july 2022

7.5.22
I had been doing moderate training for the Peachtree this year, but I didn't end up going. I wasn't feeling great and I didn't get much sleep the night before, so I decided I didn't even have enough energy to walk. Julie went on her own—she typically walks most of the way and just enjoys the experience—and I was able to catch her at the very end of the local news broadcast of the event crossing the finish line just before they ended the program.

We didn't end up getting to see any fireworks, either, at least not up close. We were kind of tired and didn't even want to do the 15 minute walk to sit out in front of the Decatur middle school, so Will had a friend come over and they watch the fireworks in the distance from the back porch.

We didn't stay in all weekend, though—on Sunday our friend Kevin from high school invited us over to his condo for a pool party, which I really enjoyed. We hung out in the condo pool with a bunch of his neighbors drinking a vodka/watermelon concoction of Kevin's, and then grilled out for dinner. We were scared out of the pool when it started thundering, but as is typical of Atlanta in the summer, the storm passed after 20 minutes or so and the sun came back out again.


7.6.22
On Saturday of July 4th weekend (I realize I'm kind of telling these stories out of order), I met up with some friends who I had previously only known through our shared love of music in an online Facebook group. It's a group where people post pictures of the album covers of music they're listening to, with the only catch being that you have to be listening to it on physical media of some sort (and yes, there are people who are obsessed with reel-to-reel tapes and 8-tracks on that group).

I was invited to join by my friend Marc, but I never posted because, up until October of last year, I didn't listen to any physical media anymore. But then after the fire, I decided not to replace any of my lost collections and instead start collecting vinyl, so I started posting to the group soon after I bought my first piece of vinyl in probably 40 years.

Steve and his wife Elizabeth are from San Francisco and both belong to the group (they are both DJs who use vinyl in their sets), and they were going to be in Atlanta for a convention (Steve is actually some big muckety muck at the Elk's Lodge and they were having their annual national convention in Atlanta). So I met up with them in Little Five Points, starting with a beer at the Vortex followed by visits to Wax 'n' Facts and Criminal Records and ending with another beer at the Little 5 Corner Tavern.

They were really cool people, and like so many other people who started as online friends who I've met in the real world over the years, I'm not sure if the circumstances will ever arise where we'll be able to meet in person again. But it was a nice experience, and I hope our paths cross again someday.


7.12.22
Will turned 12 over the weekend, and we did activities with our local extended family to celebrate. The big event was a trip to the Illuminarium near Ponce City Market to see their immersive exhibit on the solar system with my sister and her husband and also Julie's mom. Julie and Will had been to see the previous safari/wildlife experience, but this was my first trip there and it was pretty enjoyable. It wasn't too crowded, and the space was big enough that even if there were people wandering around, etc., it didn't really interfere with the experience.

Things were a little lower key this year for his birthday (as they have been for a lot of other holidays, etc., recently), but I think he had fun and got some good presents. It's hard to believe he's going to be a bona fide teenager in just one year.


7.13.22
So my modified summer schedule was supposed to have me only working full time on Tuesdays and Wednesdays for June and July, but as I expected, it's actually been closer to a four day a week schedule rather than two days a week. I still try to keep Mondays and Fridays as clear as I can, but between the two of them, I'm probably working a full day total. And Thursdays are also supposed to be blocked off, but because I only accept meetings on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, those days end up getting pretty booked up and so Thursday becomes the main day when I actually get stuff done.

It's not as much as I had hoped, but my expectations were that I'd probably be working closer to three days a week, and it's not too far off from that. I'm definitely taking a more relaxed approach to things this summer, and I'm not overloading my still-understaffed team with more projects than we can reasonably handle.

I'm supposed to move up to three days next month before returning to the full five days in September, but I expect that August will be pretty much like June and July, especially because I'm already working at least three days a week. And while this will hopefully help me reset after our last cycle where I was so burned out that I almost quit, I'm also working on making sure I don't get put in a position again where I and my team have to push so hard that we reach our breaking point.


7.19.22
On Saturday night my friend Marc and his family (wife Virginia and children Dakota and Rose) were passing through Atlanta on their way back from seeing the Mountain Goats perform in Tallahassee (all Marc's family members are huge fans of the band). We met them for dinner at our favorite place to take out of town friends, Holy Taco in East Atlanta.

