The body does you bad

Update: They don't know what I have.

They know that I do not have rheumatoid, sjorgens, or lupus. But they also know that I had a high sed. rate which means I have inflammation. This was a bit surprising since I didn't feel like I was having a flare up at the time. I've probably just gotten use to that level of inflammation, which is a sad thought. I also have low Vitamin D, even with all the milk and cheese and whatnot that I eat.

So, I've been placed on plaquenil to treat the inflammation and to hopefully stop the flare ups and therefore stop the damage. It's a drug that causes GI issues and can lead to blindness over an extended period of treatment. I have to go to the opthamologist every 6 months to look for eye changes. It's also a drug used to treat malaria, so I'm all set to go to africa now. I also have to take a super duper vitamin D pill once a week, which can also cause nausea. But it also causes constipation, so maybe it and the ridiculous amount of iron I'm taking every day will stop the diarrhea from the plaquenil. You know, silver lining and all.....

Traitorous body

I know I have been remiss in posting to the blog. I just don't seem to have much that I want to really write about lately. Not sure what that's all about. But here I go on another tangent.

Most of you know that I have struggled with painful attacks every so often that make my joints hurt. This has been going on for probably 10 years or so. I've been tested and scoped in just about every way possible and nobody could find anything wrong with me. Basically, I was told to take some ibuprofen when it hurt, which was okay at the time.

I've been pretty awful about going to the doctor for some time. You get tired of saying the same things over and over and nobody ever finding anything wrong with you. But my attacks have gotten much more severe and I have pain that doesn't go away even when the attack is over. My knees hurt so much that I avoid stairs all together. If I chase a kid, I can hardly walk the next day, I can't push in the clutch without it hurting, and it's hard to get in and out of my seat. So, I finally went back to the doctor. Got yelled at for not taking care of myself and sent back to the Columbus Arthritis Center.

During my visit to the arthritis center, I was stabbed three times to get blood and x-rayed enough to probably exceed my radiation allowance for a year. My knees had been x-rayed the last time I was there, and showed nothing. This time, it showed that I have arthritis in both knees. I've had constant pain in my lower back, so for the first time, my back was x-rayed and it showed a pretty good curve of the spine, scoliosis. Even though scoliosis runs in my family, that was a surprise. I was given some physical therapy exercises to do, told to go to Aquatic Adventures and join the arthritis swim program there and take alleve and tylenol arthritis strength.

I was actually pretty upset by this information. In six years, whatever connective tissue disease I have has permanently damaged my knees. What the hell is it going to be like in another six years? Not to mention, that spinal curve. Can't fix that. The best I can hope for is to live with this level of pain for the rest of my life. It isn't going to get better, but it will probably get worse. I was hoping for something that could be fixed with physical therapy or maybe even a minor surgery. Not this.

I can't tell you the number of people who've tried to point out the silver lining. "You know, they can do wonders with knee replacements now." I just try and smile, I know they mean well, but that isn't really something I'm dying to go through, okay folks?

I go back on Wednesday to see if the blood work reveals anything. I'm not holding out much faith since many of these things can't be found in blood work unless you're having a flair up at the time. Even then, they might not be able to find it. If they can identify it, there's an even smaller chance that it might be one of the ones that they actually have a therapy for.

I am doing better with all of this, adjusting to the idea. Still sucks, but not as depressed about it. But dang, one of those physical therapy exercises hurts! :)

events

Saturday, Mia and I went to the North Market Farmer's Market to get preservative free apple cider so that I can make hard wassail cider for Beth and her sister. Mia had fun looking around, although she had a pretty bad cough. The hard cider is stinking up the basement right now. Then later in the day I scrubbed and sanitized two cases of beer bottles, primed the chocolate stout that was in the secondary and bottled it all. This is a tedious process and not one I particularly enjoy. Hopefully, I can one day convert to a keg system and not have to mess with bottles and waiting 3+ weeks to drink my beer.

Sunday we all went to Young's Jersey Dairy for the pumpkin festival and to meet up with Max's birthmom. The kids had a lot of fun running around and playing in the hay and bouncers. Max even decided that he liked to feed the goats!

Monday night Mia woke up screaming. When I asked her what was wrong she stuck her finger in her ear and announced, "ear. hurt." So, at 9:30 pm Beth ran her to the children's urgent care. Her ear was full of pus and the eardrum bulging painfully. Beth brought Mia home while I tried to find a 24 hour pharmacy. Beth ran back out to the get the medicine and finally made it into bed around 12:45 am. That was a great night!

