A New Week And An End to November

So I am up at 6:30 AM this morning and I didn't even have time to take a shower. Why do you ask? Because Lisa had asked me to come by at 7 AM to help her log in to her telehealth consult with her Cedars-Sinai physician. Her appointment is not until 7:30 AM but I had long since stopped taking for granted that she can be technically challenged with the simple things like logging in to a Zoom call. She gets easily flustered when she hits the tiniest of roadblocks due to something as common as a typing error and so I agreed to come help as my good deed for the day. And true enough, she would actually need my help this being the first time she had logged on to the patient portal to go to her appointment. She had a couple of issues. One was that she was having a problem getting the hardware test completed to tie in her audio and video. Not sure how I actually fixed anything except that I just let it run a couple of times since it seemed slow on their end. The bigger problem was that she actually DIDN'T have an appointment today LOL. She got the time wrong and she got the day wrong. It's not actually until next week. Oh well... at least she knows she can log on now which is half the battle. I can only imagine what QueensCare patients go through when they do THEIR telehealth appointments. No wonder they don't like it. It's simply not that intuitive no matter how tech savvy they are or not. And so with that, at least Lisa fixed me breakfast this morning which was some of the brioche French toast and the sausage I bought for her just this past Saturday. And at least Johnnie, Lisa, and I got another meal in together, and this time it was breakfast for today. Tonight is still hand-off night mind you, just that I got to spend a little bit of time here already. And wouldn't you know when I did the 10:30 AM Business Continuity call this morning, a great deal of the topic centered around helping patients schedule in since they are not really into all the telehealth stuff. Just as I had previously mentioned. It was like I was talking about the situation I had just gone through less than a couple of hours ago! Someone has to help these patients and hand-hold them through the process. How we would do that consistently in bulk is the key isn't it? Anyway, morning work all done I feel like I had already put a lot of time in today! I had already finished the Health Net Report last night, which was due today. And so I had already had a pretty productive day. And it was only lunchtime. I made myself some shaved beef on yakisoba for lunch (see pic) and had myself a hearty meal. 

So Mondays is when I usually load up on steps for the last 6 weeks now. I don't know how that evolved really, just that if I get a good jump on the thing in the beginning of the week, then I can ease up a bit on the weekend. And today I actually walked over to Ralphs to buy some chicken to cook for the rest of the week. I figured I'd experiment on how to cook a juicy, perfectly browned chicken breast. I think I know how actually... you boil the thing for 12 minutes first! And so it was that by the time I got to the late afternoon, I was already up to almost 10000 steps. It was a good thing too because Emma at worked lined up a 3-4 PM meeting about HRSA stuff that was about as dry as you could ever get! I mean I would usually get on the computer and do other things when I do these kind of meetings and for this one, it was an absolute necessity or I would have just fallen asleep where I sat. Talk about dry. Well, at least I can say I did some work stuff in the afternoon though. Heck I was even able to step away and cook Johnnie's penne pasta for the week. I told the group I had a hard stop at 4 PM. I did though... I had to cook the chicken. I was going to do chicken marsala in the Instant Pot tonight. And so I prepared everything, the mushrooms, etc and sauteed the chicken and then set the thing and then headed off to pick up Johnnie. I ran into mom and son having dinner actually. And saw that they had put up the Christmas tree and decorations sometime during the day. YAY... after Thanksgiving marks the official start of the holiday season. Usually at the FRB, we'd be getting our doors decorated right around this time. Which obviously isn't happening this year. We'd be planning the holiday potluck too. And planning the Secret Santa gift exchange. I'd be trying to get in on the early Laker games too. Sigh. None of that happening this year of course. But I'm going to find a positive silver lining out of all this at least for me personally. For one thing, I can focus on the moment. And for tonight, that's watching Johnnie excited to get hot just-out-of-the-oven chocolate chip cookies to eat! The little things like these count for much more. And that's not so bad. WE both went to bed early too. Not so bad either. And as I pondered the last day of November, I'm thinking about an election that Joe Biden won completing my tri-fecta but that continues to cause anxiety because that is what Trump does. Sow chaos and confusion so he can divide and conquer. I thought about Thanksgiving and a pandemic that is starting to ramp up and get worse again. But hey, my immediate inner circle is doing just fine. Gotta be thankful for that. Bring on December.

Ode to Penmar

How many times did we play at Penmar in the last decade?! Used to be we would play there practically most Sundays, first with Roe and Ellen and then with Mandy and Chris. Those days are long gone though I'm afraid, lost in the new normal of the pandemic where you have to get up on a Friday at 6 AM to even get a sniff of a tee time for the following Sunday for the busy courses like Penmar and Harbor Park and even though you won't be able to get all 4 golfers in. Which is how I got a tee time at Penmar this morning. I started with 4 then 3 when Scott pulled out and then 2 when Chris pulled out. Although Penmar was the course of choice in the not-too-distant past, that was because it was closest to those of us in Westwood and even closer when we moved down the block. I do have memories of simply walking there with my golf cart like 2 1/2 years ago. It did have drawbacks even then. You always had to wait at each hole... so much so a 9:30 tee time would not usually end until amost 1 PM more than 3 hours later. And we never did score well in this course. Still we have SOOO many memories on this course. This was where Lisa and I learned to play after all. I can even remember when Dexter was still joining us on a Saturday or Sunday. I can't believe that's been more than 10 years. Anyway, all those drawbacks seemed to have changed when we played today. They don't send out 5-somes anymore and they go 10 minutes between golf slots, which does quite a bit in terms of speeding up the play. And with less golfers, the course actually felt like it was very nicely manicured! And on some holes, it even had a Roosevelt-like quietness. It was all amazing! And it was so different to pick up food at Starbucks and still be less than 10 minutes away. As far as the play itself, I can't say I changed the narrative on how we don't score well on this course. First shot off the tee? Yanked to the left. Missed from the fairway, 3-putted to a 7. I blasted my only great shot from the tee on Hole 2. But my 2nd shot ended up in the bunker which blew my chance at a par. Short 3rd hole which I played dozens and dozens of times, I deposited an iron to the left but got on the green on the next hole. Only to miss my par putt. I whiffed on the tee shot on Hole 4 where I used to hit mammoth tee shots, but got in front of the green 30 yards away on the 2nd hole. Too bad a chip got me way way left leading to a 3-putt and another 6. Hole 5 I whiffed the tee shot, but got on on the 2nd shot. And then missed the putt for another bogey. OK I wasn't actually playing that badly. Until the next hole where I whiffed 3 shots from the fairway. That was lucky to be an 8. And on Hole 7 I got in front of the hole again after 3 shots but missed a bogey putt. Hole 8 got me in front of the hole again after 2 shots but missed a bogey putt. Hole 9 tee shot hit the trees on the left and I had to take 4 shots just to get near the green and 3-putted from there. All in all I didn't play that badly, but I whiffed way too many shots of the fairway and missed chippies from right in front of the hole. I just didn't slow down my swing enough. But it WAS a beautiful day out and I was glad to get out to play. And we got done by 10:30 too! A first for Penmar! 

