the birthday boy

monday 31st:

1.30am up, 4.30am down, 7.15am up

school drop off, hours trying to work but distracted by bureaucracy, finances and recruiter harassment

a second day of disturbingly summery heat, rain worries (as of today, we have about 60 days of water left in cape town and not much rain in sight)

school pick up, mr smear's asthma directing us home instead of the gym, nap and work time, beginning to fall asleep just as mr smear woke up, failed party shopping, hitting the park until sunset, home for dinner panic and dropping gd off at the synagogue then rushing home to pull pies out of the oven and discover an urgent need to shower mr smear before feeding him and getting my mom to pick gd up; a slightly more relaxed bedtime, mr smear throwing up a little but so tired he passed out immediately afterwards

not watching game of thrones (chewing noises and a lack of subtitles, we'll be waiting for the season to become available on showmax), limitless (so far, fun series) then working until 11.30pm

tuesday 1st:

4am up and suffering sciatica, running through dark memories of my first apartment after i joined the army, remembering how crazy i went that i developed a tic of growling and how i would lose myself in music in public in uniform blasting my headphones and dancing or singing, then somehow finding myself googling the autistic guy from my first team and discovering that he's become a respected researcher - and lecturer?!?! - in discrete mathematics

up at 7am to be told how boring my stories are, taking mr smear to school in the rain (not much, but we're grateful for it), the window repair guys forgetting our appointment, breakfast and work and unpleasantness over arts and crafts shops and map fails, picking up mr smear in the cold rain when i was dressed for the day before, "no nanny" letting me know that daddy has to read

the arts and crafts mission to plumstead that ended in a breakdown on the highway in the pouring rain, half an hour of misery until the mechanic arrived and sorted us out in time for us to drive straight back home to relieve the nanny

an uncomfortable evening, good words only coming after bad and cancelling gd's conversion course (logistics of night classes with a toddler and no driver's license)

mr smear definitely sick but hyper busy and naughty, an easy bedtime, shark tank and working until i completed the unit i'd been busy with

wednesday 2nd:

12.30 to bed after some texas hold'em, 5.30am up for a sick-day feed, mr smear and i sleeping in a little before breakfast, an interesting chat with the director of a big recruiting company (who i went to school with), the angry rush to drop gd off at the acupuncturist, an hour chilling with mr smear, driving out to wynberg to an amazing kid's store, developing a relationship with the creepy eyeless life-sized noddy in his coin-operated car, buying a couple of great books for mr smear on the way out then rushing back home

gd's lunch panic and both of us losing our shit, a badly timed call to tell us the conversion program directors had found us a solution, learning that our therapist has had an unimaginably horrible month, mr smear crying to bed then crying out of it (fever), keeping him as comfortable as possible until he started to come right and torment us (cheeky bugger, but funny at least)

our landlord / property manager trying to screw us and shooting themselves in the foot

a positive meeting followed by a little me time followed by an unmotivated dive into code and logs that turned up pretty much what i expected (nada)

thursday 3rd:

mr smear almost making me cry at stupid o'clock in the morning, a locked up back and a damaged wrist

a pleasant restart to the day with breakdancing compilations, the drop off followed by a crusade against pillow theft and reducing my unread email count from 650 to about 500 (it was hovering around 800 a couple of days ago)

dropping off a tray at my mom's, laser hair removal test (for a neck fix required after suffering the unprofessional montréalers), two quick rounds of shopping, an unsuccessful hunt for staplers, mr smear's favourite ginger turmeric soup and the long walk back to the car

my son may drive me nuts at night, but he sings along to ac/dc and falls asleep to nirvana (heart-shaped box) so i guess it's okay

not much of a nap, ordering birthday cake, taking gd to the chiropractor and picking up our pillows (after all that, they're the same kind we already had), getting through the late afternoon, a chat with the RCMP, rushing through shower and dinner for mr smear before my mom arrived and we headed to our first conversion class

an interesting and pleasant evening, feeling welcome and having a good laugh about gd's candle lighting philosophy (keeping god in) and about "nida" ("don't poke the bear")

mr smear spiking a serious fever, to feed or not to feed sparking a serious but positive resolution, shark tank and trying to work

friday 4th:

but tweaking and fixing my pc until 1.30am because nothing was running

mr smear sleeping, but then not eating...

