It still raining girls!!!

ANNOUNCEMENT:

Everyone welcome the "official" arrival of Madalynn Elizabeth!!!!!

(is it just me or does anyone else see a trend with baby girls here??!!)

She was born on Aug. 17th to my good friend Teresa and her hubby Hoy. Isn't she a cutie!!! Yet one more little girlfor Aunt Julie to spoil!!!

Check out that head of hair!!!

My name is Earl, uh, I mean Travis Jones.

Ok I'm a first child. You know - serious, overachiever, etc... and I'm married to a first child. I would venture to say he has more severe "first child" issues than I do. I think one reason is because he has two other siblings to make up the personality "differences".

My brother-in-law, Chris (I'm using his name because some day he'll be famous and I won't have to worry about protecting his identity....) is definitely cut out for acting. Now, I personally, have never been into acting. I feel you really have put yourself out there when you act - become incredibly vulnerable - something I'm not at all willing to do. Chris - he's all about it. I think he might find acting enjoyable for just the opposite reason (which I've read a lot of actors state the reason as to why they are attracted to acting) which is it gives you opportunity to be someone completely different than yourself - a "reason" to act unlike you would normally.

Nope - you'll never find me acting. I'd rather run naked through Times Square in the middle of winter during x-mas shopping season....

Regardless as to why Chris enjoys acting the bottom line is he appears to love being "other people" and has no qualms about doing that in front of others. Case in point:


Here's a regular picture of Chris the weekend of my wedding. Sorry it's not a big picture - it's all I have on my work computer... But I would think he comes across to most of you as a clean cut, good-looking guy.







Recently Chris and some of his friends went to Vegas *baby* and originally he and one friend had decided to actually fly to Vegas as "My Name is Earl"-type characters. Why?? I have no idea. They may have had a reason - knowing Chris, they probably just wanted to have *extra* fun. Well, his friend had to back out of the trip for some reason. Did that stop Chris from dressing up as "Earl"?? or rather, as we later learned, aka "Travis Jones"? Hell no! Not only did he "dress up" but he even grew a moustache for it too!! now, his hair is long but I don't know if he grew it out for this or another part he currently has. His mother and I are still debating as to whether the chest hair is real or not.

Oh - the best part!! what you can't see is that he is also wearing cut-off jean shorts and work boots!! He flew on the plane from NYC to Vegas "in character". I believe he even went to a casino dressed like this when he first arrived.
















See- he's obviously the ham of the family.... and the least inhibited....

Congrats to TF and HF!!

Everybody - send your congrats to my Friend TF and her husband HF. TF gave birth to a little girl - their first child - this past Friday night! Everyone is doing well and healthy. HF promised (or rather - TF promised for him) that I'd get photos, etc. soon. Once I get those (and confirmation on the correct spelling of her name) I'll post them!!

Welcome the MadHatter!!

One of my friends finally started a blog!! ; ) So everyone - go check out the MadHatter's blog. (crazy for lovin' this life) I've got her linked on my page. I'm already lovin' it!!! She's got three kids - so there's some great parenting stories already!! I love her parenting style!!! I'm confident her kids will grow up emotionally unscathed!!!

it keeps on comin'

So - I have been chosen for grand jury duty. who hoo! well, not really chosen... it's not like a trial jury where they ask you questions. This is purely on a lottery system. So, I'm in. Luckily it's not everyday, all day - but I have to call in after 5pm each weekday to see if the tentative schedule has changed. So far I'm not scheduled until Monday. all afternoon....

Obviously I can't talk about what we talk about. but I already have some funny stories that I can talk about. Yesterday the jurors (me and the rest of the group) were being sworn in by the judge and his assistant. Ok, he may not be an assistant but I missed his title. Anyhoo - this other guy was the one that read the spiel that we all had to swear to. Funny thing - the guy looked EXACTLY like Cliff from Cheers. I shit you not. And he had a thick NY accent. HA!!! I'm standing there, right hand held up, trying to pay attention to what I'm swearing to and not laugh at loud at the ridiculousness of it all.... ok, I thought it was funny....

And on a serious note - I had to have another CT scan today. I've been having headaches again for the past month... Two weeks ago it was a scan of the brain and today a scan on the sinuses. I know, I know. I've heard it all. "if I had a head like that it'd hurt too!" yeah, yeah. ha, ha. very funny. Hopefully we can finally figure out what is causing these. They are quite irritating....

