May I Present to You…

We slept in a bit today since I didn’t really plan on seeing the opening keynote speakers. Breakfast had me feeling a bit off though, which made me a couple minutes late, which in turn made it awkward for me to walk into the first class I was thinking of attending. I ended up finding Ben in his booth for ARKSTE and chatted with him for a bit before making a round through the vendors and eventually finding my way to Esports 101 by the presumably unlikely ByteSpeed.

Fortunately that session ended up being wonderful, and in fact, one of the best I’ve ever attended. The guy was a former esports coach at the collegiate level, and you could tell he both really knew his stuff, and also wasn’t necessarily there just to sell us something. He definitely gave me some ideas for practice that I’ll have to use, assuming this thing ever gets off the ground for me.

My presentation was next after a bit of a break. I followed Adrian in the same room we were in before, and setup couldn’t have been easier for what I needed to do. I had a small crowd, including one guy that didn’t even know what esports are. It was small enough to be a little intimate, and my jokes were received well, so overall I thought it was a success. We actually used up the hour, which was my primary concern, and our conversations kind of floated from Discord to esports in general. All I can do is hope that tomorrow’s session will go as well.

I went to one more session before heading out. Summer came back to pick me up a bit early and was waiting outside, so I ran out after retrieving the laptop power supply I had forgotten in the classroom. Then we stopped by Dick’s to try and find something cheap to earn me the last point I needed for another reward certificate. Once we got that, we headed back to the hotel so she could get ready for dinner.

We met Ben in the lobby and had a few minutes to kill over beer, wine, burgers, and brats. I hadn’t eaten lunch and was pretty hungry, but I didn’t want to kill my appetite right before dinner, but I also didn’t want to be super hungry in case we ended up waiting for another couple hours to get our food in such a big group.

Dinner was at the same Back Porch Grill as last night, so we were welcomed back with open arms. I had the red fish this time, which was excellent. After trying Summers Cajun ribeye, I did have a taste for steak, but I still left satisfied. Summer did some work on some wine and wanted to go back to the room, so we dropped her off before heading to The Porterhouse for the ARKSTE party. I stuck to tea, and we spent most of the time chatting with a couple techs from Conway. The karaoke room was too loud, and the dining room was too old, so we stood by the bar like hip young men and got in the way of servers and ladies wishing to visit the loo.

None of us in our group won a door prize, and then they shut the thing down and we went out the back door. It was a quick trip back across town, and off to bed for one last day. I present early, and I need my beauty rest after today.

The eagle has landed.

Winner, Winner, HSTI Dinner!

I had an absolutely terrible fit trying to sleep last night. I climbed up into the window to try and mask the street light right outside our window, and only just barely got it too dark to read inside. My heart raced, and I had all kinds of anxiety about waking up early enough to get to my preconference meeting. After what felt like no sleep at all, I got up and ready, woke Summer up, and we went down for breakfast.

Ultimately I made it in plenty of time. Breakfast was fast, traffic wasn’t bad, and even parking that early for a preconference day was easy. The class was pretty good, but I think the biggest thing I got out of it was seeing the number of schools that were not only competing, but already had fully funded labs. It’s frustrating still waiting to see if I’ll even get paid for it in the future, since I’ve already volunteered all of last semester.

Lunch was cold, cold burgers and surprisingly good hot dogs in the cafeteria where I sat alone until another group of people spilled over into the seats by me. I have always, and still struggle getting to know individuals, so I didn’t actually talk to any particular person long enough to hunt them down for a lunch buddy. It wasn’t bad, and may have even been better since I kept getting mustard in weird places like some kind of man child that had never eaten food before.

We finished up early in the afternoon, so I headed back to the hotel and caught Summer exploring outside. We went up to the room so I could change, then went for a walk down the street, marveling at the near-million-dollar homes along the water. It really is the best of both worlds, being close to nature, but still having access to broadband internet.

