Tag: Traditions

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On the Color of Sheep

Julie messaged me just as I was about to go to bed last night, so I went over to her place to try and chat with her and Dad. I was there for a little over an hour before she finally kicked me out, which is to say that it didn’t go well. Then this morning she started in on me again, but followed up later in a group text with a deal that I appreciated, so I’m hoping that’s an indication that it’s not a total loss. I’d really like my sister back.

We had a busy day today. Summer wanted to meet for lunch, so I got ready and met her at Mulan’s. Then we ran to Walmart for a card before picking up the girls to go to Maleea’s birthday party at the skating rink. The girls had a bit of fun, but it seemed like Maleea was starting to grow out of that kind of party. I remember having skating parties all the time in grade school, but not nearly as much into the double digit age.

There was just a little bit of time to kill before we had to get across town for another birthday party, so we went to my house for a bit. Then we took Eaddie to Washburn Park. Amber dropped her kid off and I waved her down so Summer could meet her. We waited for a little while for Jaylinn and Maristella, but gave up and headed on to the bowling alley to wait there.

Even then we had to wait, so eventually we went inside to play a game. The girls took turns bowling for Jaylinn until she got there, then we played one more game. It was a pretty good time, but that place was absolutely packed and hardly anyone had a mask on. The sign out front basically gave everyone a pass on having a health concern that they wouldn’t ask about, so even the staff weren’t wearing masks.

The kids finished their game and spent some time in the arcade while Summer and I waited outside. Then we headed on home for the evening. Summer and I watched a couple episodes of WandaVision to catch her up, and then it was off to bed and to lose an hour for daylight saving time.

It’s been Agatha all along!

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38’s Special

I woke up early this morning so I could make it to Starbucks for my free birthday drink. They ran out of venti cups, so they gave me a grande and tall instead. I got to work just barely early, so we jumped right into our meeting. Then Zach and I went to the high school to check out a projector lamp. It had blown and we didn’t have any replacements, so we went back to the shop until lunch.

The guys decided on Mexican and we went to La Chiquita for the first time in a while. Brody called us late to find out where we were, and then went to the wrong restaurant, so he arrived a little late. Otherwise it was uneventful.

Kyle and I had to help Josh with a TV install in the afternoon, which ended up being a bit of a circus act. I don’t know what it is about Josh, but it seems like he just doesn’t take his time with anything, and we ended up spending more time fixing things in the long run. We got the TV up, but it could have gone quite a bit faster.

I spent the last bit of the day helping Mike set up some computers for Ethan. Then I got the girls and we headed to Summer’s shop to see her for a minute. From there we went to my house so I could take care of a couple things before heading up to their house. As soon as Summer got home, we met the rest of my family at Colton’s for dinner.

I was really glad Julie came along, and everyone had a really good time. Even when we were talking. It really was a birthday success.

Eaddie and I watched some House when we got home, because the other two went to bed early. I was pretty exhausted too, but I managed two episodes before heading to bed.

38 is the sum of the squares of the first three primes.

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A Stroll Down Memory Frames

It just rained and rained and rained today. Everyone pretty much stayed at the shop since it was just a half day. Somehow we got on the subject of my blog, and Ben started Googling for it. He happened across my old highschool site and the Cow Patty Link of the Week section. A little Wayback Machine later, and we got to experience the early Angelfire web of yore.

I got one more HP lesson done, and then Ben had me run to Staples to get some badge holders. They were a buck a piece for 40, so I ran by Lowe’s instead, and then finally Walmart where I found some for just under two bucks for a dozen.

That got me to the end of the work day, so I went home and waited for Summer to get off, and then we went to Leonard’s to spend a coupon I had been saving. She got a mortar and pestle, which was sold in a set, so I’m still not sure which one is the mortar and which one is the pestle, and at this point I’m too afraid to ask.

I had another coupon for Mulan’s, so we met my parents for a New Year’s Eve dinner. Then I took Summer back to her car so she could go home, and I waited until it was time to get the girls from their friends’ house. Eventually with them in tow, we went up the hill and waited for midnight.

Autumn came into the bedroom and played Monopoly on Stadia with Summer and me. We finished up right in time to not see anything happen, because we don’t pay for live television and we didn’t properly coordinate any kind of streaming service. Somehow, one of the neighbors managed to light a few fireworks in the downpour though, so it wasn’t completely anticlimactic.

Maybe all this rain will help put out this dumpster fire.

