June 2003 Family Update
Well where do I begin? This year has been so busy for me that I really have not had time to update anybody on anything including making that simple phone call to say hi. So once again I am begging for forgiveness and asking that all of the 3 people who read this stuff give me another chance PPPLEASE. So just what have I been doing this year you ask? Read on and I will try to tell you. Oh and if you are reading one of these updates for the first time let me know and I can change the number to 4.
This year started in January (go figure) and right out the gate I have been busy with upgrading and installing new computers and other technology hardware at the office. This has really taken up a lot of time for me. Along with that Ryder has been doing some downsizing and as people are let go, the responsibilities they had fall on someone else. In my case our office had been given the responsibility to take care of the Toyota account. This account covers 5 locations, primarily Georgetown Kentucky, Memphis Tennessee, Huntsville Alabama, Erlanger Kentucky, and some laptop computer in Virginia I think. I have already had to make 2 trips to Georgetown and will most likely have another during the second week of July. Spent a day in Memphis and have spoken with all the other locations in support calls at one time or another. Along with that I have been getting more involved with other accounts from a consulting level which has taken up some more time.
The above has left me next to no time to work on my genealogy and I would really like to get back to doing that. Updating this site has also taken a back seat as well, even if I had nothing new to say I like to change the web pages just for fun. I have made it a point to continue to spend time with the family and that of course cuts in to doing these other hobbies of mine.
Terri has been busy working and fitting all of Matthew's activities in her schedule as well. She spends on average of 2 hours a day working with Matthew in reading and writing as well as his piano lessons. This is beyond what is taught in school and yes even though it is June we still go to school twice a week just to keep him busy. And let's not forget all of the cooking and cleaning Terri does for us boys. :)
Matthew has been doing extremely well in school this year and we are very excited about next year as it looks like he will continue exceed our expectations in his academic and social growth. Matthew did have pneumonia in May which was no fun for him and kept us up worrying about his every cough. Fortunately we caught it early and the doctor was able to knock it out before any hospital stay was required.
And now for the trivial story of what we've been doing.
Instead of taking a vacation this year (our schedules just don't permit this to happen) we decided to spend money on updating our bedroom. Now lets start this story by stating that I have been wanting to get a new bed for the last 6 months or so. My back has been giving me a few more pains than I prefer to have as I would wake up with backaches every morning. So I had been hinting to Terri that I would like to get a new bed like one of those select comforts or nautilus sleep systems. Ok reality check here, I currently sleep on a King sized bed and have no intention of changing my bed size to fit the price. This put the base price of the aforementioned beds at around $3000.00 each which was well above my $1000.00 budget I thought would work.
Up to this point in my life I have never really spent much time considering the importance of a comfortable bed and hadn't planned on starting. But a few weeks ago I was once again joking with my wife on the importance of my getting a restful nights sleep and low and behold she said ok let's go look at some and see what might work. Now when my wife says that, it means let's go shopping so of course I'm in for the fun. So off to the stores we go to try out some of these beds to see if there is anything we like. Mattress World was our first stop and we quickly learned that my $1000.00 budget was a waste of time. If we were to really get a mattress set that we liked we would have to up the price a bit. And of course this store had exactly what we wanted which was a Simmons Beautyrest World Class pillow top mattress. And at $1800.00 I could take it home today. This was perfect except that Terri wanted a new headboard as the one I built was just not to her liking anymore. So we decided to walk over to Rooms To Go next door and see what they had in beds and headboards. Once there we realized that we could get everything we wanted in one stop so we decided to get a Simmons Beautyrest World Class Bianca pillow top mattress and box springs. And while we were at it let's not just get a new headboard but the entire bed. And so $3000.00 later we had exactly what we wanted, (where did I hear that figure before) delivered and set up. However on the purchase of this wonderful bed we really had not considered how much space this would take up, and yes I did measure my current bed before shopping. An average king size bed comes in at 78" X 80" plus 4 inches for our current headboard depth. Ok we don't have a large house and our bedroom is not really big so a king size bed does take up some space. Upon measuring our new bed it comes in at 87" X 97". "Oops" this is going to take up some extra space and I don't really have much left to use. Nonetheless we managed to get it in the room and set up. But that's not the end to this story.
Since we got a new bed I jokingly told Terri that I needed a new TV for the room, we currently had a 25" TV and I was looking for something a little larger. To my surprise she said OK which got me to looking. Best Buy had a 32" on sale but upon measuring that I quickly realized that this was not going to fit well with everything else. So I opted for a 27" flat screen TV (no not a plasma display) and while I was at it I needed to get a DVD/VCR combo unit as well. So $500.00 later I am set to go in my new room but wait their is one more thing I need to replace and that is my ceiling fan which is making noise and off to Lowes I go to see what they have. Found it! The perfect fan for my bedroom and it's less than a $100.00 bucks, its not a Casablanca (have one of those in the living room--- very nice and worth the money) but it is pretty.
So I think we are about done with the bedroom with the exception that the headboard on the bed had a split in the wood and we had to have it replaced but you would have never known it or seen it unless I told you. Now our replacement headboard had a bad drill hole for the side board to lock in to and a technician now has to come out and see if he can fix it, if not they will have to get us another headboard. Ok the technician just laughed and said manufacturer defect, we need a new headboard. So if we are lucky, by the end of June we will have a new headboard that is not defective.
In any case that is my story for this update and you can see a picture of the bed below.
 |
 |
 |
And a final thought before I go. In September of this year there will be my 20 year high school reunion. I had hoped to be able to go to this event which of course is in Phoenix, but my work schedule and the fact that I live in Tennessee make it very impractical. Also Matthew is in school so there is no way to take the family and I am not going to take another vacation with them staying at home. So I had to decline the invitation, but it's amazing that it has been 20 years already. It really doesn't seem that long ago.
TTYL
Tim