6/30/21 Boy Has A Plan For A Home?

     Last night was interesting, to say the least.  I got to work and for the second night this week, we did not have work to do.  We had one simple job, a monthly internal qualification we do on our tool to make sure it is running as it should.  It took me about an hour to run (we have about 7 jobs on our logbooks, they just haven't arrived onsite, so we can't start anything), then I was free to go home, no reason to stick around work all night, in the age of Covid19.  I rushed home, stopped to get some more burger patties at HEB since Baby A had three extra guys hanging out and Girlie had come over after she told us she had been fired.

    Boy was not there when I got home, I figured he was at his girlfriends, but I guess he was just stuck in traffic, he showed up closer to 7pm, while I was outside grilling the patties, we cook about 90% of our meals now outside, specially if I am making dinner.  He was excited that he had come up with a plan to get a house, I said "what are you going to do?"  His one word answer was "build".  I said that sounded like a great idea, considering his girlfriend's family has a lot of people that do that for a living and I imagine they have to be getting closer to moving in together permanently, I mean they aren't little kids anymore.  Then he added he was going to order a kit to build a dome house, he saw them online and then proceeded to get me to look them up.  According to the website, they sell the kit to a dome house that will fit 5 bedrooms with a kitchen, living room and multiple bathrooms for $18,000, I would say under $20,000 before adding taxes and stuff.

    The idea of a dome house kind of sounds interesting and if someone could pull it off, I would think it would be Boy, he is a little different and him living in a dome sounds about right.  There is still a lot of other stuff that goes along with this, such as needing some land to build on, a foundation, which I don't imagine to be cheap, the kit does not include interior walls and all the internals, so the $20,000 is not even halfway to all that will be spent.  I don't know if this is an idea he will follow through with, but I did tell him that if he found some acreage and wanted us to go in half and half, we could look into it.  I then saw a ten acre piece of land with a pond for $200,000.  I told him we could get that, we go 50/50 and he can build on half and we can eventually build on the other half, later.  This is to help him, land is expensive and I don't want him stuck in a small lot with a bunch of shitty neighbors, but his girlfriend needs to buy into this idea, she may not want us that close.  Still, I am glad there are ways to work around this glut of overpriced homes that just do not seem affordable to regular people.  We are lucky we bought our house 14 years ago, I am sure we wouldn't be able to afford it today with the prices how crazy they have gotten.

6/29/21 Getting Fired Has To Suck?

     Girlie was fired from her job yesterday and that has to suck.  She was actually in the middle of trying to move on and find a better paying situation, but she was not prepared to face life with no stream of income.  On the bright side, she is down to needing about 5 more classes to finish her degree.  Like Boy, she has had a long road to get to her bachelor's degree, at one point she was even put on scholastic probation and kicked out of Texas State.  It took her three years to get her act together, including going to ACC to improve her GPA, get re-accepted to Texas State and get to where she is at.  She has been a much better student with a little age and maturity and now that she has had to pay for her classes out of pocket, she takes school a lot more seriously.

    To go along with almost finishing, she is currently doing an internship course for her degree and for the summer is working with a house that deals with young adults who are "special needs".  Because of this and needing to get 200 hours of experience, she tried working a modified shift and she said in the past there had been no problem with her old manager, but she had said things had changed recently and she was under new management and they were not trying to be flexible with her, so she had been warned and was even told she would only be employed as a part time worker, which meant she lost her benefits, including insurance about a month ago.

    I think getting fired is a blessing in disguise.  Yes it sucks in the moment, but the work was not interesting or even challenging.  Because of Covid19, she had been working from home and she had even come over and done the work from here a day or 2.  She just made calls and monitored things online for her company, answering emails and responding to customer requests when they had questions.  I can't say if it was warranted or not, but the fact she was already in the process of looking for a new job and that after 5 years she was only recently given a raise to $16 an hour, I would say she is better off.  She can now really focus on looking for a new job, finish her internship, which she is on pace to complete at the end of July, and hopefully graduate in a year or so.

    Wife was helping her look for jobs last night and she quickly found some after school jobs at Crockett High School dealing with programs that help with student retention and keeping students from dropping out when they are at risk.  Wife's solution is to always try and get a job with a school, she is a proverbial beaver.  Adam Carolla described a beaver's mindset that if you placed a beaver at the top of the Empire state building, it would immediately try to build a dam, that is what they do.  Wife has always worked with schools and specifically programs that work with at risk kids, so it doesn't surprise me that this is her go to, adding "I know so and so, I could even talk to them to try to help you."

6/28/21 Confused A Bit By Diet?

     I am a bit annoyed and confused by this round of dieting.  Wife and I did a great job last year, I went from 432 down to about 357 or so before the holidays started, then what I thought would be a couple weekends of taking a break to enjoy the holiday goodies turned into almost 5 months of eating mostly junk food and gaining the weight back to 399.  We have been back on a low carb diet for a couple months and I am stuck at 380.  I have seen 379 a couple times on Friday mornings (yes, I weigh myself every morning at around the same time).  But every time, by Sunday night I have put on 3-5 pounds and it takes most of the week to get back to where I was on the previous Friday.  I don't want to blame Wife, but having a partner does not make things easier since eating is one of the activities we do together and both of us being fatties, we do want to just go out for a shake or some pizza at any time during the day.

    Yesterday was kind of a lazy day for us, I kept expecting we were going to get rained on, but it never really came down hard like I wanted.  Because of this, we never even went outside.  I got up ate my toast with coffee around 7am, Wife got up at 11am, she made breakfast, toasted sandwiches (low carb bread) with morning sausage patties and sunny side up eggs.  I had two of these, maybe around noon.  I then took a nap until 2pm, woke up poking at some cheese in the fridge, so Wife suggested I make a pizza for the boys and that turned into me heating up two pizzas, which I ate half of one around 3pm, this I thought for sure ruined the diet for a couple days.  We weren't done as she offered to eat some leftover BBQ and I had another two tacos of fajita meat and a sausage wrap for dinner at 6pm.  I ended the night with a small cone from our freezer and not the low carb kind.  

    I fully expected to be up around 385 or more this morning, but to my surprise, I only weighed 380.2.  This means I can get ahead this week unless it was some sort of mistake, but I am hoping to break into the 375 range by the end of the week.  My goal was to be in the 350s by August, but that is fast approaching, so I will be glad if I just keep making small overall losses.  I generally feel better when I don't pig out on sweets, I get that they give you a high and then a low.  This might even be part of the reason I was getting sleepy all the time a year ago.  I think I have been much better on this front, but maybe it is also because I am not staying up all night every week for work.  I might still occasionally be up until 3am, but I don't want to, if I stay at work late, I try to get home and get in bed without hanging out.  Like it or not, my day will start in the morning with taking Baby A to football practice, so I have to squeeze in some sleep before 9am.

6/27/21 Am I A Dooms Day Prepper Now?

     I now have 90% of the stuff I think I need to be a dooms day prepper, maybe not.  Yesterday, we went to Best Buy because Baby A wanted a new PS4 card to buy a game or something on his PS4.  While we were there, we saw some air conditioners they had by the front door and we got to talking.  We bought a generator the weekend before and we aren't sure if the generator will be able to run a 3.5 ton unit A/C, much less two of them (they may be 4 ton, not sure), but it should be able to run a window unit since they do run on less power, they plug into a regular electric outlet.  We went ahead and committed to the idea of being self reliant.  We bought one of those portable units that can be inside the room and a hose sticks out the window.  I know I read reviews and they don't seem to be the most efficient units, but the fact that we don't need to permanently install it on a window and it can sit hiding inside the house the 99% of its life it will sit unused makes for a better purchase for this purpose.  Like I told Wife, we just replaced both central air units, so we shouldn't be suffering with a broken unit anytime soon, but if we do, we can role this unit to any room, upstairs or down and simply stick a vent hose out the window.

    Last week, I also bought a small Blackstone griddle grill which are all the rave suddenly, but I liked the idea of being able to run it off those small green propane cylinders.  We bought it at Lowe's and they only had 3 green cylinders and each one cost $7.99, I thought not bad, but we went looking for more yesterday (Saturday) and all the Academy stores were out, I thought they had a good price at $4.99 each or $13.99 for a 3pack.  Well, I looked at Walmart and saw that they had them for $3.99 each and they had a 4-pack for $13.87, so I bought a dozen of them.  These cylinders have been around since I was a kid, so the technology is trusted enough that I will probably keep them in the washroom where it is cool and out of the way (if I read that it is better to keep them in the garage I'll do that).

