Tag: parenting

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Bee Team

I had forgotten about my ice scraper being broken, and had to try and use the bristles of the brush side to sweep away the heavy frost this morning. It went about as well as you would expect. Fortunately I didn’t really lose too much time waiting for it to defrost.

I had forgotten about testing at Oakland this morning, so as soon as I got settled, I packed up to babysit them for about an hour. Of course nothing happened that was even remotely related to us, but everyone felt better for my being there, and it helped me split up my day.

There wasn’t much going on at the shop when I got back. I killed some time until lunch, when Zach, Gary, Thomas, and I went to Morelos. Evidently Greg is the sole reason we haven’t gone there, which is unfortunate, because they’re far superior to La Chiquita.

The afternoon was really slow. I ran home to get a package, thinking it was Summer’s new phone. To my surprise, it was a Mariah Carey beanie from a McDonald’s promotion before Christmas. I had forgotten all about it, and was pretty disappointed. If I had just waited until the end of the day, I would have been much happier about finally receiving it.

Zach, Gary, and eventually Thomas all came back to the shop at the end of the day and just chilled until quitting time. I went home and started some laundry until Summer and Eaddie came to pick me up for Autumn’s band concert. The auditorium was mostly empty, and super cold. It really felt like they were just barely keeping the lights on. It reminded me a lot of the theater experience at the movies right after they re-opened from COVID.

I finished laundry when I got back home. Then I tinkered a bit more on the computer before going to sleep.

Stalled

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Cap Conference

I didn’t sleep the best last night, but I made it work. I took some sweet rice and a banana for breakfast, but then blended cultures with a cup of Earl Grey with milk. I felt pretty useful when I helped Gary sort a PaperCut issue, and then continued to take Brody’s calls the rest of the day. Thomas came into my office and asked some questions about the last lease pickup that we did, but I felt less good about that conversation. Things lightened up in the afternoon though.

Zach took Gary, Thomas, and me to CJ’s for lunch after not getting to eat there the last time he tried. The food was fine, but the service was slow and I wasn’t really all that hungry. I could have easily skipped, but as soon as I decided that would be what determined when I went out to lunch, the guys started remembering to invite me every single day.

I went by Oakland in the middle of the afternoon, fully forgetting that school would be out an hour early. Fortunately it wasn’t too much of an ordeal getting around, and I eventually made my way back to the shop to end the day. I put Gary’s dual monitor stand together, and discussed the proposed change to the policies regarding job descriptions and how they would be changed in the future.

As soon as I left for work, I had to run home and change so I could meet Summer at the high school for parent-teacher conferences. I didn’t realize that she would have both of the girls there with her, otherwise I would have warned her against it. We needed the opportunity to be frank with their teachers without pressuring any of them to mince their words. Autumn became upset as we spoke to her science teacher, and ended up storming away from the conversation, which I think ultimately benefited us in the long run. Next time we’ll know better than to let her tag along.

I got dragged away a couple of times – once when Charlie wanted to talk about all the people he knew, and again when Ethan wanted to chat CPPC. That got me thinking some more, and I think I’ll have some good things to say during our meeting next week. I caught up with the last conference for Autumn, and then the girls went home so Summer and I could go to the junior high by ourselves.

Eaddie’s conferences went much faster, but she didn’t get out unscathed. Missing work is missing work, and though having the grades helps, there’s no reason to be missing the types of things that she’s missing. Once I took Summer back to her car and we each made it home, we had a video call to chat with the girls about our conversations and expectations. They vocalized an idea to set aside time at home to do homework together, which I think was a great idea, if they could commit to actually doing it every night.

I spent the rest of the evening tinkering with the new bedroom setup. I’m relatively certain the HDMI output on my parents’ old home theater receiver is just outright dead, but I should be able to use it as a dumb analog audio amplifier. I’ll make do.

Sounds good.

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Aparent

The girls let me sleep in a bit today while they did chores. I eventually got up and warmed up some tacos for a really early lunch. Summer brought Eaddie back home after going to the gym. I just hung out at their house all day, not getting into anything much. Autumn decided that she wanted to go to her father’s house, which caused a bit of commotion since we had dinner plans with my parents. She continually pushed us with attitude until she finally finished her chores enough so that she could go.