Wednesday I was out in the field all day and had to leave bright and early in the morning. Met up with Bryan in Lancaster and then drove down to Pomeroy. It was cold and kept misting on us while we drilled through concrete and took a gazillion soil samples. I'm sore today from it all.

Today I went to the CASA annual breakfast. This is a big fundraiser for CASA and they usually ask for some of us to help set up/tear down and to attend the event. We sit at tables and talk about what we do and why we need these folks to donate money. I was there at 6:30 am and I'm strongly advocating for an annual lunch instead of breakfast (too early!). It was interesting that most of the speakers ended up crying at some point. What we do has an impact on all of us and it's hard not to show it.

Tomorrow I get to go attend the manager's meeting in place of my boss who is on vacation. Woo hoo!

Fun

So, I went to a supervised visit between my CASA kids and both of their parents. It started poorly and I should've realized early that maybe I just wanted to turn around and go home.

The National Youth Advocate Program (NYAP) building, where the visits are held, is in a questionable part of town. I never feel particularly threatened there but I do become much more alert while in the area. The building has a weird entrance and I always forget that if I turn down the wrong road, it is technically one way the wrong way for me to enter the parking lot. This time I decided that I would be a good example and go around the block so I could enter the correct way. In doing so, I got stuck behind a car full of folks who stopped to talk to a man and a woman on the street. Of course this led to what I believe was a drug deal. Then everyone turned around and took a look at me, dressed up in office clothes, glowing all white and conspicuous. I just kinda smiled and nodded my head, and put the car in reverse. They must have seen that I was harmless and probably looked nervous, because they all laughed and drove off or returned to their corner.

Things only get worse from here.

The father is at least 6'5" , 270 pounds and a felon fresh out of prison. The caseworker told them something about me and he immediately demanded that I leave. Which of course I didn't. Just to make matters worse, for him, the youngest ran to me and gave me a hug. I had to force him to go visit with his parents and chase him off (gently) every time he came back to me. This did not make dad happy. But he decided that he would ignore me, which I was fine with.

The caseworker was sitting next to me and told me that she hadn't been feeling well. About half an hour into the visit, she took a drink from her gallon jug of water and promptly inhaled it. She started coughing and then ended up vomiting all over the floor, repeatedly. The oldest kid thought this was fabulous and kept yelling, "She's barfing! On the floor!" The caseworker couldn't leave because the visits are supervised. So, I had to go run all over the building begging for someone to come relieve her. Amazingly, none of the other social workers really seemed to care and it took awhile for one of them to eventually come down and relieve her.

At the end of the visit, I found myself outside in the parking lot with everyone and 4 caseworkers. The everyon, including the caseworkers, then vanished and left me alone with the parents. Dad was pretty ticked off at me and was under the impression, thanks to the caseworker, that I was the bitch who took his kids and controlled everything about the case. That was a little nerve wracking, considering he has issues with violence and all. In the end, I kinda got him to understand my roll, although I'm not going to be on his Christmas card list or anything.

That was a very hard 3 hours and I was the amusement for the CASA office the next day. Hey, at least somebody had some fun out of it all.

Wild Things

Today we trekked down to Zanesville and visited The Wilds. This is land that AEP used for mining coal back in the day. A neat piece of history, Big Muskie was the machine that did the mining at this location. It was the biggest earth moving machine ever made. It's a machine that is near and dear to most AEP employees. There are pictures in our corporate office of the bucket holding a whole marching band, with plenty of room to spare. Anyway, when the mine was closed the property was reclaimed with 6 inches of top soil and a lot of envasive plants. It was then donated and became The Wilds.

You can take safari-like tours and get close to rhinos, giraffes, bison, etc. I wasn't horribly impressed, but Max and Wilson liked it a lot. Max announced that he wants to go back. Mia, of course, was not happy that the animals could get so close. She was very annoyed that the rhino was near us and kept yelling no at it and then decided that she wouldn't look at the animals any more and would just take a nap. AEP fed us lunch, which Mia was very excited about. So, all the kids were happy in the end.

When we got back home, I decided to do some yard work. Mainly, taking the lower branches off of three pine trees. These trees take up a huge part of our yard and attack me when I mow. Not to mention they create a cave that draws kids and dogs into it and grows poison ivy. I now have a huge amount of branches to dispose of some way, but have discovered that two of the trees are perfectly spaced to hang a hammock! I'm totally excited about creating an adult space in the yard.

