Of Moose And Men
The Best Laid Plans Of Both Often Go Astray

Okay, when I said I was spent when it came to cleaning for the day, I so lied. The parental units called, and when I’m on the phone with them I generally have to wander the apartment and do minor straightening, which lead to cleaning off all the surfaces in my bedroom. That then lead to tossing out more crap, putting away the latest two medical devices I’ve picked up (the vertigo collar and the plantar faciitis splint), etc. Hell, I even cleaned up the pump bottles of lube by the bed so they aren’t dusty/lubey any more.

Yeah, it’s been that bad today.

I also finally tried out the screws BC got me for the PC’s CPU fan, and they worked. I had forgotten what fun it was to own a PC. Anti-virus software needed updating, there were 10 gazillion Winders updates to download, etc., etc., etc. It’s running a full scan now (not that it needs it, but Norton insisted), while I ignore the thing in the corner.

Thankfully TBS has been playing the Lord of the Ring trilogy all day, so there’s been some noise/distraction going in the background most of the day. Frodo’s just about to get gotten by the giant spider, so all’s right with the world.

Upgraded my install of WordPress, too, which managed to break the LiveJournal crossposter on the front page of the overall site. That’s what I get for following the directions and deactivating the plugins before I upgraded. I forgot to deactivate it on this portion of the site, and it’s supposedly still working. Hopefully that’s true, as I’ve liked having the dual-posting option, and the programmer who wrote the crossposter hasn’t upgraded it in a couple iterations of WordPress.

Heaven willing tomorrow at work won’t be quite as evil as it was the last two work days. I do have more writing to do, I know, but not nearly as much as this past week held. If not, I’m not sure what else I can clean.

Forgot that I got to do a video conference via iChat with my parents down in the Tampa area. They called while we were at Dad’s place to see if they should go swimming then or wait until later. Life is so rough in retirement. But the chat was a lot of fun. It’s so neat to be able to do something like that now and have it work so easily and clearly. They loved their gifts, which was fantastic, and it was a great way to visit with them for the holiday.

Wiped out. Completely wiped out. But a fun time was had in getting to here.

I spent the past three days with BC and his family. They do big stuff for the holidays, culminating in a big party the evening of the 25th at his Mom’s place. The 24th was relatively sedate – some last minute wrapping, prepping food for the next day, and some good Indian take-out for dinner. Wine and spades (the card game) after dinner, then a late bed time. The morning of the 25th bloomed with BC’s younger sister (29? 30?) coming in and announcing that Santa had come and we had to to come out to see what he brought.

At least, I’m told she did. I don’t recall it at all, and BC says I just buried my head further and snuggled up closer to him when she came in. Eventually we got up and did gift exchange with BC, his younger sister, Mom and Step-Dad. After that we cleaned up and then it was off to his oldest sister’s house for brunch and more exchanging of gifts. His brother-in-law did a fantastic job with the food, and including vegan dishes for me. Had fun picking on his niece (12 y/o), then it was off to Dad’s place.

The event at Dad’s went very well. This was the first time bringing a boyfriend to Dad’s event, and I think it went well. Step-mother’s family was in full force, and they were a trip and a half. Unfortunately there was not a damned thing there I could eat, so nibbling, just sipping of red wine over the course of the afternoon. Whew. Dad was gracious and pleasant, so was a pretty good time. Finally it was time to return to Mom’s house and the party, already in progress.

Plenty of food for me at Mom’s, which I dived into as soon as I could. And more wine. And then there was singing.

A big family tradition is the singing of carols. I have a fairly strong baritone (aided by the wine), and I’m not shy of singing in such a crowd, so I kept us mostly on key and pace, which I think Mom appreciated. No solos this year for anyone (thank heavens), but it was quite fun. At the end of the night BC volunteered the two of us to clean up and sent Mom & her husband off to bed. We got it pretty well policed, all food and dishes put away, and everything else straightened up nicely for the morning.

Slept in this morning, obviously, and thanks to lots of water at the end of the party and while cleaning, there was no hangover. And, as an added bonus, the plague that’s been stuck in my system for the last 2-3 weeks seems to have finally, finally been killed off. Late brunch, relaxing at the house with BC while his parents were at work, a good movie & cuddling. Finally came home at 5 or so.

