all hallows' eve

monday 23rd:

marc maron's too real is brilliant, in bed at 2.20am with a very sore hand

waking up painfully slowly until diaper change stress turned psychostorm, getting gd and mr smear to where they needed to be then taking so long to get to my mom's that it was time to pick gd up already (damned forgotten keys), a long talk in the car and then returning to my mom's to fail to get the city of cape town on the line, picking up mr smear, stopping home for lunch and then walking with mr smear and the nanny until my mom's, a short while later they joined me for mr smear's nap because the construction at home was too much but just as the arrived my mom's neighbours fired up their hammers and drills so it was only marginally better

a struggle with CORS but eventually succeeding, returning home for a dinner while on a conference call - not ideal - and shower, eventually putting mr smear to bed and finally finishing the 500 hats of bartholomew cubbins with him for the first time

the anticlimactic realization that game of thrones season 7 has only seven episodes, fighting with videotron about an unpaid invoice, working until late

tuesday 24th:

up painfully early but with the ends of spirited away, my neighbour totoro and howl's moving castle, hustling mr smear to school then taking a little down time before dropping gd of at the mall and working to good beats until pickup time

managing to get mr smear to the car in record time only to have to go all the way back to the classroom to change him. watching him and a friend's kid and losing them both on the playground, panicking and eventually finding him coming around from the dark side of the jungle gym, picking up gd and parking with him snoozing in the back, but unfortunately waking him when we got home; a slow afternoon entertaining and working

fedex telling me not to worry when i expressed concern that the package we were waiting for went from cape town to johannesburg, then at 5.30pm receiving an update to the effect that the documents had been sent to the wrong address. it didn't help that the african contact number they have listed is invalid :/

evening meal while gd stewed about the insensitive pharmacists (is it really necessary to be douchey and judgemental?)

dropping gd off at her class and bringing mr smear back home, unable to interest him in dinner, showering and putting him to bed with two short books and pretzels and getting a magical "daddy? i love you" when i turned the light off

... and ten minutes later he was yelling for the living room...

... and three and a half hours later i crawled out of bed after lying for a while in discomfort...

wednesday 25th:

adding a fun feature before crashing at 2.30am, up at 6.45 to zombie-state put on spirited away

a mostly pleasant morning until mr smear needed a timeout and gd and i had a shattering fight about discipline, a breakdown and taking mr smear to school and coming home for an hour and a half communicating: i'm forced to acknowledge that i'm sick, and that i need anger management. i cannot distinguish between myself and the behaviour i use to protect myself, when i feel antagonized i completely disconnect from all emotions save rage and hurt. i don't even know where right ends and wrong begins. i don't know how to prioritize threats and i don't know how to adjust my responses accordingly.

why is it often so much harder to understand and accept that our behaviour is harming ourselves and others than it is to change it?

sorting out the police clearance delivery with an excellent fedex courier, struggling to get work done before going to pick up mr smear; a little play time with his best friend and his sister, coming home for lunch then walking to my mom's with him and the nanny and settling down to work, making great progress which i completed on returning home; continuing to work while gd and mr smear whiled away a cold and windy afternoon

a mostly-smooth bedtime, the last episodes of big mouth (magnificent from start to finish), crashing early (9.30pm)

thursday 26th:

4am hammering waking us, a restless couple of hours then giving up and getting up to start the day with a stiff neck

learning that the bubonic plague is still alive and threatening south africa

mr smear coughing himself awake, lots of duplo fun and then the usual until dropping him off at school, racing over to town to install an insurance tracker and leaving pissed off because i could've gotten it done if they'd just told me what to prepare beforehand

an emotional therapy session

taking mr smear to nü while gd discussed jewish shamanism with the rabbi
the car key crumbling on our visit to the chiropractor, a nap with boxing tire practice taking place noisily below mr smear's window, a long accountant conversation, the challah bake with and without mr smear and being super awkward saying goodbye to my hebrew teacher

gd's awesome first challah

friday 27th:

early morning hebrew songs
looking at shoes and a big grocery shopping eating up my workday
twenty minutes of work then picking up mr smear
an emergency pick n pay run for nothing (empty shelves)
the forgotten stroller remembered just as i parked outside my mom's
fifteen minutes to charge my phone and fix a bug before rushing out to waze on a rapidly-emptying battery
the intro meeting with the anger management guy a background check, a third shopping on the way home, a fourth shortly after
evening planning stress while trying to get some work done and entertain mr smear while gd baked
friday night dinner
absolutely buggered

saturday 28th:

early up, gd struggling, a stupidly hot day, arriving at an empty temple already half an hour late before learning that we were supposed to be in wynberg; waze failing but arriving reasonably fast, mr smear behaving really well (and crying impressively quietly when he bashed his temple against a pew), eating lunch in the car, driving home and taking advantage of mr smear's nap - even managing to sleep after he woke up as gd occupied him with the dr horrible soundtrack.

