Welcome to the world my dear, sweet girl

After little rest, from being at the hospital to see my father-in-law, it was time for an early morning trip to the other hospital for my wife to get her check-up.

She turned in her 24 hour urine collection, they drew some blood and hooked her up to monitors. We tiredly waited the results when the doctor came in and said your results have doubles since Monday and you have preeclampsia. The baby is fine but your (my wife’s) condition could deteriorate rapidly. She said they would have to induce soon. My wife told the doctor to do what she thought was best and the doctor said to the nurse, get a room and induce labor.

Wait, what? Did I just hear what I thought I heard?

I was pretty much wide-eyed and alert after that and indeed I did hear things correctly. Within a few minutes we were in a labor and delivery room and they were prepping for delivery.

After a short wait, my brand new baby girl arrived in the world. She is a preemie and will have to stay in the hospital for a bit to get her breathing down and learn how to eat, but other than that she is doing fine. She’s in the neonatal ICU and we’ve learned that she is kind of mad for coming out early and doesn’t like being touched. Haha, cranky already and not even 24hrs old yet.

Having five sons and now suddenly a girl, I don’t know what I’m doing.

All I know is if this year continues to be full of surprises like the first few days, I may need a year long vacation in 2014.

Anyway Harper, welcome to the world sweetie and can’t wait for you to come home.

Well that didn’t take long

As I look back on 2012, I see an emotional roller coaster of a year. I spent the first six months in Afghanistan and the last six at home so really that’s a night and day difference alone.

I learned that forgiveness is the hardest thing to do. It’s real easy to tell someone you forgive them, but actually forgiving that person can be hard. I think I’ve done a decent job at forgiving but every now and again the anger, disappointment and hurt creeps back in. But I’m working on it and it comes back less and less.

I’ve finally gone back to counseling and am working on some things. I got my motorcycle license and am picking up a bike in February. I already know what I’m getting, I have someone holding a Harley Sportster until I have all the cash.

So as the year came to an end, things were looking better and I hoped 2013 would be a nice, level, good year. I figured I’d find new ways to occupy my mind (which as evidenced by this web collection of ramblings, I get fixated on something and go all in but in a couple of months and grow bored and do other things. I blame it on my ADD baby).

My thoughts of a great new year made it the whole way until 6am on the 1st. Mother in law called my wife and said her Dad, my father in law, was being taken by ambulance to the hospital.

Turns out he had an abdominal aneurysm which leaked and caused clotting in his arteries to his legs rendering him paralyzed from the waist down. He had clots from his kidneys to his feet. The removed the clots but couldn’t get them removed from his feet. They don’t know if the paralysis is permanent yet and either way he may end up losing both legs if the blood doesn’t start flowing. Then he had high potassium and had to go on a dialysis machine to get it cleared up a bit. Last complication was his blood pressure dropped. It’s been a long day.

In the morning I have to take my wife in for a test, she’s pregnant, and they may admit her, at least that’s what they said during last checkup on Monday. My FIL was going to help with the kids if she is admitted but now obviously he is unable to.

Hopefully the next 24hrs go good for him, he’s in the most critical stage. Hopefully my wife won’t be admitted. I do know that if things don’t work out the way I hope that I’ll just have to figure something out. It will all work out in the end and at least there’s still plenty of time left to make it a good year.

Happy new year, I guess

And so we meet again

Yes, it’s true, a slacker am I.  I know it’s been awhile since I’ve written anything, but when I have the time to write, I don’t seem to be in the mood and when I’m in the mood, I don’t have the time.  Ah, such is life.  So, following are several short stories of some events that have unfolded in the previous few weeks.

Bunny makes a new friend

While at work, diligently doing some manpower analysis and not watching youtube videos, I receive a frantic text from my wife explaining how she and the children are being terrorized by a flying cockroach.  Eager to #1 have an excuse to leave work, although I didn’t tell them the specific reason, and #2 be a hero, how could I refuse to respond to the aid of my clan.

