The regular season hasn't even started, and I'm already tired of the Bungles...oh, excuse me, the Bengals.  Does anyone else have a team I can root for instead?

First off, Chad Johnson, egotist that he is, goes and changes his name to Ocho Cinco.  I'd love to see him get his wish and be traded--to a team that won't let him have that number!  And I think all the announcers should translate his name and instead of calling  him Ocho Cinco like he wants, they should just refer to him as #85, or 'the player formerly known as Chad Johnson'.

I had a bit of respect for the Bengals management at the end of last year, when they cut Chris Henry after he blew all his chances to stay out of legal trouble (just like they said they would).  Unfortunately, they crushed that bit of respect when they took him back, decided to 'give him another chance.'  Now, my hubby thinks this is just fine, says 'maybe he'll straighten up if he knows this is his last chance.'  Heck, he knew it was his last chance last year and he still got in more trouble with the law--what makes anyone think he's going to act any differently this time?  I predict he'll be in legal trouble before he gets to play in a single game this year, considering he's still suspended by the league for the first 4 games of this season. 

I guess it's a good thing I like college football, too, or I'd be SOL.

 

Got my hair cut and colored today, and it's feeling really good again.  I really like the color, instead of highlights we did low lights, since it was getting too light, especially at the ends. 

The kids and I had tickets to the Taylor Swift/Rascal Flatts concert this evening, and it was incredible!  Rascal Flatts really puts on a great show, including a wonderful light show.  I just love their music.  Taylor Swift was quite enjoyable, too, and it was fun watching Katie--she loves Taylor Swift!

The concert was a nice distraction for me, so I'm kind of glad that the date was moved back--it was originally scheduled for August 24th.  Today is my brother Herb's birthday, he would have been 44 years old--instead he's been gone for 11 years and 2 weeks.  We still miss him, and it's amazing how often my mom, my other brother Jim and I find ourselves still telling 'Herb stories'.  It makes me sad to think that there hasn't been a new story in 11 years.

Well, we started off the school year with a hectic day.  We try to leave for school at 8:30 am...and we woke up at 8:29 am.  Amazingly, we made it with 3 minutes to spare, I've never seen kids get dressed so fast in my life, they really didn't want to be late for the first day of school.

I took the week off from work, and so far I've been mainly catching up on appointments I put off during the summer.  Dentist, 2 doctors, etc.  Katie got her hair cut two weeks ago, it's shoulder length and really flattering on her.  Chris and I have appointments tomorrow.  I wanted to get his cut before school started but he begged to go to school with his long hair, and I caved.  His hair hasn't been this long since he was about 2 years old, it's below his collar in the back and he can pull the front down below his nose if he wants.  His hair a fair amount of curl in it, so it's not quite so obvious that it's that long, but it's been driving his dad crazy for 6 weeks now.  I'm in desperate need of a cut and color touchup.

We were totally engrossed in watching the Olympics the past few weeks...okay, I was totally engrossed and I made the kids watch selected bits.  Phelps was just incredible, as were both the men's and women's beach volleyball teams.  Usain Bolt was a spectacular runner, but really needs to grow up some.  The gymnastics were impressive, too, as was the men's volleyball.  I can't wait till the Winter Olympics in 2010.

Chris' football team is 1-0 at the moment.  His fall baseball team is 0-1--they lost 2-0, but it was a close game, we has many scoring opportunities we just couldn't capitalize on, including 2 kids thrown out at the plate (and 1 thrown out of the game, but thats another story).  Katie's fall ball schedule will start in a week or so.

Chalk one up for the girls, my daughter managed to 'burn' my hubby good today--we were all laughing and giggling about it all through lunch.  Here's how the conversation between Katie and my Ohio State alumni husband went:

Katie:  I might go to Ohio State some day.

Jon:  No, you won't.  You have to be smart to go to Ohio State. (This was said teasingly)

K:  But not to graduate, right?

