I was in Pendleton for the Pendleton Round-Up. I go most years to spend time with family and whoop it up a bit.  Mona stayed home because Samantha had school. My Mom woke me up and handed me the phone. It was Mona. She told me the towers had been crashed into and that America was under attack. It was hard to believe, but I soon went upstairs and saw the news coverage showing the smoke coming from the towers.  It was surreal to watch the whole thing unfold as so many people died while we were all watching.  This day is one of the few days I have ever gotten a migraine. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one.

Mona had gotten out of the National Guard just a year or two before that and Samantha was instantly worried that she would be called back into service. That never happened.

Along with my parents I was also with my Grandma Blakely who I drove to Pendleton like I did many years for Round-Up. I was glad we were all together and only wished that Mona and Samantha had been in Pendleton with us as well. The Round-Up ended up continuing as planned (one of the few sporting events in the country that did). Most of the cowboys were already in the area for the early go-rounds. It was a subdued Round-Up, but I was glad to be there. A week later on the drive home to Southern Oregon with Grandma there were flags flying everywhere (bridges, buildings, cranes).

Mona and I already set up a trip for the 21st  to Lincoln City to celebrate our five year anniversary. It was an odd time to be celebrating when the nation was morning. It had a nice time especially with the great food we got at the coast. Hard to believe we have now been together almost fifteen years. A little over three years ago we became legal registered domestic partners when Oregon passed a domestic partnership law. We registered the first day it was available.

Mona has done a lot over the last ten years. She first became a CNA then an LPN. She is working towards getting her RN, but health issues halted that last year. Along with the schooling she has done she has also had to focus on healing a few times. She has had surgery on both shoulders (recent one last month) and is trying to get an eye condition under control so she can go back to school. One of her prominent memories was helping her brother Chris move to Alaska after the family was able to sell her late Mom’s house. It was an adventure on a ferry then through snowy and icy roads in Canada and Alaska with his car and a moving truck.

In September 2001, I just about finished my second year at Southern Oregon University. Since then I went back to school (while working) and got my Masters degree in Computer and Mathematical Sciences. I still enjoy the challenges of this job. I get to learn new things all the time. I briefly worked at interim manager last year, but I’m now back as programmer/analyst with my original boss coming back. I’m happy with the way things turned out. I’ve had a bit of a health issue being diagnosed with MS, but overall my health is good I don’t generally have any major issues. I’m very thankful for that.

This past decade, I lost both of my Grandmas (the same year) and a niece, Danielle (this last year). Samantha now has two sons and another one on the way so we have two grandsons. My brother also had a second son.  I am very grateful for the time I’ve had with the family we have lost and look forward to the time spent with the new additions to our family. Enjoy each other as much as you can. Time is precious.

My parents have done a lot in the last ten years. I believe Mom had just retired before 9/11. Dad worked a little longer then retired. They moved a couple times and are now moving into their new beautiful house/cabin they are having built. They bought a cabin out of Lostine in Eastern Oregon which is a wonderful place to retire. Great place to relax, but plenty to do to keep you busy if you want. I am really happy they are able to do this for themselves. They deserve to enjoy the rewards of their hard work over the last thirty plus years.

After finishing my Masters degree I decided to start a new hobby for entertainment. Video games. I bought myself a PSP and soon after was asked to join a group called the PlayStation Gamer’s Advisory Panel. GAP for short. It is hard to believe that from this group I have become friends on-line with people from all over the United States and Canada. I treasure those friendships and celebrate their achievements and morn their hardships and losses just like any other friend I’ve had.  The majority I’ve never met, but hope someday we may cross paths. The internet has brought people closer from all over the world. We didn’t have Facebook, Twitter or many other Social networks ten years ago. It is incredible how communication has changed over the last ten years. It seems to bring the world closer together, but can constantly bombard you with information as well.

Time keeps going, but it is always good to take a moment and look how we got here. September 11, 2001 was a scary painful day. Security everywhere has changed. Not always for the better, but we are generally safer because of it. Our country has been at war for the past ten years and in a recession for at least 4 years. Not an easy time for many, but we keep moving forward. It is all we really can do.

I hope for the best in the next ten years. For the world, the United States of America, friends and family. As long as we all try to make our lives better for ourselves and others, we will be going in the right direction.

Health wise everyone is doing better this year. Mona didn’t end up having surgery. Her neck is feeling better so she put it off. My Dad is healing well from the truck accident he had last winter. He is going to ride again in Cycle Oregon. This is a big deal since he injured his right leg pretty badly. They are riding around his corner of the state. I’m hoping to be able to get up there to cheer him on this week long bike ride.