We got done so early with golf that I toyed with the idea of dropping by Lisa's to say hi. Until I remembered her parents were swinging by. So I nixed that and just went home. Ordered online from Crimson. They screwed up my order though and didn't give me any lentil soup. That's been kind of a trend of late that I need to reverse somehow. That my orders have been screwed up. Happened at McDonald's last week when they didn't give me Johnnie's chicken nuggets and instead gave me a cheeseburger. It usually doesn't happen with Crimson though. I think it's merely a test of my patience. After all, isn't that what I am flunking with golf? Still going way too fast and not slowing myself down enough? I could have checked the order before i left. And now I am at home cussing out the restaurant for messing up. It wasn't my fault I know but I still need to find patience within me. The rest of the afternoon I spent on the couch just chillin'. And then I headed out to Supercuts to get a haircut. Should have done it last week before the photo shoot. Now it's way too long and unkempt. And I need to take advantage that Supercuts is still open. New quarantine rules are supposed to get stricter starting tomorrow after all. This will be my Christmas haircut. And so I got my fresh cut and actually got pushed into working a bit. HealthNet report due. Oneida sent me a text chat. I finished it tonight just to get it out of the way. Submitted it at 11:20 PM. Hey I didn't have anything to watch so I didn't have any excuses. FTWD concluded last week. Walking Dead isn't going to start until next year. I just didn't get motivated to do the Silva program which is something I DO need to finish as well. Instead I got me a medium pizza from pizza hut and just chilled the rest of the evening. 4-day Thanksgiving weekend is all over. One holiday down, Christmas coming up.

A Little Time With Johnnie A Lot of Time For Me

I am at Lisa's for breakfast this morning. But not before I wolfed down a bagel and cream cheese and took a shower for good measure. I hadn't showered since Wednesday morning and I was starting to smell.  About the bagel, you never know what ends up happening at Lisa's. The game plan is always to do things on your terms first sight unseen then there can be no argument when things don't happen as expected. The thing this morning was that Blue the Gecko went missing last night. And so I was fully prepared to help this morning and be as supportive as I can. Which is why I was extremely relieved to hear first thing that they did find him this morning! It turned out he had hidden among Johnnie's toys in the closet in his room. I'm sure Lisa was more than relieved as well. I mean I don't see the thing but 2 days last weekend to feed him and I would have been disappointed big time if he wasn't found.  And so disaster averted, I went to heat up some water for some hot tea. And Lisa went on to make breakfast. Or rather she asked me to cook up some scrambled eggs for breakfast. She was in scrounge mode which happens when she has no food left in the house and she simply won't take the time to go out and buy some. She did have eggs left though, and she did have pastries courtesy of old friend Inez who we used to hang with back in the day pre-Johnnie. That was enough for breakfast. As for me, I had the privilege of downloading the MindValley Silva Life System that i found on someone's unprotected Google Drive. Downloaded the whole program. And did a couple of lessons too. Including the Alpha Meditation. Which is why I was much more mellow this morning. So much so my resting heart rate dropped 3 full points to 69 which was the first time it had dipped below 70 in about a month. And so it was that I ended up having breakfast with Lisa and Johnnie to go with last night's dinner and then right afterwards, Lisa went back to practicing the piano. In the meantime, it turned out that Johnnie had a list of stuff for us to get at the store. He knows he gets to hang out with me this morning on a Saturday. He knows the routine. And Lisa had a couple of things she needed anyway. Her parents are coming tomorrow to bring her full bags of groceries. But I'm supposed to get Johnnie's chicken noodle soup and flour and a couple of other things. I didn't care. I have a couple of hours to hang out with my Little Bug. And he was only all too happy to hang out at my apartment even for just a couple of episodes of the Cat In the Hat. I stretched it all the way to lunch even, getting him some Panda Express. And so we went back to Lisa's at before it was even 1:3o. It was a win-win-win. Lisa got to practice piano, I got to hang out with Johnnie, Johnnie got to watch the-Cat-In-the-Hat! 

So this afternoon was all about some ME TIME. Which would actually last the rest of the weekend actually since I don't typically see Johnnie and Lisa on a Sunday, especially when her parents are going to be over for the bulk of the afternoon. I had started some work yesterday with the Silva lessons and not only was I much more relaxed today I also had a lot of clarity with regards to relationships. Mine with my family. Mine with Lisa. I realize that the time I spent with Johnnie is simply an extension of the social time that Lisa needs in her life regardless of who she that time is with. Yesterday it was Inez Garcia. It could be her many friends on the phone. And that is really her ME TIME too. Funny that she is spending social time with me when it is me that realizes I don't have to do that now that we're divorced. Yet I do it anyway. I also realized from a video this morning I watched on an MS diet protocol that the stuff I bug about with her... the constant anxiety, the perfectionism, the drama could be effects of the MS that she has. It's really FEAR driving itself isn't it? All that to say it wasn't necessarily about me a lot of the time. Some of it is a part of her own narcissistic tendencies, but even that I think was learned from her dad. The bottom line is that I was far more accepting today than ever. And not much bothered me at all. In fact, she continued to talk to me for as long as I was there and I did stay to listen although a huge part of me really just wanted to go home and take a nap such as it were. How I ended up turning that into lunch at Taco Bell for a beef burrito and some nachos hopefully doesn't mean I'm turning into fast food couch potato guy. The minute I sensed some guilt about those tacos I immediately went for a fast walk around the neighborhood. See, I even posted a pic of me doing same. Hey it turned into a beautiful day really. So much so I didn't even need any layers late in the afternoon. Kind of odd for late November when it is supposed to be getting colder. But I'm not complaining. I actually did finally do a movie tonight. I was able to download Greenland which is not supposed to be released to video-on-demand until December. A disaster movie about a comet hitting the earth. I admit I was a bit disappointed. But hey it was a movie right? I'm glad I could watch those considering LA County is ratcheting up quarantine again for the holidays. Still who could blame me for being in LAZY MODE. I didn't even want to do much for dinner other than Chipotle carne asada burrito bowl. Check that. I did turn into couch potato fast food guy. I'll let it go for just tonight though. What's the harm for just one day right?

Golf Friday and the Vietnamese Dinner

Last year I remember playing golf with Scott the Friday after Thanksgiving at Penmar. This year we were a little more intentional than a last second text. I made a reservation at Eaton Canyon and the regular foursome all agreed to play which was pretty cool and considering only 2 of us are playing on Sunday, this works out. The morning started out really cold. To the point where I was double layered when I first got to the golf course. But after just one hole, both layers came off. I was simply trying to play much better than the last time we played here 2 weeks ago when all 3 of us Scott, Greg, and I really butchered our first 3 holes.  After my first 2 shots I already played better than the last time. Too bad I missed the putt for a bogey. But the 6 still ended up winning the hole! Ok good... I'm already on the board after 1 hole. It turned out that was a good thing because I would not win another hole until Hole 8. Not that I didn't have any chances either. The goal was simple: slow down my swing, cancel the negative thoughts and negative programming, visualize good shots. Easier said than done though because I simply could not get it done all morning long. I was either too distracted or more accurately, too easily distracted. Even some good-natured yapping with the golfers right behind us did not help and did not put me in a more relaxed state. I did hit some good shots... but not good enough when Chris is swinging well. And with a resurgent Greg hitting even better shots. Even my signature Hole 5 swing went into the sand trap at pin level. I got on to the green after that, but missed a hole-tying putt. Yet again. As I did on Hole 3. And then I started whiffing badly on Hole 6 and Hole 7 and even Hole 8. It was like I was already flustered and out of it and I couldn't back into it mentally. Sigh. Oh well... at least it turned out to be a nice day out on Black Friday. And I still did manage to get out and play. The thing was we got done so quickly I was home by 11:30. If this were a Sunday I'd be getting out and getting a nice meal somewhere. But since it IS a Friday I figured I'd get an IMpossible Whopper and a couple of tacos for lunch and then finish off the mid-day with a nap. Especially since I didn't really have a good sleep last night. Hey it's still a day off and nothing could be better than that really.