Go Katie, Go Katie, Go, Go, Go Katie!

I'm sure our waitress and half the people in the restaurant thought we were nuts, the way we'd laugh, and then quiet down, and then look at each other and start laughing again.

Football started to day with a preseason scrimmage called the Pigskin preview.  And both kids have now had their first practice for their fall baseball/softball team.  All that's left is for mom to wash the Tahoe so we can put new teams and numbers on windows.  Gotta keep the car up to date, after all.  It's the second most important thing, after the calendar.

This past week has been quite the week for birthday dinners and other celebrations in our family.

Sunday 8/3 was my in-laws anniversary and my sister-in-law Claudia's birthday.  Claudia and Cuco (her long-time SO) came up from Florida last Saturday and spent the week.  We went to dinner.

Monday 8/4 was Cuco's birthday.

Wednesday 8/6 was my son Christopher's 12th birthday.  I have no idea how he got so old so fast.  We went to football practice.

Friday-08/08/08-we went to dinner for Christopher and Cuco's birthdays. It was also my brother Jim's birthday.

Saturday night, we went to a surprise party for my brother Jim--the big 4-0.  It was at the Moose Lodge, where they are members.  Everyone got an invitation to the surprise party except my brother, who got an invitation to "Moosefest".  He even made a covered dish for them to take to "Moosefest'.  It was fun, because he was completely surprised.  The last two surprise parties anyone has tried to throw for him, he's figured out ahead of time.

But, needless to say, I'm pretty partied and dinnered out at the moment.  Although, if someone offered to take me out to dinner, I probably wouldn't turn them down.  I surely do hate to cook.

Went to the Kenny Chesney concert Thursday night, and it was a really great time.  I just love Kenny's music, and the concert crowd was, surprisingly, one of the calmer ones we've been to this year.  All the seriously drunken people must have been over on the other side of the lawn.  I just don't understand the concept of paying lots of money to go to a concert, just to spend another huge amount of money on overpriced beer, and then behave in ways that distract you from the concert.

We had duelling ball tournaments this weekend.  Katie was playing in a softball tournament in Dillsboro, IN and Chris was playing in a baseball tournament in Brookville, IN.  They are about 45 minutes to an hour away from each othger on the back roads.  This meant Jon and I were split up for the games, although since we spent the weekend at the camper (which was just about in the middle) we still ended up with a good amount of family time.  Neither team won the tourney, but they both had fun, which is what really counts.

Early this week, the mother of one of the girls on Katie's team had a massive heart attack and died.  I didn't know the mom well at all, but Brooke is a really wonderful girl.  Brooke missed the first two games on Saturday for the funeral, but showed up at the evening game--Jon said she thought her mom would have wanted her to play, she knew how much she loved softball.  Her first at bat, she hit a grand slam--for mom.

Chris' team had some off field drama, as one of the 'diva boys' quit the team.  He and his parents didn't like that he didn't get to start the game and got pulled after one inning.  Anytime a catcher has 17 dropped balls and 5 throwing errors trying to throw out runners in one inning, he's going to get pulled.  He gave up 5 runs, and we lost that game 7-1.  You do the math.   I'm personally glad to see them go, and I hope they don't come back next year.  There are a couple of other high maintenance families and kids I'd like to see take a hike too.

Chris and I were driving from Katie's tourney to his after watching her first game, and we were hungry.  I swear, we drove for 50 minutes, through several little small towns, and only saw a Dairy Queen (which was one of the ones that only has ice cream, not food) until we went to turn into his tournament complex, where we found an Arby's.  What the heck to these people do when they're hungry?   Cook?  Egads!

We had a lovely weekend at the camper, a big group of us had a great diinner Sunday evening before we came home.  It was just a nice relaxing day.

I was on my way to Chris' baseball tournament Saturday, with Katie and one of her friends in the car.  It was about 45 minutes away from our house.  I made a flier with directions for everyone on the travel team, but of course I forgot to bring mine with me, and didn't want to go back and get it.

