Where's the stuffing!!

To my relief and a miracle I am able to write this blog. While all of you were out Christmas shopping I decided I needed to work off the turkey dinner, by tackling Zachary's room. I thought about taking a before picture to post but to be frank I was embarrassed on how bad it had gotten. I have seen messy rooms in my days ( I thought I saw the worst when I saw Sally's bedroom before we got married) then Michael's room gets bad too, and I have seen other messy rooms but nothing I swear nothing compares to Zachary's. Last year when it was messy (nothing like this) we went out and bought containers and storage bins. We organized everything thinking it would be easier for him to keep his room clean. Nope. Instead there were lots of empty totes and cracked bins blocking the door way ( Kaity and Zach thought more useful using them for stepping stools and hiding places). I know you are sitting hear reading this and thinking I should have made him clean it. My wife and I have had on several occasions. It seemed like every time we sent him to clean his room it got messier. On one occasion he discovered his art easel while trying to clean. He dragged it out and of course it was lying on the floor on top of the clutter. One time the police came to our house and asked us if we knew where Jimmy Hoffa was. We had no choice but to lead them to Zach's room to begin there search, luckily they didn't find anything. It was so bad that all Kaity's and Zachary's clothes vanished in the room. Of course, it wasn't Zachary's fault for his room getting that way. Kaity did it. I think his room has a magnetic field that pulls everything in the house to his room. I found all my black dress socks which have been missing. There seemed to be a treasure in his room for everyone in the house. Yesterday, I spent 5 hours in the room and by the time I quit there was still no floor to be found. I am not finished but there is a floor now. Sally has a billion loads of laundry to wash. I might even get saucy and finish putting the final touches on his room that was suppose to be done almost 3 years ago, ahhh maybe not. I promised him if his room started to get messy Sally and I are going to start locking him out of his room. Our neighbor gave us that idea when she locked her 8 year old out of her room because of the mess.

Hope everyone had an enjoyable Thanksgiving and full bellies. We had a quiet dinner. Sally made dinner at her mom's. It was just us and Mary (her mom). We had the tradition Thanksgiving dinner : turkey breast, gravy, mashed potatoes, green jello mold, sweet and sour green beans, sweet potatoes casserole, cauliflower cheese gratin, roles, cranberry sauce and stuffing. Yes , that's all we had. Oops did I say stuffing. I forgot we didn't have stuffing. Someone not mentioning names (cough cough Sally) forgot to make the stuffing.( I love stuffing) I am sitting there looking around for the bowl of stuffing but there was none to be found. I was disappointed but decided to keep my mouth shut but after dinner was done I asked where the stuffing was. No one missed it except for me. Sally offered to make it and I could have it for desert but I had already eyed the apple pie, pumpkin pie, and apple Bavarian torte.

On Friday since it was a nice day, I let Zach go out and play for awhile. He started out playing with his legoes in the driveway and then was on to kicking his ball all around. He came in the house at one point and asked if he could go across the street and get his ball that he kicked across. I said yes, but to be careful crossing. I was watching him from inside the house to make sure he would be OK. He got his ball and decided to try and kick it back across the street(bad idea). First time he kicked it, it hit one of the neighbors cars. Didn't faze him, he tries again and hits the other neighbors car. He tries again, this time it bounces into a neighbors pick-up and luckily bounces out, but he is still on the other side of the street. I was thinking ,I hope he gets it over soon cause I don't want all the neighbors coming over to yell at me. now for the last time he kicked it , it hit a tree branch and came scorching down and hit him in the melon. That is when he knew he was beat and picked up the ball and came home. Just to kick it again to have it get stuck in a tree. I think I may need to teach him some kicking techniques. Not saying I am the best kicker around but, I don't think I would have vandalized the neighborhood in doing so

I am on afternoons at work this week. Wednesday morning I go in for chemo. I am going to try to post another blog during the week. There is more to tell about the weekend but I know sometimes it gets to long for some people to read. Plus, my buns of steels are sore from sitting on the floor for hours sorting out toys. Thank you and God Bless.

A Thanksgiving reflection.

