a lazy afternoon

 we took a taxi to the clinic, getting out early because the road was blocked and almost having an incident with a street cleaner. i decided to try reading stranger in a strange land while we waited, and was very busy nodding off just as gd was called in to see the nurse.

the nurse was very sweet and helpful, but the most helpful thing she did was inform us that her daughter had recently gone through a similar thing with a toe and the local anaesthetic hadn't helped in the slightest. so i looked it up when we got home, and discovered that it really is a thing, and i know what to suggest to the surgeon next time we encounter him.

after we got home i spent some time fiddling about with an ai side project (it's building right now) and learning about some more devious google nonsense, which introduced me to helium: i'm trying it out right now, so far, so good. i played an act of slay the spire 2, tried to nap (but didn't get in more than five minutes), and after mr smear got home i went out to do some shopping, which turned out to be quite a mission.

i'm tired, but i can't decide whether to lie down or drink one of the beers we bought for lag ba'omer. not because i particularly want one, but because it's hard not to have one just because i keep seeing them whenever i walk through the kitchen.

...

when he's not doing his homework, mr smear's been playing minecraft with stabbity-stab-stab, which is how gd and i have been calling his classmate who allegedly threatened another friend with a knife. and they're still friends. so either someone's lying, or everyone's mad.

...

i've been listening to if pink floyd played the entire ocarina of time soundtrack today, and it's amazing.

the perpetual trauma train

 sleep journal entry: i was so tired i didn't record the precise times. i got up in the middle of the night from a combination of things, part of it was minor lower back / hip discomfort, but mostly it was restlessness and belly discomfort.

i'm really tired, and after a relatively good sleep (even if it was in two parts) i feel like it's just from being psychologically and emotionally on edge for too many days straight.

...

i never left the house yesterday. my team daily referenced the outcome of my sync with my manager - we had two items on the agenda that were affected - and afterwards one of my teammates contacted me and we sat on a video call for almost two hours, discussing the challenges in our work environment, debating viable approaches, and i guess a bunch of me reframing things to motivate him as much as myself.

between those three morning talks, i feel like i'm starting to shape my "mic drop" for when i leave; i told my mentor and my boss that i don't want to end my contract without having had some noticeable positive impact, and i feel like i'm starting down the path.

my afternoon was spent doing "more of the same" ticket preparation work, where, unfortunately, "more of the same" refers to going around in circles with AI and uncovering missing aspects that i somehow never encountered before. i took a break for dinner, and then had to put in another hour after, but i think i've done sufficient scoping. it worries me that it's real work, across a wide range of aspects of unfamiliar moving parts, and i only have two weeks to get it all done...

...

gd's thoroughly traumatized. not only does it look like the surgeon didn't get all of the nail out, but she's been reliving the surgery itself because the anaesthetic didn't take. she's terrified of losing her toe, and her foot with it. so we're heading out in an hour or so to see a friday doctor and hope that there's someone who can help her.

i felt really bad all afternoon after an incident; she was venting, and i was trying to be supportive and constructive, but at some point she yelled stuff that was so unhinged* i couldn't take it any more. so in addition to not being supportive when she needed it, it took additional time for things to cool down enough for her to resume and get through what she needed to get through.

* it may be unhinged, but it's understandable. all i needed to do was STFU

"the universal pressure cooker" - i feel like our family's a microcosm, and the world just keeps raising the temperature of the stove while lumping more shit into the pot.

...

at least mr smear and his friend sorted themselves out yesterday. they both apologized, and hopefully they'll both be better to each other.

over dinner we finished watching dead poets society. it's generated some very interesting discussions, but regardless we all enjoyed it (or, appreciated it, it always feels weird to say "enjoyed" for a tragedy) and i was surprised by how much i remembered for a movie i haven't seen since i was mr smear's age.