Back in the room, we watched the end of The Amazing Spider-Man and the beginning of the new, dark Fantastic Four before leaving for dinner with Next Step. We went into The Back Porch Grill as relative strangers, but ended up sitting with a pretty good, chummy group of folks. It was a good time, and the conversation was casual and topical enough that Summer had plenty to talk about as well. I’d hate to even see the bill, but needless to say we all left with full bellies.

Charlie hitched a ride with us to Woody’s Big Party at Terry Martin’s bar, where things got a bit crazier than I’ve seen at other conferences. Summer had never seen anything like it, so it was a good experience for her to have, even if it was only educational. The craziest thing to happen was with the door prizes though. Those guys running the show were rowdy, and drew the whole thing out forever. Summer and I both had winning, sequential tickets. First I got up for a tiny Bluetooth JBL speaker and wall power splitter. Then at the end we won the grand prize, which was a new Lenovo Chromebook.

We split after that, heading straight back to the hotel and to bed to hopefully get a good night’s sleep before the regular conference starts tomorrow.

FREE STUFF!!!!!

Friar Cluck

Summer started off super early to get the car show going. I got out as quickly as I could, feeling much better after sleep. I had to go by her place to get some cakes she forgot, then made it in at least before it started.

I didn’t feel confident in running more than one deep fryer because of the lack of outlets, but I managed with just one pretty well. The show had a great turnout, and people seemed to have a really good time. Nick sold out of pulled pork peculiarly fast, but we had chicken strips for days. I just kept churning them through the fry baskets, using the timer on my Pebble to keep them going. While I was there, I had a few esports kids come in to play, but they were just left to their own devices since I was busy elsewhere.

Dad came by to check it out and hung out with the Model T guys for most of the day. I pulled him away for just a bit to climb up to the roof for some photos. The trees were a bit in the way, but I got a decent panorama out of the deal.

I was absolutely beat by the time we got everything wrapped up, but I had to go to my parents’ to clean up their fryer, and then to the shop to drop off the borrowed extension cords. Somehow Summer had the energy for some gym time. I went home to clean up just a little bit, then made my way to her place to pick her up for the Magic: The Gathering open house. Travis met us there, but John and Melissa had something else going on. We ended up wishing we had brought the kids, but they were tired and moody anyway.

We played a couple games, first for Summer to watch and learn, and then again with all three of us in a free-for-all. Summer won that game, and seemed to really enjoy it, so I’m sure we’ll be back for the next open house. One of the esports kids that didn’t show up to the car show today was there learning how to DM a game of D&D, which I thought was pretty neat. They really did a lot with a small amount of space.

Once Travis had had enough, we headed home and I fried up some rice and egg for dinner. We watched a couple episodes of Parks and Rec, and then crashed.

Oh, oh, it’s Magic!

I Could Chair Less

I haven’t been able to sleep in much this weekend for some reason. I don’t know if it’s just too bright outside or if it’s because of the head cold, but it’s been tiring and annoying feeling so drained. Summer headed home to get her chores done while I spent all morning preparing potatoes to bake in the afternoon.

The girls came home all gross, cranky, and uncooperative because they were tired and apparently good personal hygiene is out of fashion. The twice baked potatoes ended up taking me quite a bit longer to make than I expected too, but I still had them finished right as the girls walked in the door. We made it to my parent’s house about an hour late, so everyone had already started eating without us. The girls weren’t very hungry anyway since they ate with their dad, but Summer and I filled up.

Julie made keto food and said she made cauliflower rice. It was cauliflower, and I don’t get why these people have to call it by the wrong name. I guess if I eliminated a food group, I’d be a little crazy too. As they were leaving, Mr. Houston said he moved in next door, so that will be new I guess. Nobody stuck around for very long after dinner, and we weren’t an exception. Summer and I had to get back to move some furniture out of my house.

Bulk item pickup comes twice a year, and I refused to miss it this time around. I set calendar reminders for both Summer and myself, and we planned to move at least one couch out of the house. We ended up moving three. I no longer have a huge amount of seating, but it seems like nobody comes around these days anyway. It was nice to get rid of so much stuff all at once. Random scrappers came by and picked up two lawn mowers as quickly as I put them out. The rest I suppose will sit until morning. I’ll probably continue to feel guilty about trashing old shoes and boots for the rest of my life, but it made Summer feel better. I really should have cleaned them up and donated them, but it hadn’t happened in this many years, so I guess it was just as well for them to be thrown away.

