Tag: frustration

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Upper Elementary, My Dear

We met at the shop for projects this morning, since teachers had a professional development day. I was sent with Josh the Wanderer and Travis the New to the intermediate school, so we could swap out docking stations for teachers that were still hanging on to old Lenovo Thinkpads from the high school. It was long and tedious work, but was broken up with some leftover breakfast in the teachers’ workroom.

Josh kept getting sidetracked while Travis and I split up and deployed docks all morning. We had a touch panel install as well, but it ended up being a faulty panel that had to be replaced again. While we were in the building, Josh found another projector out as well, so that had to be swapped in the afternoon.

I loaded Thomas, Zach, and Gary into the Model 3 for lunch at Arby’s, and it noticeably hampered my launch acceleration. I think it remains that Tammy has been the most excited about the new car. I was still full from breakfast, so I just got some Loaded Diablo Fries, which were barely hot at all. Zach and Gary had the Diablo sandwiches, but reported the same.

The afternoon dragged as well, and we didn’t get to leave early as we had hoped last week. I felt hot, sweaty, and gross all day, so I was excited to go home. I started a load of laundry while Summer headed home from Conway. Eaddie was still with her friends and would be out trick-or-treating all evening.

As it got late, I went to my parents’ house to hang out with them until Eaddie was done. They had a few kids come through while I was there, and apparently I had missed Eaddie and her friends by a little bit. She wasn’t ready to go home until an hour after we all expected, and I wasn’t thrilled to be out so late. I picked her up a little before 10 and we took Autopilot home down Skyline. It made it all the way to the end of the mountain and then bailed on the sharp 90º curve at the end. We swapped vehicles, and then it was home for bed.

Who’s driving this thing, anyway?

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Not Playing

I got up this morning and dug out all the leftovers I could find to make breakfast. I started by caramelizing some onions and serrano peppers, and defrosting some ham. Once I got all of that diced up and into the pan, I added all the eggs we had, along with some tomatoes and cheese. Once that was scrambled up together, I loaded up some whole wheat pita bread that we had in the freezer. I thought it turned out really well, and the girls seemed to like it.

The girls wanted to go to the high school play again in the afternoon, so I went home to clean up. I ended up springing a leak and couldn’t stop the bleeding for several hours, so I just stayed home and did a couple loads of laundry. Once I had things under control, I headed back up to Summer’s for dinner.

She made chicken and dumplings for me, but forgot the green onions, so I turned around and ran through Walmart first. They were actually out of green onions, so I picked up some chives and cilantro instead. Those, along with some more fresh onion and serrano peppers made for a really good dinner, though I’m not sure anyone else enjoyed it as much as I did.

I laid on the couch with Summer for a bit while she wound down. Autumn took Eaddie to her friend’s house for the night, and then came back wanting to play Monopoly. Summer just wanted to relax though, so it ended up being a really quiet, early night.

Frustered

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Stuffed Crabby

I woke up feeling quite a bit better this morning, after struggling with a full belly all night. There was just too much good food all day long. I got everything packed up and ready to go, but struggled to get out before 8:30, so I ended up skipping the first session. I figured they should have been recorded anyway, so I should get access to those copies.

I came down for the second session, and Gary and Greg were both just sitting in the atrium. The session I wanted to attend was actually held out there, since the guy had too much trouble keeping warm in the designated room yesterday. I didn’t think it was bad, but I think he may have been stuck under an air vent at the front of the room.

After that session, we decided to skip out on the keynote and lunch. I forgot that they usually have drawings for prizes, otherwise I might have protested a bit. We stopped in Conway so Gary could get an oil change and a carwash. While we waited for a quick detail, I took us back across town to Chipotle. I don’t think Greg was too impressed after the sticker shock, but Gary and I enjoyed it. When we got back to Splash, Summer convinced me to wait 15 minutes for her to get off work and ride back with her.

Nearly an hour later, we finally left and ran into some really heavy traffic due to a wreck right on the interstate. We made it home though, and Summer went to the gym while I went down into the shop to see how the week went. One of our new guys started that morning, and I just briefly met him on our way out for the day.