I arrive home and find my second oldest son with his hand in a slipper, slightly crouched and walking slowly in the house.  My youngest son, if I remember correctly, was holding a Croc and running around.  My second youngest was just running around terrified, and my middle son had some type of plastic hatchet or sword.  My wife was in the bedroom with the door closed, my mother-in-law had arrived just prior to my arrival and was standing in the living room shaking her head.  I asked the kids where they saw it last and of course I received four different answers.  I grabbed a fly swatter, which by the way makes sound effects when you use it, and we searched the living room.  We searched everywhere, I even moved furniture and we couldn’t find it.  We conducted room by room searches of the house and found nothing. I advised my wife we couldn’t find it and she was not pleased that it was not found. 

I spent enough time away from work on the bug safari, so I decided it was time to head back to work.  I was in our living room, by the back door, and noticed the rabbit was drinking from his water bottle, well attempting to anyway, it looked empty.  I figured I had enough time to fill the bottle, so I enter the screened in porch and grabbed it from his hutch.  For the record, my rabbit lives in my screened-in porch, or what some people call a Florida room, but since I live in Florida doesn’t that make every room a Florida room?  Anyway, as I’m pulling the water bottle out, I see movement by my feet.  I jumped about three feet in the air and darted for the door, slamming it behind me.  My kids are all staring at me and are like what is wrong with you.  They already know I’m partially crazy, so not too many things I do surprise them.  I told them to look outside the door onto the porch.  They look, scream, and run away.  A four foot snake decided to come visit the bunny, well he’s actually almost three years old, so he’s a pretty big rabbit.  I knew it was a snake when I saw it, but we have poisonous ones here so that’s why I darted away quickly.   Once I got in the house and looked, I realized it wasn’t poisonous; it was an eastern racer snake.  I went out the other back door and propped the outer door to the porch open.  I then entered the porch, from the door connected to my living room, and used a broom to shoo the snake out into the yard. 

I then had a sternly worded conversation with Mr. Sniffles and told him he was not allowed to have any friends come over without prior permission. 

With that all said and done, I went back to work.

 

Politics, schmolitics.

Being an election year, it is hard not to hear more about politics than usual.  Recently I heard about Mitt Romney’s remarks about the 47%

“There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what…. These are people who pay no income tax. Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax. So our message of low taxes doesn’t connect. So he’ll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich. I mean, that’s what they sell every four years. And so my job is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”

Now I do somewhat pay attention to politics, but I don’t usually get too involved however, this comment pissed me off.

We, as a country seem to be all about percentages lately and I know I’m in the 99%, because I’m not rich, I now know I’m in the 47% because I pay no income tax, and I’m also in the .045% of the population in the Active Duty military.

Due to being an atheist and not having a predisposition of dislike, or open hatred, of things that don’t agree with my religion, as many religious folks do, I’m probably a little more left leaning than right.  I don’t actually align myself with any party; I registered as an independent when I registered to vote.  There are things on both sides I like/dislike but I think it’d be great if a third more middle of the road party came into prominence.   So what does this have to do with anything you ask? Well, let me tell you.  I will not vote for a republican candidate for a long, long time.  The reason being is because of the comment above.  Yes only one person said it, but after listening to the platform of the GOP I would bet money that many, many more have the same mindset as Mitt Romney.

 

An open letter to Mr. Romney,

                I have spent the last 19 years, 7 months and 3 weeks, serving this country as a volunteer in the United States Air Force.  I have missed countless birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, celebrations and family events.  I have missed many of my children’s firsts.  First step, first tooth, first day of school, etc.  I have been unable to attend funerals of loved ones and I truly believe my military service was one of the major factors that led to the divorce from my first wife.  I have given myself to my service with everything I am, both physically and emotionally.  I am forever scarred, both physically and emotionally, but yet I do not regret the decision I made in joining the Air Force.  I am proud to be part of the very few people who volunteer to put their lives on the line for this country, something that you will never experience or can even begin to comprehend.  Your recent comments are out of line and I cannot believe you think so lowly of the people of this country, the same people that I volunteered to sacrifice my life for so they may continue to live the life they know and enjoy the freedoms they have.

I want you to know that I am part of the 47%.  My family receives federal aid in the form of the Women, Infants & Children program run by the USDA.  Also for seven months, out of the past year, I paid zero income tax, but that was due to my deployment to Afghanistan.  I receive earned income credit and often get back more than I paid in income tax.  Sure the system is flawed, but for you to say that you’ll never convince me to take personal responsibility and care for my life, I have only one simple response.  A response I wish I could word in a less coarse manner, but I have yet to find the appropriate words to truly express how I feel.  So my simple response is, fuck you Mr. Romney.  I implore you to please take your silver spoon and head back to whatever mansion you came from and please stay there.  I just want you to know that I equate your comments to spitting in my face, the face of someone who has sacrificed nearly 20 years of their life for the sake of this country as a whole. 