Lisa had called by mid-afternoon asking me to come over to watch Johnnie. Since mom and son didn't go anywhere for Thanksgiving weekend, that was to be expected actually. I was happy to take her up on it so I could spend QT with my Little Bug. I even had a novel idea for dinner when she mentioned she didn't have any food in her fridge. Why not eat takeout? And why not eat Vietnamese food I volunteered? I remembered Blossom had opened right next to Crimson and I had never eaten there although it used to be the go-to Vietnamese place in DTLA even from the USC Stevens days.  So I was glad when Lisa agreed. I even brought up the Grubhub menu for her to choose what she wanted. She picked pho of course and I was very happy to choose the old favorite of rice noodles with meat egg rolls, shrimp, and lemongrass beef. That dish brought me back to memories of that nondescript Vietnamese restaurant we frequented when Lisa still lived downtown. Those were the early days of our relationship. Pretty good days too that I fondly remember. Even Lisa remembered eating Vietnamese pho the day we hiked Mt Wilson with Courtney. Yep, it is a nice anchor all around. And to top it all off, even Johnnie enjoyed the rice noodles. All we should have done was order extra rice noodles for him and he would have been just fine. Needless to say I enjoyed this meal much more than the regular fish fare we usually do. And the food alone made it already a memorable dinner. And after dinner, Lisa went on to playing piano, I went on to washing whatever few dishes there were (the beauty of ordering takeout) and then playing with Johnnie. We rough-housed for a bit and then he seemed to tire of that. After Lisa had been playing for at least an hour, Johnnie decided he wanted to play where his mommy was. Oh well then. I left at around 8 PM only because Lisa had planned on playing the piano again tomorrow morning and so I was invited over for breakfast. Hey it IS Saturday after all right?  I went on home, turned on the Mandalorian which was an especially good episode today because it centered on Ahsoka Tano one of the less famous Jedi but no less skilled. Lots of connections to past Star Wars events in this episode. I would have been happy to go on to bed right after that, but nope. One more phone call. A frantic one too. It was Lisa. And Johnnie. They had lost Blue the gecko and he was nowhere to be found.... Sigh. Always some drama isn't there? I don't know what I could have done to help except to stay on the phone and offer emotional support and ideas. I told Lisa to close all the doors since he was likely still in the house. She had found some gecko poop in her bedroom. And then they will have to wait until he turns up. Hopefully Johnnie didn't lose track of it outdoors. We'll have to see what happens...

Happy Thanksgiving

So first things first, Johnnie spent the night at my apartment last night so Lisa could do her usual Wednesday routine and so we got up this morning, got breakfast, I let him watch a few videos and THEN I dropped him off at Lisa's. They're spending Thanksgiving at Joah's in-laws and so it's a combined Thanksgiving with Lisa's family too. I of course worried that some people were not taking the coronavirus pandemic too seriously and it would become some kind of spreader event, but I trust Lisa to be careful. She, of all people, should practice a large amount of caution. I was reading somewhere that the numbers in LA County has gotten quite significantly worse... to the point where the modelling predicted that 1 in 145 LA County residents are already infected with the disease. That's great. I, on the other hand, made no plans today. I would have gone to San Diego to see my family like last year, but this year with the pandemic, I simply did not feel the urgency to get together. And I was already back to being anti-social towards them when we all got sent home to quarantine in March anyway. It's like I was given a legit reason to actually avoid contact! And I have to ask myself... do I dislike them that much? That can't be it right? I think there may be SOMETHING to my own perception that they don't care. I mean have they reached out to me ever? My mom used to... to make me take her out for her birthday and things like that. But my mom's cognitive decline was pretty evident the last time we all got together for Maia's birthday in February. And so whatever she felt towards me now, I'm just letting go regardless.

I reminded myself that today was a day to practice gratitude. And I actually I will admit to spending some time in my old journals. Those that go way WAY back more than a decade ago. I looked up what I was doing Thanksgiving. And got no further than the first online journal in 2009 when Lisa and I went to Maui together. And of course 2010 when Thanksgiving was spent in the Philippines and Thanksgiving dinner was some saltine crackers from 7-11 because both Lisa and I got violently ill with gastroenteritis. There was the Thanksgiving spent in Vancouver which is still one of my favorites because of all the swankiness we experienced at the Fairmont. And then the road trip to Sedona/Grand Canyon with Dexter and Yadira. This was all before we started going to Maui to visit Joy and fam for a span of a few years. It saddened me that Lisa didn't really want to go this year even if Hawaii was NOT in the middle of quarantine. Something about her feeling like she was overstaying a welcome. I resisted the idea that that trip is not the same without me. But then again, there was no denying that Thanksgiving trips had turned out to be the most memorable for Lisa and I when we were together. I was grateful for the memories. Grateful that I have a son to raise. Grateful for a very well-paying job that affords me a pretty nice apartment. But other than being employed, I'm also grateful that I make a difference in my company. I'm grateful that if all I have to complain about is getting up a couple of times a week sometimes to pee and a case of high blood pressure that is under control and some numbness in the skin of my left big toe, then I'm thankful that I am relatively healthy aren't I? I'm thankful that I have more than $75K laying around for a rainy day and almost $700K in a retirement account that is sure to grow. Oh I could whine about me being alone on Thanksgiving and not being around my family. But then again I chose to do that didn't I? I am still thankful for them though. After all, intentional or not they are a part of what made me who I am aren't they? I'm thankful for the here and now. And next year I am grateful for even MORE.

Last Day of a Short Week

Don't we usually get let off at 3 PM the day before the long Thanksgiving weekend? Maybe if we were still working at the FRB I guess. Since we're working remotely, I'm ending my workday at 3 PM one way or another. The only sort of drama today centered around Kennedy as we all awaited his COVID test results. Fortunately, he tested negative, and so we could avoid all the negative repercussions one way or the other. Today I had one huge mission for Johnnie. By now since nobody had reached out to me, I figured I actually had no plans for Thanksgiving. Kind of like last year huh?! And for my family I'm sure it's partly because I hadn't reached out to anyone since we all got sent to quarantine from COVID way back in March. So much so my mom complained about me to Tita Alice. So I called her. And of course she didn't answer. I FB messaged her. Didn't answer. Finally I had Johnnie do a video message. I even had him rehearse and everything... not with the pic I posted of course. That was just him goofing around. But I wrote out a script and it turned out just fine. And not only did I leave a message for my mom, I decided to leave a general message for :dear family: And sent it via group chat to my sister Grace, my cousins, Tita Lou, Uncle Pons, and even Auntie Alice. If they're not going to reach out to me, for sure Johnnie will melt their hearts. He always does. And finally I actually did get a response. And so at least no one can say I did not reach out this Thanksgiving. By the time the afternoon rolled around, I headed off to Ralphs to at least have some turkey to cook for tomorrow. I may not have anyone around but I can still celebrate. And so I bought a nice turkey breast... not an entire turkey. Way too much food for just me. but a turkey breast should last me a couple of meals at least. And I was even going to get some pie too, but there was this huge line at Marie Callender's! So much for that idea. By the time we got back it was already almost 4 PM. It is STILL Wednesday after all, albeit the night before Thanksgiving. And so we still headed out to Panda Express to get Johnnie his dinner. And mine actually. And although it feels a little off-routine, it is Lisa's last night of work tonight so I was expecting Johnnie hand-off to happen later...

