On Oscar night, a little show from my drama queen

As though a thousand words weren't enough...



...how about a few laughs as well...

...she thought I was going to take a picture, but soon learned otherwise.

Rude (but necessary) awakening

Mom just called me. She was cleaning her bathroom (at this time of day) and got bleach in her eye. She was a little panicky, so I called my sister and conferenced her in. We talked her down and got her to rinse her eye for awhile, and we called the Philadelphia Poison Control Center. They've advised her to go to the ER. She refuses. Oh the joy of stubborn moms. The best we could do was get her to agree to keep rinsing, 15-minutes at a time, and to call her personal doctor when they first open to get a second opinion. Sis is calling her back every hour to check on her status prior to reaching her doctor.


Update: Mom finally called her doctor, who referred her to an ophthalmologist. They put her on eye drops and antibiotics, so she's on her way to recovery.

Ashes to ashes

Took the girls to mass for Ash Wednesday. Tried to convince Darby again to give up boys for lent. She's just not buying it. :(

You call this progress?

Shelby's progress report, given to me mysteriously late (vs Darby's which was brought home last week), had a C on it, a decline in one subject compared to last quarter. Grumble, grumble.

Getting fat on Tuesday

Took the girls to a Chinese buffet for dinner so they could stuff themselves before lent. Dinner time conversation included what we were giving up for lent. Darby said TV and Shelby said her gameboy. I told Darby she didn't HAVE to give up TV, and that she could give up boys instead since that probably fits better into the "fasting" concept. Her response? "That's pretty much not possible."

Ugh.


Update: Well, Darby realized giving up TV was a bit too extreme. She wouldn't give up boys still, but I let her switch to chocolate. To be fair, I had to let Shelby switch also, and SHE switched to boys, not that that helps, as she's still in the "boys are yucky" phase (unlike Darby apparently).

Authorized hookey

So it turns out the girls didn't have off yesterday for President's Day, even though I kept them home thinking they did. I am unhappy about it. Mostly because while the school didn't have off on a federal holiday, it DOES have off NEXT Monday (and the Friday before) for them to take care of internal business. WTF? The school year was lengthened by four days due to weather but we still have this overhead built into the system? I don't like it. However, I do not regret our time at the park yesterday. That I would do again in a second.

Spring training

Thank goodness for the signs of spring. Warm temperatures made for an excellent holiday.

We got some business out of the way first in the form of new shoes for Shelby and dentist appointments for the three of us. But I was a little miffed by what can only be described as a useless appointment for myself. While the girls got cleanings as expected, my mouth was just "looked at" and a secondary cleaning appointment was scheduled. I have no idea what that's all about, but I got tired of being inside on such a nice day, so we got the heck out of there.

Instead, the girls and I spent nearly three hours at the park. I'm pretty sure the girls had an awesome time. Darby and I got some softball warm-up in as well, as the season is just around the corner. I SO hope this weather is here to stay.

Tulsa for dinner

So we just got back from a whirlwind trip to Tulsa, mostly just for dinner. We met up with some friends we hadn't seen in a few months, got a few hours of socializing in, and had a nice dinner before heading back to OKC. About a twelve-hour round-trip outing.

Accepted!

I was pleased to learn today that Darby's recent audition resulted in success. Darby will be going to one of the best schools in the state starting in the fall! What I'm not looking forward to is the girls' going to two different schools for the first time ever. Congrats Darby!

Humbug

Thankfully, the "holiday" passed by in a mostly harmless way.

A month ago we bought valentine cards for the kids to distribute at school, and I had them fill those out last week, so that had long been out of the way. Last night we got supplies for the kids' school valentine parties, so no big thing there. Though after all that, Shelby missed her valentine party.

I got a call from the school just after ten this morning. Shelby had a fever and needed to be picked up. But I had a mandatory meeting at eleven. And her mom, who works closer to the school, was out of town on business. Ugh. So I had to make the cross-town trip to school, pick-up Shelby, get lectured by the school nurse, swing by the pharmacy, drop Shelby off at my dad's (thank goodness he's still recovering from surgery and so not at work), and head to my meeting. I was only five minutes late, so not bad.

I am an f-ing genius

I learned today that the least likely person on the planet referred to me as an "f-ing genius". Not my words, but I'll take it. Apparently, his firewall guy is somewhat less knowledgeable about such things than myself (his former firewall guy).

Quaking again

Not long after the earthquakes we felt a couple months ago, along came seven more quakes in two days (PDF). I didn't feel any of them, unlike the last time, but one of the epicenters was an intersection I drive through everyday.


In less than earth shaking news, Darby got her 3rd quarter progress report today. As suspected, her tenuous straight As have turned into 2 Bs and the rest As.

Darby the eager reader

Darby has been a pervasive reader for quite some time. She's like her mom in that regard. She's required to do a book report for school every three weeks, she picks books with 2-3 times more pages than the required minimum, and she's got to hold a class record with a 300+ page book she read back before the holiday break. Well, today she impressed me again by reading a 144-page book in one evening. I know I couldn't do that.

Pool party in February?

Shelby had a pool party to attend tonight. It was held at a hotel with an indoor pool, so she thought it was the greatest thing to be able to swim in the winter. It was technically a sleepover at the hotel, but I just let her attend the party itself for logistical reasons (hotel on the complete opposite side of town, things to do on this side of town in the morning). One of these years we're going to do something like that for Darby since she's been saddled with a January birthday.