a fun, quick visit to the park next door, shopping with dirty trolleys, tipping badly balanced bottles at the liquor store

a braai at the temple, the kids keeping each other busy and connecting the parents, a really nice havdalah ceremony and coming home really late but with mr smear still awake so showering and reading him to bed (and allowing him two bananas, but no beigelleh)

finishing an episode of elementary (loved it), then scribbling this until 23.25

sunday 29th:

working until 2.30am

dreaming: "old mcgrampa had a meth lab"

a beautiful summer's morning, gd still struggling but joining me in taking mr smear to clifton 4th. feeling fine until a few minutes before we left, then a short period of acid reflux and a sinus headache before meds kicked in, grabbing the last parking spot before realizing we had no cash for the parking attendant

a super hot and beautiful day with the water forming a little kid's pool, being joined by mr smear's best friend, mr smear joyfully screaming "i NEED the sea!" while bounding in naked-nuts-deep to the freezing water, his friend throwing sand in his face and my taking the opportunity to walk him through the correct response

keeping the kids awake to play at primi piatti, then home for a serious nap; i couldn't nap, so i played some (unsuccessful) command&conquer instead (i'm really not very good)

getting through the evening, some parts easier than others, and being so tired by the time my mom arrived that i forgot she was there and left the toilet door open while peeing

shower (don't drink grey water, boy!), bedtime, a bit of stranger things 2 and a junk food pigout and serious rls

monday 30th:

interrupted dreams, exhausted waking, tissue box emergency stress, barely eating half my breakfast
a boiling hot day, lots of driving so it was great having taken a bunch of psytrance cds along, dropping off mr smear at school then racing home to print documents and take gd to the hairdresser, getting an hour of offline work done while waiting then taking her to see a neurologist in pinelands, dropping her off and rushing straight back to pick up mr smear and take him home to the nanny before rushing straight back to pick up gd then race home to drop her off before heading out to a job interview at century city, only getting trapped by the anti-farm-murder protest on the way and having less than half an hour to get there instead of an hour and with no battery for waze (so i had to borrow gd's phone)

arriving *just* on time but struggling to find parking, a not-unpleasant interview experience (although it would have been nice to have been offered water or coffee), then returning home in easier traffic to sit and finally finish my breakfast before mr smear woke up, then working, visiting the chiropractor and grocery shopping until dinner time; a very nice and simple dinner together, a positive shower and tooth-brushing experience and only a little tantruming before bedtime reading; gd going straight to bed and me watching half of get carter before getting back to work

tuesday 31st:

almost paying off one of our credit cards (i'll be jumping for joy when it's both of them, and when we'll be able to start making local purchases instead of paying international charges on every bloody charge), working well until taking a break to write this and now jumping back in

another month bites the dust

thursday 5th:

1.20am finally testing a working solution after days of hunting, then entering a rabbit hole of encryption details to ensure that it's safe as well

1.50am finally being able to go to bed after struggling to back up my code and update SxS

a diaper change while half asleep and then handing mr smear over to gd to stay in bed almost until 8

great project success (exciting!), leaving late for kirstenbosch and mr smear falling asleep in the car so enjoying lunch at cavendish instead

the long drive home, trying to lie down and being jump-started by an out of control diaper change shower, coffee and work before taking mr smear for a stroll

old schoolmates and their kids, generally pleasant and i hope i didn't come across too strong when discussing food choices

the rush to feed mr smear before heading to the spur without gd to meet cousins i haven't seen in years, my mom giving me some time to eat and converse but mr smear becoming more wound up as it crept further past his bedtime

home, quickly putting him to bed then diving into recruiter responses then documentation

friday 6th:

eventually turning in around 1am

up early and resting on the couch desperate for actual sleep and not managing; getting gd to the chiropractor, picking up my now seriously cool shirts* and sending mr smear off with his nanny before catching up with a glorious couple of hours dreaming insanely weird and wonderful dreams (why was the business owner's mother getting off the gynaecologist's table in the promotional video? what was the point of the dancer in the elephant costume?)

* which after a couple of wears have proven to be shitty quality prints after all. ****er.

a little work while determining whether mr smear would nap of not, then joining a group of parents at the grifizzi brothers animal-free circus for a really fun afternoon; not all the kids enjoyed it, but our whole family most certainly did (i'm a bit of a fan, now)

mr smear passing out on the way home, us deciding on an easy night with game of thrones, work and command & conquer (got to the point i got stuck when i played it in my teens)

saturday 7th:

mr smear singing in his sleep

and then it was 2am...

