Cindy Strikes!

No, not Matt’s mom, but the tropical storm, which we think is probably not even a tropical depression any longer. Whatever the storm is being classified as it sure did bring a lot of rain to the Atlanta area. It was just overcast this morning as Matt drove into work, but as the day went on it got thicker and by the time the workday had ended, it was raining. But let’s back up....

Matt decided that even though his gorgeous bride seemed to be doing pretty well at home today that she might be able to use a good lunch to sustain her energy through the rest of the day. Matt had to go out to get something to eat anyway, so it wasn’t much of a decision. It was off to gather a to-go order at Noodle, our favorite noodle house here in Midtown. Of course Matt didn’t tell Patty that he was coming, so lunch was a double surprise. Lunch was really tasty and it hit the spot in a big way. They hadn’t eaten there in a quite a while, so it was a nice change.

After taking Matt back to work, Patty and Gabe came home to get some more packing done. Yes, we’ve started packing the non-essentials up and are making some small bits of progress. We’re determined to be ready when the movers arrive this time. The Chipster seems to be doing his best Gandhi impression, not wanting to eat or sleep very much. We think he probably snuck some calories in on us at dinner time (more on that later), but during the day his intake was way down. We can’t complain about the corresponding slow-down in his output, though. After pooping away most of the past couple days, Gabriel didn’t dirty too many diapers today. Our nostrils salute him.

Patty and Gabe came back up to Marietta to get Matt so they could take in some dinner before Matt’s 8:00 scheduled softball game. As luck would have it, the rain started to pick up and they went off to grab some sushi at their friend Clay’s favorite sushi joint, Hashiguchi. While the food was good (possibly very authentic, but how would we know?) and the service leaving a great deal to be desired, the eavesdropping there was great! The couple one table over from us was there on their first date through JDate, which is a Jewish internet dating service. Their conversation started out funny: the woman asking for spicy tuna rolls, except not really spicy but mild instead and made by a specific sushi chef. It only got better from there, culminating in the man telling his date that he had also been dating another woman for four months (!!) and the woman using some colorful language to describe why what he was doing was wrong. We thought that the woman was very close to getting up and walking out, which we would have applauded for several reasons, but some smooth talking by the guy saved the date, er, I mean day.

When we finally left the restuarant, it didn’t seem to be raining too hard so the Angles were worried that Matt would actually have to play softball. We drove out Lockheed only to find the lights off and only one player in the parking lot, who did confirm that the later games had been canceled. In celebration, ice cream was in order! After a trip to Baskin-Robbins, the three decided to finally head home.

Gabe continues to acquire more and more skills. He is now throwing things by holding them over his head. Sometimes they do go forward, sometimes they just come right down on his noggin. He’s geting really good at it, though, and we play catch with him now. We’re really impressed with his standing skills. He can now stand unsupported for quite a long time and when he’s ready he just crouches down and then sits. He doesn’t panic or get upset, and he doesn’t usually fall over. He’s really, really close to walking, and even took a step a couple of times tonight as he tried to prevent himself from falling forward while we were playing with him. He is amazing!

A Little Jog

We’ve had a great weekend, and now it’s back to the grind. Back to the grind, that is, with the exception of the packing. The countdown is on to the big move, and we are determined to be prepared for the movers, since we now know what kind of damage extra boxes and bubble wrap can do to our wallets.

On Saturday, Gabriel took us to Jake’s birthday party. It was also Diana’s and Diana’s mom’s birthday party, so it was a big day at the Fleming household. We had a great time (Gabriel playing with aquaintance Mackenzie in photo), and the food was super fantastic because they had a great caterer.

We were surprised to see pretty severe storm damage in the Highlands, because it hadn't even rained at our apartment a scant two miles away the night before. The house across the street and over one from this one had just been sold, and those people have to be thanking their lucky stars because their house wasn't even touched. We were happy to see that it didn't look like there were probably any injuries from the tree in this photo, but those owners are probably not very happy anyway.

Dad drove overnight and tried to get himself on a daytime schedule at Chris and Yolanda’s on Saturday, but he ended up sleeping until our bedtime so we had to wait until Sunday to see him. On Sunday, we had some lunch at Ray’s, drove out to our new house to show Dad and test our new cell phones (he loved it and they worked great), went to church, had a quick carb-loading, and M and Dad went to pick up Gail just in time to meet her at baggage claim.

