bad fiber again, but ultimately I figured TCW would have to come back out and perform the actual repair anyway. I’m surprised they don’t install rodent-proof fiber in situations like this, because our crawl space is just so open. Surely by starting their business in the most rural areas, they’ve had to deal with rats before. While I was outside investigating what I could reach, I decided to whack a log to see if it would be any easier to split. To my surprise, it actually was.

Alexa, add “chop firewood” to my to-do list.

Eaddie had her first concert in the afternoon, so Summer had to alter her dress a bit. I would have liked to vacuum some more, but I had a pretty slow start. We eventually got cleaned up and headed to Witherspoon early to find seats. Eaddie was sitting with her grandmother in the back corner when we got there, so Summer stopped to talk to her, and then invited her and Autumn to come sit with us. The show was long, with an assortment of exciting, and not-so, music. They changed the band around every time, so Eaddie wasn’t playing in like half of the show.

When we finally left, we decided to go to Check-H for an early dinner. I started out with a really great salad, but I should have quit there. We both came home with belly aches, so we stayed in rather than walk Muad’Dib.

Pick a project. Just one.