Daddy's little trooper

The "mump" saga continues...

We took Sofia to see a ENT doctor the other day, he took one look at her and said that the swelling under her jaw on the left side is definitely not mumps, but rather an infected lymph node. He prescribed antibiotics right away. We gave her the meds for a few days and had one follow up appointment with him. Then, yesterday afternoon, I took her to another follow up and the doctor said, "we have no choice, we must drain it."

So, daddy's little trooper had surgery this morning--minor, to be sure, but she was given an IV, a general anesthetic and the doc drained 5 cc's of "stuff" from her "mump". She's fine now, she's sitting on the couch here at home watching a movie and the procedure happened about five hours ago.

She'll need to go back and see him in a few days to change the packing and dressing and such, but she's already been given the go ahead to go to school tomorrow...and more importantly of course, go horseback riding.

I know, right? As if I didn't already have enough to do...

So, first of all, happy father's day, if it is appropriate to say so...and thanks to all for the condolences on the passing of Mr. Frey. Funeral is Tuesday the 17th, so if you will be near Pittsburgh on that day...

I mentioned last weekend that maybe we'd relax this weekend. Didn't happen of course. Sofia spent the whole weekend competing--thankfully (for her mother and I) this is the last horse show of the year. She'll spend the summer recharging her batteries and reconnecting with the horses without all the pressure of a looming competition. I've been trying to upload video of her shows, but Firefox ("Fox on the world" as Dylan calls it--so cute!) keeps crashing for some reason. The short version is that she did VERY well, and we are so proud of her. She jumped both days, yesterday she went through the whole course but knocked down the very last jump. Today she did a clean round and then competed in the jump off. She ended up knocking down a bar during the jump off, but not too shabby for the youngest competitor in the under-14 year old category, no?

Anyway, this week coming up is shaping up to be a good one too--we sure have been busy lately. We stayed at the horse club until midnight last night (w/o the kiddos) but I still managed to get up early this morning and go for my run. I cut it a bit short this morning, but I felt really, really good around the six mile mark, good enough to pick up the pace by about 90 seconds per mile. I'm not too worried about cutting the distance short though...I run a big loop and I'm never very far from home, so if I need to I can always get back relatively quickly. But the bigger reason I'm not disappointed is that I'm getting ready to start my train-up for my big fall race.

So, in addition to posting to this blog, taking my classes, working, spending quality time with the family, and doing various other things too (I'm going to take Thursday off, for example, and go SCUBA diving...) I'm "organizing" a race...the quotes are there because it's a virtual race. Meaning I don't actually have to "organize" anything. I realized that in order to keep myself motivated, I need to have a goal. So I was talking to a friend of mine who is a veteran marathoner and we came up with a plan. No pressure to do so, but if you like, you are more than welcome to play along too...link to our blog is here: DAS Virtual Marathon. I'll post about my running stuff on this blog from time to time, I suppose, but I'll be posting much more about it over there. You're welcome to come check it out...and even participate (if not the full marathon, there's plenty of stuff for lesser, shorter distances). It's mostly for my own motivation anyway--so far I have about seven people committed in one way or another. See you out on the trail!

Norman Matthew Frey (1922-2008)

The first time I met my step-father-in-law, Mr. Frey, (or "Ga" as he was known to Natalie, Sofia, Jackie, and Dylan), was almost ten years ago--labor day weekend, 1998. It was my first trip to 318 Waldorf Street...I was being "shown off" to folks in Pittsburgh for the first time. That address would eventually end up on my driver's license, and although technically I suppose I've never actually lived at 318 Waldorf, I have moved away from that house on no less than three separate occasions over the course of the last ten years. Stefanie always called him that, by the way, "Mr. Frey"--ever since she was very small and even after her mom married him thirty years ago.

I always felt I had a bit of a special connection to him, a northern European descendant in the midst of a southern European/Mediterranean (= Italian) family. A waspy-looking fellow who was always presiding over Italian-American style Christmas Eve dinner--and why not? He was the one that did buy the house at 318 Waldorf fifty years earlier after all. Also, the fact that he had been in the Army Air Corps in WWII was something that always fascinated me about him, too. At the time the Army thought that blue-eyed people had better night vision--so they made him a navigator on a bomber out of England. He spent his whole war time experience in the ETO (European Theater of Operations) ferrying VIPs back and forth, so he never dropped any bombs on anybody, but no matter. He answered the call and served his country--and I, of all people, certainly respect that.

But of course, no discussion about Mr. Frey is ever complete without the most important topic. When I met him in 1998 he was already retired, but even so, there was always sports. And I'm not sure that he was interested in much anything else. I know that's not true, but an entry in the Pittsburgh sports hall of fame is not something that someone wakes up one morning and decides that they want to accomplish in a weekend, either.

I'm not sure it really mattered what variety of sporting event, he could get into them all, but definitely baseball was always best. I never talked to him about it, but I bet he could have coached some pro team somewhere if he had really wanted to, what with all the contacts that he made over the years--but I like to think that he chose to stay at the high school (Peabody, where he was Stefanie AND her mom's PE teacher) and college levels (Duquesne University) so he could get the young boys and turn them into men. And not just sports for sports sake, though, mind you. If a player didn't respect his teachers, show up to class, make passing grades--he didn't play. And that's the way it should be, I think.

