Waves of Emotion

So that tingling feeling of something going to happen, happened, as it were.

My boss instant messages me and tells me he set up a one on one with me the next day early in the morning and wants to make sure I can make it.

My brain immediately recoils in horror thinking that I’ve been caught using the interweb too much, or that fact that I’m at work for exactly 8 hours a day now, not a minute more.

I try to feel out the situation so I don’t spend the evening throwing up in anticipation.

I message back, sure no problem. Do I need to have some yearly goals put together to discuss or something like that?

He messages back, Well, I wanted to tell you in person… Oh shit … that your promotion went through.

Cooling calm and joy fill my heart. All my finishing reports on time has paid off. I tell him that’s awesome and thank him for working it on his end.

So I get 5%, and now I’m a Senior Gonzo Engineer. Maybe the Gonzo won’t be listed, but we all know the truth. I guess the grays in my beard are deserved now. It will look nice on a resume too, puts me in a different category and bargaining position.

This morning the kids don’t wake up at some point from 5-7. Seriously, the day I need to get in by 7:30 and they don’t make a sound. On top of that we find out my wife’s friend’s mom died this morning. I’m full of panic, self worth, and sadness. I need to get to this meeting so I get out the door buy 7:08. Luckily Peoria did a halfway decent job clearing the streets after 3 inches of snow.

I tear up a bit as I climb the hill to work. It’s a combination of relief of getting this promotion they’ve dangled in front of me for so long, and the loss my wife’s friend has to deal with. I remember her wedding and talking to her mom, this kind, lovely, gracious woman, nevermore. I try to pull my shit together and navigate the country road without killing myself.

I make it to work 5 minutes late, no big deal, everyone is 5 minutes late to every meeting they go to.

I sit down after the meeting, which is really nothing groundbreaking after finding out the high point the day before, and I am able to breath and let my head stop swimming.

Why do I always have to be on B-squad? You’re the LEADER of B-squad.

I’ve completely destroyed my normal sleep schedule with this whole being home alone thing. I’ve been staying up till around 3 in the morning this past weekend.

Last night I went out drinking with my hockey comrades. The strip club had it’s sub-sub-par B-squad out. We had fun drinking and bullshitting though. It was snowing like hell when we left. It took a long time to drive home. I took the long way on the interstate since I guessed it was in better shape than the rest of the roads. When I got back I was up until around 2 in the morning fixing a problem with our computer. Windows Explorer kept resetting over and over and over and over. I finally got it to stop through trickery and deception.

6:30 came quickly, but surprisingly I’m not very tired. The beer must have made me sleep soundly for the four and a half hours. I need to try and not take a nap when I get home so I can get back to a normal schedule prior to The Boy and Wife returning tomorrow night.

Zen Snow Shoveling

It snowed about six inches this weekend.

Steve- Snow is a frozen crystallized form of water which falls during the winter months due to the temperature being below 32°F (0°C).

OK, now that we’re all on a level playing field.

I heard all these snow blowers running and I just scoffed. Snow blowers are for old men and women, much like the only people without beards are young boys and women.

I find the act of snow shoveling calming and quieting. It turns off the unessential parts of the brain and gets you down to the essential survival parts.

It’s you, the cold, the shovel, and your muscles extending and contracting, much like ice-skating is you, the cold, the skates, and your muscles extending and contracting.

Everything else in the world is stripped away.

I also did a bit of electrical wiring in my house this weekend. I replaced some 1960’s vintage light switches. The wiring in the house is just scary. It’s that old shit with an inner layer of insulation and then kind of cloth wrap on the outside.

The three switches I replaced were all wired in parallel. They took the hot wire and just stripped off three sections on the continuous wire for each switch. Not exactly to code.

Then I spent like an hour and a half trying to get a timer switch wired into my outdoor plug to run my Christmas lights. Something was fucked up with the internals of the switch so I just went with an outside timer that plugged into the current outlet. I should have done that in the first place, it took all of 5 minutes to mount to the siding and setup.

Five days until the great Wisconsin Christmas Odyssey.

I’m your Neighborhood Spaceman… (terrible video, good song)