The Cruzes Top 10

Yup - I took no pictures this week but I didn't want to disappoint my 2 followers so its another blog of the week's top 10, as determined by me and my little world.

1) Mason attended his first school friend-invited birthday party. That made no sense did it? Its his first party in which a friend from school invited him. It was today at McDonalds. Siena came too and all the kids had a great time. Its cute to see Mason interacting with his friends from school.

2) Luis and I got through a tough set-list on Guitar Hero Smash hits. I haven't played a ton of guitar hero of late so its good to know I've still got it. Oh yes, I've still got it.

3) Mason has gotten back into Speed Racer. Go Speed Racer, Go Speed Racer, Go Speed Racer GO!

4) Remember the ad from 20 years ago that consisted of the picture of an egg frying followed by "this is your brain on drugs"... too much accounting has the same effect. My brain hurts.

5) Luis had a "date" last night with a 70 year old classmate. Actually they both had to go attend a acapella concert at a church of a mens group that sang Russian church and folk songs. It was extra credit for one of his classes. I was invited to go but politely declined in deference to staying home on the couch.

6) Mason is turning into a good passer in basketball. We may have a little point guard on our hands.

7) For some reason this week the internet is convinced that I need viagra. No internet, I don't need viagra.

8) We got to hear the songs for Siena's dance recital yesterday. One is from Tinkerbell and the other from Princess and the Frog. This recital is shaping up to be adorable. Yes, multiple cameras will be involved.

9) Our daffodils are blooming! See, I told you that groudhog was smoking crack!

10) We're trying to eat healthier. I had a salad for lunch one day this week (I was starving an hour later). Luis made a good chicken dish for dinner. And despite my current craving for Popeyes, I suggested Sweet Tomatos for dinner tonight. I'm trying folks, I'm trying.

Mice, Elephants, and Cars

I got home from a late PWCL meeting last Monday night, hung up my coat and purse in the entryway, and saw some movement on the floor out of the corner of my eye. It was dark in the entryway, as it was nighttime, so I couldn't immediately tell what it was. My first thought was that I had maybe kicked a toy or something but why was it still moving. Then realization set it. It was a MOUSE! I may seem calm, cool, and collected normally (or maybe not) but mice have the effect of turning me into an instant sissy. I immediately squeeled for Luis (I didn't want to wake up the kids but I was still paniced). I yelled and yelled for Luis some more. To his credit, he made it up to the entryway pretty quick.

When Luis got upstairs, he turned on the light. The mouse was writhing a bit, apparently from an injured limb. How was the mouse injured you may ask...apparently I stepped on him when I came in the house. Eeeewwww! Aaaaahhhhh! There's a pair of shoes I need to burn (have I mentioned I don't do mice?). Luis heroically got the dust pan, gathered up the injured rodent, and plopped it out on the deck in front of the cat.

Meanwhile, at Yaya and Papa Ron's house on Friday, a Play-Doh sculpture was created by a very talented artist: Papa Ron. Siena loves it. The elephant now resides at our house.

Luis turned 34 this week and we celebrated several times. We went out to dinner at Rogue's on his birthday (Wednesday) just as a family. Then we had a nice breakfast out with the Cruz family this morning. Nice that is except for the old lady sitting behind us in a horrible wig that kept telling us our kids were too loud. That of course motivated us to to rile the kids up to be louder.

Now that Luis is a year older, he had a momentary midlife crisis one evening and gave himself a faux hawk! What do you think? I think it suits him.

Yaya and Papa Ron came down to our part of town for dinner tonight. We had a great meal at el Tapatio with them. Now the kids are playing a little bit before bed. Here's Siena in the playroom. It looks to me to be a bit like Radiator Springs looked after Lightning tore it up. That's how they like it though.

The playroom was so messy that the race tracks had to move into Daddy's office. However, the race must continue.

Unrelated, I've mentioned my love of the podcast Never Not Funny on here before. One of the surprising things about a podcast is how much you get to know the regular hosts on there after listening to them an hour and a half each week, every week, year in and year out. Their point is to make the listeners laugh and they do that, every week. In addition though, they share their lives with the listeners to a degree that you almost feel like you know them. To that degree, when something tragic happens to one of them, the sadness I find myself feeling is so much more than any other Hollywood/TMZ story, the reason being that these folks are entertaining as themselves, not as playing some character.

