Tag: lessons

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Fifty Dollars an Hour

I’ve been having so much trouble getting out of bed all week. I really think it’s just the time of the year, the temperature, and the daylight hours, because I always get this way coming out of summer.

Allen and I were supposed to meet at Long John Silver’s for lunch, but he ended up ditching me because he couldn’t communicate effectively. I decided to try McDonald’s for another dollar burger, but then Ronda messaged me and said she had a soft taco left over for me. I went ahead and got the Big Mac, then went to the junior high to eat everything.

I wanted to get back to Oakland for a bit, but I got busy fighting with their sign computer at the shop until quitting time. From there, I went straight home to get the gas lawn mower to make an exchange at Walmart. For some reason I thought it might be best to park by the garden center, but I ended up having to walk all the way back to the service desk. It took another couple trips across the store and some explaining to a manager, but he ultimately agreed to give me an additional $50 discount to the already low negotiated price bringing my total to $200 for both mowers. It wasn’t an awful way to spend an hour, but now that I’ve mastered the art of negotiation, I want to see if McDonald’s will sell me a Big Mac for 75 cents.

Just as I got packed up and climbed into the car, Julie said she was on her way to Pasta Grill for Dad’s birthday dinner. I pulled up just as my parents did, and Julie came along a bit after we were seated. We were sat right by a large table full of some Asurion folks, and Ben waved to me as we left. Most of the rest of them can go to the hot place. The jambalaya pasta was amazing.

When I got back home, I started a load of laundry and then headed to Summer’s with my leftovers. I couldn’t stay long though, because folding socks is another thing my smart house won’t do.

That cow is staring right at me!

Adventure Time!

It’ll put Aeron your chest!

September 2, 2010

Everyone slept in today after such a long day yesterday. I didn’t get to bed until around 3AM, but I was still the first up. I went downstairs to make some breakfast to bring back up since this hotel’s breakfast only runs through 9AM.

When everyone finally got up and around, we decided to go to LemonGrass, a Vietnamese restaurant I visited with my family almost eight years ago when we passed through to pick up my R1. I remembered the hotpot being so good that I just had to go again, even in our sudden downpour of rain. We all got something different, so everyone got a chance to try everything else. My vermicelli with lamb and an eggroll was pretty great. Afterward, the rain let up so we could walk a couple blocks down the road to Gelateria Del Leone for an icy dessert.

July 3, 2018

We left there and headed back toward the hotel, stopping at a Sam’s Club right up the road. We had picked up just a few things when I got a call back from the guy in town with the Herman Miller Aeron chairs. We ran back to the hotel to drop everything off and load up the cargo carrier, and headed back through the city to get a chair.

It’s going to be tough packing everything up. I’m definitely in charge of choosing what goes and what stays for any future adventures. It’s been more frustrating than necessary simply due to how much crap we’ve been lugging from hotel to hotel. It’s all a lesson in planning and minimalism.

Eat the leftovers!

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No-tell Motel

We slept in late today after a pretty rough night of sleep for me at the Red Roof Inn. It took us another nine hours or so to get where we were going after all the extra rest stops. We stopped just before St. Louis for some pretty great barbecue and were waited on by a kid from Hector while we watched competition level cornhole on the television. Several hours later we finally landed in Sun Prairie just after dark, and then went through the arduous process of finding a place to stay.

I don’t know what was happening in town, but virtually every place we went to was booked solid. We did find a $200 hot tub suite, but passed since we only had about five hours to use it before we had to be up to go to Beth’s event. That was also news to me. After both calling and driving all around greater Madison, we ultimately crashed at a tiny motel just a couple blocks from Beth’s place. I just knew we were going to be robbed and murdered. I was wholly reliant on Summer’s intimidating looks and extensive karate training. It was exactly the kind of place you stay when you shave your head and the random girl you’re with dyes her hair in the sink because you’re both on the lam with some kind of government conspiracy-proving evidence. I’m pretty sure Bruce Willis was in an adjacent room.

To add to the disappointment, the front desk clerk was the first person I’d encountered on our entire trip that spoke with any kind of an accent, and it was thick Indian. Apparently Wisconsin forgot it was a northern state and people sound the same here as back home.

THUGS WON’T STOP
TO WAIT FOR A COP
GUNS MAKE SENSE
FOR SELF DEFENSE
BURMA-SHAVE

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Radio Silence

She said we weren’t good for each other. I asked for some time, and she said she would think about it until the end of the day.
But she had already thought about it for much longer than that. I just didn’t know it.

She said I hurt her feelings when I joked. I asked her if she would talk about things and work on it with me.
She quietly shook her head.

In a relationship that should be two people communicating, she chose not to communicate.

She chose not to work on us, expecting instead to fall into some effortless fairy tale fantasy.

If something is wrong, you have to say something is wrong. You can’t go on telling someone they’re perfect in every way, and then expect them to know that something needs to change. Some people are more compatible than others, but no matter what, every single relationship is a choice. Sometimes that choice requires a lot of hard work.

I wish I had been given a choice at all.

Thanks for your support.

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Premonition

We’ve entered the stage of heavy dreaming and suspicion. I find myself wanting to know absolute truths. Do I question what’s in front of me, or do I just let it go now without a fight? If I fight, is it worth the struggle, or is it best to leave it all behind?

I’m at a disadvantage when I assume the best in people. I’ve grown sarcastic and cynical, yet assume honesty and take everyone else at face value. I guess that’s my fault. Everyone’s got a story. I just wish it wasn’t so hard for people to share it sometimes.

I tried to separate myself this time as a precaution, and I thought it helped at first. Maybe it did. Or maybe it was my undoing.

Or maybe it’s something else entirely.

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We’ll All Float On

I tend to not let myself get too excited. It helps to mitigate the disappointment when shit goes sideways.

Only days until the finish line. I let myself get excited. Summer was finally here. We were supposed to leave for New Orleans today for the quiz bowl tournament. Not only was I excited, but I spread that excitement to my friends, and they were excited too. They’ve been asking me about our plans, and letting them know I wasn’t going was splitting myself open again every time.

I let myself get excited. Summer had so much in store for us. For the first time in such a long time, I was looking forward to the future. We were going to take a trip to Wisconsin to pick up the girls after their stay with her sister. It was going to be such a fun trip. I was so looking forward to it.

The support structure is here in full force. Hardy and true. Built to withstand so much worse.

But even a clean break leaves things broken.

So, are you coming to the game?

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Lessons in Journalism: Write Things Down

I hate when I come up with something I’d really like to write, and then the thought escapes me before I get it down anywhere. I downloaded the WordPress Android app hoping I could keep drafts, but the system isn’t ideal for me. I’ll just have to continue using Google Keep for jotting notes, and then transfer those thoughts to posts later.

Today was a celebration of all things tortilla. I started off with a chicken and gravy burrito from Taco John’s, which was actually super good. Lunch was at Las Palmas for a taco salad. Then after work, Jesica wanted to go to La Chiquita where I got to try her ceviche, and I had Chiquita Nachos which had a bit of everything.

After dinner, we went to the Walmart Neighborhood Market to pick up some things. We’re grilling at work on Monday, so I picked up the stuff I needed for a broccoli, rice, and cheese casserole.

I’ve started saying “please” and “thank you” to Alexa when I ask her to do things, with the hope that she remembers how nice I was when the AI takes over.