Memorial Day

Today is Memorial Day. It is not just a day for picnics, going to the lake or great sales at the mall. Today is a day to remember all the men and women who have sacrificed either a portion of their lives or who have given the last full measure for all of us here in the US to be able to say we live in freedom. First is my Dad. He served in the Navy during WWII on Okinawa doing radio communications. Second is my son Joseph who served in the Army. This is a picture of him home on leave from Iraq. He served with the Engineers restoring bridges there. I love this picture of him and Jo. Third is my brother-in-law Chappell affectionately known as "the Colonel". He was an Army Green Beret serving during the Vietnam era. He was stateside training other soldiers in the Airborne at Ft Campbell, KY. Thanks to not just these great soldiers but to all who have worn the uniform. Because of you all we have the freedoms we cherish.

Happy Birthday Jonathan!

Today is my eldest "baby's" birthday. This is just a crazy picture taken earlier this year. Here Jonathan is with Joanna and Jaxson, Ryan, & Drew while they were at the Ponderosa. Happy Birthday Jonathan, love you.

Verdict

The verdict is in and the laptop is dead. When Uncle Daisey came in over the weekend he did all the things that needed to be done to hopefully to save the laptop. It was a lost cause. Not only could he not get it into safe mode he could not get it to stay on long enough to get it to safe mode. I appreciated his trying and he did not want me to have to buy a new laptop if it could be avoided but now all I can do is go to the Best Buy Geeks and get them to rescue the harddrive and put my stuff in a new computer. Have I ever mentioned I hate computers. They make us need them in so many ways and then they quit on us. I had always had trouble with that particular computer but now that I do not have it and have to use the old dinosaur PC I am missing it. Guess I will go computer hunting again but it won't be for a Dell.

Crazy Week

Last week was a really crazy week. Uncle Daisey came back Wednesday to load all the rest of his stuff for the move to Lubbock. (Pitifully Jo asked me yesterday how long he would be gone. I did not have the heart to tell her we don't know if he would ever move back in the DFW area so I said at least two years. Her little eyes welled up with tears and she said, "that's too long.") Here is Uncle Daisey pausing in the middle of moving the furniture to take a work call. I just thought it looked funny because the cushion was out of the chair. Then on Thursday on top of Uncle Daisey packing, Blah Blah finally got to have her back surgery, yeah! It was a long time coming and hopefully she will feel her old normal self soon. Grandma Clara is reading to Jo while we were waiting for the doctor to come out and give us a report. Grandpappy Pete was wisely using the time for a nap after the drive in from Odessa. Scout was so tired that she fell asleep in the chair. Over the weekend we flew to Amarillo for the twins second birthday party. Unfortunately those pictures are on my regular camera and I have yet to be able to get them downloaded here. Monday was another Remicade infusion for my RA. Good thing too as I think the last one was all gone. Yesterday we went to wait for the cleaning people to clean Uncle Daisey's house so the renters could move in. This ended up being an all day thing. Fortunately the girls came to keep me company. Jo amused herself by drawing with a Sharpie on a box that was in the garage and then playing with toys inside the box. Boxes make the best toys. Uncle Daisey wanted to check out what the problem is with my laptop but there has not been enough time so I told him to look at it when he comes this next week. I am really missing the simplicity of having it to say nothing of not being able to download pictures from my camera. The socks here are some Berocco Metalic that I just finished. I love the yarn. I used Yarn Harlot's Basic Sock Recipe of course. More knitting is going on just not photographed. Busy times.

Seriously?

Yes, seriously. I am still here but still dealing with no laptop. So because of that I have been using the OLD computer. It leaves me in need of serious help not only in fastness but in the fact that it will not let me access/perform certain functions. Grrr. So I have not posted very much about anything, RA/OA or even my knitting projects to say nothing of grandkid pictures. I have a whole camera card of pix that I have yet to be able to download on this dinosaur of a computer. I also thought by this time, after five years, that I would be working again. Life happens and as Jo says my job is playing with her. After the "kidney" thing in December I thought I was doing better. That was until April 21st when it happened all over again. Let's just say I was not as impressed with the ER people or the meds they gave me to keep me from throwing up and eliminate the pain. They did neither. It is kindof hard to move to a CAT scan table when you are in so much pain that having a baby seems like a walk along a sandy beach with a cool wind blowing while you are sipping your beverage of choice. It was awful. So because they could not find any reason for the problem and supposed ruled out any "kidney thing" this time I had to go to the urologist. Yeah, fun. But he was a wonderful doctor and after looking at my $3000 CAT scan said, "You have no kidney problems and probably never did." Ok, what then? Well everything looked good, but of course I have "severe back issues." Everytime a doctor tells me this I just want so say, "Ya think?" What I did not know before this last scan was that my back is FAR worse than I thought. I have said for several years that it was bad but man it is BAD, severe degeneration. Well thank you osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. So I am hoping that I have no more of those painful weird episodes, knock on wood, but am going to try to be careful and guess the back exercises will have to be everyday. Hopefully soon I will be back in the swing and can post my knitting stuff I have done for the kids. Dang not feeling well is a pain in the..well..back.