A few weeks ago, I managed to find some time to watch episodes 3 & 4 of Band of Brothers.

Carentan

The men of Easy Company head to the French village of Carentan, where they they experience heavy fighting with the Germans defending that town, and lose a number of soldiers. Much of the episode follows a soldier named Blithe, who seems like a simple young man who struggles to deal with the fear and danger of battle, and rightfully so. Good episode, but again, I struggle to keep track of who is who in the fog of war with so much happening. I’m not saying that they could change anything, but it’s hard for a viewer to tell guys in matching brown uniforms and helmets apart in the midst of a battle. Ah well, what can you do?

Replacements

Since Easy Company has lost quite a few men since the Normandy invasion, new guys join the ranks, including one soldier played by James McAvoy! As part of Operation Market Garden, which I recall from the 1977 film A Bridge Too Far was an abject failure, the troop is dropped into the Netherlands. The troops suffer heavy fighting and must retreat, but the “replacements” prove themselves to be worthy of Easy company. What I also liked about this episode, besides James McAvoy showing up, was that this episode featured Michael Cudlitz as the commander of the new guys. Cudlitz, of course, stars in one of my favorite shows and police dramas, Southland.

Overall, good episodes again. The video and audio quality on these blu-ray discs were good. My only complaint is that there are only two episodes per disc, so it’s going to take me a long while to get through all ten episodes.

So…….. we had kittens today.

What, really? Yes, it was a bit of a strange fiasco. After seeing the kittens the week earlier, I submitted an adoption application to the animal hospital on Saturday, expecting to hear back on Monday. Monday comes and go, no word. I call them on Tuesday, and I eventually am told that our adoption application was denied. Denied??? Why? No information, but they’ll talk to the person in charge. Okay, tell me tomorrow.

Wednesday, Thursday, and most of Friday, I hear nothing. Finally, I get a call back on Friday, and it turns out that they misunderstood some responses I wrote on the application. I can understand that, but instead of outright denying an application, shouldn’t they pick up the phone and ask? Long story short, we got approved, and we could come check out the kittens on Monday evening (today.)

With all that was going on today, it was busy, but we all made it. One of the three remaining kittens had already been adopted, so these were the two left. We had a small room to play with them, and it was fine. We decided to adopt them, and we had an hour to split up and pick up additional cat supplies from the pet store, clean the basement out, and for the nurses to administer some additional vaccinations. At 7:50 pm, I was back (with cash and a cat carrier), to bring them home. 

Right now, so far so good, but kittens really are like toddlers. Lot of supervision is required. They’re cute, though. No names yet.

Kitten #1

Kitten #2

[In the voice of Professor Farnsworth, Futurama] “Good news, everyone!”

First a little background:

1. I got a flat tire on the Toyota last Saturday, which is the first since 2010′s “the year of flat tires.” It’s been a good seven-month run of no flat tires, but it was bound to happen again. I planned to go to our local Toyota dealership to replace the tire.
2. Saturday night, Josh got a stomach virus, and was sick all night. He was still a bit sick on Sunday, so I’d stay home with him, to allow him more time to recover.

With these two facts, I watched Josh on Monday, and took him with me to Toyota to get the tire replaced. I was hoping to get the tire replaced under Toyota’s tire warranty program,  but with getting all four tires replaced last year, I didn’t know if I could make a convincing argument to get this one replaced as well. After many wheel balancings, who knows which tire was purchased at what Toyota dealership, which was an original new tire, and which was a replacement for a replacement. I didn’t want to plunk down $275+ for a new tire, when we’re trying to save up money to replace the rear brakes. This was “rear brakes” money!

Ah, well, we could’t drive around with no spare tire all this time. I picked up some McDonald’s for Josh and me, and we sat for over two hours in the customer lounge, waiting on the tire change. Around 4pm, two hours later, Toyota changed the tire. And? They were able to cover the cost under the tire warranty program, so no cost to me. I said hey, that’s great. You know, since the car is up, can I get the brakes done? Also, I forgot my $25 off coupon for brakes (I did forget), so what should I do? They said, no problem.

