What's In Your Attic?

Yesterday I finally got to meet Natalia, the new Hillsborough Kids worker (DCF outsourced care management). She came to the house and she was really very nice. Young, but nice. She is ~ different ~ than Karen. Karen seemed to take a personal interest with the kids once we got to know her... Natalia, well, just seemed very paperwork oriented... asked all the questions she was supposed to ask... etc. But again, she was very nice. She asked about Justin's therapy appointments, and I had to admit that I've done nothing about them... haven't even called to get a list of providers as of yet. But she didn't seem very bothered by this - she told me I had some time. Whew......

Natalia does have to come back to the house though because Justin wasn't there. He had his FIRST baseball game! Yippee! He did SO WELL. He's playing short stop, and he fielded two balls. One was a fly ball (my heart was racing as I saw him under it, thinking 'don't drop it, don't drop it!) and he CAUGHT it! His hitting was.... well... he struck out once and was walked the second time. None the less, we were very very proud of him... he's already improving greatly.

Katie and Tatiana made a drive all the way up to watch him play. It was funny... all the other parents/kids there were so quiet... so serious.... but not us. We were like "Go Justin go! Go Justin go!" and "Go Yankees!!!" Of course I also had to cheer on the Assistant Coach, Coach Chris. What a hottie he is! We only stayed until they pulled Justin out (2 or 3 innings) but we were most definitely the loudest cheering section there! And it was funny... although the girls had been to the ballpark before (as Justin played and his dad coached him) they'd never sat and actually SEEN an inning or a game. They would just 'walk around' the whole time. But I thought it was important for them to sit there and watch him, and of course cheer him on! Our cheering section had 6 of us, Kayla, Kayte, Jono, myself, Katie and Tatiana.

Afterwards, I went home to get dinner for the girls and Jonathan. I had been cooking it for a day and a half... crock pot cooked pulled pork and BBQ sauce served on hoagie buns with french fries. Yummy.

As we started dinner, Katie called - she was BALLING her eyes out. At first, I thought something happened in the car... she had an accident and something happened to Tatiana??? I couldn't even understand her at first. Then I realized what she was saying..... it wasn't fair that Ron wasn't here to see Justin play. Why did he have to die? Why couldn't he be there to watch his kids grow up and learn and do new things? I told Katie that he WAS watching... that he WAS there... that he was their Angel.

This kind of thing is so very hard. I believe that Ron is in heaven. I'm no longer angry with God for taking him. I believe that God knows what He is doing and I trust that. But... at the same time, it is still really hard to go through these kinds of things and not wish he was here to see it. I can imagine when the girls get married.......... oh lordy....... that's going to be extremely hard.

Speaking of boyfriends - I should tell you what just happened to Kayla. Kayla has been dating this guy "Pito" for over a month. (Real name is Oswaldo... not a very popular name for a black young man, so he goes by "Pito") I've told you before what a very nice young man he is... polite... kind... good to Kayla... etc. Well, apparently Pito's cousin told Kayla that Pito smoked (cigarettes). Without any verification or confrontation, Kayla (I find out after the fact) broke up with Pito. As of Sunday night, I still didn't know anything about it. Kayla is on phone restriction so is not using the phones, so it's been really quiet around the house. Sunday night, after the kids get back from their Sunday night teen gathering... Kayla comes in and asks me if she can call Pito... she has tears in her eyes and I can sense the urgency in her voice. She has NOT asked to use the phone before while on phone restriction, so I was surprised she asked. Then again... I could tell something was not quite right. I asked her why, and she told me about breaking up with Pito. Then she tells me that she was in the church and everyone was praying, and she just started crying and crying... she knew that breaking up with Pito for the reasons she had was not a good thing. She said that, he's been so good to her and at the first suggestion / rumor -- she immediately broke up with him and she felt awful about it.

I was deeply moved by the fact that she felt this during Church. Naturally I let her call him (5 minutes)... and they are back together again. Frankly I'm surprised that they are still dating... he doesn't go to her school... he works every day... and she's on phone restriction and banned from the Internet. But they are still together and I really feel it's a good thing. Good for both of them. :o)

Tonight should be fun. Since I quit the chorus, Toast of Tampa, 2 years ago, I'm no longer the Tenor Section Leader (of course). Well, the new section leader is out of town tonight, and guess who gets to lead the section? You betcha - I do! And... it's a big night for that as well... we are having sectional rehearsals and sectional qualifications tonight as well. I'm really nervous about it and excited at the same time. Funny how that happens!

I just called to check in on Julie as I haven't talked to her since her visit last week. She seems to be doing very well. She is staying at the Sandpiper Beach Resort for a couple of days with her boyfriend. Must be nice.

Well, this just shouldn't be a short blog... I've got way too much time on my hands today. So... I think I'll tell ya another one of our stories. This one is about our squirrels.

