Work, jogging, and WoW

Wordle 741 5/6

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Went jogging first thing yesterday morning. T. and the weather report advised against it due to the air quality, but I felt I had to do something, so I compromised and ran just the basic loop, 2 miles.

Spent the whole day inside anyways. T. was home with me but basically spent the whole day in bed, sick. I worked. Some of it was frustrating. The day before yesterday, I got started on a task that had been on my to-do list for months. I had forgotten about it from March to the first week of June or so, and since then I was honestly too busy to get to it or close enough, and yesterday I finally finished my task on it, and when I tried to reach out to the subject matter expert about some questions... I found a note in a spreadsheet indicating that they said two weeks ago that it should be retired. Great.

Besides that it was fine. I had two meetings, productive. I got another old document updated for an oldish task and this one wasn't useless. It wound up needing more work than expected but I got it done in a day anyway. Good for me. I also played Warcraft. Two high-level dungeons and a bunch more casual stuff. 

The day was so sedentary, late in the afternoon I went for a walk around the block, just to get my daily step count up to the app's goal of 6000. Jogging wasn't enough when I spent the following 10 hours in a chair!

Dinner was air fryer chicken and grilled squash. Easy, fast, and I didn't have to go outside. 

In the evening we had a school parent's group meeting. Tough to figure out the next step(s) to actually get change made, if any are possible.

Work, haircut, errands, and takeout

Wordle 740 3/6

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Logged on at the usual time yesterday. 

I wasn't terribly productive at work yesterday. No apparent reason besides the usual procrastinatory tendencies. Even so, I got to one data call, followed up on a couple things, and finished the last of the "easy" follow-ups on that big meeting two weeks ago. Now for the harder follow-ups...

I meant to run some errands right after a meeting at 10. But as it turned out the meeting was actually at 10:30, and I had a couple follow-ups, and then there was another meeting in the early afternoon. I didn't actually run those errands until 2:30.

I did it by bike, so that was my exercise for the day. The main errand was a haircut. I was due. Minor stuff included mailing a package as part of the decluttering effort (we follow specialized recycling instructions to the letter!) and a little shopping.

For dinner I was prepared to cook, but we wanted to relax and treat ourselves, so we got takeout from the taco place on the corner - quesadillas in our case - and watched Shazam 2. Once again, relaxing in ways we couldn't with the kid around.

Jury Duty, Day Two

Wordle 739 X/6

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Thus endeth the streak. No mistakes, except maybe not being careful enough, I just didn't get it right. Maybe I should rethink my strategy a bit.

First thing yesterday morning I went jogging. The "medium" route. Good for me. Jury duty didn't start until 10:30, so I attended my weekly team meeting at work. I feel ambivalent about this, like I should be taking more advantage of the jury duty to set better work/life limits, but my team and manager are all reasonable people and we're busy lately, so I felt I could put in an hour or two.

Then, jury duty. It took them two hours to let me and the others not selected go. I finished Antigoddess while waiting. It was fun. If we had the two sequels, I'd read them next, but we don't and I'm trying to avoid buying new stuff. Maybe I can find them at the library.

By the time I got home it would be after lunch either way, so I treated myself to an overpriced chicken sandwich from a place on H St. I didn't log on work the minute I got back, so I did set some balance... 

Work in the afternoon was fine. Sent a few emails, followed up on a few things, etc. 

Dinner was tilapia and cauliflower. T. and I settled in early and watched a movie: The Menu. Weird.

Jury duty

Wordle 738 5/6

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Yesterday I got up at the usual time, but instead of logging in to work at the dining room table I got dressed in business casual, had breakfast promptly, and caught a bus to jury duty.

I don't miss being outside in DC heat in business casual attire. I might not have done it at all since COVID (been to the office a few times, but in the winter or by bike) and it was never my routine at all, except for getting lunch. I occasionally feel silly wearing shorts everywhere at my age, but pants suck in this heat. 

Jury duty itself was uneventful. I read. I almost finished the novel I brought with me, Antigoddess. It was fine (but like I said, not actually done yet). I also read stuff online and commented on Reddit and Unfogged. I might elaborate more later; I kept detailed notes.

Lunch was a leisurely two hours. I was dismissed around 4:30 indeterminately. They haven't finished selecting the jury. I'm one of about 35 people asked to come back today; I still might or might not be needed for the trial.

After I got home I checked in at work briefly to update people. 

Dinner was steaks, grilled, and a salad. T. and I watched Renfield. It was funny.

Productivity should feel better

Wordle 737 5/6

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Yesterday we had the usual Sunday brunch, eggs and home fries, more of the latter than usual to use up some stuff.

The plan for the day was decluttering-related errands. In addition to the usual stuff like laundry, we kept busy until after noon just getting everything destined to be disposed of in one place. Dead batteries from the pantry; worn-out shoes from the closet; clothes (mostly mine) and kids' toys for Goodwill in the spare bedroom; some corks to be recycled in the kitchen, more in the basement; same for some detergent pouches (although those couldn't be disposed of yesterday); while in the basement, I found a chair we haven't used in years I also suggested we donate and T. agreed; some unused kids' toys that were intended to be party favors but they went unclaimed so we might as well return them; and some pet-related things from around the house as well.