Or not? I called Lisa at 7:30 and she was headed home from work. She explained that although it was her last day of work for the week, it was still Wednesday night and she wanted to do her Wednesday routine, which apparently was going for a walk with neighbor Melissa. Apparently, they do this every Wednesday. More power to her of course, and for me it meant I was going to keep Johnnie just a bit later. But in the middle of conversation, Lisa and I both figured why not just keep Johnnie for the night? And then I can drop him off tomorrow after breakfast. I was ALL for that of course.  My routines were pretty much all done anyway, and I was already at 9000 steps by the time Lisa and I talked. It was not even 8 PM yet. And so it was that Johnnie and I got to watch Jurassic World again together. And he got to draw to his heart's delight. He had all these lists he wanted to give his mommy. What to do for Thanksgiving. What he wants to do for Christmas. A rendering of the Jurassic World movie and a nice rendering of Thanksgiving and what he was thankful for this year. This would of course include Blue the Gecko in addition to mom and dad. Tonight couldn't have been any more different than last year's Thanksgiving. Or the one from previous years with Johnnie when we would spent the night before Thanksgiving packing for Hawaii. For a brief minute I also reflected on how I used to spend the night before Thanksgiving packing extra food from the Cedars-Sinai lunch following the example of the Tony Robbins Basket Brigade. It was an activity that grew both in participation (Bruce YOung and Dexter) and also in the amount of food! One year I remember delivering more than 50 individual dinners. 2 years ago I even had Johnnie give out a couple of cheeseburgers. The symbolism of course was that no matter how much he think you have or don't have, you always have something to give and share. And it felt good. Tonight I was simply very grateful that Johnnie was snoozing quietly next to me sleeping peacefully.  Very VERY grateful for that.

Johnnie No School Tuesday

So what do I do when I have Johnnie for the next 2 days and he doesn't have school and I still have to work? What you do is come up with a bunch of activities that last about 45 minutes each. I let him sleep in a bit later since he went to bed late last night <thanks Lisa!?> And then on we went to McDonald's for breakfast as if he were on his school routine. He had an extra long shower this morning too because he was scratching and itchy and very much sniffly, likely a product of whatever they did today at Courtney's. But after I cleaned him up, he was just fine. Couldn't have him catching a cold now could I? If he catches one, then I catch one. Kennedy from my team on the other hand has called in for the 2nd day in a row with flu symptoms. Here is where it gets dicey. When do you tell him to get covid tested? He had called in sick yesterday too. And then positive or not, do you start with contact tracing? I'm thinking about me of course since I was in the IT room yesterday. He wasn't there but do I need to worry? These are the questions that being in a pandemic sort of forces on you. For now I have no symptoms, not even a sniffle from Johnnie so I put it out of my head. And I managed to get him watching NumberBlocks and Alphablocks while I got some work done minimally. At least those things ARE educational. And then right after that I got him watching the same EPIC books he would be reading normally, except that these were on someone's YouTube channel. A little Cat Ninja, A little Bright family and Johnnie is all good to go, at least through lunch. I had lots of leftovers from yesterday of course and all Johnnie wanted was some penne pasta in chicken noodle soup broth and so we were good to go. The funny thing was that some people at work weren't going to be around tomorrow and so today would be effectively their last day to work this week. And I got some emails about invoices needing to be approved, and reports needing to be run. Would I be getting these things if we were working in person at the office I wonder? Ah no matter, tomorrow IS the last work day of the week so all I had to do was hang on for a little bit longer.

To keep to the routine, I kept Johnnie's swimming class with Stacy today. There would be no resistance from him today. In fact, look at him on our way back from class in the picture. Earlier I snapped a pic of us going to McDonalds' to pick up chicken nuggets. A plan that got derailed when they screwed up my order and gave me a cheeseburger instead of the nuggets. Johnnie wasn't going to eat that of course. Oh well, that meant I had lots of steps logged in already even before the swim class. And so I didn't need to walk around the pool. I just lounged around, checked my email and I almost even took a nap. And the hour long session went by fast. No complaining about how cold it was from Johnnie either. A very good thing. And when we got home, he immediately pivoted to making drawings. Lots of drawings. He wanted to draw about Thanksgiving, he wanted to draw about what to ask his mom about Christmas, he wanted to draw dinosaurs. I almost had to interrupt him to go get dinner at Panda Express even! And so it was that I really actually had no problem keeping him occupied the entire day today. So much so he didn't even take out the trampoline to jump around. Later on we finally did watch Spaceballs together. And as i suspected, and much to my chagrin, there were a bunch of choice words that were said that I really would have preferred Johnnie not to know about until later... way later in his life. Words like bitch, and asshole, and shit. Sigh. I can't believe Lisa was ok with all that. And actually, I think she probably didn't even know the words were said in the movie. Chances are she was half-asleep while Johnnie and the rest of the adults were watching it. That's usually what happens. Again no matter. I will just have to do damage control if necessary. For Johnnie, he likes this slapstick comedy stuff.  And goofy words as in the book "The Book with No Pictures". Innocently goofy stuff. I hope to keep it that way god help me. Today bedtime was as normal and I look at today as recovery day from whatever it is, Lisa had Johnnie doing for the last couple of days. And it was all good.

A Short Thanksgiving Week

Thanksgiving week is usually quiet. And short. And goes by fast. But sometimes there are unusual things that happen. Today that would be a photo shoot at our Westlake North center. I.S. is supposed to have some written accolades in the upcoming company annual report and so the I.S. Team is supposed to get some pictures in it. I'm supposed to get some pictures in it. Which means I actually have to get dressed up today and drive to work albeit at 1 PM in the afternoon. I must admit it felt strange wearing work clothes again. It has been at least 8 months after all. I hadn't worn work socks and work shoes in that long. And it did feel strange getting dressed up. The good thing was that as soon as I got to Westlake North, I ran into their Halloween pot luck. There was SOOO much food! Carnitas, chips, pizza, lasagna. I don't know if they had even a dozen people working at that Center and there was enough food for at least 30 people. See the pic attached. As far as the photo shoot was concerned, Kennedy called in sick so it was Larry and I. There's the head IS guy looking over the shoulder of his staff. There's the IS head guy with a laptop. Head IS guy in front of the regular everyday mess of the Helpdesk room. The entire thing lasted 15 minutes and honestly the best part of all was that I had a couple of pieces of pizza and some lasagna for lunch! No need to make a pit stop in Echo Park. And when I got home I started working on my regular routine finally. That would be getting my steps in, especially since I really didn't do much in the morning other than do the Business Continuity Meeting. I got out of those work clothes the second I went through the door. And instead put on regular clothes and walked around my neighborhood area. It turned out to be a nice day for fall actually and I was aware that I really only had just about an hour before it was time to head on over to Lisa's for the Johnnie pickup.  I also needed to fix myself dinner of course. That was the plan anyway until I did call Lisa at 5:30. I just knew I had to do that before heading on over, because of course you never know with her. Turned out that my instincts were spot on. Lisa said they were still 4 hours away on the road. And they weren't supposed to get to LA until well past 9 PM. Yep, THAT would be Lisa. It IS different when you expect that she didn't think about the routine actually. That means you don't get to be disappointed. For me it simply meant that I didn't have to rush getting my steps in after all. Didn't have to rush making dinner, didn't have to rush doing anything. I reminded myself that a year ago, Lisa and Johnnie had already left for Hawaii by this time and I had the entire week to myself. It's already going to be different, and pleasantly so, that I get to have Johnnie for a couple of days this week. And so what did I do for a Monday nite to myself? Well it turned out that the LA Rams were playing on MNF against Tom Brady and the Buccaneers. And it was billed as a heavyweight fight between 2 really good teams! And by the time I got my spaghetti bolognese all done, the RAMS had gone into halftime with a lead! OK then. And so it was that I took my time and actually got to 13.000 steps before Johnnie by 9 PM. And I did a couple of reps of the Nitric oxide dump exercise too. And for good measure the RAMS won and now all of a sudden they are the talk of the pundits again. Could there be another Super Bowl for them this year? Making LA really the center of the sports universe for the Big 3 football, basketball, AND baseball? Wouldn't that be something?! Finally around 9:45 PM I looked out my window and Lisa's car pulls up the curb almost right outside my living room. I see my Little Bug hop out excitedly! His butt must be sore, being on the road for that long! I'm just glad Johnnie was able to make it. It used to be I hated driving even to San Diego with him because you had to figure out how to keep him occupied the whole time if he didn't fall asleep. Anyway, Lisa babble on about them watching the movie Spaceballs... What? The Star Wars parody from the 80s?? Apparently that was the one and only DVD they had to watch up at Courtney's. I remember it was not exactly suitable for Johnnie's age, I mean this IS a John Candy movie after all! But no matter. I promised Johnnie we'd watch it again together. After all, it is probably on YouTube right? And then since he's had his nap I let him stay up until past 10 PM. Lucky he does not have school tomorrow. And for me, it IS still a short work week. But I fell asleep early regardless. I must have tired myself out eh?!

