Staying Busy

It's the question/comment I hear the most this time of year. "So, y'all are pretty busy about now, aren't you?" For the most part. I don't do as many tax returns as some others, focusing more on audits and other things, but I do my share. Plus we are open extra hours, so there's that as well.

Outside of work, things have picked up some as well. First off, the big news is that Meron now has a new (to us) car. My great-aunt now lives in an assisted living complex. You know, one of those places that is like a nursing home, but allows for more independence, etc. Anyway, she's not driving now and decided to sell her car. My parents got it for us (for which much thanks is deserved!) and we went up the first weekend of the month to get it. It's a 1998 dark blue Buick Century, and it was an old-lady special that a used car guy would love. Just under 8500 miles on it when we got it, and probably hadn't be driven but a couple of hundred in the last two years. So it may be a bit older, but it almost still has the new car smell.

This now means that both of us have reliable, usable cars. The 92 Tempo that Meron had (only technically--I've driven it the most lately) would flash the check engine light at me in the five miles from the house to the office. Tended to smell like something was burning and basically you hurried away from it after parking just in case this time was the time it was going to blow up. It probably just needs a little work, but it's definitely more of an "in-town" car, with as little driving of it as possible.

We thought we had it sold this weekend, as my friends Jon and Jennifer had a garage sale for her mission trip to the Congo. (And talk about God working--over $1000 made on a garage sale. A garage sale! But I digress.) Anyway, we parked the car down there with a sign on it. A Hispanic couple was interested in it and said they'd buy it. Jon called me at work and I said I'd meet them down there between 1 and 1:15. (This was about 12:30.) They said they'd come back, but they never did. So now it's sitting out front of my office with a sale sign on it.

What else has been going on.....

We had another ultrasound last week. Sarah is doing well, up to two pounds now. Meron is doing well enough on her blood sugar that the doctor told her she could cut out one of her testing times, so now she just has to do it three times a day instead of four. It's not a huge thing, but it's nice and between that and the fact that Sarah wasn't just huge, it made Meron feel better about the whole sugar thing.

Benjamin is doing great. He's liking the warmer weather and looking forward to another zoo trip. He and Meron (and another mother-son combo) were going to go today but there was a chance of rain so they put it off until Monday. He continues to amaze and humor.

Played poker last Friday and, for the most part, felt pretty good about how I played. Built a big chip stack early, then let it get away from me and finished 6th of 14. Did have a wonderful hand, though. The guy in front of me raised my big blind, and I look down and saw pocket aces. I reraised, then the flop comes out A-3-3. He bets, I raise, etc. After the turn I go all in, and almost had him sucked into it, but he laid it down. Still, it was a big pot for me to win. I also took the bounty for knocking out the last winner, something I've never been able to do before.

We did Parents' Night Out at the church on Saturday. That's where the parents take turns watching all the kids while the other parents get a night off. We did it early this year due to the baby coming and it nearly wore us out. I'd not had a lot of sleep due to actually staying at the poker table longer than I usually did the night before, so that probably didn't help. We weren't able to take them to the playground since it was dark (figures it'd be right before the time change) so they didn't get to wear themselves out there. On the whole, they were OK, but I'm glad we are done for the year with that!

I've been a little busy around the internet as well. I've written the season previews for CardsClubhouse (AL East, NL East, AL West, NL West so far, with the Centrals in process) and I've been keeping track of Viva El Birdos' All-Time Cardinal Sim Tournament. And we've started kicking off the YNOT season at the Clubhouse, with six open games right now (three Cardinals, two general baseball, one NCAA tournament).

Plus there have been drafts on line and then the Friends League draft to get ready for as well. Keepers are in and plotting is being done. Two and a half weeks to go!

Some Cardinal discussion in the next post--this one is getting a little on the long side.