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La-La-La-La La Boda

Summer ran a bunch of errands this morning while I tried not sleeping in. It didn’t work in my favor, but at least I was up and ready in time to leave for Dalia and Mario’s wedding. They had a pretty big gathering at the Catholic church, and of course Summer wanted to sit right up front so she could see everyone. Early on, I thought it might take twice as long because it seemed like they were going to do everything in Spanish and English. Luckily(?), they did almost all of it only in Spanish, so we were left taking cues from everyone else for all the standing and sitting, but in the normal amount of time that a ceremony would last.

After the wedding, we went straight to my parents’ house for some leftovers since neither of us had eaten. Then we came back to the house to change and rest a little before going back out for the reception.

The reception was a big, loud event with way more action than I was prepared to witness. We ended up sat at a long table to ourselves, and they brought us some drinks and a couple plates of food. They had their first dance, then took turns dancing with people that would pin money to the couples’ clothes. After that, for a while it seemed like couples were just taking turns dancing together on an otherwise empty dance floor.

The highlight for me was when a crowd of girls took off running in a line, holding hands, all around the tables, between the bride and groom, and just all over the room. Then a hoard of guys got together, with probably twice as many guys as girls, and did the same thing, only seriously mobbing Mario and trying to knock him off of the chair he was standing on. Fortunately there was a small group of people doing their best to keep him upright, and though I’m not sure he stayed on the chair through it all, he at least never touched the ground.

We left shortly after that, since the rest of the party would carry on into the wee hours of the night. We chatted for a bit, enjoying the quiet, then slipped off to sleep.

Wait, so only the priest gets the wine?!?

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Christmas Bills

With Christmas presents handled the night before, I got up today to all three girls wandering and cleaning house in preparation for some time away. Summer was in the kitchen making her contributions for dinner with the family, and the girls were cleaning up so they could spend some time with their father.

Evidently the turkey was a little slower to cook than expected, so we had plenty of time to get everything done and ready to go by the early afternoon. We headed on to my parents’ house and waited for the main course to arrive. I spent most of my time fighting with the wireless to get a new Chromecast with Google TV to work for them so Mom wouldn’t have to keep using her phone as an unreliable remote. It was more frustrating than dealing with my defective Belkin WeMo light switch a month or two ago.

Julie eventually showed up with the turkey, and Bác Vân and Doug braved the Coronavirus to come see everyone. It was a good time, but I think too much effort was made to keep the conversations with feelings to a minimum. There’s no reason everyone should be walking on eggshells after this long together.

After we ate, Summer dropped the girls off and Julie tried to start Soul. I had to interrupt so we could get food packed and get out of there before too late. As soon as we got back home, I remembered that Amanda asked me to check in on her cats, so I ran back across town to do that before coming home. It’s been a super spendy season, so I had to spendy a bit of time moving the ol’ numbers around, but I think the pandemic has actually cut my living expenses so that I already had more than enough saved up to cover all these amazing deals I keep finding.

Now if only going to work actually paid more than not going, I’d feel a lot better about this.

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Wrap It Up

I slept in pretty late today and woke up with a little bit of anxiety about it. I kept feeling like I had missed something important, but we didn’t have anything going on until the evening. Summer was at work, and the girls were up watching TV. I motivated myself just enough to win a game of Into the Breach before heading home.

I had to get presents wrapped and take a shower before coming back for dinner and gifting with the kids. I’d done better work in the past, but I got pretty good by the last gift. When I got back up to the house, Noah was already there but nobody was hungry. I ate a little, and then we opened presents. It was still a very different process than when I was growing up, but I can’t say I have a preference for either way.

Noah left shortly after gifting and eventually getting some food. Then Summer went to bed and I finished the last season of Jessica Jones with Eaddie. I’m not sure what’s next, but I’m kind of glad that chapter is over after all this time.

Now I can practice before going back to the grind.

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Oh, Danny Blanket

We got up this morning and finished up some old leftover breakfast pizza, then Summer left for the gym and to start baking a mountain of cookies for the family to decorate later in the evening. I laid back for most of the morning, then took a shower before heading out.

I stopped by Harbor Freight first, just to pick up a couple quick things with a 30% off coupon. The kids were all huddled around the living room TV watching YouTube compilation garbage when I got there, and Summer was trying to finish up the icing for the cookies.

Noah was in a hurry to get out of there, and then the girls wanted to open one present each. Autumn was happy with a wax warmer she picked out, and Eaddie got a blanket that I’m pretty sure sends you straight to Hell. We sat for a little while in the living room just listening to the “winter” playlist I found, and watching the photo slideshow on the TV, featuring up-to-the-minute photos even from decorating cookies tonight.

Eventually Summer went to bed and settled in. I watched a couple episodes of Jessica Jones with Eaddie, mostly just trying to wrap up the final season after all this time.

