Tag: work

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1200 Squats

I spent the entire day by myself imaging laptops. Between yesterday’s boot disk creation and today, I’ve completed 150 devices. There are only about 1050 left to go. I didn’t have a terrible time today, but next week is going to be a long week.

Allen was the only one that said anything about lunch, and we were both pretty hungry, so it was KFC or bust. Then it was right back to the grind. The music helps. Having things to rearrange helps too.

After work, I went home for a while and ended up vacuuming out my car so I could install the new WeatherTech floor mats. I got super hot and sweaty, but the job’s done and I’ll feel better about having those nasty children in and out of the car all of the time. I just wish they tucked under the door moulding to keep the crumbs from falling down between them.

I beat Summer and Eaddie home but just waited in the car for them. Then I fried up some chicken for their sandwiches, and Summer went to bed while Eaddie and I watched another episode of Daredevil.

I’m gonna have to get some better knee pads…

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Boot Nuked

I got to pull away from the low priority nonsense that’s been going around so I could deal with the more important stuff. Gary and I spent all day at the high school coming up with a process to create boot disks, breaking only for lunch at Wendy’s with Zach. It wasn’t stressful work, but we weren’t quite at the stage where we churn through hundreds of laptops yet either. At the end of the day, I finished up and then rebooted the computer as usual. Unfortunately I didn’t notice that I had forgotten to take the boot disks out of the USB ports, and the computer immediately booted back up and wiped itself.

After spending so much time making sure we copied all the files Dale saved for me, I wiped it all away in just an instant. I’ll have to pull the hard drive and try to recover some of those files, but I have a feeling that most of them aren’t that important. It’s still a good lesson in keeping important things off of the local machine though. I had been thinking about getting rid of the desktop and going to a docking station setup anyway, so this just kind of forced me along into trying that out sooner than I expected. I was so initially upset by my negligence that I decided to go ahead with rearranging the office. I stayed super late moving things around to how I wanted them, and I’m not even sure how long any of it will stay. At least it’s left in usable shape for tomorrow morning.

Summer left Eaddie with her parents and came to stay the night at my house. I hadn’t planned to eat because it had gotten so late, but then felt so hungry by the time I actually left, so she picked up some Taco Bell for us. I ate some, and then did some quick water changes in all of the tanks just to try and help out my recent negligence. That seems to be a running theme lately.

Are you leaving those here? Are those your own personal speakers??? Can you even hear me??????

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Runaround Blues

Jason had us take a crew of four to Oakland this morning to do what really only two probably should have done. We’ve got pallets worth of higher priority work to do, and we’re doing cleanup crap, and it’s just infuriating as usual. I peeled off with Amanda, which somehow made it less bad. Then she and I ate leftover turkey at the shop while the others went out to eat.

After lunch, I managed to escape and run around with Gary for a bit, mostly to start looking at high school stuff. While we were there, it started to pour down rain, so we stayed longer than originally planned. We explored the PAC some more while trying to find some people there. All we ever heard were ghost whistling and wood cutting, but no people.

Once it cleared up, we went to the junior high and helped Heather with some stuff for the rest of the day. I stopped by the high school on the way home to deliver my refrigerator from the junior high. I think I may have scratched up the front a bit, but it was a gimme anyway. I shouldn’t be too attached.

I went home and got ready to go to Sheri’s father’s visitation at Humphrey. I’d only met the guy a couple times and only in passing, but I at least wanted to stop by to see her for a second. I told her it really felt like I was in line for a buffet that was just taking forever, so I didn’t want to keep her long. There was a good sided group of people there, and it was nice to see them outside of work for a change. Everyone was all smiles, as I think they should be in the best of scenarios.

Becky, Marcia, Miranda, Mollie, and I all went to Ruby Tuesday afterward for dinner and drinks, and we had a grand ol’ time. Our waitress was awesome and took all three coupons I had, and worked her magic to split the discounts across all five tickets. When we left, I dropped Becky off at her car, then had to stop in to see Summer for a minute. She and Eaddie were watching Spider-Verse in bed, and I had a bed of my own at home that still hadn’t been cleared, so I left to do that and get some sleep there for the first time in over a month.

So long, flower man.

