Hot Saturday!

I went running this morning at 8:00, and it was already sunny and hot outside. I made it slightly over 2 miles away, to Andrew's High School, stretched out at the rec center there and walked/jogged back.
I came home to discover Mali outside painting more of the inside of her playhouse. She's tearing into that project. And Moose is up, and fed.
I don't see anyone else getting up anytime soon.
Wait: Susy up before 11:00! Andrew may sleep well past noon - he's been tired and grouchy lately, and stayed up late last night watching the Olympic Trials.

Scleroderma Auction and Dinner

Today we head to Tacoma for the Scleroderma Auction/Dinner. Then we'll spend the night at Grandma and Grandpa's. I gave Moose a haircut yesterday, so he's all ready for a visit, and the hot weather - It hit 100 degrees here yesterday. Then Mali and I hit Great Clips, where I told them of Mali's last unfortunate experience there, and they took very good care of her. Today Susy and Andrew will be getting haircuts before we leave for Washington, then we'll all be freshly shorn!
Mali and I are going running in ten minutes after I digest some of my breakfast. We are hoping to run the Starlight Run and we've only got 2 weeks to be ready to run 5km.

Recovery

I am all better now, at least once the Oxycodone wears off I will be back to normal. This afternoon I gave birth to a pair of baby kidney stones, and now I'm feeling much better.

Emergency Room Fun

Before you panic at the title of this post, let me inform you that the trip to the emergency room at 2:00 this morning was FOR ME, Darrin, OregonDad - and not one of the precious children or the lovely OregonMom.
I discovered, as the night wore on, that the muscle strain/cramp that I was feeling in my side and back was actually getting worse as I tried to loosen it up. I googled my symptoms and came up with appendicitis, as I was pretty confident it wasn't a tumor that suddenly sprang into my abdomen, and I've some healthy fear of appendicitis after Mali's friend Amanda lost a third of her body weight coping with the aftermath of a burst appendix.

I stumbled up to the bedroom (I was downstairs in my writhing, stretching, grunting and occasional moaning state, so as not to bother the lately sleep-deprived OregonMom) and woke Susy to tell her I was going to explode at any moment. After she wrapped her sleepy brain around that statement, and my additional 'Yes, I think so" to her query of "Should I take you to the Emergency Room?" she leapt into action, only yelling at me once when I was doing one last thing on the computer for work in case it was the last thing I was able to do for work for some long, undefined period of time.

Susy drove me to the hospital, after alerting a near-somnambulant Andrew to our departure (he exhibited his concern for me later by going about his morning rituals as if nothing unusual had occurred, the brave kid.) At the hospital, the whirlwind of uniformed people quickly concluded that it was probably a Kidney Stone, which was then confirmed by a cat scan, after the administration of an IV and some wonderful drugs. The good news: It is a small stone, only 2mm, and I should be able to pass it in the normal course of events, though also with the normal amount of the fabled pain that comes with passing a kidney stone. We, the doctor, Susy and I, discussed the upcoming event in great detail, along with the upcoming further pain-relief medication. Only then did the kind doctor bring up the less-than-good news: there are several more of the little pearls waiting in each kidney for their turn in the sunshine.

I intend to become an expert in these things over the next couple of days, particularly in the whys and hows of their creation, with particular attention paid to measures available for countering these whys and hows.

Right now my overwhelming desire is for sleep, and as soon as I email some folks at work with news that I have not yet slept, but intend to -- and email my Canadian customers with the information they need this morning, I am going to bed.

Good night/morning/whatever/night.

I'm home!

I made it home today, after another long day in BC. Mali had play practice - Alana picked her up since I was still at the airport. Andrew had track practice and was able to catch a ride with Eric.
Susy made spaghetti for Andrew, since he will attempt to break the freshman 800m record at tomorrow's track meet. They go against Aloha H.S., and I plan to go watch. Look for an update here tomorrow afternoon.

Sadness - We return to San Juan, then home.

