Category: Family

One Hour to Go

It’s 4:30. I have one hour left in the work day. It feels like an eternity.

This has been a long one. I am in the office today and I really wish I had been able to work from home. I really miss Jen today. I always miss Jen when I am not near her, but today has felt so much worse. I just want to go home and have dinner with her and relax a little. She has a computer hardware project she wants to do tonight. I can help out a little. It will be fun.

I am not sure what the problem was today. It has just felt like an endless grind of a day. That happens sometimes. It’s actually been quiet and calm, but it’s not at home and somehow that makes quiet and calm feel stressful. Weird, eh?

53 minutes until quittin’ time. I can make it. Who knows how long the commute will be. It’s pitch dark outside already (stupid non-daylight savings time). It’s 34 degrees out. It will probably be below freezing by the time I leave. I really don’t like this time of year. Blah.

Okay, let’s make that last hour of the work day productive. What do you say. Get some work done and then go home to where you belong.

ADDENDUM: Almost immediately after publishing this post we got pulled into an escalated issue for one of our biggest customers. So much for calm and quiet.

Morning Cats

Harry went back to Burlington yesterday afternoon. Bellana went back first thing this morning. She has a three hour commute to work today. I hate it when they leave. I miss them both. We’ll see Harry this coming weekend. Jen and I are taking him to a UVM vs UMass Lowell hockey game in Burlington. Bellana won’t be joining us as she’s going to a conference in Boston. We may not see her until Christmas. Blah. Boo.

Anyway, I took pictures of the cats this morning because I could. The cats eventually let both kids pick them up and hold them. Good for you, cats.

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They haven’t destroyed the xmas tree yet. So far so good

Xmas Lights

We went out for a drive tonight to see some xmas lights around town. Jen and I were telling Bellana about a pair of houses we saw a few years ago that actually had their light display stretch across the street. We couldn’t remember where it was though. It made us a little sad.

Jen was directing us around based off of a screen shot of a facebook post that had some addresses on it. She took us to Sampson Street and wouldn’t you know it, that was the place where the lights stretched across the street! It wasn’t two houses, it was practically the whole street, but the lights only crossed in one spot.

It was really cool.

It made me wonder… is this a case of multiple households collaborating, or is it one household who knocks on doors asking if they can decorate other people’s houses. I wonder.

Drives around town like this are attempts at jump starting xmas spirit for me. It generally doesn’t work. I still doubt that I will have anything resembling holiday spirit before the 21st or 22nd of December. That’s just how it goes for me. It would be fun if it weren’t true and I could get into it early, but nope.

I lost

At one point of Trivial Pursuit I had four pie pieces and Jen and Bellana both had two.

I lost. Jen won. Bellana had all six and I only had five.

I was hoping someone would suggest calling it a game at least half an hour before it ended. It was the most frustrating game of Trivial Pursuit ever played.

It was fun though.

How Was Your Thanksgiving?

It’s about 8:30pm here in Eastern Massachusetts. Thanksgiving Day is fast coming to its close. How was your day, USA? Did you feast like it’s going out of style, surrounded by family and loved ones? I hope so.

We didn’t have a Thanksgiving today, at least not in the traditional celebration’s sense. Jen and I slept late, which was glorious, and then hung some cool new ambient lights in her office before cleaning up a bit. We then hung out for a while. She played World of Warcraft while I watched an episode of Invasion on AppleTV+. After that we went to visit my father. He had his Thanksgiving dinner at his assisted living place. My sister and her family joined him. They have had a super rough week so I am happy they got to share that with him. I hope it lifted their spirits a little.

Jen and I hung out with him for a couple of hours and then went home and made dinner for ourselves. After dinner we watched the last episode of JFK: One Day in America. It was pretty powerful and moving, even if it did not add anything new to what we know about the assassination. It happened nine years before I was born and yet it’s still tough to watch sometimes.

Now we are just hanging out in the living room listening to The Beatles on vinyl because it’s still the 1960’s, right? Look at me with my vinyl records and film cameras. Dead technologies live forever ’round these parts.

After writing a novel or two about stomach pain yesterday, how am I doing today? I woke up feeling a little sick still, and I have not been 100% at all today, but I have been okay. No real issues. There were a few instances of stomach aches but I think they stemmed from my tiny little rewired, redesigned, rebuilt stomach being empty. Once I ate something I was okay. I’m still a little gun shy today though. I should be over it by tomorrow. I still have to do today’s exercise, which is disappointing, and I still have 12 ounces of water to go before I hit today’s goal. I’ll get it all done. I’ll probably wait until Jen is asleep later then I’ll go down cellar and jog in place (pronounced “yog, with a soft J”) for about half an hour and that should close all of my activity rings on my Apple Watch.

Did you know that the US version of The Beatles Help album includes excerpts from the film score? I sure didn’t know that. I know the UK version of Yellow Submarine has film score, but Help does not. Interesting. Does the US version of A Hard Day’s Night have anything like that? Maybe I’ll visit the used record store in downtown Methuen tomorrow and see if they have a copy.

Okay then, that’s my summary of Thanksgiving Day 2023. I loved every second of it, despite not having the kids here. We’ll make up for their absence on Saturday when we do our official family Thanksgiving celebration. We should have a full house for all of that.

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone in the USA. Everyone outside of the USA, here’s hoping you just accidentally had an extra special good day today.

Happy Thanksgiving

Do you live in the U.S.A.? If you do then Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday but it’s been pretty screwed this year. The kids are at their father’s house for the day. He just moved into a new house so this is the first holiday, so it makes sense to spend the day there. We will do our family Thanksgiving on Saturday. We’re actually boycotting the Macy’s parade as I type this (it started 10 minutes ago) in the hopes that we’ll watch it Saturday. Jen and I were supposed to go to my sister’s house but they have a real estate issue going on and they had to cancel. Now we’re mostly staying home. I want to go visit my dad (he was supposed to go to my sister’s too) but I haven’t figured out the timing yet. Mostly because of my stomach fun from yesterday.

I woke up a little after 6:00am today and felt pretty nauseous. I moved from the bed to the couch along with a big bucket to puke in if needed and slept a couple more hours. Vomit-free. Thankfully. Now I am feeling okay. I just drank 12 ounces of water over a span of about half an hour. I had my morning vitamins too. So far so good, but I think I said that yesterday too, didn’t I? In about 10 minutes I will be clear to eat something. I’ll have a protein bar and see how it goes. Fingers crossed my stomach is done with whatever hell it tortured me with yesterday. I don’t want to be sick on Thanksgiving, you know? I don’t want to be sick when I visit my father.

So again, to all of my American friends out there, Happy Thanksgiving! And may your gastric-bypass-rewired stomach not give you any shit today! HoHoHo and all that stuff!

He’s Home!

My step son is home!

He came into the house and immediately hunted down the cats, kidnapped Robin and smothered her with affection, attention, and love.

As it should be.

I am very glad he’s here. He’s sitting on the couch doing homework, but he’s home and it is good.

Happy/Sad or Sad/Happy or Both?

My sister just got word that my mother’s headstone has been installed. I can’t decide if that is happy news or sad news or both. Both, I think.

I will actually be near the cemetery for a doctors appointment tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully the timing will work out and I can pay a quick visit before it gets dark.