Jon and Chris were going to be late, since they were coming straight from Scout Camp to the ball fields.  Katie and I were supposed to beat them there by about 30 minutes.

Of course, I turned the wrong way off the highway.  After about 10 minutes, I stopped and asked directions at an Arby's. As I pulled out of the lot, I told the girls "Don't you dare tell daddy I got lost."

As we pull onto the road, the cell phone rings. It's Jon.

J:  "What the heck are you doing in Lebanon?"

D:  "How do you know where I am?"

J:  "I'm two cars ahead of you."

So much for that plan.

 

Chris had a great time at Scout Camp.  He earned 7 badges--his goal when he left was to try to get 5.  Out of 180 boys at camp, he was third highest in number of badges earned. 

Well, for better or worse, I'm going to restart blogging.  I just hit a point this spring where I had so much to do that nothing was seeming like fun, so I decided some things needed to go on the back burner, and my journal was one of them.  And as things slow down, I'm picking some of the dropped activities back up, and some are staying dropped for good.

Let's see, what's been going on since my last entry...

Once Upon A Mattress

Chris was a hit in the role of The Silent King in the 5th-8th grade production of Once Upon A Mattress.  He got lots of accolades from the audience members.  In addition to people telling me that they thought he did great (and were impressed that he managed to stay speechless!), I overheard several conversations of people I didn't even know who were commenting on how good he was.  You can learn a lot while you are helping to clean up.

Katie was busy throughout the spring and early summer with her softball teams.  Her St. John team finished second in the league which is great for them, they are traditionally not a very competetive team.  She pitched (slow pitch) and played first for them.  So many of the other Catholic schools have consolidated and draw players from what used to be 2 or 3 schools, and we are still a lone little school.  Even if they wanted to consolidate us, there really isn't another Catholic school close enough to us to merge with.

She had lots of fun with her Harrison softball team, too.  She played first and right field for them and did some catching, too.  They only lost 3 games, I think, but I'm not sure where that put them in the league standings. 

Hers softball tournament team is the only one still practicing and playing at the moment.  They did well early in the season, but lately have been having trouble playing as a team.  I'm not sure what the problem is, but they need to get it figured out if they want to win anything higher than second place.  Katie will actually miss the tournament this weekend due to an injury, more about that a little later.

The Tourney team after their 2nd place win. Katie is the one on the left in the first row.

Chris' regular season team lost three games this year, which doesn't sound bad until you know they only lost 1 game in the previous 2 years.  They moved up this year, and had some better competition, but the main problem is several of the better players have lots of attitude this year and think they know it all--and this attitude is coming directly from their parents, who think 'little Johnny' is God's gift to Harrison Jr. Baseball.  I'm hearing a couple of them won't be back next year, and all I can say is 'good riddance'.  If I have to hear once more about how so and so is the best catcher in the whole complex and that sitting out an inning might damage his ego and self confidence, I think I'll puke.  Jon and Ken (hubby and his other coach) have already said they'd rather have a team that wants to play together and learn, and maybe doesn't have such a good record, than deal with this team again.

However, Chris did get to pitch this year, and he is very impressed with his 0.00 era over 2/3 of an inning.  Honestly, he came in after Brady (who pitches very fast, but has some control issues) and Chris basically just lobs it in, and no one could figure out the change in speed.    But he doesn't care, he's got a 0.00 era!  Normally he plays second and back-up catcher.

They also got these neon 'highway worker' green/yellow uniforms this year.  At least you could see what field they were on...from 1/2 mile away.  Ken and Jon wanted a color that would get noticed...they got it.

Kaiser's Hardware 2008

Chris' travel team has finished third twice, but no higher.  However, they are having a great time.  They got really cool black and white uniforms--black socks, black pants, black t-shirts, with an white with black stripes sleeveless jersey to go over them.  They really look good in them.  They have a tournament coming up this weekend, too.