    I now have a power source, a way to keep the cool air in the summer heat, at least 5 bags of charcoal in the garage for the charcoal grill, a dozen small bottles of propane for the gas grill(we tested one and it ran for two hours on high.  We have used a second one and cooked two meals so far with it.  I also bought the adapter hose to be able to plug a larger 20 pound propane tank to the grill, the kind they sell outside Home Depot or Lowe's.  We have food in our freezer and a way to salvage it with the generator.  I even bought a 5 gallon tank to fill and move gas to the generator, when the time comes.  I talked to Wife about ordering a couple boxes of dry foods but she says that sounds crazy, she is willing to survive on canned foods if we need to, so I will be looking at foods that come in a can now.  We have some cases of water but we also bought those life straws which campers use out in the woods to drink from strange water sources and they filter out the bad stuff.  We also have a couple lanterns that run on batteries and we bought batteries for them last week.  If anything, we need a heat source or two to be prepared if another freeze comes our way.  Walmart had the Mr. Heater Buddy in stock at $74.  They run off the same small green propane cylinders and are safe to use indoors, somehow.

    I hope we never get to the point that we have to use any of this stuff for survival, but that week long freeze taught us some lessons and we can't just sit on our asses and rely on the government to protect us at all times.  We must be smart and flexible enough to sustain ourselves, hopefully for small stretches, at worst.  The weather for the next week and a half sounds mild, at least for Texas, in the low 90's, so we shouldn't be losing power, but they did announce to expect rolling blackouts, so no one can be surprised when and if it starts happening.  The phrase "better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it" came to mind on all these purchases, but at least we are lucky that our problems are first world problems and we can prepare backups to maintain our comfortable lives while a lot of people in the world would be buying a generator to simply have power at all.  What other population buys a backup air conditioner, just in case their main one goes down.  I love 'Merica!!!  Don't worry, we have guns to protect all this shit too.

6/26/21 Dave, 2nd Season? (FX series)

     I am more than a little disappointed in the 2nd season of Dave, which stars Lil Dicky, and I noticed he is only referring to himself as Dave, maybe trying to move away from the silly moniker, which is a mistake, I think.  You "gotta dance with the one that brung ya" and you got famous being silly and crazy talented with the lyrics, now you want to act like a legitimate actor and musician, nah, your fans won't dig it.  I loved the first season which followed a storyline I could believe in line with his life as we have learned it through all the Youtube clips.  It showed a vulnerable young man on the journey to greatness and overcoming his mental roadblocks (he has an obsession with his small penis and other stuff) while being strongly supported by his friends and girlfriend.  The first season ended with him rapping freestyle on a radio station with a popular DJ that is on XM radio, I believe.  This coincidentally is what gave him his early fame as he went on with a DJ and rapped an awesome track (idk if it is called a song) that I still enjoy listening to every now and then.

    The second season starts with his team in Korea trying to make a video, I think for his first song, but he is lyrically bankrupt, he hasn't been able to write anything and is trying to fake his way and make a Korean pop song because that is trendy right now, according to the show.  I know this won't be popular with the liberals, not that any of them reads this, but he and his crew is obsessed with smoking marijuana, and fine if you do it recreationally, at home, or at a party, but come on, you are in a different country and you're partner is still being stupid needing to get high every couple hours??  That is addict behavior if you can't function without it.  The episode is mired in shenanigans caused by them refusing to give up the weed.  Their intern gets hauled away in a train, they think they're being arrested because they have a bag of it, they take a picture with a Korean singer and one of his crew is smoking in the background which they are sure that is the reason she is not responding to their calls after she agreed to sing on his video.  Every scene just makes him less and less likable, as a human, I mean get your shit together.  If you weren't prepared to make a video, why waste everyone's time and go to another country?

    The second episode has him obsessed back in LA with going to a party to see the girlfriend from the first season, I think he needs her, because he is not half as interesting as he was in the first season and all I have gotten from him so far is douchebag and self obsessed narcissist.  I can accept those qualities in a person if he has talent and is delivering the product, music to the studio funding him, but to act this way and you got nothing... that I don't understand or respect.  Get your shit together Dicky or Mr. Burd because as much as I have liked you, this little endeavor is currently circling the drain.

6/25/21 Trying Google Fiber?

     What can I say, I am a tool for new toys.  We had been getting flyers to switch to Google fiber for about a year.  According to what I just read, it has been around for ten years but it is in only 18 cities, so far.  Austin happens to be one of those cities, so the optical lines have already been buried in the streets and neighborhoods.  The technician is installing whatever connects from the outside to inside the house at the moment, but I think it will be great.

    First off, I am tired of paying for cable.  First Time Warner gave us a good screwing when we were paying over $280 a month for cable, internet and a landline for phone.  This was a good 5-7 years ago.  We then tried AT&T U-Verse and initially we paid like $160 or maybe a little less, but the latest bill was $248, so it has crept up.  Honestly the quality of programming has been coming down as the price keeps going up.  I currently look forward to watching Black-ish, Goldbergs, and that is about it.  I stopped caring for HGTV when they insisted on focusing on Property Brothers instead of just showing houses in beautiful locations.  I would care about the Longhorn Network, but they have sucked since Colt McCoy and Mack Brown left.  I have no reason to watch a group of outstanding players put out a mediocre product on the field.  Rant off, my point is that there isn't anything compelling to keep me paying crazy prices for cable if I hardly watch it anymore, and the thought that we are supporting brats like Lebron James by sponsoring the companies that pay him, well fuck that.

    Google Fiber will provide us access to the internet at supposedly much faster speeds and with that we can look at Netflix, Hulu, Disney, Youtube, and if the Longhorns ever get good again, I'm sure I can buy a dedicated something for football games.  Fuck the NFL and their pandering to BLM, I just can't support that BS.  Same with the NBA, it is a long time since the class and quality of a Robinson or Duncan graced the Spurs anyway.  

    I'm willing to try Google Fiber, for $70 a month, well $80 and we can keep our landline, only because I have had that number since I moved to Austin in 1991, not that I keep a phone plugged into the wall, only annoying solicitors call that line.  As far as the sales lady said, there are no contracts to sign and we can quit anytime, so we will keep AT&T for another month in the background, so if there is a lot of buffering or lag times, we will just go back to them.  We shall see if Fiber is the future or just another sales gimmick.

6/24/21 Mulling Over A Conversation I Had With Wife While Driving?

     Last week, we went for a drive and on our way back home, Wife got all uppity about women's sports.  I was going on about something or other about that Rapinoe chick who plays soccer or something and is now a model for Victoria's Secret.  I made a crack about how they think they deserve more pay but they play to empty stadiums, should they then share the money the men's teams make?  I said it sarcastically, but Wife in a moment of dumb, said yes, they should be paid the same, they work just as hard as their male counterparts.  This doesn't make sense on many different levels, first off, why should the men's teams finance the women to the point of making things equal?  I've seen comparisons in basketball and while the men can dunk and go aggressively which is a lot of the reason people watch, the women fall short of this, of course it is rare to see a woman dunk, a handful can do it, but for the most part it doesn't happen.

    I have also heard discussions such as at a college, the men's football program makes most of the money that then supports all the other sports programs, this is not fair, but in college the players are not getting paid, so the money has to go somewhere, might as well all the athletes get lifted together.  This seems to be where Wife wants to find equality, I then said maybe if say Mark Cuban owned not just the men's Dallas Mavericks, but also a women's Dallas team that played as many games, but that is not how sports franchises work.  Cuban owns the men's team and it has probably been good for him, it does not mean he is supposed to also own a women's team.  This already being a fact, why would he then give some of the money his team earned to another team to support the women who can't seem to fill their stadiums?  I have no problem with women getting filthy rich by playing sports, more power to them, but they shouldn't get rich by eating into the men's profits, there is nothing fair about that.

    This sounds to me like we should pay someone with 30 years experience the same as someone who just started, so it's fair.  Life isn't fair and it shouldn't be.  You should be compensated more as you climb up your ladder and reach certain milestones.  If the women's (whatever sports team) reached a level like the men and they could count on full stadiums and get TV contracts like men's sports have done, then yeah, they should receive money on par with their men counterparts.  But if they are only playing to their parents and the only TV spots they get is public access, then sorry but beat it, let the adults do their thing.

6/23/21 What Happened To His Childhood?