They are forcing us off the boat. We like it here, and don't want to leave.
Tomorrow (actually later today, but after I sleep) we are out of our rooms by 8:00, and off the boat by 9:00. Then we head to the airport for our 12:30 flight.

Today was a pretty good day. I was up early and ran a mile on the track while we docked. Everyone was up a little later - though still early, because we had to go through immigration this morning. Then we all went to breakfast for the first time, and met some nice folks from Illinois.
We went into Charlotte Amalie to shop and hopefully find some stone turtles for Andrew to replace the ones I lost yesterday. We haggled over fake Coach purses - more expensive than in Curacao, so we weren't too excited by them. Everything (except liquor) has been more expensive than Curacao.
Susy and the kids weren't too thrilled with the town, mostly because we walked the 2.5 miles from the boat to get there. They headed back and I walked all over town and got a nice feel for the place, and found several very pleasant spots. I walked back to the boat and took a nap with the kids up on the pool deck. Susy got us for the trivia game, then we played Bingo and ALMOST won a huge amount of money - Susy did manage to win over $80. Then we went to the farewell show, and our last dinner with the Puerto Ricans.
THEN: we bought photos and had to pack up, and we leave early in the morning. So sad!

Philipsburg, St. Maarten, Dutch Antilles

Today we docked in Philipsburg St. Maarten.
I woke up early and tried out the track. It's very nice, and I managed to run two miles (WooHoo!)
The kids decided to join us in town today to search for gifts for their friends. We shopped for awhile, then ended up at a nice beach spot. Andrew found some stone turtles and T-shirts for his friends, and Mali found some odds and ends for the people on her list. I found a bunch of fake Nike shirts that were cheap and seemingly relatively well made. Susy found an Australian opal ring she liked, as we went into many, many jewelry stores.
Each store seemed to have a nice Indian guy that we met, and they were all from Bombay and knew each other. I found my watch for $40 cheaper, so I got it written on a business card so I could show it to the Indian guy from Bombay on the ship who sold it to us, so he could reduce the price still further.
The kids got some beach time and Susy camped out on a beach chair while I walked around the city some more. A waiter told Susy she had to pay $10 for the chair - instead she moved into the welcoming shelter of Bamboo Bernie's immediately behind her, and used her $10 on a frothy drink. I returned and joined her in a few more. The kids had their share too, but without the alcohol.

On the ship we had another great dinner with our friends from Puerto Rico, and the girls came by the room and took Andrew and Mali up to the Latin dance party outside at the pool so they could teach them the Merengue. I was hoping to go too, but exhaustion kicked in. The kids (apparently) made it to bed around 1:00.

Willemstad, Curacao

The kids wanted to stay on the boat, so Susy and I went in to Willemstad, Curacao, and had a great time! It is a beautiful city, and all the people we met were wonderful.

The kids had fun on the boat, but were really disappointed the pool is salt water! They got the walky-radios working and had fun playing sight-tag around the ship.

Our table-mates joined us for dinner tonight. A fun family from San Juan.

Aruba

Catamaran trip to snorkel today to a nice little reef with tons of colorful fish, then to the wreck of the Antilles to supposedly see larger fish. The wreck was in open water so was a little choppy and murky - spooky for us Jaws-influenced old-timers. Mali didn't try it at the wreck, and didn't like it at the reef as much as she'd hoped because she swallowed a couple mouthfuls of water. I did once too, which was more than enough.
The folks that took us out were really fun - the open bar on the boat (post-snorkelling) didn't hurt. They taught us the "Bacardi! Yellow! Limon! Coca-Cola..." song. The kids loved it!

Home from Canada. Insanely busy!

