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I told my father that my being here during his time of crisis was his Father's Day gift.

What I didn't tell him, was at $1000 for the suite I was in at the hotel, it was the most expensive Father's Day gift he's ever gotten from me.

Happy Father's Day Dad, I love you.
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Today (so far) is far (far) easier. Why? I don't know. But this morning, everything flows. I assume, in part, its her increasing ability. The independent movement she is capable of today far surpasses her previous capabilities - something I was not expecting to occur so soon. This makes my assistance more effective, and strengthens her for future independence.

But I think that only tells part of the story. Knowing myself as well I do, I also assume knowing what to expect aids me tremendously. We have a rough routine of movements down, a ballet of required actions - and knowing ahead of time what I am going to face and its resulting outcome, I think, makes me far more prepared.

When I arrived Tuesday, I didn't forsee this level of improvement.

[time passes]

When I first arrived in Texas, I spent time talking to the social worker at the nursing facility and the home healthcare nurse, both who expressed reservations about the level of care yet required. My father cited insurance and secondary coverage and the (rather high) daily co-pay involved with a full-service nursing home. Additionally, he didn't feel she was getting enough care at this particular facility. The wonderful social worker told me, "Perhaps your father will have to come to realize he cannot provided the level of care she requires of his own accord."

Turns out, she was right.

This week-long exercise has enlightened him, and he's decided to place her back in professional care for the next six weeks.

I think maybe I've been enlightened a little too.
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Its interesting over the years how I've learned to understand the effectiveness and duration of my abilities in terms of their corresponding energy levels, and my capacity for any given activity given its proposed draw, and subsequent recharge availability. So far this week has been a veritable cornucopia of empirical data.

It may sound "cold" to those of you who cannot or do not compartmentalize personal attachment as a coping mechanism, but I walked into this situation with my mother as a job which needed doing. All I required was procedure and expectation. This removes the toll of any potential devastating feelings from being "too close" to the situation - at least for me.

And as usual, it was worse than I expected. It usually is.

It was also better than I expected in other ways, and encouraging to witness.

Regardless, for me, maintaining the absolutely-nothing-phases-me-uber-positive-devil-may-care attitude for 12-hours of otherwise emotionally and physically challenging hoop-jumping in an area far, far out of my experience takes its toll every single day. The energy I exude comes off me in waves at my parents house as my nearly-infirm-himself father and I constantly toil around my mother attending to her numerous and immediate needs, but at the end of each twelve hour I shift its all I can do to not burst into tears the moment I pull the door closed behind me. Not because my compartmentalization is ineffective, on the contrary - because it is wholly effective - and taps every reserve of energy I have to operate in the mode I do.

Just today we had someone come to bathe her, the physical therapist arrive, a new wheelchair delivered, an LVN to change out her bandages, and an interview from Adult Protective Services. There were that many yesterday, and that many again tomorrow. My brother didn't fall and break his hip - his hip was apparently already fractured when he fell and broke his femur. Yeah, that's the big one. He was discharged from the hospital the second day I arrived, so I moved my aunt and uncle into the suite I didn't budget for the same day I took my children to their respective friends' house in Anna.

Every single hour has been a different, unexperienced challenge, and its exhausting; draining. I am at my absolute limit here, but have to do it all again tomorrow.

That said, I have a plan.

My aunt and uncle are leaving tomorrow - that gives me one day and two nights entirely alone before my Disaster Recovery Exercise starts. Introverts - no matter how "outgoing" they may appear, recharge their batteries [read energy] - by being alone. I am quite sure this will be more than enough time for me to fill up to capacity in order to survive an entirely different type of stress, albeit one I am far more comfortable with.

And I'm sure the extra sleep will come in handy too!
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Remember my mother falling and breaking her hip? Right, so she was supposed to have been released into the care of my father and brother, with the understanding that my brother would be doing all the heavy-lifting. Apparently he fell off the ladder while putting up the new carport and broke his hip.

Dad called and asked if I could help out this week. Is it just me, or is it odd these things happen exclusively during the summertime DRE's?

