My Many Interests

Friday, August 20, 2010

Asking for a little help

You probably haven’t heard but over the last few months my wife has been dealing with some medical issues. They had to remove a category 4 brain tumor from her left temporal lobe and the surgery was a success. Chemo was started during surgery and through the work of many doctors and some new wonder drugs, my wife is going through radiation treatment five days a week and daily oral chemo, but is in good spirits and great shape and dealing with it day by day.


While visiting the chemo office, I noticed a sign for Fink’s Fighters. Dr. Fink is the doctor who is supervising my wife’s chemo treatments and she has a team set up for the Dallas-Ft. Worth Brain Tumor Walk on November 6, 2010. I’ve decided to do the walk and am asking everyone I know to help out in any way they can. On my page you can see how much I’ve raised so far and also gives info on how to help out. Anything is appreciated, be it time, money (no matter how little) or just thoughts and prayers.

You never know how much it really means until something bad happens to one you love. Again, all I’m asking is a little help to try and raise awareness for this cause. Even if you can’t donate time or money, at least send this to someone who might be able to do the same.
Thank you.

Friday, February 26, 2010

Lilly visit the Great Grandparents

Arrived home Thursday night at 11pm after a 17 hour trip from the northeast corner of Georgia. It wouldn’t have taken so long if not for the 30 minute feedings every 3 hours or the Texas State Trooper who pulled me over for doing 5 miles over the speed limit. From amongst a small group of cars doing the same. Neither in front of or last in line. Anyway.

I got off work last Saturday at 3pm and came home to load up the car and take off. I like to get on the road as soon as possible and we had already talked about stopping halfway to get a hotel room.  We would have found relatives to stay with, but didn’t know if we would be able to afford the trip in the first place, so I felt it would be rude to impose on family at such a late date. We did stop in Louisiana to see my brother, Jeremy, and his kids and I got my Johnny’s fix while I was there. We got a hotel room in Vicksburg for the night around 11pm. Had all intentions of getting up around 6am and heading out, but “Deathrace” with my boy, Jason Statham, was on and I hadn’t seen it yet. Asleep at 3am so we moved the launch time to 9am.

Once on the road, we made good time. Some work had been done on the road leading to the house up on the mountain and so we had to call Mammaw and get specifics. Every time she picked up the phone the signal would drop so we backed up the road to the top of the ridge and finally got through. Found out that we were headed the right way, just didn’t go far enough. Things look different in the woods after dark.

While we were there, we got to visit with my cousin Chris who was in from Kentucky and my Uncle Mitchell came up several times and talked. Aunt Bernadette popped in shortly and we visited what little we could, but she was working long hours.  Grandaddy seemed to be doing really well while we were there. Only a few times did he seem to not remember somebody or forget something else, and he liked to play with Lilly when she was awake.

It’s been four years since our last visit and I hope that we get to visit sooner than that, now that Lilly is here. I want my grandparents to see her as much as possible, but we may have to resort to technology to help out in that department.

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Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Imelda May

Saw her with Jeff Beck on the Grammys and just had to look her up. Oh boy, look what I found! This girl rocks!

Saturday, January 23, 2010

The Known Universe

Thanks to AstroPixie who posted this on her blog. She leads a very exciting life as an astronomer (I envy her) at Nottingham University in the UK.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Things have changed . . . forever

Just a quick blurb for everyone. Most of you knew that Carroll and I were expecting a baby sometime in the near future. How little did we know that the near future was this morning.

Due to certain events, we had planned on delivering a baby by c-section somewhere around January 19th. Baby had other plans. Thursday, Carroll and I did our thing earlier in the day. I took her book shopping and then to lunch and a movie and I think that may have stirred the kid up. We rang in the new year at midnight and were asleep around 1:30, but about an hour later Carroll yells from the bathroom that something is wrong. Without going into details, let’s just say that there was some bleeding that with her placenta previa was bound to eventually occur and in the amounts of blood there wasn’t supposed to be a lot of worry. As it seemed to diminish, we just decided to call in the morning.

As I prepared for work, Carroll was on the phone with the doctor and the doctor asked her to come on in for a look-see. We checked in at 10:30am and after some exams and blood work it was decided that Carroll would probably stay until the 19th. Then as more lab results came in, the doctor found that Carroll had indications of possible preeclampsia which is pregnancy-induced hypertension which can affect both mother and child. Not wanting to push things, the doctor ordered more blood work and said that with bad results the birth would take place that evening or with stable or good results we would do it Sunday.

Again, baby had other plans. Around 5:30 or 6pm Carroll started having contractions. And I mean bad ones. She went through about 4 hours of it before the doctor said that they may just do it a little after midnight. Carroll decided that I should go check on the cat and get something to eat since I hadn’t eaten since about noon. When I got back around midnight, plans had changed again to just let her ride it out on morphine until the morning and see then.

With the morning light, they had decided that the baby would be delivered a little after 10am. Dressed in my finest scrubs (I looked like a big blue sausage), they had me wait in a little room while they prepped Carroll. Earlier, I got to watch them put the epidural in but not up close. Thank goodness for that one. For those that don’t know, I don’t handle needles too well. Into the delivery room and not 20 minutes later, unto Carroll and I was born a screaming baby girl. At a not-too-shabby-for-being-6-weeks-premature 5 lbs and 3.4 oz, Lillian Josephine Pickering let loose. I got to hold her right away and mommy got to giver her a kiss before I escorted her and the nurse to the warmer.

She’s breathing well on her own, has already taken a bottle since Carroll can’t breast feed right away, and again has exercised her voice several times, though she was fast asleep the last time I saw her. Mommy is resting up also, and will probably be in the hospital for about 3 or 4 more days. Baby will probably be there for at least another 2 or 3 weeks, until they deem her to be able to perform as a baby should on her own.

Thank you for your prayers and well-wishes and look for more pictures and stories to come in the years ahead.

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