We left after lunch. First to the Human Rescue Alliance to donate some pet-related things. Then to Mom's the organic grocery, for both grocery shopping and to drop off the shoes and batteries; they have esoteric recycling. Then to Costco for some actual shopping. At Costco we also got one thing we didn't need, an outside chair T. liked. Then to 5 Below to return the toys. Then we would have gone to Goodwill, but I noticed that a tire was nearly flat. (A light on the dashboard has been on for days, but we didn't think of checking it until now. Whoops.) T. suggested taking it to Costco's tire center, which I never would have thought of, but it was right there, so why not. 

While we waited we had a smoothie and ice cream. It was hot. After over an hour waiting we decided we had to take home what we had bought before the perishable stuff spoiled. On the way, Goodwill. 

Then back to the Costco tire center again. This time we went to Micho's and had beers while we waited. We got out of there after 6 PM. Apparently there was a nail in the tire, easily patched, something like $20. Yay, and I can't complain too much about the time when we were doing it without an appointment. 

Dinner was dumplings.

I feel like the day should have felt better, but in the afternoon and evening I kept dwelling on the chair. We don't need it, and I told T. I didn't want it before she put it in the cart, but she put it in the cart anyway. We have more folding chairs than we have people as it is! Decluttering is two steps forward, one step back! Finding a place for it yesterday afternoon was a hassle! And speaking of which, all the day's work barely moved the needle on our clutter! I really need to do stuff with my comic book collection while the kid is gone, and we have tons of books we'll never read and toys she's outgrown, and...

But in hindsight, my mood probably had more to do with simply being tired and frustrated with all the waiting for the car than with one chair or any inadequacy of the day; progress is progress.

Women's March

Wordle 736 5/6

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Yesterday we had the usual brunch. Later in the morning we went to the farmer's market for a few groceries. 

After that, we walked to the library on Maryland Ave. to return a few things, and then to the Stanton Park for a rally point for a protest, since it's the anniversary of the Dobbs decision. While waiting there we called T.'s mom and the kid to catch up. They're having fun.

From Stanton Park we walked to a rally with speakers at Union Station and then a sort of circuitous route to the Supreme Court. I'd estimate a couple thousand people? Not the smallest protest, but definitely not the biggest. It was fine, except for the heat and the counterprotesters.

By the time that wound down, it was after 2 and we hadn't eaten since breakfast, so we went to what we were thinking of as a late lunch at Good Stuff Eatery on Pennsylvania Avenue. The original plan for the day was a Smithsonian event in the evening on the Mall with the possibility of not going home in between, but we were so tired, we decided to go back for a bit. "A bit" turned in to a nap, which turned into watching Dungeons and Dragons streaming. Oh well, it was fun, even though we missed the second event of the day... The goal these days is to (a) relax, and (b) get to all those things we couldn't get to with a kid around, right? So we did both, although not in the way we planned.

Data call, biweekly reports, other stuff

Wordle 735 5/6

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First thing yesterday morning I did a data call on our team's work over the past six months. It makes us look good and when my manager responded that afternoon she had no follow-up questions. Can't complain. 

Most of the work was on the usual biweekly report. It was... average. One team's report came in after 11 AM, so it wasn't great, but hey, only one. 

Around 1 in the afternoon I went jogging. I meant to go earlier, but I tried to take care of just one thing first and it took longer than expected, and then someone messaged me about a quick question that took more than 10 minutes, and so on. I just jogged the minimal route, but anything is better than nothing.

In addition I did a little more catch-up on stuff that had been put off, and dealt with new requests, some of them ambiguous or poorly thought out. Our workload is just plain high these days and people don't do their part enough.

T. came home around 5. We thought of a few options for dinner but ultimately went with the option I had planned all along, chicken and roasted broccoli.

Afterwards we tried to get dessert, but Rita's was closed, apparently for good. That's sad. We considered a few other options but settled for ice cream by the pint from the Family Dollar. Lazy but good and simple. Maybe we'll do adventurous stuff next week, we're still taking it easy... 

In the evening in World of Warcraft I did my fifth dungeon for the week to get the last 15 points or so I needed for Keystone Master. Good for me. This is one of my two seasonal goals. Not feeling great about Ahead of the Curve, though. Still doable but it's definitely become a struggle.

A long but relaxing day

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Yesterday was low-pressure and relaxing, and I didn't get too much important stuff done, but after the past few days (few weeks! Fuck it, the "feeling too busy" period extends over the past few months!) I don't feel bad about that. Nothing high-pressure except a dungeon or two in Warcraft. 

Even so, I still managed to get started on a few tasks that came up before or during that crunch and had to be put off until after it. As for personal stuff I folded a load of laundry, picked up the dry cleaning, and went grocery shopping.

Dinner was pork chops and a salad (partly fresh, partly using up stuff from the party).

The big day

Wordle 733 3/6

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Yesterday I got the kid up at the usual time for her last day as a second grader. It was raining, so we couldn't bike, and T. actually got her to school, since she had taken the day off and I hadn't. In addition to last-minute packing she worked on that parent advocacy effort.