Chris in part of the travel team uniform.  I love this pic...all the black makes the blue of his eyes really 'pop'!

We've been doing quite a bit of weekend camping out at our new campsite and having a great time.  It's so nice having someplace to get away to, even for just one day.  And it's so much easier now that we don't have to pack everything we need everytime!  I love being able to leave things there.

Chris had a mild pneumonia earlier this summer...who they heck gets pneumonia in the summer?!?  I took him in because he'd been coughing for a couple weeks and it was getting worse instead of better.  We had a 4:30 appointment and they told us they were running a little late when we got there.  Well, at 5:45 we were walking out when the doctor (we were seeing one we've not seen before) stopped us and asked where we were going.  I said "Unless you're the doctor and coming to see us right now, we're leaving, we've got better things to do than sit around here for hours."  I was glad we stayed though, after they said he had crackles all over his right lung, and he ended up doing a course of antibiotics that cleared it up nicely. 

It's just not been Chris' summer, health-wise.  He also just got over a case of swimmer's ear in both ears.  No one in our family has ever had swimmer's ear before, and I was stunned by how much pain he was in.  He mentioned his ear hurt on Sunday, and again on Monday, but only once each day.  I told him I'd take him in the next afternoon and get it checked before he went to scout camp the next week and then I went to work.  He called me 3 times between midnight and 3 am, crying so hard I could barely understand him.  He's almost 12, he just doesn't do that!  He couldn't even lay down, his ears hurt so bad, and the pain radiated into his jaw and up into his temples.  I ended up leaving work about 3 am and one of the docs called in a Rx for me for numbing drops that got us to morning, and then we got into the doctor.  I hope we never have to go through that again.

Chris went to scout camp this week--2 hours away, for the whole week.  His dad went along as one of the adults.  Chris has so far earned his swimming badge (see why we wanted that swimmer's ear cleared up?), first aid badge, and painting badge, and is working on 2 or 3 more.  Jon says he's doing really well, although I guess for about 5 minutes every night he comes into Jon's tent and complains about being homesick.  I'm not sure how he can be homesick with half his family with him, but I guess he can.  Personally, I don't think he'd complain about it to one of the other adults, I think it's only happening because it's Jon there.

Katie had all kinds of wonderful plans for the week Chris was gone, but they've sort of fallen through. Unfortunately for me, the day of Mall Hell was early in the week.  I got roped into taking Katie and 2 of her friends to the mall for 6 hours.  Then the same two friends, Natalie and Liz, came over to spend the night.  The girls were outside playing and their volleyball went down the hill in the side yard, and they were chasing it towards the woods.  Supposedly the ball hit a bush and a rabbit shot out of the bush, and as they were watching the rabbit and running, Katie stepped in an old hornet nest and then tripped and rolled the rest of the way down the hill.  Nat came in and said she was crying.  My reply "Tell her to walk it off."  Then 5 minutes later Liz came in.  My reply "Tell her if she wants to see me she can come in."  (Aren't I sympathetic?)  When Nat came back again, I decided I'd better go see her. Turns out that between the hole and the tumbling, she hurt her knee.  We had ice on it for several hours, and when she still wouldn't put weight on it, we headed to the ER.  So, not only did I get to do Mall Hell with the three of them, I also got to do ER Hell.  Anyway, the final diagnosis is a sprain, nothing is broken.  She's wearing a brace and using my crutches.  3 days later most of the swelling is gone, but it's still tender and painful to put weight on, so she'll be missing her softball tournament this weekend.

We've also been to several of our 'Mega Ticket' concerts already, and had a few lovely conversations when it's just me and the kids.

Tim McGraw was great.  I never did explain to the kids why after he stripped down to his tank top, the binoculars were MINE.

Brooks and Dunn was very good, too.  I knew I'd like them, but I wasn't sure about the kids, but they really enjoyed them too.  Katie spied a woman walking around with pants that were ripped just about all the way across the top of the thighs in back.  "If she's that hot, mom, why doesn't she just wear shorts?"

