Eric Does Not Do Antibiotics!

At the beginning of this month, Eric started battling an infection in his foot.  It was spreading, so he was put on three antibiotics (two pills and a topical cream).  A week into the course of antibiotics, he got a fever and wasn't feeling well.  Before bed, he started developing a rash that was even worse when he woke up.  He called into work and started working out treatment - the doctors office was too busy, so he went to Urgent Care.  They were going to give him IV steroids, but his blood pressure was too low, so they sent him to the ER.  So on to the ER around 11am, where they admitted him and gave him IV prednisone and benadryl.  

Three years ago, he had a similar allergic reaction when the free clinic gave him an antibiotic when he had mono.  It caused the exact same reaction, trip to the ER, and IV steroids.  

So Deb and I hung out in the ER with him - while they did blood tests, pee tests, and chest X rays to try and figure out why his fever was staying above 103 degrees.  He was released around 4pm and we all headed home.  Deb bought Chinese food and we watched some TV.   

On a side note - today was my first day back to work!  The new job is going great!  I took a half day on the first day of work...but it was no problem.

Rash from last night. 

Freezing in the ER. 

The rash in the ER - practically solid in most places, it looked like a sunburn.

Etc. Stuff

This is mostly a picture:story post - surprisingly enough, the cat focused part of the post lacks pictures!  

In the beginning of July, I had our carpets professionally cleaned because Mystic has a bad habit of not making it to the litter box.  I must not have thought this all the way through, because she was back at peeing on the carpet a few days later.  She is sneaky about it though, and never does it when we're around.  So our new routine is to keep her locked in the bathroom (with food, water, and a separate litter box) when we're not home or asleep.  I'm thrilled to report that we haven't had a carpet accident since!  Hooray for having a house that doesn't smell like cat pee!

Last week we came home and Eric noticed Addy was limping.  I felt so relieved that we have a section of our savings account earmarked for pet expenses.  So the worry of the cost of taking her to the vet didn't overshadow our worry of what was wrong.  We spent the evening trying to make her sit still, and I held an ice pack on her for ten minutes.  Luckily, the following morning the limp was gone.  Who knows what happened, but we're glad she's feeling better!

My summer has been full of working with my nanny kiddo - and he's been working on bowling this summer.  His form has something to be desired, but he's bowling in the 50's or above!

I've also been working on programming his AAC app on his iPod - he doesn't speak well, and he's picked up really quickly how to use it to say his words!

 My nanny kiddo also has this awesome body sock.  It is a nylon bag that provides sensory stimulation, and I caught this really cool picture of him!

Eric's summer has been spent wondering whether or not to buy some new games.  Addy broke him down, and now the are playing Age of Empires I, II, and III, Bioshock 1 and 2, and Unreal Tournament 3.

Eric and I housesat for Papa while he was in Michigan visiting Molly & family.  I used this as an opportunity to further unpack and organize his house.  This is his dining room, starting to look like a dining room!

This is his office, now empty of boxes and fully set up!  There is even a pillow for Frisco to sleep on while Papa works.

The guest room is also empty of extra boxes!  It has a bed, bedside table, lamp, and rug.  Perfect for someone to roll in for a night or weekend to visit.

I've also upgraded my clothesline!  The old one was nylon and flaking off strands on our clothes.  This is pvc, and affixed with L brackets - I used the two screws to secure the brackets to the porch, and then the pvc wire goes through the other two screw holes.  Now I just need to do some laundry!

This massive heat wave (temps over 100 for the past two weeks) has killed off most of the leaves on Grammy's tree :(

Some of the branches appear to be dying...

However there are still some that are holding on for some hope.  We got some rain today and have more in store for the next week.  Hopefully the leaves pop back up...we'll see.

We really let our budget get away from us this summer.  So we're attempting to go all of August without eating out.  Fast food was definitely a weakness for us over the past two months.  This is our last hoorah before that kicks in (this was on July 30th!).

