Welcome, all, to Gravy Season 2020. Gravy Season happens every year between November 1 and December 31, and is a celebration of holiday foods as well as all things gravy and gravy-related. Really, that's all it is. It also includes gravy-related humor and memes, and generally coincides with an uptick in partaking of gravy-covered foods and meals over the holiday season.
Sunday, November 1:
Working from home, day 138.
Immediately upon logging in for the night, I tell my boss that I'd like to take Wednesday and Thursday off as comp days for working the entire weekend, as by the time I get to that point I will be entering 11 straight days of working, and I need some downtime. My request is quickly granted without argument, and I let the team know.
"Comp days" are only available for salaried employees, and they're not guaranteed. They're generally awarded for service above and beyond the call of duty...such as sacrificing a weekend to ensure that everything keeps running and working ten days in a row straight without a day off.
The night itself is quiet and I get a lot of admin stuff done, finishing up what I started over the weekend while I was helping to run the ship.
Monday, November 2:
Working from home, day 139.
I barely touched my computer here and did not get a chance to sit down and write.
Tuesday, November 3:
Working from home, day 140.
ELECTION DAY.
As we enter possibly the last day of our country as a democracy before history books may end up saying today was the turning point towards a fascist dictatorship, I am at unease. There are so many things I need to write about here, and because I've been working so much I just have not had the time. Thankfully, I have the next four nights off (the aforementioned comp time) and I will take some time to expand upon those things a bit in that time -- I have to tell you all about the PS2, about Daisy's health issues, about my own world, etc. I've just been so frazzled and exhausted that I haven't had the time.
By the time I wake up in the evening, some polls are already closing. By the time I sit down at the computer, a few states are already projecting victories for one candidate or the other. By the time I settle in to start work -- TV definitely on in the background for live updates -- Biden is ahead by around 30 points or so. By the middle of the night, that lead is much more narrow than I would have expected. We did not get the "blue wave" almost everyone was expecting. Instead, we got more of the same, a "red wave" with a few blue swingers -- of which my district in Nebraska was a part. By the time Trump came out onstage and held his middle of the night press conference telling people to stop counting votes because he'd already won (I'm paraphrasing here) and I knew we weren't going to get any more results, I turned the TV off in disgust.
I am dreadfully ashamed of our country. It is not the country I grew up in. It is not the country I thought and hoped it to be. In Nebraska, there was a measure on the ballot to remove actual slavery as a punishment from the state constitution, and 29% of voters voted to keep it in there. Yes, 29% of Nebraska voters approve of slavery as an option.
I just...I just can't, y'all.
I stick around until 7:30 at work making sure everything that needs to be done is taken care of, and put on my OOO message on my phone and email so that I can enjoy the next two days off.
Wednesday, November 4:
Day off.
Election Day: Day Two, Election Boogaloo
Election Day: Day Two, Election Boogaloo
The vote still has not been decided. By the time I awaken in the afternoon, Biden is very close to 270 -- once Nevada solidifies their vote, he should have it, even if the other remaining states swing to Trump. But the waiting. Holy shit, the waiting.
I still have hope. I have only a little hope, but it is there. I have a hope that by the time I end my weekend and return to work on Sunday, we'll have a new president-elect. I have a hope that maybe this country isn't as awful as the preliminary election results showed last night.
Now that I have a bit of free time, I can tell all of you about the other events in my life that have been unfolding over the past week -- starting with the first, and most important one: my wife.
Daisy has not been feeling well for the past several weeks -- she has been getting random bouts of nausea and dizziness, and she's been coughing a lot (I hear her cough in the night when I'm downstairs working, sometimes pretty loudly/forcefully). She also thought she had an ear infection, as her ear had been hurting, and has had some...let's just say, woman issues. She booked an appointment with the doctor last Tuesday, and that's when I knew it was serious -- Daisy doesn't do doctor's appointments unless it's absolutely necessary, and we have actively avoided doctor's visits during the pandemic because, well, there's a pandemic happening.
The news she came home with wasn't good; they'd ran two different tests, and had come to the conclusion based on those tests that she had a blockage in her heart. They scheduled her for a EKG to confirm. Said EKG was supposed to take place that afternoon, but they scheduled it in Lincoln (an hour or more away, possibly longer in afternoon traffic). This was Thursday. She rescheduled it, here, in Omaha, for Monday. That meant she would need to go the entire weekend without information, knowing that there was something wrong with her that could possibly kill her at pretty much any time, but not knowing how or exactly what.
Additionally, she did have an ear infection, as she thought.
The weekend, of course, sucked. Add to it that I had to jump into the fray on Friday night and work the entire weekend through, and I got no weekend at all -- meaning, I couldn't really be there for her and help comfort her because I was stuck chained to my desk regulating the work flow of the few volunteers we had covering work. The few off hours I had that I wasn't asleep, I spent getting some food in me and decompressing just a bit by playing the PS2 (again, more info on this later).
By the time Monday rolled around, I was on day eight in a row of working and was beginning to feel it wear on me quite a bit. I put on a brave face and expected to hear the worst from Daisy when I awakened in the afternoon.
"I don't have a block," she said. "It was wrong. All of my labs are perfect."
This is wonderful, yes. I basically leapt on top of her once she got home from work to smother her in hugs and kisses.
It does not, however, account for the dizziness and nausea she has, and still continues to experience.
The next day (Tuesday, Election Day -- because there's no better day to have doctors shove things up your bits) she went to the gynecologist on a referral appointment.
The wife has PCOS. This is not a secret, and never has been a secret with her; PCOS makes it very difficult to lose weight, conceive and carry a child, puts her at high risk of developing diabetes and/or heart disease no matter her lifestyle or diet, and greatly increases the risk of several types of cancers.
I don't exactly know all of the details, but what I do know is that the doctors did a biopsy (which, according to Daisy, hurt like hell) to see if she has cancer or pre-cancerous cells. These labs will take about a week to come back. So, until then, we wait.
Neither of us are happy about this, really, but we're trying to focus on the positives right now. Adding to this is that Daisy is having a very hard, stressful week at work because, starting Monday, she gets to work every other week from home -- at least through the end of the year, anyway. This means that when she's there in the office, she has to take care of everything, and her job becomes much more hellish by comparison.
Thursday, November 5:
Day off.
Election Day: Day Three.
I spend the day doing as little as possible and keeping glued to the election results via my phone and computer. They do not change.
So, now that I have the time, let me tell you about the PS2 debacle.
The PS2 arrived in the mail a day earlier than scheduled -- and the way it arrived greatly angered me. It is stuffed into the mailbox, not in a box but in a single-wall plastic shipping envelope far too big for the actual unit, with no padding whatsoever. When I take it out of said bag, what was once (I'm sure) a beautifully-kept machine has a piece broken off the housing, the lid latch broken (so it won't stay closed) and the power/reset buttons so loose that they're almost falling off the unit. I am angry as fuck. These parts broke during shipping because the plastic pieces are actually in the shipping bag, which shows me they did.
Remarkably, the machine works and works just fine, though I have to place a box of heavy deck screws on top of the lid to keep it closed and make it play. The disc laser skips like fuck on Star Wars: Battlefront II, screwing up some music and sound effects, which makes me even more angry. I later find out that appears to be the disc itself, as when I play the original Battlefront it plays perfectly. Regardless, I am still quite pissed off and am wondering who in their right mind ships a game system in the thinnest mailer envelope possible with zero padding whatsoever.
I immediately send a message to the seller that night, basically telling him "hey, it's here, but it's fucked up" and request a refund, replacement of the unit itself, or other adequate compensation to make it right. I was extremely professional and courteous, but made it very clear that I'm sure it worked just fine and all the parts were functional when he shipped it, it was just his idiotic choice in shipping (which I paid $16 for, by the way) that fucked it up.
