Today I abandoned my child when he was scared.
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Category: Daily Life
Ramblings, often stream of conscious, journaling the events of my life.
The Dark Side of Working from Home
I’m under a lot of pressure right now. I’m trying hard to close out a project. The end of projects are always the most difficult because time and budget is usually running out. Often the client realizes they want features that either were never requested or not implemented for whatever reason. In using the product during testing, user interface issues arise or the enduser finds it would be easier with just this "one simple change". Those are generalizations to "many projects" and not necessarily talking about the one I am on. But today I have been really trying hard to reach a couple of very specific goals and it hasn’t gone as fast or as smoothly as planned.
Enter the children. Since its nearing 4pm, Sarah has to be picked up from the high school, which is right across the street from Party City aka Halloween Depot. So Amy and Cathy are off to get Sarah, costumes, and accessories leaving me with my computer and Evan until Noah gets home to babysit. Of course, Evan just wants to play with Dad so he comes down to my desk and starts moving things around. In his cuteness, he wants to help so while I type on one computer, he starts typing on the other and unknowingly messing up my test bed. I lose it. No tv Dad for me today. I’ll reserve 50 lashings for myself later when in great self-flagellation when I punish myself for my loss of temper. Of course, that won’t change the fact that I sent a crying 3 year old packing to an empty upstairs. I feel like crud. I should work at night while they sleep. I just cannot figure out when I’d sleep. Time to go make amends and give some hugs.
State of Me
Today I feel beat down and sad.
Oh, Nebraska, not Target!
Big families should use the buddy system and we do. In the parking lot, before entering a store, Cathy chimes out the buddies: "Amy, you’re with Dad. Evan is with Sarah. Noah is with me." (Tommy is at the border of Kentucky and Tennessee) As the children have grown older, they gain a little independence. For instance, in Target, Noah in the Middle is allowed to hang out at the video games on his own leaving him buddyless. Unfortunately, this hasn’t worked out too well for him. Today we shopped at Target for Amy’s homework supplies to decorate a pumpkin as Fancy Nancy. After checking out and loading the car, Sarah questions, "Uh, where’s Noah?" We forgot him! Again! One day Target is going to gain a night employee. Sorry Noah!
Well lemme tell you sonny!
I’ve entered the last year of my youth. Today I am 39. In October 2009, the Boy Scouts of America will make me fill out new forms to make sure I’m not dead before leaving for outings, I’ll get to check a new checkbox on everyone’s forms (35-39, 40-dead). And apparently all innovation happens between 20-29 or 30-39 so this is my last year to become famous (you know I was supposed to retire at 35 right?). Tim requested this post so that we could avoid talking about the Antichrist or that I’ve become an old fart. Al I can say is, "I’m not dead yet!" (And thanks to all for the birthday wishes in Twitter and in the comments on Reality Me. You all are great!)
From the mouths of babes
Dad: "Sarah and her boyfriend are going to hang out at the park today."
Mom: "It’s too cold for anything. They’ll be fine."
Dad: "You’re funny."
Mom: "No. You’re funny!"
Lesson of the Day
When you are eating cereal at your desk and you have just raised the spoon to your lips, never cough!
Code Buzz
Runners get a runner’s high. I’ve got a coder’s high. My head is buzzing as I’ve been hitting the keys hard. My current PHP application has dynamic content loaded via AJAX but when the user navigates with the browser’s forward or back buttons the state is lost, that is, all the dynamic content disappears. Also if the natural navigation of the application takes the user away from the dynamically generated content, when they return the content is lost and the user frustratingly has to drill down, dynamically loading more content, to get back to where they were. Using jQuery, some custom JavaScript, and some fandangled PHP, I have overcome this obstacle and created a state engine that remembers which content was loaded and re-presents it on the screen whenever the user navigates with the browser’s forward or back buttons or the applications natural navigation. I’ve just finished the behind the scenes mechanics of this code and now have to fix the presentation level (after a 10 minute break). Whew! This was fun!
Kmart less confused
Kmart confused
From the mouths of babes
I’ve been ratted out regarding this tweet.
Not so close shave
I am starting to come to terms with the fact that an electric shaver needs new blades more than once every half a decade. For that matter, I probably should buy a new electric shaver more than once decade.
From the mouths of babes
Ring, ring.
Dad: "Hello?"
Amy, 6 years old: "Mom won’t buy something for me!"
Dad: "Didn’t you just go to Young Chefs?"
Amy: "Well, yeah but I want her to buy something just for me."
Dad: "But Young Chefs was just for you."
Amy, whining: "But Daaad. I want her to buy me something."
Dad: "Amy, you’ve been temper tantruming and whining a lot lately and that makes it awfully hard to…"
Phone becomes quiet and a distance voice is heard, Amy: "Here, I don’t want to talk to him anymore."
Two words application developers love to hear
"Looking good!"