I’m doing pretty well so far this year also. I just have to pay attention to my body when I am run down. It gives my clues when I need to get more rest. Colds do play a number on me so I’m trying to stay healthy if at all possible. This has been more challenging because our daughter and her 2 boys (1 and 4) have moved back in with us. They like to share their colds.

So our house is packed once again and having them around here seems to cause a time suck. I don’t know where the time goes. They boys stay at their Dad’s house every other weekend so on those weekends I try to get things done around here. I do admit those boys are quite cute and it can be nice to come home to after a hard day at work.

Mona is very busy as well. She finished all but one prerequisite for her nursing program winter term. She worked spring term so we were able to catchup a little and have enough to get through June when she did an intense three week LPN refresher course. It was basically a 18 week course crammed into 3 weeks to get LPNs who haven’t been in school for a while back up to speed. She is now getting her last prerequisite done (a math class) then she will be starting her RN program August 16th. She will be working some the next few weeks to hopefully catch us up again. Things have been falling into place, but it has been a balancing act and everything had to fall together just right. So far so good. *knocks on wood*

The last piece that has recently gone off the grid for me is that my boss is leaving (got a job in Hawaii). For a little bit I am going to be the interim manager. I am going to apply for the actual manager job when they post it. This is a big change for me and I’m going out of my comfort zone a bit (understatement). It is exciting and scary. I am bummed my boss is leaving. She has been great, but with the way the cut backs have gone her position hasn’t gotten a raise in a few years since the rest of us are union we have gotten raises and have inched above her in salary. I (of course) won’t take the job unless I can at least make what I am now (hopefully more). I think it can be a good move for me career wise, but if I don’t get the job I won’t be totally upset because I enjoy what I currently do. I just worry about who would be the leader of the team in that case. I do want to mention that she both managed and did projects like we did so I would get to do a variety of things. I like that but it may be overwhelming.

Since it has been about 11 years since the last time I interviewed, I am brushing back up on what I will need to do to apply for the job. I need to update my resume as well. I think I had an updated version on on my computer that crashed, but I can’t find it now so I think I just need to revamp. It is kind of weird because I will be interviewing with people I have known for a while now. Haven’t done that before. Any advice?

Anyway… Hope 2010 is going well for you. I am hoping we will manage to get through it alright and on to 2011.

There have been a lot of layoffs at the university I work at over the last few years. First our college was doing badly all on its own before the economy tanked. There was a restructure and we were making a profit again until the state needed part of the money it allocated us because of the economy. More layoffs happened that finally touched my department so now we cover a lot more areas. I am definitely happy to have a job. I actually like to learn new things so I certainly won’t be disappointed in that area over the next couple years. Hopefully we won’t have more layoffs, but there is a tax vote this month that will probably fail. I’m hoping the administration has allocated for that failure already and not spent the money we will probably have to send back. I’m hoping after this spring’s probable cuts we will start to build back to a sustainable level.

On a personal note this winter has been a rough one physically for my family. My Mom had abdominal surgery in September. The muscles in her abdomen were ripped from her pelvic bone to her sternum. Doctors had tried to fix parts of it in the past, but didn’t do it well. This time they finally fixed it right so the pulled the muscles from both sides back u to the front and got them all sewed together. She is doing great now, but for a while she couldn’t do a lot (or lift much). Seeing a bear across the yard didn’t help much a couple weeks after surgery though.

Since Mom had the surgery she couldn’t come down with dad to the Cycle Oregon ride he did in September. It is basically a bicycle ride that goes every day for a week. It started in Medford, went down to Northern California, cycled there for a day then back to other areas in Southern Oregon. It was great having Dad down here, but five days into it, I got an email from Mom saying Dad was quite sick and was being driven to the next stop. She didn’t know if he would want me to get him or see if he felt ok to ride the next day. The town they were in was about 30 miles from my house. I couldn’t’ get a hold of him on the phone so I just drove. I knew the park, but I had to find him among thousands of tents for the riders. I did find him after about an hour and he was happy to leave. It ends up that he had a version of the Norwalk virus. I helped him recover and unfortunately I got it as well a few days later.

Ok… I think we made it through October ok. Then in November I got a call from my Mom… Dad was run over by his own truck. What happened was Dad was sledding with my nephews a few miles from the Cabin when they got back into the truck; one of them had a hard time getting the sled into the back. Dad got out to help and while he was putting the sled in, one of the tires slipped over the side of the road in the snow making the truck start rolling. Dad ran up to the driver side and got a hold of the steering wheel and steered the truck so it would go straight down the hill instead of sliding sideways where it could possibly roll. One of his grandkids and a friend of theirs were in the cab of the truck when this happened. So Dad was running along the side of the truck steering it and finally got knocked down and the back wheel ran over his leg (got pretty much the whole right leg). Truck finally stopped a few hundred feet down. Kids were ok. Dad not so much, but didn’t want the kids to know (although his pants were pretty ripped up. They were 3 miles from the cabin with no cell phone service so they all had to walk back. Yes Dad walked back after being run over. He even carried the 5-year-old grandson part of the way.