No energy whatsoever tonight, so not going to set up the new Xbox 360, nor pop in any of the games I’m playing at the moment on the Wii. Working the next two days, and a good, long sleep tonight should be just what the doctor ordered. Get to have a talk with da bosslady this week about job prospects and how to proceed with these things. I trust her, so I know it won’t be a problem to tell her I’m considering some other options, but it’ll still be an interesting conversation.

With the plague over, hopefully there will be a return to regular training. I’ve missed getting out to run, and being active generally, and I know from past experience how much I need that activity for my physical and mental health. So, time to dig back in, and prep for the year to come.

I’m very bad at trying to pick gifts for my family. It’s an obnoxious process that taxes my patience. But anyway.

An opportunity may be arising at another Big Government Agency which I may apply for. It would be a step up in responsibilities, and a good career move. I’m not entirely certain if I’m ready for it, but there are extraneous factors which argue for applying now or missing the opportunity entirely. Given my particular specialty this isn’t surprising – a similar situation arose when my current position came open (though I was certainly much more ready to go when that one came open!). I’ve been told it’s going to be posted, so I’m keeping my eyes open, and I’ve asked a mentor (who mentioned the opening in the first place) to keep his ears open for when it’s posted so I can look it over and decide whether to apply.

I don’t look forward to polishing my resume, but that’s simply a necessary evil in the process. To be honest, the possibility is a bit intimidating. But again, this is a now-or-never kind of thing, and I think I want to try for it.

Work has been torture today – it’s my last day in the office until next week, and on top of that our email went down for most of the day (after the firedrill at 10, that is). The network is still hosed for getting at documents, so trying to work on a lot of things isn’t the easiest thing today.

Since my last serious update I’ve run a 5k with BC & his family (local turkey trot this past weekend), made progress in both Super Mario Galaxy and Twilight Princess, picked up a couple more games on sale, found out my year-end bonus is coming (hello, new oven), had a soup & bad movies party, and have been otherwise occupied with life. BC & I are doing well. I’m headed down to see my folks for Thanksgiving, partially to see them before they take off for Florida for the winter, and partially so I don’t force the whole vegan thing on BC’s mother on the first major holiday she’s known me. She and her husband are doing well with it, but I am a bit sensitive to such things.

Back on the subject of games, what nimrod at Nintendo thought fishing would be fun? I spent a good 10-20 minutes yelling at the screen (“This is not fun! This is not entertaining!”) while trying to fish in the damned Ordon village before I gave up and googled the answer – you have to wiggle both controllers side to side, not up and down as Nintendo tells you to do. Once I switched I caught the requisite fish easily, but that was decidedly Not Fun, unlike the rest of the game. They’re lucky its not a larger part of the plot or I’d have been tempted to sell the game. My time is too precious to me for un-entertaining games.

And I beat Puzzle Quest on the DS finally. BC’s envious, he’s still working on it. I saw they ported it to the Wii as well, but I don’t see how the game would be much fun without the stylus and touch screen of the DS.

[…]

I love trying to explain legal citations to folks. Case in point, I was just telling one of my budget folks about 3 provisions of law she needs for footnotes, and for each one there at least 4 different ways to cite it – the amendment which gave us the funds acceptance authority (section XXX of public law YYY-YYY), the original section which was amended (section AAA of public law BBB-BBB, as amended), the US Code cite (cc USC dddd, note), and a statutes at large cite (eee STAT ffff), and all four were useable depending on her audience (Tre*sury, for example, only wants cites to the Statutes at Large). I told her to go with the code cites for our internal reference – they’re easier for non-lawyers to find, in my experience.

Anyway, haircut & laundry & playing on the Wii tonight, then driving to Tidewater tomorrow for the holiday. Hopefully will be a nice, quiet time.

That was an interesting trip ‘home.’ I went down to Tidewater this weekend to see my parents, and my grandparents, and help my brother and his family move their stuff out of their old apartment. Oh, and pick up Mom & Dad’s Cooper Mini to drive back to DC ‘on loan’ from the parental units.