     I remember Boy growing up, he pretty much spent the summer days up all night with an assortment of boys here playing video games and eating junk food.  That very much mirrored my childhood where I remember hiding away from the heat in my bedroom, my parent's house still did not have central A/C but all the bedrooms had a window unit, so I kept my room super cold and dark, and as an added touch, we would put a piece of cardboard over the return vents to hit us with that cold air.  I thought my growing up was pretty awesome, we'd get a new video game every so often, so we always had entertainment and of course we had the connection, my grandma worked in the cafeteria, so every now and then we'd get a box of burritos (like 100 of them at a time), or a big government size block of cheese or even blocks of ham, those were some serious good munching times.  Anyways, my point is that all this was normal to me, take your time growing up.

    Fast forward to Baby A and he is in this serious relationship with the gym.  The football coach has dreams that this year Crockett will overcome and be good this year, their goal is to go to the playoffs and win, not just show up.  They have a staff of new coaches, like 7 of them, and they are working hard through the summer.  I thought there were rules to the amount of practice they could do, but I know the rich schools get around this BS because they are always so much better, but we had a meeting with the coaches and they said because Covid-19 affected last year so much, they are being allowed the summer to work out and catch up.  As a result, Baby A is at practice every day, for 3 hours a day.  He is like a work dog, when he doesn't exercise like this, he is constantly trying to get me riled up so he can push me around or looking to wrestle anyone, he doesn't know what to do when Mama goes after him though, because she is a lot of woman and she goes hard but he can't just throw her to the ground, it's funny.  But after he comes home from these practices, he is spent and lays pretty low and quiet.

    On the one hand, I appreciate the fact that he is looking more solid and he mentions the gains, last week he squatted 525 pounds, a new high for him.  He carries himself with a lot of confidence and I love all those attributes.  He is becoming a leader in the gym and amongst his teammates as he is now an upperclassman, and he takes that as a responsibility, always trying to help the new guys.  On the other hand, I kind of feel like he is done being a little kid, no more just enjoying a big bag of Cheetos and Mountain Dew all night, orange fingers in the morning showing his accomplishments and finding satisfaction in finally killing the big boss on whatever video game.

6/22/21 People Don't Grill Every Weekend?

     Wife was telling me this weekend while we were in the pool enjoying our best life, that she was telling some of her coworkers her plans that we were going to grill some meat and hang out for Father's Day and they seemed puzzled "you seem to grill every weekend."  I thought this was what most people do on the weekends, is it not a thing?  I assumed this is 'Merica and we burn cows and pigs on the weekend and enjoy that smoky taste.  I figured my neighbors didn't partake because they are uppity white folk but normal people love BBQ.

    Don't get me wrong, I used to love going out to eat, but it seems lately every time we go out it is at least $50 for anything halfway decent.  I mean going for a shitty cauliflower pizza at Mod Pizza is like $35 for three of us.  We went this past weekend and met my in-laws on Saturday at Clear Springs Restaurant in New Braunfels, Baby A did take two friends, but that cost me $180.  It was mediocre, to me.  I mean the onion rings were good, but should that be the highlight of a dining experience?  I also did not like that it seemed like all the white people were sat down first, we were all in line when we got there, my in-laws were at the front of the line, but we still were sent outside, almost rudely by the twit running the door, who had let half the people in.  We stood outside for a goof fifteen minutes, then we were called in and looking all around, it just seemed a little suspect, nothing but white folk, nothing against them, but it sure seemed like we brownies were made to wait, then we were sat in the back room against a wall.  It just set a bad feeling for the start of the meal.  That is another reason I prefer to just cook and eat at home now, I'm not there for your benefit, I want to be treated with a modicum of respect if I am going to give you my wallet for you to scavenge.

    We have always grilled on the weekends, if we are home and not in a rush or distracted by other events.  That was the rough part of those 5-6 weeks there where Baby A was doing the wrestling tournaments and we went to Houston then the back to back funerals and a couple other things, we couldn't just hang out on the weekend and grill, it was rough.  The pellet grill sure does make the affair a lot easier, it is just a flick of a switch after a little cleaning to remove the ash from the previous meal, but even when I used charcoal, we still enjoyed a lot of meals over an open fire.  I have probably gone through a good ten grills during my married life, this one being the best, but I did just buy the griddle grill and I haven't learned how to really use it yet, so who knows.  I do know we shall continue burning meat outside as long as I can afford to buy the meat, have you seen prices at the meat market lately?  Might end up smoking dogs and squirrels from the area if this doesn't let up.  (just kidding, winnies)

6/21/21 Good Summer Day?

     The day started like I like, I woke up a couple hours before anyone else so I was able to relax and enjoy my own company.  I drank my coffee, went outside and fired up the pool pump to make sure it was clean for the afternoon knowing I would get in at some point.  Wife got up around noon or so and came down with Baby A, she wished me a happy Father's Day right away, Mijo seemed confused, as usual, admitting that he thought Father's Day had been Saturday.  I countered with a blank "It's not like you wished me a Happy Father's Day yesterday, Little Shit!"  "Well, uhhh..." was all he could muster.  Wife made us a little breakfast, Spam with eggs and bean tacos.

    We then pressured Baby A to get his husky ass outside and cut the grass.  He said tomorrow, but he has been saying tomorrow for two weeks and I tried guilting him with "if you don't go out and do it, I will" but he just shrugged like "go for it Old Man."  He finally gave up and got started, I hate to do it to him because it was so hot, but we get so busy during the week, and with his conditioning classes, he is wore out when he gets home every day.  He cut the grass and I followed behind trimming along the fence and the edge of the cement.  I felt gross and overheated after so I showered and laid down for awhile.  I was going to nap upstairs with Wife, but I decided to come back down thinking I still had some energy.  I putzed around for 20 minutes then laid down on the bed downstairs and finally napped for 30 minutes or so.  By the time I got up, Wife was ready for me to start the grill, even I wasn't.  I decided I would go and burn-in my new Blackstone griddle grill.  It is more work than it appears to be.  I had to fire it up, wait 15 minutes for it to get hot, then smear the whole surface with grease/fat and wait for it to burn off.  I did this four times, at least.  At this point, the surface is protected by a layer of growth that it did from all the fat that was melted on it.  In case someone is wondering, I was able to keep a fire going at full blast for almost two hours with one pound of propane.  It burned itself out about the time my piece of salmon was done.  

    At the same time, we had the pellet grill going and we cooked some steaks, a chicken, and sausages, standard weekend food.  While the food heated up, we swam for about an hour.  It was so nice with the pool pretty clear now, the grass freshly cut and meat on the grill.  I mean what else do I need?  We had invited DD and the Wife, so they showed up about when we went inside to eat.  Dinner was good too, Boy and his GF joined us along with Baby A, and DD and his wife.  We chatted until almost 9:30pm when they left.  Wife then went upstairs 10 minutes later to get ready for bed and I was left alone much like how I started the day, in peace to write a little bit and watch some Youtube videos.

6/20/21 Happy Father's Day?

    Well, I did it.  Yesterday we were bored and went to Lowe's to probably get a generator.  Wife and I talked about it all day and it came down to thinking about it like the freezers before Covid-19 started.  Once we decided we wanted one, we had a hard time finding one and got lucky by taking a chance and buying a floor model from Conn's, which is a store we never shop at.  Better to have a generator and not need one than to need one and not have it.  When we got to Lowe's, I saw that they had 2 of the Blackstone grills I had wanted the day before, this was a different Lowe's.  I asked the guy if we could buy the "floor model" and he said yes.  They had been assembling them because today's man is not really good at stuff like that, not his words, my interpretation.  I asked if there was a discount for it being open and he said I could have it for $100.  Not bad, from a price of $129.  This was the smallest version they sell, at 17 inches.  I think it is perfect because we do have the pellet grill and a charcoal grill, this is to play around with the stir fry idea, possibly smoke a pizza, and maybe even try some pancakes outdoors.  Like I said it runs on the little green cylinders and I bought the last 3 they had.  I will be stocking up with a bunch of these as time goes on.  After all this conversation, I ran out of steam for the generator, plus I didn't really see that they had but one and it wasn't one I had looked at online.

    We left, dropped off the grill at home then said screw it and headed back to the Lowe's at Kyle, where we had seen a bunch of different generators.  We did notice they had sold about half of them, so they are selling, but luckily, they had two of the ones I liked online.  We got a 6500watt Generac and wow, was it heavy.  I managed to load it in the back of the Excursion, but it was a back breaking 200 pounds.  Now we have it at home and I was figuring out how best to connect stuff to it.  We bought a few heavy duty extension cords, but this morning I was reading that the generator can be hooked up to the electrical grid in your home (technically, it might be illegal, but if done correctly, it works) through the dryer connection.  The important thing if this is done (I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND THIS TO ANYONE, JUST SAYING IT CAN BE DONE) is to turn off the main breaker so the power does not go up to the street and possibly electrify a lineman working on the power being down.  If the main breaker is turned off and only the smaller power things are used, then this can work, in an emergency.  You wouldn't use the dryer, washer, stove or other high energy devices, such as pool pumps in this configuration.  Some youtube examples show the central A/C being used, but I would rather have a smaller window A/C to prevent overwhelming the generator.