First of all I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. This is a time I like to reflect on the past year. This has definitely been a year of trials and tribulations. I was diagnosed with stage 4 Colon Cancer on January 28th. At first it was very hard to take. I have a very fun loving and unique family. We all like to make each other laugh. Now I was thinking the worst, that all of that was going to end. I was always thinking how my kids would grow up and what they would turn out to be. Thinking how this will affect Sally, with all the things that need to be done to the house and all the bills. I actually thought that maybe Sally should divorce me. so she wouldn't have that burden.( This is something I never told her, until she reads this blog) I feel that Sally deserves a good life without all the problems of having a husband with Cancer, a house that needs repairs and the bills that come with it. I never did say anything to her obviously. I guess that is the selfish part of me. She has always been there for me and everyone else that needed a helping hand or some words of thoughtful encouragement or giving an opinion whether it was asked for or not without any biased. It wasn't always what you wanted to hear but, it was said with love. It really breaks my heart knowing the heartache I am putting her through. She has always been a great Mother and wife, even though she has doubts. I really don't know why she thinks that. She does everything she can for us. Although Zachary the other day got in trouble because he was having a listening problem and Sally made him write sentences. He told Sally that he thinks that she is going to the" Dark Side".( A reference to Star Wars) Now thinking that my kids will be cheated out of a father that can't do much any more and is always too tired. Before my diagnoses I was always trying to work as much as I can to help get the bills paid and be able to get the things we needed. So I wasn't home as much as I should have been. Then I got sick and I was bless with 6 months of play time with my kids. I had two major surgeries one in Feb. and the other in June. So during those times I couldn't do much, but when my recoup time was over I took advantage of that time. So to get back to the beginning I was thinking that I was feeling sorry for myself and that is the worst thing you can do. I am not buried yet. I was getting allot of support from everyone. I was always somewhat of a quiet person with not a lot of friends. Unless you knew me personally you never saw me for who I was. I was told on many occasions that I looked mad. I just don't walk around with a smile on my face allot. I do like to have fun and make people laugh. Sense of Humor is one of my top personalities a person can have. I am just a quiet person by nature unless you awaken the sleeping giant. It took me a while before Sally saw my humor. Thanks to her and Michael I get a lot of material. I know too I can depend on Zachary and Kaitlyn. Being in the family I have you have to have a good sense of humor. Take my mom for instance, never mind I don't have that much time right now. Now to get back to perspective, I do believe now that my Cancer is a blessing. I learned to appreciate things more and not to let as much bother me anymore. I still have a ways to go but, I will have to try harder making changes in my life, like my eating habits and need to exercise more. So to say what I am most thankful for this year is all of you and my family who I cherish and love with all my heart. I never would have made it this far without all of you. I thank you and appreciate all that all of you have done to get me through this illness. If not for that I wouldn't be in the positive frame of mind that I am in now.

I hope you all had a blessed Thanksgiving with your loved ones. I will try and do another blog this weekend, so check back probably Sunday. So again thanks to all of you to help me through this with prayers, thoughts and just an ear to hear me babble. God Bless you all.

I quick note to let everyone know to pray for my friend Patty from Minnesota. She had surgery on Tuesday. Not Cancer related, but prayers for a speedy recovery. Patty I hope all went well with your surgery, God Bless.

Almost a 2fer

This past week was a good week except all I did was work and want to sleep. I was on midnights and I know that makes a difference in how I feel. I did have a major headache all day that I couldn't shake. It felt like someone put a knife in my head. Not that I know how that feels to have a knife shoved into my head, but if I did, I am sure this would be close.I was supposed to have chemo this week, but because of the hustle and the bustle of the holiday week I asked if I could have it the following week. So it will be a week from Wednesday at 9:30am. Two more full chemo's left and than 6 more of the partial treatments. I can't wait until it is all over and I feel more like a normal person. A week after my pump was removed and I still have problems drinking cold things. It seems the effects are lasting longer.

Now for the events of the week. Today I put up the Christmas decorations for the yard. I was cruising along putting up the decorations when the neighborhood kids decided to attack me as I am doing this. Leave me alone can't you see that I am a busy guy.(obviously not) Than one of the gang members asked what I was doing. "I'm picking apples what do you think I am doing".Putting up Christmas decorations.Very good little girl anything else I can do for you. "Why are you doing that now, Thanksgiving isn't even here yet." "I am doing it now because, I don't want to do it when the ground is frozen and also little girl I am the boss and this is the day the voices in my head told me to do it"" Now go away you bother me".
The other day before I came home from work Sally asked me if I would get Kaity a Sausage McMuffin and her a Hash brown.When I left, I came down Broad St. They are doing road work and you have to be careful of the pot holes forming. When I was going down the street and listening to the radio, there was a guy walking on the sidewalk. I wasn't really paying to much attention to the water filled pot holes until it was to late. I went right into one and splash. The water sailed and hit this guy good. I couldn't have done any better If I tried. I felt really bad so I did the mature thing and sped up so he couldn't get a glimpse of my license plate and find out where I lived. I got home and delivered the requested breakfast to find out , Kaity wanted a sausage biscuit.Kaity refused to eat it. I made a mistake, so I said I would go and correct my mistake. When I was coming home the same way,I noticed the same guy coming down the sidewalk but, this time facing me.I was thinking what do I do,What do I do. I decided to speed up a little to make it past this guy.All of a sudden a squirrel darts out in front of me and I had to slow down( I didn't want to hit the furry little critter) After I past the squirrel I looked up and the guy was right there and splash. Thankfully it just missed this guy. I looked in my rear view mirror and he was looking in my direction. He was probably thinking naw it couldn't have been but,what little did he know ,yes it was me again.
I am planning to do another blog at mid week. I hope you liked this one. I left my note book with my notes at work. So I will have some more to talk about. God Bless you all and thanks for visiting.
I wanted to mention that Hope the little girl that was hit by a car a few months ago went to Franklin to visit her classmates. She is doing great but, still won't be back to school for awhile. She is still going through physical therapy.

