I was afraid The Third Department was going to be hell since one of my co-workers was taking the rest of the week off, and it was.  Goddamn, I didn't leave last/Thursday night until 7:15 -- that's a 10:45 day.  I'm glad I got to the pizza place (in a gas station very close by me) before they closed.  But it might be just as bad today/Friday because there are a half-dozen tests coming in.  There were only supposed to be two yesterday/Thursday but that became six, goddammit.

Since I got home much later than I was hoping, all the things I thought I wanted to do I just didn't do -- not just because I got home so late, but also because I was so tired.  At least I have enough energy to blog post this complaint.

Addendum To: Where The Fuck Is She?

So I texted ****e* around 2.  She texted around 2:15 she'll be there in half an hour.  She suggested I leave with the door unlocked so she can just go in and start cleaning.  I thought about that, especially when she said she was taking at shit at a quarter to 3, but I decided to wait because she lives about 40 minutes away.

But then it's 3:30, and I haven't seen her and I haven't heard from her.  I asked for an ETA.  She says she's 27 minutes away.  So at 3:45 I really did say fuck this, shut the door but kept it unlocked, and just fuckin' left for Clear Lake.  ****e* said she would've gotten there earlier if she had known I was going down to Iowa, but I thought I made that clear when she initially postponed on Thursday.

Whatever.  I checked in with her at a gas station at 4:15.  I said my piece about the mix-up and that was that.  ****e* said she got there at 4.  Going to the The Day The Music Died Memorial took a lot longer than I thought, three hours as opposed to two.  And I don't like gravel roads, and I hated the humidity while I walked from the parking lot to the gravesite.  But I got there, a shrine embedded right in the middle of a cornfield.  Wish I could've stayed longer, but it was hot and it was getting late.

The nearest gas station to the memorial had 88 gas for $2.78-9/gal., 12-3 cents cheaper than I can get it here.  Still had to gas up before dropping off the rental (and by the way, I wanted to pre-pay so I could send the car back as close to the full line without going over, so I could save myself some money.  But six bucks brought me up short, goddammit, so I had to put my credit card to make sure it did go past the full line).  Anyway, after eating at Taco Bell and freaking out because one of the water leak pucks went off, I finally got home to see ****e* cleaning away.  (I think a hose in the boiler room overflowed because she was using hot water to wash out the kitchen sink.  Is that normal?)  And, per usual, she left everything spotless.  There were marks in the upstairs toilet I couldn't rub out, but she did.  Finally, she let me touch and even bite into her new tits.  She stopped me when I dropped my pants to start touching myself to her, though.  Oh, well.  Can't win them all.  And she's one hell of a cleaning lady, so I will once again tolerate her aloofness and tardiness next time.

I Have To See Supergirl Again Because I Took A Shit For Too Long

I have this -- I think I've spoken about this before -- OCD thing whereby if I don't see a movie from the beginning, I will, most likely, pay another ticket to see it again so I can be sure to see it from the beginning.  Now, that is kind of a problem if I don't drop everything and make a concerted effort to get to the theater in time to make sure I see that film from the beginning.  But until last/Tuesday night, the last movie whose start I missed was Equalizer 3.

Well, I missed the start of Supergirl.  And what I really hate about myself is that I planned on getting there in plenty of time, and everything that I needed to happen so I could get there in plenty of time happened.  I was given a shift where, if I had a normal shift, I would get out at 3:30.  I never have a normal shift at work, but I only had to stay a little longer, till 3:45.  The listed showtime is 3:50, and they have so many trailers that I knew I had plenty of time to get there.  And I didn't want to get there so early that I would start looking at my watch to see how long after the listed showtime will the damn thing actually start.  I've grown to hate trailers, so, after I punched out at work, I went to the bathroom.  Nature called.

And that's where I fucked myself.  By the time I got done relieving myself, I looked at my watch and saw that it was, oh, around 4:05.  The theater is close to work, but it still took me about ten minutes.  And even though I was able to get a ticket, the guy giving me my ticket said I missed the first 5-10 minutes.

Goddammit!  I lollygagged.  I didn't look at my watch.  Seeing how much time I thought I had when I clocked out made me overestimate how much time I really had.  I was doomscrolling as I was pooping, proving once again that looking at your phone promotes brain rot.  And, sorry to get too graphic, I did have to go.  I picked up a limited time honey brown butter bacon, egg and cheese biscuit, a sausage burrito, and a coffee from McDonald's on the way to work, and that lubricated my excretory system.  It was the second time I had to void waste during my workday, and so when you need to do #2, you can't just say you're done if there's more you need to force out of your body.  Maybe I shouldn't've eaten any breakfast at all.  That would mean I wouldn't need to doo-doo, and I could've just gone to the theater instead.  But nope, I had this great plan laid out before me, and I just tossed it to the side.