So that's my life right now in a nutshell. Doctors appt, jury duty and work. whoo hoo!!

My life's soundtrack

I had to laugh to myself the other day. I had an interaction with the hubby that reminded me why I married him in the first place.

me: man, I went running the other day when you were out of town. it felt great!!

D: really? do you think the cycling is helping

me: absolutely! when I was running I didn't feel like I was dragging around a lead weight. I even sprinted towards the end, like I do sometimes, but this time I felt I was really sprinting! I felt light and I was pumping my arms and my legs were just moving on their own!

D (with a straight face): Did you hear "chariots of fire" in your head?

I heart him!

He's witty like that - in a dry-humor kind of way that I'm not. I told him he is now responsible for editing the soundtrack to my life. He just proved he's much better at it than I am....

Flowers take 2

I was out of the office sick yesterday. (has anyone else besides me noticed that I get sick a lot since moving to NY??) I came in today and the beautiful flowers David sent me were still on my desk. Connie had watered them for me while I was out... but still about a third of them were drooping and dying!!!! WHA??!!! So I called the florist and POLITELY told her how unsatisfied I was that my flowers were starting to die TWO days after I had them. So they sent over new ones. Still as pretty!! And will alst much longer! (I hope..)

MUSHY WARNING!!!

If you're easily grossed out by mushy stuff STOP HERE. If not, keep reading.

Today is our third anniversary. D's out of town so I wasn't goingt o make a dela out of it today. Thought we'd go out to dinner some time when he gets home later this week. But look what he sent to my office today!!!

I heart him!!

A vote for centralized medical databases!!

I know - I sound like a dork running for office... but I have a great idea. Well, I'm sure it's not my very own idea. As a matter of fact I think I read about this a handful of years ago in a mag...

So, if you're reading my blog then you're a close enough friend to know about my car accident as a toddler. If you don't know me and happened upon this blog by accident, let me clarify... I was not driving a car as a toddler and got in an accident. Rather, I was involved in a terrible car accident when I was 22 months old. Hope that clears things up a bit.

Now that we have that settled.... I've been having more headaches and mentioned to my doctor here that I have copies of CT scans, reports, etc... She asked to get copies because that would be great to be ablet o compare the scans from 2000/2001 to now and to be able to read the reports from the surgery I had at that time.

No problem, I said. I've got it all at home. But apparently I lied because I can't find them. As I started looking I remembered that I had given everything to a doctor I saw at the Cleveland Clinic in 2003. Did I make copies of the reports? of course not. Did I make copies of the CD's? actually, I couldn't do that anyway...

So I've been on the phone all of lunch calling my old ENT, the hospital, the imaging center, to get copies of reports and disks. Pain in the ass.

So then, why can't all of our medical info, reports, imaging, tests, etc... all be centralized?? Especially in this day and age people are moving all around. Keeping track of all that is quite a task for someone with my medical background. Plus, I couldn't even make copies of the CD's of the CT scans anyway. What if I were in a major accident and they could easily save my life if only they could pull up that CT scan from last year??? Well, that's assuming they'd even know I had a CT scan a year ago since it wouldn't be in their system...

If computers are/ have been supposed to turn us into digital beings then why is the medical industry lacking so far behind??? If I remember correctly in the article I read about this, one issue stopping a "centralized medical database" was issues of privacy and the issues surrounding keeping that info safe from hackers, etc...

Now if I had any computer skills whatsoever at all I'd be going out, solving this problem and making myself millions. But since I don't can someone out there please develop this?? and soon!!!

I debated

I debated telling you this. But since I was dumb enough to share the cat-shat story I figured this isn't even as bad.

By the way - I have since determined it wasn't cat poop - but something out of his anal glands... It makes me feel better - that it wasn't actually s**t. David disagrees. He says it was still something from the back end of the cat and it involed my face.

Anywho - back to this story....

So, I've had an "issue" that required me to see an colorectal specialist. Yeah. Just the doc I want to see. I brought up the "issue" with my regular doc and she's the one that sent me to him.
Dr. Cami: You'll love him. He's great! He's young, you know.
me: Um, I don't want someone I'll "love" looking at my ass. I want an ugly, fat old man. Can you accomodate that?
Dr. Cami: No, no. I mean he's a great doctor. Don't worry about it.
me: so long as he's not a) just out of med school and 2) drop dead gorgeous
Dr. Cami: No, he's not just out of med school... and he's a good looking guy.
me: like I said - send me to some old, fat guy. please?
Dr. Cami: Don't worry - you'll like him.
me: fine. whatever. I see I'm not going to win this battle.

