Last night I went to my mother’s place and this morning we drove down here to Houston to visit my grandfather in the hospital.  He’s been having problems since he had stroke a few years ago, but lately he’d been having a lot of trouble with fluid in his chest and it is very hard for him to breathe.  He’s 91, so the doctors assumed that it was pneumonia, since that’s a common problem.  For the past month he’s been going through this kind of trouble.  Yesterday they finally performed an operation to try to drain the fluid.  That was when they discovered a very large tumor in his lung.  According to the doctors, this is a very agressive and hard to detect type of cancer (which they say is usually associated with asbestos exposure, although we don’t think that he was ever exposed in any significant way).  He’d had a number of X-Rays in the past month, but the cancer was not visible. 

Now the doctors are talking about trying to do chemo or radiation therapy, but he’s so weak and tired that it’s feared that he wouldn’t survive.  My grandfather has said that he’s tired of everything and that it’s his time.  He’s in a lot of pain from the cancer and from the drainage tubes.  It has been pretty hard on my mother to see her father in that condition.

We’re going to return to the hospital in the morning and will likely spend the day there.  Right now it’s a case of waiting and seeing what will happen.

The ten day period in the standard house contract is for ten actual days, rather than business days.  It just dawned on me yesterday that the contract period will be up on Tuesday, and Monday is a holiday.  So we’re going to have to scramble a bit after the inspection on Friday.  To make things more interesting, I have to head out of town on Friday night for a wedding on Saturday.  Also, I have a deadline for an external design document on Friday morning, but I hope to finish it up by Thursday morning to allow for reviews.  If I can iron out one final technical issue tomorrow, I should be in a good position.

I’ll just be glad when the week is over.  Until then, this site will probably be neglected.

I purchased an atomic wall clock with a wireless outside temperature sensor at Sam’s today.  I made sure to mount the sensor in a shaded area.  Here’s what it said a little after 6:00pm today (yes, the quality sucks, but I had a hard time getting a good angle):

My poor air conditioner starts up in the morning and runs straight through until some time in the middle of the night.  Even with all that, it still gets hot in here (it doesn’t help that I’m somewhat warm natured and my preferred air conditioner setting is the one where frost starts to form on interior surfaces).  At this rate my next electric bill will be as horrendous as the last one.

Sorry for the lack of posting lately.  I’ve been sidelined by some kind of nasty bug.  It started as a sore throat last Friday night and developed to the point where I could barely speak yesterday and today.  It seems to be getting a little better, and none too soon as I’m about to go completely nuts from being home all this time (not to mention being either too tired or too zoned out to think or write).

I hope it gets better tomorrow, since I have a vacation day and it sucks to be sick on your own time. 

Things are promising to get a bit hectic for at least the next month.  I have two months of crap to stuff into a one month bag (unless our project managers can pull a rabbit out of their hats and convince the customer that their proposed delivery date is delusional). 

At the same time, I have been prequalified for a mortgage loan so I’ll be house hunting.  So when I’m not at work I’ll probably be checking out houses and neighborhoods.  I’m going to be looking in Roanoke, Keller, and possibly Flower Mound.  Keller is most promising, given the current housing market it looks like it’s possible to get more house for the money there. 

I’d been piddling around with the idea of buying a house for months, but what finally motivated me to get moving was the fact that mortgage rates are starting to go up again.  I’m looking forward to having my own place.  At the same time, I’m dreading the move.  I originally moved into this place because I was going to graduate school at UNT part time and it was convenient (and the rent was cheap).  I’ve been here for a little over eight years now and I’ve accumulated more stuff than will reasonably fit.  Packing up all this crap is going to be a major pain.

Unless I get some free time tomorrow afternoon, it’s likely that I won’t update tomorrow or Saturday.  I’m planning to go to the range after work tomorrow and then I have to get up a little early on Saturday. 

I was speaking to a friend on Tuesday evening and was amazed to learn that she has reached the age of 23 and has never been to a zoo.  So, we’re going to go to the Fort Worth Zoo on Saturday morning and then to the gun show in the afternoon (she’s never been to a gun show either and the zoo is less than two miles from the Will Rogers Center).  After that is another friend’s house warming party starting at 6:00 (in Dallas).  Saturday is going to be a long day away from the computer and away from home.  It’ll be a nice diversion, although it’s going to involve a lot of driving (about 130 miles round trip).

I’ve been back since Sunday evening, but going out of town always messes up my schedule the following week.  You don’t realize how much stuff you do on Sunday until you have to do it on Monday and Tuesday.

We fired off approximately one metric assload of fireworks on the Fourth.  I got carried away at the fireworks stand and ended up buying way too much stuff (like this and those big “Pluto Invader” rockets).

My biggest mistake, though, was to buy some low-carb chocolate bars.  I always seem to forget about the caffeine in chocolate.  I don’t do caffeine very well (it makes me cranky and irritable) and now I’m going through withdrawal, which includes a massive headache.  Ugh…

I’m in the office again tonight, for what I hope will be the final chapter in the deployment saga from hell.  I left the office around 4:45 to run some errands and get dinner before coming back.  As I was leaving I put a Diet Rite in the refrigerator (which, per the sign on the door, was marked with my initials).  When I returned around 8:00 it was gone.

What kind of low-life steals a fellow’s Diet Rite?  That just isn’t right.

I just returned from a short camping trip to Lake Ray Roberts.  I’m hot, sweaty, tired and a little sunburned and I wish I could have stayed for a few more days.  We didn’t do much of anything, except sit in what little shade we could get or float in the lake.  But despite the heat (around 96°F both days), it was still good to get away from everything for a little while.  Unfortunately, pesky things like work and paying the bills had to reel me back in.

I’ve come to feel like I should try to update this site at least once per day.  Unfortunately, between not getting enough sleep lately (my sleep habits are still turned around) and the onslaught of allergens, I’ve been too tired to come up with anything interesting.  My allergies are usually kept under control through Claritin, except for certain short periods when things get really thick in the air.  Right now is one of those times.  The cottonwood trees are spamming the environment with massive quantities of white cotton-like “fluff”.  So much, in fact, that some people’s yards look like they’ve been dusted with snow.  While I haven’t been sneezing constantly, it’s still left me feeling physically drained.

So, until this subsides, things might be a bit light on this site.