I went home to unpack, and then struggled with Summer to communicate that we should move some money around for Monday. I ended up meeting her at Centennial to try and withdraw cash, but they said they didn’t have that much to hand out. Frustrated with my explanations of what we needed, she snapped that she would just get a cashier’s check for seven bucks. I took that to Arvest, and was back out the door in mere seconds.

From there, I went home and shuffled things around in the garage for a bit. Autumn had senior night, and Summer wanted me to come record them walking onto the field. Somehow, Autumn convinced those in charge to let her have three people with her on the field. I was glad that Summer got to be a part of it, but it seemed like Autumn was only paying attention to her grandparents while they were out there.

As we left, I ducked out in a hurry and went home to continue cleaning out the garage. There’s still a lot of work to do, but at least I’ll be able to fit a car in there again. The girls went to IHOP after the game, so Summer was already in bed and not at all talkative when I got there. I waited up for the girls, and then went to bed once they got home.

You’re Not Getting It.

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Hip to Be Cubed

I tried not to sleep too late today, and I think I may have been the first one up. Summer eventually got up and wanted to make monkey bread, so she got stuff to start that, and then fried some potatoes for brunch. I had my Steam Deck recharged, and tried to play a little Fez. It played really well, though the first part of the game that acted like it glitched out kind of had me worried for a second.

Eventually I headed home so I could try and get something done instead of wasting another entire weekend. I almost immediately noticed a tiny leak under my kitchen sink that caused the particle board to swell up and sag even more than it already was. All I could really do at the time was stick a bucket under the drip and leave the cabinet open to try out. Then I got a little bit more stuff shuffled around in the garage, but I need to finish up since I’ve probably only got a couple weekends left before delivery day.

I ended up having a pretty bad, relatively long anxiety attack while doing some sweeping, and had to go inside to lie down on the couch for a bit. Summer stopped by after dropping Eaddie off at a schoolmate’s house to work on something for robotics, and we eventually went to Walmart for dinner ingredients.

As soon as we got back to the house, I butterflied the pork loin into surprisingly thin and tender chops. Summer sautéed some Brussels sprouts and then did a little Shake ‘n Bake, and we ate that with some leftover potato salad and broccoli salad. Dinner was really good, but we never saw Autumn except for when we made her come take out the trash. I think all three of us are just ready for her to get lost.

When we finished eating, I went to pick up Eaddie, and brought her back home to eat. Then she had Autumn take her to the store to get cake mix so she could make cake pops. Summer was in her head, on top of having a headache all day. I got frustrated that she wouldn’t even do the bare minimum to take care of any of it, and nearly went home for the night. I ended up staying and just sitting on my phone on the couch all night until bedtime.

Just do the goddamn thing.

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Worsedevil

I didn’t end up going to Maumelle with Summer today, and instead slept very heavily until around 10. I finally got up and around to finish some leftovers for breakfast, and it looked like Autumn was awake, but I never saw her. I peeked in at Eaddie to see if she wanted to go ride her bike, but she got up and did homework instead. I unintentionally spent all afternoon playing Into the Breach while she worked on her stuff, and didn’t leave for home until nearly dinner time.

I had gotten the date wrong on my free headlamp from Lowe’s, and stopped by there on my way home to pick it up. Shortly after I got home, Bác Vân called and wanted me to come over to try some ground-up black sesame seeds in water. She insisted it would cure my high blood pressure, but I wasn’t so sure it was worth it. I went back home and killed most of the rest of the evening in front of the TV.

I watched the penultimate episode of She-Hulk, and was surprised at how much Daredevil was in it. He was very different from the Netflix version though, down to his accent and the way he spoke. I didn’t much care for it, but I’m still excited to see what’s next.

After a hot shower, I headed back up to Summer’s for the evening, but she was already nearly asleep. I ended up just sitting in the dark on my phone again, wasting what was left of the night. I kind of assume tomorrow won’t be much better.

Spoopy.