The Fourth of July is one of the biggest days of the year for us. It’s the day of the Peachtree Road Race, and this year was our third in a row. After running in extreme heat and even more extreme pregnancy in the past, this one was a breeze. In fact, Matt didn’t even train and did great. None of us got a PR this time, but we all had a blast. We added on a couple miles of walking because we went home and realized that Gail and Gabriel were at the park, so we had to go back. Thankfully, no one minded the mix-up.

After the race, we all went back to the apartment and took up every horizontal space with our sleeping bodies. We were a tired bunch. At around 3:00, we finally headed up to Chris and Yolanda’s for barbeque. Dad made his famous teriyaki pork, and we had pasta salad, beans, and turkey dogs. Yum! It rained, and we were having fun anyway, so we didn’t go watch any fireworks.

Today, P&G spent some time at Starbucks and Barnes & Noble, and Gabriel made lots of friends as usual. We had a great time, and Chip got a book called Planes. After work, we all went to Ikea, and no one vandalized our Jeep this time. We bought a few things for the kitchen and picked out a faucet for our new kitchen and possibly some new lighting.

The packing has begun. Over the weekend, we packed two boxes of books, and today Gabriel helped his Mommy pack all of our movies, four more boxes of books (we have a TON of books!), a box of framed photos, and another box of photo album stuff. We're trying very hard to be ready for the movers so we don't have to use any $8 boxes and so we can get them on their way as quickly as possible.

Mall Rats

Not much to say about today (like you expected that, eh?) except that we spent it almost exclusively at the mall. Today was an off Friday for Matt, so Patty was able to get up on her own, without worrying about Gabriel and what he needed. After spending a little time starting her day off, the Chipster did require some breakfast so Patty took care of that in a way that only she can. He went right back to sleep after nursing, so Patty gently nudged Matt awake to let him know that she was going for a run. Five kilometers and one stop at Starbucks later, Patty was back with a coffee for herself and a hocho for Matt.

Pretty soon they were all off to the mall to do some looking and some actual purchasing. They didn't really expect to be there that long, but six hours later they were finally ready to leave. Patty had some new "walking around" shoes, Gabriel had some new shoes of his own as well as a World War I era plane mobile to put up in his new room, and the three of them had a lead on new cell phone service. Gabe did really well as his parents looked in (with very little exaggeration) every store at Lenox Mall. They returned their beloved meat thermometer, which had stopped working several weeks ago leaving the two cooks with little to judge meat doneness on besides a vague idea of what the meat is supposed to feel like. Williams Sonoma apparently gaurantees almost everything they sell for life. Patty and Matt had gotten the meat thermometer over a year and a half ago (as best they could figure) and W S took it back with no questions asked.

It shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone that the Angles detest Sprint PCS. Not only is their customer service questionable, but they don't seem to have coverage in the forthcoming new Angle abode. After doing some serious searching around, we decided on changing over to T-Mobile. Their coverage map indicates that our new house should be in the middle of the their highest coverage area, so we're keeping our fingers crossed. Either way, they aren't Sprint. After determining that T-Mobile had a family plan with two phones and a decent amount of minutes for less than they are paying for their Sprint "service", Patty and Matt had only one hurdle left to leap: getting out of their Sprint contract.

Under normal circumstances, we would have had to pay a $150 early termination fee if we wanted out of our Sprint contract. We figured that since we didn't have coverage in our new house, it wouldn't be a big deal. They told us that that was the one condition under which we could terminate whenever we wanted (not having coverage at home). The problem comes in that their coverage map shows our new house to be very well covered indeed. It took about an hour on the phone (in the heat outside of the T-Mobile store) to convince the fine shysters at Sprint that they might show coverage at our house, but we sure weren't getting any. And that's what having coverage is all about, being able to actually use it. Finally Matt was able to talk to a sympathetic ear (after being told that he should take the phone into a Sprint store near the new house because they'd know where the coverage holes were in that area) and they agreed to waive the fee. They even made it clear that we would be welcomed back to Sprint whenever we wanted. Can you say, "Yeah, right"? Now Patty and Matt each have a phone. We currently have temporary numbers, but one of the phones will have our old number on it as soon as we can determine that we really do have coverage in Dallas and the people at T-Mobile can "port" (that's an industry term, apparently) our old Sprint number over to our new phones. We really love the phones! Patty's has all sorts of bells and whistles while Matt's is a little more understated.