And what really makes me hate myself?  Sorry, I don't think Supergirl's that good.  Now, please don't get this twisted.  There are a lot of Republicans and incels who hate this movie for culture war/rage bait reasons, which are not legitimate reasons.  I thought the movie was kind of rote and, um, boring.  But my OCD compels me to buy another ticket so I can see this mediocre flick again in its entirety.

I plan on seeing Toy Story 5 after work today/Wednesday.  I was hoping the showtimes for that movie and Supergirl would line up in such a way so that I could get to the theater super early, buy my ticket to Toy Story 5, and sneak in to see the start of Supergirl, then go see Toy Story 5 from the start.  But unless I get there in the afternoon, that can't happen.  Welp, that means I need to see Supergirl again either Tuesday or next Wednesday.  That's when the price of tickets are the cheapest at the theater I go to.  I may have OCD, but I also know a bargain when I see one.  And hell, I might change my mind and not see this C+ movie from the beginning anyway.  But I could've just avoided all this mess if I would've  taken advantage of the time I had and shit quicker.  So disappointed in myself.

Well, I'm still drinking way too much alcohol; drank a Bloody Mary for the second consecutive day.  But hey, at least ****e finally got back to me this morning.  It would've been too late anyway, but she said next weekend would be better.  And then she sexted me a picture of herself in a dress with convenient holes, shall we say.

So, next weekend is it.  But I have this nagging feeling she'll change her mind, damn it.

Simple Syrup Is Seeping

I thought putting the full cup of simple syrup, which I made by boiling a cup of sugar in a cup of water, into a smaller plastic container instead of the larger one, would suffice.  All of the simple syrup fit, but when I put the lid on, I could see the syrup push up against the bottom of the lid, you know what I mean?

I put it in the fridge and didn't think anything more of it.  But when I opened up the refrigerator door later to get something to drink, I saw that there were droplets on the side and all around the container.  The syrup was seeping out.  I don't think the container was leaking, but I surmised that the lid pushed the syrup through any opening between the lid and the container, and if it didn't drip over the side of the container it was, um, solid enough that it could travel to the lip of the lid and then drop onto the glass shelf.

Darn.  I'm not one to clean the fridge, and now it's all sticky.  I actually poured out a little simple syrup so it wouldn't push up against the lid.  I also used, like, 15 mL of it on a, I think, gimlet.  But it continues to leak out.  I have put a paper towel underneath the collect the drops, but that's too late for the simple syrup that had dropped onto the shelf.  Meanwhile, I thought I would have used more of the syrup by now, but it doesn't look like I'll be using it at all this weekend.  So the simple syrup will continue to seep.

A Gig Or Democracy (Or Neither)?

I anticipated working a Wild Game this week.  I signed up for it and everything.  But I have yet to hear back from them confirming I would be working for them.  At some point, if I don't hear anything from them (and I swear I looked everywhere -- e-mails, texts, and especially the junk boxes for both just in case their messages went there), I have to figure they're not going to hire me.

I decided that yesterday/Monday afternoon was the deadline.  I checked everywhere one more time, but no one said, "Hey, can you work the Wild Game this week?"  I knew this was a Game for which they could use a runner, so a few months ago I blocked off two days this week at work.  Well, I'm not going to work the Game even if I get a late-night, desperation text right now asking me if I could work it.  Too late, you know?

That means I now can work this week ... however, you may have heard that there is not one but two walkouts planned for this week, one today/Tuesday and one on Friday.  I want to support democracy and protest our fascist regime in my own passive-aggressive way ... by taking those days off.  And I might as well give up the ghost to illustrate the absurd irony of this situation: The two days I had to block off to work the Wild Game are tomorrow/Wednesday and Thursday.  So I am going from taking tomorrow/Wednesday and Thursday off to taking today/Tuesday and Friday off ... well, seeing as last-minute as this change is, taking this/Tuesday afternoon off, which would coincide with a planned nationwide walkout this/Tuesday afternoon.

And, well, wanting to take today/Tuesday and Friday off.  This is very last-minute, but I tried reaching out to my new boss about flipping my days off this week.  I haven't heard back from her yet.  I hope I can still do it, and I hope this change doesn't affect all the plans she and my co-workers may have had when it comes to where they're working.  But, well, if I can't work a hockey Game, I may as well protest our freedoms being taken from us, right?

