Tag: job

New Father Brogging, #021

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

As my paternity leave winds down, I naturally feel like the last six weeks have blown by, and that I wish I had more time.  Mentally, I’m not really that prepared to return to work yet, but it’s not like I really have much of a choice if I want to be able to provide for my family, other than to suck it up and get back to it.  But I definitely wish I had more time, without a doubt.

Overall, the last six weeks have been mostly anything but easy, as raising a child is definitely no small feat, and I should be fortunate that I even had the luxury of paternity time in the first place.  As necessary as it most certainly felt to me, the reality is this is something that my company did not have in place when I first started there, which wasn’t even a full five years ago.  I remember the big deal it was within the company, and even getting some national news traction about how when we went full paternity, and thinking nothing of it back then, because I wasn’t even married yet, but having capitalized on it now, I couldn’t be more grateful to work for a company that offers it, because I know that such is not the case everywhere else.

But throughout my paternity leave, my child has grown a bunch, begun eating solid foods, competently rolling over front to back to front, has graduated out of swaddles, and has been teething, chatting a lot more, and we’ve begun trying to get her to sit up on her own strength.  One of my prime hopes was that while I was off, we’d be able to get her into a casting call for some sort of baby company, and put her to work a little bit, and once she actually did get put on a shortlist of candidates, but then they hit us with the curveball that all babies would be required to be able to sit up on their own power.  Bummer

Aside from baby-ing, over the last six weeks, I managed to get my brog back up and running, although it’s an indeterminate time to whether when or if I’ll ever get the pre-2010 archives back up and running, because that’s way lower priority than the brog.  I also had some house issues, when some freakish storms exposed some leaks in my home, which turned out to be a time consuming and costly ordeal in its own right, which really messed me up, and I also found out that my own dad has been having some minor health issues on his own, leading to my sister and I to have some real talks about the inevitable future.

Needless to say, it’s been a time during paternity leave, and it’s hard to comprehend that these six weeks have evaporated so quickly.  Put being on full-time daddy duty 10-12 hours a day, with next to no help and practically no down time for myself, and it’s been very understandable when people try to expound the difficulties of parenthood.

To reward myself and/or indulge in some retail therapy, I decided to get myself a new belt, as well as track down my own belated birthday gift, in this sweet Power Rangers T-Rex DinoZord.  And the belt is mostly as a result of an Amazon gift card my sister got me for my birthday when her own attempt to get me the T-Rex stalled out due to a flaky seller in Japan, and much like Target gift cards, I’m left with a wtf do I purchase, until it came to my attention that Amazon actually had a few people selling legitimate belts.  So now I have a Ring of Honor tag replica, that guys like Kyle O’Reilly, Bobby Fish, the Young Bucks, Hardys, AJ Styles, Kevin Steen Owens, Cesaro, CM Punk and Seth Rollins have held in their histories.

And modeling the belt is my new life-long tag team partner.  As intensive as some parenting might have felt at times, I wouldn’t take anything away from the last six weeks, and I’m sad that it’s likely I’ll not get another massive chunk of time like this to spend with my child for the immediate future.

New Father Brogging, #018

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I’ve been a little bit in the pits lately, and it’s one of those situations where I think about the things that are making me feel down, and they bring me down more, and starts this cycle of negative thinking that only gets gradually worse and worse if I don’t talk about it and admit that I’m feeling a little depressed.

Firstly, by no means necessary is any of my recent funk on account of my precious baby child doing anything wrong; if anything at all, she’s the one steady and greatest and brightest thing in my life, as should not really be of a surprise, and frankly, my only woes in regards to my child is that I feel guilty that I’m not enjoying my paternity time as much as I probably should.

Sure, I’d love to be able to take her out of the house and go and see things, but in in the coronavirus-addled world we live in, such isn’t necessarily a good idea, not to mention the feed and nap routine we’re trying to constantly reinforce doesn’t exactly make it convenient to leave the house and expect to enjoy ourselves and be back at the bassinet approximately two hours later.  But there are admittedly times in which I feel like I’m failing as a father, by not always having an idea or things to do with my child, and I’m always worried that I’m boring her or not stimulating her enough to where that budding developing brain is actually growing.

I don’t handle with particular stresses very well, and in the case of my house, which has had some recent issues due to the bipolar Georgia weather, I’m frustrated and aggravated at how long and how much it’s going to cost to get things fixed, and if I stop and think about all the moving parts in play, it tends to get me all anxious with annoyance, which doesn’t help.

To boil it down, my skylight issue was an easy solve, since that was basically a $430 caulk job that has prevented further moisture from getting in, but the window issue I’m having, is going to be substantially more, and I’m in this situation where I’m wondering if I had hired an actual window company from the onset instead of assuming it was just a simple caulk job here too, and hiring a handyman, would’ve saved me a tremendous amount of time, money and aggravation, instead of the route that I’m on right now.  But because I’ve already committed, I’m doing myself a favor and not finding out, because if it turns out to be a substantial savings on all accounts, I’m just going to end up way more perturbed than I already am.