and then it was 6am... struggling, early emergency shopping downer, arriving at the temple for the last five minutes of the service, super awkward with an old high school substitute teacher, an inappropriate reaction concerning my father and an unnecessarily harsh response to the offer of cheesecake

a brilliant call to try the museum and enjoying the company gardens with an israeli family and the squirrels and doves

nap time (thanks, sneaker pimps), a new frankenstein series and lunch, no idea what happened between then and mr smear waking up, a very interesting chat with sailor and his enthusiasm for my nursery rhyme project, mr i-don't-wanna-go-outside-i'm-drawing, a freak gust of wind at the park but mr smear sliding alone, jungle-gyming like a pro, inspiring a new rhyme reboot (helicopter blades), then peaceably coming home when i realized his favourite part of the jungle gym was covered in ice cream

the jerk parked on the pedestrian crossing and me responsibly walking away from a fight i really wanted (physically, not verbally)

mr smear's dinner and bedtime prep, then trying and failing to watch spiderman: homecoming, eventually giving up and resuming guardians of the galaxy 2

sunday 8th:

up early, howl's moving castle and watching mr smear happily drawing

a big and uncomfortable discussion about what to do if cape town runs out of water

taking mr smear to kirstenbosch, being extra careful about the sun and using plenty of sunscreen but still getting burned, ending a long walk by grabbing another kid's balloon, driving home yawning while mr smear slept soundly, enjoying his nap, a lazy-ish afternoon, my mom coming over for bedtime, spiderman: homecoming (definitely my favourite spiderman) and working well

monday 9th:

until 1am, waking up 6 as if i'd unslept to "butterfly!" whines and cries, a couple of hours on the couch before i was able to function, dropping off mr smear, really struggling to be productive and eventually napping (a lot longer than planned because the first attempt failed), getting a little work done then dropping gd off at the chiropractor and hanging around the school with mr smear until she was done

two or three hours until mr smear finally went down (to a lullaby of his choosing: b. i. n. g. o.), but managing a few important phone calls and getting some work done anyway

my sister's birthday: her daughter's gift to her was announcing that i'm going to be a great uncle soon! and my sister's going to be a biker granny!

a telephone interview beginning with me stopping the call to extract apple skin from mr smear's teeth (YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG!), but very interesting nonetheless, mr smear helping me shop and ending the day realizing that if it wasn't for school he'd have been in front of the telly all day - although in our defense he spent a fair amount of time leveling up his drawing skills and we're very proud that he started (by himself!) trying to colour in inside the lines and was largely successful ^_^

game of thrones s7e6 was exquisitely painful

completing a milestone and crashing before midnight

tuesday 10th:

6.30am slightly-better-than-zombie-state, crazy baby rhymes and the demented soccer ball people, postponing my laser hair removal until march due to excessive sun exposure, noticing that my greying beard is looking more and more like muttonchops, a busy and productive morning, picking mr smear up and teaching his teacher a bit about nutrition, his traumatic best friend goodbyes

work and paint tool struggles (gimp plugins are hard work), test driving the car and deciding to go with it (!)

taking mr smear to the park in the blazing sun to play with his friend from earlier, feeling like i was saying too much to his mother, awkwardly avoiding a milk product that she was sure would be fine (people just don't understand how pervasive dairy is, it's in EVERYTHING), coming home and getting things - including work- done, gd really struggling with her neck, CRA fail

game of thrones still surprised me with the things that i thought had been spoiled before

finally getting my paint tools sorted out and learning about bleed

wednesday 11th:

calling it a day at 1am, two hours after i knew i needed to go to bed

up repeatedly for a long four hours (lots of interrupted interesting dreams), 6am wake up breaking me but gd managing to give me an hour or so of unbroken rest

the relief that gd's fingerprints were received and accepted, another excited recruiter contact, a misty morning used to deliver printworthy documents

picking up mr smear and gd (acupuncturist) together, dr horrible following us from the car to the living room, mr smear eating gd's chickpea and spinach curry, lego grip slip jeopardizing nap time, a short but helpful nap, then an afternoon navigating bureaucracy (south african for our nanny - "just go to our website", canadian for our taxes "email within the next couple of years")

groceries (wedding ring included, i caught it in time to hand it back)

gd in trouble, surviving the evening

thursday 12th:

gd still in trouble

better sleep, visiting glendale (highly emotional moment and some really awkward ones), everything conspiring to wake mr smear from his nap when we got home, my first print trial in production, mr smear loving his first slide but too nervous for the second, rushing home to let sailor in and then dragging him out again to bootlegger (an interesting and productive meeting and mr smear enjoying himself immensely), mom paying for our car (!), dropping gd off at home and taking mr smear for a run through the waterfront before returning home to eat, shower and manage mr smear's last breastfeeding

friday 13th:

sleeping well in short blocks trying to get up to work, succeeding at 4am and working hard, continuing even after mr smear woke up and joined me

gd going to the doctor, the nanny taking mr smear out just as she returned and after he made me so angry it took all i had to a) not give him a beating* and b) calm down after he got the message that i was really mad

* the final straw was him throwing his toothbrush into a bin filled with toilet trash

a disheartening chat with my accountant, a quick review of options with my mom, lots of work and mistaken commit fixing and my mom signing for the car and finally returning the rental in friday afternoon traffic, picking up the new car so tired i was hallucinating (thank the dealership for the water and coffee)

a comfortable drive home, shopping, family kiddush and the first bedtime without breastfeeding since he was born (a little sadness but no drama)

a very short nap until rls (or sciatica, or whatever the hell is wrong with my legs), then being responsible until midnight (okay, a little c&c too - finally completing the first commando mission!)