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Mow, Mow, Mow to Boat

I didn’t sleep very well or for very long last night. The girls were supposed to get up early to mow so they could go to their father’s for the weekend, but we beat them out of bed. It took some prying, and neither one was super motivated. Eaddie finally went out to start mowing, but complained that she wanted to go out on the boat with her friends. Summer was kind of in and out and up in her feelings about it, but tried to get Autumn motivated to do some cleaning up herself.

Eventually I got it through to the kids that they didn’t meet our expectations, and that they had to get it done and work together if they wanted to do anything else for the weekend. Autumn eventually started mowing while Eaddie took a break to go out with her friends. Summer went to the gym and I dropped Eaddie off. On the way back, I got some more gas for the mower, then stopped by to see Grant and Robert. They didn’t have any pork pops that I wanted to try, so I got some brisket and headed back to the house.

Autumn had taken a pretty lengthy break while I was gone, but started up again shortly after I got back. Summer got back from her workout, and by that time I figured we didn’t have long before we could go to my house and do some cleaning up there. I didn’t realize she had a bunch more stuff she wanted to get done, so I ended up burning all afternoon and evening doing nothing more than playing Into the Breach.

Eventually Autumn left to get Eaddie and head to Clarksville. Summer wasted the rest of the evening in front of the TV. I ate some leftovers myself after refusing to get some takeout for her. I cleaned a whole bunch of stuff out of the refrigerator, and I’ll clean out some more for breakfast in the morning before going home.

Better just go it alone.

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Make Work Count!

I woke up in the middle of an ocular migraine this morning, but fortunately that didn’t slow me down. I made it in to work a few minutes early and got right to it. Eventually I got around to making a cup of coffee, but when I brought it back to my desk and tried to dunk an old, stale donut into it, a piece fell into the cup and splashed coffee onto my desk mat. I rolled it out from underneath my keyboard and washed it the best I could in the sink, and then hung it up on my door to dry.

A while later, Thomas came into my office and asked me to count my phone calls since Monday. It wasn’t very accurate, but I added messages, texts, and emails to the list of things that required “non-trivial” amounts of work. It truly felt like I just couldn’t self-prioritize anything today.

Zach came and got me for lunch, and we went to Fat Daddy’s downtown. I tried their Thursday lunch special, which was a BLT with pulled pork. It was probably one of the better things I’ve had there, but I wished it had more bacon and less pulled pork.

After lunch, I got to spend some time at Oakland to close out some work orders. One of them got me a little heated, because she just bought her own computer and didn’t cancel the ticket, so all the time and effort I spent on it was completely wasted. I got out just before the kids were released, and ran into Robert and his tiny toddler for parent walkup.

The rest of the afternoon went by quietly, and I left a bit late so I could finish up one last project for the day. Summer beat me home with Chipotle, and we ate at my house before she headed home. I ended up following her after a while, and we called it an early night.

I can’t fix willful ignorance and a discernible lack of effort.

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I Smell a Rat

It was cooler and rainy today, so I went in with my hair down and did some quiet work in my office all morning. Evidently our rodent friend returned and ate through Gary’s backpack to find some crackers, so he put out some glue traps in the breakroom. I kept busy all morning, so lunch time was there before I knew it. Zach, Gary, Thomas, and I went to Sam’s for the first time in a while after Tammy suggested Chick O’ Fish. It really does seem to just depend on who’s cooking that day, because I got some decent sized fish, but the chicken was smaller than my jumbo shrimp.

After lunch, I finished up what I could in my office and then ended the day at Oakland to close out several tickets that had accumulated. I never got around to looking at any of Kyle’s tickets, but Greg and Zach did quite a few since he said he was out for the week with COVID. It definitely seems like it’s spreading quickly now that school is back in session, because Sheri said Steven was out as well.

I went home for a while after work and tinkered a bit before deciding to set up a live trap at the office. Evidently Dad bought a couple larger ones, so I took all four, from Mason jar, to full cat-sized. Once I had them set up at the shop, I headed on up to Summer’s for the evening, but kind of wished I had just gone home. I lose a minimum of an hour out of my day by doing that, and everyone was already in bed anyway. It was a little unfair how irritated it made me, but I should know better by now. I kept getting too distracted as I was leaving the house, so it was just too late by the time I got there. On top of all of that, I noticed that Summer’s rear driver-side tier was down to 15 pounds, so I’ll have to watch that to check for a leak. I think it’s time to pull the trigger.