Work was busy. It was the due date for those big, important documents. Some numbers: yesterday I sent 17 emails, and since the meeting a week ago I sent 52 despite time off in between, when on a normal day I probably send fewer than five. Two meetings yesterday, both unplanned (only one related to the big effort). Yesterday we published three documents to the library and last week three more, two of those as part of the same effort, when the average is probably between 1 and 2 per week.

T. took her mother out for brunch, so I had the house to myself for a bit. During that time I helped the kid pack. T. also picked the kid up from school alone. When they came home, the kid was crying; she had lost a stuffed animal she brought to school, and by being picked up early she missed a martial arts demo that was planned for the afternoon. We had thought after-school care wasn't an option on the last day and hadn't known about a martial arts event, so those are two more communications complaints to add to the very long list, but given that it was scheduled for 4:15 PM we couldn't have made it even if we had known. 

T. and I drove the MIL and the kid to the airport around 3 PM to see them off properly. Then back home. Traffic was terrible but not as bad as it looked, I guess.

After that I put in another hour or so of work. Still had to actually finish those important documents.

After they were out the door and the recipient had acknowledged them, we finally relaxed.

Dinner was a sort of chicken-basil pasta and a cucumber salad. Weird and following no recipe and in hindsight I would have done a few things differently, but on the other hand it was easy and used up some things that would otherwise have gone bad, so it was worth it. 

In hindsight I wish we hadn't scheduled the kid's flight on the same day as the last school day. I'm sure it was cheap, and it saved us from having to find childcare for even one day, but that plus general end-of-school stuff was a hassle. I'm not sure if I could have planned better around the crunch time at work, or kept it from being as bad as it was. The second thing is definitely going to be discussed with my team and management in a "lessons learned" sort of discussion; the first thing is more about personal time management and forecasting.

Work, parenting, swim class, dinner out, and more work

Wordle 732 4/6

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Yesterday we didn't take the kid to school because T.'s cousin and his wife drove up from Richmond to visit. The five of them - T., the kid, her mother, and yesterday's guests - had a tour of the NPR HQ in the morning. 

Meanwhile I worked. 3 meetings, two of which were focused on that high-priority stuff. The guests and the kid happened to be in the house for the first and last meeting, so that made things a little harder than usual. Plus of course work on the documents themselves. While I had the house to myself I did some laundry and cleaned a bit.

In the afternoon we went to swim class, as usual. There were problems getting the MIL in there to watch because she's not a DC resident, and once we finally did, swim class was cut short by a safety break, i.e. all kids out of the water for 15 minutes... of a 30-minute lesson. I won't miss lessons at this swimming pool. It's a mess on several levels. 

We went out to dinner. Nice enough. The kid's behavior was... OK. (In the restaurant, fine. But walking there she begged to be carried. I obliged, partly because I didn't get much exercise yesterday, partly because I won't be able to do it much longer. On the way back, same, plus begging for dessert she didn't exactly earn.) 

In the evening, normally T. would have put the kid to bed, but she got sucked into working on a letter for the school parent's group and needed my help on incidental stuff, so T.'s mother did it. I felt a bit bad about that and I think she might later. Ugh.

The zoo

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Yesterday morning was busy. I put in 2.5 hours first thing at my job despite the holiday because of how busy it has been lately.

On a personal level it was busy too. The early stages of packing, plus getting the kid to write thank you notes for her birthday presents (we think it should be easy. She objects to writing them, but insists on drawing pictures with them, which makes it take much longer and introduces more chances for errors. Ugh), plus laundry, plus a meeting with a city-sponsored consultant about improvements to the tree box area. They were late and it was a bust anyway because apparently we don't actually own that space, so that was frustrating.

We left for the zoo around 11. Getting there was stressful, because of traffic and construction and the kid being annoying. When we finally got there it was fun. Didn't see the whole thing but saw some new things for us. 

After that, the kid's last guitar lesson (definitely the last one with this teacher/school until after the summer. Maybe the last one for good, who knows?). There was a scheduling mixup but everyone was good sports about it. I left early by bus to get started on dinner. While doing so I turned the air conditioners on for the first time. They felt needed.

Dinner was tilapia with the onion, basil, and wine sauce, and air fryer broccoli, and couscous at the last minute. Sort of fancy for the last real dinner with the MIL here, since we're eating out tomorrow.

I got to bed early. T. got to bed late due to a parents' group meeting - in person, she was invited on the spur of the moment.

Father's Day at AwesomeCon

Wordle 730 6/6

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Yesterday we had the usual Sunday brunch, eggs and home fries. We also finished off some pastries from the party.

As soon as we were ready, we took the bus to the convention center for AwesomeCon. We only went to three actual events: two science presentations on things like acids and dry ice, and a meeting of people with Owl House cosplay, including the kid. (All events were kid-oriented. Not sure if that's extra appropriate for Father's Day or not...) However, we also did some shopping. For the kid, we got a graphic novel, wizard's wand, and pointed elf ears. For me, a replica of Gorehowl, a famous weapon from World of Warcraft. It's now on the bookshelf in the dining room. For T., several graphic novels, and at least one is of interest to me too. We also did a lot of sight-seeing where the main sights are people in costume. 

Dinner was at City Tap House nearby. Nice place. While there my dad called me. While I like to think I would have remembered to call him at some point, I feel a bit bad I didn't get around to it before then or make explicit plans, but we couldn't really talk in the restaurant. After we got home and played a little phone tag we finally had a nice conversation.