This week in Vancouver, Andrew Koenig took his own life. Most probably know Andrew as the actor who played "Boner" on Growing Pains. He is also the son of Chekov of Star Trek fame. I know Andrew as the "fourth chair" and camera man on Never Not Funny. He is the brother-in-law of the host, Jimmy Pardo, and always came across as funny and an all-round good guy. Check out the nice little tribute page at www.aspecialthing.com. Its short and sweet and is a fitting tribute to a good guy.

Never Trust a Groundhog!

Punxsutawney Phil said there was going to be 6 more weeks of winter. We may be tucked away in a little hovel here in the Northwest, but our weather didn't seem to get Phil's message. It was so nice this week and weekend, I almost managed to forget the stress of PWCL, craziness of trying to get a 10K filed, and my sore nose (Siena, you may be the sweetest ever but you have a very hard head).

I have had PWCL meetings for the last 2 Saturdays and we have another board meeting Monday night. The economy has hit us hard and cash flow has been a big issue. However, it looks like we're going to pull through. The whole thing has been very stressful but we plow on. Recent news stories of domestic violence keep us focuse and validate our efforts.

These are the only flowers we currently have blooming in our yard, but they sure look good!
I went for a run today and afterword, the kids came out and played for a long time. Luis also came out and we did some yardwork.
Mason still loves his '57 Chevy. Eventually we'll get him interested in riding on 2 wheels on his bike but for now, he's content in his car.

Here's big helmet Cruz on her little pink bike. Note that she dressed herself today which helps explain the dress with pink pants.

After working the pedal car for a while, Mason brought out his race cars and had a big car race. Note that these races normally take indoors but in this weather, even the cars wanted to come outside.

Friday night we went to the Blazer game with the kids and our friends the DeCiccos. The Blazers lost but the kids had a good time. Mason seemed into it the whole time. We got them foam fingers and cotton candy and we all cheered loudly.

Siena had another successful dance lesson and continues to love her weekly classes. Mason is getting better and better at basketball each week.

Back to some Olympics action!

Blogging the Super Bowl

Since last week was busy with work and Saturday was our usual dance and basketball business, the highlight of this weekend, of course, is a little football game known as the Superbowl (aside from dinner at Yaya's which was also great).

For something new, this will be a real time account of my crazy superbowl observations. Hopefully I have some.

3:11 - For the record, I am rooting for the Saints. I have nothing against the Colts and would root for them in most circumstances. However, I can't help but pull for the underdog and who's an underdog more than the Saints and the city of New Orleans. So, go Saints!

3:12 - Got a beer. The kids are hollering for help with their Cars game. We hollered back that we won't be helping them because it's game time. A lot of talk about Freeney. We get it. He's got a bum ankle. My prediction - he'll play, play well, and they'll be talking about it for years.

3:19 - I didn't know Queen Latifah could sing. Just thought she was a rapper. I didn't hate it either.

3:21 - National anthem. Carrie Underwood. Apparently there's bets in Vegas over whether this will go over or under 1:40. Apparently you can gamble on anything.

Luis timed it. It came it at over 1:40. A whole bunch of people just lost a whole bunch of money. And her rendition of our anthem wasn't that memorable to boot.

3:26 - I likey the LJB/Howard McDonalds slam contest. We're trying to remember who did the original - Bird and Jordan?

3:27 - HOF inductees - aka bunch of guys I've NEVER heard of. Wait! Rice! I've heard of him. Wasn't Emmitt from Dancing with the Stars?

3:28 - They just announced the NFC has won the last 13 coin tosses. They really track that crap? Furthermore they provided the odds of it happening...and what happens to that coin after the toss? Ebay?

3:34 - Is there a more apt last name for Indy's punt returner than "Rushing"?

3:35 - Jose just arrived. Junior and Andre are here too. Apparently Junior is in the kitchen cooking up some sort of bratwurst.

3:40 - Could that Super Bowl patch/emblem possibly look any bigger?

