Irregular Monday

So Lisa alerted me last Saturday that she is going to the doctor's yet again today for the same condition she had complained about or been complaining about for a couple of weeks now. I have no comment as to the need for such a visit. All I cared about was that I have to watch Johnnie while he is in his last online class because her appointment is at 1 PM. And so dutifully I showed up at 12:30 and caught Johnnie interacting with his schoolmates. Apparently a return to in-person learning is imminent and I can't wait. It's only going to be for 3 hours a day in the mornings. But that's still a meaningful enough 3 hours. This morning for example, I got up and immediately started my Monday round of reports (for Covid vaccination) and started my round of stretches and exercises. Monday is heavy steps day and has been for a few months now after all. I looked and I averaged 100+ minutes of activity every single Monday since the new year. Pretty awesome I think. And a routine I am not going to stop today even if I have to play things differently in the middle of the day. I figured this would be a good practice for when Johnnie goes back to school. By lunchtime I had already done 8000 steps, but the problem was that when I got to Lisa's I hadn't had time to get lunch for myself. Still, Lisa headed off to her appointment, Courtney was on her way out and Johnnie let me know he still hadn't had lunch either. WEll then... off we went to Panda Express Marina del REy! Was it a few years now that we used to come to this Panda Express every Tuesday? Today, we just got our lunch and went back to Lisa's house to eat it. At least the boy will have had a decent meal. I also got him to clean up all the saved work he had out, including his "restaurant" for the weekend. This would make it easier for us to leave later on as Lisa tends to not do anything until late late afternoon. By 3 PM, Lisa still hadn't gotten back, which meant she was probably in the middle of a bunch of tests. That was my timemarker to head back one way or the other. And so I had Johnnie pack up and off we went to my apartment. I figured we could always come back if Lisa wanted to have dinner with Johnnie. But then again who knows what mood she would be in right?  

Almost 4 PM I had my answer. It turned out that her condition was not kidney stones after all and now she's back to square one as to having this "mystery pain" and "mystery ailment".  Great. I can only imagine what that does to her mentally <roll my eyes>. She was actually surprised that we had cleaned up and left although predictably, she felt like taking a nap. And so it was good that we left after all and Lisa just waved off the rest of the day. Heck, we were already at the apartment and into the Monday routine kind of early. I had spent enough time at Lisa's house even though I managed to get to 10,000 steps by the time we got back. Hey, it was a nice day out actually and I was glad to burn steps just in Lisa's backyard.  And anyway, I cruised through all the reports that were due today. I wanted to work on my presentation for the CCALAC symposium actually but having Johnnie and the dog back severely limits my ability to concentrate and focus. Even if Johnnie was happy and content simply watching the Octonauts again. It really IS different to have him in the house. Not that I'm complaining actually. I think it's no small miracle that I pull off what I do pull off on a daily basis. Tonight I had him do a video wishing my mom a Happy Birthday. It's not until tomorrow and I noticed on FB that Grace and fam already had her over last weekend. She's not going to remember that I did it, because her narrative I think is that I am not such a good son. And maybe she's right. But I'm trying. This is one of those things I still have to do a deep dive on and do some clearing and emotionally cleaning and basically do some self-forgiveness on. I remind myself that everything is ME pushed out and if I am feeling some guilt at any level, it is merely a program I have mistakenly bought into. And so it was that Monday evening was really routine after a brief blip in the middle of the day. We were even back to making Johnnie penne pasta chicken noodle for his dinner and me eating my beef stew which turned out much better than before. I was thinking that those Lisa blips are no more than a little change of focus is all and if I don't judge anything and anyone, then it is merely me getting Johnnie a whole lot earlier than usual. And THAT in itself is preferable anyway. Early night for all, a good night's rest on Monday. It's all good.

