Ups and Downs

Tonight I am writing my blog entry from my bedroom.  In what is becoming the "new normal" I am sitting here on my bed with my laptop on my lap as Finnegan is curled up beside me.  He is such an affectionate dog!  Once Zack and Lex have gone to bed in Zack's bedroom, Finn will normally come and find me and curl up right beside me.  He is so funny as he practically tries to melt into me.  Oh how I love this little puppy of mine. 

It's hard to believe but Finn is now 7 months old I would guess.  We don't know exactly when he was born as we got him from an animal rescue league and they didn't know when he was born.  The best guess is that he was born sometime around the middle of October of 2010.  Given his age he has become a "teenage" old and is definitely making his own way through life.  Regardless, he remains an affectionate and loving puppy who dispenses his love to everyone in the family.

So one to my the title of today's blog entry - "Ups and Downs".  What do I mean by that?  Well - I am talking about the ups and downs of life.  This weekend has brought me a set of downs that have been hard for me to swallow, but I haven't had a choice.  Last weekend brought me a very nice set of ups that were definitely enjoyed.  Regardless of whether we are on the up or the down, we need to find ways to manage it all.  Today's management of the down meant that Zack and I spent the day just hanging out.  He loved it!  We played video games and watched a lot of TV.  It was a low-key, relaxing day for us, but we both needed it to correct the down that we experienced.  Hopefully our day of relaxation and play did it's job and has made us ready for the week ahead.  (As the adult - I also added a few alcoholic drinks to the mix to make the day better.  :-)  )

Things have been really busy for us of late and that is the primary reason I haven't been updating the blog that much.  When I have had the time to write I have spent most of it writing for my other blog - 365 Things To Do In and And Around Denver.  I maintain that blog on Facebook.  Hopefully in the coming weeks as Zack's school schedule winds down for the year things will get a little easy and I will have time to keep both blogs updated.  I was definitely spurred to action today by one of my Facebook followers who commented on the fact that I hadn't updated this blog in so long!

I will be sure to update several times later this week as things are always going on around here!

Thanks and peace to all! ~ J.

FYSRD!

I Learned Something This Evening - Utterly Amazing I know!

Yes - If you can believe it I actually learned something this evening.  That is truly remarkable for me as my brain is mostly full of mush and I am pretty sure I am incapable of learning.  I have to set the expectations of myself pretty low so that when I actually do achieve something like learning I can be really proud of myself.

So what did I learn this evening.  I finally learned how to use my Canon EOS 5D Mark II SLR camera.  I purchased this camera back in the fall of 2009 after I got a bonus from work.  Normally I take any bonuses I get from work and I promptly stash them away in a long-terms savings account.  I had a bee in my bonnet back in October of 2009 and I took some of the bonus and bought a pretty darn expensive camera.  My intention with purchasing this camera was to finally start developing my photographic talents.  (If I have any that is...)

I of course did what all men do and immediately started to use the camera without reading the manual.  I was able to take some OK shots but nothing spectacular.  After about 2 months of using the camera I decided it made more sense if I tried to read the manual.  After a bit of a struggle I did end up reading the whole manual but, I still understood very little about the use of the camera.  Over the last 1.5 years I have gone back to the manual to research various topics about how to use the camera and I picked up a couple of things, but in general I was clueless about 95% of the really good features of this camera.

Early this week I got an e-mail from Mike's camera advertising a camera seminar that was focused on the Canon EOS line of cameras.  "AHA" I said to myself as I realized I might get someone else to teach me about this complex machine called my camera.  So I decided to sign up for the seminar which was this evening.  It only cost $49, but I really feel like I learned a lot this evening.  I am really looking forward to get outside in the light of day and trying to put the camera through it's paces.  Hopefully this is the beginning of new and wonderful relationship between me and my camera.

On to some other topics...  Well - I guess just one other topic for tonight - Zack.  I think, I hope, I pray I might have finally gotten that boy to see the light when it comes to his grades.  It took a lot of persuasion and threats (I ended up taking away his Nintendo DS - I told him I gave it to charity!) but I think he is finally going to take things seriously when it comes to school.  He had such a horrendous punishment because he got 2 F's this week because he didn't turn in assignments.  Also he has to serve detention next Tuesday morning because he has been consistently late to several of his classes.  Needless to say I have not been happy with him!

We hope everyone has a great Easter!

Thanks and peace to all! ~J.

What a Break!

In my last post I talked about the Canyonlands Half Marathon and my failure to complete the race.  Since that time I have gained more knowledge about what caused my elimination from the race.  Though the first orthopedic doctor I saw concluded that I had several strained tendons, the doctor I saw last Tuesday came to a different conclusion and was able to back it up with X-Ray film. The fibula in my left leg is fractured.  In all likelihood this is an injury that I have had for quite a while but then I pushed it to the limit on race day and caused the bone to complete fracture.

The fracture seems to be a stress fracture, but is a complete fracture through the bone as opposed to a hairline fracture in which the bone is still intact.  Due to my running schedule, my shoes or some bio-mechanical issue with my running gait the pain that I started to feel 3 weeks before the race was likely the beginning of the fracture.  The first 2 miles of the race were relatively downhill and the constant beating my legs took as I ran caused the bone to come under additional stress.  The "popping" that I felt at mile 1.5 could have actually been the bone finally giving way and completely fracturing. 

The treatment for this injury is pretty much the same as it would be if it were strained tendons - rest and wear a "boot" to keep my leg as stable and as immobile as possible.  Two weeks after the injury it isn't too bad as the pain has mostly diminished and I have gotten used to the boot.  However when I have put a lot of pressure on the leg or I have done a lot of lateral movement my body definitely makes me aware that I have a broken bone!

The most frustrating thing for me is that I am not able to do the things that I normally do.  Walking with the boot is a pain in the butt and the doctor has told me to stay off my leg as much as I can.  The boot definitely made our spring break trip to Orlando much more interesting - but I still did it and pushed myself as hard as I could.  But that is a story for my next blog entry!

I haven't been doing really good in keeping up with my blogging in recent weeks, but I am going to try and do much better in the future.  For whatever reason I just haven't felt the desire to write.  But I kind of feel the desire beginning to return.  Also I have some really good pictures to post that will make my writing fun!

I hope everyone is having a great week so far!

Thanks and peace to all! ~J.

FYSRD!