3:44 - Colts just got on the board and the controversial Tebow ad just aired. Is it me or does his mom look just like Mary Steenburgen? The Doritos dog ad - stupid.

3:50 - Colston!! Even I could have caught that!

3:58 - Luis is drinking a 7.5 oz can of Coke. Puerto Rican import. Apparently they like their beverages small?

3:59 - Addai just got his longest run of the season. Saints D - I shouldn't have to tell you this but its not so good giving that up in this game.

4:01 - Indy TD. Not looking good at all for NO. Might as well stop watching the game now.

4:14 - Junior's brat was very good. Now we're balancing it out with some Oreo's.

4:19 - Okay, I'm still watching. And the Budweiser people-bridge ad was cool. And the Mark Sanchez ad was creepy. Love the Jay/Dave/Oprah commercial!

4:22 - Why are all the commercials naked-commercials?!? And Hyundai - don't be giving Favre ideas about sticking around until 2020...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JD_n7ExZVZk&feature=related

And Dove is jumping on the male bandwagon...really?!?

4:29 - Tracy Porter's haircut is awesome!

4:34 - Nice make-up play Colston. You're darn right you needed that one!

4:38 - Luis just tried to change the channel to the Caribbean world series during the commercial break. There was an angry outcry.

4:39 - Alice in Wonderland - Does Johnny Depp have to play a creepy clown-like character in EVERY movie?

4:42 - Freakin' Saints. Are you kidding me? Going for 4th down and then NOT getting it! While we're at it, Junior's on the phone trying to explain to Sara who is playing in this football game.

Wasn't this guy supposed to have some sort of ankle injury?

4:49 - I need the Saints to have 9 points going into the half so I can win $100 in our office pool. Clearly that's not happening as it is now halftime. All this blogging is taking a dent out of my beer drinking abilities. Need to do some catching up. Maybe during halftime. And now for:

5:01 - Does it seem weird to anyone else to have a non-US band play the halftime show of a US game? Who cares. I love the Who. Centerfield looks pretty cool cool too. Yeah, Baba O'Reilly - great song! Nice cymbals on the drum kit.

5:03 - Pete Townsend is sounding better than Roger Daultry. Hey drummer dude - that hair-doo has been out of style for 30 years.

5:06 - WHO are you! WHO WHO...WHO WHO...

5:21 - Onside kick! I LOVE the call even though they're still trying to sort out who has the ball. WHO has it! WHO WHO...WHO dat! That's who.

5:27 - TOUCHDOWN SAINTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

5:30 - Almost as good as the NO TD was Stevie Wonder on the VW commercial playing Slugbug.

5:37 - And that's why Dallas Clark was on my fantasy team this year.

5:38 - Just like that, TD Colts. At least its an interesting game.

5:41 - Dude, Addai, don't need to see your belly. And when do you EVER see Coca-Cola in bottles anymore? On commercials. That's the only place.

5:44 - Supporting Haiti is good, but PWCL needs support too. http://www.pwcl.org/.

6:02 - Figures the Colts would connect on 4th down.

6:05 - The kick is NO GOOD! Course, I could have used that for my Mentor pool. Regardless...this Emerald nuts and pop secret dolphin ad is horrible.

6:08 - Nice run by Reggie Bush Kardashian!

6:12 - Luis almost pulled a hamstring trying to show us how Stover should've kicked the field goal.

6:13 - SHOCKEY TOUCHDOWN!!!!!!!!! Saints going for 2. Almost got it. Pull that thing in big guy! Wait! It's being challenged...and the crowd waits with bated breath...

6:18 - Saints GOT IT!!! Score - Saints 24 - Colts 17. And what's with the screaming chickens? Is Denny's trying say Obama is a chicken?

6:27 - Chuck, maybe its time to lay off the Taco Bell. The diet ain't working for you big guy.

6:29 - OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Interception!!!! Tracy Porter!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I credit the haircut.

6:32 - If the Colts score no more and the Saints get one more TD, I win $300. C'mon Saints. Lets make this happen!

6:35 - Mason just came down to announce that he just saw 2 raccoons eating the cat's food. The kids have been playing Cars on the Wii the whole Super Bowl.