Addendum To: On Money -- When I Spend It And When I Complain About Spending It

OK, so this is what I did on Sunday.

I was still feeling the pull of the Megamall.  Moreover, I was feeling the pull of Grand Casino Arena, which was staging both Semifinals of the World Juniors.  I stay pretty late after Vikings Games to make sure the traffic thins out, but I could move it up and still leave without getting stuck.  So I formulated a plan to go down to the Mall Of America, buy some stuff at the pop-up store, eat at Popeye's (I had this digital coupon of three tenders for a buck), then drive to downtown St. Paul.  If I could find parking close enough to the arena (parking meters aren't enforced in St. Paul on Sundays, so yay for me), I would park, buy a ticket, then see the second Semi at 7:30.

That last bit was buoyed in part by the prices I saw at scalper sites.  I checked after Friday night's Quarterfinals, which included the United States losing to Finland in Overtime.  I thought the prices would crater because the host U. S. was no longer in it, but prices were too high for me to entertain.  In fact, I think StubHub told me there were no tickets to sell.  But I checked again Saturday, and not only were there many tickets, prices were falling like a stone.  SeatGeek's cheapest ticket Friday night was $93; it became about $50 Saturday, and while at work, I checked again and it fell to $39.  That's it, man; even though I was tired as hell and I would be driving all around the Twin Cities, I decided to do all this.

Well, first of all, me eating so much after the Game that I had to shit really bad threw the Popeye's deal out the window.  I felt this push out of my asshole while I was driving down to MOA, and if you know that feeling, it feels like you're about to fucking shit your pants so bad everyone will see and point at you and laugh.  Scariest feeling in the world, am I right?

But I made it to the public men's room next to the doors at MOA, aka the last place I would want to evacuate my bowels, but of course, I had no choice.  This diarrhea attack made me second-guess if I should even try and go to the Game.  Good thing, then, that I didn't plan on buying a ticket unless I found a space to park in St. Paul.

Systems back to normal, I went to the pop-up.  That orange quarter-zip that probably was going to be the thing I buy?  Well, it went from one or two of those to six or seven.  Unfortunately, the only sizes available were small and extra-large.  This was something I saw with several popular items while I was browsing for World Juniors clothing.  I couldn't buy that, and nothing else there interested me.  So I didn't buy anything there, like I thought I would.  Yeah, it was kind of a waste driving down there.  But I had to know.

Didn't feel the urge to crap after that excretory meltdown when I cashed in the winning Powerball tickets I bought (oh yeah, I did that, too) on my way out to the car, so I felt good going to the arena.  And maybe I shouldn't be surprised considering the half-empty crowds at Mariucci Arena for group and Quarterfinal Games, but I found a spot easy-peasy.  And so I turned off the car, leaned my seat back, and looked at SeatGeek and StubHub for a ticket to that 7:30 Game.  And I was surprised, and disappointed, that somehow prices for that Game went back up.  It can't be demand; these scalper sites are running fucking algorithms to maximize prices.  Makes me so goddamn frustrated.  But hey, I got there, and I wanted to go, so I bought a ticket for Canada-Czechia for, hrmph, $50.

By the way, great Game.  Back and forth, but the Czechs got the upset (even though this is the third straight year the country eliminated the Canadians), 6-4.  (That Semifinal, by the way, was delayed from its scheduled start because the first Semi went past Overtime into a Shootout, where Sweden slipped past Finland, 4-3.)  I'm glad I went, and this is the World Juniors, so maybe I shouldn't bitch so much over the price of the ticket.  Anyway, I had plenty of time to check out the merchandise tables at the "Gicka."  You remember my obsession/fear about "exclusivity," buying items that I could only find at Mariucci or the pop-up store at the Mall Of America?  Well, that OCD blew up in my face.  That hoodie with the huge 2026 IIHF World Juniors logo right on the front that I bought at Mariucci?  Saw it there.  And I also saw the Paul Bunyan & Babe t-shirts I also bought at Mariucci, as well as the first pair of t-shirts I bought, the ones that had the flags on the hockey blades on the front I bought at the pop-up.  Oh, and the pin, too.