    Still, we do have a unit in the house, I need to unbox it, but if anything, I could save my cold food now.  My folks and my brother all had to throw a whole freezer's worth of food and I'm sure that was a couple hundred's dollars worth plus then they didn't have food and were stuck by icy roads during the freeze.  I want to protect my people in my house from stuff like that.

6/19/21 More Preparation Or Paranoia?

     I am still thinking of the generator and air conditioner situation, but we did pick up our Excursion from the shop and it cost me a pretty $2600, so the idea of a $5000 generator seems like an excess right this minute.  I will buy one but I am a little worried the first blackout is just around the corner, but also it might not even happen, we've never been without power for an extended time.

    On the wings of that thought, I noticed the Blackstone grills at Lowe's and I think I want one.  I have my pellet grill, but in the event of a power outage, it isn't going to really help.  I like the idea that these griddle tops run on gas and the smaller one uses either the little green 1 pound tanks or the bigger 20 pound propane tanks.  I can envision having a store of the little green propane containers in the garage or washroom along with the charcoal bags I have for my old style charcoal grill.  This would give us options to prepare food if we did lose power because of heat, storms, or a freeze like the one we had.  The reality as the guy at Lowe's said is that the week long freeze is probably a once in a lifetime event for us here in Texas, unless the people crying about global warming are right and we are in for crazier weather because we have ruined the planet.  On a side note, isn't it early for the weathermen to be talking about the first hurricane forming in the gulf here in June?

    I saw a Youtube video of a guy doing a review on one of these grills and I really liked the idea of grilling sliced and diced veggies.  The griddle surface even works for pancakes and other flat type of foods.  I am sure a pizza could be heated on the griddle too.  The big show on the commercials I have seen is the cook is making something like a stir fry, heating up a rice of some kind, veggies, and topping it with some sort of thinly sliced meats.

    The one drawback is that I looked online at Lowe's and they are sold out, I was looking at the website and they had some for delivery, but as I was checking the different stores in the area to see if they had one in stock to pick up, the information changed and now they don't even have them for delivery.  Amazon has them, but the delivery is out in the middle of July, and I think I can find one if I look around hard enough.  I could order a larger one, but then I am not sure if it would run on the little green propane tanks, so I will wait until I find either a 17 or 22 inch version.  The 17 inch one has one burner, and the 22 inch has two burners, but the larger ones have three or more.

Blackstone 22 inch grill

Green Propane cylinders

6/18/21 Boy Scout Motto "Be Prepared"?

     Technically, I was a Boy Scout for a summer or so and the take away from that is that we learned that we must always "Be Prepared".  On that note, the state has told us to prepare for rolling blackouts this summer and that is something I am not excited or willing to live with.  As a consequence, I have been looking for a generator to provide power when and if we are put in that position of no electricity if even for a few minutes.

    There are two ways that I see to do this.  We could either buy a nice sized generator that will run a window unit air conditioner and maybe the freezer and refrigerator along with some lights.  This would also require us buying a good sized window unit and it would have to be large because all the rooms are big in our house.  In this scenario I would imagine the generator sitting in the patio in the back and the electricity coming in through extension cords.  This might be a little sloppy but the generator would be a portable power source if we ever needed power away from home, and running on gas is something we could keep handy as long as we had gas in the cars and a few containers.  This type of unit would cost around $1000 or so.

    The other way to do this would be to get a whole house generator, Lowe's carries the Generac brand and this come on in the event of a power out and will run the whole house once an electrician connects it to the house main panel.  My biggest fear with this is that it is big and meant to sit outside like an air conditioner unit which means in this day and age it would be susceptible to getting stolen, you know how shit humans are.  These type of generators seem to run off propane or natural gas, so a house cylinder would also have to be installed.  Apart from the cost of an electrician to install, it would require a cylinder and routine fill-ups of gas, not as easy as getting unleaded gas at a gas station.  These units are also more like $8000-$10,000.

    In an emergency, I don't know how much you would want to stick out with a loud generator humming in the yard attracting undesirables specially if you are the only house in the area with power.  The more I think of it, the portable generator seems the better route, but I do like the convenience of having use of the whole house and not being confined to one comfortable room.  Are events like the freeze going to become more common?  Are blackouts a new normal to get used to?  If so, I'll get a hole house unit, but like everything, it is probably being blown out of proportion in my head.

6/17/21 Too Much Of A Good Thing?

     I think I overdid trying to be a  dayshift employee this week.  I did some simple deductive reasoning, knowing I was covering for the imaging group, I figured once the second employee left for vacation on Tuesday afternoon, I would have free rein of the tool and thus could go in whenever I wanted.  Adding to my little logic, I also considered that in chemistry we have 4 of us, so surely they could do without me for a couple days.  Well, maybe not.

    I mentioned it to Wife that I could go in whenever and she made it her little plan to get me up in the morning when she gets up, at 4:45am.  That was hard, when you consider I lean towards night shift, even if I do get up at 7:00am on my days off, that is to screw around here at home, not be out in public for 10 hours at a stretch.  At first it seemed cool to sneak in before the majority of people and get all this work, like the military says "we do more by sunrise than most people do all day..." or something like that.  At the very least I was kind of avoiding that hot sun by getting to work before the sun was up.

    Some problems were that I was told to work on a certain job, it had 6 samples and being I started working on the stuff on Tuesday afternoon, I split it in my head to do two samples a day, not killing myself, but being productive.  At 11:00am while I am in the thick of my sample prep the imaging manager calls to stop working on what I had and start working on a different job.  I hate doing shit like that.  Once I am focused on something, I really don't like changing directions, but "what are you gonna do??"  I pissed and moaned for a good hour, probably why management stays in their ivory tower on the other side of the building, so they don't hear the peasants doing the actual labor complaining.  This threw me off on Wednesday from getting my 2 samples done.  I went in focused telling myself if I busted ass, I could finish those and the other two.  I know it's dumb, but that is how I keep myself motivated to do work.

    Today, in the afternoon I was well on my way to completing samples 5 and 6 and even if I had to stay an extra hour or so to finish, I would feel like I had done a great job supporting the imaging group.  Then my chemistry manager called at 3:30 to mention we had a job that was due today, to make sure and start with that.  I told him that I was getting ready to leave but I was sticking around to finish the job I had started.  He sounded a little hurt "you mean you're not going to run the job (I need)?"  Well, it was implied that I had one foot out the door, but I can be guilted when asked by the right person.  I figured I get out early most nights, so I decided I would do the right thing.  I stopped the samples I was working on for imaging since I was doing those just for my personal ego and just left a note that I got close but someone else could finish them.

    I was quick and it was an easy job.  I was done by 5:15pm or so and got home before 6:00pm, so I still beat Wife home and we had already talked about eating pizza tonight, so no rush to cook dinner (Mod Pizza sells a pretty good low carb cauliflower pizza).  I will still be glad to get back to my routine of working in the afternoon, this early rising crap is not for me.

6/16/21 Bag O' Nuts?

     We went to Berdoll Farms this past weekend to buy some sweet pecans because they are relatively low in carbs and the chocolate ones are delicious.  I mentioned it to my folks at some point and my dad, who usually doesn't pay much attention perked up and yelled for me to buy him a bag of pecans.  It is not as easy as it used to be with Wife no longer going down there every week, but I did like the idea of buying a big ole bag, I like how they package them in the same type of bags one would put potatoes or onions.  I wasn't sure what size to get, the sacks come in 5 pounds, 10 pounds, 20 pounds and maybe 30 pounds.  They get pricey pretty quick, for a snack.  Still, I liked the idea for dad, he likes to sit at the table and fidget with stuff, sitting there cracking nuts is a good activity and the reward is not a sugary mess, but a healthy nut.  This was on Friday and we walked out with 4 one pound bags of the chocolate, cinnamon, and white yogurt variety and a little pricey, each bag was $17.99, except for one of the chocolate bags which was on sale for $5 because it was from the melted mess table.  After we got in the car, I thought I should have just bought all the $5 bags, who cares if they are a little melted.  We ate most of that bag before we got back to Austin, the store is outside of Bastrop.

