After my last post, which I can hardly believe was as long ago as February, my no-contact relationship with N continued for a bit, followed by a few months of nice but very limited contact on about a weekly basis, and then last weekend which was almost a no-call weekend.
Last weekend was fine for me...immediately after getting home just after midnight I launched into preparation for a Saturday afternoon presentation of my Kurzweil K2661 music workstation at the XCSSA computer club meeting. I got decent sleep, then packed up and got to the meeting itself at the uncharacteristically early hour of 1pm with all my equipment. The demonstration went well. It was almost all new people I'd never met, including (almost unbelievable at an XCSSA meeting) several women. I finally did end up talking for a few minutes to one of the women, the lesbian partner of another I had looked at more than thrice. She did have interesting story, professor at St Phillips, and her partner is working on PhD at UTSA, hence the interest in R. The XCSSA meeting was actually combined with 3 or 4 other computer groups, including the R programming group, I didn't catch the exact name of the group. Actually XCSSA people could barely be counted, Frederick himself, a couple others, and me. But it was fun, anyway, especially with the female presence. So perhaps a combined computer junkie meeting is fine or more than fine anyway. In fact, a combined computer junkie meeting is what XCSSA always was in the first place.
Then I got back home, relaxed a bit more, then back to the Symphony and an hour cruising the Riverwalk with a great but far-too-many-calories dinner and dessert. I was back home well before midnight and could hardly believe it. But texting N didn't yield a phone call, just some confusing return texts. It seemed she continued her second shift with a third shift, and then might be working Sunday as well.
This is only the second Symphony performance that I can recall N having ever missed. She often misses other dates, especially those involving coming over to my house to watch a movie. She misses movie watching dates at a rate probably exceeding 50% (though, lucky for me, she made a movie watching date, for the first time in 6 months, on the last weekend in May). But she almost always finds a way to go to the Symphony, even if her kid has to drop her off, etc. But N missed one notable Symphony date in February IIRC, because of her weekend security job, possibly in combination with a new M-F job (which now seems to be a weekend job also). And then this weekend, once again, she missed a Symphony date this weekend because of her new (?) job, which I thought was only M-F. She got very testy several months ago when I just asked some simple questions about her new job. "What do you do?" That was all I asked after she said she worked at UTSA. Then she said she couldn't talk about her job. "Without talking about specific patients, etc., can you just tell me what general sort of work you do?" No, she couldn't. Perhaps I remembered wrongly that she was getting back to her old profession after all. So now I know not to ask any more of those questions. It seems very puzzling if she has a job in her old profession, an office specialty, and now has to work weekends too. That makes no sense, actually. It seems more likely she is back at work as a security guard again, perhaps, and doesn't want to talk about not getting back to her old profession anymore. Or there are lots of other weird alternatives I can imagine, does she now work in family planning? (I don't know why she couldn't just say that...I'm a proud supporter of PP). I wish her well in whatever she chooses to do. I think it would make much more sense for all of us if she took me up on one of my marriage or non-marriage proposals in which I offer as much as $2k per month for less than part-time housekeeping work, effectively $20-$40 per hour, plus car, benefits, and other expenses, just to do what she finds fitting. No obligation to have sex. Then we could have full weekends together, etc. If she's actually at work in her profession, she could make more money than that (though just barely). But if she's in Security again, probably not, and that could explain the pointed refusal to answer questions (which I now no longer ask, and you can see why). It's ok with me if she turns down my feeble attempts (which admittely might not work out anyway) to offer paradise to replace the call-it-freedom of her wage slavery. I understand that there are complex motivations to continue down the beaten path...she feels greater security with lousy jobs because she could always find another lousy job. She wants to continue living with daughter for a while longer, and that doesn't fit with living with me. OK. I can easily accept all that, we've talked about it all before. But for whatever reasons, she doesn't want to talk much about her new job, except as say when or perhaps afterwards that she couldn't call or text me because of it.