                                                                                                                Regards,

                                                                                                                Michael McCoy

 

And that’s all I gotta say about that.

 

Days off and bodily fluids

So I decided to take a few days off of work so I can run my wife to some appointments on Wednesday and then pick up an iPhone 5 on Friday (more on that later).  At 5:30am on my first day off I heard my three younger children talking about barf.  My oldest son gets up early to meet his bus at 6:00am so it’s not uncommon that all the kids are up around this time.  The youngest one came running into my room telling me that my 7 year old had thrown up and in doing so had gotten puke on my youngest son’s blankets.  I got up to investigate and indeed sometime in the night, my 7 year old, threw up in his bed and since he’s in the top bunk was able to get a bunch over the edge onto his brother below and all over the floor.  Apparently after doing so, he went back to sleep and rolled around in it.  At 5:45am, I’m steam cleaning the carpet in the bedroom, not how I wanted to start my day!

Rest of the day was ok, until the evening.  I’m outside feeding the rabbit and my youngest is at the door, crying.  I ask him what is wrong and he says he needs a new shirt. I notice that the white shirt he’s wearing has brown streaks all over the place and ask him if his Mom gave him chocolate.  He said no.  In my mind, I’m just thinking “wonder what he got on his shirt and where he did this at so I can see if he made a bigger mess.”  I must have been lost in thought when he supplied the answer to what was actually on his shirt, but when he said poop, I snapped back to reality and asked him “Did you just say poop is on your shirt?”  I then look closer and notice that not only is poop on his shirt but it’s also on his shorts, legs, and on top of his foot (how does that even happen?!?).  I asked him if the bathroom was a mess and he just nodded.  I wanted to run away and never come back.

To the bathroom!

He managed to get poop on the floor, sink, toilet paper roll that wasn’t on the holder, the toilet paper roll on the holder, side of the toilet, and wall.  I started the shower and had him remove his clothes and hop in while I cleaned the bathroom.  I put his clothing in the washer, thankful for the sanitize setting on our LG washer, and went back to the bathroom and washed him.

The next day, my wife and I are at a Doctor’s appointment for her and the school called.  My second oldest son had become ill while on his field trip and was lying down on a bench.  We told them we would pick him up.  The Doctor’s office was close to his field trip location so it didn’t take us too long to get there.  Fortunately I didn’t have to see any bodily fluids that day.

I spent Friday and Saturday feeling sick, hmm, wonder why.

Monday, my 7 year old got the runs, and pooped on himself.  I told him it was no big deal and had him go in the bathroom and get in the shower.  If it was only once, it would have been no big deal, but he pooped himself twice more and then at 9:30pm he threw up in the bathroom.  I had lots of laundry to do that day and I felt so bad for him.  Poor guy.  When I was cleaning up his puke, he heard me gagging and said “Sorry Daddy”.  I told him that he didn’t need to apologize, it’s not his fault he got sick and I can help the gagging.  I got his bed set up and he went to sleep.

Wednesday, I just had to go pick him up from school because he had diarrhea again.  Poor boy, I hope he feels better soon. 

By the way, I have a delicate stomach and certain odors cause me to gag.  Of course, poop and puke are two of those odors.  So while I’m cleaning all these messes up, I’m gagging the entire time.  I am physically unable to throw up, so all I can do is gag up fluid, which becomes tainted with red from blood.  Joy, guess I’ll have to get that checked out sometime.  I’m tired of cleaning up bodily fluids.

 

iPhone 5

I woke up to preorder my iPhone 5 on the 14^th, but due to some complication with AT&T I was unable to complete an order.  No big deal I thought, I’ll just go to the store super early on the 21^st and wait.  I woke up at 5am and checked the AT&T site and noticed they still had a shipping date of the 21^st.  Apparently their website was down for hours and people couldn’t get orders through.  I placed my order with no problems.