    The lady was nice enough to give us a booklet which can be used to order pecans later.  It had an online address which I went and checked out the store.  Just as I thought, one can order and have them delivered pretty much anywhere in the US.  I decided on the 10 pound bag since that one was $63.00 and that is about the price of a shirt we would normally get him for Father's Day.  The last thing was to choose between Pawnee or Choctaw pecans, I didn't even know there were different kinds of pecans, and I looked on Amazon and there are even more varieties, but I won't get into that.  I did choose the ones from Berdoll because they are local and the ones on Amazon were from Georgia.  Along with the price, I also had to pay $17.00 for delivery by mail, but I thought he would love getting a big surprise package during the week.

   He called me yesterday (Tuesday) that they had arrived and he said he tried a couple and they were delicious.  He said it was a big ole sack, so he seemed happy about it, saying he would be enjoying it for awhile.  I liked that idea a lot because it gets old giving him the same gift every year, a shirt or two for Christmas and Father's Day.  I just hope they last him a while, my people are all munchers and that bag might be gone in a day or two.  

6/15/21 Life's Little Surprises?

     Sunday night was mostly just a regular day here at the house, we grilled a small brisket and sausages, our normal weekend thing when we are relaxing.  Boy got home just as we were getting ready to eat, he had gone to the coast and came back pretty sunburned but seemed happy with his trip.  Baby A was getting his mind set ready to start summer football conditioning, which I am excited about and by 8:00pm we had gone upstairs to go shower and so Wife could get ready for bed.

    DD texted around that time but I hadn't had my phone in my hand, but I saw his message around 9:00pm and he asked if we were home and available to talk, they wanted to talk to us and it seemed important so I said come on over.  Wife took her shower and within 20 minutes or so they were at the door.  Him and his wife and two dogs are staying in an apartment out by Buda near Cabela's, so they are probably 10 minutes away from us.

    It was nice to see them, we hadn't seen them in a few weeks, we exchanged hellos and then invited them in to sit at the kitchen table so they could share the concerns/news.  Just looking at them, looking nervous and excited I blurted out "you're pregnant!"  Yes, was both their response and both seemed giddy and excited saying we were the first people they had told.  Both Wife and I said congratulations, we are excited and happy for you.  My stance has been "don't be an idiot and have kids as a kid", but the two of them went and got married and are living together so they are playing life right as they should.  I told them "well, you're living together and probably humping day and night, it's what is supposed to happen."

    They wanted advice and assurance, so I told DD that the biggest advice I can give him is that being a dad is not hard, you just have to show up, she will be doing the hard part.  Be forgiving of each other, we all have good and bad days, if she calls you an asshole, don't take it personally, it might be the hormones.  Wife said the best thing is communication, don't let misunderstandings get in the way, explain when something upsets you, the other person may not know what you are going through.

    I don't know that I am great at the job but I show up every day, my boys know they can count on me to be there for them, anything else is just gravy on top.  She was already experiencing hormonal changes and said she had been crying all morning, for no reason.  Wife told her it is normal and the baby will mess with your hormones, just ride it and realize it is temporary.  She told her how with Boy she was really nice and passive with everything, but with Baby A she could see herself being very aggressive in her interactions and curiously that is a big makeup of how each boy's personality is.

    There really is no downside for them, they are married and seem happy together, they are both working decent jobs and have plans to move to a more permanent living situation here soon, although plenty of people do live in apartments for a time.  I am happy for them and I wish them the best.

6/14/21 Going Slower On The Diet This TIme?

     I don't think I am doing anything radically different from when we went on a low carb diet last year, but I am noticing that the weight is coming off much slower.  I have been dieting now for about a month and am hovering around 382.  I hate to admit, but after being off the diet for my two week vacation from work during Christmas and then snow balling with getting Covid, the freeze, Spring Break, Mother's Day, I just kept bouncing from one excuse to the next to keep eating sweets and bad food.  I call it bad food because there is no reason to stop at Buc-ee's and get a jumbo Snickers, a pecan caramel thing, bag of chocolate pecans, couple of breakfast tacos and eat it all before we get to Houston, for example, when we did that trip.  I can eat and when I am not being disciplined, I will eat anything.

    When Wife finally came back home for her new job, it felt like a good starting point to change our diet, so we have now been at it for about a month and I generally feel better.  I feel like maybe if I am not taking off weight as quickly is because I also started lifting weights again and have been pretty steady at it.  It was a real wake-up call on our way back from that Houston trip for the wrestling meet when Baby A challenged me to an arm wrestling challenge while we ate lunch and he completely dominated me.  I understand him being 16, he is just coming into his strength and that is going to happen, but I feel I could put up a better challenge if I work out.

    I will also admit this was a sloppy weekend, we tried having some good old fun and drove around on Friday.  We ended up at Berdoll Farms and picked up four bags of flavored pecans and by last night we had finished three of them mostly Wife and I, add to that we ate Zaxby's and Chicken Express Friday and Saturday and I ate the bread and fries and enjoyed them.  This of course takes you out of ketosis, but it felt like the right thing to do at the moment.  All we can do is pick up as soon as possible, so I am putting away that last bag of pecans and hoping to get back to losing some weight Monday, I guess we'll see Tuesday morning.  I know they recommend not to weigh every day, but I do it every day at the same time, when I get up and I can see the scale moving a pound or so a day when things are going right, so I trust that and it motivates me to keep going.  If I eat stuff I am not supposed to, like this weekend, I am not surprised when the weight is up by 2-3 pounds, that is the punishment.

    At some point, I will add walking on the treadmill, if I can set it up in our weight room, and that should help a bit, but right now, I am aiming to be in the 350s by August 21, 349 would be great.  I really want to be down to 320 or so by the time we go to Florida, if we end up going for the holidays, that seems a long ways away, but time marches on.

6/13/21 In The Heights? (musical 2021)

     We just finished watching In The Heights, a musical in the flavor of Hamilton, set in Washington Heights, a poor minority neighborhood in New York City.  It was very interesting to see it with Wife and Baby A, and we stopped it frequently to discuss various points that came up.  The movie itself is a bit long, 2 hours and 25 minutes, but it is a musical so it flowed from one dance number to another.

    The story follows mostly Usnavi, a young man with a dream of wanting to go back to his native land of Dominican Republic to open the business his father ran when they were young and lived there.  Along the way we meet many of the people that make up the neighborhood and we see their dreams too.  He has been in love with a girl who is a hair dresser who dreams of selling a clothing line, and she is trying to get out of the neighborhood and move up to Manhattan to prove she is successful.  Then there is the girl who is going to Stanford and is back for the summer.  She is having a crisis of conscious because she feels she doesn't belong at a university far away from her people and she feels that it is too much of her father sacrificing his business to pay for her schooling, but of course that is all her father wants to do to ensure she succeeds.

    We had to stop the movie to discuss at the point where she describes that she was "searched".  On the first day of school her ditzy rich white roommate "lost" some expensive pearls and she was searched to prove that she didn't steal them.  The roommate had misplaced them in her purse or something.  Baby A was bothered by the idea that she would be so hurt by that action.  To him it would make sense that if something disappeared, the new roommate might be the culprit, and if you have nothing to fear, who cares if they look through your stuff.  We had to explain that there is a sort of class thing that occurs, and her coming from a poor background, even if her dad owned his own business, might feel like she was being looked down upon by the rich white girl and her peers.  He had a hard time understanding this position, which we concluded is because of his "brown privilege", if that is a thing.  Our son has grown up having everything at his disposal and has never been one to not have or been in a position where he interacts with others that have more than him.  Growing up in this way makes one unaware of being seen as suspicious by authority figures, like "why would someone accuse me of stealing, I got my own shit?"  I think poor or underprivileged kids carry that stigma and it probably didn't help that she was all the way on the other side of the country surrounded by a bunch of people that did not look or act like her.  This was reason number 1 that I don't even entertain the idea my boys would go to college in another part of the country.  

    The movie touched on a couple of interesting topics and was generally an enjoyable experience, I do always enjoy a good musical.

6/12/21 Not Quite San Antonio?

     Yesterday (Friday), was going to be a fun travel day until Baby A ate and decided he would rather be home.  Wife and I kind of talked about the idea of taking a day trip somewhere but we really had no agenda or purpose and I find it really hard to just get going.  Wife I guess "tricked" me into going with the idea of looking at watches in either Dallas or even San Antonio.  I wanted to go to Dallas, but then looking at Google Maps and figuring 3.5 hours to get to the mall and then another 3.5 hours to get back just didn't seem like fun to me.  I decided San Antonio would be good enough, they have a couple of stores they carry Rolex, maybe they would have something worth considering.  I have looked here in Austin and even in Houston and had no luck.

