Monday, August 18, 2008

  • A Recap of Recent Events...

    *** Warning:  Lengthy Blog Content Ahead ***

    Well - if you haven't already figured it out - we're pregnant!  Well, technically speaking, Nadia is the one who is pregnant.  But we are a team, so I'm laying claim to a little of that glory too!

    We waited to tell everyone until after we could tell my parents.  We went to visit them this past weekend and let them know what was going on.  (if you haven't yet, check out the video from Friday's post).  They were thrilled.

    Saturday morning, Nadia woke up to find that she was experiencing some minor bleeding.  Of course, we panicked and started freaking out.  I mean - Nadia started freaking out.  I tried to remain calm and cool - but on the inside I was pretty much freaking out too.  We contacted the doctor and he told us to either go to the ER or wait and see if it subsided.  Either way, he wanted us to call Monday morning and come in for a visit.

    Things got a little better and it began to subside over the course of our Saturday afternoon.  It certainly put a damper on the "feel good" weekend of sharing the news with my parents - that's for sure!  We spent the better part of the day just hanging out, with Nadia taking it easy of course.


    Sunday she awoke and things were not much different.  Again, she spent the day hanging out watching tv and laying on the sofa.  I spent the majority of the day teaching Chris to ride his bicycle.  THAT was a good time.  We shared some laughs, some tears, some screams, and a few yells.  After about 4 hours of trying (consisting of 20 minutes of riding attempts and 3 hours and 40 minutes of "talking" after each attempt) - Chris was successful at riding a distance equal to ~50 yards or so.  Sure, he won't be signing up for the Tour de France anytime soon, but at least it's a start!

    Sunday evening, we went to a family gathering at my aunt Rita's house.  There, we were able to tell everyone of our news...although we were still feeling a bit nervous over the situation.

    We arrived back home Sunday night and got ready for bed.  Shortly before bed, Nadia started to bleed again - this time worse than before.  She freaked out.  I secretly freaked out and pretended to be cool and soothe her back to normal.


    First thing this morning, we called the doctor's office and they told us to just go straight to the ER.

    Fun times.  In my book, ER stands for 'Eternally Ridiculous'...

    When we pulled up to the ER - they have valet parking available.  As the guy was giving me my ticket he asked, "Are you going to be longer than 30 minutes?" 

    Somewhat stunned, I responded, "Does ANYONE get out of the ER in less than 30 minutes here?"  (already knowing the answer - but secretly wishing for some miracle response)

    He replied, "Oh - your going to the ER?  Nevermind then."  He took our car and I acknowledged silently in my head I wouldn't be seeing the car again for many hours...


    We got into the ER and I started making Nadia laugh.  I don't know exactly why - maybe we were both just nervous.  I couldn't seem to stop myself.  Everything I did or said seemed to crack her up.

    A few highlights were, I accidentally pushed the "call nurse" button on the remote control.  (seriously - who puts it on the TV remote???)  I immediately realized my mistake and heard the alarm blasting out at what seemed to be about 5,000 decibels down the hall at the nurses station.  I thought to myself, "what to do now?"  I decided if I pushed it once, and it activated it, perhaps pushing it repeatedly over and over again may somehow deactivate it.  FYI - that does not work.  It only seemed to speed up the loud beeping noise and everytime I pushed it, I could hear the alarm down the hall screaming quicker and quicker.

    I quickly apologized as the nurse came into our room.  She was nice about it.  I tried not to play with the tv remote too much after that.  (by the way - I appreciate the tv in the ER exam room!  nice touch)

    Another super awesome highlight:  Nadia had to go into a different room for a pelvic exam.  I was attempting to help her onto the chair/bed thing upon walking into the room. She was just too short.  I quickly tried to pull out the bottom of the chair/bed - thinking it was a step stool of some sort.  WRONG!  As I pressed what I thought was a release lever to open a step up stool...the whole front piece of the stupid thing fell to the floor with a loud crashing thud noise!    I quickly took the piece away and set it on the other side of the room.  I'm sure the staff (mostly seated just outside the room at a nurse station) thought I must be destroying the room!  Before anyone came inside, I was able to reassemble the chair/table thing.  No one has to know...