A Pleasant Golf Day

So Greg emailed yesterday that he had hurt is foot and is unable to walk and so he begged off today's game at Roosevelt.  His loss too because it was a perfectly nice day. It was just Scott and I of course but it was actually nice that it was just 2 of us and there was another 2 some in front of us and a 4some behind us that would never catch up. And so we could actually relax and still not wait on each hole. The bottom line today? I played well. From the tee box to the green. But I couldn't putt all day until the very last hole! First hole: on in 2, 3-putted to a bogey 5. Hole 3: Tee shot barely misses the green. 3-putt to a bogey 4. Hole 6: the narrow funnel hole: Front of the green in 2. Wayward shot from there turns it into a 5. Hole 7: On in 2, missed the par putt and got another bogey 4. Kind of the story of the day isn't it? Until the very last hole when I finally took a wayward tee shot and the 2nd hole landed a foot from the hole. Even I couldn't miss that follow-up putt right? That would be my only par for the day. Still, it wasn't like I played badly, just that I would have scored lights out if only I could make a putt or two. Scott was in the same boat actually. He was hitting bogeys because he couldn't make a putt either. Still, it was a nice day and we got done by 10:40 and I enjoyed another beautiful Sunday morning on the links. I actually did feel good that I found a way to relax, at least on my tee shots and most of the fairway shots. No thought about anything other than relaxing at the point of contact and focusing then on making solid contact. And I probably whiffed less today than I normally would have. There were whiffs to be sure. Always on Hole 2 too. A mishit on 4, a rescue from the trees on 5. Really only that one bad whiff. I will take that any day. I decided to go directly to Crimson and get an early order in. While waiting I knocked off the rest of my steps walking around this Santa Monica neighborhood, imagining myself living in one of the houses. Would I live in this neighborhood? Hell yeah I would. And so I was home enjoying my salmon kabobs and lentil soup before it was even noon. Hey I deserve a reward right? For a pretty good morning?!

I spent the afternoon shifting between more TV shows (watched a little Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon... hmmm, last week it was the Grandmaster. What is it with the lean towards martial arts movies all of a sudden. And not just martial arts movies mind you, CHINESE martial arts movies at that), enjoying more of a beautiful day by walking outside. Hey, it turned spring officially yesterday after all didn't it. It's going to start getting warmer again and I, for one, can not wait. I have to think about what to do with Johnnie next week for his week long spring break. But never mind that for now. For the rest of the day, I'm simply going to chill knowing full well I have another presentation-heavy week next week. As in I have to put my symposium presentation together. No different than Tech Council really but still, it requires effort. More than a few ways to chill and relax though. I posted a video of mean cooking up some ground round while listening to Chicago. That would be because I'm making my weekly stew tonight instead of tomorrow like I had the past few weeks. Pretty soon, it will be too warm for any more stew. This night's version turned out pretty good too. I even cooked up some biscuits to go with it. Ahh, a fine dinner I had. And with some peace and quiet too. Lisa had talked about possibly coming over and using the spa with Courtney. Thank God THAT didn't happen. I just ended up watching the Walking Dead and NOT doing any work like I should have. The golf this morning already made it a pretty good day.

