processing

 i'm feeling less physically and emotionally drained today, but i'm still struggling. mostly emotionally and in terms of desperately needing an uninterrupted day off.

yesterday:

starting to write up my experiences with bigtalk

mr smear and the drone workshop - he kind of shut down the moment he encountered the other kids, which really sucked. but my coworker who was running it was kind enough to do a private drone session later, and mr smear had an amazing time ^_^

...

making progress with the new devops guy, but uncovering layers of bigtalk's bullshit (amateur-hour and AI vomit). my boss informing me that bigtalk's hearing was basically him begging not to be let go, which is heartbreaking. i really feel bad for him, and i feel like the whole world has let this dude down; and he is one courageous dude.

...

a big moment with mr smear about tearing up artwork he doesn't like

planning to get dinner with mr smear (gd was getting her hair cut), and his friend inviting him to play table tennis. accompanying the two clowns on the bus, sharing hummus, falafel and chips for dinner, and occasionally jumping in to play some ping pong.

my mom's laptop being expertly stolen from her car

getting the kids home late (because his friend realized he'd left his phone by the tables when we were already on the bus we'd waited a while for)

a very late bedtime for mr smear, and therefore for us too

today:

i slept alright, but woke up early with my thoughts. continued writing.

we had a family meeting in the morning (regarding mr smear's workshop behavior, and his looking-at-his-failures behavior), and mr smear was very angry with me. but on our way home this evening, we had a very mature discussion and he acknowledged what we were trying to get through to him.

gd took mr smear to have bloodwork done while i had a meeting, apparently mr smear handled it impressively well.

it was a quiet day at work, though jam-packed with meetings and included a very intense lunchtime debate about israeli politics. it also included a two-hour long demo by a contractor, and i found it very validating that the new guy and i both came up with similar alternatives to his architecture and we both feel that what he's put together in two months is something either of us could do in a matter of hours... and better.

i came home, and took mr smear to dizengoff for their japanese food. we had dumplings and onigiri again, and mr smear ate the dumplings with chopsticks this time, and then we walked home picking up ice cream on the way. and talking a lot.

a lot of the talk was about bigtalk, and why this is such a difficult experience for me personally.

...

on an unrelated note, but running in parallel through the day, is responding to a south african connection on linkedin's anti-israel propaganda post. i felt i couldn't let the lies stand unchallenged, but the experience is gross.

...

i don't want to take vacation days unless i can actually enjoy the vacation, and i don't feel like that's going to happen anytime soon :(

a whole kernel through a nostril

we woke up this morning to another massive barrage. in addition to discovering that our neighbors are also vegan, we also learned about the US strike on the primary iranian nuclear facilities during the night.

now i'm listening to how islamists are attacking churches... they're deep into phase FA, i can't wait to see them FO.

...

yesterday:

after the midnight attacks on friday night we had relative calm. it was a day spent reading (i read about half of danny the champion of the world), we played (or, more accurately, i picked up a copy of webbed and mr smear played a lot). and getting the basis of the frontend for my language project.

in the afternoon, mr smear was invited by his friend to play table tennis, and i joined them and his friend's mother, scouted the area for a bomb shelter, and then enjoyed watching mr smear actually get into playing - giving him breaks by taking turns, and i was quite surprised by how good his friend is!

he came home with us and joined us for dinner, and his mother and i both made the screen-time rules clear. until dinner the two of them legitimately played, amusing themselves in hilarious fashion, and it was a treat to witness it. dinner was nice, but i was concerned about getting him home before mr smear needed to start getting ready for bed (and before the expected iranian attack), so i accompanied him home.

and then felt super awkward when i returned home to find mr smear still eating (demolishing a large pile of corn-on-the-cob), so he could've stayed later...

today:

it was a busy morning, and i was a wreck even though i slept a little better last night (not well, but better). i spent my work day in meetings, and working on something that took a lot more time than it should have, so unfortunately i'm going to have to continue working after posting this.

on a positive note, my mother sent me a whole bunch of documents and images of her parents and grandparents, and aside from being fascinating it gave me what i needed to respond to the people who've offered assistance with her aliyah process.

the saddest reason for a lot of lost time today was mr smear, two days after getting his privileges back, losing them again over homework (and lying to me). so that sucks.

but in positive news, we received the next two illustrated harry potter books (books four and five). it occurred to me that purchasing more beautiful books while we're under threat of getting our apartment bombed might be a mistake, but thinking like that is just silly.

[knocks on wood]

reversal

 WELL. we went to our friends for dinner last night, and aside from enjoying a really nice evening with them - and eating too much delicious food - we were all completely taken by surprise when mr smear and their daughter forgot their rivalry and just had a really good time together!

today was mostly relaxed, we played rayman: legends (we've restarted from scratch, and we're generally playing pretty well together), and we watched the second installment of pirates of the caribbean. so that was a great start to a saturday.

in the afternoon we all went out to play table tennis, which would have been nice except for a) mr smear throwing a wobbly on the way that generated a lot of unhappiness and b) the apparently-biting flies (both gd and mr smear complained about them) and wasps around the table.

so after all the drama in getting there, and the minor success in mr smear deciding he wanted to play, we ended up getting out of there without much playtime.

i had a good chat with horseman, though it's tough hearing how much he's been struggling (he's been suffering from chronic pain, he's in montreal where the only effective care is private, and he's had to quit his counselling job and has limited benefits that are running out).