Cleaning the cat box has become a total nightmare, and I had to do a load of laundry before bed. I guess change will feel better eventually, but right now it’s hard not to feel a little jarred.

Sofa, so good.

I Have Reservations About This

It was more bike weather today. I started off at the shop and got to spend some time in a room with Gary, and I felt smarter for it. I hope I’ll have some time to hang out with him over summer projects, because there’s still so much I want to learn. The trick is to be around for his projects and not the busy work that I normally get assigned to because I’m actually willing to work.

When I finally left the shop, I spent some time at Oakland taking care of a few things before heading back to go to Chick-fil-A for lunch. It tasted better than average, but it was still expensive. I’ll take a deal at Wendy’s over full price at Chick-fil-A every day of the week.

I spent the afternoon at the junior high trying to clean up a bit, but I didn’t get a whole lot accomplished. I did get to flex my math skills a bit by using known component measurements to find the unknown angle of a TV that Jessica wanted to mount outside the library. After that, I got to use Google Assistant with Duplex to make a dinner reservation at Pasta Grill for Mom’s birthday. The assistant asked everything from how many people were coming, to what name and contact number she should give the restaurant. Ronda said it seemed like it would have been faster just to call myself, but she missed the whole point of not having to talk to people myself. A robot did all the work for me. The only thing it lacked was a transcript or recording of the call. I would have loved to hear the transaction. About 15 minutes later, I got the notification and an email that my reservation was confirmed!

I finished up at the shop, enrolling the Chromebits Jessica got for her TVs. Then I ran home to clean up for dinner. Summer and the kids beat me there since I stopped for gas, and then we headed to Pasta Grill.

Julie beat us there and confirmed that the reservation was made. I couldn’t find anyone that knew anything about the call, so I guess I’ll have to try again when Erica is working. I’m glad it worked, but I want to experience the other end of it so badly. I’m such a nerd.

After dinner, I came home and started some laundry while I messed with the fish a bit. I don’t want to move Blue since she’s built a bubble nest and is actually floating her eggs, but I did get some snails moved to the kitchen. I want to clean up the 55-gallon, but I’ve got too many other things I need to do this weekend. I’ve felt exhausted for a few weeks now though, and summer is only going to make it worse with the heat. I just have anxiety about feeling behind all the time now.

Too many things!

Eureka!

I got up early this morning and went to pick up the girls to head to Eureka Springs. We went to Ozark and then took the Pig Trail north from there. We stopped at Turner Bend to check out the tiny waterfall, but Autumn didn’t want to get out of the car. The rest of us took a few pictures, and then we continued on our way.

Eaddie handled the drive pretty well, but it helped that we got stuck behind some slow vehicles for a ways. We made it into Eureka right at lunch time, found a parking space, and started to wander. We should have gone straight to lunch first, but things ended up working out alright in the end. I ended up buying some tea after the girls kept sampling a bunch of things. Then we walked to the other end of the strip and went to Local Flavor Cafe for lunch.

I had fish tacos on the waiter’s recommendation. The girls had burgers, and Summer had something with avocado instead of meat. Of course I couldn’t leave without a chocolate lavender crème brûlée. We shared it three ways because Autumn is weird, and then we started back down the strip to do some shopping. The girls got a few things, and I got us some chocolate dipped stuff at the candy store that’s always pulling taffy. After our four hours were up, we headed to the Inn of the Ozarks to meet my parents for dinner.

We went to The Bavarian Inn Restaurant as is tradition. They had us sat in a room with a bunch of other magic folk. Dad was super excited for everything, which was nice. Even Autumn found something she liked. My food was fair, but it always feels so overpriced and under filling. Even Summer agreed that it didn’t fill her up. They seemed to make up for that with gas though, because by the time it was all said and done, I did feel a bit bloated for a while.