I do not get a response.
I wait a few days before I copy and paste the same message to him again, saying "hey, don't know if you saw my previous message, see below" and send it again.
Again, I get no response.
As it has been more than double the required three business days (per Ebay) and I have now sent two messages, I reach out to Ebay to step in to rectify this -- I'll either get a refund from the seller or from Ebay, but I will have this situation rectified. Ebay requires me to send yet another message to the seller through their system, which they will track, and after that, if no response again, they'll step in. In the third message I told the seller that I do not want to return it, as I can fix the system up myself with aftermarket parts -- which I can, of course, do, but probably won't -- I just want it "made right," so to speak.
"I hope you know," I told Daisy, "that once I get my refund I'm going to put it back into getting another PS2 from someone else, one that I don't have to put a box of screws on to keep it working correctly."
I'm not an asshole. I don't like doing this, don't like being this guy. For all I know this could be some sixteen-year-old kid selling his father's old PS2 for some extra cash, or some guy out of work due to Covid-19 selling off all of his old game stuff to pay some bills. But I am also not going to be ignored and am not going to be out $60-something (including shipping) because some dumbass didn't want to properly protect my purchase for shipping.
My wife, as well as the friends I've told this story to, all believe I am 100% in the right for calling this guy out. I believe I am as well, but that belief doesn't make me feel any better about the scenario. I feel like a Karen asking to speak to the manager.
Like I said, the machine works, but that doesn't mean I have to be happy with the events that have transpired in the interim.
Friday, November 6:
Day off. Payday for both of us.
Election Day: Day Four.
Payday. Finally. While the election results are still pending (and dragging onward at that), we get a shock in the overnight hours -- counting has caught up in Georgia and Biden has pulled ahead. With him leading in Pennsylvania and Nevada as well, a Biden victory is almost completely assured at this point. I also find it disheartening that every state I've ever lived in has gone to Trump, and it's not even been close in any of them.
I wait all day, but the numbers do not change. Nobody will just step up and call this election. And they should, because it's over. It's so over. It is over for Donald Trump and his cronies, his nepotism, his scandals, his treason, and everything else horrific he has done over the past four years. It's over, Don. Pack your shit, you're done, go back to Mar-a-Lago for the next two months so this country can start rebuilding itself now instead of needing to wait until January to do so. The people have spoken.
I would also like to note that almost all of my friends and family back home who are Trump supporters have gone radio silent on Facebook, probably out of disbelief and despair. To that, I say good. Shut the fuck up. We know who you are. You lost. America has won. Every vote being counted for Biden now makes it that much closer to becoming official, and it is just a matter of time.
The wife and I go in the evening to Trader Joe's and spend over $200 on groceries for the next few weeks. If I can avoid it, I don't want to leave the house for the next two or three weeks. As such, I get the staples I need to survive, and tell Daisy that anything else I need in the interim, I'll get from Amazon. I don't eat a lot, and what I do eat over the next few weeks will be better for me overall if I don't go to any of the bigger chain stores.
We watch two episodes of Schitt's Creek before she goes to bed. I stay up a bit longer but eventually pass out in my chair as well.
Saturday, November 7:
Day off.
Election Day: Day Five.
Around 11AM, Joe Biden is elected as the 46th President of the United States. Pennsylvania, in a surprise move, declares for Biden. Shortly thereafter, Nevada does the same. All network television (including college football) is pre-empted for coverage of people dancing and celebrating in the streets, like the end scene of Return of the Jedi all over again. It was surreal, it was historic.
With this, Kamala Harris becomes the first woman, woman of color, and woman of south Asian descent to hold the office of Vice President, and in four years, pretty sure she'll be the first female president as well (as I've long held the belief that Biden probably won't run for a second term). At this juncture, I am okay with this. I may change my mind in four years based on how those years go, but I doubt it.
As it is in the mid-70s in the afternoon and sunny, the wife and I go outside to do yard work and around-the-house work -- she re-caulks some small cracks in the house's foundation and chops up big branches that have fallen in the yard, and I mow over all of the leaves in the yard to mulch them into the grass. We also get out the leaf-sucker/mulcher and fill four yard waste bags with leaves sucked off the driveway, sidewalks, and the remainder of the yard, attempting to make the house and our yard look like someone actually lives there, and she cleans all of the spiderwebs/cobwebs off the front of the house around the mailbox, lights, and windows.
The yardwork makes me ungodly tired and sore, and after I shower, I lay down in the bed and pass the fuck out for several hours (this is customary for Saturday afternoons/evenings anyway; if I don't nap, I can't stay awake in the overnight hours to reset my sleep schedule for the week). When I get up, the wife and I squabble because we're both tired and cranky, and she goes to bed. I eat something and then return to my office upstairs, where I place a $170 Amazon order for the remainder of stuff I need for the next few weeks -- and finish my Christmas shopping for Daisy in one fell swoop.
Daisy has mentioned multiple times that she doesn't want us to spend more than $100 on each other for Christmas. I spent $108, and I am now done because of that edict. She has next to nothing for that $108 (four items total) and I feel like an asshole, because she's deserving of far more than that for as wonderful of a wife as she is. But shit costs money, and even with a much lower-key Christmas this year, $100 does not go very far at all. It will be the least I have spent on her since we've been together. I don't like it. I don't like having a limit on what we can spend on each other. It's too narrow, it's too restrictive. I'm a much bigger fan of "get what you want, don't go overboard" instead, because at least with that there's wiggle room. I don't like not being in control, and I don't like being told what I can and can't do. It also means that no matter what goes on sale on Black Friday, she's not getting any of it because of that $100 rule.
I don't have a clue what she's gotten for me, or what she will be getting, or if she's even started. I've given her a few ideas, but there's no point in speculating.
Sunday, November 8: Working from home, day 141.
Monday, November 9: Working from home, day 142.
Tuesday, November 10: Working from home, day 143.
Wednesday, November 11: Working from home, day 144.
Thursday, November 12: Working from home, day 145.
Daisy has been working this week from home as part of her new schedule her job has implemented to promote self-isolation and help stave off the Covid-19 pandemic, which is getting way worse absolutely everywhere. There were over 700 new cases in Omaha yesterday alone. As such, I've been sleeping far later into the afternoons/evenings than usual and have been spending as much time with her as is possible, and I have not even turned on my own computer since last weekend. That, of course, means I didn't write here at all.
Friday, November 13:
Day off. Friday the 13th.
I get up in the evening (after dark), immediately shower, and place a Amazon Pantry order for some around-the-house foods that I'd normally get at the store, but since we're avoiding stores due to Covid, I have to get online now. I look up at the clock a short while later and it's already after 10pm. I have no idea where the time went.
I have a remarkable amount of things to do when I haven't touched my own personal computer for a week, I've found. I need to charge and reload my mp3 players, I need to back up my hard drives (again), I need to go out and get all my podcasts I've missed, pay my bills, keep up with personal correspondences, etc. Daisy working from home throws off my entire routine, and I end up spending much more time downstairs with her just...in her presence. For the first two-ish hours she works every morning, I sit on the couch and either chat with her or play the PS2 or dick around on my phone until I'm so tired that I can't really stay awake any longer. In the evening, I get up and go directly downstairs and do the same until I have to log in for work. I also tend to sleep longer in the evenings and get up far later than I normally would, because I don't have to make sure the cats are fed or little around-the-house things are done (because she tends to take care of those even when she's working) and I don't have to make sure she arrives home safe and sound because, well, she's already here.