So, when it comes to buying things that appeared to be at only one place, I got the scarf that I bought down at MOA and the winter hat with the logo on a plate stitched on it at Mariucci.  All the other stuff I bought I could've bought at any of the three places.  And the scarf and hat, for all I know, were being sold at the other two places before they sold out.  I'll rest in the peace of my ignorance.  But I think I could've been more judicious about what I would've bought if I could've went to Grand Casino Arena for that Sunday group stage Game if not for the snowstorm that blew in that day.  I think I would've gone up to the merch tables, realize that most if not all the items were the same as that at Mariucci, realize that some of the things I saw down at the Megamall I didn't see there (and vice versa), and purchased accordingly.  But now I have a lot of things that, right now, I'm not cool with (see Title of blog post).

But hey, it was the World Juniors!

Cold And Car

Going out for my annual shindig with friends today.  My friend says that whenever we go out for Christmastime, it naturally is on a night where it's extremely cold, and this year (if the adage is correct; I haven't done my research) is no different.

I'm not looking forward to it.  Well, I am looking forward to being out with friends, but I'm not looking forward to going out in the cold.  I'm scared for my car and how it'll work when it'll be below zero tonight.  I saw on the news last/Friday night on tips of how to operate your car when it's this cold -- make sure your tires have enough air (I checked; the fronts are fine and I put enough air, I think, in the backs Tuesday) and have at least half a tank of gas (I plan on filling up after going out tonight).  Also, and this was weird as fuck, my defroster seemed to stop working on my way to work yesterday/Friday.  I was on the highway while it was sleeting, and I slowly saw my windshield ice up, from the top to more than halfway down.  I was crouching in my driver's seat, panicking.  The defroster was on but not doing shit.  I had to take an exit and park at some business.  I was going to scrape the ice off, but then it started melting almost immediately.  Guess the defroster kicked in.  Too late though; I was late for work.  Fuckin' hate that.  I checked the defroster when I got home; seemed to be working fine.  Was it the precipitation that was so bad it overcame my defroster until it stopped sleeting?

So I hope I get to have a good time tonight without worrying about my car.  Maybe that is up to me and my attitude.  I say it's up to my car.

My Sister Knows Too Much

So my sister Thursday night busted me for not putting aside the bathmat.  My Mother is using the upstairs bathroom because for now she's confined to one floor and she should where the food is.  But she's still using a walker, which means that any loose object on the floor can trip her up.

My sister had warned me to put the mat away once I was done in there, but I forgot after I took my shower.  She told/admonished me through my bedroom door, and she specifically told me that she was just going to leave the mat there for me to put away.  I guess I can't complain about her move too much, but in the context of siblings calling siblings out, I'm still quite peeved.

---

Just to blow off some steam, I tried to look at porn Thursday night, too.  But the damn pop-up ad started off with a woman moaning in ecstasy as the guy stuck himself inside her, and I was listening to Halloween music on YouTube when that fucking happened.  And my sister's bedroom adjoins mine; we share a wall, and both our beds push up against that wall.

Did she hear?  I assume she has, even though she may be asleep.  I turned the sound down on my computer as soon as that porn star screamed, but it may have been too late.  My sister's smart and observant; she hears everything.

I love her, but I'm getting to the point where I wonder when is she leaving.

This Week Has Sucked/Is Going To Suck

Asked my co-worker yesterday/Sunday about my schedule.  I'm going into the lab weekly now, seems like, goddammit, and I do that tomorrow/Tuesday.

I realized last/Sunday night while exercising that today/Monday I have the MNUFC Playoff Match, and that starts at 8.

That means that I am getting home late from a soccer Match being played late, very late, on a school night, and then I have to wake up early for work the next day.

It's out of my control when I have to report early to work in the lab; it just happens it's the morning after a late soccer Match.  The soccer Match usually isn't played on a Monday night, let alone at fuckin' 8 at night, but it is, and it just so happens to be the night before I have to report early in the next morning.  This constellation of bad timing didn't have to happen.  It took a lot of bad breaks for this shitty situation to occur.  And yet it has.

I fucking hate everything right now.  I'm worried for Mother's surgery, my sister accused me of not flushing the toilet when I did, I didn't get to fuck my sex worker (I think I'll save that for another blog post), I'm scared I'm overworking my car, and most of all, pretty much every single Minnesota sports team got fucking embarrassed, from the Vikings Thursday through the Gopher football team on Saturday and the Gopher men's hockey team this weekend.  And Losses by the Wild (yeah, the Timberwolves won last/Sunday night, but they lost to The Bastard Minneapolis Lakers over the weekend), and I have been in a foul goddamn mood since Thursday and I will be at least until I get to rest tomorrow/Tuesday night.