Brad Paisley was the latest one we went to.  He put on a wonderful show.   Here's the conversation from that concert:

Chris: "Mom, what's that smell?"

Mom: "That would be weed."

C:  "But Mom, that's illegal."

M: "Yes, it is."

C: "Why would someone do something that's illegal?  And how do you know what it smells like?"

M:  "Um, I used to ride to school sometimes with your Uncle Herb.  He didn't always follow the rules."

 

Sorry for the long post, the next one will be shorter (as long as it doesn't cover several months).

 

I've been catching up on some friend's journals for the past thirty minutes or so, in between playing virtual tic tac toe with Chris.  LOL He could tell when I was into reading something, because that's when he won games instead of them ending in a draw.

Jeanie, your flowers are lovely, I'm jealous.  We do have a few of our daffodils just starting to bloom, but that's all.  However, here in Ohio, we have other, more reliable ways to determine the start of spring.  You think I might be talking about that goofy groundhog that lives over in Pennsylvania?  No way!

Ohio has it's very own indicator of Spring:

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Hinckley abuzz over buzzards

Famous turkey vultures will come home to roost this weekend at park

By Bob Downing
Beacon Journal

Published on Wednesday, Mar 12, 2008

In a Northeast Ohio rite of spring, the buzzards will soon be back in Hinckley Township.

Cleveland Metroparks will rely on official buzzard spotter Bob Hinkle on Saturday to officially declare that the world-famous buzzards have returned to northeast Medina County.

The buzzards cannot return to Hinckley until they are spotted by Hinkle, the park system's chief of outdoor education.

He will be out at 7 a.m. at the Buzzard Roost at State Road and West Drive to watch for the birds, also known as turkey vultures.

According to the story, Walter Nawakaniec, a patrolman for the Cleveland Metropolitan park System, told a newspaper reporter in 1957 that he had witnessed the buzzards returning to Hinckley for six straight years on March 15.

The old Cleveland Press printed the story Feb. 15, 1957, and one month later 9,000 people turned out and spotted a buzzard at 2 p.m. March 15.

An 1810 account reports the black-feathered, red-headed buzzards circling over Hinckley. But local legend says the birds may have been drawn to Hinckley after early settlers in December 1818 conducted the Great Hinckley Hunt and killed wildlife that threatened their livestock.

Turkey vultures with wing spans of up to 6 feet are scavengers and feed on the carcasses of animals. They weigh 3 to 6 pounds.

Buzzard watchers are invited to join Hinkle at the Buzzard Roost, their summer home.

Cleveland Metroparks will celebrate Buzzard Day from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Sunday in the Hinckley Reservation.

There will be scavenger hikes at 9 a.m., shuttle bus/hikes to Top O'Ledges and Worden's Ledges at 10:45 a.m. and 12:45 p.m. and bus tours of the Hinckley Reservation at 10:15 and 11:15 a.m. and 12:15 and 1:15 p.m.

Platform activities include birds of prey programs at 10 and 11:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.

Tent activities include storytelling at 9:30 and 11 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., music with the Buzzard Boilers at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. and Buzzard Bingo for kids at 10 and 11 a.m., noon and 1 and 2 p.m.

In addition, the Hinckley Chamber of Commerce will hold a pancake breakfast and art/craft show from 7 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Sunday at Hinckley Elementary School on state Route 303 just east of state Route 94 in Hinckley Township. Call 330-278-2066 for more information.

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Once again this year, the buzzards returned, so flowers or not, we know it is spring in Ohio. 

 

Katie's team lost both their basketball games today.    They couldn't get a shot to fall through the net for love or money, everything was bouncing off the rim.  Katie was a rebounding fool, though.

Chris has a double header tomorrow in a baseball tournament.  Their Friday night game got rained out, so they'll play Tuesday night too, as long as they win at least one game tomorrow.