6 posts tagged “michael”
I love my fur babies. They are like my children. I ESPECIALLY love Fatso. We've had this big furball of a cat since he was born and he is just so sweet and loving, he has a very special place in my heart reserved JUST for him.Although he can be very sweet and loving, he also commands a certain amount of respect. Fatso does not tolerate things such as being restrained or even being held or fooled with for too long. He ESPECIALLY doesn't like anyone venturing into areas such as his haunches or his tail when brushing him. I'll openly admit it: I'm afraid of Fatso! Although fat, his reaction time is akin to a Jaguar and I'm NOT kidding! He has hurt me many times over the years so I have learned to be respectful and careful! Fatso is a Maine Coon aka FURBALL! He has long, long hair and it is EVERYWHERE in my house. I try to brush him regularly, but he doesn't tolerate it well and he absolutely will not allow me to brush the areas that REALLY need it! This has resulted in some knots on Fatso's chest and down in his 'neutered but still somewhat manly area'.
Michael is much braver and stronger than me (and tolerates pain much better also)! So I told him last week I couldn't take cleaning up the hair any longer and I was concerned about the knots and I wanted him to buy a shaver and come shave the knots off of Fatso and give him a bath.
Well Michael and Alyssa arrived last night with a brand new trimmer and a whole bunch of good intentions! Alyssa, being the intelectual girl that she is wants to follow the instructions that come with the trimmer and some other techniques that she's heard of from pet groomers. She's even brought him a special treat to give him after the procedure is over so he will 'associate the shaver with a treat'. Yeah right! She doesn't realize that there is no instruction booklet written on how to deal with Fatso! She soon learns this though....
So they spread a blanket out on the couch and Alyssa starts shaving his sides while Michael holds him. So far, so good. Then about 10 seconds later Fatso begins to buck and resist like a Red Bull!
After a couple of minutes Fatso is spitting everywhere, Michael can't even hold him. So they let him go. Fatso is MADDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD!!!!!!!!!!!!! After a couple more attempts Michael is about ready to give up as he is bleeding from several nice cuts on his arms. Alyssa has more ideas though: She says we should try putting something over his head to keep him calm and to put socks on his legs so he can't claw Michael. She went out to her car and got the bag from a bottle of Crown Royal and I went and got 2 old pairs of socks. She put the bag over Fatso's head and pulled the drawstring just a bit to keep it on. Then, with Michael holding him, tried to put the little booties on all four of his feet. I was laughing so hard I forgot to take a picture but it was quite hilarious! Fatso must have worked with Houdini in another life because before they could even get 2 of the booties on him he somehow removed that bag from his head, removed the booties from his feet, spit, scratched and clawed and catapulted his entire body out of Michael's grip! He was all bowed up looking at all of us like "WHAT THE HELL ARE Y'ALL TRYING TO DO TO ME?" Bob is freaking out because he doesn't understand what is going on. Heidi doesn't care because she's rekindled her relationship with Hailey.
So, the saga continues....
Although they have removed a sizeable amount of hair with the trimmer, they have still only touched the tip of the iceburg and haven't even ventured to his underbelly (I can already see that that is NOT going to happen, Fatso is just NOT going to have it and all the brute force Michael has cannot even restrain him). Finally they decide to try cutting off some hair with scissors. Fatso is a little bit more agreeable to this but still it's not very long before he rebels.
Finally, Michael is ready to concede defeat and asks me to call a groomer and get a price. He takes Fatso upstairs to give him a much needed bath.
Poor Baby! So now he has a haircut that looks like he did it himself, but at least he's clean.
I'm calling a groomer tomorrow.
I haven't had much to blog about this week besides American Idol and Hailey's new job. I've been feeling kind of blah, started back to school this week, so there's that. I haven't been inspired to take any nature photos because it's just the same old stuff outside. I need a new place, something new to photograph. Anyways...I finally got the two couples together last night. Corey was over visiting with Hailey and Michael called and asked me if I was cooking (which translates into he's hungry and broke LOL). So I invited him and Alyssa over to eat and hang out and so he could finally meet Corey.
I took some group photos:
At first everybody was a bit tense...I think Corey was afraid to touch Hailey around Michael. Finally I told them to do some hugging and whatnot and I got a couple of good shots.
I liked this one of each couple (except for Michael's bird finger) so I cropped it into two individual couple photos:
We had fun! I cooked hamburgers and chicken wings and we watched some band DVDs and looked at pictures. Alyssa is REALLY growing on me. She's a really sweet and smart girl. Some people may say that I don't have much of a life hanging out with my kids and their respective beaus but I treasure each and every moment I spend with them and the fact that they WANT to hang out with me means more to me than any less important thing I might could have been doing.
