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Sunday, July 29, 2018

beginnings of ends

in one week, gd has completed her conversion course, i've accepted a job offer and we've taken an apartment in the city centre. mr smear and i appear to be over being horribly sick, gd appears to be making progress in the health department and i've begun a different kind of training regimen.

---
monday 25th june:

working and playing until 2.40am

the lifting floor becoming a bit freaky

up at 7.30 to a very unhappy gd - it appears that the nerve block procedure was ineffective

not only dropping mr smear off late but forgetting his schoolbag, going all the way home to fetch it, stopping by the vodacom store to learn that the sms informing me that gd's phone was ready was erroneous, delivering mr smear's bag, hitting the gym, struggling a bit with the run but a lot with the jump rope, bag and planking (a bit weak and dizzy), work progress and an infuriating experience with a recruiter prompting me to send an angry email to her boss - that earned me a phone call and it turned out to be the company's fault and not hers...

forgetting to eat until it was too late to order, picking up mr smear who'd napped at school (the teacher was laughing because he messed about for a while, and when he finally did put his head down it was with a naughty smile so they were sure he wasn't asleep)

coming home tired and hungry (and sore, my back and neck were giving me problems); angrily cancelling my GAP insurance policy and trying to contact a montreal consulate on st jean baptiste day, work and puzzles and coffee, taking mr smear out with his plastic bike, running into our neighbours whose uncle had just been murdered in stellenbosch, a big grocery shopping with no loyalty cards, a good dinner and shower and bedtime and passing out myself for an hour, then lying in bed uncomfortably

tuesday 26th:

until 1.30am, getting up in a haze, working well until 4am when gd woke up, chatting and playing a bit more human resource machine befoe before crashing around 4.40am

difficulty getting up at 7.30, choco-banana not working as expected, late for school, hitting the gym only for the workspace and preparing for ios dev

a relatively productive morning (although it could have been more so if xcode hadn't taken so long to download), a delicious lunch (although they have precisely one vegan item on the menu and were out of its main ingredient), taking mr smear home, filling up the car, paying the phone store another pointless visit, upgrading my phone contract at the waterfront, a lot of small shopping, coming home with the weariness of a few days of sciatica (both sides), eating, making a smoothie with oranges (bad idea)

my mom and me visiting my uncle who's clearly on his last legs, his girlfriend forcing him to eat way more than he could handle in spite of our protests

a fast shower and bedtime, gd not feeling good, remembering why i despise the israeli consulate in montreal (i wasted a lot of time on multiple attempts to call them, they pick up and put down)

reading a bit of deadpool, a productive chat with SxS, trying to clear my desk a bit

11pm nightmares

wednesday 27th:

2am bedtime after a night of mixed work and faffing, a slow wakeup but feeling better than the day before, late for school but a quick drop off followed by a good workout, coffee and lunch and learning swift for a bit before diving in to my first ios project

sudden, overwhelming exhaustion about half an hour before i needed to pick up mr smear

*TRIGGER WARNING POOP STORY* at least he was good enough to come and tell me that he'd pooped on the floor. i wish "the floor" hadn't primarily meant "the bathmat". i wish the poop hadn't been soft and slimy. and that i hadn't made the mistake of getting down on one knee to clean him up while wearing nice pants. i really hope i've done a good enough job of cleaning him. and the floor. and the batgirl figurine he was busy playing with at the time. is 3pm too early in the day to start drinking?

discovering that mr smear's problem with solving puzzles was one of motivation - as soon as it was a picture of a superhero who could only be saved by completing the puzzle he performed beautifully and didn't need to start with corners at all

gd's passing grade for her conversion course after retaking some of the exam - it turns out she knows plenty, but just isn't in a good place for writing exams (in addition to the learning difficulties imposed by pain meds)

taking mr smear for a promenade ride, some stressful moments, running into a friend of his and grabbing his dad's skateboard (and standing on it well!)