Strangely, though, I do remember her new job as being M-F. That was certainly how it began, and I remember hearing that it was specifically a M-F job. Well now it isn't. And there have been some smaller reversals also. Just a few weeks ago, N was saying she would insist upon not having to work Saturday on a Symphony night. She would not let them do that to her, she had the liberty to turn down specific weekend workdays. Well that 'promise' was broken last weekend actually, when N couldn't make it to my monthly party because she had to work. Or maybe that party wasn't specifically promised, I think it might have been, but for sure back when the new supposedly M-F job started, N had said she wouldn't have to miss parties anymore. And then, especially, N would not have to miss Symphony nights. And now she did.
Along a similar line, when her daughter adoped a new large dog, N had been dog sitting while her daughter was (borrowing the car and) working a part time job. (Daughter is soon 19 and this job doesn't pay much, receptionist at a tatoo parlor or something, arguably even she should be studying instead. But particularly it was cruel for daughter to work weekends and leave mom to babysit new dog--when mom had to work all week long and this was N's only chance to get off and be with her guy, or do whatever.) So just a few weeks ago N was adopting a hard line tone and said her daughter would never force her to babysit dog again on a weekend night. Well that was exactly what N reported doing the next weekend after making that promise, and IIRC before the new weekend jobs at strange shifts started.
On Sunday I took a neighbor to Home Depot and paid for his new garage door, a gift I had been intending for more than seven years. Then I mowed the front lawn, paid the CPS bill, took out the garbage, mailed the electric bill, and washed a critical load of laundry including the pair of work pants that got full of thistles when I checked out the neighbors back yard (with his permission that I had just gotten).
N did call, but at the worst possible time, when I was making a difficult left turn in the neighborhood on the way to Home Depot. As quickly as I could, I pulled over and returned the call. The message was basically that she would call back on Sunday night.
OK, now all along I had texting about once every 3 hours or less, essentially tweeting everything I was doing. When N called on Sunday Afternoon I had just texted, about 10 minutes before, that I was on my way to Home Depot with neighbor. So she could have seen that text and hence the abbreviated call. But at many other times it seems my texts don't get read for many hours. I understand she can't even look at her cell phone on her new job, she is under security cameras. And it often seems she doesn't read my texts under other circumstances too, such as when home with husband. So I just never know when my texts are read. I've asked her about this ("Do my texts bother you?" "No, I like to hear from you, I just can't always text back.") and so decided to just keep texting, regardless of whether she responds or not. She responds, it seems, to peculiar things. Such as trouble with the contractor, she was furiously texting me on Friday about my travails with a new contractor. We texted so much on Friday it didn't bother me much that we never managed to talk. She had texted she would call around 11pm. By 11:20 I texted her to please call soon, I was going to leave early. She had not called by 11:45 when I left. So the two minute call on Sunday afternoon was our only weekend phone call. There was no call on Sunday night. After I finished the chores around 10:45, I texted every half hour or so with an update or comment. I didn't wait around, after 4 years of experience wating around for calls, I found that to be very negative. And by not waiting around, it means I sometimes miss calls, in those moments when I've gone up to go to the bathroom or do a laundry cycle without taking the phone with me. But rarely, if ever, is that a problem. On Sunday night I was constantly checking to be sure I hadn't missed a phone call. And I hadn't.
I got a text on Monday morning that N would let me know when she had a weekend off again. That sounded pretty negative, like loss of will. I texted back asking about when she could call. Now I am totally confused as to what shift she is working (it changes weekly now) which determines what times she can call.
Rather than answer when she could call, she simply called, and left a short message saying she would call again. At that exact moment, I had just washed my hands twice after a BM, and went straight to unload the dishes from the dishwasher with the cleanest possible hand, before touching germy cell phone. And that, of course, is when she actually called. I called back as soon as I went back to my room and saw that there had been a call. I got a strange squeak, perhaps she quickly had to shut off the phone, and then got the answering machine. It was only after that I checked the message, in which she said her primary objective was getting rest, but she would call again soon.