Neat sounds

Beth called me into the kitchen with, "You might want to come see this." Best kid routine ever.

Bunks

Max and Mia got bunk beds last Thursday. Max is very excited about sleeping up high and was even mostly ok with moving into the "babies" room and Wilson moving into his old room. When Mia saw them for the first time she yelled, "Look! Playground!" Notice that each bed has a little storage cubby in the headboard.

There is some rustling around and giggling at each other. But they do pretty good. Max is learning to turn on his light so he can see the ladder in the dark.

Max got a new transformers bed set, which he was almost more excited about than the bed. Tonight I went in to check on him and didn't know where he was. He was laying in the storage cubby. I don't know how he fit, but I did have to break the news to him that he couldn't do that anymore. It was all I could do not to laugh.

Mia has done very well in her big girl bed. She takes her sleep pretty seriously and I thought she would do well. She has a very cute bed set with flowers and bees that Aunt Katy gave her.

We did have one incident the other night. We hear Mia yell, "NO!" and then start hysterically screaming. I was very afraid that she had really hurt herself. Beth went back and asked what had happened and Max said that "The horse might have been too low." Max has a big Black Beauty horse puppet that Mia has HATED from the first time she saw it. Max knows that it makes her have a fit and we are pretty sure that he dangled it over the edge of the bed at her until she saw it. It was all we could do to not bust out laughing. It is such a typical big bratty brother thing to do. I can almost hear him thinking to himself, "Oh, Mia. Look up here." Heh.

C is for Cookie!

Max has been talking a lot about Cookie Monster. He brought home some art that he colored of Cookie and a big paper cut-out doll of Cookie (which he slept with for a couple of nights). The teacher sends home a folder every Friday that has important papers and communication from her. In the Friday folder we found out that Cookie had caused some mischief at school. Apparently, Ms. Young used Cookie to help the kids find important places like the gym and library. He "stole" their cookies and they hunted him from the library to the gym and ended up in the principle's office. Ms. Campbell-Sauer, the principle, had caught Cookie there and had kept the cookies for the kids. It sounded cute to me.

2022

Max started kindergarten yesterday. It's been quite the event. Since kindergarten is only half day (although that has been mandated to change in 2010 by the state!), arrangements for getting him to and from school had to be made. Fortunately, we got into the am session and the daycare can transport him.

The week before school started, the kids at the daycare practiced getting on the van, buckling their seat belts, getting off the van and walking to their classroom. This was very exciting to Max and I was given frequent updates like, " Bryce missed my school and had to go back!"

On Tuesday, I took him into the daycare and he got all sorts of tags put on him and his backpack. Then he was assigned a seat in the van next to his "big". The big is an older student who will help the younger one with their seat belt and helps them get to the school. Then the daycare takes roll-call and off to the van! I was there taking a bunch of pictures and then I hopped into my car and drove over to Ridgewood and waited to get more pictures.

When they got off of the van, Max could care less that I was there. He had practiced what to do and he was going to do it without my help. All the parents and teachers were very amused at his confidence level. It was obvious I was his parent and it was also obvious that I was not needed or even particularly wanted. He only got confused at one point when he has to make a turn to go down the kindergarten wing. Luckily, they have a teacher who is stationed there to help them remember.

He found his room with no help, marched right in, found his name, then marched right over to his assigned spot to hang his backpack, found his assigned seat and told me goodbye. I took the hint and beat it out of there before I crimped his style too much.

One of the daycare teachers asked me if I was sad or excited. I told her I was excited, which I am. He is ready to have some more challenges. It wasn't until I was walking back to my car and thinking about how on his own he was in this new stage of his life that I started to cry. I had thought that he would be coddled a little bit more. I had assumed that he would be dropped off right in front of the door like the bus kids, he isn't. I had assumed that the volunteers that get the kindergartners and walk them to their class would get him, they don't do that unless he rides the bus. He has to do it all, and he is perfectly capable of it. I'm proud that he did such a good job, especially compared to some of the other kids in his class. But it hit me suddenly that he is much bigger than I think of him and that I am running out of time with my little boy.

Big Girl

On August 24th, Mia turned 2. It doesn't seem possible. She had a couple of friends over for a little celebration and proceeded to cry when we all sang to her. But I think she did have fun. On her birthday she wanted, "Pizza!" for her dinner. She's crazy about pizza.

