2018-08-04
Dzung has to work so I took the kids to karate, and stopped by Garbo on the way
home to grab some pies for lunch. Crystal dropped Eli over and I took the kids
into the Earth Sciences Museum at UWA where they had a great time looking at
minerals and chatting to the lady there to help identify the rocks they’ve been
digging up in the school playground.
Back home via mum and dad’s for an afternoon tea of banana bread and crackers.
Made Malaysian curry with potatoes, carrots and pork for dinner, along with
grilled eggplant and roti. Curry too spicy for the kids, but delicious with a
beer. Kids to bed and I cleaned up, then watched “The Death of Stalin” with
Dzung.
2018-08-03
Casual day. Rainy morning. Did some shopping while kids at school. Good progress
at work. Made lamb cutlets and pasta for dinner (mum and dad didn’t get the kids
due to poor weather). Glass of wine with Dzung to break the drought of dry July.
Watched “The War on Waste” with Eliza after dinner. Quiet night, very tired.
2018-08-02
Blindsided. Spent yesterday scoping out urgent work that needed to be finished
for the customer by Sunday, ready to work on it today and tomorrow. But had
another very long meeting today to cancel that, and return to previous work,
which I’d put on hold, to modify requirements that were written months ago,
which requires existing implementation to be changed. And this piece of work is
now super-urgent. This wiped me out; the lack of sleep overnight didn’t help.
Spent the day in a daze, thinking about life and career and the things I want to
be working on. Just fixed bugs and did some work that was blocking a few things,
but otherwise dropped out mentally.
Lack of sleep because it was super windy overnight. Hail at 2am. Worried about
the bins on the kerbside. Kept getting out of bed to check on them. At 6am I
went outside in the dark to find the lid of one of the bins was open, and the
bag that was on top had disappeared! It was full of foam that had been used to
pack the desk that Dzung bought a while ago, which I’m gradually disposing of,
so it would have been very light. Walked up and down the street but couldn’t see
it anywhere. Terrible way to start the day.
Spent the evening in a depressed funk. Watched the last of Handmaid’s Tale,
which didn’t help. Need to start on a skunkworks project to show my boss how we
could be doing things differently, and need to get back to HackTile!
2018-08-01
Busy day at work. Early morning meeting, and heads down all morning. Dzung and I
to Kitchen Inn for lunch (after trying somewhere else that ended up being closed
only on Wednesdays). They got my order wrong, so I only ate half of the plate.
Working all afternoon, then cooked dinner with Eliza; steak, cous-cous, baby
carrots. Turned out quite nicely.
Kids to bed, finished “Magician’s Gambit”. Then watched a couple of episodes of
“The Handmaid’s Tale” before sleep. Stormy outside, worried about the bins. Jack
had earlier spotted a crow making a mess of our neighbour’s bin, which we tidied
up, but it’s the wind that worries me.
2018-07-31
Busy day at work. Picked up Jack in the middle of the day to visit the
immunologist. Needed to talk about Eliza, but they won’t give you a follow-up
appointment unless you bring a kid along. Found him digging in the playground
with Eli and Josh. Appointment was good, happy to have a realistic action plan
for anaphylaxis, and not a knee-jerk of giving the epi-pen the moment Eliza
mentions a lump in her throat.
Picked up Jack after school and went shopping, then collected Eliza after
orchestra. Made mapu tofu for dinner, and second attempt at Japanese-style
grilled eggplant. Burned it this time. Hoping for third time lucky tomorrow.
Kids to bed, and I watched a couple of episodes of Handmaid’s Tale before
retiring. No HackTile.
2018-07-30
Walked Jack to school early for school banking. He showed me a map that he had
drawn with Eli and Josh for their Geology Club. It was a quite detailed map of
the school playground with measurements and everything, along with a description
of the digging conditions in the sand pit. Funny!
Returned the stools, then a work meeting and semi-busy day. Mark talking about
the new directory product again; got the creative juices flowing. Did three
repeats of the seven-minute workout. Watched Handmaid’s Tale at lunch. Walked
Jack home from school, then to the shops to stock up on some Japanese items.
Bought small eggplants to have another attempt at grilled eggplant for tomorrow
night. After shopping we picked up Eliza from quiz club.
Home to help Eliza cook the oven backed panko-and-parmesan crusted fish and
potato wedges. Turned out great, and enough food for us all to have seconds, and
save enough for lunch for all of us tomorrow. Value! Put the kids to bed, then
watched an episode of The West Wing. Nada HackTile.
2018-07-29
Up early to help Jack finish his North Shore homework, which we neglected
yesterday. Then Dzung took him in, and Eliza went to tennis. I did some
housework, then breakfasted while reading, and took delivery of the “You Plate
It” box for the coming week. Then some gardening out the back. Off to Van and
Kiet’s for lunch of vietnamese pancakes. Would have been perfect with a beer,
but still doing dry July.
Home in the afternoon to help Eliza clean up her room. Then read some more in
the sunshine before playing a bit of Elite Dangerous, as the VR was still set
up. Made dinner for the kids (leftovers of potato and leek soup, shepherd’s pie
and steamed brocolli with vinegar rice) before playing a round of “Takenoko”
before bed. Read to Eliza, then watched “The Lobster” with Dzung.