I do actually have a hypothesis behind this - DR would normally be a mental and physical stressor, but following events of family drama, DR is like a vacation! Its no wonder I can be all smiles no matter what :D

Perspective is a wonderful, wonderful thing.
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I would like to say that I am comfortably lounging as remediation from my 90-hour week, but that would be a lie. Some sadist put me "on call" the Monday after the Disaster Recovery exercise, which wasn't as bad as also requiring the infrequent 0700 Monday morning production refreshes this morning. So here I sit.

I would like to report that both my parents are home and resting comfortably - my brother procured a hospital bed for my father and set him up in the living room, and the friends my kids were staying with in Anna while I worked are now here in Newton with me. Saturday I drive to Guthrie, Oklahoma to return them, then school starts.

I haven't exercised in a week.

Though I did smoke an Arturo Fuente natural-shade Hemmingway while gulping real, from over-the-border Mexican tequila directly over ice while standing adjacent both the grill and the smoker in already 100+ degree temperatures readying something like six pounds of various meats and peppers for the coming week yesterday. No, its not really a surprise I have a headache, but I have to wonder where the time goes?

While I did slumber 10-hours last night I had restless, uneasy dreams about trying to take a commercial flight to a war zone - something which took several hours to accomplish, it was all very frustrating in the airport trying to find a travel agent and a place to check in - I was either back in uniform or a member of the Behavioral Analysis Unit from Criminal Minds. Maybe both. There was a lot of dismemberment. I was a sniper who did my job unemotionally, but the fallout from everyone else's reactions disturbed me, as did the wanton violence of the dismemberment. There was really no need for any of that.

I couldn't begin to imagine what the rest of my week will look like.
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The day before I was to visit my folks enroute to a week-long onsite disaster recovery exercise I got the news that my father had fallen and broken his arm. As he required surgery, I postponed my trip for a day. Saturday morning I loaded up the kids in the Land Yacht and we made our way due South. Nearing Texas, I got word that my father's surgery had been postponed due to renal failure - his kidney's had stopped working, and also he'd had a heart attack.

Suffice it to say I was bit unnerved as I texted work that I may have to juggle my professional responsibilities with personal responsibilities if he were to pass away during our disaster recovery exercise - and as our schedule has us on 18-hour days, I let them know that the physical stress of those hours would eventually emotionally compromise me.

When we arrived in Texas I stopped at the hotel across the street and got their largest suite, picked up my mother, took her and the kids to lunch then dropped them off at the hotel so the kids could swim and my mother could sleep - she'd been at it two full days. I drove to the Cardiac ICU and visited with my father for several hours, long enough to get the report that his kidney's were at least functioning again and that after the cath to peek at his arteries the next day they would look at finally setting the radial fracture in his humerus - four days after he broke it. The morphine drip he was on was only enough to keep the edge off. I texted work that my father seemed stable and to disregard my previous text.

I drove back to the hotel where I left the kids in the room to escort my mother back to her car at the hospital. Rather than walk her all the way across the parking lot I told her, "I'll bring the car to you." About ten steps away she asked, "Is GBZ waving from the hotel window?" I looked up and sure enough there was my son, waving. I waved back and yelled to my mother over my shoulder. She took two steps forward while simultaneously craning her head up and to the left, and lost her balance - even with the cane - on the "slight downgrade" carriage entrance of the hotel. I turned just in time to watch my mom faceplant right into the bricks. I had never seen so much blood so fast.

Not only was she just laying there, unmoving, she was moaning terribly. I got her rolled over and was shocked to see that her face was woefully misshapen - as if it were permanently frozen from the disfiguring fall; think Secundus from Stardust. I looked up to see if my son had witnessed it - he had, and now both my kids were in the window, gaping, as was a couple next door to my kids? I ran into the hotel and asked them to dial 911 - I was going to need an ambulance. I ran back out with a handful of paper napkins to clean the blood from her face - it was just a small gash on her chin which had caused it all, and now my mother was talking: She was ready to go home. She wanted me to get her in my car and just take her home. She wanted to go to sleep in her own bed. She was, quite obviously, in no condition to do so. The ambulance arrived approximately sixty seconds later, but not before the window-couple came down with a pillow for my mother's head and an ice-wrapped towel to place around her neck - two things which were quite helpful but which also didn't even cross my mind.