    I got up at 6:00am, worked out, drank my coffee and then went to wake Wife at 8:00am.  She was receptive to the idea of getting up which is something she usually does not appreciate, me waking her up early is usually not met with positivity.  We got up at then woke Baby A, Boy went to Rockport on the coast for the weekend, so he was gone since Thursday, the younger Knucklehead said he wanted to go with us the day before.  His problem though is that he stays up until 4:00am playing video games with all his friends and then can't rally and be useful before noon.  We got him up, he showered and we left around 10:00am.  We made it to San Marcos before I had to stop to feed them, I would have preferred not to, but then I am the bad guy.  We ate at Zaxby's, it had been awhile since we had eaten their chicken tenders, then Mijo got whiny that since he had eaten, he wouldn't mind just going back to bed.  I felt like pooping and gassy, this is why I hate eating early, so I didn't fight him too much.  I also wasn't excited about watch shopping with the amount of money we have to spend on our vehicles, just fixed the Escape at $900 plus $1200 for new tires and the Excursion has $2400 in repairs and it needs new tires as well.

    We headed back to Austin, dropped off the boy at the house, I did what I had to do, then we went to Berdoll Farms to buy some pecans, and then to Jared where I maybe jumped a little too quickly and made a watch purchase I didn't think I would but was ready to, if I felt the deal and watch was worth it.

    The afternoon was still nice, we stopped at Sam's after my watch purchase (I had dropped off the watch at home, wasn't going to leave it in the car), got some meat to grill, then went home, jumped in the pool while the grill heated up, ate some great tacos and I was asleep in the living room by 10:30pm.

6/11/21 New Watch In The Collection?

     I finally made a decision and added another watch to my collection.  It turns out I am pretty predictable and went with something as Wife said "I thought you already owned that one."  I had been looking and thinking of buying a new watch for probably the last year, in reality I am always looking for my next thing to buy, but I really wanted another Rolex, if I can be honest.  The problem with that idea is that they are sold out everywhere we look.  This little first world problem got me thinking and looking at other brands and I really thought I was going to decide on a Panerai, we saw those watches in Houston, but they just seemed a little overpriced to me, but I am no expert.  I then fell in love with the idea of a red dial watch and when I started looking for one, I discovered the Bell and Ross diver watches, which I do really like a square faced watch and their piece de resistance was on a bronze body with a red dial and red bezel, it was beautiful, but I gave the lady at the store a week to find one and call me back but I did not hear from her, they only made 999, so they were a limited edition batch.

    We went to Jared yesterday afternoon, thinking they were going to have Omega or Tudor watches, at least that is what I was interested in, but they did not have either of those brands, saying they were discontinuing Tudor from their lineups and Omega was only through their online store.  Their pride and joy on the watch front is Tag Heuer, not my first or second choice, but still a very recognizable brand and the prices are not crazy.  The sales guy started with his pitch that Tag was probably a better watch than everything else, of course he would say that, that is his job, but over on the side of the display, he did have a couple of Monaco watches and either memory of a bad decision or nostalgia got me swayed in that direction.

    About 8-10 years ago, we were in Corpus Christi at the mall and I had one of these Monaco watches in my hand and the lady said they were discontinuing carrying that brand and at the time the watch was $4800 I believe and she was saying I could buy it for $4200, or something like that.  I had just bought a watch at the time, so it seemed excessive and did not buy it, but always felt like I missed out on a good opportunity.  The watch yesterday had a price tag of $6300, the sales guy explained that it had a new movement inside with an 80 hour reserve, the glass is sapphire crystal, and he would even get me the longer length strap with taxes for $5500.  It being about $1000 ten years later from when I should have bought it added to me deciding to get it.  I doubt Ben Bridge would have offered a discount, I love that store, but they have never mentioned any type of discount, I didn't even know they could do that.  This makes me want to continue doing business with them, maybe I will get an Omega next with these guys, let's see how this watch behaves.

6/10/21 There Might Be Something To Circadian Rhythms?

     The past two weeks have had me on an almost regular dayshift and I am feeling all sorts of renewed.  This week I have been going in early, Wednesday I was in to work by 8:30am and I haven't even felt sleepy all day.  I have also been working out before starting my day, Wife suggested I get up when she gets up and that meant I got up today at 4:50am today.  It sounds real early but we were in bed by 10:00pm, so we still managed to sleep a good almost 7 hours.

    So far, my workouts have only been lifting weights, and I do enjoy that but at some point I need to incorporate some walking on the treadmill, but I need to make room in my workout room before I add that.  I had been doing this at 7:00am when I would wake up to take Baby A to school and wait for him to finish when I would then hurry back and get him at 9:30am.  This week, I have started earlier and earlier, culminating with my 5:00am start Wednesday.  The interesting thing, to me, is that I have been getting up around this time on my days off.  I believe that is my natural circadian rhythm, to go to bed early and rise early.  Normally, on Friday nights, I am asleep before Wife, where she will stay up until 1:00am, I like to fall asleep as soon as we go upstairs.  Then in the morning, I usually wake up between 6:00am and 7:00am, which is especially nice if we don't have plans.  I find it peaceful to be up before everyone and drink my cup of coffee in quiet solitude.

    If I am not fighting the layout of the day, such as when I force myself to take a nap around 3:00pm, so I can go to work at my normal time of around 4:30pm, I find that I am much more at peace.  Getting up at 6:30am is annoying for a minute or two, but I like that I am doing it for me.   Before Covid19 forced us all to slow down and hide in our houses, I was working at a rate that I could not really sustain anymore.  I was in a world of hurt, falling asleep everywhere we went and not even being confidant enough to drive out of town anymore, with a fear of getting tired and falling asleep.  In the last 6 months, I have been more or less working a normal schedule, in that at least I am home in time to go to bed by 1:00am the latest.  This means that I am sleeping when the normal people sleep, and I see the benefit and I hate to admit that I am liking it.

6/9/21 Baby A's Foreign Language?

     Baby A had a hard time with his Spanish class earlier this year.  It was something he just could not get in his head.  After a few months if trying in the fall, he finally dropped the class so he would not suffer a failing grade and ruin his GPA.  The plan was to retake Spanish with a different teacher but then he found out the one Spanish class he could take was in the middle of the day when he is trying to be at school practicing with the team.  When it looked like he wasn't going to have a choice, he talked to his advisor and assured him it was only for the first summer session.  I was not a fan of him having to take a course like that over the summer, but he has to stay connected and accomplish his goals if he is to remain in the program that talks about graduating with an associate degree.  This is when the idea of taking sign language first started, and although he was told no initially, he was able to petition it or ask someone else and get permission.

    Mijo has always wanted to learn sign language, it is something he did a little bit of when he was baby and Wife had been convinced that he was going to have a hearing disability.  Actually, Wife was telling me that he is a little hard of hearing based on a test he undertook years ago.  According to Wife, who admittedly, pays more attention to our boys than me, claims that Mijo has only hearing of 70% in both ears.  This doesn't seem right to me, but Wife is willing to fight me over this news so I just kind of let it go.

    He is excited about what he is learning, yesterday I walked in the house and he showed me he had learned the alphabet and went through it all.  Today, I walked in and he was excited to show me he could count up to 20 with his fingers.  Wife thinks he is picking it up very quickly, we shall see what he does, he is in a self paced class, so it will be up to him to keep up.

    I just want him to get the language credit, Wife is envisioning him working as an aide to someone who is deaf, maybe as a translator while he is in college since she has been able to pay students and others who can communicate through sign language in some of her programs.  I don't know how much interest our son really has, but I do know that he needs to strengthen his fingers as he is already complaining that his fingers are cramping up from all the different finger positions.

6/8/21 This Is Normal?

     I have been on nightshift for pretty much the last twenty five years or so and then Wife was working out of town for the last five years.  This past week I have been working days training on the old tool I used to run before coming to the chemistry group and then the fact that Wife is back living with us here in Austin means that we are eating dinner and spending time together during the week.

    I thought today (Tuesday evening) was really cool and special because we were both home by 6:00pm, we were able to grill some burgers outside and we even spent about an hour or so in the pool.  It was almost too nice of an afternoon for what I am used to.  My normal weekdays have mostly been spent at work.  Most of my work nights start around 5:00pm and over the years sometimes as late as 7:00pm.  I am happy enough to start it earlier, but even happier right now that I can start whenever because I am covering for people on vacation and part of my job is to run the tools when they are available.

