november already?!

monday 17th october:

another complete night?! gd waking up feeling sick
a long and intriguing meeting with the tax consultant, followed by a big shopping mission cut short because gd couldn't go on; mr smear becoming highly agitated and tantrum-y
picking up lunch and running into an old classmate i barely recognised
eating and running after a very destructive little boy and then suddenly it was time to take gd to the chiropractor and have coffee with my mom at bootlegger and try to discuss business with mr smear wreaking havoc
a failed attempt to walk on the promenade, buying lego for hcc's kid

mr smear going down for a nap when it was already nearing his bedtime, i grabbed one of my own and woke up two hours later to find him properly asleep...

another fantastic page from my illustrator!

the woman moving in upstairs hammering at 9pm after catching us earlier by holding the elevator for ten minutes when we couldn't take the stairs: not the best first impression

a good work session

tuesday 18th:

ending around 4am, waking up for mr smear, then for rls, then for mr smear again, followed by a super early morning utterly exhausted with an even sicker gd and no chance of resting

finally getting a short nap after giving up on getting mr smear to nap, waking up groggy but a little better, mr smear sneaking into our bedroom and literally running back and forth for a great distance before we picked him up for a feed and i left for plant

...

as a husband to a woman who's managed to breastfeed a couple of months into her child's second year already, i have to say that breastfeeding is not only important for the child's immune system and the mother's psychological state but it's a remarkably beautiful bonding mechanism that's a joy to behold. but it's a surprisingly difficult thing to do, and many mothers don't manage it - i'm still amazed that gd stuck it out with all the horrible things that she had to go through because the "breastfeeding nazis" were more interested in applying pressure than in her - and her baby's - well-being. women who can't get it right, or can't make it work for other reasons, are deserving of sympathy, not scorn. they're not bad or irresponsible moms, we unfortunately don't live in societies where the whole village participates and provides support and breastfeeding is HARD in addition to all the other things that being a new parent engenders.

...

a fun working lunch with airplane, coming home to sort out security tags and pay the doctor's accounts when they weren't in and pick up drain cleaner and a lecture about sulphuric acid and return and convince our property manager that our sink needs urgent fixing and run around after mr smear

a long but not unpleasant afternoon (including watching some luke cage) and a simple dinner and an easy shower, putting mr smear to bed quickly and trying to nap myself before a 9pm meeting but getting hit hard by rls again

a slow (as in my brain - mouth connection) meeting interrupted by mr smear suddenly developing a really bad cough and being unable to feed without throwing up and then throwing a tantrum that lasted most of an hour until we'd taken every desperate nighttime measure and moved to daytime measures: to be fair, the cough and asthma meds had kicked in by then but it was ultimately the dancing to psybient trance that calmed him down enough to go back to bed

wednesday 19th:

working until 2am, finally getting some rest but far from enough
mr smear dragging us out of bed early again, kulipari: an army of frogs just keeps getting better

a partial nap while gd was taking my physio appointment, getting through lunchtime and paying the doctor a visit before big shopping and a visit from hcc, other parent observations

mom's arrival and mr smear climbing onto the couch by himself, crazy busy and showering and putting him to bed before putting together dinner and trying to catch a few z's

first night with rls meds

repeat performance and midnight antihistamines and high tension

thursday 20th:

finally getting a little sleep, but not nearly enough, just trying to get through the morning and failing to do so without tensions exploding

finally getting ready to go to the gym when a top shelf filled with glass jars collapsed on me while i was holding mr smear; fortunately i took the only scratch. we were very grateful to my mom for showing up quickly to help with the cleanup while i took mr smear for a walk outside and then looked after him while i dropped gd off at the gym and did some shopping.

a better (if not great) evening, getting some work done but being cut short by a telkom service outage

second night with rls meds

friday 21st:

working well until 2.30am, followed by a solid night's sleep ending in weird dreams: at a wedding in an incredible farmhouse discussing good taste and establishing the draw of nursing a beer in an old, broken place that visually tells the story of how you survived the apocalypse

an old acquaintance's ex who has a one month old baby and is stuck in a foreign country with no food or money and who won't ask her friends for help on the assumption that they won't make time for her? and who won't go to the authorities who can help because they're worried they'll take away their kid? sorry, little one, i think you have shit parents.

exhausted but forced to be functional as usual; doctor visit, gym, plumber and physio, feeding mr smear then showering him and trundling off to the pharmacy and walking right past mos def and shopping (gd being harassed by a beggar in the store while i was chatting with a staff member who was curious about going plant-based)

buying more domain names and selecting fonts for a company logo, playing with wix and friday night dinner and complete exhaustion

third night with rls meds

saturday 22nd:

not exhausted - sick. early up to rick and morty, news that my sister's friend finally passed away, mr smear tired but resisting a rest, finally getting enough, an ugly afternoon of miscommunications, weary evening

sunday 23rd:

long, weird dreams, then waking up to the previous afternoon (ignited by video games), a slow sunday, being thoroughly impressed by s03e02 of black mirror (e01 was only watchable at the end), a long walk with mr smear on the promenade and enjoying him running back and forth and his fascination with the waves and the blue train, finishing heroes: reborn (not a bad ending to an otherwise disappointing season) and watching joe rogan's latest special while discovering that gd's off pizza

