Much of what follows may or may not be decipherable but I didn’t have access to or the time to actually hop on the net and post any more blog posts so I simply typed them up and have now transferred them over to the blog.  I failed to date each one as I wrote them but they are all about the last few days; the time I was able to spend with my dad while he was in the hospital.  Please feel free to ask any questions you may have regarding this post.  As always, thanks for reading.

So they took him off the ventilator this morning and he seems to be breathing well on his own.  His heart rate is somewhat elevated and they are worried about kidneys but as of right now the outlook is good.  He isn’t all that alert but he seems to be trying to wake up and trying to talk.

Showed up this morning and they were taking dad down for a ct scan bc they feel as if dad should be a little more alert and coming around and they are just taking precautions to see what may be going on bc there is the possibility of dad having an infection in his brain or that he also suffered a stroke.

Well no new news just yet.  We haven’t got the results yet for the cat scan.  All we know is that they want to do an MRI as well.  They originally wanted to do an MRI with (or by, not certain) contrast but the kidney doctor said absolutely not bc it could cause serious damage to the kidneys.  So, pretty much status quo right now.  Nothing new and nothing certain.

Im on my way home now.  Just about to Brenham as I sit here typing this and still no fucking clue to what is wrong with dad.  No word of the cat scan and the mri is not a possibility.  They said Dad is too big for the MRI machine.  Kind of confused about that bc although my dad is a large man he isn’t really that big.  So they are looking around the area to get him an open MRI.  Don’t know what that is but if it will help him then im all for it.  Got there this morning and they were administering an eeg to see what kind of brain activity was going on.  And they want the MRI bc they think dad might have another abscess somewhere else in his body which would be the cause for his fever.  But just as before; nothing new, nothing certain.  This has to be the hardest part of this entire ordeal for the family.  Not knowing what is going on or what is causing his sickness and then only being able to wait.  We have no control on what is going on and the feeling of helplessness sucks.

Dad is pretty much the same as before.  Just dropping a quick line to make sure everyone knows how he is doing.  They ordered a cat scan because the neurologist feels that Dad should be a little more alert than he is at the moment.  He is still responsive to commands.  He will still squeeze your hand and answer some questions by shaking his head back and forth.  So nothing really new to post about today.  I’m sure we will know what’s going on in the morning unless it’s something super serious and then they will call Carol so no worries there.  But ill get back into blogging on a more regular basis so do please continue to come back and see my latest rambling-ons.

Until next time,

Sorry to leave my post yesterday so vague but I didn’t have much time to sit down and actually type up a decent post.  But I have a few minutes this morning as I try to peel back my eyelids to let in the new day.  Sometimes I think I should buy some extra Scotch tape and just use it to keep my eyes open

Anyway, I told you yesterday I would be back to explain the hospital comments.  Tuesday night, not certain the date and not that important anyway, my dad had a minor heart attack and had to be taken to the hospital.  He has since been taken off the ventilator and is breathing fine on his own.  The doctors say his heart looks normal and healthy so the heart attack didn’t cause too much damage to the heart.  However, three months ago my dad broke his ankle.  Now, this man only does things one way and half-ass just isn’t it.  He sheared his tibia and fibula off just above the ankle.  His foot doctor misdiagnosed it as gout and so my dad’s ankle was left as such for almost three months.  As a result a massive infection set in and started running a muck.  In an attempt to save my dad’s life the doctors have amputated his left leg from just above the knee.  The surgeon told us, in order to get ahead of the infection he had to go that high.  Which means, in three months this massive infection and crept all the way up his leg damn near into his knee.  According to the doctors, the infection in his ankle could be the cause for most of his problems at the moment.  Either way, it’s been 36 hours now since the amputation and Dad has seemed to make 180 degree turn around.  He is still in isolated ICU because he has MRSA and I realize at any moment everything could come crumbling down again and he might be right back to knocking on death’s door but for the time being we are all hopeful and everything looks to be on the road to recovery.

I will keep you updated with any new information as I am made aware it.

And don’t worry, I do have some happy news to report.  But I don’t have the time to type it up and get it to all of you.  But I promise, it will make you smile.  Hint: collaborative writing project between my wife and me!!

Faithful readers I promise I’m still alive and well.  It has been quite some time since I’ve posted an update but I should be able to keep up with a little more frequency; hopefully.  Either way I have to run for now, I’m posting from a laptop in a waiting room of a hospital.  Don’t worry I will update with why I’m at a hospital in the near future but for some reason I opened the laptop and started typing so everyone felt it a good time to start up a conversation.