6:40 - To quote Junior - "That's halfway the fu#%#ing distance to the goal."

6:43 - Right through Wayne's hands. Okay Saints. One more score! One more score! Do it for Mama! One more score! Dammit! They're taking a knee. Oh well. Great game and great win! Congratulations to the Saints and the city of New Orleans!

Time for Cruzer to go to dinner!

Lets Get Physical...Physical!

I'd like to say we've been inspired by the endless NFL commercials telling us to exercise 60 minutes a day but we seem to have that taken care of on our own. Even with taking a break from soccer, the kids and grown ups have found ourselves keeping pretty active.

Every Saturday morning, Siena has her dance class. I actually rememered a camera this time. Class starts with ballet where she is learning the terminology and basic positions. Then its time for tap. I don't know what happens there although a lot of noise is generated. With her Scandinavian mother, I'm not going to be much help for her in this endeavour other than to cheer her on!

At what is called "freeze dance", mommies, daddies, and siblings are invited in to watch the girls. They basically get to do their own dancing and they're supposed to freeze when the music stops. They usually freeze after being reminded to freeze but its very cute regardless.

Siena is 2nd from right with some of her fellow classmates getting ready to start freeze dance.

They're getting going now. They like having props like the purple wands to dance with.
There's my tiny dancer!

After dance, we head home, get some lunch, then its off to Mason's basketball. His basketball starts with a practice and then there's the weekly game. They even have to run some sprints to warm up. Mason's the cutie in the back with blue shorts. He's one of the younger players on his team.

Mason made a lot of improvements in basketball in just one week. He seems to learn pretty fast. He's the blue shorts and red wristbands in the center.

They even attempt defense on occasion. The wrist bands are so they know who to guard.

I tried to get in as many workout classes as I could this week since my busy, 10K reporting weeks are coming up starting next week. That doesn't leave me time to do my lunchtime workouts and I'm relegated to trying to get a couple runs in on the weekend. I ran 4 miles after we got home from basketball in that spirit. Also because I signed up to run the 8K in the Shamrock Run in another week and a half.

Luis is doing PT on his sore calf (see the purple leg picture from several months ago) and its getting better. He walks about every other day in addition to therapy and takes the kids for a walk every Sunday. Today the weather was nice and they walked down to the boat ramp and fed the ducks.

Now we're off to Red Robin for some dinner!

Saturday Business

Do I still have any blog readers after last week? If you thought that was bad, at least I didn't include pictures.

This week was a little more typical. Work, school, American Idol.

Saturdays have turned into our busy days of late. Luis is taking a class at PSU on Saturday mornings. While he's at class, Mason and I take Siena to her dancing class. She LOVES her dancing class. Its half ballet, half tap. She listens well to her teacher (who Mason insists is her coach) and pays attention.

After dance, we hurried home, ate some lunch, got Mason changed, and hurried along to Mason's first basketball practice and game. He had never played basketball before so he had to try to learn how to dribble and shoot. Those things will come. After almost 2 years of playing soccer though, come game time he gets in the mix and is pretty tenatious. Once he learns the basic skills, he should do well. Course, being 5, he has no interest in practicing at home. That will come later.

The battery in our camera was nonfunctional during these first 2 events so pictures will have to wait until next week.

After basketball, we came home for another quick clothes change and headed to Pietro's for Giada's 2nd birthday party.

Giada seemed a bit unsure of what to make of all of the sights and sounds of Pietro's but in all seemed to have a good time.
Siena found a new favorite game - this one which involves smashing cockroaches with a hammer. She kept disappearing and I would find her here.
After Pietros, we went to the Old Spaghetti Factory. Cousin Craig and family was in town and a bunch of Kinney's came together to see them for the couple days they were in town. Since there were 16 of us, we were seated in the Trolley. Pretty cool.

Siena enjoyed some good mac and cheese with Papa Ron to go with the pizza she ate at Pietro's 2 hours earlier.

Here's the big gang in the trolley.

There was even a balloon animal man that came around and made the kids some special animals - Siena got an Ariel mermaid and Mason an elephant.

Here's Siena again with her Ariel. She wanted to sleep with her until we pointed out that she may roll over on top of Ariel and pop her. She wisely set Ariel on her dresser.

