Tag: work

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Evasive Tax Form

The weather was supposed to be nice again today, but it was still super cold on the bike in the morning. I went back and forth between Oakland and the shop a few times trying to fix some issues before testing season arrives. It was still a mostly mellow morning though. I did run into Michael, who asked about borrowing my home theater speakers for a Dancing Through the Decades dance in a couple weeks. I just didn’t feel comfortable loading them up and bringing them out for use in public though.

I met Zach and Allen at Morellos for lunch, where I vowed to eat too many chips. I had been hungry all morning, and I absolutely loaded myself with fajitas and chips. Allen left us super early as usual, and Zach and I both still got to the shop separately, and well before our lunch hour was over. I really don’t know what his anxiety is about.

I tried to get some tablets reset at the junior high before school let out, but I didn’t get them all done before Jason wanted Brice and me to help Amanda mount a touch panel. At first I thought we were all four going to be there, but evidently he helped Amanda deliver the touch panel, and we were to swap it with a previously mounted television and then bring that back to the shop. I got pretty annoyed at Brice, because Jason emailed us early in the morning with a scheduled time of 3:00, so I left my tablets unfinished to meet at the shop. Brice took an extra 30 minutes to get there, and then we still had to drive to the middle school. On top of that, Gary seemed to be bored at the shop, and Ben was going to be at the middle school to continue his walkthrough. It just felt like everyone was either already there or available to help, and I was annoyed that I couldn’t get my work done. It didn’t help that I was mad at myself for forgetting to complete a work order yesterday, but I really didn’t get any heads-up for that one anyway.

After work, I came home to gather some things before going to Lowe’s to hunt down some light bulbs. I didn’t even see a compatible LED like I’ve been getting from Walmart, but they had one single-pack incandescent for a little more than the LEDs cost. Hopefully it won’t burn out after just a couple days though. I wish I knew what the problem was. I went ahead and picked up a new fluorescent bulb for the 35 gallon bow-front tank as well since it’s been out for years. There were only a couple cashiers, and after waiting in line for quite a while, my guy couldn’t scan a gift card correctly and I ended up getting out of line to check the balance. Once I confirmed what I knew, I got back into the next shortest line and checked out without incident.

I finally made it up to Summer’s for just a spot of dinner and to visit. They had already eaten since I was still a bit full from lunch anyway. Summer and I went to the other room to talk about her offer from the shop, and I tried to help her calculate the value of her time. It really could go either way, depending on her negotiation. The best part is just that she has multiple options for now and in the future, so I tend not to fret too much over her choice. I spent a bit of time trying to buy tickets for Shazam, but had to give up after I met a hidden order limit that required a call to guest services to explain.

Eventually I headed back home for the evening and tried to take care of the aquariums a bit. Once that was done, I spent the rest of the night cleaning with the purpose of finding my W-2. I just couldn’t find it anywhere, and I started to get really aggravated. I felt good about getting so much stuff cleaned up and thrown out, but I was going crazy not remembering where I had put it. Eventually I found it in the living room, but didn’t have enough time to actually file my taxes. I guess there’s still tomorrow.

At least I got my watch shipped off.

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Self Promoting

Gary and I chatted for a while this morning, reminiscing about the days of olde. I missed not getting to see Mitch when he came to town. He said they all went to Robert and Grant’s barbecue truck to see what they had, and that it was the best barbecue he had ever had. It got me thinking and wondering, and even made me a little sad to think back to that earlier time.

Dad texted Mom and me asking for a ride home from St. Mary’s after they had doped him up and told him not to drive. I got him home and then went to the junior high for a bit before lunch. Allen was really craving chicken, so we went to KFC for lunch, and then I went back to the shop to talk with Gary some more about how to block the kids from accessing porn on the school devices. Those kids are so crafty about it, and some of the things they do are pretty creative. I guess I just can’t imagine them living in today’s world without access to that kind of thing everywhere else, and it makes me wonder why they’d do it at school.

Eventually I made it back to the junior high for esports. Rachel and Josh came by to get a few quote from some kids and take some more pictures. Josh even staged a little artistic photo as well with a mix of someone’s Razer headphones, a VicTsing mouse, and my Monoprice mechanical keyboard. At the end of the day, I accidentally remotely restarted three computers that were being used to play a winning game, and I felt really bad for causing the team to lose an otherwise winning match. They gave me some grief over it, but they seemed to brush it all off in the end since it was really time to go anyway.

I went home for a bit to clean up, and then went to Summer’s for the evening. She prepped some more veggies and I made another awesome pizza since the girls went out with their dad. Then I spent the rest of the night playing some Overwatch with Johnny, Jack, Aaron, and Clint. It was nice to have so many people on, and I was surprised at how late they all stayed on. Must’ve been kismet.

