Fucking Sprinkler Head ...

I thought I knew what I was doing after I fixed (I think) two others.  Next up was checking the arcs for a different cycle, also in the front yard.  Yesterday/Sunday afternoon I did, and I was OK with all but one, which was arcing in both directions so much that it was clearly wetting our driveway twice.

Learning what I learned before, I made sure to wait until the water got absorbed into the dirt enough to clearly twist off the head.  I oriented the arc so that its right-most would line up with the edge of the grassline bordering the driveway and no farther.  From there, I put in the key that shortens the arc to its left.  I had the cycle going on for 15 minutes, giving me plenty of time to see how far this head would go and either cut it or lengthen it so that it wouldn't sprinkle water on the driveway.

And I got it done.  It was perfect.  So, I pulled the key out of the top of the sprinkler head ... and the goddamn, motherfucking whole thing came out.  Without the sprinkler head, the water was coming out of just the open end of a pipe, so it just looked like water coming out of the ground.  I needed to stop it; fortunately, by the time I got to the garage, there was only one minute left in the cycle.  Water dribbled its way down to the street, but it stopped before it got really, really bad.

Swear to God I screwed it in.  But I have to admit that I had trouble when I didn't think I would have to worry about lining up the threads.  And for the goddamn life of me, I couldn't screw the fucking sprinkler head back in a second time.  I don't know what it was.  The threads at the bottom of the head seemed to be fine.  It's hard to look five inches deep into the grass, but I think the threads at the open end of the pipe are just fine.

There is only problem I could see, and it might be a big one.  There was dirt on and in the open end of the pipe.  I was able to scrape off enough so there was nothing blocking the threads so that I could screw in the sprinkler head -- I think; shit, I thought I did that the first fucking time, but apparently not.  The issue is that opening should be completely clean.  No dirt at all should be on or in it, because if there is, it would block the flow of water coming up through the pipe and into the sprinkler head.  I don't have a way of completely cleaning that opening, so now I have to wait until I have time (probably tomorrow/Tuesday evening, assuming it isn't raining) to turn on the cycle and see if water is flowing freely through that sprinkler head.  If it isn't ... shit, man, I could see enough pressure building that the goddamn head flies up in the air, or hits one of the cars, or dents the house, or conks some neighbor who's just walking.  If it's that bad, that sprinkler head is unusable, and since I can't turn off a sprinkler head, that whole cycle has to be shut down until, I don't know, I get the company to do what it does in order to blow out all the dirt that's in that pipe.

Motherfucking Christ, why in the fuck do we have this goddamn sprinkler system, huh?  In particular, I hate that My Fucking Father has saddled me with the responsibility of maintaining it.  It wasn't my goddamn idea to install a whole fucking system which, by the way, I have only used to only water the lawn only, like, four times so far (I've turned it on way more times to fix the arcs one some of the heads, a practice I'll continue to do until they're all correct).  He got off on something that made him feel like a tried and true homeowner, but the silly and stupid details like fixing this shit?  No, I deal with that because that bullshit is beneath him.

Let's go beyond that: Why do we have lawns?  Why do we need to constantly need to tend to grass?  What is giving a lawn a crew cut proving?  I think we do it just to keep up appearances, and as you all know, I don't give a good goddamn about keeping up appearances.  Fuckin' A, man, you should see how brown my lawns are.  And I don't care, and I don't have my parents here to make me care.

But now I have to fucking find some time to check out this sprinkler head and hope it's screwed on tight enough that it won't go flying from all the water pressure and smash one of my car windows or kill a stranger.  Oh yeah, then I have to hope that it still has the arc that I want.  This is just a frustrating pain-in-the-ass, man.  I just wanted to take the key out of it, that's all. ...

Giving The Van A Little Love, I Guess

I now think I remember what I was going to originally blog post about yesterday/Saturday afternoon.

So I brought in my parents' minivan last week.  I have no idea what maintenance Father did or did not have on it before my folks left, so I just assumed I should not trust him and asked for an oil change and a tire rotation.  This was also the time to find out if there's anything more to the exhaust smoke I saw coming out the passenger side of the van earlier in the year.  And finally, if there was anything else the mechanics saw, let me know; I might get it fixed.

Well, they never said anything about the oil looking fresh, so they changed the oil and rotated the tires.  The exhaust was something; they showed me that there is a hole in the muffler.  But this is one of those cases where one thing could lead to another.  They could replace the muffler for a grand, but they would then have to disassemble the whole exhaust system, and the mechanic was afraid some other part that is closer to the front of the car would get loose or break off, and that would mean, at the very least, three more thousand dollars.  That is one repair that I will not have fixed.

But, while looking around, the mechanic saw that the stabilizer link, whatever that is, on the passenger-side front tire was broken.  To level with you all, the mechanic(s) described its, uh, brokenness in vague and relatively benign terms -- "You'll feel it bounce over bumpy roads," one of them said.  He made it sound like it wasn't worth fixing, frankly.  He gave me the same advice, and in the same tone, when he advised me not to fix the muffler.  But honestly, I felt a little guilty saying no over the muffler -- not to the mechanics, but to the car.  Yes, I'm treating the minivan like it's a living creature.  But I feel guilty that I won't fix what appears to be a major issue because it's just too damn expensive.  And in exchange, I want to "make it up to the car," and throw some money at some repairs to make it run better.  And the van still runs well.  I think it'd make it up north, even though I dare not do it.  I think having a second car around is a good idea, and I will spend some money for its upkeep, just not a few thousand dollars in one heap.  Several hundreds dollars, though?  I said yes, even against what seems to be the advice of the mechanics who spent only half an hour switching out these stabilizer links or whatever.

Am I a fool?  Sure.  But I want to let my car that I still care for it, even a little.

I blog posted about thinking about bringing in my parents' minivan to look at exhaust that appears to be coming out of the passenger side.  Well, I have driven it a few times since, including this morning, when I used to drive to the bank and then to get my face shaved, and after the initial start, I don't see any exhaust coming out of any place it ain't supposed to.  When I got home, I left the vehicle on while I got out, and while I saw smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe (I just checked; it's 19 degrees now), I didn't see it seeping out of the side of the car.