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The Princess Is in a Cooler Castle

I had to take an alternate route home this morning due to railroad construction, and then the extra traffic on the way in to work very nearly made me late. I spent all morning with Brice doing the cleanup work orders at Oakland. Allen came by and helped after taking care of something else.

Ben brought smoked turkey for lunch, so I had to run to Neighborhood Market for my side. I brought potato salad and rolls, because I didn’t realize Jason was bringing some kind of cheesy potato salad type dish. Both people in front of me in line paid by cash at the self-checkout, which was stupid and slow. Why do people use money?

The afternoon was more of the same, with the addition of Amanda and Jason for a short while. Summer and Ben stopped by after Mark stood them up for their meeting, but I couldn’t really help them. Ben let us have a working lunch, so most of us left early. I ended up going to the high school to drop off some things first, where I got caught up chatting with Bryan for a minute outside. I didn’t realize higher level administrators had the same number of contract days that we have.

I stayed super late in my new office, hooking up one of my speakers and contemplating a desk move. Then I went home and started water changes in all of the aquariums before having to pick Eaddie up from karate. We went by my parents’ house without any real plan, where we ended up eating some leftovers and doing puzzles. Eaddie was doing them on her phone, while I put together a 3D castle that Dad pulled out of the closet.

We headed back to Summer’s pretty late, and I was so exhausted that I just crashed there. It took my house a frustrating hour to cool down four degrees, and I don’t know if it’s the weather, or if there’s something wrong with the new unit, or if it’s just not designed to be shut off for long periods of time. In any case, I need to spend some more time at home now to take care of all of this stuff. I just feel like I’ve been run over by a school bus.

“And at the end of it all, my only regret is not spending more of my life working for a living.”  –nobody ever

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The Humidity of Our City – Our Ciiiity!

I scarfed down an apple fritter on the way home this morning, and was greeted by another dead A/C unit, presumably full of water again. At least the house had cooled down quite a bit, so I was able to get ready for work without too much additional sweat. I was running a tiny bit ahead, so I proceeded with adding the new shrimp to the kitchen aquarium. Dad showed up just before I left for work so he could house-sit while Dependable replaced my central heating and air. I figured it would be a few hours, but it ended up taking all day long.

Jason decided to take a look at the high school sign with me, which took quite a bit of walking and driving back and forth across the campus. We ended with the assumption that the outlet is bad, or at least giving dirty power that’s causing some issues. Everything else seems to be working correctly. When we got back to the shop, we loaded up with some cable and went to meet Heather at the junior high to pull a couple lines. I thought I had it down to the foot, but I ended up being super short and lost one of the two cables in the ceiling, so we had to finish after lunch.

Allen and Gary wanted to go to Bocadillos for lunch, but didn’t want to wait for me to get back to the shop, so I had to drive myself down to Dardanelle. The food had been better, and the salsa tasted like it had started to turn. To top it all off, I was charged double for my drink, and my mangonada cup was served super messy. I managed to make it home to check on Dad though. Bác Vân brought him lunch, but I felt bad that he had to sit in the hot house all day. I really had no idea it would take that long, and I didn’t leave him anything to keep entertained. I really should have just taken the day off myself.

Back at work, Jason stayed at the shop while Heather and I finished re-running and terminating cables. Then we ended the day with some battery swaps and a cooldown in the office. That’s when the rain finally hit, and it really poured. I wasn’t willing to wait it out, so I ran to the car, splashing through the flooded parking lot, and made my way home.

Baby Bye Bye Bye!

The guys were just finishing up with the equipment and needed to test the thermostat. It was a bit upsetting that they didn’t seem to have a clue how to use the Nest thermostat since Dependable is a registered Nest Pro. I had to set the thermostat up myself after plugging it in to a micro-USB cable to quickly charge it back up after they cut power at the breaker for it last month. They had enough other stuff to finish while we waited for the charge though, and eventually tested everything successfully. It took the house a few hours to cool down from the peak of 89 degrees, and the unit didn’t seem to be very fast at all. The air coming out of the vents was just barely cool, and the outside unit didn’t blow as hot as I expected. I was just happy to have something going though.

When Summer and Eaddie finished what they were doing, they came to pick me up and we went to my parents’ house for some leftover phở. We sat there for a little while before going back for my car. They went home and to sleep while I cleaned up a couple things at the house, and then I joined them for another night.