After dinner, we went back to the Inn for the magic show. They put on a really good, if short show. Evidently they had split it up into like three shows this time, and Dad performed at the afternoon show today that we didn’t get to see. Eaddie got to participate in the finale with a really solid levitation, and then refused to smile as she left the stage. She really enjoyed it though, and continued to talk about it for the first part of the trip back home.

The drive back was uneventful, except that Eaddie got to feeling sick as we got into the tighter curves. The Dramamine didn’t seem to help her much, so I just slowed way down until we got most of the way back to Ozark. Then we hit the interstate and made it home just before midnight. The girls all crashed, and I eventually made it to bed super hungry.

Alright, already we’ll all float on.

Logan’s Birthday Run

The girls got up and left this morning so I could get ready for our trip. Summer dropped them off with her parents so we could go to Little Rock for The Great Inflatable Race. I got going quite a bit later than I originally intended, but it all worked out in the end. My ghost shrimp appeared to have perished in the night for some reason, but the cherry reds still seem to be doing okay.

I fed everyone else, and left to pick up some Starbucks on the way to get Summer. I ordered a “featured drink” called the Iced Cinnamon Cloud Macchiato, that I simply could not recommend. Someone must be tickled to pay for air, but it’s certainly not me. You can keep your whipped cold foam that fills half the glass. I didn’t even know how to drink it all separated like that. Luckily enough, the foam collapsed by the time Summer got into the car, so the rest swirled nicely in the cup.

We first made our way to Conway for a free birthday appetizer and happy hour drinks at Logan’s Roadhouse. The waitress seemed a bit lazy at first with her reluctant response to my request for soda water. She reported back after she found it at the bar where I knew it would be, but fortunately she turned the experience around after that, and we had a good time sipping drinks in the sun coming through the window.

Next we made our way to Red Robin where I had a free birthday burger. Summer got a BLATT with bacon, lettuce, avocado, tomato, and turkey. I got the Burnin’ Love with the jalapeño on top. We both ate too many fries and had to take half of our sandwiches to go.

Our final birthday promo gauntlet stop was at MarketPlace Grill for dessert. I had a $10 voucher, so we both ordered desserts and got out for like two bucks. She got an apple crumble dish with ice cream, and I got a cheesecake with raspberry topping. Hers seemed good. My cheesecake was dry and possibly overcooked, and didn’t have enough raspberry drizzle. Both seemed like really tiny portions, but we ordered the full size portions, so I’m puzzled whether the smaller option would come on a baby food spoon. Service was great though, and I guess I can’t complain too much for getting out so cheap.

We completed our trip to Little Rock with a stop at Academy in Sherwood to pick up Summer’s race packet. They didn’t have her shirt size there, which aggravated her since she preregistered quite a while ago. She did find some leggings with a pocket on clearance though. From there it was a short trip to the hotel. It’s right behind Red Lobster, so I think I know what we’re doing for lunch tomorrow. Summer watched some gymnastics on TV for a bit, and then The LEGO Ninjago Movie played us out for the night.

It’s amazing what those girls can do on a 4-inch beam.

Bos Ludus

We’re halfway through testing today, and I spent the morning cleaning up a bit more between working on a couple laptops. I kept missing my bell breaks to get into classrooms, but testing has made it so relaxing that I didn’t really fret at all. I met Dale, Allen, and Zach at Taco John’s for a cheap lunch before going back to the shop for a bit.

I ended the day at the junior high with another esports practice. It was pretty quiet, as everyone jumped into public games to level up their accounts. I took the time to mess with our Discord a bit more, and finally cleaned up the #welcome channel to more clearly funnel new members into their proper roles. One of the kids was a little late getting picked up, but eventually I made it to Brown’s Catfish for my birthday dinner with the family. The girls went to Karate, but Summer came along and we stuffed ourselves with too many fish.

Back home, I got to build out a custom team category in Discord, so we can finally see how that works out for my players. I’m a little anxious to see if my proposed “Discord for Esports” session that I submitted this morning gets accepted for HSTI. In either case, Ben’s letting me go for three whole days just for submitting it. I’m not sure anyone else cares to go because they’re too shy to submit their own breakout sessions, but I won’t turn down a $40 per diem for dinner, and I hear the Embassy has a free bar.

