Look for me on TNT

Kim and I are headed to Dallas tonight. Our first stop will be to attend the Mavs season opener against the Rockets. So, why do I say "look for me on TNT?" Well, I got some incredible tickets for tonights game from my best friend in Jr Hi and Hi school, Ken. I don't mean good tix, I mean incredible tix, on the floor, 2nd row from the floor I'm pretty sure. I thought we were trading, a pair of my OU game tix for a pair of his company owned tix to the Mavs. Turns out it was anything but a fair trade. So, we're sitting courtside, actually row 3. There's the VIP row, AA, then BB where we're sitting. Maybe I'll have a chance to headbutt Mark Cuban, or at least see him. Here's a link you can go to and see a 3D view of our view tonight. Find sec 108, row BB then see a 3D view. It's gonna be awesome. Check it out and look for me, I'll be in my red Rockets shirt and a bright yellow cap I bought in St Thomas. Then, we're headed to Forney for Halloween tomorrow night. I hear that Noah's going in a group with him as the scarecrow, his cousins as the tin man, the lion, and Dorothy. Guess I better go find me a costume. The Wizard, what do you think? Should I?

thanks as always for reading and thanks Ken, for the tix,
de

P.S. Our house is coming along nicely. Still very dusty and dirty and still aways to go but we're making progress. Another couple of weeks and we should be done, I hope.

Happy Diwali!

That's right, Happy Diwali, well yesterday officially. It's India's version of Christmas but totally different. It's the festival of lights, happiness, giftgiving, and forgiveness. This time last year we were in India, post Kim's two surgeries, enjoying the local Diwali festival and celebrations. Actually it was a few days later into the first part of November but Diwali bumps around much
like Easter does for us. No, we're not Hindu or anything remotely connected to Hinduism but, its a significant time that will always be special to us. We ate at an Indian restaurant yesterday. We promised we'd dress in our Indian clothes and go out to eat. With the house and everything that's going on with that, we just didn't have the time. Lord willing, next year. We'll light a candle, thank God for our many blessings, and remember Diwali as something special.

de

Cool but messy today!

It was downright cold this morning. Yeah, I know, not really cold, maybe 45, but I could see my breath first thing on my way to get the morning papes. All the sheetrock is finally up. All the joints have been taped and floated. Today we sand! Boy its going to be messy but that's the drill, you gotta sand before you can texture. Hopefully before the day is over all that will be done and the ceiling will be stomped. That's what you call the technique to texture the ceiling. When that dries, then the painting can start. Think I'm going to leave the sanding to Doug and his son and head to the Depot for ceiling and wall paint and make sure I've got everything I need to paint. Then next week, we start rehanging the trim we were able to save and adding new for what we couldn't save. Then more painting. It's looking very much more house like than it has in weeks. I'm still thinking three more weeks to get where we need to be but much progress has been made. Now all I need is the insurance money. Hava good Friday.

de

One Year Ago Yesterday!

Kim reminded me that it was one year ago yesterday when I left her in the operating suite at Wockhardt Hospital in Mumbai for her first of two surgeries. I'd been so busy with trying to help our contractor out at the house and keeping up with everything going on at the church, I plum forgot. Boy, that's a nice feeling, for Kim to be pain free for long enough that I tend to forget how bad off she was just one year ago. Truth is, you never really forget. I know she never does. But it is nice to actually think about it less and less. She's doing just marvelous, except for nasty cold thing she's had for a couple of weeks now. Hipwise, she couldn't be any better. I'm always thankful for the blessings that came our way through that whole experience. The folks at Wockhardt, Dr Malhan, all the prayers for us, the financial help, the blog comments, so many in our church family at Lakewood who were there for us, and most of all our family. And oh yeah, I'm thankful for all you who thought I'd lost my everlovin mind, for keeping it to yourself or at least not sharing it with me.

There's no telling how many people have been blessed by Kim telling her story everywhere she goes. You were a part of that. It's been quite a year since that day in Mumbai. Not one I really want to repeat in lots of ways, but as the saying goes, "no pain, no gain." We have truly gained by leaps and bounds this past year.


de

Feel the Excitement

I haven't really had the time nor the energy to put into this year's political process. Been busy with other stuff. I've been a registered republican pretty much all my voting life and continue to be so. I'd have to admit I'm less than thrilled over the choices this time. Since this is my personal blog I'll tell you, I think Obama is the closest thing to a socialist the Democrats have ever put forth and that concerns me. I think his meaning of "change" actually means big, bigger, more expensive government, and more and more taxes and regulation. It certainly seems plain that in some arenas, mainly the financial sector, we've needed someone to penalize the greedy folks who made billions in selling subprime mortgages to folks that couldn't afford them and then resold them as great investments. Not everybody bought though. It seems that Bank of America bowed out of that arena early on and now is on top of the banking world and a good stake of Wall St. 60 minutes did a segment on BofA this week, pretty fascinating stuff.

I guess the lesser of two evils is McCain although the excitement level for his campaign is about like this picture I saw today. Enjoy! And be sure to vote early and vote often! lol

de

First Week Finished

Doug, our contractor finished his first week working on the house. We, Jared and I helped when we could, made quite a showing if I do say so myself. We finished all the ceiling sheetrock in the bayroom and in the kitchen, plus more on the bay wall, then we tore out the cabinet on the north wall in the bayroom. It got quite wet behind there and we were concerned it would continue to mold and get worse. Really looks weird not to be staring at the rafters anymore. It's a good thing. Here's a couple of pics of the former cabinet. We certainly are blessed to have someone we trust already working just 5 weeks out. I heard a lot of folks are still waiting for their blue tarps. I already got my roof done.

de

Gameday pic

Here's our official "College gameday" pic proving we were at the OU/Texas game on Saturday. Seems as though we were strangely surrounded and outnumbered by an ugly orange color. Longhorns facing the Zou this weekend. Geaux tigers.

de

Pics & Progress

Here's some pics of our favorite grandson
in his Sooners shirt. Some pics of the gameday.
Some pics of today's progress on the house. Yeah!

I think this was Noah's before and after the game reaction!





We put up radiant barrier on the rafters, three new ac ducts, (they dripped water when we checked them on Monday), and all the insulation in the ceiling.
Sheetrock starts going up tomorrow!

de

Four Weeks Today

It's been four weeks today since we were busy doing the last preparations for Ike. All in all things are good here. I suspect in another four weeks or so I may be able to report our remodeling is close to being finished. In the meantime I thought I'd post some Ike pics. I honestly don't have any pics during the storm itself. The first ones are pics I took yesterday of some of the homes on S Burnet and their current condition. One of the pics is the one that made me semi-famous for just a few seconds on Channel 11. I'm telling you, everyone I know was watching Ch 11 that evening and through the night. It's a picture of a mailbox almost under water. Several are what our yard looked like afterwards and the damage on the inside of our house. a couple are from 5 in the evening as the storm waters began to rise on S Burnet St.I intentionally left off the pic Kim took of my purple backside, you're quite welcome.


Homes on South Burnet drive, Oct 9, four weeks post Ike.

Thats' not the garage either

No walls or just studs and a roof, or a pile of debris


The inside of our house the morning after. What a night it was!

Tearing down the sheetrock day. Yeah, that's Tyler Prothro in the kitchen.

On Burnet Bay, neighbors pier, then our pier reimerges from the waters, unscathed.

How bout a swim in that pool!

Debris was everywhere.




The water rises on S Burnet St about 4:30 pm prior to the real storm.

The very end of Burnet and the pic that made me famous.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot. Boomer Sooner tomorrow!

de