I'm supposed to join a conference call training thing in the afternoon hours, but I get an email notice that for anyone who can't make it, the recording will be put online this coming week. This is good because I have to take a training assessment afterwards to prove I was paying attention.
We are down on help in the office this week; one of my team leads has taken the week off for vacation (basically since he plans to work straight through Thanksgiving as per his usual shifts) so our escalation manager and myself offer our assistance as necessary over the weekend to be called in/etc if everything gets too crazy and someone at our level is needed to help out. Luckily, it does not.
Saturday, November 14:
Day off.
I spend the afternoon hours watching WVU handily beat TCU in football, and (despite their record) look like one of the top teams in the Big 12 conference.
Covid cases in Omaha are extremely high, which does not give me a lot of hope for Daisy going back to work in the office next week -- she spends next week in the office and then the rest of November she works from home. The news comes out that the third highest risk for infection (after bars and in-restaurant dining) is grocery stores, so she puts together and contemplates a delivery order from Whole Foods but ultimately decides against it for the moment; we'll hold off on it as long as we can.
I tell Daisy that regardless of anything else we do today, we both need to make ourselves look presentable and take Christmas card photos for this year -- I must get the cards created and ordered quickly as they can take up to three weeks to be manufactured and to arrive via UPS. I go through Shutterfly, which I'm sure some of you have heard of. It's expensive, but it's also worth it (to me) to have a better Christmas card than almost anyone else I know. I've done this for the past four or five years and I always change up the design/template/format of said cards every year so that it doesn't get stale. I also know that this year it's going to be more expensive than usual, because my perennial mistake every year is that I don't order enough cards for everyone I need to, and I end up sending generic cards to 5-10 people in the end because I run out of the fancy expensive ones. This year I know I'll basically have to double my order.
Some people think Christmas cards are antiquated and old-fashioned -- a last-century thing. To me it's an important tradition. For many who receive the cards, it's the only pictures of myself and the wife they get to see every year. It may also be the only reminder someone gets that hey, someone cares about you, even if that someone is very far away.
Still, one of the most depressing things I have to do every year is go through my address book and cross off the people who have died in the past year. There are a few more than normal this year. Because of Covid there's likely to be a lot more next year. It is not something I like to do and it is definitely not something I want to think about -- yet it is, most definitely, a thing.
So, in the afternoon hours as the sun is setting, the wife and I go out into the back yard to get some natural light and a fall backdrop, and we take a bunch of pictures of ourselves. Of the probably 100 pictures we take, some with Daisy's high-end camera and some with her phone, we get about ten really good/usable ones. Of those ten, all of which Daisy edits and color-corrects where she can, I take five or six and in the overnight hours, put together the Christmas card and order fifty of them.
It is close to eighty dollars. This is with two coupon codes, one for free shipping and one for half off the order. Half!
Fuck it, it's Christmas.
The cards should arrive between now and the end of the month.
Sunday, November 15:
Working from home, day 146.
I work eight more days this month, seven of them before Thanksgiving. Needless to say, I am getting very antsy for some holiday time off to decompress and to not dread waking up every day because I know I have to spend the night chained to my desk. These short two-day weekends are not enough, especially not when I sleep through the entirety of the first day.
There are three people on my team, reporting to me who currently have Covid-19. All three of them are now in recovery. Two of them have had a live-in roommate die of the disease. The other just lost her aunt to it last week. It is a scary situation, everyone. People are dropping like flies. Cases are exploding everywhere. People are being stupid. In the weeks after Thanksgiving I fully expect to see 1,000 new cases per day in Omaha, because you can't tell Americans to not gather for the holidays. Americans are stupid and will not listen. One of our closest friends, who is immuno-compromised and has been following every precaution to the letter, had a friend barge into her house maskless on Halloween and hug her. Said friend tested positive for Covid three days later, and now our immuno-compromised friend has it as well. I am so angry about that. It is possible she could die from the disease.
Look, I want to go out and do things and see Daisy's parents and have a normal holiday season too, but that is not going to happen and I get that, I understand that, and while it sucks, it is necessary. Why other people don't get that or understand that is beyond me.
There is hope, though -- Moderna says that their vaccine candidate is almost 95% effective and is in final trials now. That's great; let's get it mass-manufactured and distributed for free to everyone. Please. We need some good news. We need to be able to live our lives again. People can't keep dying by the thousands every week.
The night at work is long and fairly busy, at least for me. We're down two people and a third tries to leave early (probably because he doesn't want to deal with a larger workload than usual) but I stop him from doing so since we're so shorthanded. I deal with several hot issues, two of which resolve themselves almost immediately after I engage on them, and the rest of the night is spent trying to keep other stupid things from blowing up. I am able to take a (shortened) lunch hour to relieve a little stress by shooting things on the PS2, but I am so tired by the time I get off in the morning I am in bed before 9am.
Monday, November 16:
Working from home, day 147.
The wife texts me in the afternoon hours, just as I wake up, to tell me that her coworkers have relayed that stores are selling completely out of toilet paper and paper towels again. While we are good on paper towels, I immediately run to Amazon and purchase a 24-pack of Cottonelle toilet paper, and relay that information to her. She counters with the fact that she did the exact same thing (and even ordered the exact same item). I tell her that we're not canceling either order -- the last thing I'm going to deal with in mid-January in the middle of a snowstorm is not being able to wipe my ass because there's no toilet paper to be had in the tri-state area. Nope, fuck that. This household stays prepared.
I put away the laundry and immediately strip the bed to wash the sheets and blankets, which I wanted to do over the weekend but, because of our differing sleep schedules, I was unable to do. It also takes hours to wash the blankets and sheets, it always has. I want to make sure all of them are fully clean, and the heavy cycles take sometimes three times as long as the lighter/normal cycles to complete. And then there's the time that these heavy, thick blankets take to dry in the dryer, which can be excruciatingly long as well. It's a most-of-the-day affair that this afternoon/evening I am trying to cram into a few hours before I have to start work and before Daisy has to go to bed for the night.
When she arrives home, she tells me that she does want to go forth with the Whole Foods delivery/pickup order (depending on availability), and asks me if there's anything else I know offhand that we need as this will be our grocery shopping for at least the next two weeks.
"Laundry detergent," I tell her.
Fun fact -- Daisy hates my laundry detergent and fabric softener. I get the Arm & Hammer pods because they're dirt cheap (a 90-count pouch of them is less than $9) and use either Gain or Downy fabric softener and sheets. She hates the scent of all of these and according to her, the companies either test on animals or the products themselves aren't completely vegan (if they contain lanolin, that's derived from sheep wool), so I get that. But, truthfully, while those things bother her I couldn't give less of a shit about the laundry detergent or its ingredients. Yes, I hate animal testing and it sucks and it's bad, but I still have to wash my clothes and I'm not spending 3x-4x as much on an all natural, plant-derived laundry detergent that really doesn't clean as well or smell as nice. For Daisy, at least, I compromise -- for her stuff and for the blankets/sheets we use Seventh Generation's all natural, all plant-based detergent, softener, and dryer sheets, either unscented or scented with natural lavender. We also go through a lot more of it than my own stuff, primarily because she has more laundry on a day-to-day basis (keep in mind that up until last week, she was still going to the office daily and has to wear business-professional clothing for her job) and you legitimately have to use more of it to get clothing clean and smelling nice when you wash things with it.
I keep having flashbacks to my poor-and-living-alone years, where I'd get a $1 bottle of green Palmolive dish soap from the Dollar Tree and give that a good strong squirt into the washing machine to use as detergent for my clothing. Hey, shit works. And works well. Protip for those of you who are super-poor. A normal sized bottle lasts for about 30 loads.
