a mixed feelings moment

 i'm sitting in a coffee shop with my laptop and a beer, listening to chilled music on a beautiful afternoon while mr smear plays laser tag with his classmates. the walk over here, over the bridge across the ayalon specifically, was cool - all the skyscrapers and the construction provide a great sense of scale, and it reminds me of my fantasies of returning to tel aviv while we were trapped in south africa during the pandemic.

we didn't go swimming today because mr smear didn't get up until really late. i (easily) managed to get a large set of shelves up while listening to synthknot, and i spent a good hour and a half working on the AI harness and made some very real progress. the rest of the

[oh, fuck. he just called me to ask me to pick him up because he doesn't like their music. and he asked them to change the music - which i've warned him countless times will backfire, and it apparently did - and i've just threatened him with a month of punishment if i come back and he's not downstairs trying to have fun]

afternoon was spent doing not much, including a very brief nap midway through reading a chapter of starship troopers.

we took a taxi to the party, i've just settled down, and godsdammit i'm finishing my beer at my pace and trying to get something productive done.

extra steps

 after getting home soaked yesterday, we took turns showering, after which i recall very little of the afternoon. i'm pretty sure i napped under layers of blankets, i read a bit of taiyo matsumoto's ping pong, and i helped gd prepare the challah-peño taking our neighborhood baker's advice.

it came out much better quality in terms of the challah itself, but it didn't taste quite as good (intense) as it smelled :(

dinner was really nice, and the late night was mostly due to watching iran revolution-related stuff and tool / a perfect circle reactions.

i slept alright.

this morning was a lot of reading, and watching stuff, and then mr smear woke up (late) and we got into breakfast time. did i nap before we went out, or afterwards? i don't know. but we did go out for a nice walk (we were going to join nystire and co. but they got rained in) without argument, during which i convinced mr smear to draw a comic he's been thinking of.

he did that when we got back - oh! that's when i napped - and the outcome was excellent (and funny) but he doesn't want it published and he won't tell me why... *pouts*

i finally sat down to work on reviewing a whole bunch of the AI-generated code in my side project, uncovering really strange hallucinations (eg. a nonce that's generated immediately before being checked within the same function) and fixing a few actual bugs, and then suddenly it was 3pm and mr smear and i geared up, grabbed the vegan hot dogs gd had prepared for us, and walked to my new employer's office for his friend's laser tag birthday party.

most of the parents dropped their kids off, but i'd walked so i hung around for the almost three hours chatting with mr smear's friend's parents (good talks) and at one point putting in a few minutes of productive work on my side project. i didn't actually go into my office, though, because i felt very uncomfortable figuring out the alarm system over a weekend when i had no real justification for using the office :P

it was a long walk there, and a long walk back, but those were two long walks with good father-son talks, and we both had an enjoyable day overall. also, it helped that it didn't rain on us.

we got home pretty late, which meant that after all the shower/toenail stuff mr smear got to bed very late, and i'm already feeling like i'm going to crash soon even though i know i've got tons of stuff to do and i haven't been doing any of it...

...

"the revolution is being streamed, not televised" - tousi tv, "pahlavi announces plan to return to iran - declares final battle"

firstly, "media" outlets like the BBC are exposing themselves clearer than ever as nothing more than propaganda shills for oppressive, tyrannical, anti-west* regimes like iran, qatar, russia, and china.

(also anti-semitic)

secondly, anyone notice how the iranian people, resisting after fifty years of REAL occupation and REAL oppression, aren't raping women or murdering children?

conflict management

 well, that was an experience. we managed to get to laser city early, which gave us plenty of time to walk around and look for non-existent places to sit down and drink something... eventually others started arriving, and mr smear played foosball with some other boys. it was going well, until it didn't, when he got angry with one of the slower kids for doing something wrong :(

then it was time for laser tag. when the guy running the show announced that the teams would be boys vs girls, i thought this would be good because the boys would have no reason to gang up on him, but he ended up being put on the girls team (with a couple other boys) and two thirds of the way through the first round i saw mr smear rush out and find a quiet place to cry.

that sucked.

but then i managed to convince him to try a new strategy: it's a team game, and if those idiots are going to insist on chasing him down and focusing on him, then he should consider himself "bait" and lead them straight to his teammates. he went back in, and came out with renewed enthusiasm after his teammates successfully ambushed his bullies.

that was round one, of two. in the second round he had trouble again, both with the being chased and with one of the kids straight-up cheating. once again, after a quick pep talk he returned and i watched his ranking rapidly jump from last place to fourth-to-last, and i was very proud indeed.

so there was shit, but there was some success, and overall he seemed to enjoy the laser tag itself which is a huge relief. and i'm extremely proud of him for walking back in there and not giving up.

...

on the way home, we took a detour to pick up some stuff for the weekend, but we were still missing a gift for tonight so after stopping at home and eating a quick breakfast, i headed out again. the mission was successful, but i got plenty more exercise in the heat today than i'd planned.

oh, and on the way out i suddenly realized that the mongoose and his family live right next to where the drone exploded, so i felt rather shit for not having contacted them earlier :(

the afternoon was very quiet, resting and doing dishes and playing inscryption. oh, and having a very quick chat with gd about what i saw today and agreeing that it's probably a good time for mr smear to switch schools. his class is full of problem (violent) kids and he really, really got off on the wrong foot. and he's really, really making an effort to be cool(er).

alright, it's time to head out for dinner.

a day after

 did nothing yesterday afternoon. played inscryption, played some lego harry potter with mr smear (finished year three), thought a lot about what i wrote in yesterday's post.

like, okay. so i'm depressed. now what?

i woke up this morning to the news of the drone attack in tel aviv - my mother was awake at the time, and heard it - along with a link to a video horseman sent me about curating the five people you're closest to into a network to achieve things because it's not possible to achieve big things alone in this world.

this morning is, so far, going alright. and although we only found out about it last night - and dramatically believed that the child whose mom i messaged was ignoring my text - mr smear has been invited to a laser tag birthday party and we're leaving to take him there in about fifteen minutes (well, my mom and i, gd just left for a catch-up sewing class).