Noah showed up after a while, and let us know that he lost his job at Walmart. We talked a bit, and I had him start on an application for the school district. Summer made a lime pie, and we headed to my parents’ house to grill some steaks for Mom.

Autumn showed up with plenty of time while I got things cooking. Mom didn’t have any of her usual teriyaki seasoning, so she winged it with some soy sauce and ginger. The food was good, and we all had a little bit of time to visit, but the girls had homework to finish up, so we headed back home before it got too late.

Summer went straight to bed. Autumn went straight to her room. Eaddie came out and did homework next to me, randomly asking for my opinions on her choices or wording. I dug into the wide world of aftermarket MagSafe charging, but never solidly landed on any products in particular. I’m anxious to find something semi-universal that we can implement though.

SHOTS SHOTS SHOTS

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Mission: Success

It was pretty cold out this morning, but it turned into a beautiful day for a few hours in the afternoon. Work was pretty uneventful for the most part. Zach was out of the office all day. Greg was in his office making a bunch of racket when he spilled coffee everywhere and decided to mount a TV to the wall as his monitor instead. It really looks like a grandpa setup now.

I was talked into Brangus for lunch, where I tried their grilled chicken sandwich. The chicken didn’t look like much, but basically came with an entire salad’s worth of fixings, and it tasted alright. I think I ate too many peanuts though, and I felt pretty stuffed the rest of the day.

The afternoon was equally quiet, if not moreso. I did go by Oakland for a few minutes, but only to drop off a badge holder. Somehow quitting time still snuck up on me, and I was the last one out.

I went home to change, and then met the girls at the high school to talk to their advisors about their student success plans. Autumn didn’t want me there on account of her hatred toward anything remotely challenging, but warmed up to me later in the evening. Summer wasn’t super impressed with our first visit, but I knew what to expect. Eaddie’s went much better, but then I had to take her to the junior high to look for her lost phone.

The junior high had their own evening plans, though it was basically a ghost town with teachers sitting around bored in the cafeteria. Hope helped us look in the office for Eaddie’s phone, but it wasn’t anywhere to be found. I ran through Taco Bell on the way up to Summer’s, but that took an incredible amount of time for no apparent reason.

Once we got to the house, Eaddie found her phone in her backpack. Autumn had brought a very trying friend home, but they stayed in her room until Autumn had to take her home. Summer had brought Popeye’s home for everyone, but had a ton left over.

When Autumn got back home, we had a short heart-to-heart before she went to do homework. Then Eaddie came and looked through some old photos with me until I went to bed.

Life is just a series of choices, one after the next.

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Don’t Forg* So Easily

I slept in for a while today, to the point that by the time I got up and around, the girls wanted to go out to eat. Summer thought Noah and Eaddie wanted to go to New China, but Noah had gone to work. Evidently the rest of them still wanted to go, so that was our plan for the whole day.

As I was getting ready to run home to get clothes, Autumn decided to pitch a fit and say she didn’t want to go if I was going, and that she didn’t like the way I talked to her mother. As someone who frequently has to listen to her scream at her mother, it was difficult for me not to burst into hysterical laughter, but I managed.

I went home and decided to shower before changing, and then made my way back up to their house. As I pulled up, they were all getting into Summer’s car. I didn’t vocalize it, but in hindsight I would have been very angry if they weren’t there when I got back. Summer said Autumn calmed down and apologized, but her apologies mean less than nothing to me. It’s all just more manipulation to get whatever she wants at any given moment. The reason she doesn’t like me is because I can see through her bullshit and I’m not afraid to call her out on it.

As though nothing had ever happened, the three of them climbed into my car and we went to New China. I really didn’t want to take Autumn with us, but I wasn’t going to stir that pot again. We went, ate, and then went straight back home where we sat around for most of the afternoon. Summer had Autumn come out and try and talk to me about her issues, but we didn’t resolve anything. She tried blaming us for her issues as usual, and then just spaced out any time we responded to anything she had to say.

As the evening drew near, Summer went to the gym. Without asking, and instead fussing at me because I was inconveniencing her, Autumn nagged at me to take her to the high school so she could get her car. She wanted to go to her grandparents’ house for some reason, and tried working around doing her chores or homework. Summer called her out on it when she got into my car without the homework.