Sunday Golf

So it's off to Roosevelt Golf Course this morning and for the first time in a few weeks, the regular foursome is assembled. Another chance to get out of my head and allow myself to have a good game. For some reason I get the yips at Roosevelt now more so than I do any other course. I have more bad holes here than anything. But also for some reason I do well on the first hole. And the pattern is that I discombobulate after that. That is the program I need to undo and delete today. And just to cut right to the chase I didn't get it done. The first hole went right as predicted. Nice tee shot. On the fringe on the 2nd shot. 10 foot putt for par. Which I missed. Sigh. That would end up being my best chance at par for the entire day which says it all. Because I proceed to completely botch up the next hole and whiff at least 3 times just on the fairway. On the short hole 3, I didn't swing my iron well and ended up pulling it way left and then i was allowed to do mulligan and tie the hole for the win. Which would be my only sniff of winning a hole today. That's how bad it went. A nice first 2 shots on Hole 4, was followed by 3 bad putts to end up with a 6. And an awesome prodigious tee shot on Hole 5, which would be my best shot of the day was followed yet again by 2 straight whiffs on the fairway. Why did I whiff so much? I simply couldn't get a rhythm and I did not do enough to (a) overcome the negative programming (b) relax and slow my swing down and focus on the ball strike. I'm going to stop describing the rest of the holes because frankly they all looked alike. Decent first shot, awful shot from the fairway, didn't putt well. Work to do. I still need to focus on the moment of contact and making sure I'm in the right state instead of letting the anxiety of the moment take over, which it did way too much today. I never could get into a rhythm all morning. Sigh. Oh well. At least it was a nice day out. A warm day even. And at least I buried myself in my IN-N-Out burger on the way home and I watched myself get impatient getting stuck on LaBrea just to get to the freeway. 

At least I had a nice, clean apartment to come home to. Just about the only consolation I had after having such a shitty game. Maybe it was that Chris was there? Nah, that excuse is weak AND lame. I tried to take a nap after lunch and I actually discovered some nice binaural beats that got me to relax some. And pretty soon I realized it was 3 PM. Time to head on over to Lisa's to wash my dirty rags and feed her family pets. That would be Jack and Jill the turtles of course. Look at the pic I took of them. They have gotten much bigger since I last lived here and they were basically babies. And then of course there is the gecko. Lisa and Johnnie sure spend a lot of energy and money feeding this thing. I mean I have to coat the crickets with calcium? REally? I have to take the damn thing's poop out too? It's a gecko for crying out loud. I must say though i did get a kick out of watching the thing spot the calcium covered crickets and eat them * see pic * Anyway I promised I'd feed the thing and I promised I would do it Lisa's over particular way. Anyway it was mission accomplished, got my rags washed too and I was in and out of there in about a half hour. Like yesterday I had no intention of spending any time there more than I have to and I wanted to be out before it got dark anyway. I went home and ate the rest of the turkey I bought yesterday. I made green beans and onions too. And so I had a proper sort-of Thanksgiving turkey dinner with stuffing and the green beans and even cranberry sauce. And after I ate I realized I was tired. The weekend was winding down and I concluded the evening with the midseason finale of FEAR THE WALKING DEAD. The story of Morgan and his friends against Virginia which is the female version of Negan but perhaps not as vile. Just as ruthless but not as bloodthirsty. Maybe. I always need something to watch on a Sunday night don't I? But tonight I actually found a YouTube video with a binaural track that actually had an effect almost immediately. As in it calmed me down and got me to get out of my head. THAT is the key you know. So much so I allowed myself to indulge in some more Chuck episodes until almost 1 AM. I figured I could use the binaural beats to get me to sleep quickly. And guess what? It worked! And so it was that the weekend was all about cleaning the apartment before next week's Thanksgiving week. And taking care of the gecko at Lisa's house. Mission accomplished. Now comes the short Thanksgiving week...

Apartment Cleanup Day

I woke up this morning extremely motivated to clean my apartment, especially since I didn't get around to it yesterday. With Johnnie and Lisa off to see Courtney I didn't think I'd be seeing Johnnie at all until Monday night when I pick him up for Thanksgiving week. Until I get a call from my son at 8 AM and I'm barely fumbling around the house because I had gotten a pretty good night's sleep. He wanted me to bring his t-shirt with the dinosaur on it he said. I guess mom and son are dressing up to match. I thought it was cute. I wondered why Lisa didn't just come right out and invite me to breakfast. Michael Villanueva was there making it anyway. He's the designated driver, poor kid. 6 hours of driving and Lisa is already exhibiting stress from undertaking such a drive. Anyway I figured I'd just bring the T-shirt over and pick up a McMuffin from McDonald's on the way. It would give me an excuse to see my Little Bug for the day if just for a couple of hours. Besides I was planning on swinging by her house later on anyway after they had left. Lisa had given me the thumbs up to wash my bulky quilts in her heavy duty washer.  Saves me from having to go to the laundromat. It was also a straight-up trade so that I could feed the gecko and the turtles this weekend. And lastly, Lisa needed someone to talk to about her gardener Eusebio giving her notice that he couldn't do maintenance for her yard anymore. It bothered her. As it should. He had been with her since he did the landscaping job when I still lived there all those years ago. But honestly, I didn't like that the backyard grass was undone for many months. And for what? Honestly I didn't think it looked better than when I was doing it myself. But that isn't my problem is it? I just told her it wouldn't be all that hard to find a replacement. As if I'm talking to myself about Lam at MY job. Hmmm... And so I went over and ended up bringing all the stuff I needed to do for my laundry, brought over Johnnie's shirt and I had some of Michael's pancakes too. After I had gulped down my breakfast before comin in LOL. Really simple day after that for me. I started cleaning the apartment. And I started with the bedroom. And the toilet. I figured those would be the areas I hadn't cleaned in more than a month so it needed a little more scrubbing. 