So I went to see Dr. Nesbitt. His name is also a problem as I dated a Nesbitt in high school/ college. I'm praying it's no relation....

So the doctor isn't drop dead gorgeous - but he wasn't bad looking either. But he made up for it by having a nurse that is EXACTLY what you'd expect at a colorectal office. Old, craggy face (probably from a life long addiction with the cancer stick) and stern, serious. Ok, I immediately felt better just having her there. She was no-nonsense, get the job done kind of gal. PERFECT!

It started innocently enough. Just talking - all my clothes on. Fabulous. Then he had to get " a look". Ugh. I'll spare you the details but did you know that colorectal docs have their own special exam tables? Serious nurse was giving me directions on how to properly, um, situate myself for the exam.

After taking a look-see it was done. As I was pulling my pants back up serious nurse cracked a smile and said "wait, tell me - what's that the Japanese symbol for?" For a minute I was totally confused. what was she talking about?? Oh yeah. my tattoo.
me: it's the symbol for strength
serious nurse: I knew I'd seen it before
me: I'm not used to having doctors see that one.

I crashed a retirement party...

I flew in last Thursday nite for my friend's baby shower... and ended up crashing a retirement party. Dad called and said one of the guys he used to coach with in WV was having a retirement party Thursday nite. So Aunt Linda picked me up from the airport and to the party we went. Good times, good times.

Got to see some of the kids of the teachers at the party that are my age. Man - everyone seems to have kids (plural) and of school age! They don't waste any time in those parts fo the woods... Heard that one of the boys that we all had a HUGE crush on in jr high is a chiropractor - and let's say I was told he's not nearly as svelt as he once was.... (but then again I could probably say that about msot of us....) But it must be pretty bad that that was specifically pointed out to me....

Then Friday was the ever-important ice cream social. There were many men in their late 30's yelling " Mr. D!! My name is on your paddle!!!" Remember - dad's been gone for 17 years... These guys were proud that their name was on his paddle (you know, back when they were allowed to paddle....) And then there were the groups of women, same age as the men, "Mr. D!!! How are you! We all thought you were the cutest teacher we ever had!!" Puke. There are just some things that a daughter doesn't want to hear....

I did see a few people from jr high but not many. But of course - my hair was lookin' especially hot....

Sunday was the baby shower. Good times, good times. TF gots loads of booty (as in gifts... you know, pirate booty.... never mind....) She has one of the new Jeep Comanders, or whatever their huge SUV is these days, and it was packed full-o-gifts. I think that qualifies as a successful shower.

Let's all wish TF good luck pushin' the little one out - preferably as close to August 19th as possible. (for her sake, anyway....) D and I will be camping in their neck of the woods over Labor Day so hopefully we'll get to see the little booger. But if not then I'm sure to make a trip when it's most convenient for them.

Sick of airline regulations

Tomorrow after work I'm on a plave heading to WV for TF's baby shower. I'm SO excited. I've known TF (formerly TM) forever. I was in her wedding... she was in mine... and now's she due in August with her and her hubby's first "kid". Can't say which since they don't know.

I saw TF back in June when I was in the area for my grandma's funeral. David and I stopped by and spent several hours visiting. She looked great at 7 months! Damn, she hardly looked pregnant. If I didn't know I would have thought she just had a little beer belly going on. Anyway - got to see the nursery - Classic Pooh. Very cute.

While we were there I literally invited myself to the baby shower. I figured she might not bother inviting me since I lived so far away - but I wanted to come!!! She laughed at me and assured me that I was being invited anyway. Isn't she sweet? I truly don't think I was on the list...

So I'm flying out tomorrow night. The shower is Sunday. You may be asking yourself why in the hell am I going so early?? Well, Friday nite is the Williamstown Ice Cream Social!! This town only has a few thousand people. Everyone who is anyone will be at the social! As a matter of fact my dad is comnig up from SC to go! So I'm hitting the road (or the airport, as the case may be) Thursday after work.

Now since it's very possible I might be seeing people at the social I went to Jr high with and the fact that I'll be seeing TF's family at the shower it is important that I look my absolute best on this trip. How does that differ when I'm traveling otherwise?? Easy - when I travel for work if my hair doesn't turn out right I don't care. They don't know what my hair looks like usually anyway. And who cares - at worst those people can just think I have a bad haircut. I really dont' care. But here.... Here I care what they think. I know, I shouldn't, but I do.