Good Morning everyone! I hope everyone has enjoyed reading the daily quote from the feed. I would have loved to have been discussing them with you everyday but I’ve been working quite a bit this past weekend. We didn’t do much on our vacation but what we did do we might have done a little too extravagantly so I’m picking up some wait shifts to grab a few bucks to throw at our cable provider

Several things to discuss, so make sure that coffee cup is full and then strap yourself in and enjoy the ride.

First off, a farewell to Mr. Jackson. I wasn’t a huge fan or in love with the man by any means but I can recognize greatness and the amount of influence he had on the industry.

(Moment of Silence)

So my wife and I are sitting on the sofa watching some T.V. last night when this commercial airs for Dairy Queen’s new Blizzard which contains the Girl Scout cookie Tagalongs. All of a sudden Mel is all about wanting some cookies of her own. She asked me to go and get them and when I finally decided I would go get them she said no. :O
But, she did start looking around for ingredients to make our own cookies.
Uh Oh! no brown sugar and no salt. Hmm….
We started looking for recipes online and she found one of the absolute greatest Peanut Butter cookie recipes ever!! As many of you know I cook for a living so for me to say that a recipe is the best, well, you should take it to heart damnit! lol
Anyway, the recipe is really really simple:

1 cup – Peanut Butter
1 cup – White Sugar
1 egg

That’s it! Well there are optional ingredients and all that jazz but I’ll leave that for the actual site we found the recipe. →
Either way these things are way tasty. A must try!!

This year was the first time in over five years that my wife and I didn’t get to watch the 4 July fireworks together. I was at work, which has a beautiful view of the communities display by sitting on a bench out front, and she was here at home. She and a friend walked to the park and was able to have upfront and personal seats with the fire works here. Obviously, we both were able to enjoy two fantastic firework shows, just not together. The ones near my work were awesome! There were these ones that would go up and burst open and then each spark from the original burst would burst open as well, by far my favorite type of the show. Mel said the show here was amazing. She said it was probably the best show she’s seen this little town put on. So I am very happy to say that we both enjoyed a good show. However, it wasn’t with each other so it could have been a lot better.

Either way, Happy 4th of July!!! I hope everyone had a great, fun-filled, safe weekend!!!

Make sure you check out the Quote of the Day on the Welcome page. It really is a very good one today. Maybe, I’ll post about it later today but right now, my coffee cup is empty and as we all know, that is a very very bad thing.

~jwhaas

As you more than likely noticed I have added an RSS Feed for my quotes of the day now. They aren’t the same ones I get in my email but I have realized the ones I am getting in my email are not always ‘daily’ as I did not get one today. So, some days you may come here and find conversation regarding two quotes but at least with the feed we should always have one to discuss.

“Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.”
– A. J. Liebling

I really like this quote! Short, succinct and dead on.

I can’t think of the song right now but when I do I’ll come back and give credit but there is a line in the song that goes “when they own [all] the information, oh, they can bend it all they want” I have to think the above quote and this lyric are somewhat common in theme.

Freedom of speech is different though, yes? Because if we so choose we could stand on the street corner and shout what we want, but in order to get it printed then yes I guess we would have to own one ourselves.

As of about 3:30 in the afternoon yesterday I am a new uncle!!! I only have the picture on my phone my brother sent me so I don’t have one to post for you all, yet, but as soon as I do I will. She is absolutely gorgeous!

She got me to thinking though. Was I really ever that small? Now, I know, I was born 5lb. 14oz. but really?? Me?? Hell, I’m 6’4″ and over 300lbs. I wear a size 13 or 14 shoe and have a size 13 ring finger. What the hell happened. I was born small and then took off. I joke by telling people that I tasted food and never looked back lol

Which leads me to another thought; small babies produce big people. Excluding prematures and other complications but babies who are born healthy but small usually tend to grow into larger people.

I must warn you, I am no scientist nor have I done any real research on the matter, I am merely expressing what I have learned through observations and questions of my own.

But ask around or tell me about yourself. Seems like the babies who come out at 11lbs and 24″ long or whatever turn out to be the short scrawny folks. I mean, c’mon, I came out a little bitty thing and well, even if I had the recommended 5-6% body fat I would still be a very large man. I have bones in my legs the size of small trees for god’s sake.

Let me know where you all stand. Were you a small baby or did you come out huge!?!

~jwhaas