Woke up at 3 AM last night due to snoring and went down to the couch. I'm looking forward to when I can use the guest room for that. I like to think I might have started months ago, but between storing camping equipment in there, hosting the MIL like we're doing now, and other stuff, it felt like it wasn't possible or worth it. It'll definitely be worth it after they're gone, though, and might have been already.

The kid's birthday party

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Yesterday was the normal Saturday brunch. 

We spent the rest of the morning getting ready for the party. Around 11 some friends came over who couldn't make it to the "main" party for various reasons. Shortly after that I went to Costco to get the cake and pizzas. I got cut off in traffic on the way home and only my quick reflexes saved the cake. I vented about this to a voice memo app. I got home just in time; the table was already set up in the park. I parked by the gate and took everything straight there.

The party was fine. 70 people had RSVPed, but the park wasn't crowded. It was nice to catch up with P. and other people we haven't seen in a while. No drama between kids as far as I could tell, although there were some minor injuries on the order of a bee sting. By the time it was over there were only about three slices of pizza and three slices of cake left. That might sound like we had the perfect amount of food, but we forgot to bring out a whole veggie platter and fruit platter. Whoops!

Also, I didn't really have a plan for dinner other than pizza, so that veggie platter plus some leftover chicken was dinner. We all got to bed on time. It was a long day.

Parenting, working, shopping, and Hadestown

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Yesterday the kid didn't have school (inservice for parent-teacher conferences, but ours was a week ago). So that was a little more free time in the morning. I spent it working. She spent it watching cartoons.

T. had to go to work normally, so it was me, the kid, and T.'s mother for most of the day. Later in the morning we went to Costco to get stuff for the party. Tried to get a few things at 5 Below but they were closed due to technical difficulties. 

Then back to work for a few hours for me. T.'s mother took the kid to the park. After she got tired of that, the kid painted with a new watercolor set, watched TV, and pestered me.

I worked until 4 - not a full day, with the Costco trip, but still a busy one. Same stuff as the past few days, with the deliverables, the suddenly urgent old documents, and another nominally urgent task but not as bad as that set. It's a huge formatting mess. I don't understand how someone can look at a Word document and think that's OK.

Anyways, T.'s mother made dinner. We hadn't planned it but I'm glad she did because we would have been pressed for time otherwise. Just as we sat down, T. joined a parent/teachers meeting on her phone. Dinner conversation was bad. 

We rushed through dinner and got to gymnastics class late. T. and her mother watched the class. I returned a book to the library, checked in on Magic: the Gathering options at Labyrinth, and scheduled a Lyft for our evening plans: Hadestown. Good show.

I was relieved when we got there. I wish the day had been been more relaxing, but I'm not sure what we could have moved or skipped without making things worse. (Skip the meeting? It's important stuff; the school really does have issues. Get the kid out of the house more? T.'s mother deserved to relax a bit. Skip gymnastics? It's the last one of the year for her. Do dinner later? T. and I wouldn't have had time. Etc.) Just one more long day after a long string of them.

Eating my feelings

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Yesterday I biked the kid to school, and stayed for a few minutes to join in the protest myself.

Work was weird. The documentation update effort bore fruit with a problematic team, but not in a way I expected or wanted. I don't know if I'm misunderstanding the policy we're supposed to follow, or someone else I work with is, or it's a personality conflict with my teammate. (Or, who knows, all three!) 

That's the documentation update effort. It was an all-hands-on-deck situation for those the deliverable and those five documents it links to. J. is working on the fourth document without explicitly complaining but the relative silence is ominous. The oldest one, it turns out, wasn't needed. I took care of the two easy ones yesterday, but as usual it turned out that they weren't as easy as I thought. That's a frequent mistake I make, but in this case I understand why I wanted an easy win. The fourth is still out there, sort of. There is a little recrimination about how this happened, and will probably be more before it's done.

I did all this while a cleaner was in the house, since we're having company. For the first couple hours I worked normally (except for using headphones for those meetings) while she cleaned upstairs, and then I set up the office upstairs while she cleaned downstairs.

Around noon I ran a couple quick errands, one of which for a Father's Day card. It'll probably be late but at least I can say it's in the mail now. While out there I got a soda (still have a cold, so the carbonation, syrup, and caffeine were good, right?)

The cleaner finished around 2. In addition to work in the afternoon I weeded the alley at the last minute before leaving. We're going to use it more than usual this weekend.

Around 5 I left as usual to get T. and the kid. As soon as we got home, our tourist friends came over. We all walked together to Union Market for dinner from different places, to take advantage of the smorgasbord of city life. In addition to my own dinner I had some chicken wings T. had bought. Everything was fine there until the kid fell over while doing handstands and hurt herself. On the way home T. took us to an ice cream shop.

Food

I don't want to micromanage my eating habits, and in fact one sugary afternoon soda plus eating out isn't all that bad, but I can't help but see an association between it and my general mood and stress level lately.

What isn't going on

Two things have been noticeably absent from my life for the past few days.

• Warcraft: I've played very little during the day. I've played a little in the evening but been going to bed early. Good for me for showing restraint, I guess, but between work and errands I feel like I literally haven't had time.
  
