Y11 D188

I swear, I am going to check in for my flight and go back to bed. I am tired AF. Had a rough sleep night. More weird dreams.

Here was our day:

Yep. It's that time of year. I get to enjoy it for a whole two days. Whee. B took her sister's bowling and gave me the best gift - alone, quiet time. I enjoyed it so much. Took a bath, had a nap, watched my shows on the big tv. It was wonderful. I made tacos when they got home. They left around 8, we went to bed shortly thereafter.

No plans for today. Just checking in, then leaving tomorrow around 3. All day travel. But with backwards time travel. Good times.

Y11 D187

FINALLY! I got to sleep in. Oh man did I need the sleep. I didn't fall asleeo until almost midnight so it's not like I got a huge amount of it, but I did get some deep sleep. I know this because of all the fucked up dreams I had. Just a ton of bizarre shit. From almost burning down a wedding to strangers in my house. Multiple weird dreams.

Got paid this morning and also finally hit the social security cap. They keep raising that shit and it's getting harder and harder to hit. Extra $300 on this check. Thank god.

To be fair (to be fair, to be fair...) yesterday was only moderately painful. Made a cake in the morning, cleaned the house during the day, then we went over to B's dad's around 3. The food was awful save for a couple of things. Like my cake. But god midwest food is so bland. Well, it's either bland or oversalted. There doesn't seem to be any inbetween. But I stayed and made small talk and acted like the good husband. We got back home around 7 or so with B's sisters in tow.

I heard from my sister. She is alive. That's good. I also got a text from X1 who isn't blocked on my new phone. Remedied that shit quickly. Heard from the kid. She had tacos. Make me proud. Heard from my buddy, he had hamburgers. Also proud.

Today Christmas arrives. Only 25 more days people! Woot! Then tomorrow I am up at 5:30 to check in for flight and I leave Sunday. Whee.

Now to go pay bills. Fun.

Y11 D186

The only thing I care about today is I finally have a day off from work. Everything else is irrelevant. Fuck your good housekeeping holiday which is 99% lies. Thankful? Be thankful every fucking day you're alive.

Got through the last day with my students without yelling at any of them. Thankful. Scared someone who was loitering in my driveway. Thankful. Not dead. Thankful.

Have to leave in Sunday. Not thankful.

Booked my first trip of 2020 to Seattle. Not thankful.

Bah humbug.

Y11 D185

Somehow yesterday turned out even worse than Monday with these people. One didn't show. One shouldn't be in the class. 3 of them had to go to a coffee shop to get on a network that would work. Oh and they didn't show up until 9:10. These people have such little respect for my time it's ridiculous. Thank goodness this is the last day with them. I don't think I could take much more.

B's friend had another close open situation so guess who stayed the night AGAIN. I mean she's nice and all but sheesh. Move closer to work already. Do something. Her car situation is screwed again. Sigh. I miss being in OR where we knew no one and didn't have any obligations to other human beings. Made life much simpler. Just saying.

Get through today. Have three days off. Rain has started. 45mph winds forecasted for today. Maybe I will get lucky and the power will go out.

Y11 D184

Fuck this customer. They didn't show up until 9 even though I told them I wanted to start at 8:30. Half of them didn't pay attention and kept leaving. Then they had a fire alarm at 1:15 and didn't come back from lunch until 2 (30 minutes late). Fuck them. But oh wait, I have two more days with them. Oh boy.

7,400 flights. 3.4 million people. That's what I have to look forward to on Sunday. 30 minute layover in Dallas. 8 hours of flights. I don't know which is worse. This client or dealing with that. Then I don't get home until Saturday and I leave again on Monday. So very tired.

That was my day. Ate leftovers last night. Had no energy to do anything else. B is sick. She is cranky. Fun times around here.

Y11 D183

Slept much better last night. I turned u;p the humidity in the house. Finally I could breathe. Fuck dry climates. Fuck them hard.

B got up late so we didn't do much in the morning. I washed blankets, wrapped presents, put away all the shit she had out still like the folding tables and the extra leaf for the dining room table. When she finally got up we went to the grocery store. I picked up six pounds of apples and am making apple butter right now. I let it cook overnight. I need to take the immersion blender to it this morning. Then find something to put it in. We forgot to get jars yesterday. Oh well.

B made soup for dinner which was good. Played some video games and went to bed. A somewhat relaxing day.

Now begins three days of teaching Canadians. Whee.

Y11 D182

I got up when Julio called me and stayed up. I left for the airport around 2:30. Had to wait forever for the fucking valet to get my car. Do not put some old ass dude on valet and have the cars parked three blocks away. Took forever to get my car.

I put in my phone MSP Airport and a gas station near there. I started to leave and it had me going down these weird streets. Dammit. I had 'avoid highways' on. Ok. Pulled over, fixed that, got going. Got to the gas station okay and it said I was 2 miles from the airport. Hmm. Nothing is looking airport like around here. I go to where it says to go and guess what? It took me to MSP Airport OFFICES. MOTHER FUCKER. I was actually 9 miles away from the airport still. Son of a bitch. It's a little after 3 at this point. Finally get there, drop the car off, and get to the terminal. 3:20am and it's a mad house. Oh boy. Things will be even worse on my next trip. Oh boy. I go through security at 4, and look for an admiral's club. Nope. Delta and United are primary at MSP so no club. There is an Amex club however. Fine. Day pass me. I have 5 hours to kill. Very nice club and believe me, I ate $45 worth of food.