I actually ended up shuttling between my apartment and Lisa's house. That would be the Arnel style for ya. Do a room then go to Lisa's house to do a load. I figured I'd wash the big pillows too since they are dirty and they don't smell clean at all. Why not right?  And anyway the bulky items needed at least an hour of drying time. By 3 PM I had gotten most of the living room done too at my apartment. And I had gotten most of the laundry done at Lisa's. I fed the gecko a little early. I had no intention of being around the house when it got dark. It always used to freak me out a bit when I was alone here many times when Lisa and Johnnie would go off on their vacations. No Hawaii this year I'm afraid. The state is locked down. And so I worked up such a sweat cleaning up and everything that I figured I'd do one more thing at Lisa's house. I would take a shower in the upstairs bathroom... in the very shower that I designed. If there is anything I miss in this house it is taking a shower there. I could sit and lollygag while the hot water worked it's wonders. Which is exactly what I did this afternoon. Sat there and let the hot water work it's wonder. Ahh I really did miss taking a shower here. Hadn't done this in more than 2 years! I'm for SURE going to keep it on the down low. And so it was that I got my house cleaned today!  And I got all my bulky laundry done too!  And I even got to have breakfast with Johnnie. Everything was so clean around the house I didn't want to touch anything! LOL. Even for dinner. I ate the leftover unstuffed cabbage that I made Thursday night. And when it came time to go to bed. I slept on the couch. <Picture I posted was Lisa's couch BTW> Right on the very pillow that I had just washed today. The clean bedroom is going to at least stay almost untouched for 24 hours. Man for just right that moment I turned into neat-freak Lisa. And I guess that's ok...

Tank Day

I woke up this morning feeling like today was going to be a TANK Day. I knew this because I had no intentions of getting out of my pajamas until necessary and I didn't even think about when "necessary" is. I figured most of the Leadership at QueensCare were tied up at the flu vaccine event we were having at CSLA and so I was pretty sure no one was going to contact me pretty much all day. I toyed with the idea of going to Westlake North to pick up my new iPhone 12 that came in on Monday. But I didn't even get around to having breakfast until well past 9 AM and by that time all I wanted to do was watch the Mandalorian Episode 4. Getting back to the Phantom Menace lore about the Force and midichlorians. Anyway suffice it to say it is getting really really good and i can't wait for the next few episodes. I did manage to read and answer some emails and by the time all this was done it was already 11 AM. Then and only then did I finally get dressed. Just so I could have lunch. I was thinking to myself does today seem different than many a TANK FRIDAY at the FRB? Other than the fact that if it really WAS a TANK FRIDAY at the FRB I would be heading out to catch a movie right about the time I got dressed. Everyone is pretty much otherwise occupied on most Fridays anyway. Also this time of year I'm revving up for the new NBA season usually. Almost exactly a year ago I watched the Lakers and the Heat at Staples. WHO KNEW they would end up playing each other for the championship...almost 10 months later! Was that just less than a couple of months ago? And now they're talking about starting up the new season again right around Christmas. Not sure I'm ready for it... we haven't even celebrated last season's championship. In any case the focus right about now is that Thanksgiving is less than a week away and I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to be doing. Probably same as today. Nothing. LOL.

So today doing nothing meant literally just hopping from one task to the next or just thinking about one task to the next and not finishing anything. I wanted to clean my apartment today. As in the whole apartment. But I never got around to it. Heck I was lucky just to fix myself lunch LOL LOL. And I did manage to walk to Ralphs and do SOME grocery shopping and at least get to a few thousand steps before 5 PM. And actually I did drive to Target on the Westside. Not Westwood, but a new one on Santa Monica Blvd. Since it is fairly new it still had a lot of Johnnie's 5T size. Lisa and I agreed to throw out any piece of clothing that is 3T or 4T because I hate seeing Johnnie with clothes way too small for him. It's like we were too poor to buy him clothes in the right size or something. I hate it. And so I picked up a bunch of pants for him. I figured I'd start systematically changing or replacing the clothes in his closet at Lisa's house. I wonder how long it would be before Lisa figures out that I did just that? LOL. I hate going into Target anymore, because I end up buying stuff I don't really even need. Although I'm pretty sure I'm going to use the cleaning stuff I picked up. And the one thing I really DID need, I forgot to pick up. That would be toilet paper actually. Since CA is imposing a quarantine and locking down a bit tighter, people are starting to panic buy certain essentials again. Sigh. Hope there's some left when i get around to remembering to buy some TP. Anyway for dinner I figured I'd get rid of the extra stuffing I picked up. Not to throw it out obviously but to fix my super -duper special stuffing I made for Lisa's Thanxgiving lunch. The stuffing I made didn't turn out as good as the one from last year. People ate it anyway. I think I put too much water. In any case I still needed to make the turkey. And I wasn't going to cook one. Fortunately Ralphs already has pre-cooked, right-off-the-oven turkey breasts. Kind of a 1/4 turkey which is actually plenty enough for one person for at least a couple of days. And so as it turned out I had a turkey dinner a week early LOL LOL Anyway after that it was back to watching TV and not cleaning the house. I guess I'll have to do that tomorrow. Anyway, it felt good not to do anything. Self-care means taking my mind off the routine of work and whatever else I get anxious about every once in a while. And for me that was today. And it was good. Very very good.

Rant and Rave Kind of Mood

For some reason I woke up tired this morning even though I had a pretty good night's sleep. That is, of course a direct of the night before when I chose to watch Chuck reruns until almost 2 in the morning! Why do I that?! I know full well I'm going to be tired most of the following day, yet I did it anyway. Sigh. A behavioral shortcoming I need to work on. Anyway as I mentioned today I had much better sleep last night, yet I felt tired anyway. Probably because I had been pushing myself physically too. It bothered me that my resting heart rate is back in the 70s again and it has not dipped below that but once since the Elections. I probably am being affected by Trump's idiotic shenanigans to steal the election. I mean I can't believe 70M people voted for this asshole. But then again, maybe that's why. He gives them a champion and they sure don't care if he cheats to stay on top don't they? The challenge there is to still give them a little bit of respect instead of putting them down for their erroneous beliefs. After all, there is no holier than thou when it comes to beliefs. And besides, if someone gets swindled, are you really going to put them down because they were so trusting? Why did they end up trusting a charlatan, is the question that is bugging me. Anyway rant and rave over, time to focus on the fact that it is Thursday and likely the last full day I get to spend with my Little Bug until next week for a short Thanksgiving week. I've done well all week long and I don't intend to break the streak of at least not blowing up for Johnnie at anything. And if just for today only that would end up being the bright spot of my day. Today he went through his regular paces in school while I did my IS Team Meeting as per usual, and this time I was already in rant mode. That's because I'm trying to be cognizant of the IS Budget and I keep hammering to my team that it is NOT business as usual. That a doctor asking for a $300 touchscreen monitor is not usual and those kinds of things need the approval of their department head. Of course it is difficult to push back when people are kissing the asses of these providers simply because there aren't that many of them around to hire. THAT is a seller's market to be sure. And I agree that we need to keep them happy. Even if I'm grumbling under my breath to do it. And then for some reason the Wednesday afternoon huddle is now a Thursday afternoon huddle and so I did have one more meeting late. And the day wasn't over then too even as that meeting sailed right on by pretty quickly. Johnnie had his Build-A-Fort Zoom party with his classmates for all the November birthdays. We did a build-a-fort thing way back in April already for his TK class so we knew what we were doing. And that half hour gave me time to catch up on my steps tonight too. They sang and danced and read books, I walked up and down the walkway outside my door over and over. By the time he got done with his Zoom party, Lisa called letting me know she was already at her house. Michael Villanueva was supposed to come tonight as he's the designated driver for the weekend trip up north. And Lisa wanted time to play the piano too. OK then. I kept Johnnie until 8:30 PM and then I drove him to his mom's. I came home and immediately acknowledged that my place needed a cleaning. But not tonight. I was too tired to even get started. That will have to come this weekend. Maybe even tomorrow. I need a TANK DAy.

