a long post

It's been a weird 24 hours...just odd; but I'll sum up now and say that things are going to turn out OK.

First, as some of you know, Danny has been trying to get into GCC's paramedic academy that starts this February--a concentrated M-F class that he was told months ago he could get paid for and sponsored by his employer, Southwest Ambulance. So yesterday he took his entrance level test which he passed with flying colors. He almost immediately got a call from Southwest's recruiting gal who basically was upset that he had not tried to get into Southwest's own M-F program, which had actually just closed to new applicants.

Several reasons we did not look into that:

1) we didn't know about it in time to apply
2) it is located in Mesa, an almost 2 hour commute during rush hour each way
3) we have heard it is not that good
4) something closer, familiar, and excellent is within our very attainable reach which we were promised months ago as a paid-for option

Well, as it turns out, this new recruiting gal will absolutely not let Southwest sponsor him in the February academy, and shame on him for not trying to get into Southwest's academy. "Your commute time is not our concern!" It was very frustrating for him. So yet again, we wait. This time, we'll wait until the Fall when supposedly he'll get to go through GCC's M/W/F course supposedly sponsored by Southwest, although why they'll honor that wish I have no idea. I'm not holding my breath.

It's hard...we've been waiting so long to be in something stable and I know it's so very frustrating for him to not have a home. He's been with Southwest since March and does not plan on leaving, but the fire dept was his eventual goal, so if they are hiring between now and then, Danny will definitely test. It's such a long hard process though, years of applying for most people. He tried for 5 years to get on with the police dept and one thing after another slowed us down--he failed the first test 7/98, then he had too many speeding tickets on his record 9/98, then we had a very bad car accident the week he was hired 4/01, then we had to wait for him to heal in order to pass the physical tests again 7/01, he passed those and was told he was a liability and to wait another year 10/01, we waited and then there was a hiring freeze10/02...it went on an on and we just couldn't do it any longer. Finally, he had to change careers. Now, he's been in emergency medicine for 3 years with hopes of moving up to become a paramedic and it seems he's delayed at every venture. So hard to stay positive! So hard to get ahead! So hard on the ol' ego!

We'll just wait, like we always have. He doesn't want to job-hop. That doesn't benefit him anything. So yesterday he came home with some library borrowed DVDs and some popcorn so we could be depressed together. ("John Tucker Must Die"...ehh....not great. I'd give it a C+ maybe)

Then, this morning, Dan was at work already and I got all the kids and my daycare dearie into the car to take Sean to school and found out our car battery was dead. It's my own fault--Sunday night, a light had been left on in the van and I kept meaning to shut it off, but never did. Monday, we didn't drive at all, so by this morning, Tuesday, it was dead. Well, all my neighbors who attend Sean's school were already gone, so I called a few church members and left messages asking for a ride for him. In the meantime, I was doing a load of dark laundry--Sean's school uniforms and Danny's work uniforms mostly, but also thrown in there were two new shirts we'd scrounged up $ to buy at Old Navy last week. ($5 each, can hardly go wrong). Well, when I pulled them out of the dryer, I realized I'd washed and dried them with about half a dozen crayons!! Crayon was all over everything, including the dryer. I just cried!! The uniforms! Our brand new shirts that we'd worn once! And we hardly ever buy new clothes for ourselves! It was just a stupid insult to injury and I called my visiting teacher to come get Sean and just broke down crying on the phone talking about my laundry woes. Boy, does that sound stupid. Just the last straw, I guess!

Well sweet lady, she came and picked him up, gave me a hug and some cleaning solution and I got to work on my laundry. I did this once before several years ago and was told of the trick of using shampoo to get out the crayon. I did load after load and I'm happy to say most of it is gone from the important clothing. Both sets of uniforms are in near perfect condition. Two of my shirts are ruined and a couple of Cameron's, but we'll survive. I just felt so dumb for being lazy and not checking the pockets. I've learned my lesson, I hope!

Danny was supposed to work only 6a-6p tonight, but called during the day to inform me that there was an open graveyard shift, 8p-8a. It could potentially be hard on him, but it's actually quite easy on us, so I said to go for it. He hopes to get some sleep and then he'll be home Wednesday and Thursday before doing another 36 hours on Friday and Saturday. He's such a hard worker; dedicated and honest. He really deserves a break. He really deserves his shot at success. He wants to be a good provider for our family. I'm so proud of him and appreciative of his sacrifices for us!

I got a lot done today--washed all the kids sheets, did that load of laundry like 5 times of course, vacuumed half of the baseboards in the house, cleaned bathrooms, and did some general to-do stuff. Makes me feel good to be productive, even if I didn't leave the house. We even squeezed in Ethan's speech therapy session, and I read books to the kids for nearly an hour, something I very selfishly hardly ever do. I even let Cameron paint using his craft box. I feel that all in all, we ended up with a pretty good day.

I keep forgetting to mention that I finally got into see my doctor. I had been out of my asthma meds for about 2 weeks and while nothing major had happened, I had felt a bit out of breath lately. Though I wondered if that might be psycho-somatic. The doctor's office wouldn't fill my RX without coming in, so I just had to wait. Plus, I wanted to talk to him about the possible arthritis in my left hand and my foot that has been painful since, what...July? August?

First, breathing: off my meds, I had gone down from a level 1 asthma to a level 4. Horrible! Horrible! That's practically emphasema, which is actually what I was told I had the beginning stage of last year when I first came to this doc. That's scary. Anyway, the Advair daily dose is good stuff, really really works for me, so I'll be taking it for-e-ver. He ordered me a chest x-ray (asthmatics have to have one yearly), a flu shot (ditto) and refilled my RXs. Then he prescribed me claratin which you can have filled at wal-mart for much cheaper than you can just buy in their allergy medication dept. Score!

My foot: he literally took one look at it and said "oh, you have plantar fasciitis" (I think that was it) which basically has something to do with my arch and the roll of my foot. Basically, step aerobics is out, which is really disappointing, but not surprising. And basically I just need to wear good running shoes with stabilization or a hard arch support the rest of my life. Oy.

My hand, definitely not rheumatoid arthritis. He said it could be possibly osteo arthritis, but an anti-inflammatory should help that. If it was rheumatoid, it would start out each day stiffly, slightly swollen, and I don't have any of that. Just a constant ache when I use it, like to open jars or pull my 2 year old through a cereal aisle.

So I came out of there with, I don't know, like 6 RXs plus the order for the chest X-ray. Oh, and they took a blood sample to test my cholesterol because he said last year it was a bit high. I don't even eat a lot of meat! #1, I don't like anything except hamburger, and #2, I don't eat that more than once a month due to it being out of my diet! Doc said a lot of this stuff is unfortunately genetic, especially the cholesterol and the plantar fasciitis, and that likely my kids will get them too. Genes! Ugh! Maybe by the time I'm 40 or 50 or 60, they'll have figured out DNA enough to be able to weed out these genetic tendencies!

So, this has been a really long blog and now I'm going to spend at least half an hour getting a scrapbook layout ready so I can work on it tomorrow. Thanks all for listening to me moan and groan. It is therapeutic!