Tag: home

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Almost Crafting

I was pretty mentally drained from work today. I’ve spent most of every day just reading, but I finally started digging into Windows Deployment Services today. As usual, the morning flew by, and the afternoon dragged. Out of nowhere, I answered a call from a lady in Atkins whose husband collects trash. She said he brings home laptops and other goodies that he finds, and she recovered one of our lost Chromebooks. I thanked her for taking the time to call, and Summer should be able to stop by on her way through town tomorrow.

After work, I went home to feed the fish, then ran to Harbor Freight for a drain auger. Summer was off work and not feeling great, but I met her at the Neighborhood Market to pick up groceries. When we got home, she took a bath and I had to figure out dinner. I really wanted some higher quality pizza, so I bit the bullet and spent the money on Papa John’s. While I was waiting, I saw one of my old esports kids and his father, so I chatted with them until my order was done.

Summer and I ate, and then she watched TV while I unpacked the new TV stand we bought. Then she went to bed and I watched some artistic folk on YouTube while I assembled our furniture-in-a-box. Eaddie got home late after spending the evening with Eli, and I lost track of time as I finished up. Without the glass surfaces, the stand is super light. Unfortunately one of the screw holes stripped out completely, so I’ll have to decide whether that’s worth a call to the manufacturer.

Just unlock, dammit.

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Drained

My watch has been struggling with the Tessie app, and I don’t know if it can get any better. I may just have to uninstall it for now. It barely lasts eight hours any more, and though it’s been convenient to unlock the cars, it’s less convenient to have a dead watch three times a day.

It rained the entire day, but the temperature was pretty warm. The workday went by pretty quickly as I jumped from project to project, never really accomplishing much of anything. After work, I went to feed the fish before heading home. Summer was home early, but Eaddie was out late for band. I changed and went to my parents’ house for dinner, and then Dad came back with me to look at the bathroom sink.

We tore everything up trying to get into the P trap, and of course it was completely clear. It still puzzles me that the drain stopped so suddenly, and we didn’t have what we needed to clean it up and put it back together, so it’ll be at least a three-day project.

Clean it up.

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That’s a Lye

Traffic was bad in Dardanelle this morning, so I just barely squeaked into work on time. They did some more testing first thing in the morning, and then I had to spend some time deciphering the audio mixer in the auditorium. We had a big lunch because the cafeteria had extra fajitas, but they weren’t very good. I barely got started on it when FedEx showed up with another lab of desktop computers. Those will be in the way for the foreseeable future.

I ended up staying a bit late just because I felt like I made some progress in figuring out the sound system. Then I went to feed the fish and wash my car before heading home. The bathroom sink completely stopped up this morning, out of the blue, so I poured some boiling water down the drain, hoping that would help.

Failing that, I went to my parents’ house and ate some turkey soup before returning home with some lye and a plastic drain weasel. The drain didn’t budge, so I let it sit overnight. Summer fell asleep really early after working late, and Eaddie spent all night practicing flute before going to sleep. I fought with Arvest’s mortgage site for a while before giving up. I swear the “make a payment” button only appears at certain times of the day, and it’s a load of crap. I went to bed frustrated, but before midnight, which was an accomplishment all on its own.

Shut up and take my money. No, seriously. Take it. You stupid bank.

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Three South, Five and a Half North

I thought I would be stressing over the last minute moves today, but I decided to take a different approach. We had enough cleaned up and ready to go, and I decided against trying to wall mount my nice TV in a rush. My stud finder was going nuts anyway, so I’m not sure if there’s something else already in the wall anyway. I’ll have to investigate further.

I ran to my old house to pick up an assortment of things. While I was there, I cleared a path for the sofa in case we would have time to fetch it. I brought a rake home so Eaddie could clean up the front yard while I blew off the deck with the leaf blower. Summer spent all day prepping food and cleaning up around the kitchen. I tried fixing the craft ice maker in the refrigerator, but it appeared to be an issue with the gears in the motor. Before we knew it, the sun went down and family started coming in.