• Reddit: I want to support the protest, and principles aside I didn't have a choice; big chunks of the site were down. This doesn't affect hours of my time but affects lots of spare minutes here and there. While cooking or waiting for the bathroom to be freed up or waiting for the kid to be called from her classroom at the end of the school day, normally I'd browse Reddit, but for the past week I've floundered. Last night I broke down and reopened it a bit but I'm still unsure about resuming my normal use.
  

Busy at work, orthodontist, errands

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Yesterday I drove the kid to school, despite her and my preference for biking, because T. wanted to go too to take part in a protest of the school's administration. The issues I've mentioned in passing many times haven't improved.

Work was busy. Two important tasks intersected in a bad way. A deliverable, a high-level document, links to five other documents that are all out of date, and management made it clear Tuesday night and in a meeting Wednesday morning that they have to be updated by the due date of the deliverable, which is next week. Great. For two of them that won't be hard. For the other three it might be. I'm not sure how bad I should feel about this. I could have caught it a couple weeks earlier, when I first got my draft of the deliverable. I did in fact change the deliverable to make the problem more obvious and link to more up-to-date versions of the documents, but even those are still out of date. We've been working all along on getting old stuff updated, and we've been prioritizing them by age, but maybe we should have put more emphasis on this sort of thing? I don't know. Just making the progress we have been has been pulling teeth. 

Also, we dealt with two more new things, one of which is urgent for unrelated reasons. Great. 

I logged off around 2:20 to get the ladies at the school. The first stop, the orthodontist's, for an appointment for an evaluation for the kid. In the short term, i.e. in August because we've already scheduled away most of the summer, she's probably getting an expander. Braces maybe when she's a teen.

After that the ladies went to the drugstore for cold medicine (T. and I are still under the weather) and the library and I went grocery shopping for a few things we're out of. Then downtown to a theater to pick up some things T. won in a fundraiser. It took a little longer than planned so we were late for the kid's guitar lesson. 

Dinner was tilapia and carrots. It came out fine IMO. 

I went to bed just a little earlier than usual. I was surprised this morning to learn that T. didn't join me. She wanted to make sure I got a good night's sleep so she took the couch.

A bad day

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Yesterday when getting ready to bike the kid to school I noticed that the seat cushion we ordered for the kid was missing. I guess it slid off when I was carrying the heavy load the day before. Fuck. So after dropping the kid off I walked the bike along my route from the day before in hopes of finding it. No luck.

I got home at the last minute before the team meeting - it used to be at 10, but recently changed to 9 because of a conflict of our manager's. Whoops. The meeting was productive but frustrating. We've been talking about a way to reorganize the effort to update old documents. The old way has problems. The potential new way has problems too. No resolution yet but we need to find it by July.

After that I had a little downtime and did the laundry, but it was partly lost to a discussion with one of those teams that haven't been cooperative. I thought we made progress on one of the issues. My teammate J. didn't think so. I think that this is a "the perfect is the enemy of the good" scenario, that we resolved one of the sticking points with them even though others remain, but J. wouldn't even say we resolved that. Well, we agreed that follow-up is needed, so that's on my to-do list. 

In the afternoon, one meeting from 1:30 to 2:30, requiring little work on my part but still time-consuming. Then a meeting from 3 to 4. This required work on my part. It was productive. This team is trying to get their documents updated. Good for them. The meeting was rough anyways due to almost Kafka-esque edits, like someone was editing the spreadsheet drunk. Hopefully it was just technical glitches due to multiple people in the document at the same time. Problems with the current system of organization also contributed. There's no easy answers. 

I had hoped to go shopping after that, but follow-ups from the meeting kept me busy until it was almost time to go get the kid. I did some quick dinner prep - it would be tilapia and glazed carrots, not my first choice on a swim night but I would have had a chance to go shopping for anything else, and hadn't done so - and got in the car. 

Getting the ladies at school and to swim class was fine. On the way home I mentioned dinner plans. The kid asked for dumplings from the freezer instead, and T. seemed to have a preference for it as well, so I gave in, even though I was seething about it. It's hard to make a full meal of dumplings, it might actually take longer than my first plan given the prep I had done, but, fine, we'll cave to the kid's tantrum. Ugh.

On the way from the car to the house, the kid noticed I was grumpy. "What's the matter with you?" she asked.

I answered honestly but maybe not completely. "It was a rough day. Lots of work, and I didn't get to everything I wanted to do or thought I should."

"Well, you shouldn't take it out on me," she retorted.

I thought that was a little unfair, so I replied, "How about the tantrum about dumplings? That didn't help either, now that you mention it!"

She started crying.

I made dinner dutifully while T. smoothed over the kid's feelings. I went to bed early.

Illness and Chinese food (not related)

Wordle 724 5/6

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Biked the kid to school yesterday. Afterwards I made a detour by the house of the friend who had taken her to the Girl Scout event Friday, to pick up all the stuff that had been forgotten there. Two sleeping bags, (one for our kid, one for someone else on the trip who didn't have one), two sleeping pads, and the fifth Harry Potter book. Good capacity on the ebike. I got sweaty, not because of the added distance or load, but simply because I had a backpack on and my shirt couldn't breathe.

