Tag: motorcycle

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Buffalo Weak Wings

I was starving for some hot, good food this morning, so I announced that to Eaddie when she finally left her room, and we got out of the house to find something to eat. I was between Chinese or Mexican. She chose Mexican. The new place I drove to was closed, so we ended up going in to Buffalo Wild Wings. I hadn’t even realized they were open again, but the parking lot was full and the music inside was turned up to eleven.

The service was pretty poor. Our server only came by the table once after bringing our food, and that was to drop off some napkins and waters. The cheese curds were good, but the chicken was overcooked with dark, dry breading, and very little sauce. The chicken was really small, too. Overall, the whole meal left us feeling very dry in the mouth. The atmosphere was also terrible. The audio for the TV channel kept cutting out constantly, so the constant barrage of advertisements we were forced to hear at maximum volume was even more jarring than it would be otherwise. We did not want a club atmosphere for lunch on a Wednesday.

After we ate, we headed back to the house and I got the garage cleaned up so I could park the new Model 3 inside. Eaddie helped me deliver the Shadow and the R1 to Kevin’s hangar. On our second trip, we spotted Julie at their big hangar, so I stopped in to see her briefly before going back home.

Eaddie left to go to the park, and I took the dogs on a quick run before moving the last of the stuff out of the garage. I finished just in time to park inside before Summer made it home. She was visibly beat from her day, so she took a bath and went to bed. Eaddie wasn’t out much past dark, and I was still feeling pretty awful, so I made it to bed super early.

Accessorize

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Lab Aid

McDonald’s was super busy this morning, and the lady inside was yelling at all of her employees for wasting food. I didn’t realize until I got to work, late again, that they didn’t put egg on my bagel. More on that later.

I had a few distractions throughout the day, but my big accomplishment was getting Kim out after lunch to replace 17 more lab computers with me. We had a student help as well, which was nice. We ran out of video adapters and cables, which was a bit of a surprise. The entire lab was set up with HDMI cables, so we had to go from DisplayPort to VGA. I don’t want to spend any more money than I have to, so we’ll limp along for the remainder of the year.

I had run out of gas on the way to work and had to switch over to my reserve, so I stopped in Ola for some gas on the way home. I couldn’t tell if I was flying down the road or not, because yesterday I kept getting passed at an unexpected rate. Wind isn’t my friend on the Shadow, so it’s just not comfortable going fast. I prefer something more upright.

When I got into Dardanelle, I stopped to file my complaint at McDonald’s, and bartered some free fries for my missing egg. They were the hottest, freshest fries I’ve ever had from McDonald’s, so that was a treat on a surprisingly cold ride home. Then I fed the fish before going to Orr to check on the status of the Pathfinder. Tim said it would be about three or four weeks before they could even look at it.

I stopped to see Summer at the wash, but left as it continued to get colder. Just after I got home, Dad said they had leftover spring rolls and chow mein, so I took the Onewheel over there, narrowly beating Julie and Kevin. Food wasn’t at all ready, so Kevin and I watched Julie eat spring rolls, and then Kevin, Dad, and I had chow mein once that was done.

Summer was in the bath when I finally made it back home for the night. Eaddie got home late after band solo and ensemble. We all caught up a bit, and then it was off to bed at a reasonably normal time.

Boy, do I miss Tres.

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Rolling Cycles

Mom said we were having beef spring rolls today, but we weren’t sure if it was for lunch or dinner. We invited everyone to eat at our house since we had more room, so Summer went shopping so she could make cupcakes and banana pudding. I got up to some coffee and then cleaned up the dining room. I wanted to set up two cooking stations for the beef, and three plates with veggies. Noah came over too, so we had eight people to fit around the table. I couldn’t find our new electric skillet even though I knew I brought it to the new house, so I ran to the old house to make sure. Summer ended up finding it above the refrigerator.

I stopped by my parents’ house on the way home to get some of the food. Then Dad brought over some more, and Julie and Kevin showed up. I thought the dining table worked out perfectly for that many people. The only thing I would have changed was the seating arrangement, just to make sure someone mindful was next to the rice paper water bowls.

Once everyone left, I had to take a couple trips on the Onewheel to give my parents the things we forgot to give them on the way out. We got the kitchen cleaned up, and then Summer and I ran around town to O’Reilly for an oil filter and oil, and Superfast for some tools to change the oil in the Shadow.