How’s Google going to go down on the birthday of the internet???

The Interview of a Lifetime

I woke up this morning congested with all kinds of crud, but felt just barely well enough to get home and showered before work. I went to the shop to call Rachel so she could coach me for my interview with Travis at The Courier. We joke about it a lot at work, but it was kind of funny to hear someone actually tell me in an official capacity that my role was to promote the district and myself as the esports coach. Obviously we’re selling something here, but some of our guys give it such negative light because it seems like it’s the same few people parading about as though they have some idea what’s going on, and those are the ones that always seem to get paid the most while the hard-at-work get whatever pickings are left.

I had only just made it to the junior high when Ben said we could meet up with Johnny. I did a quick work order, and then went to meet them. As if it was to be a day of only poor timing, I no sooner shook Johnny’s hand than Ben asked me to drive across campus to pick him up. We eventually got settled in, and Johnny had a lot more to say and lead the conversation than I expected. I actually didn’t even really break out the list of questions I had been curating, particularly after he got to the point where he said classified staff likely wouldn’t be payable in a coaching role. There are loopholes that we may be able to jump through, and different things that may be possible to offset my time out, but it seems like things are going to have to change quite a bit before what actually happens aligns with that which is right.

We wrapped that meeting up with just barely enough time for me to make my way to The Courier, where I met up with Travis, who I hadn’t seen in a decade. He was relatively cold, direct, and straight to the point, but relatively professional given our history. I still don’t quite know his angle on the story after trying to answer the questions he had for me, but I’ll have to trust that he’ll continue the “good relationship” Rachel spoke to me about earlier in the day. When it was all said and done, Joshua took my headshot and walked me out.

From there, I went to a late lunch. Solo, melancholy, free grand slam at Denny’s, as years and years past. I think it was good after a bit of a nerve racking few days. Nobody else from the team even mentioned lunch.

The afternoon flew by pretty quickly, and I found myself rushing to get back to the junior high for esports practice. Kids poured in like never before, and I ended up with one more student than computers. I’m not sure where they went, but at some point it evened out. I don’t know if maybe someone’s parents showed up, or what. I’m not even sure how responsible I am for that at this very volunteer point in time. Gary stopped by for a while and was impressed. Then Joshua showed up to take some pictures. Our conversation went much better than the first time. I think Gary helped, as he is wont to do. The highlight of the entire day was talking to a father of a student, and hearing him say, “no son of mine is going to be a filthy casual!”

Validation to my ears!

That wrapped up my work day, so I went home to do what little housekeeping I could muster, then ran the birthday freebie gauntlet all the way to Summer’s. Three free sandwiches with the purchase of two drinks. Not too shabby.

Esports! Will It Turn Your Teenager into a Mass Murderer? Click here to read more!

Merry Chrysler

Summer and I got up and woke the girls up for breakfast this morning. She made blueberry pancakes, and then the girls wanted to be artsy in their rooms while Summer played Torchlight II and I played Zelda. Eventually I had to head home to get ready for dinner at my parents’ house.

Once I was ready, I picked everyone up at Summer’s parents’ house since the girls would be staying the night there. We were the first to arrive at my parents’ house, followed by Bác Vân and Doug, then Julie. Dinner was really good, though I forgot to bring the leftover potato salad. We had plenty of everything else though, so we didn’t really miss it. Julie got on another rant about why America is fat after Bác Vân tried to tell me not to drink so much so fast.

After dinner, we played a little bit of Overcooked II with Julie before switching to Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes. As stressful as that was at moments, everyone seemed to find something they were good enough at that we could successfully defuse bombs with screen looking. Next up will have to be true handheld mode so nobody else can see the bomb.

We dropped the girls off, then Summer and I made it back to my house and watched a few episodes of The Office. She’s determined to finish the series over break, and then we’ll have to decide on what to watch next. I’ve got such a backlog that it very nearly stresses me out, but there are also other shows I’d like to rewatch with her. Decisions, decisions.

And a happy emu tear!