I'm not getting home until midnite Sunday. No big deal until you learn that I have to be back on at the airport at 7:30AM Monday morning to catch a flight for work. Therefore I DO NOT want to check a bag. This airport is natorious for taking FOREVER to get your bag the 100 yards from the plane to baggage claim. I want to get home and go to bed.

Now to the conumdrum. Since I'll be checking my bag I can't bring the all-important, perfect hair products. i.e. MY mousse, MY hairspray, etc... because I can't carry them on. They don't come in travel sizes - trust me, I know. I spent all nite at Wal-Mart looking.... If you know me then you know this is a BIG issue. I have crap hair. The only way I can even come close to looking "normal" is to use very specific products. What to do??

Don't laugh. But I think I have a solution. Luckily the "perfet products" I use are from a drugstore and are reasonably priced. (c'mon! I may need perfect products but I'm also CHEAP!) I've decided I'm going to hit the drug store in WV, purchase full sized products that I need and ditch them for the flight home. If I had thought about this earlier I could have put them in the box of presents I sent ahead of myself so I wouldn't have to carry them on the plane. I have thought this through.... really, I have...

I know, I know. I'm wasteful. Maybe TF can take them home with her and use them. But I sure as hell can't carry them on. But I don't care! This weekend the hair is more important than saving the environment!!! I might see DF or JW or one of the many other jr. high boys that thought I was just a crooked face with a big butt!!! I need to look GOOD!! You know, to show them that I turned out f**ckin' hot!! If only they had paid a bit more attention.....

Plus, I need to do the obligatory "girl" thing and show the WV girls that I'm walking the ever-so-fine-line of I'm-classy-but-not-too-classy-didn't-forget-my-roots-despite-the-fact-I-live-in-NY thing. Don't misunderstand - I'm not going there to show anyone up... just show that I grew up "right". Plus I don't want TF's family to think she's got a complete slacker for a friend... I mean, it may be the truth but they don't have to know that....

So you're not going to hear from me for a while. I probably won't post anything until I get back Wed. from the biz trip. And I'm sure I'll have something to say about that - since I'm the only idiot that has to go to Mississippi in late July.....

fun while it lasted

Friday afternoon I brought our new little yorkie home. Remember, I brought him home on a "trial" basis - not sure how he'd do with the cats and the other dogs. Let's just say he and Liam hit if off fabulously! Reecie (yorkie) had Liam actually playing! It was halarious to watch a 4lb yorkie getting a 100lb golden excited! Liam is so laid back - he didn't care that Reecie was jumping all over him, in has face, humping him... yep - Reecie liked Liam.

He's the cutest little thing!!! But that's the problem - he's so little. We couldn't let him out in the yard alone because there are a million places for him to get out of the fence, under the house, under the shed... we could never get all the places patched up.

Did I mention he's a vermin hunter??? and that he considers cats vermin?? Let's say we had a few interesting moments between him and the cats.... and I've hardly seen the cats all weekend.

One moment involved Reecie finding my old, almost blind cat Cabby. Cabby kept backing up as Reecie sniffed around her trying to decide if she was friend or foe. Finally she'd had enough and took off running. Bad move. He took after her like a rocket (that little shit is FAST!!!) And of course that got Liam and Nikki's attention and they took chase too. I literally had a cat being chased by 3 dogs. Round the kitchen, through the dining room, through the hallway to the family room, through the living room, around the dining room table.... every time I stepped in to pick him up one of the big dogs was in my way. I mean these guys were moving from room to room, kicking up rugs, knocking over dining room chairs... it was a fiasco! Finally I was able to catch the littel squirt. Cabby ran upstairs into David's office and sat where his laptop usually goes. She was there ALL WEEKEND. I don't think she ate, went the bathroom - nothin'. She finally moved when David came home from China and moved her so he could put his laptop back. She is forever pissed at me.

Isn't he adorable!!!!! (and small) He's essentially the size of my tennis shoe with little legs and a head. I'm serious. This guy is small!! Alas, David and I made the hear-wrenching decision to not keep him. H'es cute - but he's really like having a baby. He even has a playpen!!! I was dreading coming into work and telling his mom that we weren't going to be able to keep him. Luckily she had another family already wanting him! Whew!!! I really didn't want to see this little guy homeless. He's a sweet little dog. He'll be great for some little old lady or something.