Last weekend was fine for me...immediately after getting home just after midnight I launched into preparation for a Saturday afternoon presentation of my Kurzweil K2661 music workstation at the XCSSA computer club meeting. I got decent sleep, then packed up and got to the meeting itself at the uncharacteristically early hour of 1pm with all my equipment. The demonstration went well. It was almost all new people I'd never met, including (almost unbelievable at an XCSSA meeting) several women. I finally did end up talking for a few minutes to one of the women, the lesbian partner of another I had looked at more than thrice. She did have interesting story, professor at St Phillips, and her partner is working on PhD at UTSA, hence the interest in R. The XCSSA meeting was actually combined with 3 or 4 other computer groups, including the R programming group, I didn't catch the exact name of the group. Actually XCSSA people could barely be counted, Frederick himself, a couple others, and me. But it was fun, anyway, especially with the female presence. So perhaps a combined computer junkie meeting is fine or more than fine anyway. In fact, a combined computer junkie meeting is what XCSSA always was in the first place.
Then I got back home, relaxed a bit more, then back to the Symphony and an hour cruising the Riverwalk with a great but far-too-many-calories dinner and dessert. I was back home well before midnight and could hardly believe it. But texting N didn't yield a phone call, just some confusing return texts. It seemed she continued her second shift with a third shift, and then might be working Sunday as well.
This is only the second Symphony performance that I can recall N having ever missed. She often misses other dates, especially those involving coming over to my house to watch a movie. She misses movie watching dates at a rate probably exceeding 50% (though, lucky for me, she made a movie watching date, for the first time in 6 months, on the last weekend in May). But she almost always finds a way to go to the Symphony, even if her kid has to drop her off, etc. But N missed one notable Symphony date in February IIRC, because of her weekend security job, possibly in combination with a new M-F job (which now seems to be a weekend job also). And then this weekend, once again, she missed a Symphony date this weekend because of her new (?) job, which I thought was only M-F. She got very testy several months ago when I just asked some simple questions about her new job. "What do you do?" That was all I asked after she said she worked at UTSA. Then she said she couldn't talk about her job. "Without talking about specific patients, etc., can you just tell me what general sort of work you do?" No, she couldn't. Perhaps I remembered wrongly that she was getting back to her old profession after all. So now I know not to ask any more of those questions. It seems very puzzling if she has a job in her old profession, an office specialty, and now has to work weekends too. That makes no sense, actually. It seems more likely she is back at work as a security guard again, perhaps, and doesn't want to talk about not getting back to her old profession anymore. Or there are lots of other weird alternatives I can imagine, does she now work in family planning? (I don't know why she couldn't just say that...I'm a proud supporter of PP). I wish her well in whatever she chooses to do. I think it would make much more sense for all of us if she took me up on one of my marriage or non-marriage proposals in which I offer as much as $2k per month for less than part-time housekeeping work, effectively $20-$40 per hour, plus car, benefits, and other expenses, just to do what she finds fitting. No obligation to have sex. Then we could have full weekends together, etc. If she's actually at work in her profession, she could make more money than that (though just barely). But if she's in Security again, probably not, and that could explain the pointed refusal to answer questions (which I now no longer ask, and you can see why). It's ok with me if she turns down my feeble attempts (which admittely might not work out anyway) to offer paradise to replace the call-it-freedom of her wage slavery. I understand that there are complex motivations to continue down the beaten path...she feels greater security with lousy jobs because she could always find another lousy job. She wants to continue living with daughter for a while longer, and that doesn't fit with living with me. OK. I can easily accept all that, we've talked about it all before. But for whatever reasons, she doesn't want to talk much about her new job, except as say when or perhaps afterwards that she couldn't call or text me because of it.