The parents were chipper (though I despair of Mom’s occasional racist outburst – they’re couched in code, but I know what they are. Ugh). My brother was doing much better. At one point I rubbed his fuzzy little head (he’d shaved his head before the latest bout of madness – a sure sign he’s about to go over the deep end – and it’s just growing back) and told him I’d never be able to take him to a bear bar because they’d just keep rubbing the fuzz there. Thankfully he’s quite cool with the queer thing, and wouldn’t freak out at it.

Did not see the oldest niece, but did see the younger two. The youngest was much, much more animated than the last time I was down, which was right after she’d had some eye surgery. The middle one is a trip and a half. Will babble like crazy at you, making no sense (that we can tell), but as long as you are attentive, she’s happy. Must be nice to be 19 months old that way.

The grandparents were, well, a bit sad to see. Granddaddy has terrible balance now, and is starting to lose his hearing. Grandmother’s balance is better, but still a trifle shaky. And thank heavens I’m thin or I’d have been hearing ‘fat’ comments all afternoon like my brother got an earful of. But not within Mom’s earshot – she’s let her father know she does not appreciate such comments and that he needs to quit it, in no uncertain terms. Saw many recent pictures of cousins and their kids, and was greatly saddened that they all seem to be, well, fat. Or at least on the pudgy side of average. One aunt is just plain morbidly obese. Oy. And the family wonders why I do triathlons.

Oh, and in among the pictures was one of the president and first lady. Evidently the grandparents sent his campaign money. I still wore my earrings down there, though.

And appropos of nothing, there was absolutely no cell signal to be had down there. I started feeling like the little geek god from American Gods when they were in the nowhere place.

Traded in my DS for a DS Lite while down there (among other spending) and gave the DS to Dad. He’s had this Brain Age game for a bit, and could only use it when the eldest niece came over with her DS, so now he’s good to go. He also got some vision training game for it when I was getting the Lite (or, rather, I got it for him, though he picked it out). The reviews were right – the Lite’s screen is much nicer, though I’m not completely sold on the feel of the thing yet. The rumble pack sticks out of the front of the Lite, where it was completely inside the DS, and it’s not as comfortable to hold the sides while playing Metroid Prime Pinball as it was on the DS. I suppose I’ll get used to it.

I always forget how much driving is involved with being down there. Driving to stores, driving to restaurants, driving to grocery shopping, etc. I’m so spoiled here in DC, with a bus and rail system that, for all its faults, is pretty good at getting me (and others) around.
The drive back was uneventful. The mini’s a manual transmission, but does have cruise control, so most of the trip was spent with that on. Unlike driving back on a Sunday, traffic was pretty light, and I was able to actually spend most of the trip in the right lane, cruising along without being in other cars’ way, and vice versa. Only when we got into Richmond proper, and on the approach to DC, did I really have to take off the cruise control and dodge folks.

It’s going to be interesting having a car at my disposal again. I have an assigned parking space in one of our lots, so it’s off the street, and I’m supposed to pick up a cover from friends soon so I can keep it cleaner. It does have South Dakota tags, but the handicapped tags (Mom qualifies) were not in yet, so Dad’s going to send them to me later to switch out the plates. Shouldn’t run into problems with DC fussing at me for not registering the car here since it’ll be off-street and so not in the regular view of parking enforcement types. There are a couple maintenance issues which will crop up soon, two things that are going to need replacing/repairing, for which I have estimates, but which are not immediately needed. Otherwise everything which needed to be done to it has been repaired by Dad in anticipation of the trip to DC. Oh, and Dad prefers to put premium gas in it, so there’s that expense as well. But at 30 or so miles to the gallon, that’s not overly burdensome I suppose.

So it’s a mixed blessing, as most cars are. But I’m glad to have it.

Okay, since y’all were very, very helpful when I had to get games for my niece when my parents decided to get her a DS for Xmas a couple years ago, I’m again asking for some help with games.

My parents have decided to get my now 10 year old niece a Wii for Giftmas (which means my decision about which console to get is now made, since I have to keep my reputation as the cool uncle who not only finds the cool games but who can act as tech support when needed). She liked Kirby Canvas Curse, as well as Super Princess Peach and Nintendogs on the DS.

So, what games would y’all recommend for the Wii which would be appropriate and fun for a 10 year old girl?