We have a minor leak in our toilet upstairs; there's nothing mechanically wrong with it, but the bolts that go down through the tank (where the water is) that secures it to the back of the bowl are becoming loose and need to be tightened repeatedly; when they get loose, a little water trickles down onto the floor. Just a little -- like, a few drops. We'll probably have to end up replacing the bolts and nuts and rubber washers eventually. It's not a major issue and it's a $5 fix, but it's goddamn annoying. Even this sort of thing gives me anxiety, because if we're just now noticing this, how many other little things are wrong with the house that are going unseen/unfound and could cause BIG problems later down the road? I'm so stressed out and constantly frazzled as it is that I don't want to start the ball rolling of thinking about it right now.
The night at work is awful -- bad enough to where they called in three overtime people for 2nd shift and our escalation manager worked for over six hours on his night off. I am lucky in that I am able to leave relatively on-time as I got my own personal workload completed.
Tuesday, November 17:
Working from home, day 148.
A week from tonight starts my Thanksgiving PTO -- I made damn sure to give myself a few extra days of space on either side of the holiday itself so that I can just breathe and decompress. I believe the wife has to work the day before Thanksgiving as well as Black Friday, though she does (of course) get Thanksgiving Day off.
But. I still have to make it through the next week, and still have to work five more days on the clock until I can get to that PTO. Friday, at least, is payday for both of us. I covered almost all of my bills with my last check, but I've still got a few more to handle with this one -- plus the mortgage as well and our home warranty.
I have been informed that the Christmas cards have been shipped and should arrive via UPS on Friday; this is fantastic, as it means that I can address and envelope most of them over my Thanksgiving week PTO to send during the first week of December (roughly on schedule with every other year). It's a very time (and stamp) -consuming process. I'm sure I still have some Santa stamps from last year as well as some Christmas-themed address labels somewhere too.
After all the cards are sent out and generally between my birthday and Christmas, I post the front-and-back photos of them to Facebook so everyone who I don't send cards to (I have 362 friends on Facebook at current count; obviously not all of them get cards) can see them as well. A good chunk of my Facebook friends are college/grad school/work colleagues and acquaintances -- the cards generally only go to close friends and family of me and Daisy. But we have a lot of those people.
I'm sure some of you at least are curious as to the outcome of the eBay situation with the PS2. The outcome, thus far...is nothing. The seller never responded to any of my messages or requests, and eBay's automated system doesn't recognize that I've sent those messages/requests so it won't even take me to the section of their help menu where I can contact someone at eBay directly to step in and right the wrongs. I have not had time to fuck with it and figure out how to just "skip the middleman" on it to go to their customer service directly, because there's always something else to be done and when you work overnights, in as stressful of a job as I have, little things like that get pushed to the wayside in favor of being able to eat and sleep and perform tasks of basic hygiene and house upkeep. I'll try to look into it over the weekend, if I can. If not, it'll be next week when I'm off.
The PS2 works, at least. Some of the games' music sometimes skips or gets hung up here and there (probably due to the disc latch not being there properly or because the laser lens itself needs a good cleaning) but it's mechanically sound, it plays just fine, it doesn't overheat, etc. I might eventually just get a used one that's junked for parts -- eBay has listings of those for as little as $15 -- and swap out the lid assembly myself. It can't be that hard of a job to do. If the whole thing dies, I'm sure I could find another used one in good, well-kept condition for about $100 or so. It is but a vessel for me to shoot rebels and droids with in the Star Wars Battlefront games -- it doesn't have to be pretty, it just has to work. The games themselves are what's important.
At work, for the third night in a row, we are shorthanded by two people -- one is out on vacation, the second out on FMLA. This is getting tiresome. October and November are typically our busiest months of the year, and everything ramps up as we get closer to the holidays before, usually the week before any holiday, it all falls off a cliff and stops (because our clients are out of the office for the most part). The last two nights have been no pleasure cruise and the same goes for tonight. I keep thinking to myself just five more nights on the clock, Brandon. Five more. And then a week's freedom. By the time the weekend rolls around I may be slipping into psychosis.
Wednesday, November 18:
Working from home, day 149.
I awaken in the evening and check my work email to find the first thing I see is a bridge call invitation to all After Hours leadership from our executive director. I always dread these meetings -- it's not like we've ever actually received any good news in them. Generally, it ends up being along the lines of "here's a new drastic policy change" or "here's some other newfangled bullshit that you'll need to add to the pile and take care of every day, and it'll make your job that much harder to complete." I am, of course, always dreading that the next call like this will be the "your job here ends at the end of the year, so this is your call preparing you for that."
I will, again, stress that it is never good news. None of these calls ever tell us things like "you're getting a raise and we're modifying everyone into a three-day work week -- less hours with no lost wages" or "IT is going to provide all of you with new towers and pay your internet bill since this is now a fully work-at-home position" or anything like that.
Actually, I am due for my yearly raise -- that's something they started last year for salaried employees, and I believe I passed the date for my annual review/performance-based raise earlier this month. I've been told nothing about it. The last "raise" I got was the federally-mandated salary adjustment to bring me up to the bare minimum for salaried employees across the board, required by law. As I was already very close to that, I got something like $200 more a year for it. Woohoo.
Likely, I expect the call will focus on the new line of business our team is taking on starting November 30. Nobody at my level knows what this is yet and it's been kept very hush-hush. What I do know is that I have at least one current member of my team who starts this position on November 30, and that a friend I helped get re-hired with us will likely not be coming over to my team, but will be moving to that new program as well. In a sense, that is good news, I guess, because a new line of business equals a new contract, which equals job security for all involved. But, it doesn't come without drawbacks and certainly will create a lot more logistical staffing headaches. When I come back from the holiday PTO next month to work New Year's Day, as is customary for me, I will be entering my 7th year employed with the company, with at least five schedule changes, two lateral moves to different program segments, and one-and-a-half promotions during that time. I've seen the job change drastically from what it was when I started to what it is today, and have seen literally 100 people quit or be hired/fired in short stretches of time (I've fired at least ten different folks myself over the course of the past four-ish years)...but at the end of the day, the core of the job is still the same thing I've always done. If I find out that starting November 30, the job I'm going to do is completely changing to something else or I'll be stuck as part of a dying program, my goal next week when I'm off will be to take every spare second I have to look for and hopefully secure new employment somewhere else.
My back has been killing me for the past few days. No matter how I sit, stand, sleep, move, etc, there's always a constant dull backache that plagues me. I've had back and knee problems ever since I played football in middle school and early high school. Generally, regular exercise has helped alleviate some of those problems, as well as getting some good, restful sleep -- neither of those are things I've really been able to do much recently. I hope that when I can rest next week on my time off, it'll help -- but that remains to be seen, of course.
The wife stops at Trader Joe's tonight on the way home to pick up some things that we can't get via a grocery delivery order (for one, Trader Joe's doesn't deliver, and for two, they carry things other stores don't because they're Trader Joe's). This is apparently a risk she's willing to take. With two days left before we get paid, I don't particularly care much about what she gets. I only had a few small requests for grocery items when she asked, as there is very little I actually need at the moment. I've found I'm eating a lot less in general these days, despite it being gravy season, and the bathroom scale reflected that earlier this week when I weighed in -- I was down by several pounds. It's a trend I hope continues over the winter, as I'm not particularly fond of being as fat as I am now.
Thursday, November 19:
Working from home, day 150.
I don't believe it.
Last night when we all got on the bridge call for what we were sure was going to be bad news, my executive director addressed that elephant in the room directly -- "I know when I gather everyone here for a call it's not usually for a good reason," he said, "but tonight it's different. I am pleased to announce that we have been working in the background for this for some time to budget for it, and this year they were remarkably able to find the money for it -- all of salaried management will be receiving holiday bonuses."