back home for dinner - putting on hebrew music videos in the background, mr smear and gd both definitely dig karolina - mr smear standing under the shower by himself for the first time in almost four months

only reading in the dark (grimm), entering the second season of luke cage (shades is way overacted), napping until midnight

thursday 28th:

two hours finding documentation for GAP insurance, then two hours working, almost three and a half hours sleeping

the beard trimmer cutting out almost from the start

that awkward moment when you can't identify the other parents walking towards you with the sunlight behind them and you and your kid are in the middle of the chorus of brand new day

going straight to my laser treatment, arriving early and picking up a chai latte at vida, having a laugh with the barista when we realized that the card i'd given up on using had just the amount i needed

a very quick treatment (hopefully meaningful), returning home to scan an out-of-print graphic novel volume, handle some chores (the GAP insurance company's response to my public complaints was to actually start doing their job) and get some work done

picking up mr smear and taking him to play at one of his best friends, sadly not thinking to bring a laptop...

holy **** bacterial takeover is a stupid, and stupidly addictive game

coming home, setting mr smear up with monsters inc as a babysitter so i could take a work call, gd coming home after having resolved an issue around my uncle's "care" (the man's dying, he doesn't need to be force-fed)

work, dinner, exhaustion, coffee, shower, full reading, luke cage with half an eye

friday 29th:

watching some smart entertainment and working until 2.30am, going to bed with a sudden sore throat

dropping mr smear off very late, picking up coffee and racing through the pouring rain to gd's not-hypnotherapist, good work and bacterial takeover inspiration, bumping into my cousin in the gym for a very interesting talk about water and community upliftment, printing issues and a little work and picking up mr smear

the cleaning lady not coming in because it was raining, then not answering her phone

a quick meeting, a lot of paperwork, big grocery shopping, a pleasant service at the temple, trying to arrange chinese but our favourite place was still closed and the option across the road didn't have tofu (?!?), picking up pastas in the rain, gd's being inedibly spicy and having to go back again (the owner was mortified, somebody had accidentally dowsed all their garlic with chili oil)

mr smear dropping out easily, gd watching the rest of thor: ragnarok and me passing out on the couch

saturday 30th:

everyone sleeping in, a generally miserable wintery day spent mostly indoors and grumpy, the door and window guys finally coming in to sort out the leaking frames so we could stop with the masking tape

taking mr smear along to take my mom to builder's warehouse as an "excursion" but his feet barely touched the floor and his mood certainly didn't improve

"practicing patience" by not interfering with my three year old doing a jigsaw puzzle was one of the most stressful and perplexing six minutes of my life. it's funny how things we take for granted as intellectual can be heavily experiential. either that or my son's an idiot...

a short nap, trying out magic carpet and myst (i know!), spending far too much time with bacterial takeover, a long failed goodnight (i read to him until 9.45 before asking gd to step in)

sunday 1st july:

finally getting up from my pc and heading for bed around 1.20am

a slow morning, finally picking up mr smear's epipen, meeting our seattle friends at the superpark for a great obstacle course hour - not only did mr smear use the climbing wall grips with no involvement from me but he then went straight through most of a thin rope web with me just watching with my mouth open

coffees and babycinos before returning home to pick up gd, an extremely unpleasant journey before we found a softer space and went to a friend's birthday party; mr smear and his friend playing together under a table in the smoky german club, amazing vegan curries and generally good vibes until mr smear had had enough

playing some more bacterial takeover then exorcizing that demon from my phone, but not without htting upon a practical application for such a dastardly addictive system

mr smear's long goodnight, actually managing to chat with scrapper for a while, interrupted by mr smear yelling because he needed a diaper change, scrapper's shock that we're living in this crazy place

mr smear's quote for the day: "the DEA fights the crack, we will put the DEA in the naughty corner"

a long evening of getting stuff done

monday 2nd:

crashing after a violent storm and completing an integral task around 2am

dropping mr smear off with a new teacher for the week and the awful sensation of instructing people in the use of an epipen and being uncertain of whether they understand how to avoid getting to that point (i had a bit of an anxiety attack afterwards)

heading through to cape mail to pick up and pay customs duty on the brainiacs item i'd tried to cancel, taking the opportunity to hunt down the parcel they'd lost and finding it - it was received in october, processed in december and seized in january, i was informed in march, gave up trying to find it in may, and i'm now waiting for the nice SARS lady to pick it up from storage for me

driving back through intense and wonderfully varied weather preoccupied by my earlier anxiety, driving via langa due to a signage error, mr smear seeing me and running up to say "did you miss me, daddy?"