It was good seeing cousin Craig, albeit briefly. And I'm still waiting for those ice cream toppings Craig.

Today (Sunday) we pretty much stayed home and watched football. The kids were a little worn out from yesterday, especially Mason, who had more 1-2-3 counts and time outs than usual. That generally is only a problem with him when he's tired. Another busy week looms ahead though.

A Pain in the Ass

Aside from Mason returning to school after Christmas break and Siena starting dance lessons, my rear end has garnered the majority of the attention over the last week. I was wholly prepared to completely ignore it for blogging purposes until discovering that numerous family members have had this same affliction but have remained completely silent about the whole endeavour. Well, since grace and tact aren't much my style anyway and I'm still on narcotics, why not share the gory details of my week with all of the internet.

Be forewarned, this week's blog will fall under the category of TMI.

It all started last Saturday when I woke up in the middle of the night with a sharp pain in my nether-regions. I hadn't felt anything like it and it was none too pleasant.

Sunday, it was still there. Sitting hurt. Standing hurt. It throbbed in all positions. Finally by mid-afternoon I asked Luis to go to the store and invest in some Preparation-H. He kindly informed me that we had some. Well, when I went to apply said P-H, I felt a giant bump. Now, I don't go poking around there too often but I knew enough to know that wasn't supposed to be there.

After having Luis confirm that there was something there that shouldn't be, I hit the internet. Research led me to believe it to be an abscess. As luck would have it, I had an appointment already scheduled for the next day with my doctor, Dr. J, for some annual female fun.

While in the waiting room for the doctor, I had the honor of hearing a Russian lady, who had arrived 20 minutes late for her appointment, argue vehemently with the receptionist that her clock was wrong and then threaten to have her fired and replaced. Nothing like a display by a crazy lady to get you in the mood for a check up.

So, feet in stirups, Dr. J announced that "You don't have an abscess. That, my dear, is a hemorrhoid!" "HEMORRHOID!?!" I replied, "Don't only old people get hemorrhoids?!?" Apparently not. She then informed me that she can't treat hemorrhoids in her office. I would have to go see another doctor the next day.

For anyone as uninformed of this affliction as I was a week ago, a hemorrhoid is defined as swelling and inflammation of veins in the rectum and anus. External hemorrhoids are prone to thrombosis: if the vein ruptures and/or a blood clot develops, the hemorrhoid becomes a thrombosed hemorrhoid. This is what happened to me. Sounds lovely, doesn't it.

PWCL has been experiencing some financial concerns of late necessitating a number of extra meetings. I had a task force meeting after my appointment Monday night. Even though my rear end was in agony, I decided to go both because I thought it might allow me a chance to focus on something else and also because it would be too embarassing to have to explain the reason for missing the meeting.

Enter doctor #2, Dr. G.

I'm pretty sure nothing in life can prepare you for having your first meeting with someone involve them examining your rear end. That's what happened 5 minutes into my initial meeting with Dr. G though. I knew that all hopes of dignity were gone the minute I felt this lump so it doesn't much matter. He confirmed the hemorrhoid diagnosis (apparently it was painfully obvious) and, like Dr. J informed me that "we can't handle that here in the office - we'll have to schedule you in the OR for later today".

This was not how I had my week planned. For added fun, I had to send vague emails to my manager explaining my continued absence from work.

So, Tuesday evening, I went back to the OR and had Dr. G cut it off. I'm pretty sure those were my exact words going in..."cut it off". And cut it off he did.

I was feeling great several hours after the amputation of my hemorrhoid. Then a few hour later, the pain set it. Aside from short, intermittent stints, I didn't sleep for the next 2 days. I shoved ice down my pants and sat on a donut (until the donut popped). Percocet helped little the first 48 hours. I now know what misery was.

I killed time trying to distract myself watching Sex and the City and Band of Brothers. Time well spent.

Further good news came on Thursday when Dr. J sent me an email informing me that "PAP is good but you have a yeast infection". Well, why not.

As of today, the rear is feeling better but I'm still fighting the fatigue. I'm ready to go to bed at about 4 PM every afternoon. Work next week should be a lot of fun.