...

i don't know if elite's turkish coffee is "good" coffee by whatever arbitrary standards the world has, but i really enjoy it. it's a taste and smell that makes me feel like there are wholesome constants in the world. with all the madness around me right now, opening a fresh bag is like an emotional override.

painful realizations

sleep journal entry: a couple of hours of restlessness, but no breathing troubles and no physical discomfort. the nights are definitely getting warmer, though, and we had a mosquito in the room...

the back of my head's still a bit numb, which is worrying :/

i woke up from a dream in which i was with a bunch of people playing sports (frisbee and ball sports) around an open light rail station. my alarm woke me up, and i got out of bed, but my mind and body were still in sleep mode for quite a while after.

yesterday:

my biggest issue yesterday was motivation. i was finally feeling better, tired but better, and i got a few admin tasks squared away before sitting down to work. my primary task yesterday was reviewing an incident that i'd been told about a few weeks ago, and my work day was essentially reading through a month's worth of messages and documents, and the deeper i dove (dived?) the more tragic i understood the situation to be. by the end of the day i was literally shocked to discover that the incident, a fundamental break in a critical component of the business, and the efforts to get things back on track are still ongoing and being blocked by the company's lack of any meaningful ownership.

i'm heartbroken for these guys, they're good people and they're working hard, but they're trying to fight their way uphill in an avalanche. i don't see how this company survives if it doesn't have a dramatic shift in culture.

i want to set up a meeting with my client and manager and explain this to them, but i'm struggling to come up with a way of approaching this without causing offense or throwing anyone under the bus.

[sends message to manager, receives an immediate call and proceeds to discuss concerns and strategy for 35 minutes]

well, that went well - i was a bit clumsy in how i expressed my concerns at first, but we aligned relatively quickly and he appreciated my suggestions; i think the most crucial element is ensuring that all the developers are aligned with what ownership of a project entails, and unblocking unofficial ownership by "outsiders".

...

i had a good sync with my mentor in the afternoon, and a pleasant one later with my actual boss. gd laughed at me afterwards for the "awkward sweats", what evolutionary purpose that serves is utterly beyond me.

...

aside from taking a walk to do some shopping, that was pretty much my day. the evening, however, was a different story.

when mr smear came home, i asked him how his day went, and he assured me nothing interesting had happened. as i finished work, while i was processing the bizarre work situation i'd just finished reading about, i noticed that the father of one of his friends had sent me a voice message, that the two of them had had a massive fight that got violent.

we then spent the next couple of hours alternating between talking and yelling, trying to get the story out of him. he eventually admitted that he threw the first punch - making him the biggest asshole - but the most concerning thing is that he claims he doesn't remember the sequence of events at all. i said that he's either lying, or brain damaged, and he's now latched on to the latter and is trying to convince us that he's actually brain damaged 🤦‍♂️

we had another talk about it this morning, strategizing, and i hope he takes our advice. in the meanwhile, i've just sent a message to his friend's dad, who just responded positively. i really hope these kids manage to settle this in a mature way...

sleep journal entry

 my nose was stuffed by the time i climbed into bed, and i had difficulty getting enough oxygen the entire night. i struggled to get out of bed and i feel as if i slept well, and didn't sleep at all, at the same time.

patience is a virtue signal

"patience my ass, i'm gonna kill somebody" - the vulture

 i must be getting better, because it's almost 1am and i'm only now getting ready to go to bed. one of my nostrils is a noticeably blocked, but otherwise i'm doing okay. for now...

the next meeting was run by the guy responsible for my current project, but related to an aspect of my previous project, which is owned by a team that doesn't really know anything about it. he mumbles, and even if he didn't mumble it would still be difficult to understand him - not the greatest communicator. and the team lead who didn't know why she was in the meeting doesn't have the best english, so i was amused when i saw that she'd sent me a message thanking me for summarizing - i explained that it wasn't for her, i really did need to verify that i'd understood what we were talking about for myself :P

mr smear came home, and he was absolutely taken with the bean bags; as gd pointed out, he's all cat.

i was supposed to leave the apartment at that point, but then learned that i had a meeting with my employer team. which turned out to be an hour long presentation, or sales pitch, for software i really don't care about. i was so bored by the halfway mark... it was basically an unpleasant minesweeper session for me.

i took a walk through to the courier pick-up point, which was quite a long walk, but it felt good to be out in the sun (even on such a suddenly hot day) with my brain switched off. then i caught a bus home, and between the bus and our apartment took a quick detour to hunt down gluten-free pastas for gd.

the good news is, i found some - and the spaghetti which we tried tonight was surprisingly decent! - but by the time i got to the self checkout i was already sans patience from all the tourists and leisure class people in the store and i had a really hard time keeping my cool while waiting for two women moving in slow motion and with entirely suboptimal bagging strategies.

i came home, oversaw some of mr smear's progress (he did well this afternoon) and got back to work. once done, mr smear called me over to demonstrate that he'd solved the multiplication level in human resource machine all by himself, and he was rightly proud of himself ^_^

i received a very strange email this evening, apparently from an investment research company who are offering to pay me to answer questions about my previous employer, answers which, if honest, would explicitly violate my termination agreement and i'd owe them my severance pay back. i wonder if this is a case of entrapment?