working from the gym and sitting next to and chatting for a while with a guy i'd met at the birthday party the day before

picking up mr smear with gd, viewing an apartment, driving around to get a sense of the area, mr smear passing out on my shoulder at the bollywood cafe while the non-indian manager made sure that we'd be coming back even if they're not the cleanest establishment

passing out for an hour and struggling to get up

coffee and some good physical puzzle performance, leftovers, mr smear standing under the shower again but this time learning not to eat soap - afterwards remanding himself with his catchphrase "NEVER DO THAT AGAIN!"

putting mr smear to bed with rls ruining what would otherwise have been a great reading time, going to bed myself around 10pm as soon as it abated

tuesday 3rd:

and getting up a little after midnight to work until after 3.30am

everyone struggling to get up four hours later, but getting into the day positively

retail therapy can be a thing if i'm actually successful in purchasing stuff i really need (well, that mr smear really needs)

i was never any good at skipping, which anyone who's ever trained with me will happily attest to. one painfully obvious thing i've learned from the jump rope, yet can never seem to remember, is that the more you do it the less effort you need to expend, and if you come back to it after a long time you need to repeat that earlier effort if you don't want to keep slapping your head and feet with the rope.

more workspace-buddy chatting and deploying the code i'd been working on for two weeks, picking up mr smear and taking him to the hospital, a long trek to get to the pathology labs that i didn't know i'd parked right next to

explaining to mr smear that it would hurt and that it was okay to cry and being extremely proud of him exercising breathing control two seconds after it was over, taking him home and doing new puzzles with him

visiting my uncle who could by then barely talk, an embarrassing moment sharing a memory of something racist my father once said in front of the black carer and without context

gd's delicious potato dish that was worth a pyrex exploding, mom visiting and a sad discussion about my sister and her daughter (who's finally filing for divorce after discovering that she's his beard)

wednesday 4th:

our third anniversary

sleeping well the whole night, waking up from an insane dream* with my neck at a bad angle that caused a spasm

* gd and i on a comedian's show, fleeing a psychopath using giant chained metal hoops, trying to steal a helicopter, the psychopath managing to get into the cockpit while i teamed up with the helicopter's owner, surprising the psychopath and throwing him into a chasm like a ragdoll, the owner bumping his head and me giving him a whiskey-soaked sponge

toy story 3 on the ps3 and breakfast, drop-off, home, an exciting interview (for the company i'll start working for in three weeks), cryptocurrency account management, meeting sailor in town (buzzed, possibly all the caffeine), picking up mr smear, playing more toy story 3 and gd's captain america mask, sailor calling, mom calling during that call, gd receiving a phone call just as a british recruiter phoned me, mr smear yelling at me and the security guard buzzing to remind me about a delivery all at the same time

hulk mask park mission: "i'm not a superhero, i'm a HERO"
parking lot anger on the way to a date night
deciding that mr chan is kind of like p.m., but having to complicate the kitchen to get vegan meals

thursday 5th:

a second full night's sleep
emergency bread shopping
little captain america belting out bohemian rhapsody
krybabie's mother calling me for free IT assistance
good run, stretch, jump rope frustration, good planking
lots of work buddy chatter

a joyful captain america, home to puzzles and more toy story 3, general tiredness

a promenade walk that began with mr smear on his plastic bike, had me carrying the bike most of the way, and created a proper tantrum that was utterly infuriating because he cried until he threw up and then expected me to pick him up while i was carrying the bike in one hand and puke-soaked tissues in the other with no trash cans in sight

shower, big dinner, grocery shopping, easy bedtime

a really uncomfortable neck / back spasm, trying out the second season of glow, lots of effort into small chores (business cards in particular)

friday 6th:

working until 2am, everyone having difficulty getting up, gd sore and with a headache and my shoulder still locked up

dropping off little hulk at school, dropping gd at the dentist and getting in some relaxed exercise (why am i not losing any more weight?), a pleasant chat with workspace buddy culminating in him disappearing for a while and returning with a copy of the 4-hour work week for me