the early waterfront mission (no cell signal, crappy balloons and vegan junk food, wellness warehouse vegan lunch, amazing books for a friend, mr smear's short nap and my stopping the giant vegan cupcake halfway, mr smear super needy, fighting forex "advisors" who i believe were pranking me, chicken shopping for my family (grabbing the last ones), mr smear coughing to the beach then indicating that he needed to be changed prompting me to return (he didn't), the sudden horror realizing that gd needed to be in synagogue earlier than usual and that we had three overlapping engagements the next morning and that we needed rice, excessively over-ordering from the chinese restaurant downstairs and dropping gd off and picking up the rice and grabbing stuff for mr smear and taking him to my mom's in heavy gusts of wind, helping to arrange furniture and replace bulbs and then joining gd at shul; running into the slightly inebriated recruiter boss i'd talked to earlier and enjoying a joyful service,

my cousin's kid's gone vegetarian, so my brother-in-law learned over and whispered "you may have gotten to him, but you'll never get me"
"no, but the grim reaper will"
later on he surprised me by remarking on how well i've taken to parenting: in a relationship based on flippant jibes a compliment becomes really powerful

an entertaining evening after a much needed triple shot of whiskey, coming home with a sleeping baby in the cold wind, limitless and the rest of the cupcake and bed

saturday 5th:

another rough night, not up a lot but each time thoroughly resetting my rest clock

being dragged out of bed to drag mr smear out of bed to drive to hout bay, learning to trust waze more and more along the way

a lovely morning at the beach (though our friends' vegan deli appears to have gone out of business), a few interesting interactions with other parents, picking up gd and driving through to dolce's bakery to pick up mr smear's vegan chocolate mousse cake (and an irresistible "vegan acp") then returning home to put him down for a nap before storing the cake at my mom's; not much of a rest before he woke up and gd left for my mom's to work on her party crafts, an afternoon taking care of mr smear alone which was mostly fun... the bike tantrum at the end of the promenade notwithstanding...

our landlord's property manager repeating the same stupid things she'd been telling us and forcing us to fight over our contract

evening sick, gd and i utterly buggered and mr smear coughing until he puked, not helped by the fact that he's barely eaten in three days

a little limitless and the first new episode of rick and morty, a little rls, some awesomenauts and jordan peterson and bed at 11...

sunday 6th:

a couple of events during the night and waking up feeling like i'd missed two nights' sleep completely, mr smear's not-so-bad birthday morning

bad communication all around and serious party mismanagement, finally arriving at the park at the time we'd invited everyone to arrive but fortunately (and with lots of help from my mom and the nanny) putting together a fun (and over-catered) event with friends and family

the satisfying general disbelief that the cake was vegan

home for the great unwrapping (serious loot!) and the desperate enforcement of nap time, waking up to delicious leftovers and going down to the supermarket for a chocolate as an excuse to break a big note to pay our nanny; running into one of mr smear's classmates throwing a tantrum and having his grandmother inform me "he's a real problem child" before making an ass of herself by refusing to tell me which floor she wanted

a pleasant afternoon (mr smear didn't want any cake, and in an attempt to show him that he was missing out i ate too much myself)

a pleasant sunset plastic bike ride on the promenade until the wind came up, then home just before my mom arrived for a drink, mr smear singing himself to sleep with "ani kuni"

shark tank, rick and morty, cake and oranges and bed

monday 7th:

omg a full night's sleep and waking mr smear up in the morning, no cough until we started getting ready for school, dropping him off, coming home to confirm that nedbank's stupid mistakes are going to cost us, amicably firing the cleaning lady after days stressing about it, the school calling us to pick up a constantly coughing and needy mr smear, walking to the police station (hah! he said "canadia") then seeing the doctor (apparently mr smear's fine), home for lunch

feeding mr smear (yay!), dealing with his boredom while gd cooked, trying to make the right calls about potty training, passing out on the couch for a couple of minutes and then trying to lie down but giving up because all the stresses sprang to the fore, resigning myself to caffeine and getting something done instead

taking a PPI for the first time in a few days

lots busy, few results, taking mr smear and his bike for a walk:
a. skateboard mentality showing on the steps / ramp of the sabc building
b. watching parachuters land
c. trying to involve himself in a boxing group
d. refusing to go around obstacles along the promenade wall, saying "shalom" for the first time, then refusing to do so when a woman spoke hebrew to him

work / dinner / shower (singing "anomaly" to anna molly and making me super proud), limitless (it's frustrating that even on nzt the protagonist can be a moron sometimes), completing a task, playing texas hold'em and betting large with the winning hand but losing to an interface failure.

awesomenauts vs people: discovered that that wasn't going to happen because nobody geographically near me plays; so i tried another game with bots, giving up after 40 minutes because bots are freakin' stupid and it always ends up me, alone, versus three of the bastards. i promptly uninstalled it.

today:

now that i've posted, i'm ready to get back to work...