A couple days later I’m checking on my order and notice it says back ordered.  I converse with AT&T and they said my phone won’t ship until Oct 4^th at the soonest.  I was displeased! Ok, I’ll just cancel my preorder and go early on Friday.  Well canceling a preorder could take 3-5 days to show in the system which means the system wouldn’t reflect I had an upgrade available so I can’t get the discount price.  BS!!  I was rather perturbed at this point.  I am a gadget geek and have had every iPhone and I must have new shiny things, even though there is nothing wrong with my old things!

Wednesday rolls around and I check my order and it no longer says backordered.  I began to get excited and when they sent me a shipping number I believed it was going to show up on Friday.  I sat around Friday, eagerly anticipating its arrival and shortly before 1pm the FedEx truck arrived at my home.  Just glad it all worked out and I received my new toy on time.

I made this

I decided to be crafty and made this barrette/hair bow holder. It consists of a picture frame, some paper used for scrapbooks as a background, ribbon and hooks. The color of spray paint I used is ballet slipper. It’s a very nice, pastel pink color. Hot glue was used to attach the ribbons to the frame. The glass was removed to create space for the barrettes to be attached. Didn’t take too long.

A pic just prior to hanging it on the wall.

Lucked out

Well we lucked out with the hurricane.  It kept moving further west and didn’t really affect us much, in fact it was sunny, but quite breezy, most the day.  A day I got to spend at home because they shut down the schools and work.  The bridge shuts down when winds get to 50mph and since they were unsure of the winds we would receive they shut things down so no one would be stranded on one side or the other, away from their home.  Hopefully those in Mississippi and Louisiana who were affected will soon have everything back to normal.

Story time! It’s dark and quiet in the McCoy household around 1:30am on Sunday morning and my spouse awakens me, saying she think something was crawling on her arm.  I apparently mumbled that it was probably just a hair that brushed against her arm, rustled by the ceiling fan.  I returned to my slumber.  About half an hour later I bolt upright, jump out of the bed, my wife, who never went back to sleep quickly followed and even made it past me, surprising since she sleeps on the wall side of the bed and I on the other.  She asks why I jumped out of bed and I told her I felt something running up my arm and it woke me up. It’s now 2am and I’m stripping all the blankets and pillows from the bed.  I look under the bed, behind the bed, through every pillow and blanket, finding nothing.  Obviously I can’t get back into the bed until I find this creature that aroused me from my sleep, it could be a spider and I HATE spiders, they creep me the hell out.  I made the bed and was putting the pillows back on when I see some type of beetle looking thing (official classification) running up the wall.  I quickly grabbed a flip-flop and crushed that thing to bits.  I used toilet paper to scrape its remains off the wall.  My spouse had evacuated to the living room, so I told her all is well now and we can return to our bed.  I received the obligatory I told you so and we returned to the bedroom. Of course, from all the excitement, I was up for the next two hours.  I needed lots of coffee on Sunday to function.

“You are born from the poop from the toilet.”

Nothing like spending the day preparing for a category 2 hurricane that is scheduled to hit on tuesday and make landfall about 20 miles west of us.  I live on a peninsula, and they shut the main bridge out of the area down when winds hit 50mph, so if they are going to evacuate us, we’ll need to know before it gets real close. fun times! I’m glad I mostly cleaned out the garage while I was on leave.  Today I moved the stuff in the center and was able to park the van in the garage.  My car can’t fit all of us, so I need to protect the van.  I have all the outside stuff secured on my screened in porch and am hoping for the best.  We picked up a bunch of supplies and are ready for the storm.

This week was the first week school for the kids and we couldn’t even make it out of the first week without trouble.  I received a voicemail on Friday from the assistant principal and she said my 2nd grader was sent to the office for making an inappropriate comment to a female classmate.  I was slightly concerned as to what he may have said.  A little while later I received another voicemail, my phone reception in my office sucks, and it was the assistant principal again.  She explained that she spoke with the other child and the child said a few of them were just playing a game and saying silly things to each other and that my son wasn’t being mean.  I was pleased that at least he wasn’t being mean, but still concerned at what he said.  When he arrived home from school there was a note which explained my son told his female classmate that “you are born from the poop from the toilet”, I couldn’t help myself and starting laughing.  I was just glad he didn’t use any curse words. He understands now that even if you’re playing, you can’t say things like that to your classmates.  I’m also glad that the girl admitted to playing a silly game so it didn’t seem quite as bad to the principal and label my son a bad seed on the first week of school.