saturday 14th:

sleeping badly and pinching a nerve in my neck, spending the rest of the night trying to sort it out and waking up with painful lower back too

a day of lost patience and perspective, the rabbi's son's barmitzvah, afternoon nap

liquorice paternity test passed

meeting cousins at my mom's and mr smear eating all my sorbet, mistakenly hosting another cousin instead of visiting her, dinner difficulties but an easy bedtime with an unintentionally long dr seuss book

finally seeing ant man, which was surprisingly entertaining, then settling in to learn about hashicorp's vault before crashing

sunday 15th:

waking up to a snappy morning and feeling like crap, a very unpleasant way to take mr smear to the aquarium, a long but overall good time there, him eating half a falafel laffa and passing out on the way home; the new car's dimensions are taking some getting used to and i was sure i bumped the back leaving

kind of napping (restless), followed by an explosion that had been building for a while, taking a walk, talking through it and grabbing a cup of coffee at my mom's on my way home

meeting protoplasm and his partner for drinks at quay four, mr smear possibly causing a waitress to drop full glasses, but definitely breaking mine directly with his toy car

mr smear interfering with my rice and vegan korma dinner, which was only mildly annoying until he poured a cup of juice into it; i was so tired and weary and it really made me want to cry

a pleasant shower and bedtime, the rest of the thor sequel (try saying that ten times fast), passing out early

monday 16th:

waking up around 1am and spending a couple of hours investigating hashicorp's consul, a couple of hours sleeping, another early morning and mr smear snotty so no school

working at bootlegger waiting for gd, shopping, home, shopping again, then driving to the printer to pick up my book sample - really not bad, but not amazing either

picking up garlic bread that i wouldn't eat (does it have to be made with real butter?), buying plasticware and dropping everything off before heading to my mom's to work

making good progress but having to rush home in cold, wet and windy weather without a warm layer, then taking mr smear to a friend's to play; the older child pushing mr smear roughly, but otherwise just an hour or two of playing and talking before rushing home in time to catch my mom teaching gd about eggplants

showering in a bucket, mr smear's "police car" issue interfering with bedtime, a loooong good night, work demo, dc's legends of tomorrow and crashing

tuesday 17th:

up at five to hunt down a phantom hammer, a horrific dream in which mr smear drowned followed by another sneaking around a container ship with steve-o and peter dinklage diving in water tanks and gaming the security guards

a swollen and painful wrist (the return of the repetitive stress injury exacerbated by lifting a squirmy mr smear and heavy buckets of water)

---#metoo:

it would be nice if being a man had protected me from being sexually harassed or assaulted. the fact that "i can take care of myself" didn't make the experiences any less unpleasant and violating, and i believe that for women it's so much worse.
it's so prevalent, but we don't really see or feel it without this kind of concerted effort.
it was my own experiences in my late teens that made me acutely aware of how my own behaviour, which i'd innocently believed was cute and harmless, was not. if you see something, stand up against it. if you hear about something, support the victim by listening, not by justifying. be prepared to lose teeth for this, our children are next.

posting that on tuesday brought up a couple of incidents, one in particular of me being surprised and overpowered by a very large man and barely being able to break away mumbling some meaningless excuse; yesterday i learned that a guy i used to hang out with a lot went from run-of-the-mill "asshole" to sexual predator and life destroyer.

---shared excitement with gd in an idea combining judaism, shamanism and cycles

work

intense jackhammer work beginning as i put mr smear down for his nap, fortunately it was only about 75-80 decibels

our c# expert trying soften the blows while explaining my mistakes to me, infuriating git issues and a busy, bored and restless child

dropping gd off at the temple, the oven taking so long to heat up that i could only feed mr smear at around 8pm; shower, bedtime story, and then saying good night as the hammering started

shouting at the assholes continuing to hammer at 9pm, one of them daring to tell me "we're not idiots" and getting an earful in return, including me yelling at him to go tell his mother what he's doing to other people because i'm sure she'd be proud

gd coming home and us learning that videotron never closed our account when we left canada and expects us to pay for their mistake (we confirmed that we had closed the account before we left and returned their equipment)

a long meeting, enjoying antonio banderas in security, then investigating azure solutions

wednesday 18th:

until 1.30am

the usual, dropping mr smear off and chatting with a friend about child psychology, picking up gd and heading to the waterfront for gift books (who titles a book "turtles all the way down" without referencing the discworld?!), a passable vegan muffin (and a free smoothie voucher), leaving in good time and being stuck behind a few idiots all the way to the chiropractor; taped wrist, pinched back, a recommendation to swim.