monday 24th:

beginning the day on a sour note with gd in pain again, paying the doctor another visit and aside from a trip to the chiropractor spending the day moving from a greedy webhost (bluehost) and fiddling with domain registration and trying to sort something out on my mom's computer (gave up) while she managed mr smear for us

waiting for mr smear to self-sooth after taking meds and closing my eyes on very cool visuals

tuesday 25th:

in spite of some setbacks, working productively until 5.30am and going to bed excited and positive

getting up after four hours for a long, restless day; a successful mission to the department of home affairs including an awkward queue switcharoo and being well rewarded for double checking with the other lady who handled our marriage registration instead of making us wait; completing the first half of the first phase of the prototype i'm working on, and finishing the day with some of the hurt locker (giving up because showmax has bad audio and no subtitles) and more luke cage before diving into the second half of the first phase - microsoft's encryption package isn't complicated to work with, but it's unnecessarily complicated to integrate it with other languages

wednesday 26th:

another long night's work, another short sleep but waking up to the joy of mr smear being so excited to see me that he dropped breakfast and hugged me tightly for about five minutes before he was ready to continue eating

regaining confidence in 000webhost - i'm using their free hosting after bluehost got greedy, and setting up wordpress sites and hooking them up to my domains was only a little fiddly and the performance is great.

mom taking over for a chiropractor run, trying to nap when mr smear napped (for three hours!) but getting up exhausted and restless - an awful combination... lunch with gd and luke cage, sorting out my mom's new business website and taking mr smear to the waterfront to pick up the last winter gear i'll need for a while, watching bigger kids going ape at the playground (omg they have a lot of energy) and doing a quick shopping run (for the free parking) with a screamy needy child in my arms

showering, prepping mr smear for bed but him taking forever to actually fall asleep

another night with the rls meds, looking into the side effects and being worried enough to start thinking that maybe the rls is preferable

thursday 27th:

giving up on integrating microsoft crypto with an html client and getting good initial results using iisnode for interfacing

going to bed after 3am and being forced out at 7 by an energetic mr smear, starting the day with kung fu panda (still awesome) and emergency shopping (not awesome), scarfing down maize meal before pilates and then regretting it when the hardcore acid reflux began. a good - but painful - pilates class followed by taking care of mr smear while gd saw the physio and almost putting my back out reaching for a book he wanted

kiwis and psybient and getting overexcited when he caught something i threw to him repeatedly (until he lost interest), a good therapy session, mom visiting

taking mr smear to the park: too much wind for pokémon go (now that the excitement's over, i want to try), the joy on the swings, the post-swing trauma, the post duck pond trauma and the old lady trying to help out, non-stop crying until we got home except for the minute when we stopped to look at some seagulls and mr smear successfully threw his cap in the ocean; a half hour (at least) of screaming will wear you down

sorting out a new pc issue for my mom, dinner and luke cage and making the mistake of lying down immediately and then waking up with awful reflux

friday 28th:

a long night of crypto, it's like every package is incompatible and none of them include both keygen and encryption

to bed at 4.20 and then up for mr smear at 5 and then 6-6.30, then waking up at 9.15 having missed both alerts for a 9pm meeting to pick up vegan challah; arriving at 9.30 looking and definitely sounding a mess

the struggle to find non-fluoride toothpaste, then the traditionally horrible friday checkers experience followed by a series of assholes blocking me from leaving the parking lot followed by crazy traffic followed by asshole neighbours blocking the road and telling me to have a little patience and obviously i only thought of the right retort five minutes later and i stewed for much longer

second shopping with gd while wired from the sleep deprivation and then finally getting home and being unable to sleep: feeling like i was still affected by the rls meds, that feeling borne out later as i was actually high / manic at dinner

going out to return curtains - "our son ate the receipt" - and hitting the waterfront for gd to shop and us to try out their playground again, then home to shower and prep for a really nice dinner at my mom's with my sister and cousins

saturday 29th:

working well until 4.30am again, getting client side encryption sorted but struggling with node's crypto library...

... getting a few hours in with interesting, fast-forgotten dreams then prepping for a fun swimming lesson. as we got out the pool i felt a warm wetness down my side, it wasn't the first time mr smear's peed on me but it's the first time he's done so in public...

coming home to take advantage of mr smear's nap, watching another great episode of black mirror and putting up some of the curtains

too windy and too lazy to go anywhere, resting or playing or shopping and renting the 2016 release of the jungle book and getting mr smear to bed and vegan challah filled with baked beans and managing half the movie before we had to go to bed (first half impressions: excellent, excellent movie except for a couple of voice actor choices and they really shouldn't have shoehorned musical numbers in, baloo humming bare necessities for a few seconds as an homage would have sufficed)

sunday 30th:

3.30am changing mr smear with him screaming because he wanted to be fed instead; he's recently learned a particularly awful scream that totally kills sympathy but he's too young to learn that it's not helping him

appliance shopping with mom ending with mr smear's big tantrum performance, tea and breakfast

driving out to the muizenberg kite festival but not finding it, a long drive home after an incident with a bee, making the least of the afternoon, going for a walk in an icy wind, a nice visit from my toronto cousin's wife, feeding mr smear and getting him into bed and watching an episode of luke cage and getting into my work

monday 31st:

finally managing to integrate end-to-end javascript encryption and *just* before going to bed learning how and why RSA has to be combined with another cipher

... and rls hitting hard...

