Sore Spots

I had to go to a dermatologist today. D’s been after me for months about a mole on my back and I finally made an appointment. The only Dr. I could find that was accepting new patients graduated medical school in the early 1960’s, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. He was a good doctor I suppose but he asked a lot of blunt questions and not in a conversational manner. He asked why I have no children, he asked why I got divorced, he asked about my dad, he pretty much touched on every painful chapter in my life. I guess I should be glad he never mentioned drinking (like that asshat gastrologist I saw last year who blamed everything on my drinking even though it’s been almost 9 years now).

I have to go back in two weeks for the biopsy results, from the things he said I’m expecting it to come back positive for some type of skin cancer, we’ll just have to wait and see which kind.

In the meantime I have to take care of the wounds he left, both with his scapel and with his questions.

It's almost time

I've always loved spring. Even here in Texas where we have a shortened spring before a damn hot summer, there's a noticeable change in the air. Spring is ripe with possibilities, flowers are blooming, days are longer, nights are filled with magic, new romances can blossom or old one's can reignite.
This year I have a new reason to love spring......BASEBALL!
I'm still as head over heals with the game as I was last year and I can not wait until opening weekend! I've been on ebay and craigslist for days, trying to find just the right deal on tickets. Of course, since it's the beginning of the season, prices are higher than they were last fall but there are still deals to be had and I'm giving it my best effort. Some of the fun for me is in the hunt for a great deal. I thought about season tickets (way too expensive) or a 10 game deal pack but that's not as fun as finding the perfect seats at a rock bottom price. Besides, this way I get to sit all over the stadium and try out the different locations so that if I ever do win the lottery I'll know where I want to buy my seats for the season.
Wish me luck

You've come a long way, baby

Long time readers of this blog know that D had problems accepting the fact that his daughter, N, is a lesbian. His struggle to accept this and the journey we have made together, as a family, were the bulk of this blog for a couple of years.
The evidence of change is everywhere and nothing summarizes the whole thing better than last night, when, after a nice dinner out which N paid for, she and her girlfriend came over to our house to watch "The L Word" since we have Showtime and they don't. D sat through the first 15 minutes of it with us before excusing himself to the bedroom to go watch Cops or Dogg or something but that was more about him being a man with a short attention span than him not being comfortable watching a show about lesbians with his family. I'm so proud of him!

Wife in law

D's ex-wife, J, has been having hip pain for months and her daughters finally convinced her to go to the Dr. about it. She works on her feet so they thought that she must have injured herself. She had x-rays and there is a tumor on her femur. They are doing and MRI next Tuesday.
In spite of how much she hates D and uses that to try and alienate the kids, she is mostly a good mom. And her "wife" has been out of work due to breast cancer for about 4 years now. They can not afford for J to miss any work. She doesn't earn much and they need every penny, especially since D jr is (hopefully) about to graduate and the child support will end.
Please send good thoughts her way.

Testing the waters?

D jr text messaged D from school to ask if he could come by and get some gas money. D text'd back "get a job". Then D jr sent a message that he's upset with his father for telling the girls (his sisters) what he did because they hate him now.
He just doesn't get it.

Stump the bookseller

I love books especially young adult fiction from the 40's-60's. I went on a search for a series I read as a kid and found it, with the help of Loganberry Book's.
Their "Stump the Bookseller" feature is perfect. I found a book a few months ago using that feature (it costs a whole $2) and this time I didn't even have to pay, what I was looking for was already in their data base. I have my first "Beanie Malone" book on it's way to me now!

Feels like old times

and not in a good way.
So, D jr threw a week long party while we were gone. There were girls as evidenced by the tampons and the panties in our bed, there was liquor as evidenced by the Jagermiester left in our fridge, there was loudness as witnessed by the neighbor who went over and told him he thought D jr's friends should leave. He blew it, big time and wasn't smart enough to cover his tracks.
and the kicker.....N's mom is furious with D for telling N and her sister what D jr did. She thinks it should have been left between D and his son. This from the woman who calls her entire family over anything that N says that she doesn't like AND she is the one who said to N "you'd better tell me what happened at your dads". It went down hill after N's girlfriend called her out for saying "that's my boy" when N told her what happened. They got into it both at her sister T's house and at mom's house. Mom screamed at N in her front yard for hours, while they were supposed to be celebrating N's birthday and ended it with "once again your fucking father has put me in the middle".
Ummm...excuse me but weren't you the one who insisted N tell you what happened? How is this in any way D's fault?
I hate drama

I love my family

The joys of homecoming

Ahh...the joys of coming home after vacation. Getting up at 6 am, waiting around for hours, first to get off the ship, then to clear customs, then to get a shuttle back to the hotel. Finding out your family left before you got shuttled back to the hotel so you didn't get to say goodbye to anyone. Realizing it may be a long time before you see your incredibly adorable nephew again. Driving 6 hours to get home. Walking in to a sink full of dirty dishes. Balancing the checkbook and seeing you are, as you had suspected, now completly broke. Stepping on the scale to discover that, in spite of climbing hundreds of flights of stairs, you still managed to gain 10 pounds in one week. Tummy trouble from all the food. And the creme de la creme, having your dog pull someone's panties out from under your bed so that you now KNOW your stepson had people over and you have to change your sheets (which you had suspected and were going to do anyway, but still, yuck!)