My parents had turkey soup and egg rolls, so the girls walked while I caught up to them in the car. Summer got to cook egg rolls, so she and Eaddie spent most of their time out back. John, Thea, and her mother were the first to arrive. Mom got upset after we tried to corral everyone to the dinner table and gave up, but Eaddie and I were hungry and there weren’t enough seats for everyone anyway.

The girls tired early, before the others arrived, so I took them home. When I got back, everyone else had finally arrived. I could tell they were exhausted from the drive, but they humored us and came over for a little bit of food and company.

Julie gave me some dry goods to take home, and I stayed until everyone else was ready to head out. Then I went home and calibrated my speakers for their new home. I hate that my subwoofer went out so suddenly and unexpectedly, but maybe it’s a sign.

Why, no!

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Won’t Stand for This

I got up really early this morning and couldn’t go back to sleep, so I took my jump start on the day and made steak, eggs, and hashbrowns for breakfast. Eaddie said she really liked it, but I thought the steak was pretty middling. I took a shower, and then we went out to look for a TV stand at several places. We tried West Main Gallery, but they were closed. Then we went to CJ’s Consignment and found one really small one that might work. We went by Stroud’s and Cleo’s again, but they didn’t really have anything we liked. Our last stop was Sofa City before we gave up and went to the old house to load up the last of the speakers.

Once we got the speakers into the house, we went back out to try Hilltop Mall, but they didn’t have anything either. There was a new name attached to the old Bargain Barn, so we stopped there on the way to Walmart and found nothing. We made it into a busy Walmart and found one that might work, but we had to judge based on a tiny picture on the box because they didn’t have one out on display.

Summer got back to town, so we went and saw her at the wash. She reminded us about River Valley Furniture, so we checked them out and were subsequently directed to the old Staples building where they had a warehouse of furniture to sell. They didn’t have a single thing that would fit my receiver, so we finally just went back to my house to get my old TV stand. That didn’t really take as long as I thought it would, and we made it home so I could start cooking some beef tacos in the Instant Pot.

Once the food was started, I took Summer back out to the Neighborhood Market to do her grocery shopping. Then we went to Kroger for some fire wood before going to my parents’ house to pick up what groceries they got for Summer. Finally we made it home, and Eaddie and I ate while Summer boiled eggs.

I ended the night by assembling the home theater, and was disappointed to see that one of my subwoofers wouldn’t power on. It worked the last time I used them, so I don’t know if I broke something in moving, or if it got hit by lightning, or if it was just dumb luck to go through another subwoofer. I got the amp out of it, and maybe Dad will be able to find the bad part.

Smooooooth.

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Griffed

Summer went in to work late today because of some rain. I tried not to sleep too late myself, and continued running wash cycles to try and clean out the washing machine. After making a leftover burrito and taking a shower, Grant texted to get our address. I was kind of in limbo for the rest of the afternoon, waiting to see if he would show up.

Summer came home early since there wasn’t anything going on at the shops. I eventually started cleaning the carpet along the television wall, having given up on Grant. Then he texted that he was coming, followed shortly thereafter by another text that he wasn’t. Eaddie had a game night with some friends, so I just kept cleaning carpets into the evening.

When I finished cleaning my area, I dug some food out for Summer to see what she had rotting in the fridge. She cleaned up some newer leftovers and I went to my office for a while before coming back out to clean and organize some of the stuff in the pantry. Then I made some ramen noodles before retiring to the office for the rest of the evening until bed.

I pick all of them.

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Let’s Table That

We woke up reasonably early today, but it took us a little bit to get started. Summer went to the gym while I messed with things around the house. After she got back, we met Julie and Kevin at my old house to get the dining room table and futon. For some reason I thought he had a short truck bed, but everything fit perfectly and we got it all set up at home.

Eaddie made it home, but then left to spend the day with friends. Summer and I went to Ridgewood Brothers to try their baked potato, and Grant made us some extra special ones. He seemed a little off, so I invited him to the house after work. At first he said he couldn’t, but on the way out he asked if I was off tomorrow, so hopefully he comes around.