This is Ashley's new room in her apartment.  She has officially moved out to Hays, KS for her first semester of state college, woo!

Day 341:Oh oh oh, O'Reilly's!

Eric here, it's about time for me to officially update our readers on my new employment. I recently moved from Checkers to O'Reilly Auto Parts in Olathe. The hours and pay are better, plus I actually enjoy what I'm doing! So now my job in a nutshell is to take part orders from our store to several various shops and garages around downtown Olathe. However we're a hub store, so we get in shipments from our distribution center in Kansas City and then deliver them to local stores on *the route*. Lately I've been running the route which is cool because there's no time to take a lunch while I'm out, so I get an hour of overtime every day. I was already scheduled for two hours of overtime this week, and I'm happy to pick up any more hours they'll send my way. I'm excited to get my first partial paycheck tomorrow and get an idea of how much better off we'll be now.

My truck, 6133, and the rest of our fleet.

The store front.

Day 338: Swiss Army Wife!

Today I received a call from Eric while he was at work...he had reinjured his bad ankle and was taking care of it with a wrap and some medicine on his lunch break.  A few years ago he either broke his ankle or really badly injured a ligament or tendon or something (undiagnosed because he didn't have insurance at the time).  It doesn't cause him much trouble anymore - but it's just weak in general and fairly easy for him to tweak it.  He rolled it while reaching for something at work, and is not walking with a pretty strange limp.

I was checking up on him throughout the day and when I got home from work, I changed out his ice pack, and put on a wrap and one of the air cast ankle supports.  Eric said that it reminded him of something he'd heard on the radio, and that I'm his Swiss Army Wife!  Handy in all situations!

He's got the day off work tomorrow, so we're hoping that it gets to feeling better and he doesn't end up needing to go to a doctor.  Here's to hoping!

Poor old man and his weak ankle!

My classroom is completely packed up!  I can't believe this is only my second year teaching and I have so much stuff!

Day 335: Eric Graduates!

Today Eric, Ashley, and Shannon are all graduating from Johnson County Community College! It is also our 11 monthiversary, and today we paid Eric's car down to $4,000! A big day in the Green household!

This morning we both had work - my last Friday of the school year and another day at O'Reilly for Eric. I worked on wrapping up paperwork and packing my room, I really hope I don't have to move buildings again next year! Eric worked onmemorizing locations for the customers he delivers to. As soon as we were out of work, we each hustled to our respective parents' houses to get ready for gradauation. We reassembled with Mom, Ashley, Me, Paul, Deb, Shannon, and Eric at JCCC for pre-graduation pictures. Then we met Ken and Karen in the gym, and battled to save seats for Steven, Leslie, Brian, and Jen. Brian and Jen got here right as they closed the doors for the graduates to start filtering in...so they had to wait another 15 minutes right outside the doors.

And now, well...I'm blogging from Mom's iPad while all of these people graduate. They are halfway through the third row of graduates, and our three are all at the beginning of the fourteenth row... I think I'm going back to Angry Birds now!

After the graduation, we all went out to dinner at Cheddars.  I think it's our new favorite sit down restaurant because the service is excellent, the atmosphere is cozy, and the prices are C-H-E-A-P!

Captain Eric!

 Fancy Ashley!

Graduate Shannon!

Graduate Ashley!

 Graduate Eric!

Yea!  Congrats Eric!

Brother & sister graduating together.

Ahhh, the iPad is great! 

Eric with his signature crazy grin! 

 Ashley and Jon.

Mom, (me), Brian, Jen, Leslie, Steven, Ken, Karen, Deb, & Paul.  Everyone there for Eric, Shannon, and Ashley.

Ashley, Shannon, and Eric before they cross the stage.

Eric & perfectly dressed Steven!

Day 310: Eric & The Cats

Another boring evening in the Green house!  I happened to be wielding the camera while Eric was bothering the cats.  The result?  A few cute pictures :) enjoy!

Mystic seemed to enjoy the exercise ball! 