You're fucking kidding.
Like, make no mistake, I don't hate my job -- not in the slightest. I know I complain about it a lot here and the stress from it causes me lost sleep and gray hair, but I am very good at my job and I am constantly recognized by my team, peers, and colleagues for being good at it (leadership above me sometimes too, but much less frequently). I like being able to help people. I like being able to "do some good," so to speak. But, at the end of the day, I am but a contractor within a smaller company being hired by the much larger telecommunications giant that I actually work for. I always say I am an employee of the much larger telecommunications company -- the contracting company just signs my checks. This is as accurate as I can possibly make it.
But. That job is stressful, it is soul-draining at times, it is full of drama and office politics, and our program will seemingly hire anyone with a pulse who can fog a mirror -- regardless of their knowledge (or, most of the time, complete lack of it), abilities, or background. And while I have some problems/complaints/gripes with the large giant parent company, I have many more problems with the contracting company we all work through. Like, a lot of problems.
As I mentioned yesterday, I will enter my seventh year of working for the company in January. Over four full years of that time I have been salaried and a member of management/leadership. I am part of the old guard, one of the handful (probably less than 30 total, most of us now in leadership roles of some sort) of employees left who have been there since before we were purchased by our current contracting company. And I can tell you for a fact that holiday bonuses for leadership/management have been completely nonexistent since the end of 2014. In 2015 we were taken over by our current contracting company and those bonuses -- as well as a lot of other perks and benefits -- melted away and disappeared; some slowly, some abruptly.
Fast forward back to the present, and our executive director tells us via that bridge call that this year they were remarkably able to budget for it and deliver on their intentions.
"You know why they're able to do it this year, right?" Daisy asked me.
"...because we all moved to work-at-home and no longer have to pay the monthly lease on the building we all used to occupy four floors of?"
"Yep."
Due to program and account restructuring, our company's presence in this town has gone from a six-building footprint to one single building over the course of the past five years or so. We left one building for another in 2018, and left that building to work from home completely in June. Both of the buildings we occupied were leased, and both are now no longer occupied by anyone. The building we left in 2018 has literally sat there empty and deteriorating in a bad neighborhood for the past two and a half years, and the last I'd heard, someone had forcefully broken into it and had ripped all the copper wiring out of the walls and ducts to steal/resell it (probably for drug money, knowing the section of town it was in).
Those folks/lines of business that couldn't easily work from home, or would prove infeasible or un-doable to transition their jobs to a work-from-home position, were all crammed into the last remaining building we have in town, our "headquarters" of sorts, which (interestingly enough) is where I did my training over six years ago now. Last I heard, that building was bursting at the seams with no room or parking for basically anyone else ever. That's a scary thought in the throes of Covid-19.
We do not know how much the bonuses will be. Daisy kept trying to get me to ask while on the call, but I kept waving her aside. Once muted, I told her that if they knew exact amounts, he'd tell us -- but it probably varies for everyone based on time in the role, employment longevity, and pay scales between Omaha and our sister site in El Paso.
"I'd be happy with a $5 bill and a cheeseburger," our director -- my boss -- said on the call.
"Wouldn't it be great if it were like, a grand?" I said to the wife once the call was over. "Not life-changing money but enough to actually enjoy."
Daisy rolled her eyes at me. "My company's bonuses are like, $200."
"Truthfully, I'd be happy with $200 too," I said. "That at least would pay for that new computer chair I had to buy this fall."
Or, you know, help recoup the cost of buying a busted PS2.
The bonus is going to be delivered in randomized batches over the next two pay periods. Some of us will see it as an additional deposit with our next checks, some of us will see it on or alongside the ones afterward. Our executive director was unsure if it would start on tomorrow's checks or on the December 4th checks.
"I don't care either way," I told the wife, shrugging. "Money is money."
Then the call ended, and all of us -- in (slightly) better spirits -- dove back into the workload of the night -- which was actually very light. I think we're winding down now as we get closer to Thanksgiving (I didn't really expect this until at least next week) and as such, my team of 13ish people only had about 40 issues total to work last night. That is nothing. That's 2-3 issues per person. Coming from being constantly shorthanded all week to having a full crew in the office last night for half the workload was very nice.
However, what we had was full of stupid. Of those 40 or so issues, I had to personally engage on about a quarter to a third of them just to make sure they were on track and moving. I had my fingers in many pies.
Tuesday morning at 7am can't come soon enough, man.
Friday, November 20:
Day off. Payday for both me and the wife.
When I awaken in the afternoon I find that apparently my bonus has already been paid out and deposited into my bank account along with my paycheck...and it is less than $100.
Eh.
It's free money. Money is money. Whatever, I guess.
Indeed, bills are paid and budget is allotted until we receive our next checks. You know how people use that phrase "living paycheck to paycheck"? Yeah, it's really accurate sometimes. I don't have any big expenses every month except for my bills. Those bills take up the majority of one of my paychecks; Daisy's are the same. The other checks for the month we use for food and the mortgage. There's not a whole lot left for extraneous shit; if I have extraneous things I need, those things go on the credit card(s) and into the cycle of bills. Not much of a choice there; we are solidly middle-class, and when middle-classing-it-up, it's all about keeping your head above water. Do it well enough to where you can breathe and survive, and it's a success.
That's also a big part of why Daisy wanted to put a limit on Christmas this year -- I see her logic, I just don't necessarily like the thought of it. I thought by the time I was in my late thirties I'd have my shit together enough in life to where money wouldn't be an object for most things -- most people I knew as a kid, by their late thirties, had their shit together enough to where it seemed that way to me, at the very least. My mother never got a college degree (I have two) and by the time she was my age now, she owned her home as a single parent, purchased it herself several years before with the strength of her own credit and job, and we lived fairly comfortably. I know inflation has risen quite a bit since the '90s, but goddamn, what an accomplishment. She also drove a new sporty car less than five years old, had no real debt, no bills were ever in danger of not being paid, the fridge, freezer and cupboards were always full of food, and I always got good Christmas and birthday presents. My mother, for all her faults, had her shit together at age 37.
Of course, it was easier then. Jobs were everywhere. The economy was roaring. We weren't in a long, drawn-out war in the middle east. We had a respectable (even if he was busy staining blue dresses in his off-hours) president in the Oval Office. And there was a giant comet in the sky bright enough to cast shadows. I often think back to the 90s and remember how much simpler everything was then, how we had hope, how America was indisputably the best, most respected country on the face of the planet. Everything was better. Everything was different.
And here we are now, so many years later, and I'm looking at myself with a ton of student loan debt for the imposition of needing to eat and keep the lights on while I was in grad school, credit card debt that I will probably never be rid of, haven't owned a vehicle in over two years, and the Christmas bonus at my job is less than $100. Amongst, of course, many other things, like a president who won't concede he lost an election and a virus killing hundreds of thousands of people. This truly is the darkest timeline.
I do have hope for 2021, however. I should probably be cautious with that hope, but we do have a new incoming president. We do have a vaccine (or several vaccines) for Covid on the way. Life will, eventually, slowly begin returning to normal. 2020 feels like a year that was stolen from all of us, and as wise folks say, "tomorrow is never guaranteed." I can't wait to go eat in restaurants again, to go to the movies, to go shopping for clothes or incidentals like a normal person.