After that, home for a roughly normal workday. Fairly busy, mostly with my draft of a deliverable due today. Not a huge lift, but everything has to be perfect for this sort of thing. One impromptu meeting in the morning with the SME, some discussions with a teammate of mine working on a related document, and a meeting in the afternoon with the team it's due to. Plus a couple more minor follow-ups on other things.

In addition to work, we (T. was around, it being Monday) did most of the laundry we couldn't do over the weekend. I put away the stuff I picked up this morning and other camping gear that has to be stowed just right. 

Through all this, T. was coughing frequently. I haven't been coughing so much but definitely have a sore throat and runny nose. In the late afternoon I lay down and took a nap.

We got the kid a little bit early. Then we met some friends of T. who are visiting, doing the tourist thing. We met them at a Chinese restaurant downtown. Nice place, not fancy. I don't think I had ever been there before. After that we showed them around the Metro and bus system a bit before going our separate ways.

Once again, the kid stayed up late reading. Not sure how big a problem this is.

Driving home with lots of caffeine

Wordle 723 5/6

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We got out of bed and dressed just before breakfast at 9 yesterday. We had thought about going earlier, but couldn't handle getting up any earlier, not after the night before. Hit the road around 9:30. T. drove until noon, then we stopped briefly for lunch, coffee, soda, a bathroom break, and to switch drivers. I drove until around 3, when we stopped again for another bathroom and gas. 

We got to the kid's friend's house around 5:20. Less than eight hours, significantly faster than Friday... but still 20 minutes after we said we'd be there. Oh well. They didn't seem to mind.

We had pizza for dinner, because of course I'm not cooking after this. We went to bed with T. coughing and hacking almost nonstop, and my throat feels sore as well and my nose congested. Uh oh. We told people all weekend long that it was allergies or the smoke, but I'm starting to fear it is/was contagious. Oh well. Good thing the ceremony was outside; T. probably didn't expose too many people.

Hiking and wedding

Wordle 722 3/6

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Brunch at the B&B.

In the late morning, we drove to Newport, for a walk along the cliffs. It was fun but wound up taking a lot longer than expected. We thought there would be more road accesses than there were so we basically had to walk the whole distance. 

Getting lunch also took longer than expected - we found a place that looked good, but absolutely no free parking and paid parking started at $20, so we drove halfway back to the B&B for a more accessible place. 

All this contributed to a little panic. We left for the wedding at the last minute but misjudged the travel time, i.e. when the last minute was. We got there 15 minutes late, just before the last bridesmaid walked down the aisle. Shit! Fortunately, after the bride processed, we found two seats together in the back right corner.

Beautiful ceremony. Nice cocktail hour. Fun reception. They did stuff in a weird order, with the meal courses in between dancing, but it worked well. We stayed longer than planned. We also went to the after party, which started around 11:30. We didn't stay long, but even going was impressive. 

Got back to the B&B around 12:30 and crashed. 

Going to Rhode Island

Wordle 721 5/6

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Yesterday I got up at 5:45, which is actually better sleep than usual. Exercise seemed like a bad idea - in addition to air quality, I wanted to save energy and avoid getting dirty first thing - and I'm taking the day off, so I spent the morning playing WoW. Generally minor productive/rewarding stuff.

I took the kid to school normally. We left the house almost an hour after that. (I had hoped to leave right away, but T. took some time to get ready.) On Thursday, Google Maps said the trip would take 6 and a half hours. When we left at almost 10 AM Friday, Google Maps said it would be a little over 7 hours. We actually got there around 7 PM. We made a couple stops but traffic contributed more than them.

Dinner was sushi. After that, T. crashed, she still isn't feeling well. I was a bit torn but ultimately decided to go to the "welcome event". It was fun. I didn't stay long, it started late and was a 20-plus minute drive so I only had one drink, but even so it was nice connecting with people, including some I hadn't seen in a very long time. 

Busy Friday despite no report

Wordle 720 4/6

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Yesterday I biked the kid to school with us wearing masks, because the air quality is so bad. But the biking part of things was fine. 

I had a busy day. One regular meeting at 9 I took notes at. One meeting later in the morning about a team's documentation updates that I expected to be brief and unproductive because the team hasn't been very cooperative or motivated, and as I expected the team lead didn't show up, just a couple of their deputies. However, their lead's lead did show up, and was motivated to get things moving. So those deputies probably didn't have fun, being asked for specific deadlines for everything. Good. 

A lot of work for them over the next few weeks still meant a fair amount of work for me today, just getting all that organized. And then there was another new task that turned out to be a lot more work than expected getting set up. Not for any good reason, just for multiple misunderstandings among my team. Self-inflicted problems. Maybe I'm not the only one sleep-deprived. And then there was a follow-up on some older tasks for/with my lead, and prep for my day off... busy. I worked basically up until 4:30.

T. came home around 1. Earlier than planned, but her coughing was annoying or scaring her co-workers. So I had company for some of that but she also napped.

We got the kid around the usual time and met up with the family who's taking her for the weekend, but instead of going straight home, had a student-led parent-teacher conference. Cool. She's doing well, but she had a little too much fun with the presentation...

Dinner was chicken and peas. Easy. T. went to bed before 9 and I joined her before 9:30, i.e. early for both of us. The kid went to bed some time after that. Ugh.

