SPOILER Alert!
Jack’s grandfather says "one of these times I’m going to get away and no one is going to find me either." I think that’s the tell which says Jack’s grandfather has been to the island.
Pulling a tooth
I feel like a failed parent when my children suffer a health issue. We are a remarkably fortunate family when it comes to health. We see very little sickness. Granted, we have a bug going through the house right now but it really is not terrible. Everyone is taking turns so only one person has it at a time.
Evan has a tooth that grayed a while back. We took him to the dentist and everything was assessed as fine. The tooth whitened and seemed fine then died. We attempted to extract it at the dentist but the twilight drugs made Evan too loopy and uncooperative. A surgery was scheduled but the anesthesiologist flipped out when she saw his older brother is diagnosed with Von Willebrand disease (which the doctor thinks is a misdiagnosis) and canceled the surgery until Evan had blood work. Why this wasn’t noticed on his paperwork the month prior to the first surgery attempt is beyond me.
His second surgery attempt was scheduled for March 19th but we got a call yesterday that an opening had come available. "Don’t give him anything to eat or drink after midnight. Your appointment is at noon." Huh?! That’s a long time for a 3.5 year old to go without food. In a different phone call, clear liquids were okay’d until 9am. Cathy and Evan will be off to the hospital shortly. I will remain home with a feverish Amy and working on programming and talking to bureaucrats on the phone. I hope all goes well. These things worry me so much.
Update: Surgery canceled. In the same post I talked about be blessed with decent health, I get to say my child has pneumonia.
Update 2:08pm: Apparently he had pneumonia and is at the end of recovery so they are proceeding with the surgery. Lungs still rattley.
Update 3:30pm: Evan out of surgery and in recovery.
Day in Review
Today began at 1:30am. I awoke probably as Evan wandered into our bedroom to sleep between Cathy and I. I have a vague recollection of going upstairs and trying to convince myself to stay up and get to work but falling back asleep.
Now it is 5am and I decide that an hour’s rest will serve me better than an hour’s work.
6am- I am already up, walked the dogs, done sit ups and push ups, and begun working on fixing coding issues on a project. I have but one objective today and that is continue making up for the lost programming time from the unproductive weekend to please a client and receive a check to immediately sign it over to someone else. The best-laid plans of mice and men/often go awry.
6:30-7:45 I help children ready themselves for school and carpool the elementary student.
7:45-8:00 I follow the overflowing creek to discover a broken water main under S Northshore Drive.
8:03am I report the exact location of the main to FUD who knew they had a leak but had not pin pointed the problem.
8:15-3:00pm I work on debugging code and making changes for clients with breaks to be amused by the traffic redirected through the neighborhood including helping a truck driver back out of our deadend street.
2:47pm – I flag down the elementary school bus as it reaches the end of the street and beg, for their safety, the driver to let the children out instead of taking them all the way up to their stop and having them walk in all the traffic.
3:00pm – My wife disappears and returns at 10:15pm. During this time I split my attention between the children and knocking out code. Fortunately, Evan mostly sleeps, and Amy and Noah entertain themselves. Turns out to be a very productive coding session..
4:30pm – wife reappears (briefly) with pizza only after officer lets her skip ahead in the deadlocked line of traffic waiting from an 18 wheeler to back out of our neighborhood.
10:30pm – I blog about the day as miniature people play tom toms in my head and my eyes bleed. I avoided a stroke today but think I’ll have it tomorrow. Not looking forward to the phone calls I will have to make explaining why I failed to keep a commitment I had made for today. Oh, tomorrow, Evan goes in for his 3rd attempt at a tooth extraction. No food after midnight. Appointment, noon.
Truck stuck
Can’t tell if its an accident or not but Huntington is now 1 lane.
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Today is Free Pancake Day at IHOP
In years past, we have participated in IHOP’s Free Pancake Day. Unfortunately, today I am too busy trying to make miracles and just don’t see it happening.
Source of water problem.
Busted water main? I bet if this continues northshore collapses.
Open in Google Earth or see it on Google Maps.
Knoxnews reporting more accurate than WBIR’s reporting.
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State of Me
All super secret personal stress tells indicate that I am very deep in the red on my pressure gauge. If my maximum depth is 150 meters I’d say I’m currently running on quickly depleting batteries at roughly 245 meters and rapidly taking on water.
Good things to avoid saying to me today, "Could you…" "The deadline needs to be sooner…" "The tree finally fell on the house" and "Guess who’s pregnant!" and "Hello." – not that any of those have been said mind you.
Of Grasshoppers
Student: I spend much of my life solving other people’s problems.
Master: Who solves yours?
Mental Weather Forecast
This weekend’s mental weather was bad. It was a very important weekend to me and couldn’t have gone more wrong. However, it was a productive weekend and in that rewarding. The weekend had a bizarre dichotomy of suffering and pleasure.