Till then, everything fucking sucks.

It took me two fucking weeks to finally find an eye appointment at The Mall Closest To Me ... and I showed up late.  I thought I had time to get cash and buy motor oil, but goddammit, apparently it took me 19 fucking minutes to drive six fucking miles, and then it took me another five goddamn minutes to get to the eye shop.

The worst part about it is that they actually enforced my no-show.  I was afraid they wouldn't, but I don't remember the last time anybody did.  Maybe when I showed up late at my test scoring job?  But they turned me away.  And I barely hid my frustration.  I mean, you can still fucking do my eye exam, can't you?  But no, and I guess I could've come earlier, whatever.

I paid money for vision insurance this year, and I might as well use it, but obviously the year's getting late.  And I'm not going back to this place -- not after how they treated me, even if I guess it was my fault.  So I'm going to another mall and their eye shop.  Unfortunately, it'll be a month from now.  I should get there in plenty of time, and then I'll just, like, walk around.  Anything to get this damn eye exam in.

I'm Too Bleepin' Busy

Work is one thing.  But when I have free time after work, only for me to do other "fun" things every single day, that "fun" stuff ain't fun no more.

Case in point, the next several days:

• I have to work a Game this/Saturday afternoon in Minneapolis, plus there's an MNUFC Match in the evening I need to go to.  And I will have a couple hours to kill, so I figure I can go to a brewery, drink a beer, and work on my fantasy football stuff, which I should have sent out at least a couple weeks ago.
• Tomorrow/Sunday I get to sleep in (if my parents don't fuckin' wake me up in the goddamn morning), but I am supposed to go out to Palmer's to see Cornbread Harris in one of his final residencies before the place closes next month.  I figure it's better to see him now than one the final ones in September because I'm guessing it'll be really crowded after Labor Day.  On top of that, there's the Nine Inch Nails concert at the X in St. Paul.  I'm not a huge fan, but I still want to see him.  Moreover, many of my friends from high school love NIN, and for that reason I want to see if there's a ticket at a non-unreasonable price available.  Harris's concert is from 5 to 7; the arena show doesn't begin till 7:30, and who knows when Trent Reznor & Co. hit the stage.  So my plan, assuming I get a Nine Inch Nails ticket, is to drive all the way to downtown St. Paul in the afternoon to get a free spot (thank Buddha St. Paul doesn't enforce meters on Sundays), take the light rail westward to Palmer's, and then take it back eastward to see NIN.  Sounds like a plan ... a very long and busy one.
• I've realized that work on Mondays will be the longest just because the work in the departments I work in aren't usually worked on over the weekend.  Therefore, wherever I am, I have to deal with the work that came in Saturday as well as Sunday and, possibly, that Monday morning.  On top of that, I have gotten kind of tired of going home real late and seeing all the food my parents left for me.  It's usually a lot, and despite them repeatedly saying I don't have to eat it all, they're a bunch of damn liars, and I have to eat it all.  Finally, my wellness screening at work is Thursday, so the less shit I eat, the better.  With that being said, after work Monday I plan on going to Hooters because I have a calendar coupon where I buy ten boneless wings and get another ten for free.  But I will not drink pop.
• I have Tuesday and Wednesday off because I need to block off time to do some extra exercising before the screening.  I need to work out in the worst way.  But I will do that after eating dinner with my parents where I can control my portions.  Tuesday afternoon I plan on seeing ****e for a visit (if you know what I mean), and Wednesday I want to ... well, eat somewhere.  That and maybe hunt for this tool Mother wants me to find.
• Thursday's the start of The Minnesota State Fair, and assuming I get out at a decent time (and assuming I can find free parking somewhere), I will start my day getting my screening at work, then work, then going to The Great Minnesota Get-Together.  I love going to the Fair, but right now, that entire day seems daunting to me.

So next Friday will be my next "boring" day, where I just go to and from work.  Things might actually slow down next weekend.  But that's next weekend.  These next seven days are so might be too hectic for me to have any fun.

My Procrastination Got Me Into Bad Luck (Again) ...

... and it has to do with trimming my nails.  I was going to do it around 10:20, after the weather report, but I stuck around listening to Overtime of Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final on satellite radio, that got over around 11, I went to the bathroom to take a shower but scrolled through my phone.

