Tag Archives: weekend

Comfortably at home…

Posted on by

Once upon a time, a three-day weekend invariably triggered a round of book hunting. I’d slip out to shops from the Philly burbs all the way down to Rockville.

Here in the 3rd plague year, I’m just having trouble finding that level of motivation. It’s not that I like the books any less, but that I hate people all the more. Obnoxious behavior in public seems to be the rule rather than the exception. It’s impossible to be out and avoid the Karens and Kens insisting common sense, decency, and decorum aren’t things they need. Decent behavior is, obviously, just for other people and not for these self-important twatwaffles.

Most of the mask “mandates,” to the extent that they were ever really enforced, have fallen, but good sense along with both my personal physician and RN sister still strongly recommend them. I’ll defer to their knowledge of best practices over taking unsolicited advice from the average American politician. I’ll also fully admit, though, hours of browsing for books fully masked with glasses periodically steamed over, frankly, just isn’t fun. 

I miss spending a good part of these long weekends picking through endless stacks. I’ve gotten out a few times since cold weather set in, but not often – and those trips rarely resulted in real treasures, even if they coughed up plenty of good basic reading material. As a former boss of mine was overly fond of saying, the juice simply isn’t worth the squeeze. 

Someday I’m sure it will be again, but just now I’m perfectly willing to rely on the internet to let me get my book fix either until the browsing environment gets more fun or I recover some lost motivation. It’s hard to say which of those things may happen first. Between the general fuckery of people as a group and the persistent low-level threat of plague, assuming it happens at all, could be out of order on its face. There are way worse ways to spend three days than comfortably at home.

On the importance of knowing your audience…

Posted on by

I didn’t watch any of last night’s Super Bowl. The looks of confusion and disbelief when I tell people that is delicious. My up front admission of this saved me today from some, but not all of the conversations I didn’t want to have today. So vague is my understanding of the the state of modern football, even if I had watched, my only contribution was smiling and nodding at what felt like appropriate moments.

I don’t think my choice to be bowl-free makes me morally superior, but I can’t see any sense in watching something that doesn’t interest me when I have 300 channels of cable, 5 streaming services, and 1000 books stored away just waiting to be read. We live in a world where there are too many options to be troubled to stare at something that would bore me to tears.

I might flip on the occasional yacht race or tune in for women’s beach volleyball, but otherwise, there’s just nothing in the sporting world I consider a “must watch” event. There’s only so much free time on any given weekend and I’m determined to spend as much of it as possible doing things I want to do rather than things that might improve the next day’s water cooler conversation.

I mean I don’t drag disinterested people down into conversations about the details of Buffy episodes or the Royal Navy in the age of fighting sail. No matter how much those things interest me, I’m well aware they’re not for everyone. Now if I could just convince people to acknowledge that two groups of millionaires beating the hell out of each other for fun and profit need not be the central point of conversation we’d be all square.

Maybe I’ll just started responding to every football reference with “It’s just like when Rodney captured four ships of the line and prevented the French invasion of Jamaica during the Battle of the Saintes” or “I mean it’s not as bad as those couple of times when Buffy had to die to beat her big opponent.” All I’m saying is maybe you should know your audience a little before launching into a detailed discussion of your particular fandom. I promise you, the recounting of stats and plays sounds as nerdy to me as anything I could say about my fandoms does to you.

Running out the clock…

Posted on by

With three days left in this grand 16 day weekend, I guess you could say the only thing I have left to do is run out the clock.

With a bit of a sore throat and a touch of post nasal drip, but no other signs or symptoms of crud, COVID, or anything else catching, I’ve laid in groceries and have no further plans besides three days of proper hermiting before work raises its ugly head and demands my time again. It’s celebrating this long stretch of days off by doing that which I most enjoy.

These last two weeks seem to be ending with more a whimper than a bang, but I’m not exactly complaining. Being holed up with the animals, rooms full of good books, food to cook, and vast quantities of tea and gin hardly sounds like a disaster. Who knows, I might even get crazy and watch something on Netflix or Hulu instead of just using the television as background noise.

All while in the back of my head rumbles the warning that Monday is coming. I don’t think any amount of time off will ever change how I feel about that.

The next long weekend…

Posted on by

I started the latest in my ongoing series of very long weekends at 4:00 this afternoon. My out of office message is set, my laptop is packed away, and I won’t be sparing another thought about COVID, or briefings for industry, or taskers for the next five days. It’s a decidedly good feeling. 