dinner and some more of dead poets society was nice, although by the time we got to dinner my patience had been worn down to nothing; i did lose my cool with my mother while trying to help her, and as much as it was partially her fault i was upset my reaction certainly wasn't appropriately measured. mr smear also did a little patience testing, but for the most part he continued behaving well.

after dinner i did a little more work on my telephony side project - i'm rather pleased with the results - and after watching a few videos i decided to allow myself some spire slaying. i've just completed my first run with the defect, so that's all the characters done (no ascensions yet), and some of the relics and cards i picked up were completely insane!

...

some good news, at least - it looks like gd's toe might be starting to heal 🤞

mid-day update

 i'm sitting here on the carpet in my little office, back against one of the nice new beanbags that finally (!) arrived this morning, in a state that's a solid mix of coronavirus light-headed dizziness and post-meeting euphoric relief.

our meeting went so much better than i could have anticipated. after i presented my findings, the boss made it clear that he believes the new data to be more accurate than the old data, and that he's happy to overrule the product team's requirements. this means that the bulk of the work i've been wrestling with simply falls away, and what's left is a very small effort for bonus points, and pulling the trigger. the only new thing that came up that needs doing happens to be something i've already built for as part of my investigations, so all-round this has been a massive windfall, a huge stroke of luck for me.

...

gd's really traumatized. she made an effort to wash her toe again this morning, and i just inspected it while she's resting and it seems to me to be looking less angry.

i just chatted with my mom, who i was delighted to discover has actually taken the day off. i hope she's able to have a good rest and recover.

...

right, now for a coffee and another meeting, and then i think i'm going to go for a walk to pick up some replacement watch straps that were just delivered to a courier pick-up point.

sleep journal entry + nerves

most of the night my nose and throat were calm, but i felt like i wasn't getting enough oxygen. i woke up with lower back / hip discomfort in the middle of the night and i had to stretch hard before i could get back to sleep.

gd's in pain and scared, her toe doesn't really look much better than before. it's deeply worrying.

...

i've spent the past hour or so adding functionality to my telephony side-project. i guess i'm distracting myself because i'm nervous about the upcoming meeting i have, in which i present a whole lot of information that i neither fully understand nor care about. i mean, it's not fair to say i don't fully understand it, but from what i've read it's two ways of looking at similar data that give different results, and my take-away is that the whole marketing industry is mostly based on a load of horseshit and hand-waving.

...

in the middle of the night i had a thought: metacognition is the ability or skill that protects someone from being caught up in a cult or modernist ideology

a moment of semi-clarity

 today was psychologically tougher than it was physically. i'm fucking done.

trying to be supportive of gd while protecting her from her own terror almost got me sent to sleep on the couch instead of her (she has to sleep on the couch so she's less likely to injure her toe while she's unconscious).

trying to get mr smear into bed on time was simply impossible; i'm still trying to figure out where the hour and a half went between finishing dinner and saying good night to my mom and actually saying good night to him and having to explain the word c*nt and subsequently learning that he heard it in a video gd showed him 🤦‍♂️

i hope i can sleep tonight. i pray i don't get sicker. as i type this i'm developing a bit of a headache...

...

i finally got the network issues sorted out, hopefully for more than a while (one of our neighbors must have triggered a channel conflict). also, the above facepalm emoji was done with a keyboard shortcut, i finally figured out how to get karabiner to map a "globe" key from my windows keyboard!

i had one (million) job(s)

 while i wait for my token scopes to update, and try to make it clear to my child that it's not advisable to be argumentative with a gorram textbook... (the textbook, in this case, is not wrong)

gd and i took a taxi to the clinic, where we faced off with the unhelpful receptionist, and then tried to negotiate our way in to an early visit with the nurses. we gave that up when we realized that there was only half an hour to go before she could get helped without any favors, so i walked over to the pharmacy to pick up some of her meds.

somebody a few numbers before me had given up and put their ticket on the side of the machine, so i switched the tickets and felt guilty even though i'm pretty sure i wasn't doing anything wrong. irritating, yes, but not wrong.

i managed to get gd's meds, even though she'd given me the wrong prescription. thank $#%! i had a digital copy of the right one accessible.