Today’s forecast: mental collapse with occasional screams of agony and afternoon showers of salty tears.
Tomorrow’s forecast: stroke.
From the mouths of babes
Evan, 3.5 years old, points at the Russett potatoes on the food shelf: "I want the gun."
He relates potatoes to a potato gun!
Amy: "Can I go to A’s house?"
Dad: "Sure. Wear a jacket."
Evan: "I want go to A’s house."
Dad: "No, you are sick."
Evan, crying: "I not sick! I want go to A’s house with jacket."
Dad, feeling like a cad.
Seen in knoxville
Barnum and Bailey Kill 28 Year Tradition for Rocky Hill Elementary
Yesterday I learned that Rocky Hill Elementary school will not be having its annual Clown Day this year instead opting for a reading celebration. This ends a 28 year tradition. I’m still gathering my thoughts for a letter that will be sent to the administration and another to Ringling Bros./Barnum & Bailey.
…Clown Day started in 1980 when the first graders read a story about circus children. First grade teachers asked Jim Early to bring in circus performers’ children to visit. Mr. Early came with clowns, not children, and thus began a long tradition at Rocky Hill.
… Last year the local marketing company company, who has been faithful to bring the clowns to school, was replaced by a company in Atlanta. We pursued the Atlanta company (who knew nothing about Rocky Hill) about continuing the tradition and they said the circus was going through changes and the only clowns left did not speak English. She conceded and found two Ambassadors of Hope clowns who performed. This year, emails were not returned and the circus has come and gone.
[Source, Letter to 1st grade parents from the first grade teachers]
Clown Day is a well planned event that incorporates all aspects of learning as well as arts. The first graders spend time learning music, physical skills, and the three Rs are incorporated into the activities. Clown Day is not just a day of play and distraction from education. Instead it is a fun way to get the children engaged in education. My daughter has been so excited about Clown Day that she bought a dress for it at the beginning of the year and has avoided wearing it because she doesn’t want it "messed up" before Clown Day. She will be sorely disappointed in this decision.
This decision also breaks a rhythm at the school. Each grade has something "special" and exciting for the children. The Kindergarten students have Turkey Trot. There is the Wax Museum. (I’m drawing a blank on the others). The first grade is now orphaned and seeking their own unique event.
The cancellation of Clown Day is not only a failure on Ringling Bros./Barnum & Bailey‘s part but on the administration of Rocky Hill Elementary including Principal Cory Smith. Clown Day is a well honed operation that works within the curriculum. They have all the equipment and the support of parents. I am befuddled that they did not turn to the Shriner’s for clowns or ask a local clown to come perform. Shoot, if they just want to entertain the kids for 30-45 minutes, I’d put on a show!
Btw, as much as I love the circus, I think my children and I have seen our last Barnum & Bailey show. We will be quite entertained by the Shriner’s Circus from now on.
Related Reality Me posts referencing Clown Day: The day in review • Clown Day • Quoted for Clown Day • Health • Yesterday was my wife’s birthday • Rocky Hill Clown Day • Rocky Hill Clown Day – a big success! • Clown Day • Clown day update • Rocky Hill Clown Day • Clown day update
State of Me
I’ve had an intense day of coding. I’m going to skip dinner to help a friend support the Epilepsy Foundation by providing an hour’s worth of walk around juggling entertainment at their Mardi Gras event downtown at the Crowne. Then it’s back to code this evening. Considering pulling an all nighter and just seeing if I can kill off my list as rapidly as possible. Sleep is for the weak! Well…sleep is for the sane at least.
Link dump and closing browser windows
I have two styles of posting on Reality Me. One style is to write about my personal experiences and creative writing that comes from with me. The second style is based on external stimulus, generally other stuff I see on the Internet. Frequently when I am writing about my personal experiences (style 1) I will seek out related or supporting information from the Internet. The second style is typically items in the news, politics, or technology and in writing about them I may connect it to a personal experience. As such, the two styles often overlap.
Since life and work do not always permit time for blogging, I sometimes use the non-time sensitive items as scheduled posts that I can write about in my leisure but have them scheduled to appear in a busy time of the day. I used to set aside some Sunday evening time specifically to schedule some interesting content throughout the week. I’m an information junkie and a collector of links. When an interesting link is emailed to me, instant messaged, or Twittered (other ways to contact me), I open it in a new browser window or tab and skim it. Time permitting I may post about it right away, save it to delicious, or just leave it open in the tab. Eventually I get too many tabs and windows open, my computer slows to a crawl, and I either discard everything, or bookmark them for later. Today I’m going to dump them all to this post without lengthy commentary or research. Click "more" to see the link dump. Continue reading Link dump and closing browser windows