Unfortunately the oil pan we borrowed wouldn’t fit under the bike, so we went to borrow one from Dad. We still forgot wrenches for the drain plug, so once we got back to the old house, we decided to just take the bike to the new house to do the work there. That was when we also realized that the dip in our driveway gave us enough room to use the oil pan from the shop.

Rather than dirty up Dad’s oil pan and funnel, we decided to go back across town to get the dirty one we borrowed from Superfast. We also brought the R1 over to the new house, so I could bleed the front brake line and change the oil in it as well. Once we got everything in place, Summer was quick to drop the oil out of the Shadow. She had a fancy new headband light too, so I didn’t even get to hold the flashlight for her. The bike took a bit more than the 2.5 quarts of synthetic oil that I expected, but Summer signed off on the leak check and it was good to go. She can wear the pants in the family all she wants, because I was just glad to keep my hands clean.

I ended up riding to PDQ to air up the tires, but tomorrow may rain anyway. I may not even get to ride it, but it’s ready. The kids stayed up a bit late, and Noah ended up staying the night, but I finally convinced him to sleep in a bed this time. We’ll take the small wins with that one.

I bet we wouldn’t have had to use more than half of that one bottle if we had just let the first two bottles drip a bit longer.

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Steam Bath

Summer said she saw the rat on top of her car when she left for the dentist this morning. I thought I felt it watching me as I opened the door to feed it last night, and I was surprised it didn’t escape earlier. Without knowing where it went, I left the garage door open for a couple hours with the hopes it would leave on its own.

I had some cereal, but then the girls got hungry and I ordered some pizzas from Domino’s for an early lunch. Summer left for work in the early afternoon, and Eaddie left to hang out with Eli, so I decided to take a hot bubble bath after being cold all night. I played Don’t Touch Anything on the Steam Deck and got half a dozen or so of the different endings.

I eventually got around to leaving the house, and took the Onewheel for a long ride to the Neighborhood Market to drop off recycling, and then to the old house to feed the fish. I plugged in to charge a bit while I aired up the R1 tires and took it for a ride to the carwash. The front brake lever was super squishy, so I’ll need to bleed that line before I take it out for any lengthy rides. I’m super late for an oil change anyway, so I might as well tear it down and do that myself too.

While I was at the wash, Summer said she got a call from the bank that her account had been compromised. The more she talked about it, the more it sounded like a scam call, which upset her even more. I took the bike back home and rode the Onewheel back to my parents’ house before sunset, and Mom made me a bánh xèo for dinner.

After I ate, I rode on back to the Neighborhood Market and got behind a smokey truck that seemed intent on leaving me in clouds of black soot. I picked up a bag of oranges and dropped it off back at home, and then made a couple more loops around the neighborhood before parking it for the night.

Eaddie was out late, and Summer kept dawdling at work, so I had to call both of them home. When Summer got home, I had her reset a bunch of passwords to try and mitigate any other account shenanigans, and tomorrow we’ll visit the bank.

Just throw your phone away.

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6º

I got up when everyone left this morning, and made myself some fried rice out of some leftover egg yolks from a cake that Summer baked. Then I went home and got showered before my Tesla service appointment. Jacob came over a little before 11, and we kind of laughed at the fact that they sent him out for basically nothing since they denied any fault in my autopilot complaints. After that, we stood around talking about motorcycles for a while. He made a comment about the Grom, and it turned out he knew Chase from the group of guys that gets together to stunt ride.

Dad came over just as we were finishing up, and we went next door to work on Bác Vân’s patio door. We kept fighting getting it out from the inside when we should have just started from the outside. The fixed glass door was actually way easier to remove, so even though we had to lift more things, it was way less trouble than going out the wrong direction. The rollers didn’t seem to be in awful shape, but they were a part of a bracket that ran the width of the door.

We went to Lowe’s first to try and find some replacement rollers, but they didn’t have any. We saw Manuel on the way out, and he tried to help even in plain clothes, but he didn’t think they had the whole bracket, so we headed to Leonard’s. They had just the wheels, but they bolted on and we weren’t sure that would work with the bracket we had. In the end, we knew we were missing a screw to lower the rollers on one side, so Dad picked up a replacement and we headed back. I spotted Allen on his old Kawasaki on the way back, and it looked like he was enjoying the ride.