Matt's dad should be getting into town early on the morning of Saturday the second as race day is right around the corner. He'll probably take a couple of hours to sleep off the drive and then who knows what we'll do. Gabe seems to maybe be sick. He certainly has been a pooping machine lately, and we're not sure if his diarrhea is due to a new tooth that seems to be working its way in or from him being sick. Hopefully tomorrow will be better for him but right now he's none too happy about the state of things.

Superwoman, LPN

Tonight we would like to present to you this month’s Urological Nurse in the Spotlight: Cindy Angle. That’s right, Gabriel’s grandma is finally getting a bit of attention for all the hard work she has been doing for the past 28 years and especially the past year or so. While she’s always been eager to go above and beyond the call of duty for her job (not to mention her son), these days Cindy is doing even more. In addition to all of her duties at the office, she has been giving talks to other doctors’ offices about interstitial cystitis. Recently she was asked to be in the journal for her professional society, the Society of Urological Nurses Association. The article is great, and can be found here:

SUNA July Spotlight

Between the article about Jack that the Marines put online a week or so ago and the article about Matt’s mom, people in our family seem to be getting a lot of ink. Stick around, maybe you’ll show up in something, too.

Today was hot here in Atlanta, really freaking hot. It hit 92 today and felt like a lot more. The air conditioning in the Jeep was barely able to keep up with the demand. Matt got a haircut today, and Patty and Gabriel came along. Patty is thinking about doing something drastic to her hair. Thinking about it. So we had a consultation session with Nicholie while she was cutting Matt’s hair. Gabriel had a good time crawling around on the salon’s floor and did his usual charming of the crowd.

The heat drove us to take refuge in ice cream. Marble Slab Creamery was our destination tonight, since we’re still bemoaning the loss of our favorite gelato establishment. We feel like we’re lucky because they’ve had double chocolate ice cream the past two times we’ve been there in a row. Sadly, this isn’t always the case and Patty took advantage of it tonight.

We’re looking forward to the holiday weekend and Matt’s dad and stepmom coming into town. We’re going to continue our Fourth of July tradition of exhausting ourselves by running the Peachtree Road Race, this will be our third year out of three. We haven’t been able to prepare like we’d have liked because Gabe has been with us, but we’re going to do our best. Actually, we know Patty (and Matt’s dad) are going to do really well, it’s mostly just Matt that we’re worried about. Oh well, he’s got three days to train, right? That should be plenty for 6.2 miles.

Gabriel fell asleep on the couch tonight in the arms of both his parents. He even rolled over in his sleep. As he was rolling over, he smiled and gave his Mommy a big kiss - all without once opening his eyes.

Swedish Invasion

The Intimidators whooped the JSF team, 11-9, fighting back not once but TWICE from being behind. Number 6, M. Angle, plated two runs with a double and crossed the plate from second with the next batter, tying the game. Gabriel had a great time, as you can see in the photo, even though he did play with the spawn of an Ohio State family. His friends Brooke and Jordan didn't get as dirty as he did, but they are getting to know him better each week.

In other news, Ikea opened today in Atlanta. It was surprisingly civil, though incredibly busy, and a woman dressed like a Swedish woman gave us a card for a free coffee mug. We won! After buying a new duvet cover for the bed coming from Ann Arbor and a light for Chip's room, we skipped the marketplace, which would have made a dent in our cargo space not to mention our wallets, in order to get to the game on time. We did get a bonus gift, however, when we realized that another person slashed the driver's side window next to the arm-width hole. He apparently decided that the existing hole and the window-filling slashes on the passenger side gave him permission to add to the destruction.

That brings us to our latest breakthrough in home remedies. We (particularly P) get so worked up over the behaviour of people who leave every place they go less good than before they had been there (violating our theory that everyone should try to leave a trail of pixie dust behind them wherever they go, making the world just a little better by their presence, but we won't get into that whole thing right now)... where were we? Oh yeah, we've started talking about exactly what sort of torture we'd like to inflict on the offending person, and it works. It's sick and probably would not be recommended by the priests at our parish, but it sure keeps us from carrying that anger with us. Try it - it's fun!