Mia has changed so much in the past two years. She started out as this tiny little peanut and everywhere we went people asked if she was a premie. The picture below is right after we brought her home from the hospital, only two days old.

Now, I call her tank girl. She's so strong and coordinated and she makes the boys look a bit slow. We have signed her up for gymnastics, which I think will be a blast! can almost count to 5 by herself and strings together whole sentences now. She even has shown a lot of interest in potty training. Such a big girl. I can't help but wonder where the time has gone.

String Band Aids

Beth called me at work this morning sounding all like the cat who ate the canary. I asked her what was up and she informed me that our oldest had a wound on his knee and the daycare was concerned. Would I go and look at it? I told her I would and then I received a picture message from the assistant director showing me the wound. It looked ugly, but I couldn't really see it very well so decided to go in person.

Max had been trying to get on one of the new 3-wheelers at school, lost his balance and fell on the edge of the concrete patio. When I got there I wasn't sure how bad it really was. It wouldn't stop bleeding and seemed to do more when he walked around. I called the doctor's office and they said that the fact that it was bleeding more when he walked meant that he would probably need at least one stitch. Problem was, the doctor's office didn't do any suturing, and the children's close to home centers didn't open until 3p. I could go to the ER but I really didn't want to sit around for hours. The nurse told me that it would be ok to wait for the close to home to open since it would be only 5 hours after the injury occurred. Apparently, they don't like to suture wounds after 7-8 hours.

So, I went back to work for awhile, leaving at 2pm to go and get him. When he figured out where we were going he announced that his knee felt all better now, really it does.....

The nurse who first looked at it thought it was just superficial. Then the doctor came and and looked at it better (and more painfully). She felt that it was deeper than it looked at first glance because it was swollen. She wanted to talk to the suture expert. Max heard the word stitches and got very concerned. He didn't like it too much when the suture person came in. She told him that he would need a couple of string band aids and that it was no big deal.

A few minutes later Max was laying on the gurney with me holding down the top part, another nurse laying on his legs while the other one injected his cut. He screamed something horrible and I felt just awful. I can't imagine that doing the sutures without the lidocaine would have hurt as much as getting the shots did. He has 4 sutures and a HUGE bandage. The location on his knee makes it a bit harder to keep safe and they want him wearing the ace bandage until the sutures are removed in 14 days.

After the shots and he had calmed down a little bit, Max sobbed at me, "Momma, I love you." It just about broke my heart.

Camping

Max, Mia and I left for Helen, Georgia and the Unicoi State Park on Wednesday afternoon. My plan was to go into work in the morning and pick the kids up after lunch hoping they would nap. I did go to work and I did pick up the kids, they didn't do much napping though. Before we got to Cincinnati Max complained that this trip was taking too long!

I had taken the van in for an oil change and to check the breaks the day before. We were on the road for about 20 minutes when an idiot light came on. I couldn't even guess what it meant and had to pull over to look in the manual. It was the check tire pressure light. Easier said then done. I had to drive all over the place to even find a tire gauge and then discovered that the tire pressure was only in the 38 range. Not sure why the dumb thing was complaining but I let out some air and it made it happy for a few more hours before it came back on. I finally had to get the pressure down to around 33 before the light would stop.

We stopped at the Holiday Inn in Knoxville, TN and the kids loved it. It was a big one with a conference center and much room for running, which they did for the next 2 hours. We then went to our room and watched So You Think You Can Dance all in one bed together. Mia fell asleep with the TV on and Max decided he wanted to go to his own bed and sleep after the show.

We got up and ate breakfast at McD's per Max's request and then got on the road around 8am. We arrived at Unicoi around noon. Mia was not thrilled with the new surroundings and all the new people. At that time there was a total of 20 family members milling about. She took a couple of days to warm up, but then discovered that they all had food and where willing to share. Her kind of people.

Max went fishing for the first time and caught a little bluegill. He was very pleased with himself. One of the things he has been fretting over is whether or not there is water with fish in it here in Ohio. He and Mia also went to the Babyland General Hospital, the original hand-stitched cabbage patch kids were started here and continue to be made. It's located in what use to be a real baby hospital and originally all the cabbage patch kids were given names that the real babies born there had. Max liked it so much he want back again with the older kids. Mia marched into the gift store and announced, "My baby" so Aunt Vicki bought it for her. Spoiled kid.