After the paramedics took over (assisted by the Decatur police) I ran upstairs to check on my kids. My daughter had been pretty freaked out over the whole ordeal and had called my wife who, knowing what I was going through with my father, was aghast at how stunningly horrific things were turning out. I took them with me to the ER at the same hospital across the street in which my father was in ICU. My son thought it might be a good idea to bring Grammie's purse - which we did - and which allowed us to register her into ER what with having all her insurance cards and ID contained within. It also seemed to help that I was already in the system as "Next of Kin."

We spent the next several hours traversing between ICU and ER. My father was not pleased with the news, and he knew that my brother was the last capable adult given my work schedule. I texted work that my mother was in ER and would update them later, but that so far I should still be able to make work Monday morning. This was before the CAT scan which revealed my mother's brain was bleeding and that they were ill-equipped for that injury at the small regional facility. They transported her to downtown Fort Worth and my next text to work was equally as ambiguous as to my involvement in Monday's activities.

We went back to the hotel, my kids passed out, and I set aside my two-months of non-drinking to consume six Shiners in short-order to finally calm my raw nerves at the end of that long, long day. I texted work the update on my mother and went to bed not knowing if she were going to even be alive by morning - a very different scenario than the one I had prepared myself for as I neared Texas earlier in the day.

I slept seven hours and remembered I had a Sunday Maintenance Migration twenty minutes before I got the call. A shower, two ibuprofen, two aspirin, and a MONSTER PROTEIN REHAB and I was on top of my game. The nurse at the downtown hospital confirmed my mother was alive and I completed the migration within an hour, woke the kids - they cleaned the entire hotel room of their own accord and without any prompting from me - we ate our complimentary breakfast and checked out, texting work that both my parents were now stable and I would see them Monday.

Straight to ICU where my father had gone to sleep wondering the same thing I did. He was happy about the news and they were prepping him for his cath when we left to see my mother. Downtown Fort Worth was an easy drive from Decatur. She was in Neurological ICU and the kids and I dressed in disposable paper gowns and green latex gloves - I wanted to snap a pic of of us but they frowned on cell phone use. Mom looked FANTASTIC and was lucid. She was mom again and that made everything better. They may release her tomorrow. I passed the reins to my younger brother who will handle all the transportation this week.

The drive to Anna was longer from the other side of the Metroplex but we made it and dropped off my excited kids at their excited friend's house. I hope their enjoyment eclipses the equally stressful couple of days they'd endured with me.

So I'm back in my old stomping grounds, at a hotel behind Chipotle which provided me a quite satisfactory dinner. I am magnificent at compartmentalization, but it too, has a cost - one of which I plan to pay in full right now. And since my day begins onsite at 0600, I'm going to attempt to slumber, and allow my body ample opportunity to shed itself of the stress of this weekend before the stress of the 18-hour days, which may seem like a vacation compared to the last 48 hours. I am certainly looking forward to it at this point.
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Our "Create Your Own" quesadilla dinner with [livejournal.com profile] drax0r and [livejournal.com profile] jesskd26 was probably the best grilled quesadilla's I've had since Saint Louis. There was so much food, in fact, that we also invited our next door neighbor [livejournal.com profile] onthetrails and his wife. He helped drax0r and I pound down over a case of Heineken Light in preparation for the rest of the evening, as non-drinkers at [livejournal.com profile] glodowg's house, so our respective spouses could tie one on. It was with great forethought that drax0r arrived with two 32oz. Monster brand drinks. The B.F.C. oil can. Thanks for all the RAM!



Since dismantling the system in the garage after the December 1, 2007 party and redeploying the PowerMac G4 to my children's common area this weekend (my boy loves having his own playlist and is already adept at navigating iTunes) I was without music in the garage again. Undaunted, I attached an external drive to drax0r's iBook and moved my Logitech speakers from my primary system to the garage and voilà - back in business!

Alas, the repetition and familiarity of the December 1st Playlist became burdensome, and under the suggestion of drax0r, we turned to Digitally Imported's Goa-Psy Trance playlist. It was so very awesome we simultaneously had the epiphany that we should've just tuned in to that during the party instead of bothering with a playlist. Then the wives brought us back down to reality. Fair to say, they don't care for Techno.