Why is that kid so weird?

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Lotería!

Summer got up this morning and made some delicious eggs scrambled with a variety of peppers and onions for breakfast. Then she picked up Autumn from her Explorers camp trip before we went to Walmart to pick up what we needed for her work Friendsgiving dinner.

When we got back, she started on her broccoli salad, and then I got the ham started in the oven and took a shower while they went to get Eaddie from her friend’s house. Everything finished up right on time, and one of Summer’s employees dropped off her foster kid to hang out with the girls while we all attended the party.

We had a really good time. Everyone put together a really great dinner party with lots of good food. Summer got to announce her two promotions at the shop, and made a heartwarming speech that had everyone’s hushed attention. Then we gambled quarters in a game of Lotería, which was a lot like Bingo with tarot cards.

We were the first to go, partly so the rest of the crew could enjoy themselves and partly so we could get back to the kids. Everyone settled in for the evening and I headed home just to make my morning a bit easier after getting all gussied up today. My blood pressure seems to be high in the evenings after being low throughout most of the day. The clinic cancelled my last appointment and declined my medication refill though, so that’ll have to be a discussion once I get a little closer to the bottom of the bottle.

Just keep cleaning. Just keep cleaning. Just keep cleaning, cleaning, cleaning. What do we do? We clean, clean!

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Don’t Carve

Summer got a portion of her loans forgiven today, which was a great start to the day. I made it to work just in time to squeeze in for our morning training, and then Kyle and I were sent to the junior high to do work orders. Virtual Fridays at the high school actually give me a pretty good break anyway, so it at least seems possible to keep work orders under control.

I left Kyle to service laptops while I visited a couple rooms and closed out individual work orders. I spent the majority of my time in the library just so I had some office space to use. Then when lunch time rolled around, we headed back to the shop to meet up with most everyone. The high school had burgers grilled by First State Bank, so we headed that direction.

When we got to the high school, we rode all around trying to find a grill outside, but after fist-bumping the superintendent from my Shadow, we found the food inside. He actually came and sat near us, which could have gone either way, but it wasn’t long before Mary Beth came to occupy his attention.

I spent most of the afternoon there at the high school, but ended up back at the shop just in time to see Ben’s email that we could leave early to go vote. I ended up sticking around until after four just chatting with him about life, politics, and everything anyway. When we did finally leave, I just missed him in finding out my battery had gotten too weak to start the bike. Luckily I had access to the tools, could strip the bike, and then get a jump from Jared, who happened to be right there chatting with someone else.

On the way home, I stopped by the shop to see Summer, and then we went to my house to get the car before getting gas and picking up the kids to go to my parents’ house. We already had the pumpkins there, so as soon as Julie showed up, the kids got to carving. Mom was the only one that refused to participate, and I was honestly really surprised at how well every single one of us did. Even after Autumn’s broke and was left looking like an upside down helmet, I could make it resemble a tiny house at the right angle.

I tried, for the first time, doing some shading by not carving all the way through the pumpkin. I hand-sketched a shadow monster from the game Don’t Starve, then used an Xacto carving knife to slowly dig deeper and deeper into the pumpkin until there was just a thin layer of flesh inside.

We took a bunch of pictures and then picked at some leftovers before heading home for the evening. Hopefully the slugs won’t devour our pumpkins overnight, so we can have some to eat later.

Have fun, damnit!

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Rabbit Seeds

BUTT STUFF

Summer and Autumn made biscuits and gravy with eggs for brunch this morning. Then we all colored some eggs for Easter. It didn’t take long because we only had around 20 eggs between the four of us. I guess we could have made more. I think Dad used to make a few dozen for us when we were growing up, so we always had gallon ice cream buckets of eggs for weeks after Easter.

I joked that the girls would have to play Russian roulette to find a single raw egg I had hidden in the batch. Just seconds later, Autumn accidentally cracked one that completely fell apart with a raw yolk, and we discovered that the eggs hadn’t cooked all the way through for some reason. We had a couple different sizes of eggs all mixed together, but didn’t figure that made all the difference. A week or two ago we had frozen eggs because the refrigerator was too cold, so maybe that was the problem. In any case, I ended up boiling them again to make sure they were all done, and the colors all faded to a uniform pink.

We thought briefly about going to my house for the night, but in the end we left the kids home and Summer went with me for a workout while I took care of the cat and cleaned up at home. She was surprised by how much of a workout she got from doing the P90X yoga video.

When we got back to their house, I made a big “everything” French loaf sandwich that everyone devoured, and then played some Animal Crossing until bed.

The wind is always better on the hilltop.