The replacement screw ended up not fitting, but after going through a couple drawers and several cookie tins of random screws, we actually found the original! I just had a feeling about it, and luck was on our side. We got the door back together and it was marginally better, but then the locking mechanism kept falling down. We went back to Leonard’s and picked up a new one, but then we had to Dremel the opening a bit in order for the latch to fit.

The project snowballed on us quite a bit, and we could still fix it better, but that was enough for one day. We put everything back together, Bác Vân forced some money on me, and some shrimp and rice on Dad. Then he went home and I waited for Summer to come get the paperwork to request a new title for the Pathfinder.

Autumn dropped Eaddie off to go ride her bike, and then Summer got her paperwork for the DMV. I waited around, exhausted, for Eaddie to finish, and then I took her home. It wasn’t long after that she wanted to go to the mall to do homework with some friends. I dropped her off, and then remembered I left my valve stem caps off for my appointment. I ran home to get them, and then headed back up to Summer’s.

Julie called me about another Entergy job I asked her about, and we ended up talking for quite a while, even as I had to pick Eaddie back up. It seems that no matter what happens next, it won’t happen fast. I’m fortunate to have savings, but we had plans for all that money I was making. Hopefully my hearing next week will keep that flowing at least for a little longer.

There’s gotta be a better way. I just haven’t started looking for it yet.

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Ozark Lunch Jaunt

Summer and I got up and out of the house today for a ride on the Shadow. I was back and forth on a couple of places to ride for lunch, but landed on the Ozark Cafe in Jasper. I had never been, and the reviews looked to be pretty good. We gassed up and hit Highway 7 out of town just in time to make it there by lunch time.

We stopped at the Rotary Ann for a break from the bad vibrations. The restrooms were nice and cool, and we got some toilet paper to stuff in our ears that made a huge difference in our ride quality. My whole head was ringing when we stopped, but the rest of the ride went great.

We pulled into town and walked right into the restaurant without having to wait for a seat. They had a lunch buffet that we opted for after a quick glance at their newspaper-style menu. I started with a big salad, and then moved on to a couple plates of what I would call southern comfort foods. I was anxious to try everything, so of course I was absolutely overstuffed by the time we left. Summer wanted to walk around a bit, so we went a couple doors down and visited an antique shop for a bit before heading back home.

I kind of wanted to stop at a couple more overlooks that I had never visited before, but I wasn’t sure how well the food would sit. We went up the road to a Dollar General to find some real earplugs, and then made it all the way back to the Rotary Ann for a quick break before making it the rest of the way home. I was a bit nervous about needing to stop for fuel, but I didn’t hit my reserve until we were about halfway home from Dover.

We got some gas once we were back into Russellville, and then we stopped by Summer’s for her swimsuit and to take a bit of a breather. My whole body was numb from the vibrations, and I was achy from the ride posture of that bike as well as the sunburn. After some rest, we got the cats inside away from the night’s fireworks, and made our way back to my house to trade up for the car.

I went next door to get some bánh bao that Bác Vân got from Linh, and then we went to my parents’ house for a swim. Mom was asleep inside while Dad was working out back, but he took a break to swim with us for a while. The water was nice in the shade, and I never got the shivers. When we were done, I loaded up on ice water for the night, and we came back to my house.

Summer sat on the couch on her iPad while I put on the last half of my Stranger Things episode. Once I finished with that, we watched the latest episode of Middleditch and Schwartz. That had me rolling as it usually does, and then I continued with a bit of a Ricky Gervais special I had started some time ago. Summer was ready for bed before it finished though, so we did a quick scan for brown recluses and went to bed.

Not enough Shadow to prevent star damage!

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Cruis’n RSD

I took the Shadow to work today, and it really worked out in my favor. We were tasked with visiting every campus to check for rooms with A/V equipment where we could host large classes of sensitivity training. Three of the guys went to the high school to continue imaging student devices. Greg and Josh went to the high school to scout that campus’s rooms, and I got to ride my bike all around town to visit all of the elementaries.

I stopped by Oakland first, though I already knew what equipment they had. Then I ran home to put in my contacts and sunglasses, since I would be spending so much time on the road. Crawford was a pretty quick in-and-out, and then I made my way up to Center Valley. It was nice to get a little bit of a ride in, and then I hunted around in the dark to investigate their setup. One of the custodians saw me come in but didn’t know who I was, so he chased me down to investigate.