Max also went on a 3 mile hike and kept up with his Uncle Steve. Nobody can keep up with Steve and everyone was amazed. He loved the hike and I see more of this in his future. He also went tubing down the Chattahoochee River with me and after his initial nervousness wore off, had a great time.

We did have one incident. Max had tried to climb up the back of the pickup truck and the tailgate came down throwing him to the ground and striking his head on a stone. It was a bloody mess. Fortunately, it was a small puncture and didn't require stitches.

Max loved his older cousins to the point of worship. Wherever they went, he wanted to go too. He kept up with them and even helped them build a dam. When it was time to go, he was sad. He wanted to know why I was putting up stuff because, "we live here now".

Mia was content to just hang out for the most part and eat. She was having a good time but was ready to go home. When we got in late last night she just grinned and grinned while Beth hugged her. It was a long time to be away from Mimi.

I had some excitement on the way home. The Garmin suggested a route that I wasn't familiar with and I thought I would give it a try. It wasn't until it was way too late that I realized where it sent me, The Tail of the Dragon. This is a famous stretch of 11 miles with 318 curves in it, popular with motorcyclists and performance sport car drivers. Those folks looked like they were having a good time. I was in a mini-van and absolutely miserable. I don't get motion sickness and I was driving, but I still felt like I was going to barf everywhere. That was the longest 11 miles EVER. Now, I can refer to myself as a Dragon Slayer which almost makes up for it. I kinda wish that I would've bought one of the T-Shirts that had the map on it. Check out the map here.

What's in a name

For many years I've been planning on changing my name to Hollenbaugh. Lately, Max has been asking about my name and why it's different than everyone else's. He has been annoyed that I'm not Momma Hollenbaugh. This morning I decided to do something about it. I filed all the paperwork and published the notice to have my name changed. The court hearing will be on August 20th.

No, I will not miss the name Richmond. Originally, I thought the name just didn't mean anything special to me. But in reality, the name has bad memories attached to it and I'm looking forward very much to it going away.

On my walk to and from the court house I had some adventures. I ran into a pack of aggressive hippies lobbying for the libraries. They practically came to blows with folks who politly declined their handouts. While trying to escape that craziness I almost tripped over a casket that was on the sidewalk. It had signs on it, and the same ones on a couple of guys wandering around, stating that the funeral board had buried a felony. Ok. Lesson for the day, do not walk on the statehouse side of High Street.

Dad

I believe that I met Ralph when I was in second grade. I'm a little fuzzy on the details because at the time, I didn't really care for the guy that much. My mom and I lived in a crummy apartment complex, and I was constantly being terrorized by the neighborhood bully, and my father would occasionally come and see me. Well, up until the time he dropped me off at home and told me right before he drove off that he wouldn't be back anymore because he was moving to Florida.

My mom and I moved into Ralph's house in South Charleston. I still didn't really care that much for the guy. I pretty much stayed in my room upstairs, which as far as I was concerned was the best part of the whole deal. I had two rooms upstairs all to myself!

My mom worked weird shifts and often wasn't home when I got home from school. So, I would start dinner for me and Ralph (it wasn't that fancy, but I was a wiz at making a baked potato in the microwave). Eventually, eating dinner with just the two of us brought me around to becoming very fond of him.

He had to travel out of town a fair amount, but when he came home he always brought me a package of Mallow Cups. To this day I still associate this candy with him and will always buy some when I find them. I also remember that I had a goofy pair of red and white stripped PJs that I wore all the time and Ralph called me an embarrassed zebra.

He would take me fishing with him pretty frequently. I can remember a trip we took, the location is a bit fuzzy but I think it was in Michigan, and I was having no luck catching any fish. Being little my skill level wasn't so great. Ralph, however, was catching them left and right and I was frustrated. Then a couple of times he needed to do something in the boat and asked me to hold his rod for him. As I was holding the pole I realized that I had caught a fish! It took me years to realize that he had hooked the fish and let me think that I had done all the work.

When he and my mom broke up, Ralph was the one to tell me. We were getting ready for fishing and he told me how it wasn't working out with them and that it didn't have anything to do with me. He also told me that we would still get to see each other. I'm crying as I type this because I can still remember how much that hurt. I knew that he would stop seeing me just like my father had and I would be all alone again. Fortunately, Ralph is nothing like him.