The Kaiju

Sometimes I wonder where Johnnie learns stuff. And then sometimes I know LOL. Today's new thing is kaiju. Yes that would be the Japanese word for giant beast, which I myself learned about in the movie Pacific Rim. Johnnie got introduced to the concept via EPIC books and the Wonder Family. They too were dealing with a kaiju problem. 2 Wonder Family books later, it's kaiju this and kaiju that. See, that's how it starts. And so i figured there wouldn't be any harm if I showed him the source movie. Yep, Johnnie and I watched Pacific Rim together. What's to worry about? Gigantic Japanese beasts tussling with equally gigantic robots piloted by 2 humans each, that can mentally drift... that is to be able to mind meld together. Harmless concept right? All I cared about was that it didn't scare him too much. I think we're ok there. But hey there was more things that happened today other than just learning about kaiju. Workwise for me there was the Leadership Summit. I used to enjoy these things when they were held at the FRB. The last time we had a virtual summit and it was just ok. Today, same thing.. it was a Zoom group meeting. And we had to do homework prior to as well. We had to do a personality strengths analysis. Funny though when I went to the website to do mine, it turned out I had already done it almost  1 1/2 years ago. Hmmm. I wonder what goaded me to do that?! Anyway that time, my biggest strength was kindness. And then Hope and then Humor. This time around when I took it, my top strength turned out to be Humor and then Leadership and then Hope. And then Kindness. Funny, maybe I was quite focused on kindness in 2019. After all, I had just started divorce proceedings and maybe I was focusing on my empathetic side. Today, I am focused a little more on being a leader. And helping people that way I think. Any way, today's Leadership summit was all about using your strengths to lead. I think I already have a handle on that in the workplace. Now how to figure out how to apply it outside of work as well. As in helping people find the best version of themselves. What a great purpose statement right? And so it was that I did the Leadership thing and soon as it was over, so was my day. Johnnie had been really, really patient that whole time although everyone saw him try to whisper something in my ear.

Anyway he had been trying to keep himself busy reading about kaiju and all. But I also reminded myself that he's all about doing things with me, same as he's all about doing things with Lisa when he's with her. THAT I think is why he's into roughhousing with me and hitting me and stuff. He simply wants to be close to me. I realized this when I showed a hint of disappointment at something he did. So inconsequential was it that I don't even remember what it was. But I remember that he said he wanted to go to his mom's house. Because he'd rather do that than see me disappointed in him. He actually said that. And my heart just dropped. THAT is an example of the very programming I did not wish him to pick up!!! And I did it. By focusing on disapproval instead of controlling my own state and getting him to do what i want him to do. He does much better with the carrot than the stick that's for sure. And at the end of it all, he'll do anything I say. Look at him doing the karate stuff off the trampoline. Just because I told him to. All the while when I was on the phone he kept checking in and showing me stuff. Showed me the turkey project he did for Ms Metz's Art class. Did drawings when I asked him to just to get him out of the way when I needed to do my meeting. And of course we had to do see-saw together. THAT is the key! All I have to do is tell him we get to do stuff together and he's all in! He doesn't even care what it is half the time. Which is why I ended up putting on the movie so we could watch it together. It was still pretty much the same old same old for a Wednesday. Class until 3 PM, Panda Express in Westwood for dinner. And this time I even ate dinner with him. See? I can learn too LOL. Anyway wasn't it just last week that he had the day off for Veteran's Day? I'm actually counting down because he and Lisa are on the way up to see Courtney in Los Gatos for the weekend and so I won't get to see him after tomorrow for a few days. And then comes Thanksgiving week. Who knows what Lisa has got planned?! Anyway that's next week. Today I felt good that Johnnie and I got to spend a nice day together pretty much even though I was on the phone half the day.  It was all good.

A Collective Breath

Another Tuesday another full day of Johnnie school, with the possible relief that it is the last few days before the Thanksgiving break and Johnnie won't have any school next week. In the meantime, people in my orbit seems to be taking a collective breath too. In my IS Team Meeting we were missing James and Nelson who both called in sick. Can't really blame anyone especially after the message from our CEO at the meeting yesterday that it becomes more important than ever that we take care of ourselves. I'm thinking to myself I probably need to do a little bit of self-care too even though I also felt the need to step up on exercise. This despite experiencing some numbness in the outer region of my left big toe would indicate that perhaps I may be overdoing it just a bit in terms of the steps I put in every day. Still for the first time in months I've started to do the nitric oxide dump exercises again. That is part of the self-care I think. Getting focused on the internal work is too, but that is really hard, especially with Johnnie in the house. I have noticed I stopped doing my image cycling exercise and I really REALLY need to pick that back up. But then again, perhaps one way to look at it is that Johnnie is actually the one giving ME lessons. And the lesson is STILL to watch my state, watch my thoughts, watch my reactions. Anxiety means I'm focusing too much on a future that does not exist. Anger means I'm focusing too much on a past that no longer exists. What an amazing lesson.  In the meantime I am happy Johnnie is learning all about Thanksgiving and the pilgrims in his Social Studies class, I'm happy he's immersing himself in more advanced books in EPIC Scholastic, and most of all, I'm happy he's into the school experience even though it is remote. He still feels involved enough to ask me to go scootering to school at some point today so we could see the Thankful Tree the kindergarten teachers put up made up of the kid's leaf artwork in the style of George Seurat. I will repeat that it made me glad that he has already learned about art and painters like Seurat. And that he was proud of his work. We even ran into one of his classmates who was also there to see the tree. I was surprised he recognized Nico, considering they only see each other on Zoom. See? Immersed into his class and classroom experience. BTW, we only went there late in the afternoon because we basically skipped his computer programming class. It was the last meeting and he had already done his project, uploaded it, and got his certificate of completion. He did just fine. And hopefully I can pick it back up with some Scratch Jr exercised online so he can continue to develop. And he also had already done his swimming lesson with Stacy. He was very hesitant right before the lesson. To the point where he was even crying that he didn't want to go swimming today. Must be some old program flitting about his conscious brain. I didn't know why he had gotten so upset. But I did get him in his wetsuit and he did manage to get through the entire hour. He wasn't even that upset anymore after a few minutes. I successfully interrupted an old pattern I guess, which is a good thing. For me, it was a very good re-do of the little incident on Saturday when I lost my temper. This week I am FOCUSED on not doing that. How do I do it? Again by controlling my state, making sure I don't immediately react, and making sure I ask the question... how does the best version of me handle this? When I do that, the right answers always find their way to my consiousness. And so what ended up happening today was that Johnnie got through his classes just fine, I didn't lose my temper at any point and even when he started to do roughhousing stuff with me, I managed to get him to stop and at least work on his impulse control. I mean he's a kid! Of course he's going to have issues with impulse control. I remind myself that it is what I teach him now... at this time.... to learn how to handle it is what's going to make a huge difference when he gets older. I am not going to be the one that has left a negative programming imprint on him. Already the need to be perfect, the program that governs Lisa, has already seeped in a bit. Which is why I'm trying to temper that with letting him learn to manage his impulses. And getting him to learn to be ok with just ok, while also learning that he is more than just ok already. I mean my kid did Georges Seurat art! How amazing is that?! As for me? I guess I would say that I took a breath out today by not focusing on work so much LOL. I focused on Johnnie and it felt very very good. Now if only I can get him to eat more than just Panda Express teriyaki chicken for dinner... 

