Keeping To Routine

I keep mentioning how important I feel it is for Johnnie to have a sense of routine and I think I've done a pretty good job considering how he asks for stuff to do or even to eat that is almost by rote. Still, sometimes he WILL deviate as if he is confused by where he is. When he's at his mom's he always eats at home and I'm sure they rarely eat out. When he's with me, it's almost the other way around. But this week we ate breakfast at home on Tuesday morning and I was actually surprised he asked for it again this morning. More surprising was that I actually had food in the house in order to do that :) I knew full well what was important to him was that he keep watching his dinosaur videos. And today I let him watch all the way until 7:45, until it was already time to go on to school. Today it was supposed to rain later so I made sure he was bundled up. And then I got him to his classroom and he was the first kid in line. He didn't even look back at me when he went in. It was all good. I actually took off for the office right from there. It was Thursday and really not many things on my calendar save for one, which was the reset for the Clinical Ops/IS Meeting. And there wasn't really all that much to talk about, at least nothing new anyway. Yet one more meeting like yesterday I made it through with really not much to stress about. Not yet anyway LOL. Which leaves the rest of the day to pretty much cruise the rest of the work week. I remind myself that it IS a 3-day weekend coming up and I'm hardly the only who started to gear down after lunchtime. I did manage to actually get some other stuff done, which would be those tasks that weren't really important but makes me look like I'm busy doing something LOL LOL.

What I was REALLY focused on and that I took some energy doing was that I wanted to make sure Johnnie had a good dinner tonight. And I ended up deciding I was going to get him some popcorn chicken and rice for his dinner. Why I settled on that I'm not really sure, but getting that done meant I had to pick up the popcorn chicken at KFC, and the closest one to the apartment was the one right across from Rancho Park Golf Course. And if I did that I had to leave work 10 minutes earlier than usual to avoid traffic. And I had to maneuver through that Pico Blvd traffic anyway. The bottom line was that it was MISSION ACCOMPLISHED, not only about getting the popcorn chicken but also that Johnnie ate it. And ate it he did with a lot of gusto (see pic). With that I was able to make sure he had a pretty good dinner before his mommy picked him up. It took until 7 PM for her to call but call she did and I had him ready to go. He was a little bit surprised but he was also very glad to see her when he did. It was hand-off time and I was just fine with that. I wasn't sure if I will get to see him for the next 4 days but I'm perfectly ok if I don't. I have lots of LEARNING stuff to do. I gave him a kiss goodbye, had to listen to Lisa detail her trials and tribulations, all the while reminding myself that it IS part of being in any kind of a relationship with her. Even as her friend. Gotta listen to her whine about her life. And pay attention to your own state to make sure you remain supportive at all times. Something I couldn't do when I was her husband LOL. And something I'm sure to work on in the here and now too. As soon as they took off I did my walking around my neighborhood and got to 11,000 steps before 9 PM. And then it finally did start to rain. By then I was inside smug as a bug in a rug. Thursday night hand-off all done, the challenge is still making sure I get to bed at a decent time. No Johnnie to force me to sleep by 10 PM tonight. I've had good sleep the last 3 nights. We'll see about tonight...