Milly wanted to go outside this morning.  Usually I start off on the porch swing and she’ll sit there with me for a few minutes before wanting to get on the slab and play with holes in the concrete or look at (and sometimes pluck) flowers.  This morning she did all that, but then she decided to keep going and went down the walkway that cuts up the middle of the yard.  I called out to her and asked if she was leaving and told her, “Bye bye,” and she responded in kind.

Towards the end of the walkway she veered off path and sat in one of the many spots in the yard wherein there is little grass so she could run her hands through the soil, which is really just sand.  She stayed there for a few minutes with me standing over her, but I noticed a good number of ants around her and decided it might be best to remove her.  This decision did not best please her.

Instead of keeping her unhappily inside I decided to see if she would like to play out back on the patio.  I put her out there and took the laptop, which was nearby on the kitchen table, outside and sat at the umbrellaed table.  She climbed into one chair and then another and then took a journey to the center of the yard.

There’s a sandy path leading from the patio to the far side of the yard, beaten in by Harvey.  Milly followed this path to a large sand pit.  This sand pit was also caused by Harvey, but from his constant digging and my attempts to cover it back up.  The ground is mostly pretty even there now, but grass is not growing there since it is in a state of constant change.  This is where Milly set up camp, which was fine with me as there were no ants.

Scott and I discussed, though not fully, a new website idea of his.  One of these days we’re going to build some of these sites we keep thinking up and hopefully make a little extra money for ourselves.

After talking with Scott I saw an email from a client saying he had tried to call but was not able to get through.  I dismissed it at first, but I got another email saying he had tried to call me again with no indication on my end that a call had been attempted.  Thus began my multi-hour phone conversation with AT&T.  First I tried calling my phone from the house phone and got a message about all the servers being down or some such.  Next I had Amanda try to call me from work, also to no avail.  Scott was able to get through to me, but that was from one wireless AT&T phone to another.

So I called AT&T to see what the deal was and after being on the phone for well over an hour (possibly two) and talking to three support people (all of whom were very nice) it was determined that something was wrong with their network, which I think I could easily have told them at the beginning.  What I don’t get though is that I saw on Twitter towards the very end of my AT&T support time that several other people I know were not getting AT&T service, though the AT&T people I talked to apparently had no idea yet that there was an issue in the area.

I think I had it better than some though, since I was at least able to make calls.  I think some people couldn’t make calls and some people couldn’t do either.  Thinking on it though, since that phone is my work phone it would have been better had I been able to receive calls, but not make them.

My call with AT&T ended just after Amanda got home from work and shortly before I had to leave for a meeting.  It was just to show a client how to edit their website, add items to their store, update their blog and send newsletters.  The rest of my work day was spent discussing updates with one client and helping finish up another’s site.

Milly was a mixed bag, as she often seems to be lately.  (I almost split the infinitive there by writing “seems to often be”, but I recently had an online discussion about split infinitives and caught myself.)  She was obviously tired this evening but would not nap, opting instead to scream the whole time she was in her crib.  She was better after dinner though.  Amanda and I played with her a bit before putting her to bed, and she particularly enjoyed playing with bows.  We were putting them in her hair, Amanda’s hair and my hair.  After Milly got tired of playing with them in our hair she clutched four or so in each hand (all of them we had given her to play with) and would not let go of them.

The baby did fuss a little when we put her down to sleep for the night, but she settled down before we left the room.

We did have a lot of little fun times with Milly today.  She’s getting better about walking while we hold her hands in that she’ll do it longer before growing tired of it and resorting to crawling.  She even took a couple single steps on her own today.

Amanda and I, after putting Milly to bed, watched Supernatural.  It’s a show that somehow found its way off the DVR schedule, but we’re recording it again now that the reruns are being shown for the summer.  I’m glad to be catching back up with it.

Zach Dotsey