Maybe I don't have to bring it in.  Maybe I will bring it in and ask the mechanic if he sees something, and maybe I'll pay for repairs other than the exhaust system that may or may not need repair.  Who knows?

My All-Time Favorite Nourishes Me ... With Food!

Because it was Valentine's Day, I did what any romantic would do and visited my ATF at My Favorite Stripclub (Cover Division) to rain money on her.  I texted her if she was working last/Saturday night; after initially thinking she might not, earlier in the week she confirmed that she was.

In our text exchange, she asked me if I like chocolate.  I love chocolate!  And after she got back down from stage -- we saw each other, we got to do table dances, then she had to go onstage, but then we did more table dances once she was done with her set -- she gave me Ghirardelli chocolates that she bought.  Did she buy them for me?  Maybe, maybe not.  But I don't care -- she thought of me enough to buy me chocolates for Valentine's Day!

I don't think I blog posted about this: When I saw her last, about a month ago, she surprised me with cookies she apparently baked from home.  I was freaking the fuck out about this siege this fuckin' Republican government put on us, but I really wanted to see her now that my parents have gone.  She was trying to calm me down, and so I think she thought the way she could do that is to feed me.  And trust me, the cookies were delicious.  The flour she used was so fluffy, yet so buttery.  I ate them up at work.

I have a new appreciation for her.  It may not be a grand gesture, but making and buying food for a customer is a signal that she's feeding me, that she's looking out for me, and that, dare I say it, she cares about me.  I ... love that she did that for me.

The Main Reason I Think I Hate MLS' "Flip"

Back in mid-November, Major League Soccer announced that they are going to change the schedule of the league.  Ever since its inception in 1996, they started play some time in the spring (in '96 it was April; now it begins late February or early March) and ends some time in early December.  But this Year, the 30th Year of MLS, will be the last under this calendar year format.  After playing a four-month "spring season" in the spring of 2027, MLS will align its year with pretty much every soccer league in every country on Earth, where they start late summer and end around Memorial Weekend.

Not too long ago, I heard the Commissioner for MLS say that he didn't think that would be a good idea, and I think his main reason was that so many northern cities (such as Minnesota United) would be affected by figuring out how to deal with a part of the summer-to-spring season that makes outdoor Matches well nigh impossible to stage in the winter.  Guess he changed his mind, and I guess that not sticking out like an outlier, especially when it comes to trying to bring in players through Transfer Windows that are, right now, a bit awkward, was enough of a reason to do this wholesale change.

At first blush, I hate this as a season-ticket holder.  The idea that players didn't want to join a club in MLS during the middle of our season or the middle of the season of the league they're coming from is still too abstract for me to care about.  But another plus the Commissioner claimed would make the new calendar better is that Major League Soccer would get away from having its postseason run right into the National Football League and college football.  True -- and I still don't think it's a good enough reason to do, as some people are calling it, "The Flip."  Yes, football (mostly professional but college matters too) is the most popular sport in the country.  But it's their regular season; MLS has conducted its postseason late in the fall.  I will go to lengths to see a postseason Loons Match in person (I have skipped out on Game-watching events in the past) because they are the most important Matches on the schedule, and I think diehard fans of other MLS squads have done and would do the same.

Conversely, the commish also says that putting MLS' playoffs in May is a lot less crowded.  No, it isn't.  The NBA Playoffs and The NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs are also played in May.  Basketball and hockey are not the behemoth that American football is.  But you cannot convince me that soccer has a chance to stick out and rise above the din at a time those two leagues also have their postseasons.  When the Games matter most, MLS will take a backseat to both the NBA and NHL, every Year.  (And hell, to be honest with you, the NHL takes a backseat to the NBA every May, too.)  Major League Soccer is not running from a crowded part of the year; it's running to a crowded part of the year.  And I don't think it's going to work.  So on second blush, I still hate this.

Another point I considered: I thought that there would be Matches played through the winter, and we would thus have to have a few or even several of them played during the holidays.  Then MLS announced that there will be an annual two-Month Winter Break from mid-December to mid-February, and then on top of that there will be special considerations to limit the number of Games played here in December and February to one or two.

But I decided to think further.  What about this Winter Break?  It's good for the safety of players and fans, no doubt.  But what sports league do you know builds in a two-Month break in its season?  Wouldn't that feel like two separate seasons?  And what happens if, for example, MNUFC just sucks for the first part of the Year?  Would anyone want to come back and see the final part of the season if the Loons blow?  (Major League Soccer anticipates that 2/3 of the season is completed before Winter Break and the final third is completed once play resumes and into the end of April, which is supposed to be when the regular season will end.)  This has the potential to be a momentum killer.

Another point of concern comes in the fall.  I am very busy during American football season.  I work Vikings and Golden Gophers Games, and I organize Game-watching parties for my alma mater.  These conflicts have been in place since Minnesota United started MLS play in 2017, so it's nothing new.  Still, it's a pain in the ass to, for example, wait for when my alma mater announces the time of their Game in two Weeks and figure out whether I could travel from downtown Minneapolis to Midway to see my Loons, or if it's worth it to catch only the Second Half of the MNUFC Match, or if I need to sell my ticket.  Usually, one to three of my season tickets are casualties to these circumstances each year.

The announcement didn't say, but I wonder, assuming there will be at least as many Matches in a regular season as there currently are now, if there will be more Matches played in the fall.  So I have looked at the upcoming season, looked through my Franklin Quests for the past few years, and jotted down how many autumn Matches there have been from 2022 to this season, which would be ones subject to either work or play conflicts due to American football.

2026 home Games in the fall I have to worry about skipping: 5

2025: 3

2024: 3

2023: 4

2022: 1

There are tons of caveats here.  Major League Soccer has frequently shifted their seasons, and put in breaks during the middle of them, if there have been other worldwide soccer conflicts, such as the World Cup and continental tournaments, so there will be years more Matches had to be piled into the autumn.  Also, I wanted to go back all the way to 2017, but I realized that 2021 and 2020 were severely impacted by the pandemic -- I couldn't go at all in 2020, and I think I started going to Games late in the summer of 2021 -- and so it didn't make sense to go back even further.  Finally, we don't have the 2027-8 schedule out yet, of course, so we don't know if there will be a concentration of Matches in the fall.  Still, while I have no evidence this will get worse under the new calendar, I will go with my gut and believe it will be.

