On my life of luxury

Luther M. Siler

Now that we are … y’know, pool people, and now that it’s starting to be warm enough that actually using the thing without freezing to death is a possibility, man, this was the right call. It’s still cold, mind you– I actually had to kick the boy out after a while because he lacks his father’s insulating layers of body hair and fat and the shivering was getting to the point where I felt like it was probably kind of dangerous. But man, it has been nice the two or three times I’ve been able to use it this week. Seriously consider getting yourself one of these things if you have a few hundred dollars to spare and some level lawn space, y’all. Life-changing.

My wife is leaving me and heading off to Boston to do work stuff for a week, so it’ll just be the boy and I around here for the next several days. My goal is that the two of us not spend the entire time playing video games. I have actually done pretty well in sticking to the goals I set at the beginning of this week. I’m a little bit behind on the wordcount I wanted, which will surprise absolutely no one, but it’s at least happening. Which is progress, right? Feel free to encourage me to continue by buying a book if you’re so inclined. They’re cheap!

The goal right now is to have enough written by InConJunction in a couple of weeks that reading an excerpt at some point is a viable possibility. I don’t know for sure if I’m going to have a panel schedule or not, but I volunteered for a bunch of them so there ought to be something. I will keep everyone updated, of course.

Who won the pool?

Luther M. Siler

If you had “day two of summer break” as your prediction for When Will Luther Collapse Into a Lifeless Puddle of Body Fluids, Trans Fats and Regret, you are a winner! Collect your prize on the way to literally anywhere else, because ain’t nothing going on over here right now.

In which I dress for success

Luther M. Siler

I alluded a couple of weeks ago to a job opportunity that I was looking at that would have represented a substantial raise as well as a responsibility level more in-tune with my current career goals. I am proud to announce that, in keeping with being in week 7 or so of the worst month of my life, I was not even called for an interview for that job despite being literally the only person currently employed by my district who has done it.

I did have a job interview today, though, for my own fucking job, as in the job I have right now and I have been doing for a year. They slightly altered our job descriptions and cut a few of us and so everyone has to re-interview. I spent some time last night thinking carefully about what to wear to the interview, which I had deliberately scheduled for the last half hour of the school day so that I didn’t have to return to my building afterward.

My typical work uniform is a collared shirt, short-sleeved, with jeans and black shoes that pass for dress shoes at a casual glance but are not. I occasionally wear a tie, especially earlier in the year, and during the winter I frequently wear a sweater over the shirt. I despise long sleeves– something about the feeling of cloth on my forearms has always made me skeevy– and even if I’m wearing a dress shirt or a sweater the sleeves will be rolled up, meaning that I don’t often wear a sport jacket (or a blazer, or a suit coat, and frankly I don’t know what the hell the differences are between those things) because I’m not about to unroll my sleeves and struggle with cuffs just to put a jacket on.

Anyway, I ended up going with a dress shirt and a tie and jeans and slightly more formal shoes, because fuck it, I’m interviewing for a job I already have and if my clothes matter then my clothes don’t matter at all, if that makes any sense and just stare at it until it does if not.

I think the interview went okay, but hell if I know. The general rule lately is that if anything can go wrong it will, so I’m sure I fucked this all up somehow. There is one more day of school tomorrow and then a teacher work day and then I will relax for three days and then I’m gonna start writing a goddamn book. I got plans, dammit.

Oh, and when I got home I jumped in the pool for the first time. Which was fucking freezing. I’m not complaining. I’m in the right mood for freezing cold water, and I wasn’t in there for more than 20 minutes or so anyway. But man, it was nice.

In which it’s almost ready

Luther M. Siler1 Comment

I did promise that I’d post a picture of the pool once it was actually full. The boy has been in it, briefly, but right now we’re making sure all the chemicals are balanced and shit before making it official. We will probably be swimming in it by Monday or so.

(Oh, also: don’t look straight down into a gallon container of muriatic acid to see if you’ve poured out half of it or not. Bad idea! Bad! Don’t do that!)

Anyway. Pool:

I am buying a new ladder today, one more suited for a man of my … robustness, and I plan on spending most of the rest of the day staring at this thing while it sucks all the little tree thingies out of the water. It’s fucking hypnotic, I tell you:

Three more days

Luther M. Siler

…well, five, actually. But I’m not going to work tomorrow and day five is a teacher work day. So three more days, with the kids, for me, specifically.

I can do this.