Before I begin I have little bit of talking I need to do. I had said yesterday that I was going to do the pictorial thing for Michael that I had done previously for Hailey and tell some stories from his life but when I pulled out the photo albums, first of all, I realized just how difficult it is to get a good photo of a photo with the shadows and all, and second of all, I got really emotional as I looked at some pictures of my kids growing up that I haven't seen in a while. I tell people with small kids this all the time but I mean SERIOUSLY, DON'T BLINK! Don't miss anything, don't ever put your career ahead of your children because it is SO not worth it! They grow up in the blink of an eye and the older they get the faster time goes by. DON'T BLINK! The last thing I realized is that I seriously need a photo scanner and a photo printer. My photo albums abruptly stop at the beginning of the digital age. So I have half of their lives in hard-copy photo and the rest on the computer with no hard-copy. I seriously need to rectify this situation. So, I decided to skip the life story of Michael because there are some very, very sad moments in his life. Lots of good ones too but his life is a lot longer than Hailey's and I'm just not up to getting into all those old memories today. I will say, that through it all, he has turned out to be a wonderful, kind, caring and compassionate young man. He likes to curse and flip birds and smoke cigars, he still hasn't decided what he wants to be when he grows up (LOL), he is pitiful at taking care of himself sometimes but he is always there if sombody needs something. He is, as my Dad used to say, 'Good People' and I am not only proud, but completely blessed to be his Mother. So I'm already starting to get tears in my eyes, so enough of that. On to the party!
The day was very rushed and I was supposed to go to work but I didn't. I'm sure I will catch hell tomorrow but the time just got away from me. Hailey was to meet Corey at The Summit for a date. I dropped her off and went to do my shopping. When I got home I had to clean and make the cake and decorate. Michael and Alyssa were going to come by around 7 to get his Birthday card from me (which contained 50.00 for them to go out to dinner). Michael thought he and Alyssa were going out to dinner and then they were just coming back here to have some cake. I was trying very hard to pull off another total surprise like I did last year. I don't think he suspected anything and Alyssa was in on the surprise so she had to play it cool.
They had decided they were going to Olive Garden. They looked so cute all dressed up for dinner!
So I sent them on their way and got back to work. I was having a hard time getting anybody to RSVP me so I made a few phone calls to confirm. I at least had 4 people that would be here before Michael and Alyssa came back.
Meanwhile I got the cake done and the table set up. It was an 'Black Tie' affair LOL. By the way, Michael's nickname is Ska which is what most of his friends call him. I don't call him that but I didn't have room on the cake to write Michael. I thought it turned out well and I counted the candles 4 times to make sure I had 27 (when Michael was 13 or 14 I actually put the wrong amount of candles on his cake and he has never let me forget it).
I took a regular box cake mix and vamped it up a bit by substituting the water in the recipe for some strongly brewed coffee and a splash of whiskey.
So things were getting ready to go and some people showed up around 9pm. Alyssa had txt me that they were done eating and had gone back to the apartment. I told her to bring him here at 9:45.
Wait! Where is Hailey? LOL...just kidding. But I was rather proud of myself. She had met up with some other friends including BFF Brittany (who's had a car and license since age 16). I was really too tied up to go pick her up and she REALLY wanted to stay there a while SO I let her stay out and I let Brittany bring her home just in time for the party. And she made it safe and sound!
Several people were here and Alyssa was txt everybody because she didn't know what to do. There were some other people coming but they were at a restaurant and didn't know exactly when they would be here. I had to let Alyssa off the hook so I told them to come on.
We managed a pretty good surprise moment!
The other people showed up just minutes after Michael arrived and even more people came later. It turned out to be a pretty successful party. Although I had requested it be BYOB due to my own financial constraints it seemed that everybody was too broke so I gave them a bottle of wine and let them have some of the whiskey I had bought for the cake. I had also bought Michael a six-pack of Killian Red because he likes those weird kinds of beers.
I let Hailey have a sip of wine. She didn't like it!
These are two of Michael's oldest friends. They were friends as teenagers and he has roomed with both of them together and separately at one time or another. They all used to be in a band together and although Michael and the band parted ways, they have remained good friends.
Pat, the one on the left, has an ongoing love affair with Heidi.
Everytime he comes over she just gravitates to him and stays glued to him the whole time.