I had been thinking about gaming systems, but if my obsession behavior the past two days is any indication of how it would be if I got one, I really, really should not. I picked up the new Zelda game for the DS, and it’s been absolutely fantastic. Some of the elements are a bit slow, but for the vast majority of the game I think they nailed it for my gaming likes. So much so that I’ve been up far, far too late the past two nights playing the game. Only had to revert to guides twice, which is a good sign for me.

Big thanks to the folks who came out on Friday, I had a marvelous time, and it was good to see people. That was precisely the b’day celebration I needed – low key and fun chatting and watching folks chat.

My eldest niece and her mother popped up today to play tourist, so we wandered through the Mall and a few museums. She absolutely loved the Metro. It’s a shame Air & Space is still so disorganized and doesn’t have more hands-on stuff for kids – that’s what she stopped at whenever we were in an exhibit, the ‘I can play with this’ things. She also spent most of the day talking about going to City Lights, my now former favorite Chinese restaurant in town.

The service was, in a word, atrocious tonight. They were busy, that much was readily apparent, but that’s no excuse. No one came by to check on drinks. My niece managed to down her water and her soda fairly early, and even after I specifically asked a server to get her a refill of her soda (even handing him the glass), it never came back. Then I couldn’t manage to flag anyone down because they were all flying by so quickly. The one guy I did finally catch was one of their busboys whose English was somewhat lacking, and unfortunately my Spanish is non-existent, but we did manage to get soda refills, at least, for the niece and her mother. To say I’m miffed would be an understatement – this is a place where the more established wait staff calls me by name, in Chinese, when I come in, so it’s not like I’ve never been there before. Hell, I was lying in bed for about 1/2 an hour just now and all I could do was dredge up much-unused vocabulary for expressing in Mandarin exactly how annoyed I was at the whole thing (and it’s amazing what ancient vocabulary can be dredged up in the service of strong emotions). As it was I did get one of the management staff before we left and let them know that this was the most dismal service I’d ever received there.

Otherwise it’s been a lovely weekend. I’m going to get my newest toy hooked up to the bike tomorrow and head out on a ride with a friend after his bike (re)fitting. Haven’t played with it yet, so this is the inaugural run. Should be interesting to see the data once I’m done.

My brother has all the social skills of your average slug.

He’s doing okay, and is out of the in-patient thing, but I think he’s determined to be as much of a little shit as he possibly can to the rest of the family, especially his wife. His life to mess up, but it’s tempting to strangle him from this distance.

Went through some rough stuff there with it, mentally. Took a couple days off work, went in late once or twice. Work was very understanding, despite this being the end of the fiscal year. Am doing much better now, and thank you for the good wishes.

Trying to get back into a groove with exercise. After the half last month, well, I just sort of stopped. At least nothing normal or in any sort of pattern or habit. Been trying to decide what it is I want of the off-season, and what I want for next year. Mostly I think what I need is some fat loss (so much easier to run without extra dead weight) and some overall strength training for the joints, as well as some concentrated core training.

Which would be better if I was more into strength training and crunches/pilates, but you do what you have to do, especially when you need to train to your weaknesses. I’m also going to do a reduced season next year. I know there’s at least 2 runs I want to do in the spring, but I can’t think of any triathlons that are just screaming for me to do them at this point. I may do two shorter seasons next year, a spring and fall season, with a break in between to get my groove back. This year was just too long to keep up.

Did get in a run this evening. Heart rate was, well, disgusting, and my foot pod seems to hate me in the opposite direction now (before it was registering too far, now not far enough – it claimed my 4 mile run was 3 miles tonight; normally it claims it’s 4.5). But it felt good to get out there again.

I think the worst part about dealing with my brother this time around is how helpless I feel this time.

My parents are in Iowa, on the way back from South Dakota, but won’t get back for two more weeks, so they’re not there to help him. My sister-in-law has an injured leg from a car accident, plus my two youngest nieces (18 and 4 months old), and, well, she’s not the most mature 29 y/o I’ve ever met. I’d go down, but there’s nothing I can do as long as he’s in the institution, where we hope he’ll stay for a good 30 days this time. It’s an involuntary commitment this time, so we’re hopeful it’ll have more lasting effects.

I don’t have the closest relationship with my family, due partially to distance. But it’s still a mess to feel so helpless up here.