The Executive Director of Esports, Game Master, and Emperor Supreme does not 1v1 a bruh!
The Executive Director of Esports, Game Master, and Emperor Supreme sends his Legions to dispatch his opponents!

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Subway++

I didn’t think I had much going on this morning, but we eventually discovered that I wasn’t getting work order emails properly again. I bounced between campuses in the morning to take care of some older things, including discarding a cart full of netbooks so I could repurpose the cart in the library. Then I met Allen for lunch at the Subway in the old Darrell’s building. He had suggested Subway, and I was curious about their other offerings. I got boneless wings and made it a combo with two bread sticks and a drink. The food tasted cheap, but I paid $9 for the meal. They did have a mini Coca-Cola Freestyle machine, but it had a weird lever that had a really poor tactile response. The inside of the restaurant was actually really nice though. I haven’t tried their pasta, but so far I can’t recommend anything but the Subway for their corporate-y goodness. What I had tasted like frozen gas station food.

The afternoon was partly spent catching up on newer work orders that flooded in after the Web Help Desk reset. Ben came by at the end of the school day and tested out LanSchool for Chromebooks in my APUSH class. To make a long story short, it was absolutely terrible. The limitation of features and the ease of a student making it annoying for a teacher trying to keep tabs on them were just too much. Another hard “no” from me.

I went home after work and spent a little time with the fish before heading to Summer’s for dinner. She had a roast in the slow cooker all day, and the girls ate in front of the TV while we sat at the table. Summer spent some time doing school work while I read up on the Travel on Fi comment thread on SlickDeals. Wednesday will be the 90th day since her phone activation, so I’m getting really antsy about getting the $799 travel gift card. I’m really doubting she gets it automatically, and I kind of dread having to contact Fi about it. They’ve always been pretty decent, but it’s just annoying.

And I still have to do my taxes…

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Risk of Rain

We had a meeting this morning with our new testing coordinator about ACT Aspire testing. Heather made us pancakes and sausage for breakfast, which made the dull meeting better. The highlight was the look on her face when we told her the number one reason we get called in to help is for one of the things we are specifically forbidden to do. At least the whole ordeal didn’t take long, and then I filled up on breakfast.

Allen needed help hanging a touch panel in London, so Dale and I joined him on that quest. Shortly after we got there and got set up, they had a fire drill and the two of them insisted on going outside for it. I went ahead and hung the mounting hardware while they were gone. Of course I ended up having to drive back to town because he forgot a part. That got us to lunch, and they suggested staying in London to eat at Fat Daddy’s, but I wasn’t even remotely hungry. We came back to town, and I went and sat with them at Taco Bell for half an hour, but then just went to the junior high to work on my stack of work orders.

I very nearly completed resetting all of my PLTW tablets, but still ended up staying late to finish the second lab. When I finally left, I met the girls at my house and made more pork nachos for them. I probably ate too much of it myself, but at least I cleaned up the leftovers. They headed home shortly after that, and I spent some time on the aquariums before sitting down to some Overwatch with Johnny, and then Jack. When they both finally got on at the same time, we played some of the new Risk of Rain 2, which was relatively fun, mostly annoying, and ran pretty terribly on my ancient computer. I want so badly to build another one, but also recognize that I have such little time to sit down at it. A laptop is appealing, but I don’t exactly have the money to pay that premium anyway. I guess I’ll stick with my old computer for a few more years of indecisiveness.

I forgot all about that damn whale in the gym. I really wanted to see it.

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Tabula Rasa

It was cold this morning, but it would warm up pretty quickly, so I took the bike to work. I spent all day at the junior high touching all of the Samsung tablets in three different classrooms, and still couldn’t get it done before lunch. I met Zach, Allen, and Jason at Morelos where I tried something new – the lunch burrito supreme. I was a little disappointed in its size, and the mixed beef and chicken was really kind of split down the middle the short way, but with the rice, beans, and chips, I had plenty to eat. On the way out, some little squishy unicorns caught my eye in a quarter machine, and somehow I talked both Allen and Jason into donating a quarter each. I was shocked, but it made me happy.

I went by the shop for a little bit after lunch and chatted with Gary about some of the troubles I had been working with, and that’s when I got two work orders about kids looking at porn on the tablets. At first it just seemed like one more thing to throw onto the pile of crap I was dealing with, but after further inspection I’m not positive I caused this one. I spent the rest of my day and most of my evening updating and factory resetting tablets in two of my three labs until I couldn’t stand to look at them. I have one lab completely finished, but I won’t know for sure until tomorrow. Then I’ll still have to come up with a better management process and also wipe two more labs’ worth.