26 hours and counting until we fly away for our Spring Break cruise to the Caribbean!
(Aruba's prediction for Tuesday: 89 degrees)
I have yet to start packing and am instead frantically working away before deserting my friends and coworkers with a project theoretically going online next Friday. The only person packed here is Mali, our little planner.
Not so little anymore, the nurse measured her at 5'3" yesterday, so it's official: she is as tall as Susy now. Mali also got her eyes checked, and it was like a cartoon where the character reads the eye-chart's bottom line, which is the tiny little copyright notice at the bottom. Mali has extraordinary vision. She must have gotten that from her grandfather.
Mali was visiting the doctor to investigate a problem on her forehead. A small black spec that looks like a blackhead, but has taken up permanent residence and is actually under the skin, is really a small piece of rubberized turf field. My theory is that she must have had it driven into her forehead on a header during a game or practice. We will see a dermatologist after our vacation.

More new news below: Andrew's track meet! Mali's report card! Susy's review! My product delivery to Canada! It's all Good!!!!!

Andrew's first HS track meet! My return from Canada.

I stayed an extra day in Canada (everything works!!!), and got home too late Wednesday to see Andrew's first high school track meet. This was in Gresham, with Southridge vs. Beaverton vs. Gresham. Southridge clobbered them both. Andrew ran with the JV and won the 800m (2:08) and took second in the 1500m (4:47), losing to an upperclass Southridge Varsity runner who was demoted for the day because of a missed practice.
Andrew texted me with the news just as I was getting on the plane in Vancouver. I forwarded it to Grandpa, but I never heard back. Also Susy, who had already heard from our happy boy. He hadn't run track for over a year, and was doubting he could match the times posted for last year's JV team. Instead, he beat them! Woohoo!

Skiing

Paul and I went skiing Sunday after discovering there was new snow and sunshine predicted. We got there early and were the fist skiers on several runs. It was a great day. I fell many times, but had a great time, and I'm ignoring the bruises. The worst fall was on a double black diamond run, where I slid about 60 feet down on my head. The second picture below is of that run, taken just moments before my fall. First here's a photo of me Paul took. Both with my cell phone.

Snow again! and I am sick

We got an inch of snow last night, but school wasn't even delayed this morning. Andrew got a ride to early morning swim practice, because I am sick! I have a raging chest cold that is surprisingly painful. I am convinced it's caused from the general exhaustion following my insanely fun ski and poker trip. Nothing like drinking, skiing, and lack of sleep to bring an immune system to its knees.

Everyone else is fine, happily.

Home!

John, Jonathan and I left Whistler at 10:15 and made it to Kirkland around 4:00. We went through a strange blizzard in Vancouver that was completely bounded by the city limits. Huge flakes, falling fast. There was about 3 inches on the ground in the city, and none anywhere around it. John made me an espresso in Kirkland and I was on the road again at 4:30, and finally made it home at 7:30.
The kids were over at Tiana's having dinner and watching a movie when I got here. Susy and Moose were happy to see me. I was asleep before the kids returned, but woke up when Moose went crazy when they walked in the door.

Here's one of the photos Joan was nice enough to send me since I missed Andrew's winter formal date with Hailey Saturday night. The group gathered at Tiana's before going to Red Robin for the pre-dance dinner.

Mali goes to school! and: Fun with sleep.

Mali appeared symptom-free this morning, I think because she was heading to school with a huge bag of presents for her teachers.

I went to bed early last night, while everyone was still in the room wrapping presents. It was kind of fun drifting in and out listening to them figure out how to wrap large spherical objects - though the one time I woke with Andrew staring an inch away from my face was a little disquieting.
So of course I woke up at 2:30, sure it must be somewhere near morning. By 3:00 I was up and working. At 4:45, just as I decided it was time to go back to bed, I heard Andrew's alarm go off. So I kept working until he hit his alarm two more times, then convinced him to eat breakfast and drove him, Eric, and Rian to their 5:30 swim practice and got bagels for Mali. THEN (6:00) I went back to bed. Then I got to sleep until Susy got up, showered, and started poking at boxes: poke, poke, poke, looking for a small one for some reason. THEN I got to sleep until my daughter decided I needed to get up. At least her bright and bobbly head at 8:00 AM was a reasonable alarm.
Now it's time for caffeine, and more work.