The eBay saga for the PS2 has basically come to an end, with me giving up on it. I'm not wasting hours upon hours of my life trying to go through the same steps over and over again because there's not a simple "email customer service" or "open a claim with eBay" button. The site keeps trying to get me to return the PS2, which I will not do, or their system says "send an email to the seller and if they don't respond in three days you can ask us to step in" -- which I have now done three times with no response, and eBay's system doesn't recognize that I have. It's not worth the stress anymore to keep trying to fuck with it, we're 2 days away from the return window closing, and I've just decided fuck it, I'll cut my losses and move on with my life. I don't like giving up on things, but I'm smart enough to know when I've been beaten (most of the time).
Saturday, November 21:
Day off.
My executive director at work (you know, the one who let us all know we'd be getting bonuses) is, interestingly enough, a thrift store/pawn shop nut, and one of his hobbies is finding people good deals on things when there's something they're looking for. He heard about my plight with the PS2 and gave me a call this morning, telling me he's on the case and he'd found one of the original "fat" models for $59, but nothing else so far. He asked what my spending cap was, and I told him $50, for one of the slim ones. He let me know he'd pick one up for me if he found one.
The man has his faults, but I think that's remarkably cool/nice of him. That's going out of his way to be cool, to be helpful. I'll note that he and I don't always see eye to eye on things, but he has absolutely saved my job on more than one occasion, and in turn I've saved his ass on occasion and made him/us/the program as a whole look really good in regards to numerous hot issues at work. While I still owe him far more sweat equity debt than he owes me, his willingness to help out on something like this non-work-related quest speaks volumes about his actual personality traits.
WVU does not play football today, it's their bye week (or whatever they call the college equivalent). As such, I'm not glued to the couch with the TV on all afternoon, but there's little else I have to actually do. All of the laundry is in the process of being done or is already done, Daisy is building the new linen closet/wardrobe in her office (which she's also in the process of renovating for more comfortability for work-from-home space) and for once on a Saturday, I'm fairly bored. I'm not tired, which I usually am on Saturday evenings -- I generally take a few hours' nap in the afternoon or evening to reset my body clock for the work week -- and while I tried to get myself tired enough to doze off for a while, sleep just didn't come. I don't want to watch TV or a movie, I don't want to play on the PS2 or my phone, and I've already read numerous comics today. I'm just simply...here. When bills are paid, gaming doesn't sound interesting, and I don't feel an incredible need to sleep or be active in doing anything...it's an odd feeling. As such, I languidly graze through Amazon and a few vape sites, just to have something to do. I read the news, I check Twitter. The internet itself is rarely boring; there's always something I can do to waste time.
I am energetic, but not overly so. I don't want to go do manual labor or go dancing, but I'm conscious and feeling decent. I think my body is gearing up for the upcoming PTO this next week; I've noticed that when I have PTO or a long stretch of days off coming up, I get a several-days-long burst of energy -- like my adrenaline kicks in and is like "cool, here's some power, now power through the last of what you have to do before you get to what you want to do." With tomorrow and Monday set as my last working days until November 30, that energy is going to prove useful. Thursday night was a ghost town; it was not busy at all. The weekend, if my email is any indication, hasn't been either. I'm hoping this is a long, slow coast into Thanksgiving and that tomorrow and Monday will be dead quiet.
I do start to get more tired into the late evening hours, as I round the corner into overnight. It's fine, I expected to. If I pass out at like 2-3am it's fine, all I'm doing tomorrow is watching football and spending time with the wife. Daisy is now working from home through the rest of the month, so I can sleep later on Monday evening knowing she's home safe and sound; having her presence in the house is soothing and mentally comforting.
The linen closet/wardrobe takes her almost eight hours straight to assemble.
I tell her the next time we buy such an object, we're paying for its assembly and for it to be brought into the house and placed where we want it, even if it doubles the price.
Fuck that energy expenditure, man.
Sunday, November 22:
Working from home, day 151.
57th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy.
I always remember the date Kennedy was shot, even though it was 19 years before I was born. It's one of those dates I always remember for some reason, like the date of the Challenger explosion (January 28, 1986) or the date of the famous Hill Valley lightning storm (November 12, 1955). I've always been fascinated by the JFK presidency and the assassination itself. I've watched longform recordings of the news special reports done in realtime, with the anchors cutting into soap operas and the like. I've watched numerous documentaries on the assassination and supposed cover-ups. I've spent hours reading though Wikipedia on everything I can find regarding his presidency and assassination. Ironically, I've never seen Oliver Stone's JFK, even though the subject matter interests me and I rather enjoy most of Stone's other films. I think the best modern dramatization of the events of November 22, 1963 has to be Mad Men, though -- which, if you've never had the chance to sit down and watch that show after all these years like I have (twice, from start to finish), do that now. It is well worth your time. The way they handle the Kennedy assassination is an amazing watch.
My mother says she remembers the day, though she was barely outside of toddler age. She once told me my grandmother (her mother) ran screaming through the house "They've killed the president! They've killed the president!" I believe her. I should ask her how well she remembers the day Reagan was shot, too. When that happened she'd been married for less than a year, and I was still a year and a half or so from being born.
To find something new that is relative to my interests and isn't science fiction, and to go along with what I've written above, I've turned to Netflix, which has the entirety of The West Wing on there. After years of being told to watch it, I finally sat down last week and started it...and it is, indeed, one of the best dramas I've ever seen come from network television. Additionally, the pilot is (in my opinion) one of the best series pilots ever made. I am now seven episodes into the series (something like that, I've watched a good chunk of the first season) and am highly enjoying it.
The night at work is dead quiet, in what I hope will be the trend for the entirety of the coming week -- even though I only work two days of it. As soon as I'm done in the morning, barely able to stay awake, I go to bed.
Monday, November 23:
Working from home, day 152.
The overnight is a long, painful slog. While I am only down one person (she's in the hospital for surgery), I am bombarded all night by stupid things to take care of, manage, own, and/or fix. It is 5am before I can step away from my desk longer than to get a cup of coffee or to pee. At the end of the night, exhausted, I put on my OOO messages, make sure Daisy is awake to start her day and pass the fuck out.
Tuesday, November 24:
Thanksgiving PTO: Day 1 of 6.
I don't have to submit six days of PTO, of course, but y'all know what I mean. I have six days off.
I sleep until the late afternoon hours and wake up cranky and still tired. I can't do much about this; it's just par for the course these days. You'd think I'd be able to rest longer (or harder) when I know Daisy is working from home and I don't have to work, but you'd be wrong -- at least for today, anyway.
While Daisy works downstairs, I make my monthly vape juice order and order two more sheets of stamps off the USPS website -- I want to make sure I have enough for the Christmas cards, which I'll begin prepping this week. I'm still gathering addresses from a few folks who have moved (this is something I have to do every year, because older millennials never stay in one place for long because most don't own their homes.)
Daisy is forced to work tomorrow as well -- even though she'd originally wanted it off, someone in the office needed the day (or something) so she switched her day off to Black Friday. She is apparently all alone in the office tomorrow, but luckily, "the office" is our couch, since she's working from home anyway.
I spend the evening being as zen as possible, trying to rest and relax and get some good recuperation time in. This involves watching about five episodes of The West Wing in a row, having a leisurely dinner of vegan meatball pizza, and then playing the PS2 for a while before, eventually, heading back upstairs to use my computer for a bit, listen to several Joe Rogan shows in a row, and falling asleep in my chair while playing a game on my phone.
Wednesday, November 25:
Thanksgiving PTO: Day 2 of 6.
Remarkably, I wake up very early in the morning -- shortly before 8 -- and begin taking care of tasks for the day. There's a lot I need to get done on my days off, and some of it is hindered (at least a little) by Daisy being home/working from home. I can't be noisy, I can't have lengthy conversations with her, I can't sit downstairs and play the PS2 or watch TV for most of the day because she's working. I now know how she must feel when I'm sitting on the opposite side of the room at night working too.