With the hurricane I imagine week two of school will be shortened, so hopefully we can avoid any trouble this week.

It can’t rain all the time

Well at least I thought that it can’t rain all the time. I’ve been home for about two months now and it’s rained at some point during the day for all but maybe six or seven days. The drab dreariness of the darkened sky dampens my spirit, drains my energy, and drives the nail of depression deeper into my soul. As you can see I would not be able to live in the Pacific Northwest, England or any other place that experiences rainfall for days and months on end.

Finally bought a new power cord for my MacBook. Now I just need to remember that I did and start using it instead of updating this from my phone.

I went to a school orientation for my son in Kindergarten on Monday. Right before the teacher spoke she made the remark that the children could go play. She gestured towards one area of the room and said girls you can go play in the kitchen and gestured towards another part of the room and said there are blocks there for the boys. Once again, the south living up to the stereotypes that I had before moving here. I know she didn’t mean it in a bad way but my son looked at me confused. He enjoys playing in the kitchen area and I had to make sure he knew that kitchens aren’t just for girls and that he can play in there too. I did tell him that the difference between him and the girls playing in the kitchen is that have to ask for permission to leave the kitchen but he can come and go as he pleases…haha j/k I didn’t actually say that the last part to him.

The radio stations in the Panama City Beach area are some of the worst radio stations around. They all have terrible morning shows as well. I don’t want to hear you talk, I want music. Plus my first work problem is I forget to bring the headphone adapter for my lifeproof case on my iPhone so I can’t stream pandora or use I heart radio and listen to radio 104.5 out of Philadelphia. Best radio station ever, well if you like alternative music that is.

The new WordPress app is an improvement. I like it.

All the kids started school this week so that means I have to wake up a little bit earlier than I had the previous three weeks. I am tired.

My lower eyelid of my left eye has been twitching the last couple of days. It’s annoying.

I took my promotion test yesterday. I believe I did fairly well but all the other factors, like the board score, will prevent any further promotions for me in the Air Force. Ive never been an ass kisser and refuse to ever be one or participate/volunteer for things i do not like or believe in for the sake of getting a better board score and being promoted.

I need to CLEP a few classes now and get my core classes knocked out. Of course I still need to figure out where I’m going to do all this and even what major for that matter. Oh well, I just take all CLEP/DSST exams and push the decision off further. Lol, I am such a procrastinator.

Enough randomness, time to get back to work.

I must have angered the spirits

On Friday my wife and I went to Applebees for dinner. We arrived early so it wasn’t very busy. We were seated and told our server would be there shortly. Ten minutes goes by and not a single person had stopped. We had three separate servers walk past, but no one stopped. I was ready to leave, but the server at the table next to us happened to come by so my wife asked if she could possibly take our drink order while we wait for our server. She said no problem and came back shortly with some sweet teas. She said she would just go ahead and take care of us since the other server had not stopped by. She provided us great service and said she hoped she had made up for our initial wait, I agreed that she did and gave her $20 tip. She said she hopes to see us again and I told her I hope she’s our server next time. She told us to ask for her by name the next time we go so we get seated in her area. Hopefully I will always get good service at Applebee’s now, well as long as they don’t expect a 50% tip each time, heh. I don’t eat there often, but now when I do service shouldn’t be an issue.

The other week I noticed the light cover of the light above the toilet in the bathroom off the master bedroom was cracked. I checked to make sure it was plastic and didn’t really think about it. With five sons in the house, things tend to get broken with no explanation. On Sunday my wife was utilizing the bathroom and right after she stepped away from the toilet the light cover fell to the floor. She called for me and I went to check it out. The covering had cracked further along the base and caused it to fall. No big deal. I walked back out and sat on the couch in the family room and started playing with my iPhone. About two minutes later a small picture I have hanging above the stove came crashing down onto the counter with a loud clatter. My seven year old came running in and asked what the noise was, while at the same time telling me it wasn’t him. I told him the picture, it’s one of four, fell onto the counter. He asked why and I told him I must have angered the spirits. He didn’t know what to say, so he chuckled and went back to his room. Fortunately nothing else happened or I really might have thought something was going on.

Back at work today, fun times.

Oh, if you have a chance, play the game songpop, I have it on my iPhone but don’t know what other platforms, if any, it is on. Fun little game.