Looking for Peace and Calm

SURREAL  Did it seem surreal that Lisa would be sitting there in my "backyard" which really was the common area where the barbecue is and actually be chilling and looking relaxed? Lisa? relaxed? And EATING something? She had actually just come over after her full day of Saturday work to pick up Johnnie. She mentioned something about having some food from Zankou Chicken. Wooh! Zankou Chicken! How long had it been since I've had Zankou chicken. Can't deny I had been thinking about it for many a weekend to eat there. But I hadn't. And when she mentioned it, I asked if there were more leftovers so I can bum some off her. She had a plate but that was it. And then she asked maybe we can both eat right then and there, more than likely thinking about the patio area in front of my apartment unit. I mean why not? And why not the eating area by the barbecues? After all, Lisa would be the ONLY one in my circle that has not eaten back there. Heck even Sylvia and Quentin had seen eat and eaten back there way back when I first moved in. I thought it was harmless. And so it was that Lisa brought her food, ate there and while we just sat and chilled in the warm Saturday late afternoon sun, Johnnie and the dog were chasing each other in the grass area, very happy to leave mom and dad alone. Surreal. Johnnie climbing the tree there, the dog barking at him, Lisa and I just chatting away. Doesn't look like a broken family does it? LOL. Maybe because it isn't? Not so much anyway. I etched this moment in my memory only because any positive thing is always better than the negative stuff. For every negative feeling that I felt toward Lisa, just as I did a week ago, I will back fill and counteract with a memory of this afternoon. Otherwise it felt like just another Saturday. My goal was to chill with Johnnie and do basically nothing. After all, when he's with me during the week, it's always go-go-go from one class activity to another. Especially when I had to get up super-early because Lisa had a patient at 7:30 AM. That meant I had to give Johnnie a shower right there at Lisa's house and that we would have an early breakfast at Elysee. No matter, Johnnie got a freebie cookie didn't he? We did do some shopping at Target before going back home but we got started so early we were actually home before 10 AM. We were home so early Johnnie got to watch Raya and the Last Dragon yet again and finished the whole thing well before lunch. We went to Panda Express Westwood today, remembering that we used to come here and sit down and eat many a Saturday pre-pandemic. When we got back though my body reminded me i barely got 5 hours of sleep last night and I started to knock off. Even Johnnie shaking me awake every 10 minutes or so didn't help. He started to get so bored he was literally writing down the minutes on the clock before his mom would pick him up at 3:30. I did manage to play baseball outside with him for a half hour though. All this before Lisa came and the family interlude at the patio area. It wasn't all peace and quiet. Lisa still called Courtney who was supposedly on her way over. Locked down another play date for tomorrow. And by then I could feel myself wanting to kick them out to go home. I'm trying to think why I got so uncomfortable towards the end there. Likely an old program? Maybe I felt like Lisa was intruding on my peace and quiet at MY home? Something was going on. I gotta think about that one some. After all, even after they had left it was still barely 4 PM. Plenty of time to walk around my neighborhood on what turned out to be a very nice Saturday afternoon. By 5 PM I decided to venture out. That piece of chicken Lisa brought from Zankou had me finally inspired to go get Mediterranean food for dinner. And off I went searching for some south of me. I finally did find Tut's Mediterranean, which was barely a hole in the wall on Washington right off Grand View. Close enough to keep coming here if I liked it. I ordered the kefta kabob (ground beef) and brought it home. And before I ate it, I made sure I was at 9000 steps so I didn't have to worry about it the rest of the evening. And so finally I had my Mediterranean dinner and it was pretty good. I will definitely come back in the future. I ate dinner watching tales of the Pirate world in the 1700s at the height of its glory days. It was like watching the real Pirates of the Carribean right there in Nassau and Jamaica. And then later on I would watch some March Madness. Yep, UCLA did make the tournament, won it's play-in game last week and tonight blew out BYU in the first round. That was one thing that didn't happen last year was the NCAA tournament. Here's to hoping they win one more game and go to the Sweet Sixteen. And so it was that I did have a chill Saturday. Johnnie, Lisa and all.

Kind of A Tank Friday

Even after tech Council meeting I still had lots of stuff to do. After all, I have to speak at a symposium in a couple of weeks and my slides are due for review in a week. But I ain't going to get them done today. In fact, what I felt like doing this morning was actually to continue to clean the apartment. This morning, that was the bathroom and more specifically, the shower. After all, it had suffered through Johnnie and the dog for the last couple of weeks without being cleaned. And this morning, it was simply time. And so I got most of the apartment already cleaned up before I even stopped for breakfast. And after breakfast I read emails, double checked on my bank account... after all we did get paid today and I'm back over $30,000 AND I sent in my odometer reading for the Honda. Quietly, I paid off the rest of the lease meaning I bought the Honda outright and Honda Financial is trying to transfer the title to me. But really with all of this stuff what I really did most of the rest of the morning is kick back and chill the way I posted myself doing in the pic. I did binaural beats videos, a meditation session,  read articles. In other words, stuff I usually WOULD do if I were doing a TANK DAY at the office, hanging out in MY office. And at lunch time, when I would usually sneak out to catch a movie at the Regal LA theater at LA Live, I instead parked myself in front of the TV and watched the series premiere of the latest Marvel creation: The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. I mean Captain America is gone and Iron Man is dead and yet the Marvel Universe continues. And I'm going to be watching to be sure... at least until the Mandalorian series resumes again. I would have taken a nap too but I chose to do some steps instead. After all, it was a nice day out and it was good to enjoy the day that had gotten warm. Besides, Lisa had requested that I watch Johnnie for a couple of hours this afternoon from 4-6 PM while she practiced piano. And then we were supposed to all have dinner together. So whatever I did this afternoon would be my ME TIME for the day. 