restify's latest version's routing changes not only breaking code, but forcing me to find another solution entirely and binning months of hard work

mr smear calling a little boy wonder woman on our way out from the school

a tired afternoon, grocery shopping and task justifying to SxS, taking mr smear to the temple for a pleasant service and fun kids' activities, mr smear dropping his weight on me for a while and eventually arriving at my uncle's in need of a stiff drink

kiddush around his bed, a very nice dinner, generally fun except for the bit where my cousin fired me up with a story about an insult he received in an orthodox synagogue and i let my uncle's girlfriend have a summary of judaism in an angry hebrew rant before learning that she was very busy finding religion to cope with breast cancer

a little difficulty getting mr smear to bed, my mom suspecting that the floors are lifting because of us and suggesting we stop saving water and keeping the windows closed (doesn't seem to have made much difference)

saturday 7th:

waking up late to a warm berg wind and throwing everything open, a long and late morning indoors, mr smear messing about with crayons and me getting deep into pony island
suddenly feeling sick and dizzy, probably nerve pressure

taking mr smear to the park for an enjoyable playdate, mr smear riding off twice and almost getting properly lost, meeting sailor and a few of the playdate parents' friends, eventually grabbing something from newport deli and finding ourselves locked out of the wrong side of the park

completing pony island (superb game), a surprise visit from our cousins, an easy shower and bedtime, ender's game (great movie, a pretty good translation from the book)

sunday 8th:

in bed by 1.30am

being one of two dads surprised by a long park playdate, successful shopping and bumping into my mom, quick coffee and home for a nap / iphone game evaluation (doing it for my son, of course, totally selflessly), jumping up to rush to dischem for baby wipes, picking up laffot and arriving home just after our seattle playdate friends did, coffeeing up and meeting sailor for a walk on the promenade, being joined by protoplasm and returning to our shamefully messy apartment for drinks and dinner and a lot of chatter, eventually driving our playdate friends home and incorrectly believing that mr smear would be ready for bed...

... a long goodnight, falling asleep on the couch

monday 9th:

sleeping late and keeping mr smear home from school for a stuffy nose that turned out just fine, my neck still very messed up, joining sailor at bootlegger and introducing him to my personal telephony project, an hour or two struggling with ibm tech and finding alternate solutions

scavenging leftovers, taking little batman to the aquarium, then to buy another puzzle, vegan chocolate raspberry ice cream (win!), mr smear donating to the soccer man, no naps

VSTS deployment call, going upstairs to steal onions and my uncle's girlfriend's intolerable behaviour, dinner, a good shower experience (mr smear handled shampoo with no stress for the first time ever) followed by a poop-in-the-tub, reading to bed, finishing a leftover laffa then passing out to dirk gently while stretching out my neck

tuesday 10th:

a couple of hours with minor tasks and deployments

up early, a rush to feed mr smear and get us out by 7.45, which is roughly when he started coughing things up... managing to drop him off at school and get the car to the panelbeaters by 8.40

a fascinating interview (and a very confusing office entrance), meeting sailor for a chat

being confused by the suggestion of getting a job offer with no assessment (which i'd forget about until the job offer actually came in)

walking to the car rental, home to wolf down lunch and discover seitan biltong (herbi vohr products are fantastic), picking up mr smear, getting some investigating done, crashing for an hour, taking little spiderman to the blue train during a phenomenal sunset, shower and bedtime, a comixology refund that turned out better than expected, dredd and marshmallows, work

wednesday 11th:

work + installation wait (serial cleaner and pony island) until 3am

mr smear keeping himself awake coughing all night, working from home and becoming increasingly frustrated by the azure nuget packages AGAIN

my aunt's mother's funeral, biggles showing up from london unexpectedly, determining that if somebody needs something to remember me by i'd prefer a cactus to a headstone (oddly enough, a few days ago i saw these organic burial pods)

manic. manic, manic, manic.