I take long showers, but sometimes I'm amazed at how long they are.  I don't feel as though they are long because at some point it just becomes boring, you know?  And yet I went out to the bedroom to check the time: It was 11:26, just before Garbage was going to be on Kimmel, and I wanted to see that.  I'm glad I caught the band's performance, but I didn't think I was doomscrolling and in the shower that long ... and then I remembered that I say that to myself a lot.

And then I still have to trim my nails.  I need to do that all before midnight because you should be cutting them on Wednesdays because it's bad luck.  But I was sticking around to see the monologue on After Midnight.  I thought I still had time to cut my nails, but like with showering, I consistently underestimate the time I take to do them.  I thought I had time to do my nails, hands and feet, before midnight.  But I don't know.  See, I got done with my toenails, went to the bedroom and started filing while looking at the commercials.  I then realized I should take a look at my phone to see if I made it before the midnight deadline, and it said 12:02.  Shit.  I regret that I didn't immediately look at my phone once I made it to my bedroom.  Actually, I should've brought my cellphone with me to the bathroom to check the time as I was trimming my nails.  Now, I'm trying to backdate how much ad time I saw once I got into the bathroom, then thinking how many seconds I took in the bathroom between finishing my nail cutting and getting to my bedroom, and even though I don't really know, I think I crossed midnight and I was still cutting them, goddammit.

Now, I'll be damned with bad luck, and all because I couldn't get my ass going in time.  Hate myself right now.

You Know, i Wonder If I'll Just Get Fired One Day

So yesterday/Monday I got to work late because I took my parents to the airport.  Since I got to work two hours late, I had to stay two hours later than I would ... if it were an eight-hour day, which it most certainly is not these days.  I stayed pretty late, but considering how late I started, my overtime was pretty modest compared to the ten-hour-plus days I've been hauling in in weeks past.

I thought the new person was supposed to start today, but I didn't see her/him at where her/his desk would be.  I surmise that she/he is back in human resources getting onboarded, and she/he will be there today/Tuesday or, at the very latest, tomorrow/Wednesday.  Or, this person just flaked and it'll still be the four of us doing everything.

But if there is a new person ... I apologize if I've blog posted about this before, but once this new person is fully trained ... why in the hell couldn't I be fired?  I've been pulling OT money since the New Year, so to a higher-up's eyes I'm just a money drain.  If someone can work faster (and thus cheaper), they obviously would go to that person and cut me loose the first chance they get.  And I still go back to my former co-worker who immediately and mysteriously got let go around summertime.  Why was he let go?  Was it a personality issue?  If not, then it was a work-related issue.  Maybe he wasn't doing his job.  Or ... he was seen as too slow and just racking up the money, thus becoming, to their eyes, a "liability."  I could be wrong about his departure, but unless and until someone tells me the real reason he was let go, I will assume the worst, which was he was fired because the company didn't want to pay him anymore.

Naturally, if the company didn't want to pay him anymore, and I have to stay late and get overtime in order to get my work done, thus getting paid more than others ... and if there are enough people there for the work to get done in some sort of timely manner ... why wouldn't they let me go?

That thought just came across my mind while I was working.  That's all.

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?

The Definition Of Best Laid Plans Ruined

So I got out a little late because Mother wanted me to help her out at Walgreens for some reason.  I get to the stadium in time, but I get lost, and then I decide I really want to eat and drink something while there, so I decide to miss some at-bats while I get food and a beer.  But then the Game goes slower than I thought, and then it goes into extra Innings (Griffin Jax blows a three-Run lead, goddammit), and I only got metered parking for four hours, so I make plans to leave early, but then the Game ends quickly in the 10th Inning (Twins win!  I was wrong in the WMNSS!) as I leave the bathroom and go downstairs to see my friend, who's ushering the Game.  And then I tell him I have to leave before my parking expires, even though I promised him as I was walking into the stadium that I would talk to him for a bit before I leave.

Also, I was hustling because this bodega close to where I parked sells these supposedly awesome breakfast egg sandwiches, but they close at 3:30.  I get there at 3:32, but it looks like everything is closed.  So, to sum up: I missed big chunks of the Game including the Game-ending play; I had to buzz past my friend even though I told him I wanted to talk; and I was too late getting this egg sandwich I want at possibly the only time I will be downtown on a weekday all year.

Damn, man, I need an HJ so bad.

The Price(s) Of Going To A Concert

As I may have mentioned earlier or in the past on WAF, I have wanted to see Helmet for some time.  I am familiar with only one song, but it's the song -- "Unsung," featuring the most kick-ass long outro this side of "Layla."  It probably is one of my 15-most favorite songs of all-time, and it could be top ten.