Because it's the day before Thanksgiving and most of the day tomorrow will indeed be spent in front of the TV (both for the parade in the morning as well as football in the afternoon/evening) I wanted to get a lot of the little things I needed to do around the house taken care of today. For starters, the laundry -- all of the laundry. That includes all of my robes, all of Daisy's things, the curtains from her new office, and (if I get time for it) the bedsheets/blankets and shower curtains/rugs.
Daisy's day at work is hectic, stressful, and draining. I do what I can to help her out and ask if there's anything I can get for her, do for her, make a pot of tea, etc. There is little I can do overall, of course, but I want to put in the effort, I want her to know I'm there and am trying to help, at least. In the afternoon, on her lunch hour, the parents drive over to the house where we speak to them with masks on, socially distanced in the driveway without them leaving their vehicle, and they drop off a large ziploc bag of freshly baked Thanksgiving rolls and a tub of freshly made cranberry relish.
In the afternoon and early evening, as the sun is setting, I take the time to address, envelope, and stamp thirty-five of the year's Christmas cards. I still have a handful left to address and send out, as I'm waiting on some addressed from some folks and I have to prep the international ones we're sending to family in Canada. I find that I have probably 200 stamps already that I've not yet used, thanks to my vigorous support of the US Postal Service this summer and early fall. And I'm sure there's probably Santa stamps left over somewhere from last year too. Despite this, fuck it, I don't cancel my stamp orders from yesterday. Forever stamps are forever, that's why they call them that. Support the USPS. Daisy rolls her eyes when I show her how many stamps I have now, knowing full well there are more on the way.
"Hell yeah I have that many," I said. "Keep in mind that if it were not for the hard work of these postal workers, we probably wouldn't be getting a new president in January."
The night ends quietly. I find out that The West Wing leaves Netflix on 12/24, which means I have less than a month to finish all of it. Daisy calculates that this will take about six episodes per day, every day, between now and then. I'll never get through it. I'm only halfway through the first season now.
Thanksgiving Day, 2020.
Thanksgiving PTO: Day 3 of 6.
As planned, I set my alarm for 7am so that I can get up and watch the parade. It's a tradition I do every year -- I don't think I've missed a single parade since I was a very young child, and I always watch it live. If you don't watch it live, you risk missing any major mishaps or accidents involving giant balloons that would be edited out of later repeat broadcasts. Not to mention there's a certain thrill in being able to say yes, you watched it live, the tradition continues, etc.
I call my parents, and my mother tells me there's a big hole torn in the roof of their beach house -- could have been from the hurricanes that swept through earlier in the year, or it could have been caused by the apparent family of raccoons now living in their attic. I suggested domesticating the raccoons, teaching them to live alongside the dogs and training them to do her evil bidding. Raccoon minions. She did not, unfortunately, think this was a particularly amusing suggestion.
Whatever. I get my sense of humor mostly from my dad and brothers anyway, blame them.
The roof will probably take $5-6k to fix and she's not sure their homeowners' insurance covers it. I can't imagine why it wouldn't, but we'll see.
It is a mostly leisurely day. The football games I actually wanted to see were either a) postponed and rescheduled, or b) don't happen until Sunday. I watch a bit of the first game and am bored by it, so I turn on the PS2...and we immediately receive a call from Daisy's parents. Mama is very upset and lonely, sad that we're not there for Thanksgiving, despite the fact that we just saw them yesterday. Daisy asks if she'd like us to come over and sit socially-distanced on the porch or in the back yard for a while, just to visit. She says yes, and I agree to it even though my anxiety gives me bad, bad feelings about doing it.
A short while later we get dressed, grab our thickest/most-protective masks, and drive over there to visit with them on their back deck, staying at least 10-15 feet apart at all times. Daisy takes her camera and gets a lot of good photos of them, of their cats (who are wandering the back yard) and -- surprisingly -- of me, and I'm not a photogenic person. However, today I looked really good, and the pictures Daisy takes of me are some of the best pictures I've had taken of me in many years.
We return home a short while later and Daisy begins cooking. I offer to help, she declines. By the time it gets dark, we have a full meal ready -- vegan turkey, stuffing, garlic and chive mashed potatoes, peas and corn, green bean casserole, rolls, cranberry relish, and (of course) a giant pan of gravy. We eat, and watch the first half of the new Dolittle movie with Robert Downey, Jr. -- it's actually pretty decent, which surprises me to a certain extent. When it's half over, we get up, do the dishes and put away all of the food together, and sit back down -- and realize it's still barely 8pm. We play on our phones for a while, I play the PS2, and Daisy eventually goes up to bed around midnight. I play on the PS2 for another hour or so before I come upstairs and use my computer for a bit. Eventually I end up falling asleep in my chair around 3am.
And so, folks, that was our Thanksgiving.
I would be remiss if I didn't mention that this week, fourteen years ago (in 2006) is the week I moved out here from West Virginia -- moving directly into Alley's house just outside Kansas City with her, her parents, and brother -- and my first full day as a midwesterner was Thanksgiving Day 2006. What a long, strange trip it's been since that point. To put into perspective how long ago that was, George W. Bush was still president at that point. Thanksgiving 2021 will be a milestone of 15 years living out here in the midwest, and in July, 10 years since Alley and I broke up.
Friday, November 27:
Thanksgiving PTO, day 4 of 6.
Black Friday.
I awaken in my chair shortly before 9am, sunlight streaming strongly and brightly into my room. Despite how exhausted I've been recently, I haven't gotten any real sleep of more than 5-6 hours at a time. I have, however, gotten some actual rest and relaxation time in, or as I like to call it, downtime. I do feel remarkably relaxed and at peace. Knowing that I still have today, tomorrow, and Sunday off also helps that feeling.
Black Friday sales have been remarkably shitty, with few exceptions. I don't need anything at the moment, though usually I can find some stuff I at least want. Amazon had a 6-pack of black V-neck shirts I'd had my eye on for months marked down $20+ compared to their normal price, so I grabbed that. I also grabbed a new gaming mouse for $10, not because I need it now, but because I love the one I have and if/when it dies, I want a spare. Daisy has plans for her parents for Christmas (I won't relay them here) and I'll probably send my parents a few assorted things as I always do -- but I don't have any more real shopping to be done for anyone.
In the end, it was TeePublic who got some hard-earned money from me today; they had a 35% off sale on all of their apparel, and I splurged a little and bought four new nerd shirts -- Depeche Mode, The Smiths, a Star Wars movie poster shirt, and a Mandalorian shirt. I felt a little guilty, but once this Covid bullshit goes away and we all have vaccines and the like, I am actually going to leave the house again and I'm going to look good as I do it, goddammit. It is what it is. I'm not spending any more money on anything else today.
The wife, to my knowledge, did not get anything at all online today.
It has not escaped me that I'm off my normal schedule -- the new episode of The Mandalorian dropped last night, and apparently it's a big one, with spoilers trying to peek their way out all over the internet. As such I basically have to avoid most of the internet for the day until I can watch it either tonight or over the weekend. Again, it is what it is.
I have no plans. That's right, I have zero things to do of consequence right now. It feels great. There's stuff I could be doing, of course, but none of it actually matters, really.
Saturday, November 28:
Thanksgiving PTO, day 5 of 6.
My executive director reaches out to me today and tells me he's found a replacement PS2 -- $55, comes with a few games (I didn't ask which ones as they're almost always sports games, which I'm very ehhhh about). I tell him I accept this offer and we make arrangements to have it dropped off here at the house -- probably tomorrow at some point. I'll write him a check to pay for it; it's not like he doesn't know my money is good because, well, he's the one who pays me, in a roundabout fashion.
