Late News

I meant to post this with last week's blog. Jill's test came back and she is immune to the 5th disease virus. There should be no negative reprucussions to the baby. Cannon is also back in high spirits. Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers.

New Year's Goals

Jim finally wrote a new blog post. He mentioned new year's resolutions and it got me thinking about my problems in this area. I do not do well with new year's resolutions, but at various times in my life I have done well with setting goals. So this year I have my new year's goals. I am not going to write about them here because you would find them too funny and far fetched. I am willing to say that one of them is to be a contestant on American Gladiators 2009. I like House, Bones, The Office, and Friday Night Lights, but AG is the show that really makes me wish we were able to get a clear TV signal at our house.

Geocaching Adventure

Last Saturday after much cajoling, I convinced Jill to go to Stockton Lake with me to find a geocache. It was a truly beautiful day. Perfect weather. The lake was picturesque. We saw at least 4 different armadillos (possibly 6 but 2 of them might have been the same). The cache was a nice box worth finding and actually contained the travel bug that was listed on the cache page. I think Jill was actually glad we had done it.

Then we arrived back at the locked car with the keys in the ignition. We were a long way from anything. We tried to think about how far back the last house was. It was getting dark and cooling down quickly. Cannon was ready to go home (or run free in the woods, but not stand quietly while his parents figured out what to do). We finally decided to break the window. We settled on the driver's side window, because it is the most average shaped window that does not have heat strips in it. We found a 5 pound rock with sharp thin edge, much like the head of an ax. I wrapped my hands in my sweatshirt raised the rock over my head and smashed into the window. And bounced off. I thought, I must have been timid, it was my first window. So I tried again, and again, and again. Raring back and throwing my weight into it. I scratched the window pretty good, but it did not crack. I finally drew back and from about two feet away, threw the rock as hard as I could. It bounced harmlessly away.

We walked three miles with Cannon kicking and screaming to a cabin where two guys were down from K.C. fishing. They took us back to our van and using a hanger and a tool that I think could only be used to pry car doors open with, had it unlocked in about forty seconds.

During this week we had reports of baseball size hail in a couple of counties north of us. It broke the fuse in one of our transformers . It also reportedly broke out some car windows. I don't believe it.

Parenting is Hard

Parenting is hard, but it is possible. This week Cannon was diagnosed with fifth disease. It has a much more scientific (and in my opinion better name – Total aside that I don’t know how to punctuate: Jill called me from her mobile phone to tell me that Cannon had been diagnosed with fifth disease. I thought she said SIDS disease, and asked her to repeat it. She did, and I still thought she said SIDS. I totally freaked out for about 8 seconds before I realized that living babies are not brought into the doctor’s office and diagnosed with Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. I asked Jill one more time, and she had to spell fifth for me) name, but most people who have heard of it know it as 5^th disease. It is not really dangerous to Cannon, but has given us some alarm about our unborn child. We are now awaiting lab results.

Parenting has been more difficult with Cannon this week because he has felt miserable and has acted accordingly. He has required a lot more attention and patience than normal, and thankfully Jill and I are here and my parents are close by so I believe he has gotten what he needs. I mention all this because today I read a question sent in to a Tech Columnist: I want to limit my children’s computer time. I want them to get outside, and to finish their homework. Can I restrict when and how long they can use the computer? The tech specialist talked of Operating system settings that allowed you to limit a users time. I would have said, “Tell your kid to get off the computer and go outside.” No one ever writes me and asks me questions like that, though.

Humbled

First of all, I want to express my gratitude to Chris for replying to my previous blog. His song list would really have given me the most bang for my buck, and, rather unbelievably, I do not own any of them at this time. I was especially tempted by Alice’s Restaurant which I could get for 99 cents. That’s about 6 cents per minute. However, I don’t think I would listen to more than once a decade. Getting only one reply to my blog was a humbling experience. More humbling though is reading Jill’s latest blog entry which is, as always, so much better than anything I have written. I haven’t finished picking out my five songs yet. I have settled on (but not bought) “You Don’t Know What Love Is, You Just Do As You’re Told” by the White Stripes. It gives me the most bang for my buck title-wise.