After that, we went to Lowe’s to exchange the toilet seat we got yesterday. We compared it with another new one in the box, and it was painfully obvious that the one we got yesterday was a return. From there, we picked up a couple things I forgot from the old house, and then made it home where I spent the rest of the evening casually cleaning, organizing, fixing, and generally trying to stay productive. Summer didn’t feel well, so she did a puzzle and watched TV all evening until bed. My big accomplishment was doing a deep clean on the washing machine, because it was smelling pretty bad. I don’t think the girls had ever cleaned it, so it was very mildewy.

I’m going to make this place into a home, one light bulb at a time.

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Have a Seat

I slept in a bit today before having a shower and seeing Eaddie out the door to go to her father’s for the night. I eventually made it to the old house to clean off the dining table and pack up some things to take to the new house. Summer went to the gym and then met me there, and we loaded up the chairs in her car.

We got everything unloaded at the new house, but then had to get back out for some cleaner for the chairs. We went to Lowe’s first to get a replacement toilet seat for Eaddie’s bathroom. Then I decided to stop in to Tractor Supply to see if they had any interesting tool chests, but they didn’t. We went to Harbor Freight to drool over their tool chests, and got a free magnetic tool tray on the way out. Then Summer wanted to stop by the wash to print off some music for Eaddie.

We kept hearing something rolling around in the floor of the car, so I poked around and figured it was probably in the HVAC ductwork in the floor. We stopped by my house for the cleaner, and then went to my parents’ house for some shrimp noodle soup. After we ate, I convinced Summer to lay in the floorboard and try to get the offending pebble out while I took sharp turns. We finally got it out with pure acceleration, and it ended up being a lone Skittle. I was just glad it didn’t melt to the car.

We cleaned up the chairs and then wrapped up the night with some stand-up on Netflix. We found Matt Rife to be too vulgar and not at all entertaining, so we switched to Pete Holmes and had some good laughs. I kept getting drawn into my phone, so I ended up staying awake way too long, but finally made it to bed a little after one.

Blanket time!

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Sofa’d Up

Today was a total drag. I spent all day in Jamf again, but not feeling like I was making any real progress. I just tediously poked through settings and tested different configurations as time flew by in the morning, and then slowed to a crawl in the afternoon. The cafeteria had tons of extra milk and pudding, so I brought home a whole milk crate and a box with pudding cups.

Summer went home early with a headache, so she was there to receive the new couch. I hated virtually everything about it. The color was way more blue than it appeared in the picture. The texture was like cheap fleece imitating a wool texture. The filling was inside of a crunchy bag that would hopefully soften up quickly. The first thing we had to do was move it about a foot, which required disassembly of the three very heavy components. Somehow it felt both cheap and expensive at the same time.

I finished up some leftovers, froze some pudding cups, and then sat on the couch until the discomfort drove me to the computer. Maybe it’s just that time of year again, but I just loathe everything. I sat in the dark for quite a while, but after Eaddie got home from bowling with some friends, the two of us went to Freddy’s to get some free cheese curds before coming back home to bed.

How dairyou.

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No

I got out of the house quite early this morning, so I went to Hardee’s for a chicken biscuit. I get really frustrated when I’m asked if I want to tip at fast food establishments, because they just handed my food over the counter. The Nashville Hot Chicken Biscuit was okay though.

I tried to focus on Jamf when I got to work, but that made me sleepy. Then other less important things kept drawing focus, and we ended the afternoon with about 15 minutes of network downtime where I couldn’t even talk to my own switches. I don’t know what happened.

While I was driving home, I got a call from the Rockline recruiter to say they were pursuing their other candidate, which suited me fine. I went to the old house to get my old pot holders and feed the fish, and then I ran by Harbor Freight to ask about ordering a tool chest before finally going home to Summer, who had spent the evening cooking a nice dinner.

After we ate, I had her help me shove everything to one side of the living room, and I spent the next five hours shampooing carpets again. The water kept coming up black until the very end, but I kind of figure we’ll do it again after hosting for the holidays anyway. Or maybe I’ll give up on this house and move onto my fantasy sailboat. I could use a change of scenery.

Absolutely Knot