Addy's fountain of tail!

Day 301: Parallel Lives

Today was pretty typical of Saturday's, Eric worked at 9:30 and I got up at the same time to get on my day's work. I was your typical ADD housewife, switching between cleaning, blogging, dancing, and relaxing every few minutes. I was incredibly productive in getting the house ready for our family's pre-Easter next week. Then in the evening I went to a classmate's house to work on a project. While there, a kid stopped by doing school fundraising. He said, and I am quoting directly "this card is $10 and good for 5 free medium pizzas from Wheat State Pizza, more than a $50 value!"  I literally ran to my car, got the money and paid the boy for one of the cards.

Before I left my classmates house, I called to order a pizza to bring home to Eric when I actually read what was printed on the card... "With the purchase of a large or extra large pizza at regular price, get a free medium pizza!"  Yes, the "regular price" was underlined.  This kid scammed me into a BOGO that I would never have bought knowingly - when do Eric and I buy pizza?  Never.  Lame lame lame.

As for Eric's day - he woke up with me in the morning and headed out to work straight away.  It was a hard day at work because one of their new hires decided to quit by just not showing up, so they were short handed.  He ended up working an hour late, booo.  But then he got to hang around the house and play while I was out doing school work.

We finally got to have some dinner, watch some Scrubs and That 70's Show, and spend an hour or two together after I got home.  Woo!

Addy is the naturally occurring gargoyle in our house.

Day 292: Staging the Garage Sale

Last year we had a garage sale around this time to get rid of some extra junk. Jess and I did pretty well. This year we're doing it again, and we don't have as much, but whatever we don't sell this time we're leaving behind or donating to Goodwill. So today after class I went to Jess' parents' house to start helping move stuff out to the garage and prepare for the first sale day tomorrow. We moved and cleaned up a piano, some exercise equipment, and various other items. In return for this first night of work I got some chinese food! :D Now it's off to bed to get a little sleep before we start setting up at 5:30 tomorrow morning.

I didn't get any pictures of us setting up, so here's a picture of Addy "relaxing" with her face on our games chest.

Day 291: G5 Economics

Eric here, pretending to be the nerd for a moment. This month our budget will be a little off-kilter. We've been making large payments to various debts every month, including a large sum to finish off my credit card last month. But now with April coming up, and our budget being prepared, we're having to make some small adjustments. We threw a little more at my car than we actually should have spared at the time. It won't cause any problems, we'll just have to modify our starting amounts and certain payments.

So here it is, the vehicle that has served me so well over the past two years. No decisions have been made, but we may just have to part ways so Jess and I can reach our goals a little bit faster.

All for the "Pursuit" of happiness (It's a G5 Pursuit)

Day 282: Scott Pilgrim vs. Boredom

Lately I've been working in the morning on Mondays, so Jess and I are spending Monday evenings together more often. Today we went for a walk after we both got home. We strolled around Eudora, talking and playing Word Feud against each other on our phones. On the way home we stopped by the gas station and grabbed a movie from Redbox to watch with dinner. We made our usual pasta and sauce with ground turkey and sauteed in some onions. Our slightly different dinner went well with the very odd movie, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. It was interesting, but I couldn't decide even at the end whether I really liked it or not. I guess if I don't know by the end, that means it wasn't great.

I actually stopped after one serving tonight, and Eric only had one half portion of seconds!  We're doing a little better at portioning our meals!

Day 263: Ash Wednesday

It's a good thing Lent is about repentance, because I'm awfully sorry that I slept through the 7pm service tonight.  Ashley went to the 7am service because she had work during the day and night, and I was planning on going to the 7pm service because I had work in the morning and afternoon.  Unfortunately, I was exhausted after work and needed a 1 hour nap before driving 40 minutes to go to church.  I set three alarms, the same as I do every morning, and slept 2 hours past those alarms.  It was 8:15pm when I woke up, HUGE bummer.