mr smear throwing puzzle pieces everywhere, taking him to unsuccessfully find a balance bike, putting him to bed around 5pm, a second grocery shopping, (my) sibling drama prevention, a bit of work

netflix proxy detection and tech support fail - a long time on the phone arguing with their agents

passing out early and exhausted

thursday 12th:

a good night's rest with gd handling mr smear's 5am wakeup call, dropping him off on a rainy day, back into exercising (although lightly, not feeling 100%), good work progress, amazon once again making their interview process unpleasant

explaining to mr smear that mommy and daddy are always in his heart and that he's always in ours, so no need to stress about whether or not he's being picked up from school

working, mr smear's first time standing under the shower directly and enjoying it, my mom babysitting so that gd and i could go to prayers for my aunt's mother

dinner, intriguing news of my sister's willingness to dine with our brother for our uncle's sake

easy bedtime, calling our ISP to discover that the netflix problem was their fault and they hadn't thought to let us know, an impressive first episode of siren

late night coffee and work

friday 13th:

a few incidents with mr smear

too much vegan junkfood when trying to lose a little weight, a revelation in the middle of the night about the source of our azure authentication woes, finally getting up from my desk at 3am

another day of nerve pain, lightning shooting through my neck and shoulders into my biceps, darkening an already unpleasant mood from the usual late morning stress

driving in a hurry in heavy rains, a good hour's work, calling gd an uber from the gym and settling in for big progress

sailor getting in touch with HUGE news

picking up mr smear and taking him to pick up gd's phone and play with a really cool train set

being on our way out to grab coffee and shop and finding a leak caused by the cleaning lady shoving the vacuum cleaner and its parts into a cupboard in a way that i can only describe as utterly incomprehensible

work and managing a particularly defiant mr smear until dinnertime, with gd hit hard by the distressing news that her brother had attempted suicide

a very sombre friday night dinner with my uncle, my siblings managing to be under the same roof without drama

mr smear throwing his bumblebee action figure from the sixth floor corridor on his way to bed

setting up gd's phone and then passing out on the couch, which was a horrible mistake

saturday 14th:

a final little bit of pony island before going to bed around 2.30am

waking up with mr smear for paw patrol, big boy toilet behaviour and happily dressing himself

as soon as i caffeined enough to feel functional my nerve pain returned with a vengeance

"me time" while mr smear napped and getting some work done on my telephony project

joining the family at my uncle's place, confident that i was suffering a migraine when i was actually / also starting a fever and either way making a mistake by drinking whiskey

rushing home to deal with soiled underpants, showering mr smear and getting him into bed fairly quickly then turning in myself

sunday 15th:

a long night of coughing, restlessness, chills and fever dreams, waking up to the relieving news that my uncle passed away in the night

sick / migraine / both, a very long and difficult day, shiva house to playdate to funeral (fortunately i handled being a pall bearer), lying down until prayers, sudden intense and prolonged shoulder pain causing me to almost faint, slowly making my way downstairs

gd: daddy's sick, go give him a hug
*patter patter patter*
*bashing something onto my head repeatedly and giggling while i yell for help*

suddenly remembering it was invoice day at the last minute

monday 16th:

mega shopping with the flu and a defiant three year old

big nap

an awkward conversation with my sister before she told me "don't come back" (because i looked ill)

tuesday 17th:

getting mr smear to school late, remembering to fill up the rental at the last minute, switching cars, filling up mine, meeting gd at the hospital to sign her in and making my own appointment with the neurologist, my aunt's good friend funny high in the same ward (amusingly inappropriate jokes about inhalers), home to let the cleaning lady in, getting unsurprisingly (satisfyingly?) disappointing news from sailor about his presentation, heading out to organize gd a delicious sandwich from the hospital cafe (great move with their "build-your-own"), picking up mr smear and bringing him to the hospital to amuse everyone, home for more brussel sprout snacking, puzzles, and boredom (on his part) before heading to my uncle's to see the family, seeing one of my nephews for the first time in years and having a pleasingly rational conversation with him about nutrition

a pleasant bedtime wasted when i realized we hadn't brushed mr smear's teeth

internetting, stuffing my face and then suddenly

wednesday 18th:

it was 12.30am

a disturbing vision of a human/animal little red riding hood offering me a bowl of overflowing maize meal then giving up and scurrying up gd's shoulder to try her