At Lisa's House All Day

It IS Monday and I woke up thinking I had all this stuff to do for work today. Of course the more I think instead of going to my centering meditation, the more I end up lollygagging. And it was already close to 9 AM when I finally got showered, cleaned up, and ready to go. What's the rush this Monday? I had to be at Lisa's at 10:15 AM for Johnnie's parent teacher conference. I wasn't going to miss that for anything because it is one of the rare times in this time of COVID that Lisa and I would get to talk to Johnnie's teacher together. I even packed my laptop so I could go straight from that meeting right to my regular QueensCare Monday Business Continuity meeting.  Oh and even before that I had to field a 9 AM meeting from Barbara regarding coming back to work at the FRB. As in it ain't happening until the summer. At least through July. Which would clinch my being at home for Johnnie's entire school year this year. Not that it matters now. I have a routine, QueensCare is doing just fine with remote work, and after 8 months we're pros at this by now. And so I had a quick breakfast and got to Lisa's and just as soon as he got done with his 9:25 class, Lisa and I go to her "office" which used to be my office LOL. It felt strange working there I'm not going to lie. I spent so much time there when I lived here. But did I really? Did I not lug my laptop with me downstairs most of the time? I spent time in this office only to get away from Lisa really. And here I am in the pic doing my meetings, doors closed. Before that I thought we had a pretty good meeting with Ms. Wiley. I remember last year at this time, the focus of our conversation with Ms Gee was Johnnie and the other kids in the class and how unruly some of them get. None of that this year since the kids are not around each other. We did talk about Johnnie's progress, which I had no concerns about whatsoever. I know he's smart. I know he's already at 1st grade level in terms of reading and math. We went over the DIBELS assessment but Ms. Wiley also knew he was already at least at the level he's supposed to be. He's handling remote work just fine and so really it was just all about meeting her and Lisa giving her a download on Johnnie's physical/medical concerns. None of these you'd even know he has so I didn't think there was a point. Lisa sort of relayed the information as  a point of pride I think of how much he's accomplishing already.  I mean e IS a great kid which is why Lisa felt like sharing all kinds of stuff about him I'm sure. When I got done with my QueensCare meeting it was already noon and I was about to take off home so I could have some lunch. But Lisa reminded me that I was going to watch Johnnie while she took off to do errands this afternoon. She was supposed to get COVID tested, and then it's her usual list of stuff to do on a Monday. I was happy to watch Johnnie actually. Just wasn't sure how I'd fit in the other routine Monday stuff I have gotten used to doing. As in taking my mid-afternoon walk, doing steps, getting my exercises in. Oh well, those would have to wait I suppose.

As it turned out I ended up staying at Lisa's house all day. I had my laptop so I was at least able to work. I was so behind on my invoices I needed to at least make a dent on those today. And I had resumes to review. By 2 PM I realized I barely had 1000 steps in. And so I parked Johnnie in front of some EPIC books to read and I did steps around the sidelawn. Walk and walk and walk with a little light jog thrown in. By the time Lisa got back it was already 4 PM and starting to get dark. She was moaning about how the COVID test really cut in to her routine. Yeah for me too Lisa. For me too. But I think she had to do it. Her mom got tested yesterday only because she felt pressured to do so. For me, it was the responsible thing to do. And so I stuck around Lisa's house while she basically spent the last few hours of the afternoon making a gingerbread man. That's their thing Lisa and son. They bake. Me and Johnnie? We have a different thing. We watch dinosaur videos LOL. It was almost 6 PM by the time we got back to my apartment. I had to learn how to feed the gecko apparently because they're going away this weekend. Is it me or do I find myself getting roped into all these Lisa household things despite the fact that we're divorced! I guess that's the price I pay to keep harmony while still being able to spend as much time as I do with Johnnie. He immediately went to his DAD's apartment routine soon as we got there. He took out his dino toys, ate his McNuggets + chicken noodles, and put on Isla Nublar until it was time to go to bed. What a different Monday this turned out to be. But it wasn't so bad. I always feel like I'm not myself when I'm at Lisa's and that's ok. I got done what I wanted to do anyway. I even finished at 12000+ steps anyway. It's all good.

Golf At Eaton Canyon

So this morning we were at Eaton Canyon and it was different only because i took off my vest the second I got there. Which means it was going to be warmer than usual. EC is odd in that I always lose balls here and there are so many potholes my feet hurt on hole 4 and 6. But I HAVE been playing well here the last couple of times I played so that's encouraging. Wouldn't know it from the first 2 holes though. The first hole I spent more time OB on the left fence and then on the right tree line before actually getting on the green after 5 shots. I was lucky to do 7. No different on Hole 2 even after a nice tee shot finally. The difference was that neither Scott nor Greg played decent either. They too were having problems. So all 3 of us looked like a bunch of rookies after the first couple of holes. And even on Hole 3 where we all barely made the fence. Actually I didn't. But I goaded the ball down the path and got myself a 4. Which won the hole! My first 2 shots on the next hole were decent. But my approach shot to the green wasn't long enough and instead trickled into the sand trap. End of hole. The next hole (Hole 5) was my best. I knocked a 6-iron 140 yards to the edge of the green and got myself a par. On the longest Hole 6 I knocked my first 2 shots within 60 yards of the green. And only a missed par putt made it a bogey. My tee shot on 7 was long and straight down the middle too. I was finally on a rhythm. But I messed up the approach and left it short. And got another bogey. I was on in 2 on the short Hole 8, but 3-putted to a 5. My first 2 shots on the last hole were pretty good too. But again, I flubbed the fairway approach. Oh well, we never really kept track but I think I won 4 holes today. Not bad. Not good, but not bad. Good enough to pick up lunch at Crimson on the way home. Salmon kabobs and lentil soup. There's some comfort to having that dish I think. The lentil soup (see pic) is particularly satisfying. Last week I had it and I immediately drifted to a nice nap right after lunch. I had more sleep last night so I basically just spent the next couple of hours watching the old sitcom Chuck from 15 years ago. Still identifying with the story of the mythical journey of the normal guy turned extraordinary. Isn't that what I'm trying to do with all the internal work and using energy? Hey I'd settle for being able to control it to have a better golf game. Certainly I could have focused better. It's all about getting relaxed and getting out of my head and letting go and when I do that better, I have a much better golf game. That's what I have to practice don't I? Not to hit the ball better, although doing that will help me develop unconscious competence and muscle memory. But more so to help me relax and focus before the shot and get my head out of it. 

And so the rest of the day I spent basically chilling. I was already at almost 9000 steps by the time I was done with golf so just going to the grocery store took care of it. I hadn't done that all weekend, a product of the required trip to our E3 site on Friday. It's like it took me out of grocery shopping rhythm LOL. I did need to spend some time working on the internal work of how to stop myself from snapping. How to manage my own state in the moment. And really isn't that the same as controlling my state before I hit a golf shot? It's putting in a new program so I don't react like I did when I yelled at Johnnie yesteday. The more I think about that the more I KNOW it is ME that needs to fix my issue. It is me that needs to forgive myself. All my child wants is to play with me 100% of the time. It is MY responsibility to teach him how to do that safely. I need to condition him to learn. But FIRST I have got to get a handle on my state don't I?! Ok then. And so I drifted for the rest of the day and actually spent time at the barbecue grill grilling meat for next week and for dinner tonight. That would be Italian sausage and a nice top sirloin. And then I watched Fear the Walking Dead. Another group of people that found something extraordinary in themselves. Something we all can do right? And so I went to bed getting ready for a lot of catching up work for next week. For my job. Getting ready for the end of the month heading to Thanksgiving...