I have no real plans to speak of. I’m sure there will be a bit of junking and book hunting in the mix, but for tonight there’s nothing that even passes for a plan. I’ll be going as close as I ever do to playing it by ear. I’m not sure my version would pass as anyone else’s idea of spontaneity, but I’m ok with it.

I usually try to keep the blog schedule moving along without interruption during these vacation days, but as always, for the next few days I’m reserving the right not to sit down at the computer unless I’m really feeling a strong bit of motivation. I really have no idea whether I’ll be posting for the rest of the week or not. It’s a total coin toss.

Not to worry, of course. Even if I’m quiet here for a few days, there’s not much chance at all of me shutting up on Facebook or Twitter, so you can always treat yourself to a micro-rant elsewhere on your preferred social media platform.

What Annoys Jeff this Week?

Posted on by

1. Friday afternoon. Once upon a time, I actually enjoyed Fridays. They were a day full of promise. Now, of course, Fridays are just the day the Good Idea Fairy makes its rounds or people remember shit they should have done earlier in the week and try to jam it through so they can claim it got wrapped up before close of business. I can only urge you not to be that guy. Don’t wait until Friday afternoon. I promise you, deep down in places professionals aren’t supposed to talk about, no one give a shit at 3:30 on Friday how good an idea you’re having or whether something gets done or not. Maybe there’s an exception for immediate threats to life and safety, but otherwise all anyone on the line cares about on Friday is getting the hell away from cubicle hell for a few days. I know the uberbosses, enthroned high on Olympus, have forgotten their days lower down on the org chart and truly believe that everyone wants to (or at least should) give 300% 24 hours a day, but the heights of Olympus aren’t a reflection of any kind of universal reality. Sometimes those memos are just going to linger over the weekend… and I’m perfectly fine with that.

2. Paper cups. I know it’s saving the world or whatever, but I miss Chick-fil-a’s Styrofoam cups. In its new, socially responsible paper cups, the lemonade gets watered down on the ride between drive-thru and office. It’s just disappointing.

3. Heating and cooling season. So here we are well into autumn. It’s a special time of year where I fire up the furnace each morning to knock the chill off the house and then a few hours later when passive solar heating has sent the indoor temperature well into the 70s, switch the air conditioner back on to get the place back down to a reasonable sleeping temperature. At least in this part of the world this mixed season doesn’t usually last long. While it’s here though, I spend an unreasonable amount of time pondering the time, effort, and cash it takes to maintain a steady 68 degrees. 

The best ten weeks…

Posted on by

Here we are in mid-October, I’m comfortable saying I’ve mostly adjusted to the diminishing daylight and have started into one of my favorite times of year. Sure, it’s about to be the “holiday season” or whatever, but that’s not really it. Not directly, anyway.

I’ve long made a habit of mostly hoarding vacation time through the first 2/3 of the year. With the arrival of October, though, it’s time to start letting those days spool out. For me, that means the next two and a half months look something like this:

Three-day weekend… Work for two weeks… Five day weekend… Work for a week… Four day weekend… Work for three weeks… and finally the last, glorious Fifteen day weekend capping off the year.

The annual burning off of vacation time is a real thing of beauty. This annual rite of autumn is made easier in my case by not having to burn time during the rest of the year to tend to sick offspring or in accommodating spousal wishes. I sprinkle days through the rest of the year to get a quick breather when necessary, but it’s here in the fall where I really get my head right.

In a few months the new year starts and with it a new round of hoarding time off begins… with the promise of another fall filled with days not spent dwelling under fluorescent lighting. For now, though, I’ll happily celebrate the best ten weeks of the year,

It’s not most weeks…

Posted on by

Most weeks, by the time Friday rolls around, I’ve simply had it. I try to eat a big enough lunch that dinner can be a piece of fruit, some cheese, and, if I’ve remember to pick one up, a soft pretzel with good mustard. By Friday evening the thought of the time and effort involved in actual cooking is a bridge too far – and you might as well forget about taking the 30 minutes to an hour it takes to find decent carryout. Delivery? Right. I live far enough into the wilds that nothing I’d want delivered even comes close to me with their drivers – Those that do, arrive with a stone cold meal.