Happy Halloween

Yesterday, I had chemo for the 16Th time. I still have two full sessions of about 4 hrs for each session. Than 6 more partials of maybe only a couple hrs and no more pump. Sally had start to use a patch to help me with the nausea that I have been having during the last few chemo's. The patch is very expensive (thank goodness for insurance).For one single patch it's well over 300 dollars and cost us a bargain price of only 40 dollars per 1 patch. It's very hard to get because of the price, insurance companies don't like to cover it.Since I tried other Nausea medication, I was able to get the patch and it seems to work fine.Now my main issue I have is just fatigue. I still get the pain in my jaw when I eat,but it only last a few seconds but, very painful.I still have the numbness in my hands and feet. Other than that I feel fine. Work is going good and still glad to be back.Work does tire me out to were I just want to rest but its a good think. I have been sleeping better, but I still have a hard time during during the time I have the pump like right now. It's almost over and should all be over around the end of March.

Now I want to talk about taking the kids trick or treating.Zachary was a Star Wars Storm Trooper and Kaity was a witch.I started out taking them on our street. Zachary was all excited because he knew alot of the neighbors. He told me later that he felt like he was famous cause all the people were saying hi Zachary to him. Kaity was a little poky because she just wanted to stare at everyone. I finally had to inform her that Zach was way ahead of her getting all the candy. So she started out with a brisk walk that soon turned into a fast full pace run.She was like a cheetah zeroing in on her target. Which was all those houses that was giving out all that free candy. I had to tell her to slow down that the houses weren't going anywhere. She was trying to catch up to Zach, I had to tell her to slow down a few times. I was telling her" Kaity slow down, come on Kaity OOOOHHHHHH Kaity you OK"! "YESSSSSSS".I will help you pick up your candy. Hey, look there's Elmo! One for you and one for me, one for you and one for me............... After we were done on our block we went to his Grandma's to go trick or treating there for a while. Again most of the neighbors knew Zach because of the times his grandma watches him. He likes the attention and smiled at everyone. It seemed at Kaity was always told how cute she was in her princess costume. Princess costume,she has a pointy hat on,come on. She looks nothing like a princess. I actually corrected one guy and he said she still looks like a princess. She has a pointy hat on. I took her by the hand and said lets leave the bad man alone. Later that night I went back and threw an egg at his house. Teach him to call my daughter a princess,nobody calls my daughter a princess. Wait a minute, oh you know what I me. I finally took the kids home with all there bounty. I look through all there candy before they can eat any. I first went through Zach's. I dumped it all out, Hey ,Zach there's Darth Vader, one for you one for me one for you one for me........... After all that I had to go to work. I was able to go in late so I could take my kids out. That is something that I like to do every year.

I had a small notebook that I used to jot down things that happen and that I would like to share with everyone. Well I lost it a few weeks ago and found it in the car today. I grabbed it and saw that most of the pages were tore out and the stuff I jotted down was missing.I told Sally about this and she I know Kaity was throwing the pages at me. NOOOOOOOOOO, Why did you let her do that. They were little pages from a little notebook and you didn't notice that perhaps it was my most important notebook. I looked all over the car and saw little pieces of my notebook all over the place. I looked at all the pages and not one had any of my writing on them. I remember some of what was written but not all. I hope to find the pieces some day soon.

This is one of the shorter blogs. I am tired and going to watch a scary movie with Sally now called Trick or Treat. Most of the blogs are long because I only write a blog about once a week. I hope you enjoyed what I have written and until next time God Bless.

Happy Birthday Michael!

Tonight's blog will be a little different. Instead of writing my weekly report I am changing the subject matter. I will try to write in the next couple of days my normal weekly report.