And because of that, and despite me not really being a Helmet fan just because I know the one song everybody else does, I decided to pay money to go to a concert to see the band just for that song.  It may not be efficient, but if I love the song enough, I have decided it's worth spending the money to buy an overpriced beer, stand behind people blocking the view of the stage, and wading through song after unknown song just to hear the one that you've been rocking out to since your twenties.  I didn't buy a ticket to the Dakota when Cowboy Junkies were in town.  "Sweet Jane" may be, IMHO, The Second-Best Cover Of All-Time, but the ticket was just too expensive when I might know only one other song that I have heard of from them.

But Helmet?  The ticket price was more manageable -- at least I thought.  I was going to go, but I really did not want to pay full-price for it.  So, once I remembered that the Helmet concert was last/Monday night at the Varsity -- I've been busy with work -- I waited and checked (when I could, or when I remembered) on scalper sites SeatGeek and Stubhub.  For some reason Stubhub was more expensive than face value and some tickets on SeatGeek were below.  But I also checked the firsthand website selling tickets to the concert and there were still tickets available.  I figured that so long as it's not sold out, people selling secondhand have to offer them for cheaper than full price, and that is where I really want to strike.

I was going to set a drop-dead date for Sunday.  If I didn't find a below-face ticket by then, I will just go to the firsthand website and buy there.  But then I got busy thinking about packing up the house for when my parents come home.  I decided that if I was going to spend any money on Sunday, it would be cash only.  So when decided that Sunday was a no-credit card day, I totally forgot about Helmet.  And so by the time I paid for Chipotle that afternoon and a carrot cake and tea at Caffetto that night, I had committed myself to only purchasing through paper currency, and that meant not using my credit card to buy a ticket to the show online once I remembered the concert.

But, dammit, I couldn't help myself.  If I waited until the next day, one where I would permit myself to go back to using credit cards, the place might be sold out.  So just before I went to bed, I checked Ticketmaster to see if the price of the ticket I saw when I was checking the same site a few hours before at Caffetto.  But the damn page just stalled out, and it gave me an error code.  Oh, shit.  Did they just sell out the show?  Or are they pulling all unsold tickets?

Well, as peeved as I was at myself with hesitating and losing, I decided then that if the ticket was above the price I last saw it as, which was a bit more than $41, I will skip seeing the band.  I tried again the next morning.  This time there were tickets available, but it was for $48.  And I saw the phrase "Day of Show" -- ohhhhhhhhhhhhh, so that's (probably) why I got that error code when I checked for tickets overnight.  They just needed to adjust its price higher.

And yet that made me dig my heels in more over not paying more for a ticket than I saw it as.  Never mind that I kind of screwed up.  Maybe people were still selling tickets they can't use.  So I waited through yesterday/Monday at work ... well, it was easy to wait because I got so wrapped up in all the crap that came at me at work that I totally forgot.  And when I got home, determined I was going to go to the concert, I was equally determined to eat Jimmy John's first.  So I got Jimmy John's, went home, ate, relieved myself, then got back in the car ... all the while forgetting to check SeatGeek or Stubhub.

I remembered I hadn't done so while I was driving.  Shit.  I had to go to a gas station and park while I got out my phone and looked at the scalper sites.  I saw one on SeatGeek going for $21.  Ah, so thinking there would be a dirt cheap last-minute ticket from someone whose friend cancelled did work after all!  And I tried to buy it, but as I progressed through the pages, I kept getting an error message, so when I went back, the ticket was gone.  Goddammit.  I might have had time to buy the ticket if I looked through SeatGeek while eating my sandwich, but I didn't, fuck me.

But I was still on the road, and I wanted to end a bad day at work with Helmet, dammit.  My only thought, then, was to go there and see if there were tickets still available.  Thank goodness the Varsity is not one of those places that has a fake box office, where the person behind the window tells you go to the app instead (that was the case, or at least I think, at the soccer park for St. Louis City).  Indeed, Helmet tickets were available -- and for $37.50.  That $48 I saw that morning included a convenience fee of $13.  So, all in all, buying the ticket the old-fashioned way was cheaper than buying online, at least in this case.  And I still remember the hell of not getting that Frozen Four ticket last year, so maybe I wouldn't've gotten that $21 ticket after all.

And you know what?  I liked the Helmet concert, even the other songs I've never heard.