While I was there, Gary asked me to meet him at Sequoyah to pull some cables out of the ceiling because they were somehow in the way of the maintenance guys. Gary didn’t realize we left the lines with the intent of using them for whatever goes in the room next, and had already cut them at the ceiling. We probably could have still kept come, but we ended up pulling them all out anyway. When we finished, Greg and Josh showed up for some reason, and we chatted outside for a while. Then when I left, Selvin was taking pictures of my bike, so I let him ride it around the parking lot. Maybe I can get him and Marcela to buy one, and then I’ll have a new riding buddy.

I stopped by Dwight to take care of it before lunch, and then left London for the afternoon. On the way back, I stopped by the new Ridgewood Brothers’ build site to take a picture of the framework. They were putting trusses up with a big crane, so I took a few pictures to share before heading back to the shop.

I suggested Freddy’s for lunch, and Gary seemed excited by that. Thomas took him, Greg, and Josh, and I rode the bike. The service was actually really fast for dining in, but we were also there early enough to beat the lunch rush. The burger I had was really good, especially with all the added veggies. After that and some cheese curds, I didn’t have room for any custard.

When we got back to work, I was sent to find Mary Beth to help with a printer issue. She wasn’t there, but Thomas was in the conference room waiting on her for a meeting. I waited for a bit, but then was called away when a truck load of 75″ Newline touch panels showed up. They were stacked two pallets high, so I had to get the forklift and shuffle them around quite a bit in order to unload everything. I felt like an expert though, and we got everything into the graveyard without incident.

By that time, I still needed to run out to London, so I left again. I decided to stop and see Grant and Robert on my way out of town, and showed them my pictures while they trimmed up some briskets. They were high-energy as usual, but I couldn’t stay long. It felt like a super long trip out to the final elementary campus, but it was a nice ride across the lake. I checked an extra room there, since the cafeteria didn’t actually have any equipment in it at all. The room with the stage might actually work pretty well.

The rest of the afternoon was super quiet. Some of the guys filtered back in and sat around for a while. Thomas eventually came back and let us go just a few minutes early, though he seemed to indicate that he meant to let us go even earlier. The long days feel absolutely ridiculous, and I don’t think anyone at Central Office is even working that late.

I rode home and changed, then went next door to talk to Bác Vân about her high electric bill. She said they added four pounds of refrigerant to their A/C unit at the start of the season, so I’m wondering if it’s low again. In eight days, she’s used almost as much electricity as she did all last month.

I finally made it up to Summer’s for the evening, and Autumn was already silent in her room. Summer was horizontal on the couch watching TV, so I snacked on some leftovers, and then she went to bed super early. I took the opportunity to do the same, a little uncomfortable that there was still enough light to see outside, but also fully aware of how tired I feel when I wake up that extra half hour early for work. At least we’re over the halfway point.

Hell if Fi knows.

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The Existential Review: Year 6

I finally got back on a bike today, and rode the Shadow to work. I knew we had eSCO coming to pick up some more stuff to recycle, but I didn’t have any other real need to haul anything around. Gary split us up into three pairs, and Kyle and I were on a mission to do the work orders Gary hadn’t had time to address. It ended up not being very much, and Kyle really did all the legwork by going upstairs to install Microsoft Office on a Mac.

As soon as we finished up with that, we headed up to the graveyard to make a path to get everything onto the box truck. I convinced the guys to back up to the corner of the dock like they had done in the past, and it made things quite a bit easier. We still have a lot more carts to go, but we can almost see the end of the tunnel.

Lunchtime came around pretty quickly, and Gary decided on Wendy’s. I rode separately to get some bike time, and Zach surprised us there while he was on his week of vacation. Even a bunch of the maintenance guys walked in behind us. We had a good chat and had some time to chill before going back to work.

The afternoon was really quiet. We had to unbox the rest of our new Lenovo Chromebooks to confirm that they wouldn’t auto-update. Then I mostly just hung out in the shop until my one-on-one review time with Thomas. I thought Gary and Zach would be in on it, but it was just Thomas. He ranked me higher than I think Ben had ever ranked mee before – even higher than I had ranked myself, and had some really nice things to say, so I was quite happy. In the end it doesn’t do much for me, but it did give me some additional confidence.

