I intend to live forever - so far, so good

[ClingingToHope]

Just a blah day. Another meltdown by D8 right before leaving for work just put a damper on my day.

We had the meltdown Sunday in the woods. Monday, I've got them all packed up (they were off school for some institute day) and I was talking to the after-school sitter and D8 bolts for the woods.

She's standing in there and I am telling her she needs to come out because I have to go to work. She won't come out because she wants the sitter to come see something and I tell her there's no time and she starts running farther into the woods.

And I just lost it and chased her down and she ran again and I chased her down again.

Ugh ... the whole episode took about 30 minutes and I'm going to post some very clear rules in regards to the woods.

Part of it for her was just the excitement of a new house and the forest next door and I'm going to have to set some clear expectations.

I just had little patience with her after yesterday. Hopefully, I just needed a break. Again, I don't know why STBXW wants to be a single parent. It can be exhausting.

When I got into work I started putting together a schedule for part-time job No. 2 this winter. Me and two friends work for a local high school as the official scorekeepers and time keepers for the boys and girls high school teams.

Essentially, I have one guy who works every weekend and another who works the nights I can't -- Wednesdays and the weekends I have my girls.

So I'm putting together the schedule and I have seven Tuesday night games. Not a problem last year. This year, right now I'm taking one of the girls every Tuesday night because D11 has band practice at 6:50 a.m. on Wednesdays.

I could take D11 those nights, but that means she'll be sitting at Jefferson High School from 5 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. I'll email STBXW and find out how long these Tuesdays are lasting -- D11 was unclear on how long these band practices are going to run.

The basketball games take me through February and in March the running races start again. I'm going to have to ask STBXW to switch four weekends this year so I can work.