He went to the hospital and found he didn’t have any broken bones in his leg, but majorly crushed muscles. They ended up sending him home, but that wasn’t good. As soon as he tried to take a shower he started to have problems and they had to send an ambulance for. Luckily there was a sheriff close by investigating a truck that went over the side of the road (their truck). They kept him over night at the hospital, but that was the first time I have ever heard mom scared o the phone and I was ready to run (12 hour drive) up there. He did have a couple broken ribs, but the issue he was having that night was because of the crushed muscles. They didn’t want me to come right up, but by the end of the week they asked if I could come up. I had a week off during Thanksgiving so I didn’t even have to take any time off.

So while we were up there helping out, I had a medical issue of my own. My hearing in my right ear hadn’t been working well (felt plugged up) that last week, but then just before Thanksgiving the right side of my face went numb. The muscles all worked ok, but it felt like I had Novocaine put in the surface from my scalp to my chin. Very weird. I was dizzy as well, but I thought that was because of my plugged ear (I thought all of it was because of my plugged ear). Well I was wrong about it. I did see a doctor as soon as I got back home. Nope nothing wrong with your ear… uh oh… Had an MRI done on my brain and found out that it was probably multiple sclerosis. I have since had an MRI on my spine and a lumbar puncture (spinal tap) to test for MS. I saw the neurologist yesterday and my spine is clear of any signs of MS, but the spinal fluid test confirmed that I do have MS. He is going as far as to say it is Benign MS which basically means it isn’t very active. We have decided not to do any medication right now, but to keep an eye on it since most of my symptoms have gotten better. I have an appointment to see him in a year after having a new MRI. If I don’t have any more symptoms this year, that is when I’ll see him next.

Now we can’t leave Mona out of our road to recover blog. Eleven years ago she had surgery on her neck to remove a bone spur that was going into her spine. In November she started having symptoms again of something similar happening (pain down the arm). She got an MRI in December and she definitely has another one growing just below the fusion they did last time. She met with a neurologist and they will do surgery after she sees an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist to check her vocal chords. They want to make sure the last surgery didn’t damage the right side since they want to go in on the left side this time. The surgery has come a long ways since her last one so it should be easier for her to recover from. We expect it to happen in the next month.

So at the moment we are kind of a mess (or have been the last couple months), but we all plan to be on the road to recovery this year. I fully expect this to be a great year for all so we can move out of the problems of 2009.

Hope you all are having a good week and that you are suviving the end of the term Mike.

The federal government can borrow if they run out of money which raises the nation’s debt, but can sometimes be a necessary evil when we need to revive the economy. States and local governments don’t have that luxury. They can raise taxes or create bonds which must be paid back by taxpayers, but otherwise their only option is to cut spending.

If it comes down to cutting programs or spending in general what is really essential to the state?  For my state, Oregon, the biggest programs that are funded are Education (k-12 and higher ed), Public Safety (state police and prisons) and Human Services (health care, assisted living, treatment programs etc) . I attended an Oregon Ways and Means committee meeting that was taking testimony from anyone who wanted to give input on the budget. There are a lot of people who want their money and a lot of sob stories were told. I work in Higher Ed and of course I would hope we wouldn’t get hit so hard, but the initial proposal is a 15% cut (above what has been cut the last year or so).  It is bigger than other groups, but not as big as the governor was threatening earlier this spring.

I can complain about cuts, but I really don’t know where I think cuts should actually go otherwise. My only input would be to not add services that aren’t already being provided unless there is an outside source of revenue paying for it. I got an email recently from a LGBT group wanting me to support a new legal advocate to make sure new laws are being followed. I can’t do that. It is great we are getting some new laws, but I have to currently believe law enforcement will follow the laws they are told to follow and if it is proven otherwise and we are in a better situation economically, then we can get a new position.

My actual focus is my family. I let myself get into too much debt. A lot of it is my own, but a good chunk is money I loaned others using my good credit. Unfortunately they are not able to pay me back on a regular basis so I now cover my debt and well as theirs. Because of the extra debt and with Mona going back to school we have been doing some fancy footwork to keep above water. I wonder sometimes about how serious I really am in getting my debt down. I haven’t been cutting the bills I  have control of (like cable, internet, phone, newspaper), but we don’t eat out much anymore and I have always been thrifty in taking my lunch to work and a thermos of coffee instead of buying it (sorry Katie).