I'm not beating myself up over it too badly though.  In December I bought myself a Bible and Episcopal Book of Common Prayer, and these have both been getting a lot of use lately.  I've never been one to pray other than things like "Please God, let me pass this test!" or things of that sort.  So this Lent, I am giving up complaining about work, and adding daily prayer and reading the Bible.  This week I started reading Proverbs, which I'll probably have to read through a few dozen times before I really start to understand.  Tonight I used the BCP to go through Compline, which felt much more guided and productive than my previous few nights' "chat with God" approach.  Then I read through the Ash Wednesday service in the BCP.  I realize it's not the same as going to church for the service, but it was definitely better than saying "Oh well, I'll just catch it next year!"

Later in the night, after Eric got home from work, we were both really hungry.  He agreed to participate in fasting with me for Ash Wednesday.  According to what I found online, this fasting counts as 1 small meal and two snacks which are not larger than the meal when combined - enough to keep up your strength.  We thought we were strong enough to make it a full day of real fasting, and discovered that we were weaklings.  We ended up each eating a 240 calorie TV dinner to make it through the night.  

Usually I am the lazy one asking Eric to bring me blankets and drinks, etc.  Tonight I finally waited on Eric hand and foot for awhile.  I tucked him in to the couch, brought him the TV remotes, and even adjusted his hood to where he wanted it before putting myself to bed!

Day 257: The Job Hunt

Eric here, covering another Thursday night. I tend to do these because this and Sunday are my days off and the only time anything interesting really happens with me. Not that this is always the case; today wasn't terribly exciting. I went out to Olathe a little early to take the car seat back that we still had from Sunday. I almost went for a ride on the motorcycle, but it was going to take some work to extract it from the garage and it wasn't quite warm enough yet. So instead I went to JCCC early and stopped off at the career center to see if they had any listings. Unfortunately most of what they have is geared towards soon to be graduates with specific degrees. I ended up with a couple of leads that hopefully will be better than the picture message Jess sent me that informed me McDonalds is hiring!

I need a McJob!

Day 243: Must be Thursday

T'was a typical Thursday, not much going down; just Addy chasing the laser pointer 'round. Ok so I can barely rhyme and it's the wrong time of year. The point is that Thursdays in the Green family are all about the same for this semester. Jess works, I go to class and the gym then come home and we make dinner and watch something for a bit. Ah, but not today. Today before class I happened to check my school email and discover I'd been dropped from my gym class. I had a warning from my instructor saying to attend by the 11th or I'd be dropped. Well that's no problem, I went on the 10th. But what's this? Another email saying I've been dropped anyway... So I went out to JCCC early to sort it out and eventually ended up with some paperwork I have to get signed by a couple higher-ups and return within a week. -Sigh- I guess I'll get to 20 visits this semester somehow. Oh, and I got a new school ID made for free since it was my first one this year (actually since I started at JCCC), and I managed to lose my old one for the umpteenth time.

This picture is better than my last ID and way better than my driver's license

Day 242: Putting the Desk Together

When we moved into our apartment a year and a half ago, Eric and I inherited Mom and Alan's old desks - which are actually still pretty new and very well made.  Over the last year we realized that we don't use our desktop computers anymore, so we took one of the desks apart to save space in our spare bedroom.  We tried to sell the desk as our August garage sale with no luck, and it has been taking up a huge amount of space in our storage unit ever since.  Luckily, the Cordray/Travelbee family needed a desk, so I drew up directions of how to put it together, and left it with them.

I quickly received an email asking for help, because it is really quite complicated to put together.  So tonight, Eric and I headed over to their new apartment to put it together for them.  We've put the desks together and taken them apart a few times now, so I expected it to go quickly.  It took us nearly an hour to put it together, and we ended up being 4 wooden dowels short - but it looked perfect!  The family couldn't stop thanking us, but we were really happy to put it together for them - because what good is a gift if you can't use it?