As it was Lisa called me by 3:30 PM, right as I was headed out to do grocery shopping. 2nd attempt at depositing her check. And then she was going to drop off Johnnie at my house for a couple of hours. However, this ended up being totally unnecessary. By the time she got to the bank Johnnie had fallen asleep in the back seat. Which actually makes it even more convenient in that she no longer had to leave him with me. She could just let him sleep for the next couple of hours and she could practice for that long. I got to go on to my grocery shopping spree. Lisa still wanted me to come over to have dinner with them. After all, Friday night routine is still Friday night routine and I was down for whatever extraneous food Lisa still had left to cook. I did know that whatever she had us eating tonight, I'm sure it wasn't going to be enough protein for me so I ate a Chinese pork bun before heading out there. When I got there, Lisa was still playing, Johnnie was still sleeping, and the dog was being the dog. She was glad to see me though, or at least she totally knew who I was. Lisa wanted to cook the strip of salmon and although it was a sizeable piece it WAS enough for both Lisa and I. In the meantime, I brought some udon for Johnnie and that would be his dinner. I had this idea that I was going to use Lisa's grill for both the salmon and the veggies she wants to cook, but something was wrong with that damn grill. It did not get hot for a while and when it did, the fire was too low. Why is it that everytime I cook something in this house, there's always something I notice that doesn't work as well as when I'm at the apartment? All this expense Lisa does and it's practically mud for a lot of the backyard, the aforementioned grill wasn't working properly... and now I realize I needed to stop the pattern. my pattern of thinking. I was in mis-match mode. Only led to an almost-argument after dinner about such a serious issue such as releasing some ladybugs outside in the garden. Smh. Anyway Lisa insisted that we play a game of SORRY. Lisa and Johnnie love this game and I am not a fan only because I had yet to win against either mom or son! Heck Johnnie won tonight's game! Oh well, at least I got some time in with Johnnie and I'm back first thing tomorrow morning since it is a Lisa work day. And as Lisa said, she's gotten somewhat fond (though she will never use that word so I'll paraphrase) of Friday night "family nite".  AND I'll take today's tank day. I'll take it any time.

Early Clean-up Early Everything

The day after Tech Council Meeting is usually un-busy as I am breathing out from the day before. Today was no different even though I had back-to-back meetings first thing, with the IS Team and with my new boss, as I now report to Dennis Benton the VP of Finance. He actually seems just as hands-off as Eloisa has been, and ok with simply leaving me alone to do my job. That IS what I prefer anyway so we'll be good there still. Anyway even with the early slate I still was able to pay attention to Johnnie's music class this morning. And I was happy to see his pitch is getting better. I remember he didn't really have much pitch when he was starting pre-kinder music classes at Cornerstone. He is already improving very much and that is cool to see. After that 2nd meeting with Dennis I considered the day pretty much done even though I still had things to do here and there. They were mostly annoyances more than anything and the lesson for me was to make sure I didn't just thumb my nose at anyone or anything and to make sure I gave things the proper attention. By lunchtime I was in BREATHE OUT mode.