It’s my turn.

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Decoy Day

I was surprised I made it to work in such good form this morning after having so much trouble going to sleep last night. I would expect to be exhausted after such a long drive home, but I seem to always have trouble falling asleep after that. Today was our first day of training with Capturing Kids’ Hearts, and without going into too much detail, it went exactly as I expected it would. It seems we paid half a million for two days of teambuilding exercises sporadically placed between lectures about child psychology. I was surprised that so many people thought it went better than they expected. Evidently the usual teacher professional development is absolutely hot garbage, and this was new and refreshing.

We took an hour for lunch and were told to “leave no teacher behind,” and immediately my entire table disappeared without a word. I ended up going to McDonald’s on my own, and had a pretty terrible experience, along with everyone else that was there. I saw so many orders go back up to the counter in such a short amount of time. My burger was made incorrectly, and tasted terrible to boot. It was as though they placed the meat patty on a mound of salt to cook.

In the afternoon, we finally got to our “sentimental item” sharing activity. I had brought the giant stuffed cow/body pillow thing that Summer got me when we first started dating, but also my BaliYo butterfly/balisong pen. I decided at the last minute to switch it up and tell a story about the pen instead of the obvious, giant cow. It barely got a giggle, and nearly every other person in our enormous circle of staff had stories that made them sob.

We wrapped up “early,” but I was absolutely positive that the dismissal time was planned. I went home for a little bit to change, and then met the girls at The Center for Eaddie’s sophomore orientation night. The girls immediately left us, so it ended up being Summer and me by ourselves in the middle of the crowd. Feeling pointless, on top of some creeping anxiety, meant that I made it through the commons to the library before having to duck out.

I went home to wait for the girls, and then got a text from Dad that Mom was feeling chilled with a fever. I ran an expired at-home COVID test to them, and then stopped by to see Grant for a couple minutes as I waited for the girls. Once they were done, I met them at La Huerta for dinner, and then went home with them.

Summer went straight to bed, so I played Aperture Desk Job to completion on my Steam Deck, which took it down to about 49% battery. Then it was off to bed.

What a colossal waste of time for so many people that are already so far behind.

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All Hands on Deck

It started out kind of quiet today, so I spent most of it working on an Autodesk deployment. It’s a new teacher this year, so hopefully she reads her part and registers the students for their licenses. Eventually I started getting pulled in several different directions, but it wasn’t too bad.

Gary came back and said they wanted to go to lunch a little early, and Zach took us to BFD. Brody met us there a little bit late, which just extended our lunch. I thought I was getting the lunch fajitas, but ended up paying like $5 more somehow. I just haven’t been super impressed with that place in a while, but at least the food was fairly good today.

A little later in the afternoon, my Steam Deck was finally delivered, so I brought it to the shop and showed the guys before throwing it on the charger for the rest of the day. After work, I started loading games on it and was going to show them, but it wound down to Zach, Thomas, and me, and then Thomas politely asked me to leave, presumably because I wasn’t quite in an inner-enough circle to hear whatever he had to say.

Autumn had her karate test in the evening, but Eaddie wouldn’t get out of band until after it started. I picked her up, and we met Summer and my dad there, and she was already just barely doing any of the exercises. I know that it’s physically demanding, and that it’s hard, and that I couldn’t do any better, but it’s frustrating that she’s been treating it like she’s going to just magically get so much more respect from the others in the classes for being a higher belt, when she couldn’t even begin to keep up with the juniors. It’s obvious she doesn’t work for it, and every other lifestyle choice she makes is contrary to whatever she says about karate in the moment. I want her to do well, and I want her to work hard, but I don’t trust that she’s not doing the bare minimum and then talking big just to keep up appearances. We could have been watching OneRepublic and NEEDTOBREATHE.

After that was all finally over, I went home and cleaned up for bed as quickly as I could. Tomorrow night will be a long night, and I aim to stay awake for the drive home.

Just another way to collect unplayed games.