Again, please consider dropping off or mailing a donation to the "Cordray/Travelbee Benefit Fund" at Douglas County Bank, 300 W. Ninth St., Lawrence, KS 66044.

2/3 of the Cordray/Travelbee Family - Good luck, guys!

Day 236: How Relaxing

After a long day at work, Eric is soothed by melting into some video games...while Mystic falls into a relaxing sleep just by being near us.  This is a pretty typical view around 11pm in the Green household...

Eric prefers to sit close enough to the TV that he actually has to turn his head to scan the screen...

Day 230: The Beast feeds...

I wasn't terribly hungry when I got home from work tonight, so Jess and I decided to just do something easy. We started making sandwiches which always gets Mystic's attention. She'll watch you making the sandwich and remind you if you forgot to give her a piece of lunchmeat. So Jess held one up for her (sometimes she'll do a hind-leg dance like a bear) and Mystic attacked it voraciously. I was fumbling with the multi-exposure settings on her camera, but managed to snap this National Geographic cover:

"Give it to me NOW!!!"

"NOM"

Day 212: Hello Triyaki!

Jess and I have been hearing commercials on the radio for a new Triyaki buffet in Lawrence. We've had the original Triyaki drive-thru chinese a few times in the past, and have always been pleased with the results. Today was MLK Jr day, so Jess was off and we took advantage of our time together to run some errands. One of these was trying out the buffet for lunch. It reminded us of one of our former favorite restaurants (now shut down), Jade Mongolian Barbecue. There are cold bars where you build a bowl of assorted ingredients which you take to a window and they make it into a soup for you. Jess wasn't impressed with her chicken broth base, but I rather enjoyed my beef. That is until I squirted wayyy too much red chili sauce into it. Beyond the soup that have a standard assortment of pre-cooked chinese food (General's chicken, lo mein, etc.), and a pretty impressive variety of sushi which Jess bravely dabbled in. After lunch, we moved on to more errands, including buying me an entirely new supply of socks. As you can probably tell, Triyaki was just about the highlight of our day.

Trying new things!  We found some we liked, and some that we weren't as thrilled with.

Day 208: FPU Round 3

That's right, we're at it again. I've gone back to having Thursdays off for class during the upcoming semester, so I was there when Jess got home from work. We still had Andrew's car seat in her car, and he returns to the Wenberg household on Thursday's, so we took the opportunity to take it back out to Olathe and spend some time with family.  Of course we were prompted by Becky telling us that he is still sick and they need the carseat ASAP in case he needs to go to the doctor again.  As it happens, another Financial Peace University class was starting that night, with Ashley, Papa, and Kris all attending. We decided to tag along to see how they liked it and because Jess may end up going weekly since I'll be out there for class anyway. Anything "Dave Ramsey" has pretty much become her hobby. They all seemed to really enjoy the first class and the interaction with other people in the same boat. After FPU, we started heading home, but since it was Thursday we had one more stop to make. Boneless Thursday at Buffalo Wild Wings, where we got teriyaki, honey barbecue, and Caribbean jerk wings.

Alan was "cleaning up the trash" in the living room and decided to take Ashley with him.

Delicious, as always!

Day 206: 11:11 1/11/11!!!!!11one

Last week Jess added some textbooks to our Half.com inventory which has boosted our sales a bit. Today I wrapped one of my books from this last semester, "Philosophy of the Daodejing", in our new standard: brown paper bag. This one was going to Lawrence, so I thought I'd take it myself after work and save a couple bucks on shipping. One of our newer closers called in to work today, saying his face was leaking (which we judged to be a runny nose). But even working with the other new guy, and picking up face leaker's slack, we managed to get out roughly on time. It was about 9 degrees outside, and too dark to see addresses, so eventually I gave up and went home. Luckily, Jess had just finished making the macaroni and beef we got in our Angel Food Ministries package. We ate on the couch while she was curled up in her snuggie reading and I played The Sims 3. Kind of a trying day, but the end made it all worth it.

Success!