the rental tribunal's bad timing, picking up mr smear and heading home. waking up from a nap needing it more desperately than before, eventually going to my mother's to work for an hour or so, coming home in a rush and gd deciding not to take the now-napping mr smear to the triple birthday party

a very interesting interview over coffee at the waterfront, getting through the evening with my mom bringing sorbet, reading mr smear to sleep, dc's legends of tomorrow and chocolate and liquorice

the police authorizing 11.30 hammering

azure investigations

thursday 19th:

until 1am

a chilled morning, getting mr smear to school late, picking up an emergency allergex bottle and taking it to his teacher before returning home; i have no idea how i got into or out of the parking without hitting the cars in front or behind me

briefly home then taking gd to the chiropractor, where he stuck a couple of needles in my arm while treating her, then back home to receive a document from the car dealer before returning to the school to pick up mr smear

a badly failed attempt to instigate a nap, a long afternoon, taking mr smear to buy diapers, ride on the blue train and some little girl's bike, get him ready to hand over to my mother and then head to the temple with gd for her class

an amusing hebrew class and a fascinating bible class, coming home to the remains of dinner and a fight triggered by not debating an article by a black cop deconstructing black lives matter

friday 20th:

passing out at 12.30 from exhaustion

really struggling with my wrist, waking up early and sleeping on the couch until the nanny arrived, showering mr smear before class with much tears

working at my mom's, picking up mr smear and returning a for sudden, painful migraine and difficulty with cookies and CORS - i originally wrote migraine, meaning "painful headache", but it turned into a very serious one that left me utterly debilitated; i barely managed the walk home, threw up a lot and couldn't help gd with mr smear in the slightest. the nausea and dizziness subsided in the evening, the pain would only start relaxing in the morning

saturday 21st:

getting out of bed around midnight, tired but restless, for an episode of big mouth, toast and patton oswalt: annihilation which is an absolute must-see

a morning on the couch, dropping gd at the temple and taking myself and mr smear to the doctor who checked me out and gave me advice for managing migraines, fifteen minutes paying for the parking guard to learn how to charge me with snapscan, then fifteen minutes of buying bananas with a baby and locked up express queues, then finally! getting to the temple to pick up gd and go to the blue train

not going to the blue train because of a cold wind, but picking up bread and smoothies and coming home to nap with jackhammers at our windows

patton oswalt again and more big mouth, mr smear getting up *as* i lay down, lunch (starting with begged-for sorbet with a portion that ended in tears), gd and mr smear going on the blue train before i dropped her back home (still too cold) and took him to the aquarium for a good experience that would have been so much better if it hadn't been for the coin-op distraction

a little walk around to smoke other people's cigarettes, then back home stopping only briefly for an emergency extraction of dried mango from the bag and getting stuck chasing after mr smear on the parking lot rooftop for a while

late dinner and mom's visit, shower and bedtime and mr smear not impressed by my not finishing the whole book but eventually falling asleep anyway

the end of a stephen king movie, big mouth excellence and a bit of marc maron: too real

going to bed around 11pm with concern for an episode on the other side

sunday 22nd:

up early with a very bored, curious and naughty boy, mr smear sneaking onto the balcony and causing a panic fight, flower for the ps3, strawberry farm anxiety, clothing breakdown
a stupidly hot day
keeping mr smear awake until we got to my mom's shop, learning that tool manufacturers are tools, and whoever made pozidriv so similar to phillips is a piece of crap. why don't we learn this stuff in school?
vida's new "falafels" taste like it's made by someone who's heard of falafel and knows it's made of chickpeas but has neither seen or tasted it
a visit to my aunt's, mr smear thoroughly loving the swimming pool (i hope their water's coming straight off the mountain)
home to nap and work, then grocery shopping (checkers was out of a bunch of things, a manager made gd take some violife), watching asterix in britain, shower (inverting the bucket system made it easier and distracted mr smear) and dinner and bedtime

half an hour of "why didn't you finish dr seuss?" from my son (it's a bloody long book, that's why), big mouth (still phenomenal) and watermelon, then work

monday 23rd:

and then some posting. now a few more minutes of marc maron and bed.

school holidays part i

monday 2nd:

intense dreams (being sniped by a jiujitsu expert before fighting him off while scrambling up a ladder, finding and enjoying old coffee mugs and a sun-warmed old toasted sandwich)

dragged out of bed for breakfast and dr horrible's sing-along blog, a little inside out, a second sleep with more intense dreams (a potential landlord at a bar mitzvah taking me aside to inform me that he was sold out of A3 card paper)

aaaaaaaand SUMMER. hot and personal about it. dropping gd off at the acupuncturist and taking mr smear along for a shopping run, taking him home for his nap, meeting up with gd and sorting out t-shirts for both of us then stopping at my mom's to compulsively gobble down spoon after spoon of painfully cold sorbet

working until the weather switched back to winter then taking mr smear to the park to ride around with our friend's kids and explore their dynamic (not sure it's healthy, but keeping a close eye on them), home for dumplings and bedtime

dragon's den and passing out, trying to wake up repeatedly throughout the night but exhausted and uncomfortable (back pain)

tuesday 3rd:

up early for dr horrible's sing-along blog and inside out, then sitting down to work but being constantly distracted, eventually giving up and taking the family to the aquarium: a brilliant idea during school holidays in bad weather :P

overall quite fun, mr smear eating well (great falafel and coconut yoghurt smoothie), home to a warm nap, finally getting up with coffee but still really weary; work progress, t-shirt printing disappointment (was he having a stroke when he did the alignment? three shirts wasted)

dinner, work, shower, mom arriving, the hackerx event beginning awkwardly but turning out to be quite interesting, returning home around 10pm and chilling a bit before working some more

wednesday 4th:

going to bed around 2am after a couple of breakthrough moments

waking up at 6am unable to think of anything other than the coming experience of dealing with the shirt printer

a little bit more sleep, joining mr smear for breakfast, dropping gd off at the chiropractor and heading to the shirt printer. you know that moment when you realize the precise thing you needed to say but it's too late to say it? he gave me a sob story about how my making him deduct the cost of the wasted shirts from the printing price would reduce his salary, as if the cost of his incompetence should come out of mine! delivering new shirts for a second chance, preparing mr smear for a hard day of park, sending him off with the nanny and then settling in for a few good hours of work - three straight hours, followed by another two hours because he arrived home napping, and i suddenly realized i'd been sitting for a LONG time instead of my usual up and down and my back was beginning to hurt... but i had a few important successes even if part of my achievement was learning that i have to rethink how i've been using node.js crypto's AES offerings :/

gd's delicious burned banana bread, an interesting and amusing visit to the park, straight to the temple in my shorts and flip flops for sukkot, mr smear playing nicely with a little girl, then kicking the soccer ball around with the bigger kids and having a ton of fun until one of them knocked him over, late dinner and remembering which episode of game of thrones we're on (with subtitles!) and back into work; i've just finished verifying my RSA solution and am now about to either dig in to the AES problem or go to bed.

prejudice and pride

monday 18th:

waking up GNT (gross nose & throat) and struggling (also very tired), dropping mr smear off at school then coming home to suck a lozenge and nap, waking up and realizing that i should've been taken sinusitis meds for days already...

getting a little work done, then picking up mr smear and getting out relatively quickly. dropping him at home, trying three different print shops for a high-quality scanner with no success, but drawing cash for a microwave repair to pawn it for the same amount...

gd's revelation (finding a new passion), working and waiting for mr smear to wake up to take him for a playdate with his class best friend; he was miserable until we arrived, although temporarily distracted by the dr horrible soundtrack

taking immense pride in mr smear's relaxed response to another kid's roughhousing and in his immediate sympathy when his little buddy cried (sorry! are you okay?), and missing a classic embarrassing wedding video opportunity when one climbed on the other and yelled "you're my wife" (two year olds!!); a generally pleasant chat with the parents (not our kind of people, but pretty cool nonetheless)

missing a work meeting (feeling pretty uncomfortable and unprofessional for losing track of time), but coming home to the illustrator's revisions and feeling thoroughly satisfied and excited because i'm finally ready to start preparing the book for publishing - whoo hoo!!!

getting mr smear ready and into bed, then rushing over to my mom's worried because she wasn't answering her phone (she was fine, and not home), gd falling asleep while waiting for me to finish a quick meeting, a half hour of marc maron's too real, investigating sailor's proposal (very interesting), writing a good chunk of the new fairytale i outlined over the weekend, and working

tuesday 19th:

until 12.45am then going to bed with the cough again; a miserable, uncomfortable night full of coughing and a stuffy nose and tossing and turning, eventually getting up early with mr smear and finding myself more comfortable tired and *not* in bed; mr smear advancing quickly with his ipad-fu, us generally managing to be productive and almost on time for dropping him off and heading into town

a magnificent morning that no camera of mine was going to capture; a very pleasant and professional experience at the printers (orms) and a frustrating and nerve-wracking one coming home through crazy traffic

taking gd to the chiropractor, getting some filing done, picking her up and then doing chores and font selection before returning to the school to pick up mr smear who kindly fell asleep as we arrived home (no thanks to the woman shouting by the elevator, but she responded politely to my rather unsubtle request for consideration

wasting nap time with shopping

gimp doing a great job with cropping and text, but unable to handle cmyk. pixlr doing a great job with cmyk but unable to handle text and doing strange things to the image sizes.

after much frustration taking mr smear to the park where he was very friendly towards kids who clearly weren't used to hearing "hello" from strangers, and where for the first time he slid down the big slide with out prompting or hand holding; plus he did a little acrobatics from the top which was pretty cool. i also introduced him to the fireman's pole, it was great having him jump from above my head into my arms but i'm now nervous that he'll try the distance to the pole itself which he's only kind of understood...