At first I thought I would skip dinner because of how late it was, but then I remembered I had a Subway coupon that expired after today. I was super hungry too, so I ordered a chicken bacon ranch sub and rode on home. I got one load of laundry done as well, and was still ready for bed earlier than the past few nights. I’m already over 40 hours for the week. Hopefully all this overtime helps me build a case for a raise and a solid position with my esports program.

Oh, glee.

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Tabmanian Devils

I had to spend most of the day fighting the tablet issue I had yesterday. I took a short break to meet with Rachel about esports, and again for lunch at KFC with Allen and Dale, but it wasn’t until after lunch that I got them working again. I won’t find out until tomorrow whether or not I’ll have to touch all of the classroom devices to fix them all.

Jason and Zach helped me hang a TV at the end of the day, and we really got it up in record time because neither of them were very excited to do the work. Jason actually looked to keep busy all day, but I’m really not sure what Zach did for most of it. We did a good job though, and I’m always for good, efficient work.

When I got home, I started trimming and replanting the bathroom aquarium and did a quick water change. We were going to get 50-cent corn dogs for dinner, but then Mom said she was making chow mein. We coordinated Summer’s gym time with me borrowing Allen’s truck to move the mattress from my parents’ house, and I grabbed some corn dogs for the kids on the way. I happened to pull in right behind Keith at the drive-through, and we hollered back and forth for a bit, and then it was off to dinner.

I don’t know how Eaddie ate so much, but Noah gave up pretty quickly on his chow mein after eating like five corn dogs. I think Eaddie only had about three, but she loved the chow mein too much to pass it up. Summer took leftovers for lunch, and then we loaded the truck up to get things moved.

We dropped the boxspring off at my house first, just to raise my mattress up off the floor a little bit. I don’t love it, but I’m so indecisive about a bed that I really don’t know what I want anyway. Then we took the mattress up to Autumn’s room for her. I topped off Allen’s truck and returned it, then headed home to put everything back together again.

Johnny and Jack were playing some Overwatch, so I jumped into a couple matches with them to end the day. The steamrolling was unreal.

Turn around, now you’re my A Team.

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Sticking It Through to the End

It was supposed to be a bit warmer today, so I took the bike to work. It was pretty cold in the morning, and it never got super nice to ride, but the afternoon wasn’t too bad. I met up with Dale, Allen, and Jason at Ruby Tuesday for $5 salads. Ronda and Jennifer sat at a table next to us as well. When we left lunch, I met Dale at the shop to give him his Rap Snacks. He loved it, and even posed for a photo.

The afternoon went by pretty quickly, and before I knew it, it was time for another esports practice. We only had a couple seats left in the lab, and everyone seemed to jump straight into games pretty quickly, so I’ve reached near autonomy. Sam, one of my founding students, came in for his first meeting and gave me a set of Hot Wheels that I didn’t immediately identify as being Rocket League themed. It was a pretty awesome gesture, and I was happy that he finally made it to a practice.

I ended up staying super late again, this time fighting with some PLTW Android tablets. For some reason, several of them just refused to see the internet through the internal wireless. I wasn’t able to figure them all out tonight, so that’s just more work for tomorrow. On the way out, some kind of torpedo-looking vehicle silently zipped past me in the parking lot. It had a bicycle tire in the back, and headlights and tail lights for riding around in the dark. I couldn’t really see through the windows in it, but it looked like some kind of motorized recumbent bike. It was super low to the ground though, and didn’t seem to have any room for pedaling.

When I got home, I spent the evening cleaning up after the pets. I moved Murderface to the old shrimp bowl, and then Big Blue to the old container. Hopefully everyone acclimates well, but dead shrimp have me nervous. I’ll have to keep a close eye on them.

Señor Cow is ready for his cover photo.

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Plant Fitness

I was so tired this morning after such a busy weekend. I lost my last cherry red shrimp last night, and after fishing it out of the bowl, I dug around and found the other one dead as well. The body nearly melted as I tried to remove it, which meant it must have been dead for a bit longer. I couldn’t remember if I had seen them both alive after the trip or not, but I was sad that they both died without any signs of a reason why. Water parameters seemed okay. Maybe it was the fluctuation of the water temperature.

The work order system email handler failed at some point, so I didn’t think I had much going on in the morning and spent it at the shop. Heather got my room booked for the conference in June, and unfortunately I couldn’t get one at the Embassy Suites like I wanted. Staybridge has been great in the past though, so I couldn’t complain too much. I just wanted to try somewhere new. Allen, Zach, Sara, Gary, Ben, and I went to Zaxby’s for lunch, which was exciting and rare. We never did hear from Dale, so I ended up putting his Rap Snacks in his cabinet at the shop.