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New Father Brogging, #015

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Today, I have started my paternity leave.  Regardless of what coronavirus has done to the world, this was close to the original plan to take my leave, because in a pre-COVID19 world, I work all through most of the summer while mythical wife is on maternity leave/summer break, and when she goes back to school, I tag in with paternity leave, and stretch out the not needing daycare for another six weeks.

Ironically, as I’ve said numerous times at this point, coronavirus has unintentionally given me a whole bunch of bonus paternity time, as I’d been able to be working from home throughout the entire summer, and almost entirely since my daughter was born.  For all the bad it’s done throughout the world, I ironically have to be somewhat grateful for its existence in the sense that because of it, I’ve gotten so much extra time to bond with my child before taking off officially.

And right in time too, because it was made no more clear than the last week or so, that my performance was deemed to be inconveniencing by my superiors at work, and I had a rather uncomfortable talking to about how much they think I suck at my job, despite the fact that we’re in the middle of a pandemic, I can’t get child care no matter how much we might all want it, because my baby was born medically fragile and Americans can’t be trusted to socially distance and remain healthy, so a lot of childcare during business hours still falls onto me.

To the point where I’m actually taking this week with my own PTO, and rolling directly into paternity leave, because I’m over the bullshit and the passive aggressive swipes and friendly reminders, and ready to just spend some quality time with my daughter, without feeling any need to be worried about my inbox filling up or some bullshit virtual meetings to have to attend.

So for the next seven weeks, good riddance to work, and hello to daddy time.

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New Father Brogging, #013

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Sometimes, I feel like that guy from Lost, Desmond I think his name was.  The guy who lived in a bunker or some remote cabin, and had to keep entering the numbers into a computer every 100 minutes or so, or else some indeterminate bad thing was going to happen.  If I recall correctly, as I never really watched the show past the first season, and had to kind of catch up on it through reading synopses of it on Wikipedia, it was his negligence at entering the numbers at one point is what led to the plane crash that put all the show’s survivors onto the island in the first place.

But instead of risking a gigantic electromagnetic pulse being released, I’m at the perpetual mercy of my daughter’s feeding schedule, which has shown to be a feed every single 90-120 minutes, depending on if she can actually manage to nap in between in the first place.

Unsurprising, with my life more or less in repeated 90-120 minute chunks of time, one can imagine that it’s difficult to accomplish much in between.  Especially considering that anywhere from 20-30 minutes of that chunk of downtime is occupied by the time it takes for her to actually drink all her milk, resulting in really, an hour plus of time in which I don’t have to be feeding her.  Not to mention the fact that, as she is but a small baby, she commands an extraordinary amount of attention, lest she cry or become fussy.

Needless to say, there are some days in which become very mentally and physically challenging, when I know it’s a delicate and difficult balancing act between doing my actual job’s work, and being the attentive and hands-on dad that I wanted to be.  It’s these days where I struggle to not grow too frustrated, and feeling like I have no real time for myself, because this is what I signed up to do as a parent, and something that I need to remember that it’s never just about me anymore, especially now, but I can’t help it sometimes, and still have days where I’m just grumpy and short.

Unlike Desmond from Lost, the chances of earth-shattering catastrophe isn’t likely if/when I let too much time lapse between feeds/naps, but given the wailing that my daughter is capable of when she’s over-tired or over-hungry, and it might as well be capable of making parents feel like their heads are going to explode.

Regardless, I know this is something that will eventually pass in time, but the whole point of writing out things like this, is so that I can always remember the things I think during the whole timeline of raising a child for the very first time, and perhaps one day, some random person will get into my writing, and read this, and if they’re going through the exact same thing, know that they aren’t alone, and that the things they’re experiencing are very likely not exclusive to them.

Father Time catches all eventually

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Whereas Ken Masters is still hanging around the World Warrior tournament, wearing an UnderArmour compression shirt to hide the fact that he’s getting old and his physique is starting to sag, Chun Li has accepted the idea that after nearly 25 years, perhaps it was a good time to throw in the towel on fighting in the street and pursuing M. Bison and Shadowloo, and settling down with a real job.

Perhaps it was her side gig over the last quarter century, or maybe her accolades as a world-renown martial artist got her elevated so quickly, but instead of Kikokens and Lightning legs, Chun Li will instead be a VP for Lazada, a subsidiary company of some sort for Alibaba Group, the giant Amazon-like conglomerate based out of China.

Also, it turns out that Chun Li was a dude all along.  Cue the jokes about those gigantic thighs.

New Father Brogging, #002

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Despite my sporadic writing habits leading up to the birth of my child, I ironically seem to be finding more time to sit down and write now that she’s come into the world.  Mostly on account of the fact that as she was five weeks early, she’s unfortunately not home yet, and is still at the NICU, where her frail little preemie body is playing catchup under the safe and watchful eyes of medical professionals.