The GSC incident

At work, sometimes we get boxes of hardware. Someone has to pick them up from the corporate office, and bring it to the base. Once at the base, someone has to head downstairs with a cart to haul the equipment upstairs. So it's common to receive a phone call to this effect... "Hey, could bring a cart down? I've got some stuff to take upstairs." It happened as recently as a couple days ago. So today when I got the hey-bring-me-a-cart call, I didn't question it. Well, not much anyway. I slightly ridiculed an office mate that would have normally gotten the call, but was with a customer. (it's not technically my job, but I'm here to help)

So downstairs with a cart I went, wondering what goodies we had received. Until I saw them. The cookies. Girls Scout Cookies.

My reaction:
You have GOT to be kidding me. You're kidding me right? You did NOT just call me down here for Girl Scout Cookies.


Had I been told the pick-up was cookies, and asked kindly to assist, I probably wouldn't have objected. But the issue was the complete omission of that detail, and permitting me to believe we were getting goodies of the computer hardware variety. So, imagine my disappointment.

Perhaps it also wouldn't have been an issue if some of those cookies were mine. But I had already ordered cookies from another source, from which they were delivered a couple days before. Directly to my desk (thank you!). So to have to grab a cart, take the freight elevator, and get out in the cold for cookies that weren't for me... not quite so enticing.

Bowling for Pluto

For weeks we've been trying to get them together. JuCo and Pluto. Finally today we were successful. JuCo and Pluto together at last.

It took a gathering of folks for a lunchtime bowling session to make it happen, and there was much fun to be had. Probably the funnest lunch in a good long while for me. I only bowled a 103 and a 136, but I'd do it all over again no question.

Time to back-off?

Both my father and my brother were pulled over by the police today. My dad did not get a ticket, but my brother did ($154!). So I figure it would be best if I were more careful for at least a few days since such bad luck comes in threes.

I have been getting sloppy of late. Letting five-over turn into six, seven, or ten-over. It's only a matter of time. And if this isn't a "sign of the time", I don't know what else would be.

And the winner is...

"Connectile Dysfunction".

With "Rock, Paper, Scissors" a very close second.

Sure, the majority of the public disagrees, but this is MY blog. And I choose the winners here. Congrats Sprint, for winning the 2007 shawnwright.blog Superbowl Ad top prize. A highly coveted award in at least one American home.

Birthday festivities concluded

We finally held Darby's family birthday dinner this afternoon, effectively concluding her 11th birthday festivities. Her choice for location was the "OG" (Olive Garden), which is always tasty, but I wasn't particularly keen on their refusal to take reservations on weekends. So, I had to show up thirty minutes early to get a table for 14. Other than that (and a small screw-up on my part with invitations) all went fairly well and the food was very good.



I updated the album with a few pics from today's activities.

It's official, the Empire has taken over Walmart

Apparently there was an uprising in the local Walmart today, cause there were a couple imperial troopers at the door standing watch. Glad I missed the ruckus, cause that little trooper, he looks like he could put the smack down on me if I got out of line.

Best scoring drive ever

No, I'm not talking about football. I'm talking about Shelby and her fencing. Tonight she won both of her practice bouts, and in reviewing the video I made of them, I've deduced that this is one of her best scoring drives ever.



She's really starting to get decent at this stuff, though she has plenty of work to do before she can compete with some of the older (up to 12) kids with more experience.

Passing frozen gas

Turns out my car trouble last night was symptomatic of a bigger problem after all. The car started fine this morning, but as soon as I started driving I noticed two things. First, the "service engine soon" light was on, and also the thing was sluggish as all get out. Felt like it could die on me at any time, which made me tremendously uncomfortable because I was driving the girls to school, and it was snowing. So, instead of going in to work, I went straight to the car dealership after dropping off the girls.

Though I arrived at the dealership before eight, and explained the problem, I ended up being there an agonizing 3.5 hours. And for what? Frozen gas. Or more specifically, frozen water in my gas lines. A rare, but possible issue, and of course one of those things that only happens to me or a few unlucky souls like myself. The solution was basically to let my car sit inside for a couple hours, put some additive in the tank and call it a draw. Though they did also notice an issue with my fuel injectors, so they got a $100 donation from me to flush and clean the injectors. Meaning I've now spent nearly a thousand dollars on car issues the last six months.

But whether it was a placebo effect or something else, the difference in how the car ran afterward was like night and day. Seemed like it was running better than it had in a long time. Maybe it was the injector cleaning, but I don't know enough about such things.

All that ordeal did was delay the inevitable. My work badge expired yesterday, so I had no way to get onto the base to report for work. I was scheduled to have my credentials replaced this morning, but of course that got re-prioritized with the car issues. So after the car dealership and lunch, I finally took care of that, which is never a terribly fun process. It was 2pm before I finally got to the office, which wouldn't have been a big deal had I not been in at all this week due to my trip. I would also agonize less about the process if it weren't for the fact that I have to do it again in less than a month. The government extended my existing contract because they couldn't get it renewed/replaced in time. But that's something I don't even want to get started on.

Instead, I must take a moment to give props to the metro street crews. While they got off to a slow start (my first impression was "emergency snow route my butt")...



...by the middle of the day things were not too bad, and by the after work drive home, things were almost normal. I figure they must have gotten plenty of complaints from their less speedy performance during the last storm a couple weeks ago.