But I realized something further. It may not be the fall that impacts my season-ticket status the most, but the summer.  Major League Soccer says it'll conduct its postseason in May, and the league will begin its new season in mid-July.  Assuming MNUFC won't host Games for the playoffs or even make the playoffs (and I would contend that the league is rapidly creating a Haves/Have-nots hierarchy not unlike The English Premier League, and undoubtedly my Loons ain't gonna be a Have), there won't be Matches for me to go to between May and mid-July.

How many Matches have taken place in that time period?  I went back through my FQs and checked:

2026 home Games between May (the scheduled month for postseason, which the Loons obviously are not guaranteed to play, let alone play any home Matches) and mid-July (the approximate start of the new season format): 3

2025: 6

2024: 6

2023: 6

2022: 5

More caveats here.  The three Matches this season is because MLS needs to take a break for the World Cup.  Also, Minnesota United FC salespeople have been trying to emphasize they are going to fill this hole with pre-season Matches and Friendlies against clubs from other countries, which should be easier once MLS' preseason aligns with so many other leagues' preseasons.  But you can tell that it's not the same.  I actually love going to Loons Games during the late spring and early summer.  There's not much to do, the weather is heating up, and I have enjoyed many Matches with other Loons fans this time of Year.

And then I realized that this is the part of the season that I will miss, and that this is the reason why this new calendar sucks.  And there is little to no chance that there will be any attempt that will be adequate to fill this hole.  So now what?  Well, first of all, because I care about the integrity of the season, I would like to suggest a split-season not unlike what Mexico's Liga MX does.  Every Year they have, basically, two Years: An "Apertura" (opening) season that goes from July to just before the holidays, and a "Clausura" (closing) season that goes from early January to Memorial Weekend.  OK, so you have two champions a Year.  Big deal; that means there is no yawning two-Month gap in a season you're determined to say lasts ten Months.  For this to happen, Major League Soccer would have to have only a one-Month break, and Minnesota United would probably have to play a few Matches in January and February.  Would I watch them in person?  Maybe, maybe not.  But at least the season would make a whole lot more sense.

Beyond that, I don't know what to think.  Well, I said a long time ago that unless I die, move, lose my job, or determine the organization has done something that so offends my moral code, I won't be dropping my season ticket.  I didn't add some sort of force majeure clause when I declared that, but I sure as hell didn't think they'd do The Flip, either.  So I think I'll give it a year, to see how many more Matches I might have to miss in the fall, and how many times from May to mid-July I'll be bored out of my skull because there's no important MNUFC Game to go to.  If it doesn't make sense to spend money on a season ticket -- and that price keeps going up every Year -- maybe I'll be forced to downgrade my season ticket package ... or say goodbye.

I'm Not Mad At Them, Just Disappointed

Another thing about the funeral service for my neighbor: Neither of my parents went.  Mother was dead set against it once I told her; I thought Father would go, and he said yes, but the night before he said no.  So, even though we lived a few houses down from her, even though they sometimes waved to her when the neighbor was enjoying the outdoors on her porch, and even though, when my folks were making egg rolls for us to eat, would make enough for her to eat as well, they refused to say goodbye to her in the last time one could say goodbye to someone before the body is laid into the earth or cremated.

My parents are very private people, but I really, really thought the circumstances around this death would prompt them to behave differently this one time.  They knew her.  They live close by.  The service was two minutes away by car.  (I walked there; if it weren't cold, snowy and windy as it was that afternoon, they could've made it in five minute on foot, and even if they didn't want to go, I could fucking drive them.)  And they fucking had nothing else to do.  And yet, they refused.  Maybe you could blame the weather, maybe you could blame them being so old and not wanting to risk, for example, falling on the icy sidewalk.  But those are just excuses.  Fact is, they just don't fucking care.  And they showed their whole ass for my neighbor's children to see when I showed up but they didn't, even though it would have been so goddamn easy for them to put something clean on and stand for two hours.

Also, like I said in my previous blog post about this, they originally planned to leave for Las Vegas the morning of the ceremony.  They said they thought the flight they wanted to take would prevent me from going.  I told them when I first told them about the date of the funeral service that I could take them to the airport, come back, shower, dress and get to the ceremony, no problem -- and it wouldn't have been a problem.  I thought they stayed because at least one of them would pay their respects.  So, if they wouldn't, then why the hell are they fucking here for another three goddamn weeks?  If they're not going to be nice, respectful people in saying goodbye to a neighbor and trying to comfort her loved ones, why don't you just get the hell on out of here?

I'm not mad at them, I'm just disappointed.  No, I lie.  I'm disappointed in them, too.  I didn't learn to be a grown-up from them, that's for goddamn sure. ...

I'll Get To The Stuff On My Drawer ... Tomorrow

So whenever I get mail, I don't look at it right away.  Don't care.  I throw it either on a box of alumni-related stuff that was sent to me, which is at a perfect height and distance from my bed so that I feel that, if I want to, I can just reach over and grab it, or on the drawer next to my bed.

It's gotten bigger over the, oh, weeks or months since I last combed through it.  It has gotten to the point where I need to actually look through the mail, and I have picked at it.  I even grabbed a couple envelopes last/Sunday night.  But over the past couple weeks or so I imagined that I would have the time, just one night, to finally go through it all.  But I look at that pile, see that it's, oh, 1 in the morning, and I think to myself, "Nah, I'll do it another time."  As I did just now.

Hey, man, it's a busy week.  I'm even taking time off from work to do stuff I need to do.  I am that busy.

Oh, I Need To Care About Other People's Feelings Now ...

I love my sister, and I'm glad she's home, even if it's not under the brightest of circumstances.  But it takes dim old me, who's been doing his own thing socially for a long time now, to recalibrate because, of course, your sis wants to do things with you.  And you realize that, hey, you want to do things with her, too.