a completely nightmarish night of restless legs (not rls?) and awful dreams

pirate hulk finally leaving for school on time, picking up a cup of coffee and arriving just in time for a comforting appointment with the neurologist

home to nap restlessly

picking up mr smear who'd been unhappy all day and whose obsession with the pirate bag gd picked up for him interfered to the point where i've had to hide it away

the long nap and a quick visit to my late uncle's to say goodbye (and take one of his old catapults for my wife), almost missing my massage appointment

happening to recite a poem about my father before learning that it was his yahrzeit, which my mother keeps "forgetting" that i don't want to remember

a sad 90th birthday call to my other uncle, toy story 3 for the ps3 is amazing, a smooth-ish bedtime and great experience reading then a sad moment when i turned the light off and he told me an ambiguously vague story that makes me think he might've been mean to his friends

just recovering with gd, going to bed just before midnight which was much later than expected

thursday 19th:

dream: the invisible whale transport whose bones materialize around the passengers and whose skin completes just as he shoots off down the tracks

another tough back / shoulder day, successfully dropping off mr smear without his pirate backpack and feeling strangely proud of his mode transition from singing along with rob zombie - dragula to moody blues - nights in white satin, watching the kids for a bit on a cool obstacle course, picking up coffee at mom's cafe, clearing my desk and getting some good work done before picking up mr smear

enjoying aki alliance

waiting for mr smear to wake up, learning he'd had another bad day, a nice ride home stopping to pick up diapers on the way, then taking mr smear to the park to blow bubbles

fortunately he was too occupied with the bubbles to notice the fighting homeless guys, calling the police twice but they came far too late to do anything

home for a break before heading out again to take him onto the rocklands rocks for a magical sunset

some angry words before sailor popped in for dinner (instigated by our neighbours' weed and cocaine thing getting out of hand), my mom paying us a quick visit, introducing mr smear to system of a down, an easy good night and a positive response when i asked him to remember the sunset as he fell asleep

our neighbours' amusement at seeing me in my onesie, jim jefferies, work

friday 20th:

in bed just before 3am

the irony of lying down on my back and looking for a video to post about how great i felt about it being a beautiful friday after such a tough week and the left side of my neck and shoulder spasming violently and painfully

getting mr smear to school very late, driving to the gym for a motivating meeting with the biokineticist, a couple of hours of work while my neck got progressively worse

finishing aki alliance over lunch and feeling disappointed that she hadn't really learned her lesson

a painful pickup, as much for my neck as for receiving a very sad mr smear coming down with the flu and conjunctivitus

a pitiful afternoon in front of the screen, a little bit of work collaboration, gd going to the temple alone for the first time

mr smear passing out to animaniacs, friday night takeaway leftovers, patterns of evidence: exodus and my niece's husband's grindr outing

the book of eli (beautiful) and some cook, serve, delicious!

saturday 21st:

a long and painful night, including keeping mr smear company for a long time which made it more painful

gd going to see an apartment alone, mr smear waking up and going straight to pee on the toilet (yay!), a long morning in front of the telly with my shoulder getting worse

taking him to see sailor's capoeira group for half a far-too-loud hour of some pretty cool stuff (i'm calling it break-your-face-dancing now), mr smear suddenly picking up a fever just as we arrived at my mom's coffee shop, a latte break with krybabie's mother before bringing him home for medication and the hunchback of notre dame (a mistake, the ending was far too violent)

gd arriving home happy from her outing

[a forgotten evening]

sunday 22nd:

still very sore, a pleasant morning until we needed to go and then an ugly morning for a while; seeing a beautiful apartment next to the company gardens and unanimously and enthusiastically agreeing on it

bringing mr smear home, some relative downtime before taking him to the park for hcc's farewell, some playtime and then dragging him off after he was mean to another kid

nap

taking mr smear shopping, hotel transylvania and dinner followed by a very unhappy shower / tooth brush / bedtime

getting into ruby at 10pm on a sunday night

monday 23rd:

and finally calling it a night around 3.30am, frustrated because it took so long to get things up and running but the actual work (on the backend, at least) was really simple