He continued to take me fishing, every year he took me on a week long trip to Lake Erie, he come to see me in school plays and band concerts. When I needed a new trumpet, Ralph was the one who got it for me. And considering that band was the only thing keeping me in high school, that trumpet meant a lot. And he's made it to all of my graduations. I'll tell anyone who cares to know that he was the only adult in my life while I was growing up who seemed to give a damn about me. Without him, I don't know how I would have turned out or frankly if I would have even made it.

Happy Father's Day, Ralph. I love you.

No clever Title This Time

Max got his glasses and thinks he is pretty cool. He was super difficult at the eyeglass place and they couldn't really adjust them correctly. I noticed that they are a little crooked and when he took them off today one of his ears was pretty red. So, we'll need to go back and try to work on that. He is very concerned about breaking them. He was afraid to move his head too much for fear they would fall off and break. When I picked him up from school he ran up to me and announced that he did not break his glasses today! In the car I had the windows down and looked back at Max. He was holding onto his glasses for dear life. When I asked him why it was because the windows were down and would blow off his glasses. I did have a five minute talk with him before he got his glasses about how they cost money and he needed to be careful and not break them. Apparently it made an impression. I wish I knew what exactly made him listen to me so carefully, because it's never happened before!

He started going to the "babies school" this week and it has been a bit of an adjustment for him. It is a very long day 7-5:50ish and he is a wreck when he gets home. He was use to me picking him up from his old school around 4:30 but we only have one vehicle that can haul around all the kids, and Beth uses it to get everyone to school and then work. She has this plan of leaving a car at the daycare the night before, driving the van to daycare and then transferring to the car so I can bring my car there after work and pick up the kids in the van. We have not tried this plan out because I get tired thinking about it. I have all my work stuff in my car and will have to transfer it back and forth, blah. But we cannot afford another vehicle that will hold them all.

Anyway, in three days the teachers at the new school taught Max how to swing like a big boy. He is really very good at it now. They said that he is doing well.

In other news, we have fence posts in. It's been a joy getting this project started, so who knows when we will actually have a fence instead of just posts. But at least it looks like progress.

Lucky 13

Beth and I celebrated our 13th anniversary yesterday. It's amazing how time flies. Lots of things have happened during that time. We've had three houses and one apartment, I've had 7 different jobs, Beth has had 5 different jobs (I think), I got a bachelor's degree, and both of us have received our masters, we survived two homestudies and adopted two great kids along with surviving one pregnancy which produced one cool little dude. In the beginning we couldn't buy groceries at times and now we've progressed to being broke all the time because the kids are eating so much!

I remember the struggles we had when people first found out about us. I lost some close friends and my relationship with some of my family members will never be the same. Nobody from my family came to our wedding, none of them have ever even asked about it or when our anniversary is, and was only reminded that it isn't legal and therefore doesn't mean anything. But Beth's sister was in the wedding and interested in the planning details. Beth's parents both came and they always send us an anniversary card. We had a lot of great friends show up and suffer through the heat and mosquitoes to show us their support. Although I doubt any of them thought we would be were we are now.

I remember some of the fun we had doing the planning. The cake lady looked super uncomfortable when she realized who was getting married and the tux place had to empty out the dressing room of men so I could try on a tux. But the best of all was the experience we had at the Beavercreek Florists. They were THRILLED to be involved with a wedding for two women. As far as they were concerned it would be twice as much flowers. They even convinced me to wear a wreathe of flowers in their exuberance. At the reception they had even delivered a little engraved vase congratulating us. They were awesome.

It's been a fun 13 years and I'm looking forward to seeing what we get ourselves into next. I love you, Beth.

Biscuit and Eyes

This morning I was getting ready to head out the door and had put Daisy in her hall. I was getting a few things together and heard Wilson making a noise. Based on the noise, I knew he had something in his mouth and most likely it wasn't something that I approved of being in his mouth. He came around the corner making sucking noises and he had one of Daisy's basted dog biscuits in his mouth. He finally decided it wasn't worth the effort and handed it over to me. He must have worked for a long time to get that through the baby gate and poor Daisy had to watch him do it!

Max is very left side oriented. He might as well not have a right hand and will always kick a ball with his left foot. He found one more thing on the right side that he has no use for, his eye. His right eye has been crossing for a few weeks and we had to take him to the specialist this morning. He was a trooper through it all, even though he didn't enjoy having his eyes dilated. He has to wear glasses to try and correct the issue. He got to go pick out his first pair of glasses and was pretty insistent on which pair he wanted. He was pretty upset that he didn't get to take them home with him today, but we will get them soon. I'm not sure how it's going to go teaching him to leave them on, it should be an adventure!

