Two fer
2007-01-05, 4:37 p.m.

Day 865 Ukraine Beware

Got the kid off on his trip Wednesday. Left him at the Buffalo Airport. By 10:45 he was sufficiently through security that there was no point in our waiting for his 12 o�clock departure. Last night around 6:15 I got a call from him just before he boarded his flight in Newark, NJ. (Yeah, a 6+ hour layover to start the trip. I can almost drive to Newark in that amount of time.) We figure he should have landed in either Warsaw or Lviv (forget which � his ultimate destination is Lviv, Warsaw is another stop over) around 4am our time � 10am over there. He agreed to wait a few hours before he called us to let us know he had made it in one piece. What a sweet kid.

Day 867 Two for One Deal

Well. Don�t know what happened, but that last entry kinda got interrupted. In the mean time we�ve learned that Eric has arrived safely in Ukraine. He can�t use US cell phones over there, so it�s unlikely we�ll hear from him directly. The lead professor on the trip is procuring a cell phone over there to use in the event there are any emergencies. He is also communicating with his wife back here in NY and she is updating a website for all of us nervous parents to check in on every 23.6 seconds or so. I�m not really checking quite that often.. Eric is a big boy and can take care of himself just fine. I�ve only looked once so far today for updates and it�s 4pm already.

Cindy & I are having a less than fun time lately. Over xmas break, she managed to get drunk just xmas eve and maybe one other night. She was very disappointed that I wasn�t just jumping for joy that she�d gone something like 5 straight days with out a drink. She made some comment that I �apparently don�t like� her anymore. I did not comment at all to that statement, thinking it was just thrown out there as bait, like some carcass lying in the road with crows picking at it, only to have a semi come over the hill and flatten everything all over again. I wasn�t going to be a crow.

Turns out my mistake was in not disagreeing fast enough. Because I didn�t disagree, she assumed her statement was true, and I�d been getting the cold shoulder from whenever that statement was uttered until a couple of days ago. That�s when I asked her if she was trying real hard at being an asshole, or if it was just coming naturally to her. Charming, I know. It at least started a brief exchange wherein I got to point out that she hasn�t been acting particularly likeable for the last (few years) couple of weeks. The only time she�s been civil to me is when there are witnesses. Otherwise, she�s barely answered questions, and pretty much won�t acknowledge my existence.

After having pointed that out to her, she�s at least been civil the last couple of days. Of course, last night was bowling night (update coming on that), and I was hoping to get to my nieces high school jazz band concert after bowling. Unfortunately, bowling ran a little long and Cindy never got back to me about the concert, so I went straight home instead. Cindy had gone to the gym after work, and apparently also hit the liquor store. She was in no shape to go to a concert, and was barely in good enough shape to do her teacher substitute calling for the evening. (3 teachers called in sick for Friday between 5 and 7 pm Thursday evening. That�s like a record or something) I can�t imagine being a sub and listening to her on the phone. Hope she got the calls made before the hooch kicked in.

So yeah � she�s disappointed that I don�t go ga-ga because she hasn�t had a drink for a few days, then she goes and tanks it all anyhow. She�s obviously still in denial that she�s got a problem, or doesn�t care, or is afraid to go get help. Either way, I think what�s next is that I tell her that one week of sobriety (with her acting like an asshole the whole time) will not cancel out 3+ years of excessive drinking. She�s turned off a lot of people, me included, and one week of nice-nice isn�t going to repair ANY damaged relationships. She may not get it, but I need to tell her so she at least understands where I�m coming from. I�m not going to tell her any of this with the expectation that it�ll change her one iota, but at least she�ll know why I feel the way I do.

Had to get that out. It�s been stewing in my head for a couple of days now. Makes me feel a little better.

Now. Bowling. One brother (the lefty) kinda called in sick. His elbow has been bothering him lately. Went and saw his doc. Doc said probably not bursitis (too young � hah!), but more likely an inflamed ligament. Might try no strenuous exercise for a couple of weeks, and try taking some anti-inflamatories for a while. (Piroxicam? Something like that.) Hmmm. Heaving a 15lb bowling ball just might be considered strenuous.

So that leaves me and the youngster brother (youngster � he�s 39) to defend our teams good name. Then youngster brother says year end, accounting, buried, might not get out in time, yada, yada, yada. I reminded him of a little incident recently where one of his co-workers had no problem leaving early for some personal thing during the end of the 3rd quarter crunch or some such thing. That got him riled a bit. In the end, he showed up, almost late, but he made it.

Best part � bowling didn�t suck. For the night we both bowled our averages, and even managed to take 4 of 8 points for a change. I shot a 194 average for the night, the youngster ended up averaging around 207 or so for the night. Also occurred to me we could use Zach (the kolidge gradgiate) as a sub next week maybe. Lefty needs another week off to rest his elbow, and we could introduce poor Zach to the world of adult bowling. This is an interesting league too. The bowling is very high quality, but everyone is doing it for the fun of it � no big pressure for prize money, cuz there is very little. Great league, we have a blast every week, even if the bowling sucks.

Got up extra super early this morning so I could hit the spinning class that started at 5:45. I was running a tad late, but figured it�d be ok if I slipped in 5 minutes it started. Which, in hindsight, would have been fine. Had I been only 5 minutes late. The schedule posted on the web said the class started at 5:45. The schedule at the Y said the class started at 5:30!! Oops. I wasn�t going in 20 minutes late, nor will I believe just anything posted on the web anymore. So I headed off to the treadmills and trotted off a few miles, went and did my Nautilus work, then realized two things. First, I forgot to brush my teeth in my haste to get out the door. But that was ok, because I could brush my teeth after I went home to get the shirt I left hanging in my closet. We�ll just have to load up and try for this spinning class again on Monday. That one is taught by a girl (woman, female), so I�m sure I�ll enjoy it a lot more than the male led Friday class. Maybe that�s the motivation I need to get out the door in time. Cute female instructors. Hope it works.

Gotta go off to see the Bob. Need to get him to sign some forms to release his medical history to a new doctor. Not sure if my power of attorney extends to that kind of stuff. Maybe I�ll sneak in another riveting update over the weekend. I know I owe some emails. They�re coming . . .

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