Monday, November 2nd was Michael's 19th Birthday. By they way Michael, Happy Birthday. As most everyone knows, I didn't meet Michael until he was 5. I knew of him for a long time though. I can't tell you his birthday story from my point of view. However, there is a unique story. Sally's dad was ill with pancreatic cancer when Sally was pregnant. Her pregnancy was high risk and complicated from the very start. At 6 months along Sally had to have a surgery trying to prolong the pregnancy. In the mean time Sally's dad was getting sicker. Right after her dad ended up in a hospital bed and was in and out of a comma, Sally ended up in the hospital. 4 days later she had Michael by an emergency C-section. Michael was born 6 weeks early weighing 3lbs 11 ounces. Except for his size, he was healthy. A few hours after Michael's birth, Sally's dad passed away.

Like I said earlier I didn't know Michael until he was a little older but I heard stories about him. My little sister Lisa would baby sit him. She would tell me about him. I remember her telling me when ever she would eat he would run up to her with his mouth open like a little bird waiting to be fed. He still does that with Sally sometimes.

After a couple of dates with Sally, I decided it was time to meet Michael. I took Michael and Sally to Celebration Station. We had a lot of fun playing games. Michael wasn't shy, very out going and was always smiling and on the move to play each and every game he could. When I brought them back home it was time for Michael to go to bed. When he got ready for bed he gave Sally a big hug and a kiss good night. I was just standing there thinking how sweet he was. Then he ran up to me and gave me a hug and said "I love you Bill". He caught me off guard and I didn't know what to say. I was impressed how lovable this little boy was.

It didn't take me very long to grow to love Michael. I considered him my son even before Sally and I were married. Michael always called me Bill until the day I married his mother. Then from that day on he called me "dad". Michael has always been compassionate and always worried about others. When he was little I use to smoke a cigar before I went to bed. It was my way of relaxing after a hard day of work. Michael went up to me with tears in his eyes telling me not to smoke because he didn't want me to die. Another time Sally, Michael and Sally's mom went to Tiebels for lunch. All of a sudden Michael started to cry. Sally asked Micheal why he was crying and he said that the waitress looked really sad.I think Sally and her mom left her a fairly hefty tip. One time Michael came home one day all upset. Sally asked him what was the matter and he said in one of our neighbors refrigerator that it was almost empty.Sally told Michael not to worry I will make sure they get food. Sally and her Mother filled up her trunk with groceries before she had to pick up Michael. After Sally picked up Michael, they both delivered the groceries to them. Sally and I try to instill acts of kindness for others in our kids. I use to watch Michael on Sunday's when Sally worked before we were married. It was nice because I got to know him and it was just the 2 of us. I would take him bumming around with me and I bought the play station so he would have something to do. He use to like Sunday's with me to because it always seemed like he ended up with a new toy. I was still a little boys in a man's body and liked toys just as much if not more then he did. I was never a cook but I kept my freezer stocked. Michael loved frozen pepperoni pizza. I would make sure I always had the individual ones for him. I will always remember on a particular Sunday I was watching him, he wanted a pizza. He said he wanted to make it all by himself. He put it in the microwave for an entire 30 seconds and took it out. He sat next to me on the couch and went to eat the pizza. Before I was even able to say anything to him, he had sauce all over his face and frozen cheese all over his shirt. I asked him if he wanted me to cook his frozen pizza for him and he said "No, it's cooked", yummy I thought.

Everyone who knows Michael know that he is always good for a laugh. Sometimes it's because he tries but often he doesn't even have to try to make us laugh. Michael being my oldest I have learned a lot from him. I have not always been the best father, and did things I have regretted, but at the end Michael has always forgiven me. Another thing about Michael he is very determined. Sometimes it's not good but in life determination is good. Michael I just wanted to let you know that I love you very much. I never consider you anything other then my son. I am proud of you. I know you are on the right path to have a great life. I hope I live long enough to see you full fill your dreams. Congratulations on your first job. Hope you enjoy your first day of work tomorrow.

Prayers for a family needed

I want to ask for prayers for a man, that was a good friend of my friend Dan and his wife Tina. His name is George and was the soccer coach for Dan's daughter Kesli's soccer team. He was playing soccer on a adult soccer team at the Dyer soccer arena yesterday. He collapsed and died of a heart attack while playing the game he loved and coached, he was only in his fifties. Prayers are needed for his wife Cathy, his son, daughter and for numerous family and friends of this obviously loved man. It was a sudden shock to all and it is a very hard time for family and friends. Thank you and God Bless

The following is an interview with George done 6 years ago.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcW-edgjWzY