We were joined there by our friend Kevin (Marc, Kevin, Julie, and I all went to high school together) and Marc's friend Justin, a musician who has played in several local bands over the years (the most famous of which is probably the Rock*A*Teens). We got one of their biggest tables on the outside patio and had just enough room for everyone to squeeze around. I sat near Marc's two children (both teenagers) and enjoyed getting to know them a little bit.

I saw Marc in Chapel Hill when I visited in April, and I'm hoping we'll get to see him family in Atlanta again in September when they all come down for the Music Midtown festival. I reconnected with Marc at our high school reunion a few years ago, and in addition to texting/messaging each other more frequently, I've also been lucky enough to see him in person a few times since then.

Julie, Will, and I also went to an Atlanta United game together this weekend. One of my seat mates gave me both his tickets so we were all able to go together, which only happens a couple of times a year (I have one ticket in a block of five with two other people, each of whom has two tickets of their own, and we all check in with each other when we have a ticket we can't use before we offer it to anyone else).

It's always a fun experience to go to a game no matter what the score, but this one at least ended in a draw (and a point in the standings) with Atlanta coming back late in the game with the equalizer after being down most of the game (Orlando scored in the first ten minutes of the match).


7.20.22
I recently finished Braking Day by Adam Oyebanji, an sci-fi novel about a fleet of three generation ships on their way to colonize a new planet in a different solar system. I'm a sucker for generation ship stories, and while there wasn't a ton that I had read some version of before, it was a well-written book with a mystery at its heart that kept the plot moving forward.

This isn't where I would direct people to start if they wanted to read a book about generation ships, but it's a solid entry in the genre. It's also Oyebanji's debut, so I'll definitely be on the lookout for future novels from him.


7.26.22
I got my second booster shot a couple of weeks ago, which makes me feel a little bit better about being around people in indoor spaces. Which was a good thing, because my boss decided he wanted to start doing a monthly in-person all-staff meeting in June, and I attended my first one last week for the July session (I was at a conference in Nashville for the June meeting). It was fine, I guess, but I still wore a mask most of the time, as much my own preference as out of deference for the 50% of my colleagues who were also still masking up.

On Sunday we surprised Will with tickets to the Xfinity Club at Truist Park to see the Braves play the Angels. We picked this day because they were doing a Braves Squishmallow giveaway for kids (like most kids, Will has several of these already). I think it was supposed to be an official Squishmallow, but either there was some sort of defect with that manufacturing process or they didn't want to pay for an official version, because it wasn't a real Squishmallow and was also much smaller than expected. But Will loved it anyway.

The experience is always much more important to Will and Julie, which was a good thing on Sunday—the Braves lost badly, giving up five runs in the first inning and ending up with a 9-1 loss. And although we got to see Ohtani, he didn't pitch that day, and he also went 0-4 at the plate (a weird outcome given that pretty much every other starter in the lineup got at least one hit). But despite their one game, they're still having a great overall season—they're one of the top teams in the National League and should make the playoffs as a top-seeded wild card at the very least (right now the Braves and the Mets are jockeying for first place in the NL East).


7.27.22
I had my annual review earlier this week, and it's like all annual reviews I've had with this boss for the 21 years we've worked together—I get no official write up in the HR system and no informal letter about my performance over the past year, but I get positive feedback for a few minutes with a few more minutes of talking about goals and expectations (both for myself and my boss) for the coming year.

I also had my first in-person meeting with my friend Nancy in a long time. She and I first got to know each other on a professional level, but we've since become friends and we meet every two weeks to catch up. Up until this week, that has all been over Zoom since the start of the pandemic, but we were both on campus on Tuesday and sat at the tables outside the new Theology building instead of doing a video call.

I still don't know when things will return to some version of normal, but I'm starting to move in that direction, and it's nice to have these real-world interactions with friends as building blocks that will hopefully culminate in a return to being able to experience most things similar to how I would have experienced them in 2019.

2025
2024
2023
december 2022
november 2022
october 2022
september 2022
august 2022
july 2022
june 2022
may 2022
april 2022
march 2022
february 2022
january 2022
2021
2020
2019
2018
2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000

main
daily links
people
cd collection
library
bio