The day goes slowly. Daisy and I squabble about various things, but mainly that with my vacation time and with her working from home, we're always in one another's space -- specifically the fact that she's always there in mine, which leaves me feeling like I have no real privacy or time to myself, no real solitude. While I love spending time with my wife, there are times where I just want to be alone, get some alone time to write here or to play a game or to not be in the presence of someone else, even her. This is hard for her to understand and even harder for her to process -- mainly because her own wants are to spend as much time with me as possible when we're both off work and have nothing else to do. It's made more difficult to process when I tell her that it's not her, it's the fact that I'd be crawling up the walls if it were anyone. Covid-19 already has us in self-imposed lockdown for our social lives as well as work lives, and I lived alone for a very long time before Daisy and I got together (almost three years) -- there are times where I just crave solitude and don't want anyone else around me. Call that strange or call it selfish if you want, but I just don't know how else to describe it.
Daisy isn't a burden and she isn't a nuisance -- of course she's not. I love spending a lot of time with her, and I do so willingly and on a very frequent basis. I venture to say I spend far more time with her than most men spend with their wives. I think we talk more, I think we co-exist in the same space more, I think we probably share more meals and more TV time together than most other married couples do. I think we're probably more emotionally and physically close than most other married couples are going into their ninth year of their relationship and soon to be entering their seventh year of marriage. When I have the time and energy, I do everything I can to keep Daisy happy and to make sure her needs are being met.
Yes, that's right, Daisy and I got together in 2012 -- so 2021 will mark our ninth year together. We got married in 2014, so when we hit our anniversary in 2021, it will be seven years we've been married. I lived alone from August 2011 to May 2014, so yes, almost three years.
It doesn't really seem that long, does it?
Daisy is, very obviously, the longest relationship I've ever had; nearly a quarter of my life has been spent with her. And we're married, so (even more obviously) this is a trend that will continue, a record that will continue to be unbroken.
She and I spent the vast majority of the day together; I once more did as little as possible, and she spent the day taking care of Christmas gifts for her parents -- something she finally completed in the evening hours. There was no football I cared to watch, nothing I cared to do or read or anything else. It's been a surreal, strange vacation week. Some days I've been more energized, more gung-ho, than others. Some days I just want to crawl under a rock.
Sunday, November 29:
Thanksgiving PTO, day 6 of 6.
Either my executive director or my escalation manager colleague (they're roommates) dropped off the PS2 this morning...while I was still asleep. I texted said executive director to thank him and let him know I'd write the check to pay him if he gave me his address. He did, and I stuck the check inside the envelope with this year's Christmas card (muahahah). It goes out in the mail tomorrow with all of the other cards -- close to forty of them now, total, with a few even going to Canada. By the time I'm done, there will probably be a few more going to Canada and possibly one going to Germany as well -- I am multi-national this year.
Inside the bag with the PS2 was an extra set of controllers and cords, and close to ten games -- I mentioned that I thought they'd probably be sports games because most of the time, they are when someone sells a "lot" of a system+games. Surprisingly, they were not -- they were several Final Fantasy games, three different Kingdom Hearts games, Katamari Damacy, and a couple other titles that I'd never heard of. I paid $55 total for everything -- the games themselves were probably worth that alone, so I got a fantastic deal.
The PS2 itself looks to be in pretty good condition, and it doesn't have any breaks, scratches, or physical issues upon first glance. I'll hook it up and mess with it eventually, but my anxiety about having a busted system is now calmed for the moment. And I've got some spare controllers now, too. Nice.
The day is cold and windy. It's the last day of my PTO, and I'll be returning to work as per the usual tomorrow, as will Daisy. I actually have to log in for a bit this afternoon/evening to submit payroll, as today is payroll Sunday, and that has to be done whether I'm on PTO or not (I'm the only one who can do it). Daisy and I are both trying to get some admin stuff done around the house today -- she spent the early afternoon hours getting us a new Ring doorbell and a camera setup for the backyard, a new set of bamboo sheets for the bed, and finally, ordering more litter online for the cats. Not to be outdone, I ordered a Mario Lemieux shirt from the NHL Shop thanks to their Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals. Lemieux is one of my (few) heroes and the price was too good to pass up.
I am now done buying any more clothing for basically the entire winter -- quite possibly well into the spring months, too. I'm cutting myself off. I don't care what goes on sale or where or how. I don't need it, and I don't need to spend the money. Until Covid goes away I am leaving the house very, very little as it is.
Daisy has ordered me at least some things for Christmas and/or my birthday; one of the items was supposed to arrive via UPS yesterday and it did not (I can only assume it'll get here tomorrow or Tuesday). The stuff I've gotten for her has been sitting in my room for weeks, if not months -- it's ready to be wrapped and delivered, and as I said, I've been done for her for some time. When we get paid this week, my goal is to begin the searching for my parents' presents to ship to them. I don't usually get my parents a lot of stuff, but I get each of them a few little things and ship them directly from Amazon to save time and money. I also almost never remember what I get them from one year to the next.
In the late evening hours, I swap out machines to test out the new PS2. It works flawlessly -- it actually seems to load faster and have a better, crisper picture and sound compared to the first one. I still have the occasional sound/music glitch on Star Wars Battlefront II though, which tells me it's the disc, not the machine. Or that both machines need a good air-dusting/lens cleaning, whatever.
Monday, November 30:
Working from home, day 153.
Cyber Monday.
So here we are, folks, the last day of the month. Let's do a sort of recap and then press on to what's coming up in December. In November, I....
1. Got not one, but two PS2s -- the first of which, at Daisy's request, I'm going to see if I can return or otherwise get a refund on (probably fruitless at this juncture, but oh well -- more to come on this)
2. Watched Covid-19 infection rates steadily rise from 400-some cases a day in the county to over three times that by the end of the month
3. Left the house -- as in got in a car to go somewhere -- maybe three times
4. Showered, maybe, 10-12 times (hey, before you judge me on this, it's not like you get dirty and/or germ covered when you don't ever go anywhere or do anything but work, eat, and sleep)
5. Custom-made and ordered 50 Christmas cards, and addressed/stamped/mailed 40 of them (roughly)
6. Worked only sixteen days of a 30-day month -- taking a full week or more off work with a combination of PTO and comp time
7. Read, perhaps, 20ish comic books
8. Listened to roughly 30 GB of podcasts
9. Subscribed to two more comics and re-upped a subscription to one of my magazines
10. Ordered groceries to be delivered for the first time ever
11. Researched phone replacements as my iPhone 7 is dying (more to come on this as well)
12. Watched 17 episodes of The West Wing
13. Watched every new episode of The Mandalorian, most of the time on release day
14. Ordered eleven different t-shirts
15. Completely finished Christmas shopping for the wife
16. Had a nice isolated Thanksgiving
17. Watched Joe Biden become president-elect of the United States
18. Got some really nice glamour-shot-esque photos taken of me by the wife
19. Slept, during night-time hours, in the bed in the bedroom perhaps four or five times
20. Spent more time with the wife than I have on a daily basis probably since we've been married
21. Drained the cyst on my cat's head four times
22. Cooked a full meal for both of us and cleaned up the kitchen/dishes afterward at least twice
23. Mowed the grass and performed other yard work tasks twice
24. Did at least 20 loads of laundry, not counting bedsheets and blankets (which are washed weekly)
25. Took a nap on my lunch hour at work at least three times due to stress/exhaustion
26. Showered at least twice in the overnight hours, work night or not, while the wife was asleep
27. Continued to grow out the epic quarantine beard
Amongst other things I am of course forgetting, I'm sure.
November was a weird one, man.
On to December.