I dropped her off and continued home to start some laundry and clean out some more old laptops. I spent the rest of the night getting pretty heated in my head.

I’m cleanin’ out my closet.

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Ring That Bell

It was really frosty out this morning, but I made it in to work. A bunch of people were out, leaving me in charge for the day. We met up at the shop briefly, discovered that we couldn’t do the one thing Gary asked me to do, and then sent everyone off to do their own things.

Kyle stuck around the shop all day, and basically had me reading manuals on how to set up Kerberos for his Macs. I took a lunch break and ran through McDonald’s for some fries and Taco Bell for my taco subscription, then went back to the shop to eat it by myself. Right after lunchtime was over, the main office told us to shut down at one, unless we took a lunch, in which case we had to stay until two. I wrapped up what I could, and then we all left early.

As I got home, I decided to climb up the extension ladder and hang my big wind chime. I was a little concerned about the screws pulling out of the tree, but I put it up anyway. The bell is super heavy, but I liked the deep sound of it. I’ll still have to come up with a way to hang the smaller ones right outside the door, but I’m glad to have the big one up now.

Summer had called while I was at work to let me know that Autumn and her father tested positive for COVID. Eaddie tested negative, and Summer insisted that they come home. We talked it out, and decided to let them stay home for the night, and then have Eaddie go to school in the morning. We’re hoping that they stayed separated well enough that Eaddie isn’t carrying it, and as long as she tests negative for it again tomorrow, we’ll let her come over after school to let Autumn quarantine by herself the rest of the week. I’m not thrilled about any of it, but it seemed like the best way to minimize any new exposures since Eaddie basically has to go to school.

I put some time in on the treadmill, and eventually Summer came over after packing and going to the gym. I had her pick up some Little Caesar’s since she needed dinner. Then I had to run some stuff up to Eaddie, since she was stuck at home. We watched an episode of Modern Family when I got back home, and then it was off to bed.

Wow, a test she could pass.

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Errand Boy

I tried not to sleep too late this morning. I got Summer up, and Autumn was already in the living room when we came out. I rolled Eaddie out of bed, and could tell pretty quickly she was going to be in a pretty good mood. Summer wanted to take them to Shoe Carnival because Eaddie was in dire need of new shoes. I left to meet them after they ran home to change, but Shoe Carnival wouldn’t be open for another hour or two.

We ended up at Walmart instead, since I needed to look for a new TV to replace Doug’s. Since the girls all seemed to be pretty easy going, we perused the clearance aisle for a while, and then walked around slowly through the rest of the store. Then out of nowhere, we were discussing how many new laundry baskets we needed to buy, and Eaddie made an offhand comment that absolutely triggered Autumn. She went 0 to 100 faster than I’ve ever seen, and even got in Eaddie’s face. I almost had to choke her out just to calm her down.

We let her walk it off, and the rest of us just stared at each other wide-eyed trying to figure out what the hell happened. We continued around the store for a while, then circled back around so I could talk to Autumn alone before checking out. We went to Hardee’s because I thought we were going to eat a late breakfast, but everyone else wanted lunch food. Fortunately I had loads of coupons ready to go.

After lunch, the girls went to Shoe Carnival while I went to Lowe’s to look for some gas line tape. Then I headed to my parents’ house to help Dad replace their water heater. It was super cold outside, but the garage was bearable. It took us a bit to trim the metal exhaust tube, and we ended up running back to Lowe’s for some replacement tubing to go from the wall to the heater, but we got it going again.

I stuck around to eat a bowl of soup, and then took an old TV from there to Bác Vân’s. My parents never used it, and it made more sense to give that one to them, since Walmart didn’t have any TVs at all that had a center stand. I’ll have to go back tomorrow once they have a board wide enough to support the new TV and its corner-mounted stands sitting on top of the old console TV.

I prepped a little bit to get things ready to go back to work, then headed up to Summer’s for the evening. The girls were all in good moods again. Autumn was cleaning her room while Summer did Eaddie’s nails as Eaddie had laundry going. I tinkered a bit, warmed up a bit of food, and eventually everyone made it to bed.

Talk about cramming it all in on the last day!

