After five days of relative quiet, I happened to enter the luggage claim area moments after M, E and baby m exited an elevator from arrivals. I was greeted in the loud airport din by an inquisitive and quite soft "Daaddy, Daaaaddy" amongst the hurried and frenzied tourists waiting for luggage. It could not have been more subtle but I picked up on it like an Atom bomb in the back yard. Music to my ears.... I quickly sidled up beside M and the kids and presented E and M with some flowers. E asked, Flowers for me daddy??" "Yes, for you and Mommy" I explained and preceded to give her a great big hug as I lifted her up. M was a bit surprised but a hug later and were were off in quest of the luggage. All in all, the pick up was a breeze and having my family back was a spectacular feeling. After peace and quiet for five days, I now know that that isn't how it supposed to be.

Listen to it!

I have been by myself for three days now and can say I am getting stuff done. I have now successfully finished the electrical part of our basement with some satisfaction. It didn't jump to life due to of course a minor screw up on my part but when you do this stuff every three years or so....

I have shopped for parts, tried to recycle, dug up the troublesome outdoor lighting wiring and helped my dad do a garbage disposal at one of their rentals which of course turned into much more.

Dad came over after 1:30 pm. and looked over the basement a bit as I was finishing up what I could there for the day. Well, I was running around trying to think of stuff to do before I left. As I finally was ready to walk out, I looked at my tools sitting in the garage and thought "I should take those cause it's nice to have my own tools"... I didn't. When we arrived at the rental, the first thing a tenant said was "we just had a situation" usually very bad in tenant speak. Well, it was stated that a "friend" (its always someone else) tried to plug something in to a receptacle and it took out the main breaker for the house. Wow that isn't good! Anyway, that started everything in motion. Wondering where my electrical tester was (garage), I pulled off the wall plate and discovered that the receptacle had cracked, and shorted out probably due to 30 years of heating and such, it happens. Well, I didn't have a replacement so I taped it up to make it safe and went about the disposal. I turned off the switch and started disconnecting it and got a spark off the neutral (white) which should never happen. Well, that led to pulling the switch apart which was wired incorrect, which sent me to the basement to disconnect the power so I could fix it. In the basement, the situation was not really any better. Long story short, I now had to go home to get my own tools. My dad had a few miscellaneous jobs to do so I drove home to get my stuff. A receptacle and my own tools. On the way, I was angry at someone or something but I couldn't place what. The most convenient was my dad for getting me into this situation on such a great day, then I thought about the countless times he dropped what he was doing to help me or anyone for that matter. I soon realized that he was not the culprit.

Once I returned to the rental, attitude adjustment in hand, we set to work fixing all the unexpected problems and were done in an hour or so. As we were talking on the way home, it really dawned on me what was to blame for the problems we encountered...

the voice!

Lone time is confusing

My family went to N.Y. to visit Grandma P and all the rest of the C's and D'A's. E and not so much baby m were only slightly aware that anything out of the ordinary was going on. "Were going on a trip....." With sadness, I watched them all disappear into the terminal. I will miss them.

I was hoping E was going to take it easy on M as she was by herself to try to keep E reined in. I dropped them off at Detroit an hour before scheduled departure, and at 2 pm M called so I knew they were not in the air. Well, it seems that there was a 1.5hr delay, I hope that is all they encountered.

Now, I am at home after my return trip and wondering exactly what does one do with free time??? Frankly, I currently feel lost. No drinks to prepare, no DVDs to insert, no going outside, no knees to kiss, no going "upstairs" and no questions to answer. Yeah, I feel lost. I have a huge mental list that I want to tackle while off work (due to strike... more later) and the house is empty. I guess I will sit for a little bit and regroup. I have to go to the Father / Other dinner tonight sans my son, where a really good speaker is scheduled. I am hoping my dad will sit with me instead of washing dishes, so I feel a bit more legitimate attending. So for now, I will not be efficient and I will wait until time to leave. I will make my mental notes and hope I get some of the items crossed off between now and Sunday. Oh, and as it would happen, a "Monk" is on that I haven't seen...

On second thought, I am alone in a quiet house... Glee or confusion?

Sprung

Today is in the mid 70's and just a good day to be off. I am "On strike" truely from work. We have been without an agreement for 6 months since the National agreement was finalized. Our big stopping issues are the reduction of work force in the name of "Core vs. Non-Core" employees. What it means in a nut shell is that I could be labled as Non-core and face a wage cut or.... Well, I really hope that it never comes to that

Right now, I am thinking of ways to make sure I use my time efficiently but also how to enjoy the time with the family. M, E and little m are leaving next Tuesday for New York to see the Clarks. I will miss them. Lots!! If I am still off work, I hope to get lots done though. I can't even begin to list the Spring time items. Yard, basement, garage, duplex and household items will keep me very busy.

I can hardly believe it, m has finally taken a bit of a nap. More or less, the one he never really took yesterday. M and I are guardedly happy about how he is sleeping for quite a bit of the night right now. Crossed fingers and all, he sure looks really great laying there lumpish and all. M and E went to the barber shop to get E's hair cut short for the Summer. M and I both think that E looks great with short hair, and it hopefully will make it easier for Daddy to make her pretty!

Who's payin' for this??

This hopefully will be quick. There are certain levels of performance I expect when paying for something. I don't mind paying someone to do something they are more qualified than I am.

my own definition of; "Professional;

Someone who gets paid for what they do, but does necessarily do what they get paid for well!"

We are having some work done in our home and I pointed out to the "professionals" a possible problem from a finished stand point. I was assured that it would be fixed and I would never notice it. As a trades person, I figured that was enough and that the issue would be taken care of properly. I put it out of my mind as I have many other things to think of . Today, after all the work was finished, I saw the possible problem staring me in the face, Finished!