Some other friends:
This is Michael's friend Austin who I always mistakenly call Aaron. Not sure why I do that! (Hailey has a friend named Bobby that, for some reason I always call Eddie. Now I just call him Eddie Bobby). Austin and his girlfriend Martha are extreme bohemians!
This is Michael's current roommate Jeremy and his girl Shannon. He is the one that had to call me and give me that horrible news about Michael being in the hospital. He's a super nice guy!
So finally it was time to fire up the cake! I had to have 2 assistants to get all the candles lit!
(I actually caught Michael counting the candles too!)
I missed the shot when he blew them out. Oh and we sang Happy Birthday, HORRIBLY!
Everybody liked the cake except for Hailey. She probably would have if I hadn't told her I put those extra ingredients in!
When I was at the dollar store getting plates, cups, etc I spotted some bubbles and bubble paraphenalia. I thought they would be fun. I never thought a bunch of 20 somethings could have so much fun with $3.00 worth of bubble stuff!
Who'da thunk it?
Well my house was trashed, all the booze was pretty much gone and everybody was getting ready to leave. They were all going to a club to see some Irish band perform. I was going to bed. A good time was had by all. Happy Birthday Michael!
We had bad weather come through yesterday afternoon and into the evening. Having tornado warnings always instantly reminds me of my Dad. He took tornadoes very seriously and raised me to do the same. Back in my childhood we truly only had one tornado season and that was in the spring (now of course, with the weirdness of the weather we have another tornado season in the fall and winter, in fact, these days we can pretty much have a tornado anytime of the year). I remember many times, when I was a kid and we would go to the skating rink on Saturday night, if the weather started getting bad my Dad would always come and pick us up early. Sometimes, if bad weather was headed our way he wouldn't even let us go at all. It never bothered me because I knew he was doing it for our own safety. Such was the case last night. Hailey and Corey were to meet at The Summit for a date but as I was explaining to her (driving in the car) that she probably wouldn't get to go, he called on her celly to tell her that his Dad had told him the same thing. Surprisingly she did not argue with me. I guess the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. So I dropped her off at home and was headed back to work to try and get in a little more time when the sirens went off for the first time. I called work and told them I wouldn't be back and headed to the grocery store to pick up a few groceries. The sirens went off again while I was in the store. As I was driving home it started raining and lightning. The wind was blowing the rain in all different directions. I made it home and inside just as the bottom dropped out.
It rained buckets and caused the front yard to flood. I got some good pictures but had to stay on the porch so my camera wouldn't get wet. I finally ventured out to get one more shot of water gushing down the stairs and discovered the biggest weed I have ever seen! It was huge.
I went out this morning and it was a bit cooler and absolutely beautiful. I noticed the 'mystery car' across the street. It hasn't been there all week. I posted about this car that always has it's hood up a week or so ago and it sparked quite some conversation. Well now I've got a picture to prove it. It's an old Honda, nothing special, even missing a hubcap. But I'm telling you this car is not disabled. This person drives this car because it comes and goes. But for SOME STRANGE REASON when they park it here they raise the hood. Strange beyond strange!
On April 3rd my son turned 27 years old. I had to postpone his Birthday celebration a bit due to financial constraints but tonight I'm treating him and his girlfriend to dinner out and then they are coming back here for some cake and celebration. I'm going to do a big pictorial timeline for him like I did for Hailey tomorrow and will also include some pics from tonight. Be sure and check back tomorrow to see Michael as a baby and a kid growing up as well as read a few poignant and (some painful) stories from his life. I got to looking through some of his photos here on the computer and ran across a couple that demanded to be compared. Wow what a difference a year can make!
Here's Michael a year ago with his skanky previous girlfriend who broke his heart in two!
Here's Michael this year with his new and MUCH IMPROVED girlfriend.
Sweet!
Hope everybody has an awesome Saturday! I've got TONS of stuff to do so I gotta get crackin!
Oh here's that giant weed I mentioned. It was about 2 1/2 feet tall!
**Long, important story and then lots of pictures**
Well, let me begin by saying to all of you don't ever take your family members for granted...don't ever get into the frame of mind that you will always have 'one more day' with them. I learned that lesson the hard way when my Dad suddenly passed away on a Thursday morning last summer. I almost got handed another hard lesson this past Sunday.
Sunday afternoon Hailey and I had gone to get her hair trimmed and then she was going to meet some friends at the mall while I finished up the last bit of my shopping. I got a phone call there in the hair salon that completely changed my perspective about Christmas. I learned that my son had been found unconscious in the middle of the road sometime during the night. He had been unresponsive and had to be intebated because he wasn't breathing well on his own. He was in the Trauma ICU. I was told that he was awake talking now and they had just removed the tube from his throat. I was asked to come there right away.