By lunchtime I was making penne pasta for Johnnie AND making making myself some ground pork bolognese over the leftover penne pasta. And that turned out pretty good too. Especially when I ate it outside in the warm sun enjoying some time to myself while Johnnie was in the middle of his last class. And when Johnnie did his online playdate, that was when I caught up with my steps. See, the key is to use the little slivers of time when they become available to do the stuff you gotta do. Still, as I said the afternoon the focus shifted and for Johnnie, that meant starting to clean up his SAVED WORK by early afternoon. I had very high hopes that Lisa would pick up Johnnie and the dog early although the variable there is the time. It could be 6:30, it could be 7:30, and I was hoping it would be more the former. And so you could imagine my COMPLETE SHOCK when she called at 5 PM letting me know she was already done. It probably meant that she didn't plan on sticking around to write her notes. I'm sure she missed Johnnie and the dog. Anyway she suggested that maybe we could cash her IRS check today. She got another one of those refund checks last week and this one was almost $14,000. I mean she got a couple of checks in the past month totalling $27K. I don't want to hear anything from her about being short of money or anything. I mean I'm not even getting a dime from that! Tonight though we weren't able to deposit the check even though we made it to the bank by 5:10 PM. Seems like they had changed their hours since the pandemic and now they close at 6 PM. Oh well.  I surprised even myself when I suggested we get something to eat since Johnnie and I were on the way to Panda Express actually when she called. Even more surprising was that Lisa agreed. And that she would PAY! W-h-a-t?! And so we ended up sitting down at all-u-can-eat Korean BBQ which was right next to the bank. We ate outside although really most LA restaurants were cleared to open indoor dining just this past Monday. I ended up eating most of the meat since Lisa was still recovering from whatever it was she was suffering from the past weekend...which by the way seems to be a case of kidney stones! And Johnnie didn't eat anything at all. And so Lisa asked if I could keep Johnnie for just a couple of more hours. That was perfectly fine... we ended up getting him food from Panda Express anyway. And then he hung around with me and I gave him his shower too before dropping him off at Lisa's, already in his pajamas, and ready to go to bed. So Lisa picked up Johnnie early, but didn't actually and I still had plenty of time to clean up the apartment, doing the living room and the kitchen and washing a load of the dog's towels. Everything is good. 

Another Tech Council Meeting

I'm not sure exactly why I woke up this morning and felt some negative energy. I'm thinking it's merely another imprint or echo of something going on elsewhere. After all, it was a pretty distracting weekend and I think I did a little too much giving in to the negative push/pulls. Today is merely one of those push/pulls I think and it is totally up to me to determine how I want to experience today. I focused on the feeling of having a pretty successful IS Tech Council Meeting, my definition of which is that I was able to articulate that everything is stable, we're going in the right direction and whatever we need to deal with now and in the future, we're in a position to deal with. In the meantime, I'm reminded that it is St Patrick's Day today and Johnnie already declared he needed to wear something green today. Ok then. Green Hawaii shirt it is. And if that first class he had <Library> where they sang Irish dirges for 20 minutes doesn't distract you, I don't know what does really. Ok it WAS amusing and you can see how attentive Johnnie was to the whole thing. As for me, I was all done with my prep work for the Tech Council Meeting and I pretty much focused on Johnnie's classes for the morning. That alone sort of helped me focus on positive stuff and kept me from obsessing. And so by the time the meeting rolled around I was pretty relaxed. And it came off without a hitch as usual. I had about 40 minutes worth of material and the thing took the entire hour because I let Barbara present her pitch on a folder structure for the Sharepoint sites, simply because she can't find anything she claims. I didn't want to be the one to tell her that finding anything in Sharepoint is the same as Googling something on the internet, in fact that was the very reason we moved everything to Sharepoint. But try telling her that. Try telling anyone to do something they are not already used to and it becomes somewhat of a challenge depending on the open-mindedness of the person. To be fair, Barbara has come a VERY long way but in certain contexts she simply forgets. And I WILL not knock her or anyone for that. Far too many people in the organization doing that to condemn them all LOL LOL. Anyway, the meeting went fine and then it was on to the next one, which was the OCHIN quarterly. That meeting surprised me in that I got a message from Eloisa right after commenting that she expected to see more engagement from our team. She's right. It's our biggest expense, certainly on the IT side and the management of all things EPIC doesn't flow up and down the leadership chain I don't think. Never had. But should I take that activity over? That's what Eloisa asked. I am not sure. I don't take on anything I don't succeed at. I knew I would with Data Analytics. I was successful with it before. But the EPIC TEam? Gotta give that one some thought... 