We were renting a home down in South Tampa. The landlord had no idea how good she had it that we were renting from her... if anything needed fixing or upgrading, we did it all on our dime. Put in a nice closet system, had the AC maintenance done, etc. But we do have our limits on what we can handle... as you've already learned, Chris has a major rodent fear. :o)

One night, Chris and I were up at All Children's Hospital. That friend of mine who's daughter just passed was there, her daughter had just that day been diagnosed with a brain tumor. We were there waiting with her for some news. Amanda (then a teenager) was home alone and in bed. We had a cat at that time K.C., which - again, from a prior post you've learned also does not like rodents. K.C. was Amanda's cat and often times slept with her. Late that night, Amanda kept hearing KC in her room, playing. She threw things at him to get him to stop and hopefully run out, but he didn't. Finally, at her wits end, she goes to grab a pillow one last time, and realizes she's already thrown it, it's on the floor. Eyes still adjusting to the dark, she bends over the bed (body still laying down) to reach for the pillow to throw it at KC. Eyes have now adjusted to the dark, and she's face to face with a squirrel, in her room... looking at her. She freaks out, the squirrel freaks out, everyone is screaming. When Chris and I arrive home Amanda is (of course) not in her room but the squirrel is. We go in there to catch it... after all, squirrels are cute and all! Well, this one must have been possessed because the screeching noises he made as we chased him all over that room were awful! We did catch him and threw him outside. Little did we know at the time, we had someplace where they were getting into the attic and more were to follow.

Following this excitement, we continued to hear little pitter-patter feet in the attic. Now knowing they were squirrels we attempted to get them out. We called our landlord who told us that rodents were 'our problem' - which I totally didn't get since they were up there destroying HER home, but we tried to take care of it ourselves, being the good tenants we were and all.

We rented a 'have a heart' trap which Chris put in the attic. We can't close the outside hole in which they are getting in just yet because we don't want them to die in the attic... we want to get them all out and THEN close up their entrance. Now, not wanting to get the ladder out and set it up, open the hole in the attic, climb up and look each and every time we had to check the trap, he left the ladder UNDER the open hole in the attic (which was in the office) so that we could frequently climb up and check the trap. Seemed like a good idea at the time......

Yet another time when we were out and Amanda was home alone (again with Chris, Drew and Christal I believe) -- we get a phone call. Amanda is F-R-E-A-K-I-N-G out. Apparently Amanda had tried to go into the office, only to find a little squirrel friend climbing DOWN the ladder. She froze in her spot, as did the squirrel. Amanda grabbed a phone to call Chris. As she's doing this, the squirrel climbs to the ground, still looking at Amanda. She says "Dad, there is a squirrel IN the office, looking at me". Chris tells her to just run in there and scare him. He was a squirrel, he'd get scared, run up the ladder back into the attic and - if we're lucky - into the trap. Sounds good, huh? Yeah... Neeeeeever that simple. She proceeds into the office to scare him... but he wanted no part of it. As a matter of fact, he got downright MAD and -- CHARGED at her. She screams, turns around, runs out the door, shutting it behind her. Chris said it was probably a defense mechanism thing, and to try to go in again... she does, and again, the darn squirrel CHARGES at her. Can you BELIEVE this guy?? Of course, each time she does this, there is pure PANIC stricken SCREAMING going on over the phone.

I don't remember exactly how it happened, but the squirrel DID eventually get back up and/or out of the house somehow. We actually caught MANY squirrels in that trap. Got our money's worth, for sure.

Most of the time I checked the trap. Chris and rodents... not a good mix. But other times Chris did check it as well. We have caught so many, and - according to our ears - we have only ONE more that we know of living up there. So... this one day, Chris gets up the nerve to climb the ladder and check the trap. Mind you... there is no light in the attic, so you've got to give your eyes a few seconds to adjust to the darkness to see into the trap. Chris climbs up... all brave and all.... looking at the trap, waiting for his eyes to adjust. All the sudden he hears it - behind him..... "tha-thump..... tha-thump.... tha-thump.... tha-thump....." the sound gets closer and closer.... he turns slowly on the ladder, afraid that his biggest fear might be coming true... and sure enough....... squirrel is RACING towards him, the tha-thump is him jumping the beams - heading directly towards him. Chris's eyes get H-U-G-E as he realizes what is happening and that it's so quick, there is little he can do. Tha-thump.... tha-thump.... to the beam right in front of him... squirrel hits the air and Chris just sees four tiny little feet and one long tail headed right at his face. The squirrel's next step is ON his head, then tha-thump onto the TOP of the trap, and then down the rest of the house... tha-thump...... tha-thump. That darned squirrel not only wasn't afraid, not only charged at him, but JUMPED ON HIS HEAD!

Now.... I'm sitting just outside the door and all I hear is the freakish sound that a man (apparently) makes when he doesn't want to scream like a girl, and then I witness him falling down the ladder onto the floor, shocked by what just happened.

I'm sorry to say that when we caught THAT particular squirrel, he didn't make it back outside to play with his friends. He was buried in the front yard, close to the hole where they got in to begin with, as if to tell the other squirrels even thinking of trying to get back in "this COULD happen to you too if you even TRY it."

Never had a squirrel problem after that. Of course... that was about the time that we began to actively look into moving. Coincidence? I don't think so!