So much to catch up on now…

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16K Santa

It was a small crew this morning, so Ben sent the four of us to hang some touch panels before an early dismissal. We hung the first at Dwight before inspecting Sequoyah and then taking a lunch. We all agreed on Wendy’s, and then we were going to do work orders afterward. I chose to help Brice finish up at Sequoyah, and then finished the day delivering a speaker to my new office.

After work, I went home to change before heading out to the Clarksville Walmart for some TVs. I got four takers and picked up four ONN 50″ 4K TVs. The whole purpose of the trip was to replace Summer’s bedroom TV. Then my sister wanted one for her spare bedroom. I decided to pick one up for my parents since their TV still won’t play copy-protected sources. Finally, Gary decided to upgrade his smaller TV.

I made my way back home and delivered to Gary, and then my parents. I got Julie’s garage door camera and she let me in to her house while she was on the way home from work. I got the camera set up after a little trouble, and then she gave me a bowl of Blueberry Morning, which I don’t think I’ve had since before I moved out of my parents’ house. She said they stopped either making or carrying it locally, so she picked up a case or so.

You can’t say I never gave back!

Summer went to the gym after work, so I went to her house with the last TV and set it up as a surprise before taking Eaddie to my parents’ house for dinner and a swim. We stopped by the shop where I discarded her old TV before meeting her. Eaddie wasn’t hungry, so she jumped straight to the pool while I ate. When Summer got there, she didn’t want to eat either. I finished and then joined Eaddie for a swim, and Summer eventually came along for just a short while.

Dad got a couple telescopes out, but I think everyone was too tired to stand around looking through them. We ended the evening inside watching My Fair Lady, and headed back to Summer’s for the evening. I put on the rest of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse until Summer passed out.

Everybody knows that the best way to learn is under intense, life-threatening crisis!

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Be Happier, and That’s an Order!

I woke up around 4am and couldn’t go back to sleep for a long time. I felt like I just started to doze off a little bit around the time I had to get up. Ben had his little chat for us and basically told everyone to get along better and stop having poor morale over our pay. I hate that the district’s response to that is that they’ll help us find new employment if we don’t like it.

We loaded the trucks up and took two groups to Oakland to rehang touch panels. I’m pretty sure at least one of the rooms we hung had a newer projector, so it aggravates me that they didn’t even attempt to change the bulb before removing them. I guess I’ve just got to learn to ignore the stupidity at this point, but it’s just so damned aggravating.

Summer was running around with Ben schmoozing local businesses, and invited me out to lunch at Fat Daddy’s. It must be so nice to be appreciated by your employer.

After lunch, I kind of got left behind in the shop, so I spent the whole afternoon just chatting and sifting through Dale’s old Google Drive. It won’t be long before I have to dig right into the 1:1 laptops, and I couldn’t be less excited.

I went home after work and spent a bunch of time cleaning up. I took care of the cat, fish, cleaned up the kayak and put it away, and finally headed up to Summer’s. I beat her and Eaddie home, so I started cleaning up a salad with chicken strips. When they got in, we watched an episode of Parks and Rec, and I watched just a little bit of Into the Spider-Verse while they showered before bed.

Alright, let’s do this one last time.

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Revengers: Endgame

They’ve almost completely filled in the hole they dug to replace our parking lot. I was surprised both at how deep they dug, and how quickly they completed that much work. We had a super small crew today, so Jason took all four of us out to Center Valley to do some moving of equipment. He and Brice rolled together for most of it, while I wandered around with Allen and Amanda. They’re getting a bunch of new cubbies for the kids like most other elementaries have, so there were several rooms with technology that had to be relocated.

It was a pretty solid, yet relaxed day of work. We all went to Old South for lunch on Allen’s suggestion, and the place was absolutely packed. I saw Mr. Mathis walking in, and was a little surprised that he remembered and recognized me, and asked about my sister as well. The service was a bit slow on account of how many people they had crammed into the building, but was otherwise good. My pork chop was unremarkable, but the sweet potato was a good choice.

Daleism: They must not be rich, otherwise they’d have a covered Porchia.

We spent the rest of the afternoon with more of the same until quitting time. Evidently nobody did a walkthrough of the building and gave Allen a work order for it, so Jason and Brice spent the last bit of time there doing that. When I left work, I went home to my hot house and changed before going to Asurion to pick up Josh.