Head to my gate and am waiting. They call pre-board and O.M.G. 2 wheelchairs, 4 elderly with canes, and then a party of FIFTEEN mentally challenged. It took about 10 minutes before they got to my group and we're group 1. Wow. Get boarded, get to Chicago. We managed to get into Chicago early so I have an hour and 20. Nice. I go find my next gate and it is right next to the admirals club. Sweet. I stay in there until about 10 minutes before boarding. I go out and wait at the gate. While I am there, I am watching the two gate agents. I can tell they are making the best of a bad day. So I give them each one of the little "you did good" things American sends elite customers. These are important to employees because they get recorded in an employee file. When review time comes around, these help give them better reviews. Both of the agents love me for it. In return, when they call Concierge Key to board, they also say, by name, I can board. Everyone there is looking at me as I go first before everyone else onto the plane. Neener neener. Even though it was a short flight, I also gave one to the flight attendant when we landed in Detroit. She was happy too.

B gets me, we get going, and on the way home we stop at her grandparent's to return the folding chairs B borrowed for her Thanksgiving thing. We end up staying for dinner and finally get home around 6. I then do laundry, timesheet, expense report, put things away, dishes, bills, mail. Sigh. All the things.

At 8:40, I give up and go to bed. But I slept rough. My nose thing wouldn't stay in. The pressure in this house is off. I need to go check the humidifier. It's not putting out enough. Just not a good night's sleep.

Now to enjoy my one and only day of rest.

Y11 D181

And here's the icing on the cake of this week - the front desk just called me. They woke me up an hour earlier than I needed to be up because they had the wrong room number. Seriously? The one time I have a decent flight time out and I STILL can't sleep because now the front desk is calling me?? Are you kidding me? Worst stay of the year. Congratulations Hampton Minneapolis on winng this prestigous title. Good job.

Sigh.

Yesterday was okay. The group had a good time and lavished me with compliments on the way out. That made up in part for the otherwise clusterfuck this week has been.

Got back around 5, packed, ate, went to bed at 7:30. Tossed and turned until 9. Woke up at 12:45 thank to Julio.

Get home around 3 today. Have a 30 minute layover in Chicago. Fun.

Y11 D180

Yesterday was better. Not great, but better. I didn't have any traffic issues this time and managed to get back to the hotel in 15 minutes. That was the acceptable part of the day. During class though it was a bit rough. Still had folks lost as shit. We didn't get through all of the material as expected. Same issue today unfortunately. Plus in the background a bunch of stupid emails were happening. I am now fully booked next week. I have remote classes for people in Canada M-W, Thursday and Friday are holiday, then I leave again on Sunday. I am getting pushed too hard. Getting frustrated.

Not much else going on. B had her bingo Thanksgiving and from what she told me it was a roaring success. I have like 5 pounds of turkey left at home. Joy. That was sarcasm by the way. In case you missed the nuance of that. I warned her it would be too much turkey but she was so stressed about things going well she bought more than she needed. Okay. It's all good.

Paid some bills. Our gas went up from $20 to $70. Yay winter. More sarcasm. Yes. It's dripping this morning.

One more day. I have a reasonable flight tomorrow. 9am. Get home at around 3 so not bad. I can handle that.

Y11 D179

I was ready to murder someone last night. The client site is 4.4 miles from my hotel. While my hotel is downtown, it's not that hard to get around down here. At least under normal circumstances. My hotel is about a half block away from the Target Center (don't get me started on places named after corporations, that's a whole different rant). Last night apparently there was a sporting event occurring there. Some wolves were playing jazz, I don't know. Regardless, my trip home coincided with the start of said sporting event. On top of that, there was a major accident about 2 blocks away from the arena AND there is construction going on downtown. In the end, it took me over an hour to go those 4.4 miles, the majority of the time spent in the last .4 miles. I nearly left the car in the road and had me a Falling Down moment. I just wanted to put the car in park and walk to the hotel. I sat through one signal nine times. I was surrounded by buses the whole time too. It was just pure hell. The real fun started around 10pm when everyone was LEAVING the arena and decided that was the time to test their horns. Good times.

My class was okay. I have 12 students, 9 of whom are doing good. 2 are struggling but still keeping up. One I lost at lunch. Like she is so far gone it's not even funny. I am cramming six and a half days of material into three so needless to say the pace is brisk. She couldn't keep up at all. Mostly it's just computer skills. She can't move her mouse fast enough to follow along. Sorry. I was told this might be the case and to push forward. So I did. Not much I can do. Two more days of the same mess.

Talked with B last night. Ate my dinner in my room. Went to bed. Listened to horns. What a glamorous life I lead.