So at lunch today I went home and told him goodbye. He's going to hs new home this afternoon. As I held him a cat started meowing in the other room. He looked at me as though to say "How can you live in this filthy house??!! It's filled with vermin!! Ugh!"

I knew then we made the right decision.

New Addition

Nope - I'm not pregnant. Don't go starting rumors....

C, from my office, has a 7 month old yorkie, a husband and a 10 year old son. Let's just say the hubby has not been adjusting well to the dog... Apparently last night he gave C the "either the dog goes or I do" bit...

Have I metioned that David has always said when the "big dogs" are "gone" he'd like to get yorkies?? I always made fun of him for wanting to go from 100 lb dogs to something smaller than our cats. And of course, there's my rule: My dogs MUST be bigger than my cats.

Well, I've met the yorkie and he's so damn cute!!!! C paid mucho $$ for him (he's registered), had him fixed, vaccinated and microchiped. He's been to training classes and is house trained.... Her son adores the dog.... She's understandably a wreck. So I called David in China and pitched him the idea of adding another 4 pounds to our current 205 pounds. This way C and her family will know he's well taken care of - plus they can still visit him, etc... we don't live but 10 - 125 minutes from each other. And really - what's one more small dog in our zoo??!!

So now we wait. I'll come get him Friday and we'll keep for the weekend to make sure there's no serious issues with the other animals. If all works out we'll keep him. barring any catastrophic issues.

Cross your fingers!!!!

Mountain Goat Dogs

Sorry for such a lag in posts... dad was here all last week and I took the week off. I really didn't feel like flipping on the computer any last week...

So LAST weekend (not the one we just had. See, I told you I"m behind) David and I took the dogs to the Adirondacks to hike Rondaxe Mt. At the top there's an old fire tower, etc.... We went with our adventure group which has a great cross-section of folks. I warned them prior to the hike that we were going to bring the dogs. I felt I needed to warn them because, honestly, I've never taken the dogs hiking before - not "really" hiking. on a path, maybe - but not a "trail"...

Might I remind you that Nikki is a 10 year old lab/chow mix that has had an ACL repair on each knee and Liam is an 8 year old golden that is easily 10 pounds overweight.... I wasn't very optimistic about how they'd do. I only took them because I was feeling guilty about leaving them home so much now that David and I have been biking a lot.

We get to the site. David has the camelback ("people" water) and "people" food. I have the fanny pack with the "dog" water and "dog" snacks. (and the metal dog dish... out "princess" Nikki wont'e drink out of anything else but metal...) I take Nikki and David takes Liam. Before we even get the trailhead I realize my ass is wet. no, SOAKING! We tell everyone else to go ahead. We may or may not make it up there with the dogs and we don't want to hold anyone back.

I take off the fanny pack - the container holding the dog water is leaking. As i'm working on fixing it David is holding both dogs as other hikers are coming off the trail with their dogs. Liam starts going bonkers. Not like "Let me at 'em"- bonkers but the "oh shit! other dogs! hide me!!"- bonkers. He backs up between David's legs, and for hte first time ever, pull sout of his collar. I'm trying to fix the water container and I hear David yelling at Liam, chasing him tyring to scruff him to put his collar back on.

My immediate thought: this isn't going as well as I'd hoped.

I was pretty sure that we would be immediately returning to the truck and heading home. But no. I fixed the leak, David got Liam's collar on and we continued on....

Not but a few hundred yards into the trail and here starts the large, smooth boulders on the trail. I took one look at them and wasn't so sure the dogs could make it - especially if there were more of these on the way. Apparently Nikki had other ideas. She didn't hesitate - jumped up and started to make her way up the rocks. Not to be outdone, Liam followed.

Nikki tracked that trail like she was following a rabbit. Her tail was wagging and she smiled the whole way up. She literally dragged me to the top. She LOVED it!! She slide a few times here and there but it scared me more than it did her. (Liam was happy to follow.)

We left before everyone else thinking we might have to hand down dogs on some of the steep, rocky parts. We wanted to have plenty of time - plus it looked as though it was going to rain.

Nope - Nikki dragged my right back down the mountain!!! She's quite agile, you know. Grandma is quite the pup!

And, of course, I have beautiful pictures of us at the top of the mt... but they're on the computer at home... so when I finally remember to do it I'll get them on my computer and post.