The problem is that I have a bunch of days I've already planned for doing stuff, so that means that there are way fewer days for us to do stuff.  Also, I have no idea how long my sister is going to be here.  Finally, she laid out a series of things she wants to do, and I am still thinking about what to do with her and, even more importantly, when.  That is difficult.  For example, Saturday might have been a good time, but I have an eye appointment in the afternoon and I'm going to the MNUFC soccer Match that night.  I'm going to another soccer Match next week.  And I have sporting events I'm working on that'll also take up much of my time.  Meanwhile, she wants to go here, and there, and maybe even up north, and that'll take up a weekend, and I don't know if I have a weekend free.

Still, I need, and want, to take some time I would have reserved for myself and devote it to her.  Contrast that to considering the feelings of My Fucking Father, who blew a gasket and insulted me because I dragged the trash bin to a part of the driveway he deemed too close to the recycling bin.  He thinks those bins have to be as far apart from each other as possible.  Yeah, because the garbage truck and the recycling truck can't tell which bin to pick up if they're too close.  That asshole actually went out and dragged the trash bin to the other side of the end of the driveway.  That's weird.  What makes it even stupider is that he did that as my sister and I had started up my car because we were going to the library.  My Fucking Father dragged the trash bin behind where we would back down the car.  If my sister didn't negotiate around the trash bin, if she just backed down the driveway like any normal human being, we would've hit the bin.  But My Fucking Father absolutely had to move it there, and he couldn't at least fucking wait until we had left.  Childish son-of-a-bitch.

See, I don't want to care about what My Fucking Father thinks.  But I do want to care about what my sister thinks.  See the difference?

And No One Showed Up

So my fantasy auction, for the fantasy football league I run, was last night.  Since most of the other members reside in the East Coast, I have traditionally scheduled it for 6 in the evening before the start of the NFL season, just to get the very latest news in case there are late injuries or cuts or anything like that.

This is supposed to be the most exciting day for the league and its members.  But, and I don't know how or why the juice is gone (although I can speculate), fewer and fewer members have shown up for the auction.  We have dwindled in number of members too, but when the auction starts, there has been at least one other person doing it live with me.

I actually left work early for this.  What I mean is that I usually clear the deck, aka make sure there is no work that is supposed to be done before the new day left over to the new day.  It was doubly important last/Wednesday night because I go from The Third Department to The Fourth Department today/Thursday, so I would literally be leaving any stuff I was supposed to do to someone else.  I hate when I have to do stuff that should have been done the day before, and so I do my best not to do it to anyone else.  Last/Wednesday night was an exception because hey, I've got my fantasy football auction!

I needed to take a crap after I punch out, then I miss my turn and have to take the long way to the library.  I have maybe two minutes to get into the library, swipe a guest pass, login, get to Yahoo! Fantasy Sports, log in there, then enter the auction.  It in fact already started with the first player, Ja'Marr Chase, having been nominated and on his way to one of my competitors.  I was about to apologize for being late until I saw that all of the icons next to all the other teams in the league were represented by the dueling circular arrows.  That means that they're not online and that the computer/algorithm is conducting the auction for that manager.

Everyone except me had that icon.  No one was at the auction except for me.

Looking on the bright side, I had budgeted 90 minutes to go through the auction, but it was over in 35.  On the down side ... well, no one gives a damn about this league anymore.  And we play for money!  It's gotten so bad that there are people who have rolling winnings and debts to the league stretching back years. I (as the commissioner) haven't sent the other managers their winnings because the other managers haven't asked for them.  In turn, I haven't asked people to settle up what they owe because ... well, I'm a toothless commissioner.  And so we just ... play, sorta.  Year after year, and although I love that we have been doing this for at least a decade, the lack of enthusiasm for our league, crystallized by everyone else no-showing for the auction ... ngl, it hurts a bit.

I think we'll just auto-pick from now on.

I Don't Know Why I Let Her Hurt Me So

So I'm social media friends with this porn star.  We have a mutual friend.  I find her to be engaging and smart.  I also see, from the way she shoots down incels, that she doesn't suffer fools lightly, and as a fool, I was afraid that she would turn her verbal knives on me, and for something that I completely didn't intend.

With that being said, I did have the option of choosing my words carefully, even deciding not to comment on something she said.  And yet, on Facebook, I went over the breach when she posted a screenshot of a text exchange with, er, someone.  This guy started off the conversation (or at least the the first part of the conversation she showed) with something along the lines of, "Well, I'll probably get shot down, but YOLO -- would you go out with me?" to which she replied, "Well, since you started off being so insecure, you definitely will get shot down."  See, I see a lot of myself in this guy.  He needs to put up his walls even if he tries to do something positive because he is afraid, and he knows, that he will get hurt.  I think that's totally understandable.

Therefore, I ventured into her comments section and said something to the effect of, "I think he was only being humble."  For some reason I thought she wouldn't respond.  She is busy working on a film, or something.  Instead, she immediately goes, "WHAT?!"  Ah, whoops.

Just then I imagined myself at a fork in the road -- like, literally standing on the spot where one road splits into two.  I could just not respond, and so she would either let it go or think that I was being a dick who couldn't back up what I said.  On the other hand, I could respond, and either she could be understanding (or, better yet, laugh at my comment) ... or she could totally ridicule me.  Either way, there remains the possibility that she would block me.

With what I thought was a binary choice, I think I actually found a middle path that may have made things even worse.  I replied, quickly, and I thought I had something to say, something like, "So you're telling me this dude, who I assume you've never met, actually had a chance to meet or go out with or even have sex with you, but you shot him down because he expressed self-doubt that someone who is both gorgeous and in adult films would say yes?"  But I thought that I would be saying too much.  Also, I thought time was of the essence; if I didn't say something, she would cut me off at the knees.  So, as a stupid compromise, I went "I just ..." and then I threw up a shrug emoji.  And she replied, "ok weirdo."