    I will be honest in saying it would be nice if the pool was another 5-10 degrees warmer but after hearing Adam Carolla saying he is swimming year round even if the water is down in the 50's, makes me want to copy him.  He gave a long explanation on how getting in the cold water is good for a person to get out of their head.  I am always up for a little introspection but I get what he means, getting into that cold water is a little painful but the numbing effect after feels really good, once your whole body is in.

    After grilling we then have been able to sit and eat together more than one meal in the last couple of weeks since she has been back.  Tonight we watched a couple episodes of The Kids Are Alright on Hulu.  It is a real funny show about a family with 8 kids and growing up in the early 70's.

    I am writing this as Wife is upstairs getting her things together for tomorrow, I will be joining her in a few minutes most likely as my plan is to get to work as early as possible.  I managed to get there today around 9:00am, and that was after I woke up as Wife was leaving at 5:45am, I made myself a cup of coffee, worked out as the sun came up, then showered and headed to work.  At this point, I would like to find a way to come to days without losing any money but if I did the reality is I would lose the 15% I fought to get back a few months ago.  The best thing is to just enjoy those little opportunities when they arise, I think it makes the times we spend together that much better because they are kind of rare.

6/7/21 Relying On Repetitive Memory?

     I am not sure if I used the correct title, but after whining and complaining of having to go back to the imaging group and doing what I used to do for about a week, it was a pleasant surprise to be able to pick up and still be able to run the tool like I did about 3-4 years ago.  I have been a part of the chemistry group since at least 2018, but last week I was told that I would be needed in the imaging group to help support because the two ladies left running the group both scheduled vacations for next week.  It was like one of those silly episodes you see on TV where one person asked for vacation six months ago and then the other person not seeing it get written on the calendar, she also made plans by reserving a condo for a week off or something to that effect.

    The end result is that I was tasked with cleaning up the mess and providing support to the group in their absence.  I didn't mind the idea initially, but then it was pitched that I could continue doing this going forward and any time chemistry slows down, I can run over and provide support.  I don't see a gain for me in doing this, it's not like I've even seen a raise in the last ten years, so no, I am not just going to do it willy nilly.  I am a team player and can respect helping out for a week, but not just indefinitely to keep myself busy.  Well, helping out came sooner than I thought.  One of the ladies is already on vacation this week and going into next week, but the other one went to work but went home early because she felt sick.  I was then asked to go and try to help, even without the training I was hoping to get.

    After complaining that I didn't want to do it, I sat on the tool once I loaded a sample and just kind of ran it without thinking too much about it.  I found that if I didn't think about it, my fingers instinctively went to the right set of buttons to go to the next step.  It seemed weird because my thinking took a half second longer than my fingers going through the motion.  For example, the stage needs to be set to 52 degrees for both ion and e-beams to line up and work correctly.  I did this without even realizing.  Once that is done, it is also safe to bring in the Pt needle to protect the surface and it was fun to just know what to do, even after all this time.  I did have to call one of the ladies to make sure I was up to date, such as that they now use carbon to protect the area of interest instead of platinum, even though Pt is still used.

    Anyways, I guess I was just impressed with myself that after so long, I was able to sit on the tool and still run it.  I didn't actually have to make the samples all the way, the thinning can be very challenging, but that will come tomorrow, right now I was glad to do as much as I did.

6/6/21 Finally, A New Watch Store?

     While looking at watches online last week, I started liking the idea of a bronze watch after looking at the Tudor ones, so I typed in bronze watches to see what else would pull up and wow, I fell in love with this red faced Bell and Ross "Red Diver" watch.  It has a square body with a round dial, but it has the richest brightest red face on it while the body sits around it in square splendor.  I typed in where I could find this brand, I had seen it online but not at any of the stores I have gone to.  It can be found here in Austin in a little boutique store in west Austin in a little strip mall the store is called L Majors.  It is almost tucked completely into a corner with  Randall's occupying most of the place and a pharmacy covering it from the other side, but it is there.

    If I hadn't seen the watch and known that it was comparatively "cheaper" than some of the other watches I have looked at, I would have been a little intimidated to even walk in there.  But, Rolex watches are cheap at $6,000-$8,000, if you could find them, so knowing the watch I wanted is listed for $4600, it doesn't seem as bad.  The store did not disappoint, they carried Vacheron Constantin, which is one of the holy trinity, the other two being Patek Phillippe, and Audemars Piguet.  These are considered the gold standard in watches, even if Rolex has more fame.  I asked out of curiosity if I could even think of buying one, but she said they started at $20,000 for the cheapest one.  I told the lady "no need to open that case."  She said they only make about 15,000 watches a year, by hand, nothing is mass produced.

    They did not have the "Red Diver", but they did have its cousin, the "Blue Diver" and the blue was rich and pretty but not as striking as the red color.  The lady said she would place a call Monday to see if she could find another red one.  This is a watch I would most likely buy, I like variety and I already have a blue and black Watch, well an orange and a gold dial one too, if I could count the Citizen watches, but those run on batteries, so they are not the same.

    They also carried the brands Nomos, which looked nice but not in the same category but Wife did like one for Boy, she said.  It has the tiffany blue that he is currently obsessed with, but it was $2900.  I need to look into the brand more online to see if I like it or not.  They also had IWC, which look heavily inspired by the aviation industry.  There watches were all labeled "spitfire", Top Gun", "Maverick" and other airplane names, so it was easily evident what they were going for.  I did one bronze watch they had, but it had already started to "patina", bronze is affected by the environment and it had lost its shine, for sure.  The price was on par with the Bell and Ross and I have seen IWC at other stores, Ben Bridge carries it, I think, but the watch was smaller and lighter so the Bell and Ross seems like the better buy.

    I do believe I will be visiting this store more, I liked that it was quiet, we were the only customers there, and it wasn't cluttered with unnecessary stuff.  They had two other cases with some pearl necklaces and diamond stuff, but it was mostly watches.

6/5/21 Old Vs. New?

     Decisions decisions, I have been thinking about our vehicle situation for awhile and now I have to act.  This morning, in a heroic effort on my part, I woke up at 6:45am and started my day by going to Ford and picking up our Escape and dropping off my Excursion.  Last week, the service engine light came on in the Escape and it turned out to be the oxygen sensors which got replaced along with a tune up.  They then put it in my head that one of the tires had a "blow out" which I still don't understand because I drove the car there, but they said one of the tires had an unfixable something or other.  I had already had a thought about the tires because we bought the car used a couple months ago.  I told them I would take care of the tires myself and go to Discount Tire after he said he could replace two for $450.  I thought I could do better, but I did much worse, walking out of Discount Tire with a $1240 bill for all four new tires, but I did get some better quality tires Michelins instead of the Pirellis that were on there.  I couldn't in good conscience put some cheap alternatives on the car with Wife driving it for her commutes half the time to San Antonio.  This is a 2013 car and whether I like it or not, we have now committed the cost of the car, plus these $2000 plus dollars to fix and get up to a comfortable point, so we will be driving the crap out of it, hopefully, for a long time.

    The other big thought was in order to pick up the Escape, I took my Excursion and dropped it off for an oil change and tag inspection.  I figured this would give Wife plenty of time to sleep in and we could pick the car up in the afternoon after she gets up and starts her day.  Well, they called around 3:00pm that they had done those two things but they really recommended a brake fluid flush for $99.95 and there was an oil leak.  I'm not sure about that since I don't see any oil stains on our driveway, but the service lady said it could just be starting as a seep.  I thought BS, but after talking with Wife she said "well, it is getting old and you do still rely on it, so get it fixed before it becomes a problem."  I hate the idea that they might be trying to scam me, but I do love that I have never had a problem with the Excursion and at this point it does not make sense to try and get into another vehicle, trucks are crazy expensive and not really in stock.  The technician even told me "you really shouldn't get rid of it, it would be crazy to sell it at this point" (like she knows me or something, but I appreciate the opinion).  She also said the tires have dry rot and I should really be replacing them.  I believe the tires have a date of 2013, I haven't replaced them in about seven years and I really should have, but I was thinking of getting rid of it for awhile.  At this point, I think I'll just keep it for a few more years and save me the monthly payment for a little while longer.  I really want a new truck, but I don't want the new truck bill.

6/4/21 Are You Happy With Your Career/Job?