Resting on my laurels

Wordle 719 4/6

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Biked the kid to school fine yesterday. 

The big event of the day was an interview for the school board in the late morning. My application is advancing. I drove there because I worried about getting sweaty in my unusually formal attire (it's been a while!) or simply being late. When I did, I found a parking ticket on the car. Ugh. I screwed up street sweeping the night before.

I think the interview went well enough. I had answers and kept them professional. The board members seemed to like them. It's too early to say for sure, if only because there are more candidates. If there is a next step, it will be meetings with more board members. I might hear as early as next week. 

That was the big event of the day. I didn't get much else done. I stayed generally responsive at work but there wasn't much going on and I didn't get ahead of things. I did all the weekly chores in Warcraft on my warlock, but that's obviously not important...

Around 4, i.e. at the last minute, I cleaned the kitchen and biked over to the library to return a book and pick up a DVD set T. had reserved. This was my exercise for yesterday, and probably today too; the air quality is so bad, everyone is saying not to jog.

Then home quickly. Then to the school to get the kid for her guitar lesson.

Dinner was tilapia, the easiest pan-fried recipe, and green beans, a new recipe I found with garlic and pine nuts. I burned them a bit but even so I liked it. 

Yesterday afternoon and evening I felt like I should have been in a worse mood. I didn't get much done yesterday and got a parking ticket; why wasn't I miserable? Maybe the good night's sleep the night before made a big difference, maybe feeling like the interview went well carried me, or maybe my mood is totally irrational.

Risky exercise

Wordle 718 6/6

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Yesterday morning I went jogging first thing. I nearly didn't. I was still a bit sore from the camping trip (nothing specific, just lots of walking, including several hills) and not just on the plantar but some new places (the calf? What's going on with me???), and had a bit of a headache (I'd hate to think it was a hangover, I only had two beers the night before, but no possibility seems more likely). But I felt like I was overdue and didn't think it would be any easier to do later, so I resolved to take it easy. I kept a gentle pace but actually went farther than I have in a while, 2.58 miles, maybe farther than I have this year although still less than the routine a year ago.

I hope I don't regret it. (It's too early to say. I'm actually writing these two paragraphs immediately afterwards.) I'm probably not getting physical therapy this week; I had thought it was scheduled for this afternoon, but the therapist's office thought it was scheduled for Monday, and that conflicted with the notary, so it didn't happen. This makes the exercise riskier but also makes being overdue more important. I'm just frustrated. I feel like I'm not asking for much. No marathons, nothing competitive, just enough miles to get the blood pumping. I just want some kind of exercise to stay in shape and because it's a more effective antidepressant for me than actual SSRIs. Why is this so hard?

So anyways, after that I got the kid to school fine and did a little grocery shopping on the way home. There was a parents' association meeting that T. probably would have gone to if she was feeling well, but she spent the day at home again, in bed for most of the morning. 

Work was fine. One meeting, productive. I got one document back to the subject matter expert, which is always nice. There are a couple other things I need to get done this week but they aren't in bad shape yet.

I took the kid to swim class solo because T. was still recuperating. There was some drama trying to drag her away from school because she thought she would miss a friend's party, but it turns out it's not a "party" so much as "cake at soccer practice", and I wasn't willing to cancel swim class for that. Dinner was a salad she made and tortellini - the kid's favorite, which coincidentally is easy.

I did sleep well last night, for what it's worth. 7 and a half hours may not be much in some senses but it's still more than I've had uninterrupted in quite a while. Not sure why but can't complain.

OK Monday

Wordle 717 4/6

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Got the kid to school fine yesterday. 

T. was home yesterday, and therefore I was productive. (Aside from any guilt/shame issues about playing Warcraft, I still don't have the new card reader I ordered, so I'd need two computers, and that plus her own setup would take up a lot of space.) Didn't exactly finish anything, but started or made progress on two newish things, and followed up on several. Three meetings, two requiring input.

On the personal side, I exchanged emails with a notary about that renovation document. We met with them online in the afternoon and it eventually seemed to work out. I won't be confident we're on top of things for a long time yet, but we're following the architect's instructions step by step so far. I also got the air conditioners out of the basement, a seasonal chore I won't miss after the renovation.

Later in the afternoon T. took a nap. She hadn't been feeling well all day. Either she caught something contagious over the weekend or got exposed to something she's allergic to. I played Warcraft, and then went to get the kid solo.

T. supervised guitar practice while I made dinner. It wound up being new recipes for both chicken and broccoli. T. and I liked them, or at least thought they had potential. The kid didn't but at this point that's no surprise.

I put the kid to bed despite it definitely being T.'s turn because she wasn't feeling well.

Spider-Verse and sleep

Wordle 716 4/6

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That makes a streak of 100. I don't want to make too big a deal out of it since I've cheated a tiny bit, but still, cool.

Shortly after posting the last, T. and I took naps. The kid was encouraged to do so, and not allowed to watch TV or play with her iPad, but opted to read instead. Fine, not going to say she can't. There was a time limit of one hour on the naps because we had tickets to see Across the Spider-Verse. It was fun. Maybe a little too intense for the kid, but there were no actual outbursts or whatever. 

After that, a quick, easy dinner out. We wound up having empanadas. It was fine. 