Strangely, though, I do remember her new job as being M-F. That was certainly how it began, and I remember hearing that it was specifically a M-F job. Well now it isn't. And there have been some smaller reversals also. Just a few weeks ago, N was saying she would insist upon not having to work Saturday on a Symphony night. She would not let them do that to her, she had the liberty to turn down specific weekend workdays. Well that 'promise' was broken last weekend actually, when N couldn't make it to my monthly party because she had to work. Or maybe that party wasn't specifically promised, I think it might have been, but for sure back when the new supposedly M-F job started, N had said she wouldn't have to miss parties anymore. And then, especially, N would not have to miss Symphony nights. And now she did.
Along a similar line, when her daughter adoped a new large dog, N had been dog sitting while her daughter was (borrowing the car and) working a part time job. (Daughter is soon 19 and this job doesn't pay much, receptionist at a tatoo parlor or something, arguably even she should be studying instead. But particularly it was cruel for daughter to work weekends and leave mom to babysit new dog--when mom had to work all week long and this was N's only chance to get off and be with her guy, or do whatever.) So just a few weeks ago N was adopting a hard line tone and said her daughter would never force her to babysit dog again on a weekend night. Well that was exactly what N reported doing the next weekend after making that promise, and IIRC before the new weekend jobs at strange shifts started.
On Sunday I took a neighbor to Home Depot and paid for his new garage door, a gift I had been intending for more than seven years. Then I mowed the front lawn, paid the CPS bill, took out the garbage, mailed the electric bill, and washed a critical load of laundry including the pair of work pants that got full of thistles when I checked out the neighbors back yard (with his permission that I had just gotten).
N did call, but at the worst possible time, when I was making a difficult left turn in the neighborhood on the way to Home Depot. As quickly as I could, I pulled over and returned the call. The message was basically that she would call back on Sunday night.
OK, now all along I had texting about once every 3 hours or less, essentially tweeting everything I was doing. When N called on Sunday Afternoon I had just texted, about 10 minutes before, that I was on my way to Home Depot with neighbor. So she could have seen that text and hence the abbreviated call. But at many other times it seems my texts don't get read for many hours. I understand she can't even look at her cell phone on her new job, she is under security cameras. And it often seems she doesn't read my texts under other circumstances too, such as when home with husband. So I just never know when my texts are read. I've asked her about this ("Do my texts bother you?" "No, I like to hear from you, I just can't always text back.") and so decided to just keep texting, regardless of whether she responds or not. She responds, it seems, to peculiar things. Such as trouble with the contractor, she was furiously texting me on Friday about my travails with a new contractor. We texted so much on Friday it didn't bother me much that we never managed to talk. She had texted she would call around 11pm. By 11:20 I texted her to please call soon, I was going to leave early. She had not called by 11:45 when I left. So the two minute call on Sunday afternoon was our only weekend phone call. There was no call on Sunday night. After I finished the chores around 10:45, I texted every half hour or so with an update or comment. I didn't wait around, after 4 years of experience wating around for calls, I found that to be very negative. And by not waiting around, it means I sometimes miss calls, in those moments when I've gone up to go to the bathroom or do a laundry cycle without taking the phone with me. But rarely, if ever, is that a problem. On Sunday night I was constantly checking to be sure I hadn't missed a phone call. And I hadn't.
I got a text on Monday morning that N would let me know when she had a weekend off again. That sounded pretty negative, like loss of will. I texted back asking about when she could call. Now I am totally confused as to what shift she is working (it changes weekly now) which determines what times she can call.
Rather than answer when she could call, she simply called, and left a short message saying she would call again. At that exact moment, I had just washed my hands twice after a BM, and went straight to unload the dishes from the dishwasher with the cleanest possible hand, before touching germy cell phone. And that, of course, is when she actually called. I called back as soon as I went back to my room and saw that there had been a call. I got a strange squeak, perhaps she quickly had to shut off the phone, and then got the answering machine. It was only after that I checked the message, in which she said her primary objective was getting rest, but she would call again soon.