Well, I guess I blew my chance to meet or go out with or even have sex with her, too.  But ever since it happened last night, she's been on my mind, and my brain continues to ask why that is.  I have seen her naked.  I have seen her "work."  She's bleepin' gorgeous and can go all night like an incinerator.  But I've never met her.  We have interacted through social media a few times, but I have never met her.  So why is her comment affecting me so much?  Better I put it this way: Why am I letting someone I've never met affect me so much?  It's because she's a porn star, or that she's hot, or that she was nice to me a few times before.  But still, I have to be honest: We've never met.  We are not friends.  So why does her comment to me make me so sad?  I can't be like that.  Otherwise, my day will be ruined whenever someone isn't nice to me.  Well, that actually happens now, but that's something that I shouldn't let happen to me, you know?

I'll try and get over it.  But there is one saving grace to all this.  I would think that if she snaps at someone like she did to me, she would block that person.  It's the Internet, after all, and if she didn't like what I said, it stands to reason that she would block me, for safety's sake or because she's annoyed.  But she hasn't, at least not yet.  Maybe she recognizes my name and thinks, "Whatever, he's harmless."  That probably is the best I can shoot for, and maybe, just maybe, I can think of something more clever to say to her in order to get back in her good graces.  (Gosh, look at me caring what she thinks of me again.)

Since When Did They Care What Time I Came Home For Dinner?

God, I'm racked with so much damn guilt right now.  It was another punishing day at work for me in The Third Department.  By now I am resigned/determined to work way past my eight hours (though that may change soon; I'll discuss that some other time), and so it's been routine for me to call my parents late in the afternoon to tell them I'm coming back some time in the evening.  That was the case yesterday/Friday.  I told them 7, but I was hedging that it could be later than that.  See, it was my last day of the week at work, and I am not the type to leave a lot of work for one of my co-workers to pick up the next day.  We are leaving some work in The Third Department for the next day anyway, but I don't like it when I am faced with a ton of work that I consider to be the previous day's work because it pushes back when I get to today's work, which I also have to dedicate a lot of time to.  And since I don't like it when it's done to me, yesterday/Friday I felt like I could go a ways in order to do my part, and to leave my co-worker with something slightly more manageable so that she doesn't curse me under her breath.

Because of that, not only did I blow through eight hours of work, my set limit of ten hours of work has been obliterated often as well.  Now I'm just staying until I'm damn good and ready to leave.  And yesterday/Friday, I just kept going and going and going until I felt like my co-worker won't be pissed at how much I left for her.  That, however, caused me to stay past 7 -- like, way past 7.

I got done around a quarter to 8.  I called my parents in my car, to which Father told me I could heat up dinner myself.  No problem nowadays; I've done that several times for dinner after my folks have been home.  So I got home, turned off the alarm, and heated up the spaghetti they left for me.  And when they came home a bit later, they asked me why I didn't call to tell them I'd be later than 7.

Dammit.  I got caught up on work that I hurriedly tried to do.  But frankly, it didn't dawn on me to call because there have been several times where I would call, say I wasn't coming home until 7, I get home at around 7 ... and they have left dinner for me to heat up and help myself.  Once or twice they were going out for a walk to exercise off whatever they ate for dinner, which they had eaten before me.  More often, they were just cleaning dishes or scrolling through their phones or downstairs doing whatever they wanted to do.  I don't remember the last time they asked me why I didn't call to tell them I was going to be late, if ever.  And if they have never asked me why, I did not think it was a big deal that I came back 45 minutes after I told them I was coming home, which, again, was a time I was soft on.

Then again ... well, I think I did tell Father over the phone when I told him 7 that if I was going to be late, I'd call.  And I didn't.  And I can tell that Father was a little miffed about it, even though, like I said, I don't remember the last time he wondered why I didn't call to tell them I would be late.  I think it's water under the bridge, but knowing how passive-aggressive My Father can be, and knowing that they are leaving soon, he might think one day in the next couple weeks would be a good time to bust my balls over this, just to shore up his masculinity.

I feel so fucking guilty.  But goddamn, man, since when did they care what time I came home for dinner?

Hello? Anyone There??

Oh my God, so much shit happened yesterday/Friday, and that's not including the American economy tanking because That Fucking Guy wanted it to tank.  Motherfucker.  And fuck all the MAGAts who voted for him, too.

Anyway, I worked late, but not as late as I could have.  I actually limited myself to 10 1/4 hours last/Friday night, but because indeed two days' worth of work came in in the morning, my boss sent in an e-mail in the afternoon that we could work, get this, up to four hours extra.  I probably won't get into it, at least not for now, but suffice it to say, I was torn.  But I decided to leave.

I told my folks that I was going to not eat dinner.  My original plan was to have Chipotle on the way back.  But dammit, I forgot my phone, so I wasn't able to use the app until I got home.  I figured I would just go in and leave because there was no reason to stick around if I was just going to go out to eat.  So I did.

I thought about letting them know I was home.  I saw the light from Mother's office.  I also heard the TV blaring from the master bedroom, which obviously was where Father was.  I was going to let them know I was here and I was leaving for a bit; I was going to lie and say that I needed to show my co-worker something back at work.  But then I realized that I didn't really sneak into the house.  A chime sound emits whenever the front door is opened.  I think I wasn't loud, but I wasn't quiet when I walked upstairs and then downstairs.  And yet neither parental unit got up and looked up at the front door when I came in.  It's possible that they didn't care that I came in, but I got the feeling that they didn't hear me come in, and that they were concentrating on working and watching TV instead.

That is weird as hell to me.  I kind of find that disheartening to not care that someone opened the door to their house.  But then I figured that if they didn't care to see that I came home, why would I need to let them know that I have?  That makes me it easier to just leave, which I wanted to do anyway.  So I left without letting them know I even came home, which was around 7:45 or so.  I ate Chipotle, was given a second bag of chips I don't think I ordered (another story I may or may not get around to), went to Hy-Vee because I needed to buy dip for these extra chips, then finally came home around 10.  They didn't greet me when I came back home for the night, either.

Do they care?  Do I care?  I don't know!