accepting sailor's offer of a crazy but exciting side-gig

bedtime yelling at the boxing instructor downstairs for his stupidly loud music again, mom's visit (still coughing but finally being treated), and an evening of downloading photoshop (legally, my gods adobe's servers are slow), watching an idiot abroad and using gimp to preview the text

wednesday 20th:

struggling with photoshop to export colours correctly, in bed late and sleeping badly, up around 5am to try again while i sorted my nose and throat out, mr smear up at 6 and the three of us passing out and finally sleeping well until alarm o'clock

a pleasant morning, dropping gd off at the acupuncturist and mr smear enthusiastic about getting to school, sending fingerprints and picking up the last remnants of our montréal lives, driving to pick up gd and returning alone to the parking i'd just left as she insisted on walking to meet me, an unpacking and tidying ceremony then rushing off to pick up mr smear

a little rest before the telkom technician arrived then stealing away to the bedroom to work: working from home with a two year old is like playing a game of hide and go seek, only you don't get bored while you wait

no nap and no afternoon outing, getting to the temple on time; mr smear doing fine for a while, then playing quietly, chilling with a childminder, coming back and rushing to join another kid on the platform where he fell and bumped his head to everyone's horror; fortunately it wasn't a biggie and he was pretty relaxed for the rest of the service

rushing home to pick up my forgotten driver's license and change mr smear; he fell asleep on contact with his car seat and spent the evening sleeping like a log on my sister's bed - we actually had dinner eating and chatting with everyone like adults for the first time since he was born!

a lovely evening, following my mom back to sea point and everyone fairly quickly going to sleep

thursday 21st:

not a bad night, but waking up at 6am thoroughly exhausted and trying to catch up on the couch

a long three hours in the temple, mr smear behaving surprisingly well and i only suffered a few coughing fits; he fell asleep in my arms about ten minutes before i went up to read the prayer for israel, my first time speaking in front of a crowd in ages and awkwardly reading it with him still on my shoulder, then being asked personal questions by the visiting rabbi on everyone else's time

dropping a sore and upset gd (she didn't expect such a long service) at home with mr smear and taking off to airplane's place to learn just how little i know about graphic manipulation, then home briefly before a cold wind tashlich at the lighthouse and getting ready for a really nice dinner at my cousins with my sister - this time mr smear engaging until dinner time

that pumpkin pie!

home and bed

friday 22nd:

another 6am, finishing my book's text arrangement, walking mr smear and the nanny to the park, half an hour on the treadmill with a brief period of elation followed by a painful foot (bad running form), a day of trying and failing to create or convert different ebook formats minus an hour of work and another of walking mr smear to see the sea

adobe and the cc fails; having to download legitimate software illegally

dinner with mom, mr smear falling asleep quickly, more ebook struggling and an idiot abroad then crashing before 11pm

saturday 23rd:

the fallout from my mom misspeaking the night before (fortunately resolved the same day), a really nice, intimate and interesting saturday morning service with lots of people commenting on just how well-behaved mr smear is, home for lunch and a nap, mom's visit and finally making progress with epub and pdf formatting just as sailor arrived, a little work and a lot of strategy plus playing with mr smear, hitting the waterfront for birthday present shopping and dinner plus decadent treats from wellness warehouse (although the macha tea was awful) before returning home to eat, shower and put mr smear to bed

gd passing out quickly, working on my book

sunday 24th:

until eventually publishing (but not promoting) just after 2am, only vaguely confident in the quality of the files and the online shop (wordpress isell and who knows what paypal will do) and wondering how amazon reduced the size of my book so drastically (up to 72 hours to find out) [isell works great! and amazon dropping the dpi significantly from print quality still looks great on an ipad]

3am upstairs drunk neighbours' shit music at full blast, 3.30am going up a second time and working hard not to physically climb into those sacks of sociopathic excrement; by that stage our night was done

waking up to my first live offering on the kindle store, gd's back too sensitive to travel and taking mr smear out to polkadraai alone for his friend's birthday party - arriving beyond exhausted and struggling to manage mr smear and deal with other parents for a couple of hours, although some were fun to be around regardless. mr smear's possessiveness of his nanny, running into our first playdate friends, arranging preschool hebrew meetups, slugging down a cup of coffee and driving back home the long way through rough areas (my gods, cape town is an ENORMOUS sprawl), mr smear sleeping most of the way

surviving the afternoon with a little help from my mom, getting through the evening, the last bits of leftovers and an idiot abroad, a little more book / author page tweaking, some investigation into iot and going to bed early

monday 25th:

a few ups in the night for mr smear talking in his sleep, sleeping in a little and starting the day with the dr horrible soundtrack and some games, general unpleasantness, backups, baby city, learning that our shitty neighbours had had a break-in (not sad for them), things getting worse then better, walking mr smear to sleep, a little work before he got up and then gd's first visit to the scratch patch, mr smear a lot easier to manage than the friends we met up with there (gd's concerned that he's trying really hard to befriend a kid that's antisocial), angry clothing shopping (for me, but eventually when i found good trousers gd realized that i wasn't being uncooperative, just selective); coming home for dinner, shower and one last unpleasant episode, then finally settling in to our regular evening routine

working until suddenly finding myself overwhelmed by fatigue and rushing into bed