     Baby A is done with his sophomore year and will be a junior in about 3 months.  I guess that got him thinking about his future, so he asked me how do you choose a job/career that will make you happy?  And then he added, are you happy with what you do?  That becomes a complicated question, if I have to give a short answer, I would say no.  I go in and do the same repetitive samples every other week or so.  We just keep doing qualifications so our customers can have faith that their process, be it making semiconductors or solutions/chemicals are as clean as they need to be in regard to metal contaminants.  Thinking in this way, there is very little enrichment and personal growth, and it would be a very easy way to justify quitting after 2-3 months.  The reality is that what I do allows me to live a comfortable life, I do a job some would consider technical enough to require higher compensation than the average person, so I sleep well at night knowing I am providing an above average lifestyle for those I love, it makes the sacrifice of me doing something that is mind numbingly boring easier to accept.

    So then what can I give as advice to my boys?  I told him same as I remember telling Boy, do something you enjoy doing.  Boy always seemed to like to tinker and build things.  He would always take my tools, take things apart, and this continued into high school when he joined the robots team and then the rockets team.  Naturally, it seemed like engineering was the right choice and I think it is, but he has what I think is a perfect job for him at a big area company that provides machinery for our industry and he says he is trusted with assembling racks of electronics worth hundreds of thousands of dollars and tools for customers and now he wants to say his job is meh.  So, I don't know what advice to give.

    As far as I know, nobody is really happy doing their job.  Wife likes the end result of helping the kids in her school by providing whatever resources are out there, but don't tell me she likes the day in and day out of sitting in meetings with dolts or having to jump through hoops writing the grants that bring the money into the schools, which is the real work that she gets paid for.  My lawyer brother loves his lifestyle and is compensated very nicely but hates the actual work part of meeting with clients and getting yelled at by judges.  I am pretty sure my dad didn't love being in a truck 5-6 days out of the week away from home most of his working life.  I put my mom in the same boat as Wife, she may have loved the interacting with the kids as a counselor but there was a lot of paperwork that was part of her job and it never seemed to end.

    I think in the end, we do the job so we can enjoy life away from work.  Work provides the fuel for the life we want to have.  Few people get to live the life of celebrities, for the majority of us we simply get to enjoy life as much as we can based on the lifestyle our finances allow.  Make a decent salary and you'll probably live a decent life.  I know that sounds shallow, but if you want more, feel free to donate your time to charities, but I still say volunteering doesn't pay, but that is the beauty of America, you can do what you want.

6/3/21 Service Engine Light?

    Well, they say you can't take it with you, but dammit, you can't even pretend to be getting ahead.  We have been very responsible as of late, we got ourselves out of debt, we refinanced our house, and we keep trying to save money, but fudge!  Just when you think you might get a step ahead, a stupid light comes on and it will cost good money to make it go away.  We had such a good time Saturday, just driving around with no purpose other than to spend the day together out of the house.  Well, when we got home, the service engine light came on, this was on our 2013 Ford Escape, which we just bought a couple months ago.  It felt like a steal getting this car right before this craziness where all cars seem to be doing what the housing market is doing and the prices have just taken off.  We were able to buy the car for $11,000 cash, if I remember correctly.  This was money from the refinance, don't think we are that good at saving money.

    I took the car to Ford, I know it costs more, but I like the peace of mind that they will fix the car right the first time and we can be on our way.  Right away, when I pulled in, the guy plugged a diagnostic tool into the car and it said O2 sensor.  I thought for a second if this is all that it is I might try to tackle this myself.  He gave me some mumbo jumbo about heater coil signal too and went on, trying to sound technical.  I looked up the part and it is maybe $100 for the two coils, fine, but then I got the call Tuesday that it was going to be something like $850, they were also recommending a change of spark plugs and more confusing language about testing the closed loop cycle or whatever BS after I told him that he was sticking it in me pretty hard and dry.  At this point, what choice do I have, I am already paying $99.95 for the service visit, the O2 parts are $100, the spark plugs ($50) and coils (I hope) ($200) do cost some money, but dammit!

    I finally had a chance to look at the work to replace the O2 sensors and it really looks like a pain in the ass.  The guy doing the work for himself is super skinny, which helps, has to take apart so many covers to get to the work area.  He went under the car and took off two different shields that protect the engine underneath, then he went from above and removed two plastic shields the width of the car right below the wiper blades, the plastic you can see between the hood and the front windshield.  After removing all of these, he required a special tool which you can rent from Auto Zone but that sounds like a pain in the ass, plus the tight spaces he was shoving his hands into, I doubt I would have been able to.  He also required some special spray to break the bond of the O2 sensor where it was screwed tight.  Looking at the work, I don't really mind having some professionals doing it, even if they screwed me a bit on the price.  I am hoping this gives us a few years of dependable service, I really do enjoy driving the car, even though it's almost 8-9 years old, it still seems like a new car, to me.  They also recommended new tires, but I was already thinking I was going to install some since Wife does drive this car to San Antonio a couple times a week to save some wear and tear on the Telluride.

6/2/21 Big Introductory Parent's/Coaches Meeting?

     I had no idea we were going to a town hall meeting affair with our son at Crockett High School, but there we were Tuesday afternoon at 6:30pm.  The new head coach is busy trying to start a new direction for our Crockett boys.  The meeting was to introduce himself and set some ground rules and expectations as we move through the summer.  I find it sort of exciting as to what the coach was saying, he seemed genuine and proud to have the chance to make a difference in these boy's lives, I can't wait to see what comes of the coming season.

    He talked about the common important stuff, winning starts in the weight room, missing practice is not going to be tolerated, but he also made a point to include his approach to the athletes doing well in class.  He expects his players to aim for a 3.0, especially for those seeking to play at the next level.  Colleges aren't interested in players who can't pass their classes.  He will have a weekly checklist of players and their grades, if they are failing in a class, he will not let them participate that week until their grades are cleared with the teacher.  He does not want to wait until the end of the grade period(now they are doing a nine weeks period instead of six weeks), to find out he is losing half the team.

    We were introduced to a whole baseball teams worth of coaches, about nine coaches to break them down to their specialty positions.  I asked him after if that was the best approach, because last year after we lost half the team to failing grades, my son went from a back up sophomore player to starting on both sides and he didn't have that much experience on defense.  He said he understood my concerns but that Baby A was made to move people and they have a new coach who is going to work on techniques specific to offensive linemen.  I told him that sounds great, my son does love the position and role he plays, I just don't want to see him fall short when and if he gets called to support on the other side of the ball.  He said not to worry, our son is a great kid and he does everything to his best ability, he is proud to have him on the team.

    Looking at the schedule, they are going to go hard this summer, practice starts June14th, so by late August, I am hoping to see a buffer, stronger animal lurking around the house, this boy seems to be getting stronger daily, it is exciting to be part of a team that is trying to change things.  I totally believe you need new leaders, coaches in this case, every so often to change the energy of the team.

6/1/21 Old Is New Again?

     I was told last week that I needed to retrain in my old department and I have tepid feelings about this.  First off, I have been in chemistry now about four years, so my skills on the FIB machine are pretty much gone.  Plus, they expect me to do both, train for a few hours then go over and do your normal workload.  I don't agree with this nonsense, if you want me to train, then let me do what I have to do and don't expect much from me in my normal capacity.  

    I started planning and scheming what the best way to tackle this would be and I decided I would show up today around 11:00am and train with my old partner who I rarely see anymore because our shifts do not really overlap anymore.  Well, as I was walking in all ready to sit and watch her work to remember the minute details of the work, she was getting ready to leave, apparently, she had an appointment at a doctor's office or something.  This means I did not get much in the form of training.  I then went back to my side of the lab and did some work to make time move along.  I went back a couple hours later and the other lady was there, but she is not as laid back as the first one, she was wanting me to take over the tool and get right on the task of preparing a sample.  I told her I would rather wait until tomorrow when I can sit and watch the tool run for a time or two.  We went back and forth on this, but I wasn't going to wait until she finished her "HOT" job then I was supposed to start a sample to keep me there past 5:30pm.

    Once I figured I wasn't going to get the training I wanted, I went back to chemistry and prepped the one job we had on the shelf and due tomorrow.  It took some back and forth with the other company's people as our tool is down and we have to share theirs.  This is normally not an issue for me since I am there alone at night, but this was still daytime and so the tool was theirs.  I got lucky around 2:00pm, the lady running the tool decided she wasn't going to do any more work and offered me the chance to get on the tool.  I jumped right on it and got to work.

    I finished around 5:20pm and then headed out because my son had a conference meeting with his coach and as many parents as possible.  Wife got home at 6:10pm, we all went potty and headed out to yet another thing.