Anxiety (Should Be) Rising

Alright, I still don't know if I'm going out to dinner with family Sunday, I don't know if my parents have decided they're going out to dinner with family Sunday, I don't know if the headlight bulbs will be delivered in time to use the minivan for dinner Sunday, I don't know if I should get a rental car to use for dinner on Sunday (and I have to worry whether my parents are not going to freak out about getting a rental car too, but that's another layer of anxiety), and worst of all, I don't know if anybody involved with dinner on Sunday even cares.  I'm afraid this entire damn family is just "playing it by ear" when it comes to dinner on Sunday, and we can't.

Are we doing this or not?  I don't like that I feel as though I need to be the one to initiate conversation.  Yeah, I might be the one who most knows what's going on, and I had to buy the bulbs, and I'm the one going back and forth between my parents and my sister.  But you know, they can talk to each other.  They can make plans.  They can fret over plans, such as dinner on Sunday, and not just me.

So that's what I'm afraid of: Them not caring, me standing my ground and refusing to invest more energy than I already am, and then Sunday rolls around and we can't go because we can't drive the van at night.  So, whose fault is it then?  I'm worried about everything else about them coming; I don't need this, too.

My Self-Imposed Monthly Data Limit? I Fucking Blew Past That

And I really don't know how.  I think I have stayed with my routine of using my data during breaks at work, but somehow, this month, I have surged past the 2 GB limit I once had and continued to hew to for the first time in a long time, if not ever.  It seemed to spike on Saturday when a guy I was watching the Game with Airdropped me a photo he took of all of us watching the Game.  But I just checked my itemized data usage and it looks as though the vast majority of the 2 gigs I've used have come in chunks while at work.  It didn't seem to take that much with my old phone.  Either this 5G network is an energy hog, or Twitter/X has become an energy hog since Elno Musk bought it.

Oh, well.  I am fairly sure I have unlimited data in my plan, so I guess I can use as much data as I want now without giving a damn.  Sure, it was artificial, but the 2 GB limit per month was something I prided myself on, as a means of self-control.  Well, shit, I guess I have no self-control now, and I might as well keep my phone on 5G all the time.  Who cares now, right?

My Boss Can't Set My Schedule Next Week Because My Parents Might Not Be Able To Pick Airplane Seats

I'll let the cat out of the bag: My parents are going on safari starting on Thursday.  That obviously entails taking them to the airport, which I will do in the morning and for which I have already asked my boss if I could come in late.

Unfortunately there is another thing that my parents, or at least My Mother, wants me to do for them: Pick out seats.  I'm guessing that the same process applies to all airlines -- you check in before your flight online and, assuming you didn't pre-pay for a seat (and I always think that's a ripoff), that is when you select your seat.  I usually don't care all that much.  Besides, in my estimation (and this is usually through Southwest, even though I just saw that the airline is doing away with open seating, which is a stupid idea), when you check in, half of the seats are already taken by people who decided to pay to cut in line and pick their seats.  But my parents care.  Don't know if this is a new way of thinking, but at least their second flight (they technically fly from here to Canada and then to two stops in Africa) is long enough whereby they want to pick their seats to prevent getting crappy ones.  They're old, you see.

Now, I just assumed they've picked seats at online check-in before.  But for some reason -- my guess is Mother is panicking, which scares me because this is no damn reason to get anxious -- they either don't know how to do it or don't trust themselves to be able to do it.  And so they want me to do it.  This particular airline (and maybe it's because it's an international flight) allows you to check in 48 hours in advance.  Assuming I correctly accounted for the time zone difference, my parents can check in as early as a quarter to 10 on Wednesday.  I would be at least a couple hours into my shift at work.  But they still want me to help them open their computer, type out the airline's URL, punch in their confirmation number, and pick the seats for them.  Forget how people younger than boomers should be able to figure this out; this might -- might -- be a ten-minute ordeal.  But I might have to orient my entire day around this, and them.

Oh, and on top of this?  They might not even be able to pick seats.  They obviously booked their safari through a tour company, so it's possible that the tour has parcelled out seats already.  Do I know for sure?  Nope.  Mother is complaining that Father should be in contact with the tour company about whether seats are assigned.  But I have no idea if he has even talked to them, let alone whether the tour company has pre-selected seats for them.  If they have, I assume my folks can take care of the check-in process (and it's possible the tour company will check them in for them), and that means I won't have to stay home to help them.  But if the tour company is leaving tourists to do it themselves, that means I have to do this shit.  And since it's at least a couple hours into my normal workday, it's possible I might have to take the whole goddamn day off.  Just to help my parents pick fucking seats.

I raised this issue with my boss, and maybe I shouldn't have.  My original line of thought was to ask to come in a couple hours late both Wednesday and Thursday.  Then, after not getting a clear signal one way or the other as to the check-in/seat-selecting process for Wednesday, I had to convey that to my boss.  He then said it might be easier if I am scheduled a couple hours later than usual both dates.  That's when I had to remind him that Wednesday's still up in the air.  And I didn't receive word from him before I left for the day yesterday/Thursday.

He fills out next week's schedule by Friday because Friday's my last workday and I need to know where I am working for Monday.  But I don't know what's going on with this bullshit with picking friggin' seats online, so my Wednesday's unclear, and so I take it that my whole week is unclear.  If my boss is frustrated that he can't schedule me yet, I can't blame him.  This is absolutely ridiculous.  I cannot see how something as trivial as picking seats is hanging up my work schedule.  But dammit, it is.

My Anxiety Has Won

Not a good day.  That rattling sound came out of my car again, and even though it's quick, it seems to be happening a bit more often.  Even worse: I got out of work early yesterday to try to take it to my mechanic for an impromptu diagnosis, but there was so much fucking road construction that I couldn't overcome it and just went to Taco Bell instead.  I am now scared as hell that something the engine is about to blow or my radiator is about to fall out of my car and I'll be fucking stuck along the side of the road, or stuck on it.  Or, maybe it's not bad at all and I'm just scaring myself to death.

Work wasn't great, either.  I mean, it was fine.  But there is still that empty chair behind me, and people still aren't talking about what the hell happened to my co-worker.  And yet I had an epiphany, such as it is, while at work yesterday/Monday.  For all this time I thought he got fired.  Now, I'm not so sure.  It is possible that he was laid off.  I have been complaining for a while that the work hasn't been coming in for a while, and that has pretty much affected all departments, though some more than all.  We have been completing the work well before we need to, except for The Main Department, and there they have missed cutoff so often that I no longer think anyone cares.