tuesday 26th:

a marginally better morning, dropping mr smear at school then returning to take gd to acupuncture and head to town for an interesting meeting about my options for digital printing (next stop, lithographers); the rain beginning as i got back into the car, taking gd home and fiddling with image compression before picking up mr smear - starting to be concerned by the behaviour gd noted, we want him to stand up for himself as well as be affectionate and we're only seeing the latter (although he is only two, my gods parenting is tough)

the struggle to get him out the door with his nanny and her return about ten minutes later with him fast asleep, test driving a chev (just like an opel!), taking mr smear for his last vaccines before age six (and damned expensive ones, too, but we only just learned that we had cheaper options): unlike most kids (and pets going to the vet), he had no issues with the place itself, he played nicely and was very chilled. it was only when we put him on my lap on "the chair" that he knew exactly what what was coming and the administration of the three shots was pretty traumatic... but fifteen seconds later he was chilled and playing again.

huh.

artisan bread, home for dinner and finally finding a particularly stupid bug that visual studio had introduced into my code that had sent me on a wild goose chase for days

bedtime, a little idiot abroad, an important conversation with sailor (should i have been THAT candid?), rick and morty, mr smear mysteriously unhappy for a while, a little stripe store experimentation and then work

wednesday 27th:

until 12.30am

a pretty standard morning, returning home from dropping mr smear off and finally sitting down with the gap insurance claim form and a support agent on the phone, suddenly realizing that i'd gotten the hospitalization dates wrong* and that it was precisely six months ago to the day and therefore literally the very last day to submit the claim: not helped by frantically searching for the supporting documentation for half an hour when it had been right under my nose beneath the claim form the whole time

* might have something to do with all related parties taking a month to send their bills

picking up mr smear, dropping off gd at the gym, putting mr smear into bed just as the jackhammers fired up, trying to work and really struggling to get my head into it, mr smear waking up just as gd arrived home, the nanny taking him to the park and us going an hour later to relieve her, a little football time and a walk to learn where the horses aren't stabled, home for some shopping, reading, eating, bedtime, an idiot abroad, rick and morty and work

thursday 28th:

storming downstairs twice to complain about midnight construction (i actually asked "did none of you have parents?!")
resolving one set of issues to get stuck in another
1.30am bedtime

6am the hammering resumed, sleeping in a bit and eventually getting up to dr horrible's sing-along blog, dropping mr smear off at school then returning to take gd to the chiropractor and finally coming home and getting some work done

chatting with the "we're just following orders" contracts manager, i told him and later his boss that that's a very nazi attitude to hold

gd walking all the way home, picking up mr smear, an afternoon with an enforced nap (read: me dancing him to sleep) but mostly working and dealing with his defiance - and his new crying-for-everything thing he's picked up at school :(

our neighbour trying to sell us a more-than-just-a-vacuum-cleaner (i wish him luck, but even if we could afford it i'm not sure we'd really want one), bedtime prep and mom's visit at bedtime, a cider and chocolate disturbed by 9pm hammering, working until 11pm then crashing

friday 29th:

making a real effort to avoid waking up with gd and mr smear at 6am, succeeding well enough to dream about researching academic publishing opportunities for my mother and exploring moving to live in another area of cape town (the possibility of which gd would end up raising in the morning in an unrelated conversation)

beginning the day meeting with the preschool principal about removing dairy from the school; a very encouraging discussion as she was very receptive and accommodating

work - back to the struggle integrating microsoft and openssl encryption keys - picking mr smear up early, between a difficult diaper change and a slow uphill taking half an hour to get home

an unpleasant afternoon triggered by a detail mismatch and lasting until evening, a serious sorbet and booze run, mr smear (mostly) helping me shop after waking up from his nap, gd's delicious pre-fast dinner, showering and putting mr smear to bed... going to bed ourselves not long after

saturday 30th:

3am pride and fall

6am back to sleep on the couch

walking mr smear, playing at the park, meeting gd, mr smear falling asleep on the long walk to the temple; all dressed in black and with no kippah on the holiest day of the year - but fasting and repenting honestly nonetheless

walking home, feeling really dizzy and breaking my fast on cold coconut water (a most sensational relief), a quiet afternoon (mr smear guzzling leftovers and falling backwards off the couch)

dropping gd off at the temple, mr smear off at my mom's, a quick and painless ne'ila, a very nice breaking of the fast with lots of good food

sunday 1st:

crashing at midnight, waking up before everyone else at 6.30am

our first non-tv morning in a long time, good breakfast, mr smear's potty milestone (ripping off his diaper and using it correctly) and making a little work progress before heading out to buy pull-ups and enjoy a delicious meal at the hungry herbivore (mr smear demolished my burger!); coming home to take full advantage of nap time, waking up begrudgingly when he did, then going out for a late afternoon stroll / park / blue train ride before returning for the dinner gd had prepared

bedtime prep, a little star trek: discovery then rick and morty before messing about with this post (and trying to do other things in the background; not so successful.