He let everyone leave a few minutes early for the weekend, but I trailed out a bit late as I often do. Eaddie was still out with Maristella, so I went home to start on some more laundry until Summer got home from the gym. Eaddie rode in on her bike just a few minutes after Summer, and we went to Taco Villa for dinner. Eaddie and I both had taco salads, and both of our shells were way undercooked and chewy.

I had ridden the Grom behind them so Eaddie and I could go straight to the high school to practice riding after we ate. She was fussy about it like she always is, but I tried to press her on until she really seemed to just be unable to focus. She still wanted to go for a night ride on the R1 though, so we went home and swapped, and I took her for a big loop around town. I was pretty exhausted when we made it back to the house, so we put everything up and headed up to their house for the night. Summer was already in bed, and I didn’t waste much time finding my way there as well.

Yes, I keep repeating the same things over and over again because you are repeatedly doing none of those things.

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Slow Learners

I didn’t sleep great last night, in spite of how exhausted I was from the trials of the day. I woke up a little after eight and laid around in bed until Eaddie called to see if I would pick her up later in the day to take her out on the Grom. I took my time getting around, and eventually got a shower before stopping by McDonald’s to burn up some rewards points before they expired. Somehow, I think the Spicy McChicken ends up being the best value per point.

Summer had to work a bit today, and took Autumn with her. Eaddie was watching TV when I got to the house, so I ate my sandwich with some leftover fries from Popeye’s. Then we went back to my house to get the Grom. We rode to the high school, and even after it was her idea to ride, I still had to endure lots of griping from Eaddie for being out in the “heat” with an aching butt and hands. I pressed her on, though, and we made it to second gear along with a ride around the building out of my line of sight. As kids started showing up for the play at the arts center, Eaddie and I decided to pack it up and head home. She wanted to ride her bicycle to her father’s restaurant, so I just hung out at home until she got back.

Mom and Dad were grilling pork chops and shrimp, but Eaddie was tired and full from eating with her father, and wanted to nap after she got back to my house. I went outside to pick some mint, then ran to the Neighborhood Market for some lettuce before meeting Summer and Autumn at my parents’ house for dinner. Autumn seemed on good behavior, though she surprised us by giving Dad some selective information about our visit from DHS yesterday. After the girls left, I expanded upon what really happened.

Evidently Autumn talked Summer into letting her go to church with my dad in the morning. I thought she said she was going with her own father, so I didn’t think anything of it. Upon further reflection and learning more details myself, we decided not to let her go, and had a talk about consequences when I got to their house. She spent all evening in her room, watching shows and talking on Facebook Messenger on her school laptop. Summer still hasn’t learned how important thoroughness is when following through with punishments, but I let her sleep through her headache. We’ll talk about it in the morning.

Everything means everything.

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Pick a Number

We met at the shop again today, and this time Thomas was there while we all shared funny stories for nearly an hour. Eventually he had us all pick numbers, and the closest got to go home. Greg was the first one out, which was funny because he seemed the most eager to work. I went to Oakland and closed three work orders, which got me down to four, which are all basically non-issues. I guess it’s time to come up with some projects.

It wasn’t long after I got back to the shop that Thomas sent everyone else home. I stopped in to see Summer for a bit, then picked up an online order at Walmart before going to get Eaddie for some time on the Grom.

Eaddie did great today, and I think next time she’ll be ready for shifting gears. She rode around a couple of parking areas, and then around some of the paths in front of the school. When she was done, we went back to the shop to see Summer. Autumn pulled in just after we got there, and we went upstairs to eat some chili they made for the crew.

After a while, Autumn took Eaddie home and I went back to my own house for a while. Summer was supposed to leave around three, so I went up to their house a little after then, only to find that she was held up due to some employee drama. The girls were home feigning doing chores, and eventually Summer showed up.

The girls started in on each other with some attitude about who does what, and who likes who better. It wasn’t long before Summer confronted Autumn about skipping wrestling practice and lying about it. That argument took a little while and ended with the loss of phone and car privileges for a couple days. I don’t know that it will fix anything, but hopefully some other structural reinforcements will help.

Summer and Autumn went to the bedroom to watch a movie, and Eaddie and I watched several episodes of House until I was ready to pass out.

Drama Mama