And so after that meeting it was on to Wednesday night, me and Johnnie goofing off with the dog, going to Panda Express Westwood to pick up dinner. And the highlight of the evening: giving Claire a bath. No small feat I don't think, since I have put Johnnie in charge of that activity. He's still more play than anything else and even the act of taking the dog out to pee sees me yelling at Johnnie because he loses focus inside of 5 minutes. Can't really blame him though can I? He IS 6 years old. I still have to remind him that the reason the dog barks is because he isn't being very gentle with her and sees him as an adversary sometimes. And so my little Johnnie is still learning control.  And Claire? She's blasting around the house trying to get dry after we gave her said bath. But afterwards? She smelled so good! NOW we can let her sleep anywhere on the bed. And after Tech Council Meeting Day, I can focus on simply getting rested again. It's all good.

Distracted, Busy Tuesday

So I didn't really get as much done as I liked yesterday, so I knew today I would have to focus almost entirely on the Tech Council presentation. Not a slamdunk when you have Johnnie and the dog around. On the one hand, I start to feel for Lisa as they are quite a handful those two and when you're not feeling well, I agree it's a challenge. And today, I never did get to any of that presentation work in the morning. I DID get my IS Team Meeting done, and I did get to my emails but between shuttling Johnnie in and out of his Zoom classes, and taking the dog out to poop and pee, it was already lunchtime in the blink of an eye. Look at Johnnie trying to bite through some hot pizza. Only when he got done with that AND settled in to his last group class of the day did I get to do something. And it wasn't even work. I got a whole bulk of steps in simply walking around the perimeter outside my apartment still inside the complex. I got all the way to 4500 steps before I went back in the apartment. It's great that I can leave Johnnie alone and he has such a feel for his school routine now that I don't even need to help him anymore, other than logging him in. I do the logging in to Zoom class simply because it's faster for me to do it. But once in the portal, he can even do his homework on his own. He reads the instructions and does just fine submitting his stuff himself. I'm chuckling as I'm thinking of the many folks in my own office that would have some difficulty doing that?! Finally in the afternoon, I zoned in and worked exclusively on my presentation. It's not that I was looking for material actually. I knew what I was going to present. It was just a matter of blocking out the time to work on it. And even though Johnnie was already done with his classes after 1 PM, I at least could get him some more 1st grade level exercises to do, and some reading from the EPIC website. That kid can't get enough of Cat Ninja and the Bright Family actually. For me, that's just enough of a diversion for me to get through my work. By the time I looked up, it was nearly 5 PM and I was just happy at how light out it is. More importantly, I was almost done with my presentation. No urgency there.    

The only other potential drama that came up was that Johnnie once again forgot Fuzzy at Lisa's house last night. Although I did call her, I reminded Johnnie this was the 2nd time in a row while with me that he had forgotten her. Maybe it was letting him know that, but he actually agreed to go last night without his favorite stuffed toy. Instead he made do with Linty, the 2nd identical stuffed animal I keep at my apartment. So crisis averted, no need to go to Lisa's to retrieve Fuzzy, and last night he slept just fine. So much so I had to wake him up at 7:15 AM this morning from a deep deep sleep. Something tells me I need to get him used to waking up earlier again. That's because in the go-back-to-school survey I filled out I selected 8-11 AM as the preferred time slot to be at school. Which means we're back to the way it was when school was open and getting up by 7 AM. Yes, I thought about how the morning would have gone differently had Johnnie been at school, but then again, I did get the presentation done, AND the Meeting Minutes, AND the agenda all before 7 PM. That's with heading to Panda Express to do the usual dinner pickup and everything. I was done so early, or at least earlier than I expected that I could have had a really long sleep. But for some reason, maybe it was because I still had the energy of work work work in my system, I couldn't sleep at 9:30 AM. The dog and Johnnie were already out like a light when I slipped out of bed and back into the living room. And watched the TWO episode season premiere of Mayans MC. I don't know what it is about a Mexican biker gang near the Tijuana border that captures my attention. I had watched Season 1 AND Season 2. The first season I was watching when I was still living at Maplewood. I liked it better than Sons of Anarchy to be sure though I don't know the attraction with that series either. It isn't like the series I usually binge on. No sci-fi, no time-travel. Has to be the characters right? EZ <Ezekiel> is not hard to root for. Talk about a hero's journey. I think that's it. Am i in the middle of my OWN hero's journey I wonder? I'll mull that over in my dreams. I headed back to bed and back to sleep. It was midnight...