up at 9am with mr smear out of action, my neck still hurting

a full day of obsessively struggling with erb (ruby backend is a pleasure, the frontend is another story entirely)

mr smear being amazing during his visit to the doctor
a shopping expedition and vegan frozen yoghurt
trying to work on the assessment, gd joining me for a beachfront walk to get him to nap

mom coming over with the apartment application form
mr smear's incredible coughing fit, finishing the book of eli (amazing), crashing

tuesday 24th:

up around midnight with no alarm, working hard until suddenly it was almost 4am again

waking up from a claustrophobic dream - climbing over a post-apocalyptic bridge - to a still-stiff neck and a perpetually coughing mr smear who needed literally constant attention and commanded an unbelievable amount of pity and love

gd's successful conversion to judaism (passing her beit din interview), me finally receiving a good job offer

seeing the physio while gd took mr smear back to the doctor

work (which would result in a very successful deployment) in spite of the coughing, a mission to get stamped bank statements and shelter vouchers, getting the car transponder battery replaced, a little more work until my mom came over

walking with gd to retry a chinese restaurant (the one that previously didn't have tofu), a fantastic dinner, a relatively early night after some patterns of evidence: exodus and a bit of comedy

wednesday 25th:

up around 2/2.30am, getting stuck into doing the assessment *my* way (much easier), climbing back into bed at 4.30 (mr smear still coughing every now and again but mostly sleeping)

up at 9am for a highly stressful / anxious day
working with mr smear on my lap
nervously accepting the job offer

completing the evaluation so that i could submit it along with an email declining the job

mr smear feeling much better, taking him to the aquarium, then enthusiastically agreeing to take him on a boat ride - after carrying him in my arms for twenty minutes while waiting for the boat, he put on the life jacket and promptly passed out sitting upright and missed a gorgeous ride

dinner, shower, penn and teller's fool us, a good bedtime, finishing patterns of evidence: exodus (very convincing), resting and rls

the big conversation with SxS not going down so well, quite a bit of regret for not playing harder with the new employer and a lot of anxiety about burning bridges while leaping into the unknown

thursday 26th:

working through to 2am, the earlier regret building slowly to a deep disappointment in having let myself be dragged into something without stopping to consider my options

mr smear not wanting to get out of bed and getting to school late

successfully pushing back my new employment start date, then being unable to get in touch with SxS

meeting gd at the gym, my biokineticist training plan (stop stressing about form, he tells me)

rushing to pick up mr smear because "he wasn't himself" (meaning he wasn't a superhero? that's how we can tell)

mr smear passing out on my lap in front of fool us, me passing out as soon as i got him into bed

generally exhausted, finally getting in touch with SxS and resolving the notice period story (and learning that the guy i've been working with for two years is paraplegic: mind blown)

lazy evening and falling asleep right after mr smear
getting up for a meeting that was cancelled and crashing again

friday 27th:

nine hours of sleep!

gd's not-hypnotherapy session

a good first prescibed training and jacuzzi
reaching my target weight four weeks early due to the flu
work and lunch
mr smear running to greet me / get his back scratched
work / tedium / emergency showering mr smear / last minute challah shopping (everyone was out)
the temple service, mr smear trying to get his friend to whisper, the bigger kids playing really nicely with the little ones

friday night dinner playdate, mom joining us for kiddush, a busy evening, mr smear voluntarily heading to bed, taking our friends home and chatting for far too long about orthodox hypocrisy

checking out the amazing blood moon

i don't know where or when i picked it up, but samorost 3 is one of the most beautiful games i've ever played. absolutely stunning.

saturday 28th:

playing it until 2am

still sore, a quick breakfast and then taking mr smear to kirstenbosch for a sulky, tantrumy playdate and some fun cold water naked play at 16 degrees celcius

skipping a birthday party because neither myself nor gd have any idea who the little girl is nor which one of us put it in the calendar

mr smear waking up on arrival at home, a little toy story 3 (just brilliant) and a little more samorost 3 (exquisite) before heading to my mom's coffee shop to help install a shelf (the drill broke down 60% of the way through)

a pretty good evening, generally being lazy, then deciding instead of sleeping...

sunday 29th:

... to update my blog instead. good night!