Overscheduling

Have you ever taken a look at your calendar and realized you had way too much in there? Well I employ ghosts now.

My parents were talking with my wife about doing something this Friday. The one day this week that didn't have anything scheduled. I wasn't in the room when that conversation started, but I walked in when they were discussing what I scheduled.

(Joint access to a calendar app between my phone and my wife's is, in theory, a good idea)

I walked in where my wife was saying there was "nothing" on the calendar. My dad, hearing this, immediately thought that meant my Friday was available.

I scheduled nothing, and that's exactly what's going to happen. He didn't get it at first. My mother, on the other hand, understood right away. My dear wife, upon making the same realization, seemed almost flattered.

Darn right she should. I have a whole day full of nothing I plan on doing with her and it's going to be amazing.

The pox

I can't say any illness has ever been well timed. Nay, I would argue that any illness, ever, has always struck when unwanted. But as far as the ailment currently vexing me, I'd have to say that waiting for tax season to end was ideal.

Friday, I simply felt like I needed to sleep. Forever.
The worst of it was Saturday. Every part of me hurt. Nothing was spared. Fever, chills, a third symptom I won't describe.
Sunday was a bit relaxed.

But Saturday? Every single Saturday this tax season my wife has worked the bulk of the day. Sometimes 9-5, sometimes 9-9. For this illness to wait until I wasn't alone with my kids all day was *less bad* than it could have been.

Still, I had plans for this past weekend. I had so much stuff I wanted to finish. The only thing on my list I got to was "sleep more"

Tax Widow

Every year, from January 2 until roughly the middle of April, I'm... alone.

When my wife and I first got together, her work schedule wound its way around her course schedule. I rarely, if ever, had anything scheduled in the evenings. She was busier than I, and as such I found myself housed in solitude.

Living in Buffalo, after our son was born, my sister in law moved in with us during the season. She watched over him while my wife worked and I was away on campus. Worked out rather well for the years we spent in Buffalo.

Back in Syracuse, however, we're back to alternating schedules. It was nice to have her sister around to watch the kids, but she didn't come with us. For the past three years, I would come home from work, and she would promptly leave for work. It took some adjusting the first year (I simply wasn't used to being alone with my kids for such a long amount of time every day. My work shifts kept me estranged from the same family I was trying to support), but as my ability to organize my own kids has grown, I've found myself alone again.

She makes a paper chain. Every link has the current date, and shows the number of days remaining of the tax season. In January, it runs from one end of the wall to the other. It's imposing, daunting. Paper though it may be, that chain holds me down more than I ever expected of 20lb stock.

I'm at the end of the season. Today and tomorrow. A single link of the chain is all that remains. I look forward to shredding it with a most ridiculous glee.

Absent a dentist

I used to get a six month cleaning at a dentist. It started as a kid, but inertia held it over into my adulthood. That came to a screaming halt once I moved out to Buffalo, turning my 10 minute drive to my dentist into a two and a half hour drive.

I never found a local dentist. I didn't think anything of it. When an ache worked its way into my jaw some years later, I made a friend happy. He was in the dental school at UB, and the problem I had was the kind he needed to take care of before he could graduate.

Woo hoo, free dental work. Oh crap, that x-ray showed a few more things I should be concerned about? I promptly ignored the x-ray, muttering something about insurance and being broke. That was years ago. Also 250 miles away. Also before I had decent insurance. Just a few days ago, my son admitted that he didn't chew on one side of his mouth because it hurt.

Oh crap, I suck.

So I made six dentist appointments.

They're just baby teeth, but still. Dang. I have *not* been on top of this.

Ready Player One

So I've had the book Ready Player One on my reading list for almost four years now (it's a long list, sue me), and the impending movie release had me bump it to the top.

That book was more fun than I anticipated. It's 385 pages of pure childhood nostalgia, with an extremely heavy dose of nerd culture.

Having read the book, I felt comfortable reading articles about the book to movie adaptation. There was a lot in the book that simply wouldn't translate. (There's one part in the book where the protagonist stands at an old pac man cabinet for five hours, winning something in the process. You just can't do that in a movie) They had to change a significant portion of the book just to cram it onto the big screen. Literally all but one of the major challenges (and how they're implemented) are completely different from book the movie.

And it worked. At least *I* thought it did. I know a lot of people are annoyed the how much changed, and I suppose I wasn't one of them because I more or less knew it happened, but they kept the spirit of the book intact fairly well.

It's not quite Jurassic Park, but it's a far cry from the devastation that was The Golden Compass. Don't even get me started on that one.