This wasn’t most weeks, though. This week was special. I skipped the fruit. I skipped the cheese. I even skipped the pretzel and mustard. Moving straight on to the gin and tonic portion of the evening felt like a far better use of the small motivation I was able to dredge up. Maybe in a bit, once the juniper and botanicals have worked their magic, I’ll feel up for a trip to the kitchen to raid the peanut jar or open a can of something. Maybe. If not, that’s fine too. At the moment I’m perfectly fine and happy sitting here with no bells ringing, no email, and no one asking for a damned thing.

Three cheers for the bloody weekend.

Grinding gears…

Posted on by

One of the ways I know I’m still in a bit of a brain fog is that it wasn’t until trying to jam some things onto my calendar this morning and discovered that Monday is, in fact, a federal holiday. Huzzah, three-day weekend. It was unintentionally unexpected, but I’ll take it. I have no idea what I’ll do with it, but I’ll take it gladly.

Meanwhile, the trials and tribulations of home ownership continue. 

In addition to the ongoing saga of keeping the house in fresh and potable drinking water, this morning’s hard rain showed a number of spots where the gutter seams appear to be leaking – and one place where a small stretch of gutter could be blocked entirely. I’m still waiting to hear back from my go to gutter repair/service folks. Their office voicemail said estimates were being scheduled five weeks out – but perhaps regular customers can jump the line for service appointments. We’ll see.

Last week, the fancy washing machine that came along with the house started sporadically throwing an error code. A quick look around Google shows conflicting reports of what the code means. Could be the motor could be the water supply. It feels like those two things should be indicated by different trouble codes, but the nice people at Bosch didn’t ask me when they designed the system. Hopefully there will be an answer to that question on Tuesday.

I’m also waiting for a call back from a local paving company. I’d like to get a few cracks repaired before another winter makes them even worse and get the whole thing sealed in an effort to buy a few more years before having the whole thing replaced. We’re playing phone tag on scheduling an estimate.

Finally, there’s the bathroom. The loan closed Friday. Funds were supposed to be distributed and ready for use yesterday – which was convenient because I was scheduled to sign off on the final plans and hand over the deposit this afternoon. I pushed that to next week since the cash has, for reasons no one has been able to satisfactorily explain, not been deposited yet.

I’m not going to lie, it feels like a lot of moving gears that aren’t quite meshing at the moment. I’ll all get managed, but rest assured I’ll be swearing and cursing the whole time. 

Plugging away…

Posted on by

It’s Monday. More specifically it’s Monday before the long Independence Day weekend. By itself, that would be all the reason by brain needed to be vaguely uninterested and disengaged for the next four days. I’m sure that’s not the kind of thing you’re supposed to say out loud. I should be filling this space with key words like “commitment,” “dedication,” and “focus,” in case any of the bosses stop by to have a look around. 

In my defense, though, it’s not just a response to a three-day weekend. Those are common enough – and while I surely appreciate them, they’re not usually enough to drive me completely to distraction. Tacking on an extra four vacation days to round out the second (and last) nine-day weekend of the summer, though, is a different animal altogether. 

The first half of the year – the good half with plague restrictions and social distance and encouragement to stay home – seems to have slipped by effortlessly. I don’t in any way imagine the back half of the year – the part where we’re supposed to get back to an approximation of “normal” from the before times – will be nearly as pleasant. That means whatever days off I scrape together from here on out are going to be carrying an increasingly heavier weight of expectations. 

So yeah, I’m just over here plugging away and trying to get through the week with as little fuss and headache as possible… and maybe looking out over the next six months and figuring out where I want to jam in the remaining 123 hours of vacation time to get the most bang for my buck. 

90 good minutes…

Posted on by

I had 90 good minutes yesterday. Between turning the light’s out on this year’s Big Event and getting home to find every faucet in my house was spewing sand-infused water.

Blowing out the filters and a bunch of pipes last night reduced maybe 95% of visible particulates, but there’s still a bit of grainy residue at the bottom of every glass of water, so I’m left to conclude that something is not quite right somewhere between the submersible pump and the filter.

Twenty-four hours later, I sit here with calls in to two local well drilling companies in hopes that one of them will call back and get someone over to give the system a look over from end to end. I’m going to take another run at the main filter tonight in hopes that I can get just a little more juice out of it until the professionals get around to taking my money.

I mean a little sand isn’t likely to kill me, but on general principle I don’t think the last swallow of water from any glass shouldn’t be crispy. I’m pretty sure that’s the situation that’s going to cast a pall over my weekend.