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Need a Little Christmas

Summer jumped out of bed early this morning and ruined the secret of Santa Claus for me. I couldn’t sleep in much and was a little hungry after having a complicated relationship with food last night, so I got up. Summer made us some scrambled eggs, and we eventually got both kids up enough to dump out their stockings. Eaddie was in an immediate mood, throwing an absolute tantrum at everything. I was very near slapping it out of her, and both girls just kept picking at one another.

We got Eaddie up and around to some chores, and eventually got everyone through the shower so we could make our way to my parents’ house. Summer made all of our contribution to lunch, and we were off.

Bác Vân and Doug beat us there. I think Julie made most of the food and was about two hours late. Eaddie took a nap in my bedroom until the food was ready, and came out in much better form. We ate, did our quickest round of presents ever, and then left so I could clean up house a bit for some friends.

I had messaged Diana happy birthday earlier in the day, and she said they were in town along with Josue and wanted to get together. They agreed on a fire at my place and we all met up for a nice quiet evening outside. It was really nice seeing them all again, and the kids enjoyed some roasted marshmallows.

Josue stuck around for a little while and chatted with me after the others left. The girls all went to sleep, and eventually we packed everything up and he headed out. By then, I was ready for bed too.

Hasn’t snowed a single flurry, but Santa dear we’re in a hurry!

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Cleanup Checkup

The kids all made it to school and work this morning, which let Summer and me sleep in a bit. Summer left to shop for an ugly sweater while I cleaned up at home. Then we went to her follow-up appointment at the clinic. The doctor and nurse went on about how much tissue they serrated-ice-cream-scooped out of her, but it was all benign, so hopefully the procedure will have the desired result.

It was a quick appointment, and we were hungry, so our next stop was New China for lunch. I didn’t have a single grain of rice, and it made me feel weird about the visit, but I also didn’t feel super stuffed when we left. We headed back home and lounged around for a while before getting back up to clean up outside. I was surprised I still had hot coals in the fire pit, but I guess we did burn a lot of wood, so there was a lot of ash to insulate them.

When we finished outside, Summer went home to do some cleaning of her own while I filed paperwork inside. Then she and Eaddie came back over to get me for Autumn’s band concert in the evening. We got there early because Autumn did a poor job of informing us of the event, so we caught the last middle school band before the high school started.

Surprisingly, some of the middle school sounded better than the worst junior high band from the other day. The high school only had two bands, which were fine. The symphonic band seemed to be cheating with the pieces they had for their trip to Carnegie Hall. There were constantly so many notes that they masked any possible mistakes throughout the performance.

Eaddie went with Autumn to a group IHOP meet after the concert, so Summer dropped me off and I wound down for the day by testing my Pixel Buds and catching up on normal computery stuff that I do every day.

Three down, half to go.

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Burn it Down

Summer and I woke up super early, but with just enough time to get dressed and drive to the hospital. Her ablation wouldn’t actually take place for a couple hours, but we had to be there at six to start her on the medication before surgery. I waited patiently in the dark, playing on my phone. It could have been less comfortable, but they weren’t great digs.

My right Pixel Bud died while the left was still around 70%, and I’ve only got a few days of warranty left. That will require some testing, like right now. We finally left the hospital around 11 and went to Rose Drug to pick up her prescription. Then we stopped by KFC to pick up lunch on the way back home.

Summer pretty much slept the rest of the day, so I played a lot of Don’t Starve. I eventually took a shower, and then she did the same so we could go to Eaddie’s Christmas concert. We stopped by KFC on the way to pick up the fries they forgot to give me with our lunch order. Then we went to my house for a few minutes before the concert.

I walked around the house to inspect for the cause of the crashing sound on my security camera overnight, but couldn’t find anything. Then we headed to the Performing Arts Center for the concert. Noah surprised us with his presence, and we sat through one terrible performance, one that should have been the worst of the night, and then Eaddie’s band, which was still worse than I anticipated.

I think the problem is that being around Eaddie, my expectations have been misguided. I assume everyone is as good as her, considering that she’s in the best of three different bands. That’s simply not the case. Even the smallest, best band that she is in, is full of people that can’t keep time or hit notes. Hopefully they beat that out of them in high school, but I think I’m more looking forward to the college years.

After the concert, Noah was going to come stay the night. He didn’t make it before everyone was off to bed though. Even I couldn’t stay up any longer after such an early morning.

That’s a helluva way to celebrate Pearl Harbor Day.