August 14, 2013

I keep forgetting to write about the time my friend met Jerry Rice, so here it is. My friend was in charge of throwing his brother's bachelor party and they ended up at a club getting bottle service, which had them in a roped off area, with a waitress refusing to let them refill their own glasses, and a personal bouncer. And then in the distance, across the club, my friend spotted Jerry Rice. So he started climbing over furniture and eventually made his way over to Jerry Rice, putting his hand on his shoulder, shaking his hand, and talking to him like they were old friends. He told Jerry about his brother's bachelor party and asked if he could come over and say hello. Jerry was up for it so they went back to the roped off area and when they got to the bouncer my friend told him “It's okay, you can let Jerry Rice in.” Hilarious. At this point in the night my friend's brother was pretty well wasted and couldn't really believe that Jerry Rice was standing in front of him but Jerry said “I came all the way over here, you better shake my hand” and he did. My friend said Jerry Rice had the most beautiful hands he has ever seen.

Now onto the first day of school. I was worried it would feel like I had never worked there because last year kind of seems like it never happened. It just went by really fast looking back on it. But as soon as I clocked in and started turning on the computers in the lab it felt like I had never left.

My main goal for the day was to get all the shortcut icons from last year back on the computer desktops. We don't have a generic lab log-in this year so I was having to use mine over and over again which is good I guess because I have the privileges required to add and delete things from the computers. As I logged onto each computer I changed the screen resolution so everything wasn't so big, deleted all the shortcut icons that will never be used, downloaded Chrome, pinned all three web browsers to the taskbar along with Word, added the shortcuts that were popular with teachers last year, downloaded Reading Counts, and arranged all the icons on the desktop so every computer looks the same, at least for now. The only thing missing from last year is Type To Learn, which I can't find anywhere. Last year I had to use the generic lab log-in to even get the program to work because student log-ins generally made the program freeze, which makes me wonder if it would even work this year given that we only have student log-ins now. But I'm going to keep looking into it and email the computer aide who helped me get started last year and see if she knows anything about it.

We had an assembly today and all the teachers and staff had to go up to the front and stand in a line and we passed a microphone along to introduce ourselves. I missed that last year because I started a few days after school started. I introduced myself as Mr. with my first name or Mr. with my last name because I get both, and said I work in the computer lab, and in every other room when something goes wrong. That got some chuckles but the best introduction by far was the para who we found out last year is the cousin of one of my old coworkers (the one I ran into at the bars a week ago). As soon as he got the microphone he took a step forward like he was going to launch into a big speech, and said “I've been waiting for this moment all summer and have been working on what I was going to say... My name is Mr. Greg.” And then he passed the microphone on to the next person. There was a split second where everyone was caught off guard because we were all expecting a big speech, and then everyone broke out laughing. It was pretty good.

From the assembly I went upstairs with one of the fourth grade teachers to look at her desktop computer. I have to say getting to the third floor was a piece of cake after all the stairs at Red Rocks. Her computer was replaced recently and it worked for a little bit but then nothing would come up on the monitor. Initially she thought it was a loose cable and when she tightened them it seemed to work. But today the light was on but nothing was coming up. I checked the cables and those appeared to be fine and the monitor was working because I could pull up the menu and it was displaying messages, but there wasn't any computer stuff showing. I thought maybe the computer had gone to sleep or something because it was awfully quiet but hitting the keyboard and mouse didn't do anything so I hit the power button on the tower and it shut off. I hit it again and stuff started spinning up and lights were flashing but it quickly settled down to the quiet hum of a fan or power supply, with no hard drive activity showing (the little light that flickers when the hard drive is being accessed) or the sound of a hard drive working. And when I hit the power button again the computer immediately shut off. So I am assuming it is a hard drive issue. I could be wrong but I told the teacher that was my best guess.

A resource teacher also had her computer tower replaced recently and now it freezes every couple of minutes. I haven't looked at that one yet but something seems to be up with these replacement towers. It took forever for them to come around and fix the computers that crapped out in the lab last year (and there are currently two out of order now) but that was when they weren't trying to upgrade every computer in the district, so who knows how long it will take them to get around to the two faulty towers of these teachers.

I worked with the librarian a little to help her figure out a couple of things she will be responsible for as Lead Tech this year but we didn't get very far because she still hasn't been given the rights of Lead Tech so she can't log into what she needs to log into. Kind of annoying considering the tech guy marked her down on his sheet as the new Lead Tech last week. I think it will be a rough first few weeks but I am kind of looking forward to what kind of twists and turns come my way. And I hope that I am able to fill out my daily schedule fairly quickly.

It was only a half day and I made it home around 12:45PM and had some lunch. Around 2:00PM my dad wanted me to meet him at my grandma's to talk about a possible project that would involve the use of my router. But the project ended up not being a thing. The housing board or whatever they are called was having an issue that the block of wood with my grandma's address on it, is posted on the side of her garage, not on the brick wall to the right or left of the garage like every other house in the neighborhood. Upon measuring that brick wall it was discovered that it was around three inches shorter than the wood block, which explains why whoever installed it in the first place put it around the corner on the side of the garage. It would look dumb on the brick wall as it is and if you used a smaller block we would need to use smaller numbers, which would really look out of place. And to be completely honest, in however many years my grandma has lived there, I had never noticed that her address block was in a different place than everyone else's. It makes sense where it is because that side of the garage faces the street so the address is easily visible where it is. The only people that would really notice it are the people on the housing board. My grandma's mailbox, along with her neighbor's, are also apparently not regulation, they are too big. Whoever lived there before them changed the mailboxes without permission, I guess. But again, I never noticed this. They are white like all the other mailboxes and they aren't gigantic, maybe an inch here and there. And the only people who did notice are the ones who make it their mission to nitpick about all the little things that no one really cares about.

Anyway, with the router project a non-starter, my dad took me out to the lake to show me my brother's Eagle project. It looked completely different from the last time I was out there. All the underbrush was gone, the trails were laid out and had mulch on them, and my brother helped the other kid working on a project build a log archway thing for the head of the trail. It all looked very Boy Scout. And I was impressed. I look forward to seeing the before and after pictures.

Before parting ways I showed my dad the pictures from my Colorado trip and told him some stories. Then I came home for a bit before going down to pick up Chipotle. It was alright but my taste buds experienced so many new and interesting things in the past few days that Chipotle wasn't too impressive. Granted the burrito I get isn't that impressive to begin with. The steak burrito with sour cream and cheese is way more interesting in your mouth. I was reading about a new vegan burrito with tofu that Chipotle has started trying out and I hope it makes it to Kansas because I would be interested in trying it. Right now I am kind of thinking about just getting Jimmy John's next week. It has been awhile and it has to be quite a bit healthier for me than a Chipotle burrito, even with the brown rice.

After dinner I showed my mom and sister the Colorado pictures and then a few YouTube videos. And the rest of my night was spent watching YouTube videos and looking at Patagonia clothing. I like their bright colored jackets. And I am in the market for some new shirts. We'll see if anything comes out of that. They currently have a sale going on which makes everything that much more attractive.

And now it is way past my bedtime and 6:00AM is going to come way too soon, so I am going to go to bed and hope I wake up feeling refreshed and not groggy as hell.