Mona will be out of school in a few weeks. She is looking to get a contract job for the summer so we have some guaranteed income. This isn’t going to help get our debt down really because we need to replace the roof on our house. We got a quote of about $6200 which was less than expected, but of course more than we have. So hopefully her work will offset extra debt we will incur. Getting the quote on the roof is what got me thinking about priorities and what we really need. It would have been better if I seriously thought about this about 10 years ago, but c’est la vie.

So what do you all think? Any profound wisdom in how either the government or individual families can/are getting through this? I have been thinking about this for a while, but in the end I haven’t really come up with any answers.

I got to take a short vacation last week. I went up to my parent’s cabin with Mona. It was nice to get away from the kids and have some peace and quiet. We never get that at home right now. I may add a couple of pictures later so you all can see what it looks like up there. Had to get back to work as I’m doing an upgrade on our student system at work this next weekend. The week after that will be filled with meetings, then training classes are going to be starting up before school stars at the end of the month. Then things will get really busy

Mona will be starting back to school this fall. She is currently an LPN and wants to work toward becoming an RN. She has some prerequisites to do before she can apply to the nursing program. Money is going to be tight while she goes to school unless she can get a student loan. I’m hoping that will work out because last time she was in school, her student loan was paid off after she worked a year as a nurse. The government has some programs that are supposed to help get more nurses in the workplace. This is also the one case where it is good that we can’t get married so they do not consider my income in regards to financial aid. We pay extra taxes on health benefits, tuition reductions and the fact we can’t file jointly so I figure it is even in the long run

Being so busy, I have actualy done very little gaming in the last month. I did finish Lego Indiana Jones and got back to Ratchet and Clank Tools of Destruction, but really not much of either on my PS3. I have been playing Picross on my DS (puzzle game) primarily before going to bed. EBay has definitely taken up some of my gaming time. Although i have missed out on Socome Twosdays because I have forgotten what day of the week it is. With some new games coming out and new people getting PS3s I am looking forward to more PS3 action in the near future.

Our daughter is 22. She, her husband and their 3 year old son moved back in with us in March. Since they have moved in, life seems to be at a standstill. It’s like we are treading water waiting for them to be able to move out so we can start swimming foward again. They have been in financial trouble for at least a year when they finally waved the white flag and ask if they could move back in to get on their feet. This last month we found out that they plan on staying until December or January so 5-6 more months of treading water.

It is nice to see our grandson, but we have NO alone time anymore. For one, our grandson is a definite Grandma’s boy. He follows us every where. Samantha (our daughter) isn’t any better. Once Kaleb is in bed, she seems to take his place. What is funny is that we actually have to start making out in front of her to get her to leave us alone (usually with a huff and “You could have just told me to leave!”). No we don’t use that method on our grandson… Another twist in this “adventure” is that Samantha is pregnant. Our next grandson is going to be born around Thanksgiving. The due date is three days before Thanksgiving. If that is the case she will probably be in the hospital for Thanksgiving. Kind of funny because at the moment the smell of turkey makes her nauseous.

There really isn’t room for them now (they are all sleeping together on a king size bed in the spare bedroom). When the new baby comes it will be even more caotic. It will be a joy to see the new one, but it’s going to be a crazy atmosphere at our house. I wish I wasnt so clausterphobic. I tend to stay in my office on my computer or playing games when I’m home to pass the time. This is more of a defensive tactic to keep me from getting between the bickering (the stress on them hasn’t been easy either).

I’m just hoping we all get through this time in one piece and with our respective relationships in tact. I believe it will all be ok in the long run, but it may be a bumpy ride. This post isn’t really going anywhere, but I just felt the need to whine a bit and sort out where the last 4 months have gone.

Personally, I’m liberal in some areas (social issues), but I’m more conservative fiscally. With this I tend to agree with portions of different politicians views. This usually puts me at odds with others. The majority of the people I talk to about politics are either very conservative or very liberal. Being neither myself I’ve learned to listen and bite my tongue the majority of the time. I hear people profess that the end of the world will come if candidate xyz is elected. They can never see any good from an opponent. Sure there are candidates I really don’t want, but I try to see the pluses and minuses of each candidate.

In the media we tend to hear the views of the extremes. This tends to push the rest of us out of the discussion because the extremes don’t want to listen. If we could agree to disagree I think the middle would join the discussion more often and we could get a better view of what the United States as a whole believes.

I’m a computer science geek who got my CS degree back in 1989. I’ve been working in computing for about 20 years. Currently my expertise is Oracle programming (Oracle Forms, PL/SQL, SQL, ProC).