Ultimately, mythical wife and I both know that she’s exactly where she needs to be in her current state, and we are eternally grateful to the kind and caring staff of the hospital that has been definitely providing excellent care for our daughter.  However, when the days are over, the reality is that she is still not home with us, and it’s an agonizing struggle at the end of each night when the time comes for us to part ways with our daughter, while she stays in the NICU while we leave her and head back to our house, empty of human children.

She was born 12 days ago, but it doesn’t really quite feel like we’re parents just yet, as when the time comes in which we go to bed, it’s like we’re a married couple with no children, since there’s no kid to put to sleep and marvel over the fact that it’s a life that we created together.

We spend around 6-8 hours a day in the NICU with our kid, but until the day she comes home, there really is something kind of missing from the whole experience of having a child.  We feel like parents when we get to change her diapers, feed her, and rock her to sleep, but the wholesome feelings always end when the realization hits that we need to go home to rest and take care of ourselves, so we have the energy and capacity to do it all over again the following day.

Our daughter’s showing progress on a daily basis, but the fact of the matter is that it’s still an indeterminate amount of time before she’s given the green light to come home.  Her last real hurdle is to continue to demonstrate the ability to eat more and out of a bottle, more consistently, and subsequently gain weight.  Every day where she drains an entire bottle is akin to a playoff win, but behind the scenes we don’t know if we’re in the lightning-quick MLB playoffs, or if we’re in the endless vortex known as the NBA’s playoffs.

Back home, I’ve actually accomplished a lot of the tasks around the house that mythical wife and I agreed needed to get done before the arrival of our kid, because once she got here, we know they probably won’t be gotten to.  I’ve painted entire sections of our house, I’ve stained the entire fence around the house.  I’ve swapped out old outlets and switches for new, tamper-proof versions of them for future kid safety.  I’ve unboxed strollers and learned how to install car seats into both mine and mythical wife’s cars.  Just about every piece of furniture for our baby’s nursery is assembled and the room just about finished.

I’d wager to guess that most parents who ever have to go through the experience of their children going into the NICU go through the same kind of anxieties and frustration that mythical wife and I are going through.  I know there are many out there who have it way worse than we do in terms of state of the baby upon arrival or how little or long they stay in the NICU, but when the day is over, we’re all in the same state of where we as parents go home, while our children remain behind, which is a shitty feeling no matter how you look at it.

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A catch-up post

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Usually, after a week or so, my internal brogging meter starts panicking if I haven’t taken the time to write anything.  After two weeks, I get anxious that I haven’t written anything other than a mundane email at work, and nothing for my own gratification.  And anything beyond that is just pure chaos in my head, and I begin to descend down this rabbit hole of thinking if I don’t write anything soon, I’ll fall into this pit of never writing again. 

Obviously that’s ludicrous thinking, and I can start back up whenever I feel like it, but the overlying factor is that when the day is over, I simply need time to write.  Topics aren’t necessarily the issue, I’ve got a small queue of things that I found to be thought-provoking to want to blab on about for a little bit, but unfortunately the need for time didn’t necessarily sync up.

So instead of trying to write backwards and backfill a queue of mostly inconsequential topics, I figured I’d just start off with writing for little else than the sake of catching up, because this isn’t necessarily going to be one topic I touch on, and I’ve definitely got a lot on my mind these days that I think wouldn’t hurt to put into writing for me to reflect back on in the future.

First and foremost, let’s talk about my impending journey into upcoming fatherhood.  Obviously, I haven’t really written a lot about this, but it’s not because I don’t care, but it’s mostly because it’s a tremendous amount for me to process, and I don’t always know how to express myself when it comes to it.  I think things are a little bit clearer now these days, but over the last few months, it’s always been more of a “when” kind of thing, but as the expected due date has dwindled from months to weeks, we’re at the point where mythical wife explained to her parents that we’re in the stage where our kid can actually show up any time now, regardless of the fact that we’re still a little around six weeks away.

That notion, kind of got my blood pumping, and suddenly it doesn’t feel like I have enough time left to do all the things around the house that we both know will probably never get done once the baby arrives.  On account of this, I’ve been working pretty much non-stop when I’m at home, doing painting, minor repairs, and more painting, to get the house to a stage where we’ll be content to let it sit for many years before we feel the need to freshen things up later on.

Needless to say, I fucking hate painting with a passion.  It’s about the worst activity in the world for homeowners, and it always makes me want to pay someone to do it for me, but I know that the estimates for the labor will often times be around 10x more than it would cost for the paint and for me to do it myself, and because I’m Asian and cheap, I end up doing it myself no matter how much I revile it.  I’ve decided that in the future, painting, will be the most adequate form of discipline I can apply to my kid if she ever becomes a bratty teen that steps out of line.

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