... and being woken up early to a power outage...

heavy shopping with no elevator, passing out after getting some chores done after mr smear went down for a nap, waking up completely wiped out, the chiropractor, big shopping

ska in the shower (the rudimentals, mr smear and i love three of the songs off their blaze up the fire EP), mielies, mr smear resisting a rest and using psybient to induce compliance

the weirdness of dropping $25 on a font for my illustrator

tuesday 1st november:

an awful night with mr smear up many times and for a while each time; working really hard to find an important crypto solution and getting it fleshed out and into bed about four hours before i had to get up to meet my cousin
a very interesting meeting, as much for familial stuff as for business, then coming home to find that mr smear had been giving everyone the runaround all morning. hard work getting him to nap, not managing to nap myself (rls plus general restlessness)

[forgotten afternoon]

great dinner, luke cage and working hard

wednesday 2nd:

until 4am, interrupted frequently by a very unhappy mr smear

at least i got a few hours' sleep... finally getting my end-to-end javascript encryption operational, finally seeing the sample comic pages with captions (and learning that captions are a lot harder to do well than i thought), a therapy session that dealt with sunday's unpleasantness, a doctor's visit and an unconventional prescription, visiting the discovery store to pick up a piece of paper, gd leaving me with mr smear for physio and a productive chat with mr cat and pre-date-night fatigue
mom's visit and prepping mr smear for bed

the season finale of luke cage - what a phenomenally great season!
going to bed early

thursday 3rd:

and actually getting a good night's sleep, getting up at 4.30 / 5 to work well before mr smear woke up

missing pilates because we wouldn't realize what day it was until the evening; the rick and morty picture mission, a big curry lunch and a nap, then mom taking mr smear for a deferred date night taken in the form of acupuncture (with lots of needles)

prepping mr smear for bed, working, thai dinner and returning to jessica jones, passing out

friday 4th:

and dreaming. a lot. ending with getting to the back of the wooden last car of a train still splashed with paint from new year's celebrations and inhaling the smell of the tobacco bowl burning and speeding into the savanna; watching the train transform into a dragon with a unicorn head and rainbow mane and a train body trailed by a long flowing robe. the dragon sped into tall grass as i followed closely until we reached the end of the savanna and came to the foot of a giant ice mountain. we began the ascent and almost got distracted when it became dark and we saw a lake with a wooden pier bordering it and people on the bridge and public toilets and an entrance to where we knew we would find food but be trapped as if by sirens

meeting the accountant, then putting mr smear down to nap, talking to an insurance broker, rushing out to pick up mom and meet my sister and niece at plant, quick spice shopping on the way home and giving up on free web hosting after 000webhost dropped the ball for the last time - and setting up my own damned server on digitalocean. a completely different experience, and suddenly i wish i had moved to them years ago instead of trying to go "the easy way".

mom's first vegan challah success

getting mr smear to bed at a reasonable hour that felt early only because summer's coming, an episode or two of jessica jones that have significantly improved since about halfway through the season, then putting in a massive effort to sort out my sites

saturday 5th:

totally worth it, running sites myself is infinitely better not only in terms of setup experience but in performance and capabilities too, and letsencrypt is a brilliant service!

a good night's sleep with incredible dreams that i can't recall

small site tweaks, a good chat with my boss (that could have been better if mr smear hadn't picked that time to start wailing himself to sleep), skipping swimming for a nap, having a great time with cousins at the farmer's market, coming home for a short nap and to get ready for my niece's surprise birthday party; a lovely soirée but more importantly an excellent opportunity for mr smear to interact and tire himself out :)

the discovery that what's been getting him to sleep quickly isn't soothing sounds or the dancing motion but the 32 beat psy structure

jessica jones and rls and vanishing to bed in a puff of smoke

sunday 6th:

up early feeling mostly rested after high school hunger games dreams, starting legend of the guardians (which is amazing, minus the awfully forced and exclusively-for-kiddies montage musical number)

the waterfront last-minute birthday present shopping expedition and second breakfast with incredible choc tahini fudge

signing up for a kirstenbosch membership and enjoying a couple of hours by a pond introducing mr smear to new foot sensations (including duck poop) and gd to one of cape town's particular privileges

getting home wiped out but dirty so showering first, then tweaking my mother's website and finally sorting out her email addresses (serious relief, this struggle has been going on since before i met gd)

a back spasm and pinching nerve but mr smear "forcing" me to dance him to sleep while demonstrating exquisite taste in music ^_^

jessica jones until gd and i both passed out

today:

waking up around 1.30am and spending the last three hours fixing captions, posting this and the gods know where all the other time went. i should probably get an hour or two of rest in before another crazy week begins properly.