After lunch, I ran home to fetch my delayed aquarium plants out of the mailbox. They looked to be in pretty good condition, so I went ahead and planted a few of them before heading back to work. I went to the junior high and milled around doing a few things before Gary restarted the Web Help Desk server. Then I found myself with no shortage of tasks to complete. I managed to get most of them done, but ended up staying late fighting with the esports lab. I got the LoL clients updated, but had some trouble getting ADUC loaded on the instructor’s computer. I guess I’ll just have to keep using remote desktop to handle that step.

When I finally got home, I made some barbecue pork nachos for dinner, and then got to work planting the rest of the new plants. I think I’ll move Murderface Betta to the shrimp bowl since all my shrimp died. That will give me a little more room. The dumbo and spotted one look to be getting along fine together, so that will just leave the blue one left to home since he didn’t get along with the other two in the kitchen. I had just enough time for one game of Overwatch with Johnny before bedtime, and then it was an early lights out.

Me, a mentor? Is that like the big half-man, half-bull thing? Can those even gallop?

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Cards Versus Humanity

Spring break was in the air today. I got up an hour and a half early and made broccoli, rice, and cheese casserole for our potluck, and then had plenty of time to get everything ready for work. We didn’t have anything in the way of group projects, so I just leisurely took care of a few things as they came in.

Ben brought some smoked pork for a potluck, and I think I was the only one that actually made anything myself to contribute, but it was worth it. I haven’t made that stuff in a while, so it was about time. We took a long working lunch, but that didn’t really affect when I was going to leave. I had stuff to do. They got my lift to the junior high so I could replace the band projector bulb. It’s always fun driving heavy machinery around indoors.

After work, I chatted with Ben for a little while before heading home and trying to feed Grey a bit. She managed to get a bit of gravy down along with several treats. Then I went to Walmart to get some stuff for cheese dip before picking Summer up.

We went to Travis’s to play Cards Against Humanity with John and Melissa. Veronica backed out, but she missed a really good time. Travis and Summer had never played before, so it was a lot of fun. Nearing the end of the game, I kept having to tend to my phone to orchestrate the meeting between the internet fish lady and Clint. Eventually they did make the connection, and he shuttled the lot all the way home for me.

Summer and I stayed to chat with Travis for a while, and then left as Clint got closer to town. We met him nearly exactly on time, and I took an armload of fish off his hands. I didn’t have the time or space for them anywhere, so I just ended up opening the bags at Summer’s so they could get some air. I’ll have to take care of them properly in the morning. The girl even sent me some minimal plant trimmings, which was super awesome of her. Just before bed, I also got an invoice for a collection of plants from someone in California. Hopefully this comes together nicely. I have all spring break, after all.

Meeting people on the internet is completely normal and safe in every way.

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Compounded Interests

I didn’t sleep great last night because I kept waking up to pee, and I assume it was due to how much I ate, and possibly how much salt was in it. Grey was also laying right in the center of the bed, so I just snuggled up next to her as gently as I could. She really didn’t move all night, and only sat up a couple times when I got up.

Rachel never got back to me with a time to chat about esports, and I didn’t want to pester her about it since I figured she was busier than I was. I just kind of tried to stay loosely available in case she ever did say anything. Zach, Sara, Heather, and I went to Morelos for lunch where I broke from my traditional lunch fajitas for some nachos. My food came out really fast, but the service was otherwise abnormally slow. I don’t recall ever getting a refill on my water, and our salsa ran out much too early. It was still good though, and we made it back with plenty of time to spare.

I spent much of the afternoon trying to convince everyone else that we should create a Director of Esports position for me, since directors don’t necessarily require a teaching certification. I keep getting more and more of a feeling that this won’t turn out in my favor as much as I’m hopeful for it to, but really only time will tell. In the meantime, I suppose it’s up to me to expand this to the high school as quickly as possible. I did get some news back from HSTI regarding my proposed presentation. I’m a bit hyped up about it in spite of Ben’s response that they almost always have lots of extra room and that he would have been really surprised if they didn’t accept me. If nothing else, it’s just more experience to gain and a story to tell.

When I got home, I got Grey to eat a handful of treats and some gravy again, but she was noticeably weaker. I’ll have to call the vet tomorrow to see if they’ll even be open during spring break, or if I’ll have to try and squeeze her in tomorrow to avoid any more distress.

Feeling exhausted and spread a bit thin, I managed to do a couple quick water changes before running to Walmart for potluck ingredients. I ran into Amanda there, and we chatted for just a bit and made lunch plans for next week. Then I came home and prepared the kitchen well enough to cook some broccoli, rice, and cheese in the morning. Hopefully waking up and jumping right into the action will get me moving enough that I won’t feel too exhausted.

If I keep saying it, eventually it must become true!