in the evening, i put on my blades, mr smear got on his bike, we picked up our friend's daughter on hers and we went to the climbing wall together, for the last time on the three-month membership we bought. the kids were cool, and the evening was largely successful (her father and brother joined us after a while).

after a few walls mr smear decided he was done, but not after doing something that i had to punish him for. minor, but still. towards the end, i struck a bargain with him that i instantly regretted the moment i heard it coming out of my mouth - two more "goes" to drop the punishment.

gosdsdammit, i'm the one who's being trying to reinforce the idea that punishments are not transactional. fuck, fuck, fuck. afterwards, i explained to him that i'd made a mistake and that that won't be happening again...

the ride home was alright, and the rest of the evening was alright. now it's our bedtime, we have a big day tomorrow - first day of school, and ari's pain clinic appointment, at the same hour. whoo!

it's not suicide, it's communication

saturday:

my mom and i went to pick up mr smear around 6pm, but i took a wrong turn and we got a lot more of a walk than we bargained for.

the airport run:

we left on time, and arrived with time to spare before the allegedly-scheduled train was due to leave the station. the fictitious train would have gotten us to the airport approximately on time, but once we were on the platform it became clear that we'd been had by the transit app.

apparently all the transit apps use google maps as a source :/

fortunately, there was an available go-to car close by! we located it without too much hassle, although we were definitely stressed and relieved that gd and mr smear were at home. we loaded the car, and got to the airport without a hitch, only a little bit later than we'd have liked. and on the way, my mother taught me about the rear-view mirror clip for when assholes behind you have their brights on.

i made a mistake and parked at the orchard, instead of the vineyard. our parking spot was really far from the terminal.

we got through the first round of security quickly, but then were stuck in the queue to the counters (five counters, two manned, one only sometimes) for at least an hour. aside from "the farts", and having numnum cat stuck in my head (to my mother's perpetual amusement), at least she wasn't alone in the experience and we had plenty of time for a face-to-face farewell conversation.

there wasn't anything to do between check-in and security, and my bedtime and car rental period was closing in, so we said our goodbyes and i made my way up to the car. it was a long way, and the pay machines were broken. i was starting to panic, but encountered a family who assured me that i could pay at the exit itself, so i headed up to the car, strapped in, and turned on the engine.

that was when my mom called, and i immediately worried that she was having trouble with security and needed me to come back. she couldn't hear me, and put the phone down before i could switch microphones. then she didn't answer when i trying to call her back, nor respond to my messages.

eventually i got hold of her, and discovered she just wanted advice on purchasing headphones before the flight.

...

the ride home was okay, i was still wired from the espresso shot i'd had when picking up mr smear :P

yesterday:

a quiet morning before mr smear woke up, shopping and relaxing

the suicide drawing scare: gd approached me, freaking out because mr smear was drawing someone shooting himself in the head. so i calmly made my way over to peek, but he immediately covered it up in an effort to hide it. "it's a surprise!"

"hey," i said, "i have to go to work in a minute, please can i see it?"

"okay, but only because you're leaving soon."

it turned out to be a soldier with his rifle on his lap, and two fingers pressed into an earpiece to communicate. so that was a conversation we didn't need to have! *phew*

a long and frustrating workday hunting for a bug (and not finding it, but at the end of the day wishful-thinking that i'd found it), with me repeating "i want to die" on a loop

taking mr smear away from rain world for a really nice table tennis outing

trying to watch jumanji, but mr smear getting scared.

finishing the truman show, mr smear definitely having taken it the right way.

going to sleep lessons: understanding/remembering that mr smear has been afraid of going to sleep, and for the first time getting through to him that even if some of his dreams are scary, they can't hurt him or become real. a little later, i found him still lying awake, but he was no longer afraid, just restless.

worrying about whether it makes sense to request that he be moved to a different class before we move him to a different school

kaycee's mod update: omg this game is insane, and insanely unfair. for the third or fourth time in a couple of days, i managed to build an incredibly powerful deck (an insect deck with an ouroboros and an insect totem with an ant spawner sigil), only to get swatted at the final level by a situation i could see no way out of. i think i'm going to take a break from this abuse for a while.

today:

waking up from long intense dreams, my old house, mosquitoes, rollerblades, a weird butcher (who was butchering elephants?), and being unable to get a younger mr smear out of a creepy area after it had taken everything to get him to come with me in the first place.

mr smear waking up a little while ago, and happy to have another positive conversation about dreams.

winning.

...

it's a work-from-home day, but my first point of business is writing up a description of our aliyah story for mr smear's friend's father. hopefully he can help somehow...

numbness

inscryption is hard. and kaycee's mod is even harder. but i keep playing, i keep tasting success, i keep getting crushed.

it's now 1am, i should probably be going to bed.

...

the school year ended on a good day for mr smear, so that's good. his day ended on a not-so-good note, which was entirely my fault, and i hope i managed to smooth it over. that was bedtime, but the rest of the evening together was pretty good, and we had a pretty good time playing table tennis together after i came home from work.

work itself was good. i didn't realize i was on-call until halfway through the day - so there's that - but i made good progress on my latest project and i'm feeling alright about its timeline.

oh... and our "face-picker" sat next to me today, and once i noticed i just couldn't unsee how long his fingernails are. i really, *really* wanted to say something, but i cleverly kept my mouth shut. there's no way i could have said anything that would've come across as kind and supportive...

...

otherwise, i'm generally feeling a bit numb. i'm avoiding anything political / war-related, and my head's not right for getting anything useful done right now. maybe i should focus? or maybe i should give my soul a rest.

i should probably give myself a rest.