i picked up a teff pita from the neighborhood bakery, then rejoined gd just as she got called in. the nurse was super-kind and helpful, and even though gd screamed when he tugged off the pad there was very little blood and he bandaged the toe up very gently.

we returned home, and after a quick breakfast i crashed for an hour and a half. i got up, figured out how to request doctor's permission for being sick (it's actually quite a reasonable system), and after two coffees and a bunch of chores dived in to work. or, i would have dived into work if i hadn't run into a whole bunch of networking issues.

i'm deeply regretting the whole networking appliance story right now. i don't know what's changed suddenly, but i think maybe i shouldn't have returned it after all.

i promised my clients a report by this afternoon, but the more i've prepared it the more questions i've found unanswered... i'm still going at it.

at least i'm feeling better (overall). having said that, this is probably just like those other covid times when i've felt like i was getting better and then suddenly it's gotten much worse. my mom's having a really difficult time, too.

sleep journal entry

i spent most of the night coughing and barely able to breathe. i did get a couple of hours' sleep before waking up.

gd's unwrapped her nail and is soaking it, the pad seems to have fused to the wound, though, and isn't coming off :(

i'm now trying to rush mr smear out the door after he did another negative test. and then i have to head to the clinic to get a doctor's permission for my work (first time in my civilian life), and inform my client that i'm sick, and that i was sick yesterday.

and i already sent a message to our old neighbor that we ran into yesterday to inform her as well :(

of ******* course

 

aaaaand it's covid.

more than rough

 firstly, i've been so thoroughly exhausted today as to be dysfunctional. to be honest, i can't tell if this is because i didn't sleep last night, or because i'm just through-and-through sick.

in retrospect, i shouldn't have hugged our old neighbor when we bumped into her at the clinic.

oh gods.

after sending mr smear off to school, i accompanied gd to the clinic. the doctor was very understanding, and we booked an appointment with a surgeon. we went home, had a visit from our upstairs neighbor, who amongst other things informed us that they're going to get started working on building a metro station under our building and we're going to need to replace all the doors and windows for soundproofing.

after breakfast, i crashed for a very short nap and tried to get some work done, but was constantly distracted. some of the distraction was about my previous employer; the lead i felt betrayed by has apparently left the company (though he got some of his options), and someone i served with asked me about an opening so i told him what had happened.

then i was time to accompany gd to the surgeon. aside from his poor bedside manner, he didn't convince us that he understood the problem, nor that his solution made sense, so we thanked him and asked the receptionist for advice. she was very kind, and made gd an appointment with the surgeon i had been *hoping* we were going to see.

i'm going to remember his name this time.

so back home we went, i napped again, and got a little work done before we headed out a third time.

the surgeon immediately knew exactly what was going on - there were two possibilities, with the same treatment - and i advised gd to take his offer and get it taken care of immediately rather than wait for it to continue to fester.

we waited for a while, but he eventually arrived. he was clear in his explanations, and made me feel confident; unfortunately, when it came to the procedure itself things went south. the local anaesthetic did not anaesthetic, and i've never heard gd scream like that before. it was painful and nerve-wracking just going through it holding her hand, so i can't imagine what it was like. except that i would probably have fainted very quickly.

he bound up her toe, and sent us on our way. every step was agony, and only got worse as we proceeded towards the street. fortunately, we managed to order a taxi and jump in very quickly, and the toughest walk was getting her from the parking area to the couch.

in retrospect, i don't know how i managed to get any work done before dinner.

gd didn't manage to keep her dinner down, so that unintentionally accelerated her getting her teeth brushed and ready for bed (or rather the couch, i suspect), and fortunately i came up with the idea of wheeling her around in the office chair, which has made all the difference.

as the afternoon and evening have worn on, my nerves have worn thinner and thinner and my throat and my brain are clamoring for bed and threatening to keep me from sleeping again.

and it looks my mom's not doing so great either, health-wise, but at least she got back to cape town safely.

oh! and just prior to gd's procedure, my boss - my actual employer - called to ask me how i'm doing. i asked how he thinks i'm doing, and suggested that we schedule a sync. i hope i'm not in shit...

sleep journal entry

 i was up all night with a painful post-nasal drip (painful swallowing). no lower back / hip discomfort.

i was expecting today to be rough, but it really didn't need to be this rough.