It's amazing how one simple phone call, just a few short words can COMPLETELY change your perspective. I went from dreading the traffic I knew I would encounter at the mall and fretting over being able to find those last few things I needed to get to being afraid to allow myself to consider the fact that my son almost died lying in the middle of the street. It was just too much to even understand.
I had talked to him Friday night and he was fine and in good spirits. He called to confirm our plans for him to come over Sunday night and spend Christmas with us. We were to go to my Mom's house for Christmas Eve with the whole family. I didn't talk to him Saturday. I was expecting him to come over in just a few short hours and instead I find him in the ICU.
The area that he lives in is very close to where we live and it is a very densely populated area and a very walkable area. It is centered around a college and a bustling club district. It is relatively safe but there are a couple of bad sections. He was out clubbing with friends and somehow got separated from them. Apparently he was walking home alone, a little intoxicated and was jumped from behind. He was robbed of his cash and his cell phone and beaten unconscious. He was left for dead in the middle of the street. Luckily someone driving by saw him and called 911. Had that person decided to just look the other way I would most likely be planning a funeral today. It had come a heavy rain that night. His clothes were soaking wet. The timeline is fuzzy and I will never know how long he laid in that street, unconscious and bleeding in the pouring rain. As a parent that is a horrible and chilling thought.
His phone records indicate that the last time he used his phone was around 10pm. He was finally able to give the hospital staff my phone number around 2pm the next day. The horrible people that did this to him began using his phone during the early morning hours downloading ringtones, games and surfing the internet. Scumbags! I could see from the phone records that other people were calling him: his roommate, his girlfriend, other friends. He was not getting any of those calls and nobody knew why at the time.
One of his eyes is completely swollen shut from a very hard punch. He has a big wound on the side of his head that looks like he was hit with some sort of stick or other object. He has various other bruises and contusions. His face is horribly swollen. Miraculously he has no permanent injury. By the time I arrived the hospital had already done a CT scan on his head and an opthamologist had already checked out his eyes for any damage. He needed to heal but he was going to be fine. Thank God!
After a while of observation the doctors gave him the OK to come home with me. He was extremely upset that the paramedics had cut his clothes off of him. He didn't understand why this was necessary. They gave him a set of scrubs to wear home.
He wasn't up to the hour drive to go to my Mom's house and really didn't want to go out in public. I didn't feel comfortable leaving him alone so we decided not to go. My sister and her clan went, ate, exchanged gifts with my Mom then packed us up some food, gathered up our gifts and brought the party to our house. In spite of Michael's condition we all had a really nice time.
I'm not going to post any of the close-up photos of my son's injuries out of respect for his privacy. But you can see how banged up he looks in some of the other pictures.
Hailey and I made goodies! Peanut butter fudge, sugar cookies with a thumbprint of raspberry jam and sausage balls.
Once everyone arrived it was a very festive atmosphere. That good, safe family feeling. Cameron wanted to make an 'Elf Yourself' of three of himself LOL. He and I did it together.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH CAMERON IN 3D!
After it was over he saw the little button that said "Share it with your friend". He told me he wanted to send it to his friend Stephen. I said "OK, what's his e-mail address?" Cameron said "How should I know, that's none of my business!" LOL! That kid cracks me up with some of the things he says.
**he was pretending to fall into the tree and wanted me to take a picture**
Everyone was hanging out and trying to not treat Michael any different than they normally do. He was trying but I know he wasn't really up to the visit.
Alex was definitely the life of the party! He has changed so much since Thanksgiving. He was all bright-eyed and couldn't stop staring at all the bright lights and colors. After a while it was just too much for him and he got a little cranky and hungry.
Finally we opened gifts! Everyone liked their gift and it went really well. I got an Angel and $50.00 from my Mom and my sister gave me a Rachel Ray cookbook. Yeah!
Hope everyone had a nice Christmas Eve 2007.
So far I've blogged quite a bit about my Daughter
but I also have a Son who is a very unique and talented person.
He's left-handed.
He wears size 14 shoes.
He has guage piercings in his ears that TOTALLY creep me out.
He has NUMEROUS tattoos.
He helps design all of his tattoos.
To someone who doesn't know him he can look like a criminal.
He loves animals.
He plays both electric and acoustic guitar.
He is currently trying to learn classical guitar including pieces from Bach.
He plays in a death metal band called Unholy Ruins.