Another thing that has come up is that we have been told to document our work -- by that I mean we need to write down on a sheet of paper what we are doing, from what time and to what time.  We had to do these "audits," for lack of a better word, once or twice before, and we're supposed to do it again.  To me, that means only one thing: Headquarters is trying to justify letting people go.  Can't be anything else.

Now, layoffs don't quite explain the suddenness of my co-worker's departure, or why more people haven't been let go last week at the same time he was.  But work is now a too quiet, very depressing place to be.  And this might be the thing that gets my ass into finally looking for another job.  I don't like what's going on, and I think it's time to start looking for a way out.  This goes whether I lose my job based on merit or not: At some point, I have to look out for me.  It might be that point.

Doin' The Trip!!!

So today/Sunday I plan on going to the Black Hart to see a Tripleheader of soccer Matches, sort of.  The Euros are now in their final Group Stage Matches, so all the teams that are in the same Group play their Matches at the same time so no one knows beforehand what they need to do to advance.  That means that at 2 p.m., two Matches, Switzerland-Germany and Scotland-Hungary, will go off concurrently.  That will be followed with Copa America action, namely the USA! USA! USA! playing Bolivia at 5 p.m., and then, perfectly situated at 8 p.m., Uruguay-Panamá.

And I plan to sit my butt -- whenever I'm not pacing -- at The Only Queer Soccer Bar On Planet Earth to watch this Tripleheader.  #DoinTheTrip, I'm calling it.  This was important enough for me that, when my boss blindsided me last week when he needed someone to fill in at work today/Sunday, I told him I could only come in for part of it.  It would now be customary to "make up" for working today by having one day off this week, but apparently the maximum number of people who can take a day off has been reached for all six days this week, so I will be working the rest of my usual work week (Monday through Friday) and just accruing overtime, which I guess has been authorized.  I would be making more money if I worked eight hours today instead of the four for which I am scheduled -- but I'm not because I am #DoinTheTrip!

But that's not all!  There will be a Doubleheader set of Quarterfinals for both continental tournaments, exquisitely paced at 11 a.m., 2 p.m., 5 p.m., and 8 p.m., Saturday, July 6, and dammit, I am doing that, too!  I call that #DoinTheQuad ... and I've done it once before, if you recall, on Sunday, November 22, 2022, when the World Cup was doing a Quadrupleheader of Group Stage Matches.  I didn't think I would be able to do that again, at least not until the WC rolled around again in 2026, but I didn't foresee the Euros and the Copa America taking virtually the same schedule as each other so that their Matches on a single Day could line up like this.  Yay for a soccer sicko like me!

Moreover!  There was a possibility yesterday/Saturday that I could have taken in a frickin' Quintupleheader because there was a Tripleheader of Euros and a Doubleheader of Copa Group Stage Matches evenly spaced out at 8 a.m., 11 a.m., 2 p.m., 5 p.m., and 8 p.m.  I was going to advertise here that I was #DoinTheQuint, but then I saw that Minnesota United had a Match in the evening, and I'm a season-ticketholder, so I had to go, and I might as well go to the library to fax something if I wasn't going to be able to #DoinTheQuint.  Maybe I should have: The Loons lost a very winnable Game to an extremely mid Austin squad, 1-0, in what was the most lackadaisical performance by MNUFC I have ever seen.  I was borderline pissed to see them not care to play last/Saturday night.  Anyway, I hope there will be an opportunity in the future, possibly if the Copa America and the Euro basically hold their 2028 tournaments at the same time, to stay at one place for 14-5 hours to just watch soccer.

In the meantime, I hope four hours at work won't tire me out to #DoinTheTrip.  This truly is one of the highlights of my year!!!

I Need This Fucking Trash Day To Be Over

So I woke up before work yesterday/Monday morning from a text from my boss that puts me in a different department for the day because someone called in.  That's fine; my job is to be a jack of all trades, so shifting jobs at the drop of a hat is part of the job description.  The problem started when I was told to sit at a desk that I wasn't expecting.  It's not mine per se, but it's the spare one I and the others who have the same job description usually use.  But I couldn't use it because my supervisor is still training in one of the people who share this same specific job as I have.

Instead, I had to sit at the desk of the person who called in "sick."  I hate taking over a person's desk, even though this is a company where that happens from time to time.  I have a desk of my own.  Not many people in the departments I work in can say that, and that is a privilege I don't take for granted.  (Actually, it's one of the few perks I get at this job that I still enjoy.)  I would be bothered if someone just fuckin' bogarted my desk just because.  It may be out of necessity, but I invaded my co-worker's space, and I was not happy all day.  And, to be honest, I hated the setup of his area.  He has no space for me to write, which I had to do constantly during the workday.  And I had all these calls I needed to make, and somehow he has his desk phone so recessed against the partition that I had to strain whenever I made a call, which was about 30 times.  That was an annoying pain-in-the-ass.

Finally, since I was in a department I hadn't worked in in a while, there were a few different protocols I had to follow.  I was told about these new procedures, or at least I believe I was told about them; I just hadn't put them into practice because I hadn't worked in this department in a long while.  One of them were these phone calls.  I would normally do my best to skip them, or at least half-ass them, but I was told that my boss and his bosses were cracking down, so I needed to do them.  So that was 30 calls (more than I have ever made in a day while working for this company), and 30 times I had to reach out to the phone, grab the receiver, make sure I don't drop the receiver so it snaps back to the console, reach out to punch the number in, wait for someone to pick up, and once I was done, put a tick mark on a Post-It (to keep track of how many calls I made, which is something I was told to do when I began training, to be fair) and reach out to put the receiver back in the cradle.  That took half of my day.  I know that in this job I could have been way more productive doing something else that making some goddamn calls.