    Several hours and examinations later...

    Nadia has:
    • a heart murmur
    • an minor infection (which is causing the bleeding)
    • a cyst on one ovary 6 inches in diameter!!! 

    The baby has:
    • a total length of 1.89 centimeters!
    • a heartbeat of 168 bpm
    • nothing out of the ordinary - whew!
    A map of our 1.89 centimeter sized baby...


    A non-mapped version...

Friday, August 15, 2008

Thursday, August 14, 2008

  • Olympics 2008

    So can someone answer a question for me?  When did the Olympics get reduced to swimming and gymnastics only?  At some point in time, weren't there other events included in the Olympics?  I'm pretty much over the endless swimming and gymnastic coverage.  Seriously NBC.  There must be SOMETHING else to cover. 

    And who is the old geezer Russian guy they keep featuring on the commentary during the gymnastics?  I can understand about 20% of what he says - and it doesn't impress me much.  For example:  (and I quote) "To do well, she needs to do what she does."    Oh really?  Well thanks for that extremely impressive insight into the world of gymnastics you genius!

    So when are these games going to be over so I can get back to "The Office" and "My Name is Earl" episodes?



Tuesday, August 12, 2008

  • Shopping for Cheese

    We went to the grocery store tonight.  It was time for me to buy some more cheese.  I eat a lot of the stuff.

    Since I'm allergic to wheat - I have resorted to eating cheese quesadillas pretty much everyday for lunch. 

    We used to buy our Muenster cheese at Wal-mart, in the deli.  If I bought the entire block of cheese, without having it sliced, they would sell it to me for $1 per pound less.  This continued for awhile in Tampa - and a few times since we moved here to Indiana.  However, the past few trips to Wally World have ended in bitter disappointment for my discounted cheese purchases.  There is a very bitter lady that works in the deli at our local store.  Each time I go, she nixes the attempt to buy my cheese for $3.98/lb rather than the usual $4.98/lb.  I have not been her biggest fan.

    So, after giving it much consideration, I decided I was going to buy it anyway.  I told Nadia that if the lady refuses to sell me the cheese for $1 off/pound again - that I would make her slice the whole block(s).  Perhaps THEN she would learn her lesson for being so rude to me all the time!

    Of course tonight was no different and she flat refused to sell it for a discounted price.  The look on her face was priceless when I asked to have the entire 6+ lbs. block of cheese sliced "extra thin"!    It was even MORE priceless when I told her to go ahead and give me another block too - and slice it "extra thin" as well!    When I told her to look in the back for a 3rd block - she told me they didn't have anymore - which then changed to they only had 1 more - but they could only sell me two and not their "final" one???  Yeah right!

    I told Nadia to go get the store manager. 

    About 45 minutes later - they completed the process of slicing my EXTRA THIN muenster cheese - all ~13 pounds of it.  And on top of it - the store manager gave it all to me for $50!  That's $3.93 per pound!  Considering they raised their prices to $5.25/pound...I saved nearly $17!!!  AND got all my cheese sliced . . . extra thin.

    Perhaps the next time the old bag that likes to be a jerk to customers sees me coming to the counter - she'll think twice about telling me no.  Either that - or she'll make the new guy help me - just like she did tonight.

Tuesday, August 05, 2008

  • Test Day

    Nadia found out last week that she has been accepted to IUPUI to begin taking classes.  As part of this process, she had to apply through the office for international students - as her entire educational background is from Mexico.  While she has been accepted, it will be 2009 before she starts attending school.

    Today, she off to take her English as a Second Language exam.  The ESL exam is a requirement for all international students, which she is considered to be at this time.  She is very nervous about this test.  She has been told that it will take approximately 4 hours to complete.  She has told me she isn't a huge fan of taking tests in general, so something this "big" is really intimidating to her.

    I told her that she needn't worry about it.  She speaks english BETTER than 75% of my professors & instructors at Purdue!  If they can teach in English - surely she'll test out for learning in English okay!