I’m a little late doing this, but I should tell you about a secret admirer.

And it’s not a secret admirer for me either. It’s my son’s.

That’s right. My son’s. And she’s even from another state to boot.

See, he got not just one or two Valentine’s day cards from her, but a total of 5 cards.

The envelopes had nice decorations on them, with a couple even looking like they were sealed with a kiss. The insides of the cards were all written by hand and decorated with hearts and such. She even lightly scented them with perfume.

I was almost envious. Since I was involved in the planning in the first place, I wasn’t though.

I tell ya, the look on his face when I started handing them to him was priceless. What was even better was his expression when he got them opened and read. I do believe his face turned at least six shades of red. I wish I had thought to get the camera out, but I didn’t even think about it. I know, shame on me.

Being the sharp cookie he is, he got it pretty quickly narrowed down to two possible suspects. He just can’t decide which one it is, and I’m not telling.

Not yet anyway.

I think I’ll just let him stew on it for awhile longer.

More Christmas’ ago than I care to remember, my sister and I got matching yellow skateboards from jolly old Saint Nick.

We couldn’t wait for the weather to warm up enough to get them out and tear up the streets. Okay, maybe not streets, but just our street.

The weather warms up, and out come the skateboards, practically glowing yellow in the sunlight. We rode those things all through spring and most of summer with out the first scrape, scratch, cut or bruise.

That all changed on fine afternoon. I couldn’t tell you the month or day, but I do remember the event vividly.

My sister was sitting on her skateboard, and I was pushing her around the block on the sidewalk. We had gotten most of the way around the block, and then, wham-o, disaster struck.

I was pushing her along at a pretty good clip, practically running behind her.

What I failed to see was that the side walk in front of us had heaved up just a little. It was enough that the front axle on the skateboard hit the leading edge of the concrete and hung.

Yes, the skateboard came to an immediate and abrupt halt. No, my sister and I did not. In fact, she went face first off of the skateboard onto said concrete sidewalk with my hands still firmly planted on her back.

It was not pretty.

She ended up with a skinned up forehead, a large L-shaped gash on her nose, busted lips, and a chipped tooth. She was definitely a mess.

At least I was able to side step her and not end up falling on her. That would have been even worse I think.

And yes, I felt really, really bad about it. I don’t think I got near those skateboards again for a rather long time. Somehow, they kinda lost their appeal for riding.

You know, now that I think about it, it’s a wonder that my sister survived her childhood. Between me and our older brothers, she had a few accidents. Or maybe it was that we caused her to be in a few accidents.

More to come later.

After successfully ticking off my daughter, my son and their mother over the course of yesterday and this morning, the day got much better about mid-morning today.

My phone rang and the caller id said “unknown number.” I smiled and thought, “Alright! I think I know who this is!”

As it turned out, I was right. It was Shannon on the other end. You may wonder why I thought it was her to begin with. This is because the very first time she called me, October last year while I was at station 2 about 6:30pm, the caller id read “unknown number.” I almost didn’t answer that call, but am I ever glad I did! So, while it could have been some one else, she was the first to come to mind.

I’m very glad it was her. I can’t accurately express how relieved I was. It had been a week since we last talked, but, when you’re used to talking to someone every day, it seemed a much longer time.

We talked for quite a while, but then she needed to go to take care of tipping horns on some of her cattle. She called back late this afternoon, and we talk a while longer, till it was time for us fix dinner. It really was wonderful to hear her voice again.

And yes, I look forward to talking to her again tomorrow. But then, I always look forward to talking to her. I’ve told her several times that we could end a phone call, turn around and call right back, and I’d still be happy to hear from her again. That may sound kinda silly, but it’s the truth.

In addition, mom is feeling a fair amount better today. The doctors have actually talked about releasing her later in the week.

Pop’s hand hasn’t gotten any better, but it hasn’t gotten worse either. So, that’s good.

My ex called me and said that she had been thinking about it and had decided that she should at least help out with this other bill of hers that I got stuck with. You could have knocked me over with a feather.

Last, but not least, my son has been in a much better mood this evening. He hasn’t gotten mad even one time. That’s a nice change of pace.

Have a fine night!

My mother was admitted to the hospital last Friday evening. She hadn’t been feeling well, complaining of her legs hurting.

Turns out she had blood clots in them…again.

This is a result of being taken off of her blood thinner, put back on it, and then taken back off again. Don’t these doctors use any common sense when it comes to things like this, particularly when this exact same thing happened just a few months ago?

I don’t get it.

Anyway, she wasn’t responding as well as they wanted, and an ekg showed an abnormal rhythm, so she was moved to CCU yesterday morning.

Now, I just found out that, on top of the other things, she has (are you ready for this?) pneumonia. That’s right, pneumonia.

What the heck? Shouldn’t the blood clots alone be enough for her? Or shouldn’t the abnormal heart beat be enough? Apparently not. Let’s just combine the two and throw in a dose of pneumonia to boot.

Really, God, enough is enough. I’ve always been told You won’t give us more than we can handle, but do You really have to push the limits so often? Maybe I shouldn’t be questioning You, but at this point, I can’t help it.

I mean, I’m used to hearing bad reports on pop. Heck, I’ve even come to expect them. But not so much with mom. She’s beaten breast cancer twice, and now, it seems like everything’s coming on at once.

This is part of what was on my mind last night that I didn’t feel like getting into. To be honest, I was a little to angry, and a little to down to write about it. Thankfully, I do feel somewhat better tonight. Talking to Shannon earlier helped out quite a bit.

Anyway, that’s all I got right now. More to come later.

I’ve been with the fire department for closing in on 11 years now, and for the most part, it hasn’t been bad, with the notable exception of the past six months or so. That has been enough to cause severe burnout. I could walk away tomorrow and never look back, but you all have heard this before.

The job and I have came to an agreement 6 or 7 years ago, and it has been modified a few times in the intervening years since then.

This original agreement came after my captain and I got into a bit of trouble in an ordinary house fire. I really don’t feel the need to go into details, but suffice it to say that it scared the crap out of both of us. However, we got of the situation with no injuries. No harm, no foul. Right?

It was after this incident that the agreement first came into being. And the agreement is simply this. The fire will not try to cause harm to me, and in return, I’ll extinguish it as quickly and painlessly as possible. I’m not about to get myself in a position to get hurt again.

For the most part, this agreement has worked well. Granted, there have been a couple of minor accidents, but they have been screw ups on my part. I have learned from those screw ups too, so it’s all good.

Now, though, I think it’s time to amend that agreement again. This bit of editing has been caused by a fire we had this past Monday. We were on scene for over 4 hours, and I missed several calls, which in turn, caused some worry.

This amendment will say something about not causing those I care about to become worried about me, particularly when they can’t reach me for several hours. There will also have to be language in there about taking the time to send a message or text, or even place a quick call, to those concerned, say during a rehab break, or while my air tank is being refilled, so that they will know that all’s well; so that they will know I’m unharmed and in one piece.

What do you think? Good idea, or just plain silly? To be honest, it doesn’t really matter. I’m going to do this anyway. It’ll take less time to send a text or place a quick call, than it will for my air tank to be refilled. I’m not doing anything during that time anyway, so may as well make use of it some how.

And to me, knowing that I’m easing someone’s mind would be a good thing to do.