My folks were in Dallas today and were able to spend the afternoon with us - it was a great visit in which I had an excuse to grill quesadilla's for lunch and drink mojitos. I think we finally wiped out the rest of the ingredients. By far, my wife's homemade pico de gallo was the biggest hit. My father brought with him $800 of baked goods that my wife distributed to friends throughout the city, setting aside a healthy portion for ourselves. After that we didn't do much, but when they left I felt...lost without purpose, so we finished up Serenity and the four of us retired to different areas of the house, doing our own thing for the rest of the evening. I thumbed through the Official Visual Companion of Serenity, a Christmas gift from jesskd26, and "talked" to [livejournal.com profile] schpydurx via AIM through [livejournal.com profile] snapper521 while he rudely watched House, MD. Strangely, he has no time to post.

In a more personal vein, my Bengal, Niobe has been missing a week now. There was a lot of coyote activity in the area last week, as the weather was changing, and I fear her lost. Regardless of this, I still call for her every evening, and still leave the garage door cracked for her. She's gone MIA before, only to return without explanation, but its getting so cold at night these days, I worry. I'll do the only thing I can do, and keep calling her every evening, in hopes that one day, she comes back.

My kids have MLK off, and my wife doesn't have to get out of bed early to prepare them for school, and I really should be in bed myself, but I'm vacillating between getting a great night's sleep, and working on all the little computer projects that I never seem to get around to.
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Yesterday at work one of my co-workers was discussing terminology we use with children with another co-worker and engaged my opinion. This turned into a discussion of the differences of raising boys versus raising girls. He has two girls, and was envious that I at least had a boy I could raise. He said, "With a boy you don't have to worry about about knowing what a demi-plié is."

I placed my heels together and pointed my feet out to form a "V" and placed my hands on my hips, fingers-front, explaining, "Start with first position," and knelt slowly then came up. "The demi-plié." I announced. Mouths started to drop open. I continued with a battement tendu, that is, from first position, extending a foot without ever leaving the floor, ending with a pointed toe. Four or five people were staring at me in disbelief. "I have a girl also." I told them.

  • I'm quite sure they think I'm a flaming homosexual.


We're having [livejournal.com profile] drax0r and [livejournal.com profile] jesskd26 over for dinner Saturday, so my wife wanted me to pick up one of those little mini-kegs of Heineken for the event. I made my way over to Anna Fine Wine & Liquor to ensure one was put in the cooler for me and was informed that the 12-pack of Heineken Light was on sale. I discusses the pro's and con's with my wife (she's very particular) and ended up instead with 36 cans. I cracked one immediately as I've never had a Heineken Light, and it was delicious! They were ice cold so I had another, and another...and another! I finished my fifth and last beer, lightheaded and slightly tipsy when my daughter announced, "You have to come meet my girlfriends mom and dad. They want you to."

For those of you who remember, I took my daughter's hand in Saint Louis and we walked around the neighborhood looking for, "girlfriends" for her. Daddy, will you find me some girlfriends to play with? Last night, however, she had finally found her own - but the parents wanted to meet us. So...slightly and somewhat immediately intoxicated, I lit a cigar and my wife and I walked the dog and stopped to meet the parents of two little girls around my daughter's age. Nice folks...if I recall correctly. And I may not.

  • Its a good thing my wife was there.


And this morning, on the drive into work, I rec'd a call from my daughter's kindergarten teacher. "Mr. Howton, today I'm showing the class a film on Martin Luther King for the upcoming holiday and your daughters tells me she's not allowed to watch movies in the dark?"

Yes, I burst out laughing.

You see, the children like to turn out the lights in the Children's Retreat when they have friends over and are watching DVD's. I don't care for it because it generally causes more problems. So I tell them they're not allowed to turn off the lights.

Oops.

I explained this to the teacher and gave my permission, apologizing that she had to call me. "Oh its no problem," she said. "Its just that your daughter was adament about not disobeying you."

  • What a little sweetheart.



Wore this shirt to my folks last weekend. Much to my chagrin my father thought I looked like the "Bumblebee Man" from "Channel Ocho" on The Simpsons and he was all manner of amused. Nice.