Then home. T. was in bed by 8. I was up a bit later to put the kid to bed, but not too much later. 

Even with the unfortunately common sleep disruptions, I got probably more than 9 hours of sleep since yesterday afternoon. Good for me. It was overdue. 

Camping highs and lows

Wordle 715 5/6

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Yesterday morning we left in the mid-morning for a Scouts BSA camping trip. We forgot nothing, sort of. 5 minutes after leaving the house I thought we had forgotten sunscreen and went back for them... but we didn't! They were buried in the bottom of a bag that was packed early. We didn't bring a broom, but we knew from the start we'd be able to borrow it. We got breakfast at Dunkin Donuts, including coffee, and it was later than usual so we were all kind of grouchy by that point.

When we got there, we took a wrong turn near the end; I had plugged in directions to the wrong campsite. Fine, 5 minutes lost. When we got where we should be, we found that the first activity was actually an hour earlier than we had thought. Whoops. 

I got the tent pitched myself while the kid did Scout-type activities and T. helped with lunch. After that it was fine, although tiring. I went to bed not expecting to get a good night's sleep, but not minding as long as I was off my feet. 

I was right. In addition to snoring, the camp was loud. Forget about kids; grown-ups were partying. T. suggested not going next year, or at least not spending the night, and I agreed.

We came home around noon and all got cleaned up and unpacked and stuff.

Busy Friday despite no report

Wordle 714 6/6

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In some senses that was even harder than two days ago. But I got it honestly this time!

First thing yesterday morning, went jogging. The simple route, the shortest loop, but I felt I was overdue for something.

Got the kid to school fine. The battery on T.'s ebike finally ran out and I plugged it in after getting home. 105 miles with moderate usage - not bad.

I was late about the kitchen yesterday, putting it off until almost noon, but productive overall regardless. In addition to finishing one of those to-do list items and getting set up for a new task, I sent several reminders and checked in on old tasks. Normally I'd do that sort of thing at the start of the week. Aside from me not wanting to do it Friday, I figure it's likely to be ignored on a Friday afternoon, but the start of this week was weird and I figure there's a good chance the start of next week will be too. 

After logging off work I actually lay down for a nap a bit. I needed it.

Getting the kid and T. from school to gymnastics was fine. Dinner was at District Taco afterwards. It's the kid's favorite, and not really fancy enough for the grownups, but it's been several weeks for one reason or another. 

I have been reading her Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire at bedtime and she's been reading it in free time on her own. Last night she stayed up past her bedtime to finish. Good times.

Productivity in spite of myself

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First thing in the morning I finished a monthly report (i.e. end of May, so sort of late?). I got the kid to school fine. After that I had to move the car because street sweeping was coming and T. hadn't found a place on the correct side the day before. 

Then I had a meeting to take notes at. It went fine. I finished the minutes of it before noon. I used to not worry about them until the end of the day, but have noticed my teammates getting to that sort of thing earlier, so I'm trying to as well. Peer pressure.

That was relatively easy. After that I was torn between some more work (actual work-related activities, or personal stuff like cleaning the kitchen and research on that renovation paperwork) and Warcraft. I opted for productivity but it was much harder. I can't articulate why. Feeling like yesterday should have been good enough? I've said in the past I'm not entitled/required to play a certain amount of WoW, but maybe I feel that way anyways? 

Just to make things a bit more complicated, even when I'm working, I'm often playing WoW. Lots of things in the game don't require much attention or time commitment. The problem is, they just aren't fun, rewarding, or both. Leveling alts, doing repeatable quests for gold or similar rewards, profession stuff... unfortunately everything that actually matters requires focus and a moderate time commitment, let's say at least 45 minutes. If T. or my parents saw how much I played, it would be tough to explain that I feel like "behind" or "missing out".

So anyways, I was grudgingly responsible at work and around the house until 1. Then I went to the "expo" at the kid's school. (I walked there and back. My exercise for the day.) It was interesting. They all did reports on various types of natural disasters. Our kid was one of few who picked landslides. She has to be different, of course. :) 

After that, back home for a couple hours for a little work, but a little more relaxed than the morning. I got the kid around the usual time. T. had had a meeting outside the office around 5 and beat us home. 

Dinner was air fryer chicken and broccoli roasted with curry powder. I liked it. Too bad the kid didn't.

Getting stuff done

Wordle 712 6/6

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I cheated. What can I say, I wanted to keep the streak going.

Biked the kid in without a problem yesterday.

I worked harder yesterday at both personal and professional stuff. Personally, I went to the grocery store, vacuumed, ordered a new card reader, and called my parents. (The latter partly being work because of summer plans, but mostly because we had missed them last weekend and probably would this coming weekend as well.) Professionally I made tangible progress on two tasks out of my list of five. That may not sound like much, but in defense of yesterday and the day before, most of them are/were big tasks. I was never going to finish most of them in a day. 

Overall, I could have done better, but I feel like I did okay. 

I left at the last minute to get the kid from school to her guitar lesson. It went fine. Afterwards, T. took the kid and a friend to the park, and they wound up meeting another girl there, while I made dinner: tilapia (it's been a while), couscous (it's been open for a while), and glazed carrots. T. thought it was great. The kid tolerated it.