Moreover, I was told that some quirk I just ignored during the course of my workday suddenly became important.  Sometimes we fax, and sometimes these faxes don't go through.  We are given these e-mails saying so, but I just ignored them because I was never told to care.  Well, apparently I do have to care now.  I need to go through the e-mail, identify which specific fax it was, determine if I was the one who faxed it, then figure out what to do to make that fax go through.  I needed to do that three times.  I wound up e-mailing instead of faxing twice.  Do you know how much time that took?  That is another distraction from the main task of this job, and I am embarrassed that I basically spent only half a day doing that main task, and instead building up all these forms to pass on to my co-worker, who may or may not have the time to do it herself.

Finally -- and I haven't thought about this much, even though if I were in a different mindset this would be the thing that triggers me -- my supervisor was trying out something for the printer, and we were told to look out for it while going through the course of our day.  I wanted to know who was doing it and why, and I asked my supervisor so.  And from around the corner, my boss, who I think was on his phone talking to a co-worker, I think shouted in answer to my legitimate question, "Doesn't matter!"  Uh, excuse me?  At that point I was already in a pissed-off mood, so my mood didn't change.  Did it worsen?  Believe it or not, I might have to think about it.  But let me say this: If I weren't so busy doing other things tonight, you better believe I would be pounding the online want ads again.  And I hope to get around to doing that this week.

I can't remember a day at this job where I was so looking forward to getting out.  Unfortunately I had to come back to the building because I forgot to fucking take the banana and peach Pepsi I brought.

---

About that banana: I just ate it -- with a knife so I could carve out the bruised parts.  I sliced off a piece on its side, but the banana was so heavy that it tipped over and tore off.  Thankfully I was eating this over the kitchen wastebasket.  Sadly, about 60-5% of the banana fell into it.  Most of it looked like a banana, too.  What a waste.  And I will admit that I thought for a good, oh, 15 seconds to pick it up and eat the parts that haven't touched the trash.  But I didn't, I swear.

---

Oh, and I wanted to go out and work on the things I needed to work on last/Monday night.  I wanted to go to Pryes Brewing because there were no events going on.  But when I drove across the place was packed.  I guess there was an event: It's a Monday night and it was beautiful out.  So I drove to Caffetto (which was not packed, which surprised me; I didn't plan on going there because I thought it was going to be packed) and did all I needed to do.

And then, as I reached home, the goddamn low tire pressure light came on.  Yeah, this is what I get for trying to blow off some steam by driving around town.  I rushed out to check the pressure on the tires, even though I checked them just before I left work.  The driver's-side front had way more air than the passenger's-side front, but all of them had enough air.  I went inside to grab my headlamp and tried again, just because -- same pressure levels.  And then I lost the valve cap to one of the tires.  Luckily I had a spare cap in my car.

I'll get the old valve cap (and make it my spare) as I roll down the car in the morning.  That's after I check the tires to make absolutely sure none of the tires deflate.  If so, this fucking trash day is going to become a fucking trash streak, and I don't need that shit, even though I'll text my boss to say I'm late because of my car, and that means I won't have to go into work, and that's actually fucking fine by me.

She Finally Got The Hint

So there is a stripper whom I have blog posted about before here on WAF.  I met her once before when she was doing dances at **y's place.  She's quite old and her skin is stretched out and shit.  I got dances from her once where she jacked me over my pants.  That was enough for me to believe she was down to fuck, so when she started inviting me to other parties she was working, she would text me.  But somehow, I would get there and she would never be there.  Instead, the only girls working there were, well, ugly and fat and kind of scary.  This missing her when I got to the parties she was working (and, I think, hosting) that I once texted her in frustration that I thought she was going to be there and why was she not.  She said her kid got hurt and so she needed to run home.  I don't believe that, nor do I believe her when she subsequently said she drove back to the party.

That was at least two years ago.  That may even have been before the pandemic.  Regardless, that was the last straw for me.  Not getting touched by her in years, plus her series of excuses of not being at a party she invited me to, plus getting only fugly women to work these parties, and plus accusations of ripping off other girls who worked house parties she hosted (including **y), and I gave up ever seeing her.  And as time went on, I stopped caring that I would see her.

With that being said, she still had my number, and she continued to text me whenever she either was doing parties or working at a strip club in the region.  I told her that I was busy or I had no money, but to be honest, I had no interest in seeing her.  Also, some of the parties, and the strip clubs she now works at, are way too far for me to drive to, even if I did have money and was horny.  But she always accepted my excuses and was very cordial to me, saying, "OK."

Till yesterday/Tuesday afternoon.  She texted me that she was working at some club 90 minutes from here tonight/Wednesday night.  I told her that "job issues" came up.  That excuse is vague, and even if me thinking about changing jobs is real, it should have no bearing on whether or not I have the ability to see her.  But that's the reason I told her I wasn't able to see her at the club tonight/Wednesday night.  And she said, basically, "OK, it's been two years of you telling me you can't make it.  You're off the list."  And my first thought was, "Wow, she finally put two and two together."  But then I texted her, "Sorry," and she said, "That's OK," and I suddenly felt all guilty.  Does she think I was stringing her along?  Because, well, I was.

But, will I try to see her again?  No.  I probably won't.  Eh, whatever -- she still has my number.

... And Now They're Back!!!

Yeah, it was cold last/Saturday night, but I wanted to work on my receipts at a place out of the house.  More importantly to me, I didn't want to be afraid of the cold.  I want to do what I want despite the weather ... and the car.

But the goddamn indicator lights are back on.  They didn't appear on the drive down to South Minneapolis (even though the car seemed to be driving funny, but that could be the cold or that could just be me being paranoid), but they showed up when I started my car on the way back.  It cannot, cannot, be the oil level or pressure.  It can't be that bad after just one fuckin' month, can it?  I hope to Buddha it's not something else.  What I will hope is that ... well, first that the car won't crap out on me.  Then I will hope that the indicator lights switch off miraculously like they did on my way to work on Friday.  I am hoping that these lights are now on just because of bad sensors.  If they are triggered by the cold, maybe they will stay off once the Wind Chill Warning in the area lifts Tuesday afternoon.  If not ... shit, I might tell the mechanic, or I might just fucking drive it with those damn things on anyway.  It's driving fine enough, I guess, or maybe I just don't care anymore.