Found it! Was looking for this entry to link above:
http://ehowton.livejournal.com/39646.html
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060616_1730 Depart work, listen to BSG on the way home.
060616_1740 Wife meets me at the door with an ice cold Corona.
060616_1750 Order Chinese, change clothes.
060616_1830 Finish dinner.
060616_1900 Start Flightplan.
060616_2100 Start 4th installment of Revelations mini-series.
060616_2230 Bed.
060616_2300 Blissful sleep.
060617_0900 Wake.
060617_0930 Coffee, emails, blog, shower, dress, breakfast.
060617_1030 Depart house.
060617_1045 Arrive Carol House furniture store to peruse the selection.
060617_1150 Arrive Ruby Tuesday's. Order the ALL-U-CAN-EAT salad bar.
060617_1230 Home to pick up gift we forgot.
060617_1300 Arrive Brunswick Zone for neighbor kid's birthday-party.
060617_1301 Start drinking beer, Bud Select on draft.
060617_1430 Depart party.
060617_1500 Arrive Dillards at the Galleria...4th floor, furniture.
060617_1600 Arrive Lay-Z-Boy.
060617_1645 Arrive IHOP. Order the chicken-fried steak skillet.
060617_1730 Arrive Weekends Only.
060617_1800 Arrive Value City.
060617_1845 Arrive home.
060617_1950 Check emails, blog.
060617_2000 Start Goblet of Fire
060617_2100 Rid XP box of trojan.
060617_2200 Bed.
060617_2230 Blissful sleep.
060618_0830 Wake.
060618_0900 Coffee, emails, blog.
060618_0930 Shower, dress, breakfast, mow lawn.
060618_1050 Depart house.
060618_1115 Arrive Target.
060618_1215 Arrive Lone Star Steakhouse. Order dreadful steak nachos.
060618_1345 Arrive home, call Dad.
060618_1415 Watch Food Networks "Build a better burger" competition.
060618_1510 Update blog, scooby-snack, play Hot Wheels with children.
060618_1800 Finish Goblet of Fire.
060618_1830 Grill salmon, while smoking a cigar and drinking a Tecate.
060618_1930 Scan some pics of when I was in Germany for my buddy, then called him.
060618_2045 Added Google Chat to Adium using my gmail logon information - played Power Rangers with my son.
060618_2145 Read to both my children, then put them to bed.
060618_2230 Post. Bed.
ExpandMy arrogance )
ExpandBaiting TheTheologian )
ExpandFather's Day )



January 12, 1991 - I receive my first stripe, bringing me from the rank of Airman Basic to Airman at Goodfellow Air Force Base, San Angelo, Texas.

That's me on the left.
ehowton: (Default)


Daivd is quite sad to see me go. It was fun David - thanks for having me!

We had a nice time visiting and fraggin' the ever-living Shiite Muslim out of each other via Holomatch. The cats felt it too. They all gathered around my cot last night to pay their respects. The car is even more tightly packed than it was yesterday. I'm dead tired. I'm supposed to be creating new httpd error pages, fixing newly added printers to a workgroup of Solaris boxes in D.C., and writing an LDAP HOWTO for adding clients. Or, I could just blog all day...

New on quark is a section entitled, 'Blogs' which contains banners I've created for blogs I keep up with on a daily basis. Feel free to jump in the fray. We're talking sometimes 200+ comments on a wide variety of subjects here.

Internet connectivity at work today is intermittent. I hate that. Still, it beats a 24.6 AOL dial-up connection.

So I'm burning some music in CDDA format for the drive, but I've already packed my desk. No Sharpies! Then I recall...Tony had purchased me some high-speed, low-drag mini's, which I had clipped to the inside of my mobile command center utilizing the slick, integrated patented 'clip-cap.' Problem solved - Hooray Sharpie!



At the folks tonight, dropping stuff off at my storage shed, then last day of work tomorrow, a week in Wichita, then onto St. Louis! I know few things at this point, but I'll share with you my desires. I absolutely must have a Hotel with broadband, else I'll just die. I can't go 6 days, let alone 6 months without it. My livelihood depends on it. I'll probably unpack teh max0r and the 17" Viewsonic monitor and the ADT workstation and 22" monitor. I'd like to rebuild my Scorpio box as a unix box, but I may just give in and install linux on it. Either way, that will go into storage with the 17" Sun monitor in St. Louis until I'm ready for that. Anything that I keep in the Hotel will have to be moved to car every time I leave to drive to Wichita. The nature of the beast.

As always,

Slightly Greater than Fantastic
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