prophesy

i left later than i should have to pick up the car (of course), and arrived at the address to find no cars, having been explicitly informed by the app that no further instructions were necessary. i tried calling the car sharing service, but their lines were down, and it took a while (and some helpful people) before i happened upon the vehicle and realized that the directions were simply wrong.

i made the pickup, and told waze to get us to the airport, and it gave us all sorts of weird directions that neither my mother nor my son were able to read. so my stress levels were kinda high by the time we finally made it onto the highway going in the right direction. when we finally arrived and parked, the signage led us astray (it's incorrect on shabbat, at least, i'm not sure what happens during the week) and sent us in circles with broken elevators before we finally entered the terminal.

at least from that point things went smoothly, and we had time to be ripped off for coffee and sit down with my mom before her flight. after we saw her to the security checks, we made our way back to the car with only one incident (i didn't realize we could only pay for parking at the exit, and made the mistake of getting out of the car and walking all the way back to the locked up pay machines), and aside from the shock of how expensive an hour or two's parking was the drive home was uneventful (fortunately, because we encountered some really insane drivers on the way home). i dropped mr smear off at home, returned the car, and on my walk home managed to get hold of the service hotline and complain and was offered a voucher as compensation.

this afternoon, after returning from the car ordeal, we watched the starship troopers movie together. i've always loved starship troopers; it's not a perfect movie, but it's a fun action film with some interesting ideas. so i'm embarrassed to admit that it took me this long to finally get around to reading the book.

in addition to what i wrote earlier, it's also surprisingly prophetic, considering that it calls out the kind of irrational 20th century ideology that's infected the west and the movie producers who tried really, really hard to misrepresent, subvert and undermine everything the author was trying to say. that's not an adaptation, it's a deeply disrespectful bastardization. thank god the original ideas hold up so well that so many people didn't "get" the "satire".

we're about to enjoy a late dinner, mr smear and i have showered and taken out the recycling, and my nervous system is bouncing up and down because i keep thinking about tomorrow's tasks.

i guess i'm really grateful for having had a couple of days off, a lot of which felt like actual days off even though i was pretty busy.

a calm before the farewell

my mom and i caught a bus to azrieli, we picked up a couple of things and then moved on to try and meet up with the mongoose. we got off the bus at dizengof center, walked up to the square to pick up a coffee, then walked all the way back to the square to meet up with the mongoose, only to end up having to leave again to meet him on the way back to the square again :P

at least we managed to see the baby and deliver her gift! the catch up was quick, and then we were off to do some last-minute shopping before coming home for the afternoon.

gd wasn't able to go anyway - isn't able to go anywhere, with her toe being so bad - so my mom, mr smear and i walked to an unfamiliar synagogue (relatively) nearby.

at least i wore pants and not shorts? i was hands-down the least appropriately-dressed there, everyone else was in white button shirts. the liturgy and nusach were familiar from my youth, and it was really nice not only to have a shared singing experience but to hear mr smear singing along as well :)

for mr smear, his reaction to the baby right behind us and the woman with tourette's on the other side of the mechitza was (relative, for him) admirable, my mother seemed comfortable enough from her side, and although i did feel like an outsider it was overall a good shul experience.

i'm not sure how gd would handle it, though. she's softened on the sitting separately thing, but i think she'd find following along a bit tough with her own marked siddur (she wouldn't be the only one) and i think the biggest obstacle is how far away it is.

kiddush and dinner were quite late, but both were lovely. even though my mom's been here for two friday nights, this was the only one where it was just us doing it our way, together as opposed to on a video call.

we were all pretty tired last night, but to keep things interesting my mom started getting sick and we have to take her to the airport in less than half an hour... FFS.

and gd's toe is only getting worse...

and mr smear still not 100%...

i just finished reading starship troopers:

"Controversial". I've read some suggestions as to why it may have been called controversial. I'd heard many times before how one of my favorite movies was intended to be satirical, and failed.

I've also served in the military, and am living through a crisis in the west where the people yelling loudest "for" democracy and "against" fascism have no idea that they've succumbed to communist, terrorist propaganda and are, in fact, begging for the opposite.

With that in mind, there's nothing "controversial" being peddled in this book. What is in this book is a phenomenally accurate depiction of military service, warts-and-all, a compelling notion of civic duty, and - barring one technically heavy pre-battle scene - it's a thrilling glimpse into what galactic war could be like.

...

someone proferred the name of the 2D side-scrolling aerial combat video game where you battle waves of enemies and shoot down ducks in between levels that we used to play on the ps3: minisquadron!