Have I ever posted a video of "Unsung?"  Well, even if I have, here it is, the second version of the video with the remastered, "known" version of the song remastered once they signed a major-label deal:

So we got socked with a lot of snow overnight and through yesterday/Wednesday morning.  I had no time to get the measuring stick out -- turned out I was an hour late getting to work -- but reports I saw from spotters around where I live pegged the amount as between seven and eight inches.  Yowza.  Glad the snowblower got through, oh, three-quarters of my driveway before it conked out for the second time.  Have to get that carburetor cleaned.

Unfortunately, I have only so much energy.  I got to work late, and considering all the work that has come in, I thought I had to pull another ten-hour day, so I would get home in the heart of the evening.  But I didn't; with some help from another co-worker, I got out there after working only an extra half-hour.  That was great because I used that extra time getting home early to clear up almost the entire driveway (a driveway, by the way, that lost a lot of the snow and ice that was on the ground; man, the Sun's rays this time of year can attack the deepest of snowdrifts, including the one made yesterday/Wednesday morning).  But I had no energy to do anything after that, and this was the day I was going to stay home and start cleaning up my stuff.  But the damn snow was the priority.  I'll have to put my stuff off yet another day.

---

My supervisor is going to shadow me at work today/Thursday.  I think she's cool, and this is only because she's trying to streamline the work we all do so, well, we won't have to pull ten-hour days on the regular.  So why am I so nervous?

My Plan Was. ...

 ... to do all the chores I wanted to do between waking up today/Saturday and before the Houston-Los Angeles Chargers Wild Card NFL Playoff Game -- namely send off a piece of mail for Mother, dropping off metal drip pans at a recycling center close by, placing the old eggs my parents left for me in a compost bin at a park in Minneapolis, go grocery shopping, get a haircut, then eat Taco Bell (OK, this is not a chore) -- and have enough time to take a nap before the Game.

Nope, didn't happen.  I didn't leave the house till 11:30, which is about an hour after my ambitious dream time of leaving at 10:30, so that hampered me.  Also didn't help that I chose to stay and wait 45 minutes to get my haircut, but I really wanted to do it today.  Finally, I did stay up till around 5:30 this morning, so when my body got tired shortly after the start of the Game, it shut me down.  I think I woke up some time in the Second Quarter, when the Texans took a lead they never relinquished, but I woke up a bit past 7, missing the entire Game.  I guess I can comfort myself in knowing Houston routed the Chargers (which is a surprise, as was Justin Herbert throwing four Interceptions), so the Game would've been boring to stay up for.  But I wanted to stay up for it, and I didn't.  Hrmph.

Yeah, It Was A Mistake Eating Those Eggs

Before they left -- have I blog posted about this already? -- my parents left me four cartons of eggs.  And they told me to eat them.  Sure, eggs are perishable, but I've done this dance before.  Despite the expiration and best-by dates, I've eaten eggs that are supposedly "spoiled" and I came out of the other end just fine.  I'm still alive, aren't I?

I was thinking that after a month of them being gone, it was finally time to eat these eggs, and there was no better time than after exercising Sunday.  Of the four cartons, one of them only had three eggs in them, so I started there.  I eschewed the float test because 1) I thought it better to just crack them open and see if they were discolored or otherwise looked and smelled bad and 2) I had ideas of using egg whites an incorporating them into a couple cocktails I wanted to try.  The third egg I cracked open had a runny yolk, even though I accidentally drove my thumb through the egg shell when I cracked it open, so I threw that one away.  The other two looked and smelled and seemed fine, so I had them scrambled.

I knew I was in trouble a couple hours after I ate them when I felt bloated.  A bit later, I let out a noxious fart.  And then, about 90 minutes after I fell asleep, I was jolted awake by my body, which told me I needed to go to the toilet, immediately.  My excretory system was barking at me so loud that I couldn't fall back asleep, and I had to make two trips to the porcelain throne, before I left for work and during morning break at work.

That's when I looked at the Julian calendar three-digit stamp on all the cartons.  They were packed around mid-October and Halloween.  The United States Department Of Agriculture says that eggs are good to eat four-to-five weeks after the packing date -- which means the eggs were good until, well, the time my folks left for the winter.  And they told me I could eat them?  Now, like I said, I'm sure I've eaten eggs well past this threshold and was fine.  But after the episode I had yesterday/Monday morning (and I still feel slightly nauseous, which might be a sign my body is still fighting the salmonella poisoning), it would be stupid of me to even risk it.  So I'm going to find a way to dump them in an organics pile in Minneapolis.  Don't care if it's three full cartons of eggs.  What, are my parents going to know?