He was not a man without flaws, of course, as none of us certainly are--but now that his extra innings are over, now that another member of "the greatest generation" has passed...we should all give thanks and hope that we, too, can have as much influence on as many people as Mr. Frey did, through all those years of teaching, coaching, and mentoring.

Good-bye Mr. Frey, good luck, godspeed. See you in the next life.

Recently

Man, we sure have been busy lately. It's horse show season, and as I write this, Sofia is competing for the second time in two days. Yesterday didn't go so well, but we explained to her that as she is the only 8 year old competing in the 14 and under category--she still has many years to get better. Some day the kids will say, "oh no, here comes Sofia, she always wins."

Even so, we try to find time to relax (the kids learned the word "connotation" this morning. Example: "relax" = good connotation, "lazy" = bad connotation. We were actually being lazy this morning, but we called it relaxing instead.) By relax, I mean, of course, that I had finished my 10 mile run this morning while Sofia and Stefanie got ready for the second full day out at the horse show. Oh, well. Maybe we'll relax next weekend. Probably not, though.

Anyway, lots on our plates these days, and I'm really behind in my reading too. I've got Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans: A Brief History, and Measuring Heaven: Pythagoras and His Influence on Thought and Art in Antiquity and Middle Ages, and The Music of Pythagoras, and The Pythagorean Sourcebook and Library (were you able to detect a trend?) to read before the end of the month. And that's not counting all three of the books on Shelby Foote, the three books on Greece and the Peloponnesian War, and the two books on historiography that I have in my book basket. I'm already mostly done with the last five on the list, but I've got them all going at the same time. The TV has only been on once in the last three weeks that I can remember, not a bad thing, I think. And that was just last night to watch the Belmont Stakes--we were rooting for Big Brown, but happy to see at least that the jockey didn't run him into the ground.

And then there's work. Here are some press articles from my latest project (a 24 hours visit takes a month and a half of prep work): Tunisia takes its turn in Ward’s PR push and Ceremony recalls WWII fallen in Tunisia. Every logistical aspect of the visit, the band, the airplanes (two of 'em), the vehicles to move all the people around, hotel arrangements, lunches, receptions--the whole nine--all belong to me. This isn't the only thing I do, but it's a big part of it.

Anyway, I guess I should stop procrastinating and write the Wall Street Journal article summary that is also staring at me in my To-Do List (I'm done with that program in September, by the way).

Haven't updated total mileage in a long time, I've had some problems with my iPod, Nike+, I've lost about 15 miles, but I'll count them anyway. Total = 285 miles.

The USAF and the Blustery Day

I've always been a huge Winnie the Pooh fan. This video reminded me of that Winnie the Pooh story. But this is something quite different.

From CNN's iReport site, here's the direct link to it: click here

Also, here's what the videographer had to say about it: " was standing in Arlington Cemetery in V.A when a huge storm was rolling in. I noticed these Air force Airmen standing so perfectly still. As the weather took a turn for the worse, these magnificent soldiers stood there ground. I was truly amazing to see them just standing there as the winds and rain were blowing tress and power lines over. WOW."

Les oreillons

Even someone with even modest French ability might think that they recognize the title of this post. But you'd probably be wrong. Les oreilles means "the ears." But les oreillons is something entirely different.

Sofia started complaining over the weekend about her jaw on the left side. Stefanie and I didn't think much of it, until she lifted her chin and we noticed that she was a bit swollen on that side. Elevated temperature, swollen glands under the face...figure it out yet?

She is indeed vaccinated against "les oreillons" and this might still not be an actual case (the doctor definitely thinks it is), but we're going to keep her out of school for the remainder of the week just to be sure.

Oh, and we looked it up, to be a true case of "les oreillons" you don't have to have bilateral swelling (on both sides of the face), at this point the swelling is just unilateral, confined to her left side...and she's still going riding (of course).

So, some time off from school, lots of fluids, and lots of rest...and hopefully she'll kick this thing, mumps or no, and be back to school next week.

Les Foulées du Lac! Ready? Set! Go!

So, the "half" marathon was yesterday morning. The scare quotes are there because it actually turned out to be 15 miles instead of 13.1. The course was also different (slightly) than the one advertised, which accounted for the extra distance. Additionally, they weren't manning the turn-around during the second lap and neither was there anybody standing at the second water point the second time past. The sponge station was out of sponges the first time I ran by (just a bunch of kids singing, "there are no more, there are no more") and the whole thing started a half hour late.

But I finished. All 15 miles of the "half" marathon. So at least there is that.

I ended up drinking seven bottles of water throughout the course--and still ended up fairly dehydrated. It was just too darn hot. I ended up looking behind me at around mile ten on a long straightaway and saw that there was nobody there. Turned out that there actually were a few folks behind me, quite a ways back, but the hundred some people that were behind me at the start all ended up quitting. Another piece of good news too is that besides the sunburn I have as a souvenir I have zero soreness today, even just one day after. All that training over the last few months paid off in that regard.

So, watch this space for more--this chapter is over, but I've got something that I think is exciting planned for the next several months. Stay tuned...