lilsammi23's Journal

A good friend of our family is going through a very difficult time.  One of their 5 boys, ten years old (one of the twins), is undergoing chemo for a sort of leukemia.  The poor little guy just can't seem to get a break.  He recently started experiencing seizures on a fairly regular basis.  They believe they are being caused by the particular drug used in the chemo, but as it's the most effective treatment, they've decided to put him on anti-seizure medication and continue treatment.  Well, the anti-seizure medication doesn't solve the problem in about 5% of the cases of these seizures... unfortunately Owen falls within this 5%.  He had two more seizures yesterday after a full week without them.  He has now also lost a lot of functionality and dexterity on the right side of his body.  His mouth droops a little when he talks, he can't really grip with that hand...  The docs thought he might have had a sort of stroke, but they're not sure yet.  Anyway, long story short (too late) my dad went to visit Owen in the hospital yesterday shortly after they told him that he'd be in the hospital for at least another week.  They have to put him through a bunch more tests and he'll have to miss Christmas at home. 

Now, most people would be bummed about this.  He's getting poked and prodded non-stop, he's had to sleep in the hospital for the last week (since the seizures started) and now will have to be there for another week at least...  Understandably, Owen wasn't in the best of moods when my dad stopped in and was visibly upset.  My dad tried to cheer him up by telling him "don't worry! You'll be home soon!  I'm sure your mom, dad and brothers will bring your presents and everything here so you'll still get to have Christmas."  Owen looked up and asked "Yeah, but when will I be able to get THEIR presents?"  Talk about unselfish.  How humbling.

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I had the Monday from hell at work yesterday, I can't talk at all due to a cold that's settled in my throat, and yet I'm all smiles today.  Yay for St. Patrick's day and Mr. Texas :-D

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Started off as such a good day too :(  Now I just wanna go home and curl up with a movie and popcorn or maybe ice cream.

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I just realized my b-day is Super Bowl Sunday this year.  Apparently somebody will be taking off of work the Monday after... ;)

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Ever have one of those days where you're just smiley and you don't know why?  :-D

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http://www.channel3000.com/news/14992174/detail.html

And you all thought I was kidding when I complained about drivers here... This is just really sad.  I don't think the article mentions it but visibility was down to less than 1/8 of a mile in some spots.  I had to drive out to my parents' house to pick up my brother at one point and I was afraid to go faster than about 35 the whole way because you couldn't see past the end of your car.  One kid that they interviewed said he was "only going about 65-75 mph" he slammed on the brakes when he saw the brake lights but there was "absolutely nothing we can do."  Right, nothing, except maybe not be driving 10 miles an hour over the speed limit when you can't see the cars 10 feet in front of you.

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For those of you who'd like a quick re-cap of the Florida trip, here it is!

The day after Christmas, we arrived at the airport to head down to Clearwater/St. Pete at about 4:30 pm.  Plane was supposed to board at 6:30 pm, leave at 6:45 and we were supposed to be in FL by 10:30 (time change, Central to Eastern).  We find out at 6 that there is a mechanical problem with the plane we are supposed to be getting on in 30 short minutes, said plane has not even left Nashville yet.  Needless to say we were a little irked.  Apparently they had to send a second plane over to Nashville to pick up the people waiting there, take them to Clearwater, pick up the people in Clearwater to bring them back up to us, THEN pick us up to take us back down there.  The plane finally arrived and they started boarding at about 11:30 pm.  We sat around till oh, about midnight, then finally took off for Florida!  We landed about three hours later at 4:00 am local time and made our way over to our hotel in Tampa.  Now, there were three of us sharing this hotel room, two girls and a guy.  We were supposed to get a room with two queen beds, the girls would share one and the guy would be in the other.  They put us in a room with only a king size, no roll-away, no cot, nothing.  After they realized their mistake they finally found us our correct room and we got to go to sleep at about 5 am.

The next day, Thursday was going to be Busch Gardens but since we were all exhausted, we slept till 11 and hung aroung the pool all day instead.  I actually did manage to get some nice color. :)

Friday we went to a beach called Siesta Keys or something like that.  Gorgeous beach.  The sand seriously felt like walking around on powdered sugar.

Saturday the girls shopped, I have no idea what the rest of the group did.  I'm guessing golf or something :)

Sunday we went to the UW Band's beach day at Clearwater and had a good time hanging out with all of the other fans who came down.  We went out that night.  Not surprisingly, the only other people who were out were other people going to the football game :)  (we even had a couple beers with some Tennessee fans). Strangely enough, apparently Florida locals just don't feel the need to hit the bars on Sunday nights... who knew?

Monday was mostly a pool day.  I'm proud of myself, I got a lot of reading done on this trip (that'll happen when you have 6 hour delays)  I got through three books and well into a fourth.  Go me! :)  Monday night we went for a nice dinner and greeted the new year in the hotel bar.  Since the game was the next day I was in bed by 12:30.

Gameday!  We went to a fun tailgating shin-dig, watched the Badgers lose :( then went back and drowned our sorrows a little before heading home.

On the way back our flight was delayed another two hours.  Yay.

All-in-all though, it was a pretty good trip.  We hoped for a slightly more triumphant return but what can ya do? :)

Edit: I forgot to mention that there were a couple of the most beautiful guys from London at our hotel.  We chatted with them on New Year's Eve.  Mmmmmmm, gotta love the accents :)

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So here I am, fresh from Florida with a nice rosy glow!

I did have the guts to put on a bikini and run around the beach, but unfortunately am not quite brave enough to allow pictures to be taken of the phenomenon.  Sorry to all those who were hoping ;)

Anyway, it was a good time.  I'll try to remember to update this entry and add more about the trip in a bit.  For now, I go to work!

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In six days I shall be off to Florida for a week! :)

Wish me the guts to put on a bikini! ;)

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Ok, so many of you know that I've been seeing BB for a while now.  Well, it's just a little weird at the moment.  We never ever seem to do anything with his friends.  I mean, I'll ask what he's doing on a given Saturday and he either says nothing and we do something together or he says something like "Oh, my friend is having a party for such and such...", note, there is no "Do you want to come?" attached to the end of that statement.

I'm not sure whether I should be offended by the fact that he never seems to want me to come with him when he does anything with his friends.  Don't get me wrong, I fully expect him to have nights with just-the-boys or times when he doesn't want me to come etc...I have those too.  But seriously, every time?  I dunno. :-/  Ugh, I hate this stuff.  I'm especially annoyed because I feel like I shouldn't be annoyed when this happens constantly...

On the positive side, I've gotten myself back up to 3000m (meters), 3 times a week for my swimming :)  Yes, I realize that is pretty pathetic for a swimmer (I used to do 2000m as a warm-up before I would start my workout) but still.  Something to be happy about :-D

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