Somehow, Josh had avoided any spoilers from Endgame after all this time, so I was excited to take him to see it. We wanted to eat a little bit of something before the movie, so we went to Chipotle first and split a burrito. Then it was straight to the Cinemark in a perfect amount of time to grab our collectible posters and stow them in the car before finding our seats. We both made it through the entire movie without getting up, and even a little longer since we stayed for the extra scenes at the end. The movie of course was great, but I thought the extra clip was a bit lame. I wish we had gotten the one with Morgan Stark instead.

After the movie, we went to Old Chicago for a proper dinner, and then headed back home. I turned my portable A/C down super low to hopefully cool the house a bit overnight, and then headed up to Summer’s for the evening.

Everybody wants a happy ending, right? But it doesn’t always roll that way.

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The Long Exhaustion

It’s been getting hotter every day, which I think has people more lethargic and irritable. Amanda needed my help running some cable at the middle school in the morning, and when we got back, we heard some of the others had gotten into a yelling match while we were away. Jason ended up taking the afternoon off, but Ben finally returned after nearly two weeks away.

Gary and I went to Foodies for lunch, which was pretty decent but super expensive. The gyro I had was good, but for the price, I would have just gone to Arby’s. The rice was pretty good, but I think our favorite was the cheesy potatoes.

After lunch, I took Amanda to the junior high with me to hang out while I tried to pack up a few things to move out. After a while she got bored and we went to the middle school and did a couple things off of her cleanup list.

We ended the day at the shop a little early because power went out. Evidently it went out momentarily for over half of the city, but it seemed to come back pretty quickly. At first I thought it was something the construction crew did while filling in our parking hole they had dug.

I ran home to unload some things that had been in my trunk, then got a much needed car wash on the way to my parents’ house for dinner. Summer brought all the kids over after karate, and we had a mix of eggplant soup and spaghetti. I ate too much because of picky eaters, and then we all headed back to her house for the evening. The kids continued with their misguided dummy nonsense on into the night since I couldn’t inspire them to anything else, which was of great personal frustration.

Stymie to the moon…

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Bye Bye LeRoy

It was Dale’s last day of work today, but by the count of our accomplishments, we were all retiring today. Jason tried sending us all on a wild goose chase with phones, but then diverted us upstairs instead. I lead a group of three others in replacing telephones there, and basically did three of the six we found. By the end of it, I had to make Amanda do one herself. Gary split off first, and was followed by Brice soon after.

I had to run to Oakland to look at their fax machine, but made it right back so we could go to lunch. Jason used the scrap metal money we made to buy us all Dale’s choice of Brown’s Catfish. Gary, Amanda, Jason, Dale, and I were all that went, but it was a good time. Then after lunch we went to Sequoyah and dusted more computers until everyone sort of lost momentum again. We did encounter a dumpster scrapper back at the shop, who we invited in to take some old printers and CRT monitors. I’m not sure he’ll get much of anything for them, but at least we don’t have to mess with the junk any more.

We killed the rest of the afternoon at the shop while Dale mumbled about wanting to go home. I’m not sure anyone was really surprised, but we all wondered why he didn’t just leave anyway. When Jason finally did tell us we could leave early, he jumped up faster than I have ever seen anyone jump before. He handed me his keys and I forced a bro-hug on him, and Amanda walked out with him.

Gary and I went by Superfast to check out some cabling and other electronics they wanted to have relocated, and Ben offered to give him a free oil change while he was there. Afterward I went home to change and clean up a bit before running to the junior high for my tools and meeting Gary back at the shop. They had just closed, so Summer finished her stuff and then shut everything down so I could get to work.

The rat’s nest looked a lot worse than it really was, but it still took me a couple hours to get everything cleaned up and looking nice. There’s still more to do, but they still have some finishing work to do in the lobby first, and then I can come back and finish my part. I struggle a bit on how much to charge them for the work, but it’ll be really nice to make some extra money on the side. It’ll be good to bring a little bit of the hustle back.

When we got back to Summer’s for the evening, I fried some chicken strips and made some great looking salads for the three of us. Then we had dessert and watched an episode of Parks and Rec before bed.

“Highskoo’ Teknicken” and other Daleisms!