THE DAILY DIVERSION

Well, it seems like ages since I've posted. Part of that is due to my workload (at work, what a surprise), with the other part due to me being lazy. Its not that I haven't been up to anything, its just that I haven't had time to put pen to paper (as I used to do when I'd have ideas worth writing down and discussing). Also, it appears that the firewall at work has now added "blogger" sites to their "don't even think about it" list. It used to be all I had to worry about was not checking out porn at work! What will they block next? ESPN.com? Yahoo?

So, where do I really start? I'm thinking the first thing I could talk about is married life. All is well in this environment. I love my wonderfully beautiful wife and, as far as I can tell, she loves me in return. We don't get to spend enough time together, between work (for both of us), her graduate school stuff, my sports (I'll get to that later), and after work extracurriculars, we get maybe 2 good, waking hours to see each other every day. That's really not enough to discover each other, but we're doing the best we can.

Adrianne's class this year is hell on wheels. She thought she had a few bad apples last year, but, outside of just a couple of kids, this year's group are all like her absolute worst kids from last year. Its rather taxing on both of us, as she actually has to deal with them every day and I have to be understanding of what she has to deal with.

On a personal note, as much as I hated capital punishment (paddlings and such) when I was a kid, I believe kids these days need that kind of thing more than ever. Back when I was a kid (God I'm getting old) we were scared to death to ever do anything wrong at school because we knew our asses would get worn out when we got home. These days, the kids just don't care. Their parents aren't going to discipline them when they get home, so they aren't afraid of them. Then they get to come into the schools, where there's no reason to be afraid of teachers, principals, or guidance counselors, so they can get away with anything. The power is completely in the hands of the kids, instead of the other way around, and people have the nerve to wonder why this country is going to hell in a hand-basket. Well, you wanted it, so guess what you got!

Okay, enough on that rant. I just wanted to kind of get that out there. Now, what's on my mind lately you may ask? Well, my grandmother (Dad's Mom) hasn't been doing very well as of late. Less than a month ago we had to move her out of her old assisted living center because she was unable to do what was necessary to take care of herself. She had deteriorated far enough that she had to be in the hospital for at least a week and the old place wouldn't let her come back in that condition.

Luckily, we had already scouted out a different locale for her while we were there over Thanksgiving, and they had an opening. Talk about luck.

Sis and I converged on Salem and Rolla, Missouri and did everything we needed to do. Actually, Michelle did most of the work before Adrianne and I could get there, so all we really had to do was try to comfort Granny. Now, fast forward to two weeks ago...

Something happened (yet to be determined) and Granny was rushed to the hospital in Rolla from her nursing facility. From all accounts she was about as close to death as possible and to the point where they put her in a hospice room, assigned her a social worker, and got her a hospice nurse. From what I've gathered, she had pneumonia in both lungs, but I don't know what else. I wasn't able to get away from work and everything else on such short notice but Michelle and Mom got up there as quick as they could.

It was kind of "touch and go" for a couple of days, but Granny got through it. I think most of it was due to Michelle being there, as I think most of Granny's problems are psychological, as in she's severely depressed. She has no desire to get out of bed to do anything and its killing her. Without being active, and in some cases not eating or drinking anything, she's obliterated her immune system, making her susceptible to infection, disease, and everything else that runs rampant through nursing homes, schools, mall, etc.

So, this last weekend Adrianne and I went up to see her. Friday was wonderful. She was sitting up in bed and talking up a storm. She'd take short, 15 second breaks to catch her breath, then start in on another story about any and every thing. We had a great visit and my hopes were pretty high that she'll be a fighter and pull through all of this.

Well, Saturday those hopes were dashed. For every second she spent sitting up talking to us on Friday, she was laying down drifting in and out of consciousness and/or complaining about being tired or in pain on Saturday. When they came in to get her to go to lunch, she just told them to go away, that she didn't want to eat. I was able to talk her into going to eat, so Adrianne and I could take a little break to grab a bite as well and run a few errands for her (pick up a couple of things she needed/wanted). After lunch was no different. I spent the time watching TV on mute while Adrianne worked on her graduate class.

I spent very little time sleeping Saturday night, knowing my inevitable conversation with Granny the next day. No matter how many times you go over stuff like this in your head, its never easy to come out and say it.

When we went in on Sunday morning, she was in the same or slightly worse shape than the day before. This time she wouldn't even complain about pain or being tired. She just wanted to lay there in peace. I got up close to her so I could whisper in her ear, instead of talking aloud to her. She told me was so tired and just wanted it all to go away. I asked her if she wanted the Lord to come get her. Her first response was "if he wants to", which was later changed to "yes, I'm ready". I told her that we (myself, Adrianne, Michelle, Dad) didn't want her to be where she is and be miserable and "if the Lord comes for you, we want you to go with him". She was okay with that. Really, I think that's the best I can do.

Anyway, I'm tired of talking about that, as it depresses me. Hmm... other things going on in my life???

Well, I successfully played the entire fall season in my adult soccer league. I didn't score any goals and may have had a couple of assist (I never checked the stats), but I didn't completely suck. Well, at least not in my mind anyway. My teammates may disagree. So, I've signed up to play again in the spring. The season starts at the end of February and we've had a couple of practices, both of which I've missed due to being out of town. I'm back out of playing shape again and need to get to work on it. You can't realize how hard it is to get outside to run around some during the winter in an urban environment. First of all, its been dark two hours before I even get off work. Next, I've got two places I can go kick a ball around, and neither are safe for a honky at night.

Speaking of being out of town, Adrianne and I have had 3 weekends, tops, here in Memphis since Thanksgiving. One of which we had company come visit. Most of that is my fault, as I have an undying desire to go watch basketball games in Bowling Green, with other trips to Owensboro and Missouri to see the family.

Speaking of basketball, I don't know if anyone is paying attention, but the Hilltoppers are 19-5 with a nice, long winning streak going into yet another Wednesday conference clash, this time against the Troy Trojans. I say lets burn those rubbers! Right now I'm planning on going over to Murfreesboro on Saturday to watch the tilt against the Blue Raiders at the Murphy Center. MTSU has been playing well as of late, as much as I hate to admit it. However, we beat the dog shit out of them in Diddle a little while back and we're playing much better basketball right now.

I know I said this last time, but I'll say it again... I'm going to try to post a little more often. I found my username and password, so I have no excuse. Also, Adrianne's Mom is opening a coffee shop in downtown Owensboro, and has mentioned that she might like to use some of my "Rules of Thumb" for t-shirts, cup sleeves, and stuff like that. So, I have to put the mind into overdrive and start cranking some more "Rules" out. However, first, I have to fix the template, as its gone haywire!

Well, that's enough for now! Hopefully we'll see you soon!