We had a nice trip, not all joy and sunshine, in fact some parts were quite awful (like the part when they weren't going to let the previously mentioned adorable newphew on the boat due to a technicality with his birth certificate so that my poor sister and her husband had to sit in the terminal ALL day on the day of departure, frantically calling people, trying to jump through all the right hoops and finally get onboard right before the ship sails, or the part where I couldn't find my sisters for the first day and a half because we had the wrong room numbers, or the part where the travel agent should be shot for all the things he managed to fuck up, and the part where mom and her new husband were in the Love and Marriage game show and they played it on tv all week so that everyone on board heard about how they did it in their neighbors pool) but all in all, it was wonderful to be with so much family.
I am very glad to be home but I want to hop on a plane and go see my sisters. I miss them very much and I'm going to have to figure out a way to not be so terrified to fly because I do not want another year to go by without seeing them and I want my newphew to know who I am and how very, very much I love him.

Coming to you live from the Best Western

Sometimes things just don't go our way. We had booked a night at our timeshare for tonight, to cut our trip to Galveston in half and add a little more fun to our vacation. When we got to the time share we learned they'd over booked and had no room for us. They did end up comping us two rooms at this lovely Best Western on the access road, though and made a promise of a room for next Saturday night.
The BW at least has free high speed internet and a pizza is on it's way to us.
We are having a fun time, in spite of the problems. I've read almost all of the book I brought to read on the cruise and N and her girlfriend are good road trip companions.
Tomorrow we check into the Hotel Galvez for the rehearsal dinner and then Monday we embark on the wedding cruise.
I did tell ya'll about this right? My mom....getting married on a ship...whole family coming on honeymoon? Surely I mentioned it?
N's bringing her laptop for work purposes so I'll be checking in on ya'll while we're on board. It's the same ship D and I went on for our first cruise together. I'll even post some pics for ya'll. Anyone need anything from Cozumel?

The Birthday Continues

When I got to work this morning there was a hand turned letter opener on my desk with a note from the plant manager that said "Happy Birthday, thanks for all the help, you make my job easier".
With my history of not getting along with plant managers and given the fact that this one is particularly difficult at times (although I do like him), I can't even explain how good that made me feel.
Then...I got an email gift card to Amazon from one of my soap friends!

Just like a man

D was out in the garage working on my birthday present last night. I have no idea yet what it is. He came back in the house covered in sawdust. Every inch of him. He then casually let me know that in order to make my gift, he had to buy himself a new tool. Isn't that just like a man? My birthday and HE gets a gift. I'm trying to figure out a way to pull that one on his birthday! (ok, there was that one time I bought "him" a digital camera so I could use it to take pictures of my soap but still......)

I oughta be in pictures

The summer before I started working here, the shop made some furniture for the movie “The Alamo”. It was in Santa Anna’s tent and I don’t believe any pictures of it made it to the big screen. The other day I got a call from someone at one of the big motion picture companies about duplicating a coffee table for a movie that’s currently being filmed. They just dropped off the table and we will be able to duplicate it. If they accept our bid, I’ll post the name of the movie so ya’ll can watch out for our “famous” coffee table.

A Great Day

D and I went fishing and I caught two catfish! It was so pretty out and I really enjoyed just getting out and being together. It's been a long time since we did that. I think D was a little jealous 'cause he didn't catch any fish but it's my birthday week so it's only fitting that I catch the fish.
Of course we do catch and release. I'm still not 100% sure it doesn't hurt the poor fish so I feel bad when I catch one at the same time that I'm feeling excited. Weird, huh?
Anyway, here's a link to some pictures, you have to go the 2nd page. There's a picture of me in my dress, heels & jewelery for formal night on the cruise in there, too. I had to make sure the dress was going to fit. It does but I'd better not eat for the next week! Also, on page 3 is a picture of my new car D got me for Christmas.

Proud to be a Texan American

And NOTHING says Texan and American like a gold fringed American flag carried around the rodeo arena by a rhinestone bridalled horse ridden by an overweight cowgirl while an 8 year old in a rhinestone studded shirt belts out the National Athem sounding much like a washed up star from the Grand Ole Opry after a bout with throat cancer.
Almost brings a tear to yer eye

I'm having too much fun

with Firefox's "stumble" add on

Look what I just found

Become a Republican

You gotta laugh so you don't cry

coincidence?

I was just over at Kleph Blog, where, shamefully, I haven't been in quite a while. I sort of knew him through a friend in college. He's in Peru and he takes amazing pictures and is a journalist. Anyway, after leaving Kleph Blog, I wandered over to the Candy Blog
Candy blog is my new favorite site. She gets to try every kind of candy you could ever dream of and then tell us all about it.
So, I click on over and guess what? She's doing a review of Peruvian candy.
Weird, huh?

Not so good

My favorite co-worker is in the hospital. He's the never go to the doctor type but after 4 days thinking he had food poisoning, he went to the ER. Turns out he has something really bad wrong with him, still don't know the details but he had to have surgery last night and will be in the hospital for 7-10 days!
This causes a huge problem at work as me, my boss and the other project manager are all going to be gone week after next. We were counting on favorite co-worker to be here to keep the office open and answer the phones. Since favorite co-worker probably won't be back by then, I have to come up with a solution. Having a temp alone in the office is not a good idea, in my opinion, so I'm not sure what to do. Any suggestions?