Well, it will be taken care of but it just irks me to know the problem could have been dealt with earlier and with great ease. Instead, it needs to be deconstructed, reconstructed and refinished. ugh! Ugh!! UGH!!!

Note to self; Be the pain in the rear that you don't want to be, because you'll be sorry if you aren't!

Weekly history lessons

So for going on 5 years, I have been spending a couple hours a week at an old folks home. I visit elderly gentlemen who reside there and have become quite fond of the time spent there. I was spurred on by the actions of a "friend" R, who I like but is for unmentioned reasons, morally bankrupt. Anyway, he related to me while we were working on a Turkey barn for MSU, how he had befriended an elderly man in need. He stated that on many occasion, he would see this man trudging along the road carrying groceries and such. One particularly cold February day, he saw the old man, turned around and asked if he could give him a ride. The man stand-offish, finally agreed. To make a long story short, R began to help this man (Irv) once a week to do groceries and banking. I really was taken aback at R's generosity of time and friendship. I went off to GM and no longer worked with R but that act really stuck with me.

I thought for a few years about this act and wondered where I might find and old man trudging down the street in need? I really hadn't seen one in Okemos.

I was now dating M and we happened to be at a New Years Eve party (02-03) with friends and as the hour approached, everyone was talking about new resolutions. When asked, I said that I was going to do something of "consequence" this year. I guess I didn't know exactly but I knew it would involve the elderly. Someone said jokingly "that sounds very deep" or something like that, noting that, "you'll make us all look bad". I kept the yet unknown details to myself. I new Now, that something was going to change.

I sat on it a while longer but finally the pulling from within landed me at the Dobie Rd facility very near my home. I was not ready for the steps it took to become a "Friendly visitor" including a criminal back ground check, finger prints and two character references, Wow! Anyway, I met with the person in charge of volunteers and requested some Catholic gentlemen in order to have something in common. Initially I was set up with three gentlemen so I figured I could spend thirty or so minutes with each to fill in about two hours. That was the beginning of my "weekly history lessons" that I have come to enjoy and miss when not able to attend...

More to come on A, H, G, B and H (my old guys)

Coffee Dance

I am a person who learns by doing with my hands... "tactile" for those who know better.

In teaching our daughter, I like to explain and purposefully enact each sequence of what I do. One thing I share with E is the making of coffee. From an early age, as I held her to stop any possible crying, I would make the coffee and try to make it fun. The process, quite lengthy includes opening the cupboard door, getting the coffee filters, coffee and most importantly the "Coffee Grinder". I guess to make this short, I will not go through the whole thing and jump to the "beans of it" as it were. With and empty grinder, we pour the beans in, pick it up and with either a count down or a short drum roll, we commence to - pressing the button, shaking, bouncing up and down and gyrating like mad, for 15 or 20 seconds. I also to make it more dramatic, hum and growl to mimic the grinder noise. E seems to like the stimulation and expresses it with a big grin and some wonderful giggles. Ever I dare to make coffee on my own and she is within ear shot, she will turn her head from the TV chair or come running and loudly ask "can I hep eewwwe??" Sometimes I feel guilty or maybe sad if I do do it alone. I know that this will not be a life long practice and I am sure I will miss it. I do for my sake have baby m to do it all over again with though.

I want to at this point engage my kids in many functions of life. I think goofy is fine and try to come up with plenty of it. I am sure they may think differently but this is a God given right of a dad as far as I am concerned. For now I can do what ever makes me feel good and I hope it will allow my family to either grin widely or groan but laugh inside.

A Nice Spring day

So my wife M was very surprised that I would have any interest in blogging. For now, I do. Anyway, after showing her my new space, we decided to set out my birthday gift from last year. A GEO Cache. After getting a location narrowed down, we took baby m for a walk on this, a mostly sunny and warm April day. Temperature at 71 degrees we walked in a Twp park for the right spot. He mostly slept in the carrier against my chest and we had a very nice time. On the way, we spotted a Blue Bird and many other Cardinals, wood peckers and much more. What a great start to a day. We found the right spot and now we have to submit to the governing authorities for approval. We hope to place this cache soon with E and m next week when the temp is supposed to get back int the 60's after this w.e.'s major cool down with snow for Sunday morn.

We started Caching a year ago plus. We decided that it was a nice way to get to some out of the way places that locals know about that the rest of civilization jsut passes by on a daily basis. So far so good, we have tried it in many locals (NY., NJ., CA., MI. and PA. and had fun doing it along the way.

Taking charge???

So I was kind of hoping to ride the coat tails of M and let her chronicle My life. She has been the only one to make a log of our travels and our doings other than taking pictures which I really enjoy. Anyway, I am starting out on my own to take charge of what parts of my life I feel are important that I don't want to forget.


There are so many things that I don't want to forget and only so much precious time to do it. As long as I try to post semi often, I think I can do it. Maybe I will do it at work with a few spare moments from time to time. The hard part is that I may be mid sentence and then a trouble call will come and I will have to sign off immediately. We'll see how that goes.


As I sit here, my son M is next to me sleeping on the floor. He is well fed and content. I just dropped off my daughter E at here new school and that was not too bad except for the snot oozing kids that seem to glom on to me and want to sit on top of E as she is sitting in my lap. What has led me to this Cyber Space is just those two examples (kids) as well as a gentle nudging from M for "taking charge" of my thoughts and memories.


I always felt in school that I could quite eloquently write a paragraph and in the end say nothing so beware, I am sure more of that is to come.


There are a few things I want to talk about are; Coffee Dance, Going beyond my comfort zone (running(Meg), work(ERT, T.L.)), Kids, and a host of other things.


Tune in later...