Fishing

I left work early this past Friday and drove down to Cambridge where I met Ralph. We were all set to enter the AEP Fishing Tournament on lake Seneca. There was a tournament meeting on Friday night, where they went over the rules, had a cookout and raffled away prizes. Everyone got a prize and a tournament hat.

We spent the night in the motel and got up bright and early, 4am, on Saturday to get the boat down to the water. It was very foggy out, which made driving and boating a bit of a challenge. The fish were biting early, most not keepers, but still fun. Then we hit a dry spell. I did manage to catch two of the three keepers that we entered into the contest.

During the fishing I was having a lot of fun looking around. It is a pretty lake, I think. And I saw a lot of birds including two common loons, some ducks and geese with their babies, a Baltimore Oriole, pileated woodpeckers, and what I originally thought was a golden eagle (which would've been incredibly rare here in Ohio) but I believe was a young bald eagle flying over the lake looking for fish.

We didn't win or place, and my co-workers fished better than us (which I'm sure I'll pay for later), but it was a lot of fun being outside and fishing with Ralph which I haven't done in a long time.

Ring!

So, I'm on call from the 22nd until somewhere around the 4th. One REC had to have surgery, the other is on vacation and for two days, the last Ohio REC is in Maryland to play golf.

It hasn't been too bad so far. Had one station spill where 265 gallons of mineral oil was pumped onto the ground when a valve snapped. A couple of other minor calls. It just takes a bit of adjustment to how I live. I have to always have the stupid phone and a bunch of important numbers with me. Sometimes I'm good at that, other times I forget. Mia and I went to the grocery store tonight and as soon as I walked in I got a call. I didn't have a pen or any of the numbers I needed, so we got back into the car and ran home. That was annoying. I also discovered that I can't hear the phone ring while wearing headphones and listening to music. Thank goodness for office mates who noticed that I was not answering my annoying phone and poked me.

We'll see how the rest of it goes. Hopefully it will be uneventful.

Best

I sit knee deep in dog hair in my car. There's dog hair everywhere in the house, including on the cats. The kids look like little yellow labs.

I keep picking up sticks out of the middle of the yard, but they keep coming back. I wrestle a 70 pound dog when I meet another dog on a walk, and sometimes I loose the fight. People are vigorously jumped on when they come to visit and the cats are constantly being poked by a big, wet nose.

BUT....

Daisy and Wil have become best buddies. Wilson will call her while he is eating and offer her his food covered hand to clean. Wilson will crawl up to Daisy and head butt her (his way of saying I love you). And Daisy will come and lay down next to him whenever she can. One of the things that Beth and I had discussed when considering adopting her, was the fact that it would be a very long time before we could trust her around the baby on the floor. We were wrong about that. Here you see him leaning up against her just petting and petting her.

Every now and then Wilson will roll over and lay down on Daisy.



Wilson's love of Daisy has even inspired Mia to get in on the action. Here you see her petting Daisy, but what you don't see is her giving her a hug and then a big kiss. Considering how afraid Mia has been of all things furry, this is huge. She walks around singing, "Daisy, Daisy".

Max has been leery of Daisy. She runs vigorously up to him, which scares him even though she has never once jumped on him. I have been trying to teach him to just stand his ground and everything will be fine. The other day, she came running up to him, and he very nervously stood his ground and told her, "Sit" which she promptly did. He burst into a huge grin and it was like a light bulb went off, "The dog will do what I say!" I just about emptied out the house of dog treats after that moment. Max has been strutting around the house commanding her to sit, no, leave it, and stay. He has even been assigned the nightly duty of giving her dinner. He tells her to sit and then he'll release her to go get her food.

Max has also found another very good use for Daisy. One of the dreaded wood boring bees showed up yesterday. He started to cry and pointed at it. Daisy looked over and then chased the bee away. Another one came and Max didn't cry, he just pointed at it and told Daisy to go get it, which she did.

In three weeks Daisy has taught my kids courage, confidence and the joy of just sitting and loving on a pet. I have been trying in vain forever to do this. And on top of that, she has proven herself to be a mighty protector of the kids. She just might be the best dog ever!