So another hour passes, and $250 later, the car is done. Rear tire completely replaced, and I got the rear brakes done. Sweet!  I have to give the folks at Dayton Toyota credit, because the sales/service rep was very helpful, and the Toyota tire warranty is a big help for Toyota customers, especially this one. With the Highlander, I’m a first-time Toyota customer, and this has certainly impressed me.

I had a few hours today to myself while my lovely wife took the kids to a birthday party. I dressed up, got my water bottles ready, and made a photocopy of the route cue sheet from my NJ road cycling map book. Instead of trying to write out the directions like last time, I scanned it in and printed it for reference. Much quicker and neater.

I decided to try out some of my route from last week’s Clarksburg Ride that I attempted but got lost during. Since it was late afternoon / early evening, the sun wasn’t beating down and there was a nice breeze. I didn’t get lost this time around, and ultimately decided to follow as much of the route I could in the time allotted.

It took me about 3.5 hours to ride about 43 miles, and I worked on sprinting and keeping a strong pace. I ran out of water towards the end, but soldiered on. I now have 218 miles on the odometer. I’ve got that 600 mile goal in my sights.

Ah yes, we got a flat tire over the weekend. I hate it. What an inconvenience. I was out with Lily, having dropped off Josh to a birthday party at one of those bounce places. We had a tight schedule today, so I was trying to get as much as I could done. After hitting Kohl’s, I pulled out of the parking lot, and couldn’t ignore a low-level roar.

I pulled over near the next shop we had to get to (BJ’s Wholesale), and saw the rear right tire was flat. Argh. I called AAA, and they would have someone here soon. I took Lily in to get some grocery shopping done. I had until 12 noon before we had to pick up Josh from the party. I thought I would have time to still get him.
Sigh.

By the time we were done, I got a txt msg status that they would be further delayed. Double argh! I walked Lily to a nearby Chick-fil-A, to eat lunch and play, and I spoke to my wife, and she ultimately went to get Josh instead. An inconvenience to many. AAA’s tow company came just before noon, and we were back on the road soon enough. Still, it ate up too much time out of a busy day.

Now, we need to figure out how to add the cost of a new tire to the rest of the Toyota repairs we need to get done in the next few months.

Here’s a milestone for ya — guess who doesn’t have 20 lbs under his belt? Me. I weighed myself this past Monday, and I was thrilled to be down to 188 lbs, which means I’d lost 18 lbs so far this year. I haven’t had a chance to work out at the gym this week, due to family scheduling issues these past few weeknights. As the weekend is coming up, I decided to weigh myself, and witness the damage a week of inactivity (but still behaving on my diet) had wrecked on my weight loss. Expecting the worse, I was pleasantly surprised to find the scales balancing at 186 lbs.

Two more pounds this week? Four pounds since last week? That’s brilliant, mates! Six more to go to make my doctor happy, and 16 more to reach my personal target weight. Gym and the bicycle this weekend, so let the good times roll.

This was a pretty nice Father’s Day weekend. I purposely asked that we didn’t do any big dinner or gifts this year. I don’t need it, and we should try to save a little money. What I did want was some free time to hit the gym and go cycling this weekend. This past month (since the MS ride) has been a very long month, with little time afforded to me to work out in the evenings, or go riding on the weekends. We didn’t get to do everything on the potential agenda e.g. movie night, but it was close enough. We have Kung Fu Panda sitting in its Netflix mailer, but we’ll have to watch it next week instead.

Saturday morning, I hit the gym, then my wife had to run some errands. While she was out, Lily and I picked Josh, who had spent the past two days/nights hanging with his maternal grandparents. When she got back, we hit the animal hospital to check out some kittens up for adoption. Afterwards, we did some shopping. I made what some might call a Chinese dinner: chicken fried rice with veggies sautéed in a General Tso’s sauce. Next time, I’ll plan ahead, and have some scallions on hand for garnish!

Sunday was proving to be one packed itinerary. I planned to go cycling in the morning, then we would take the kids to the neighborhood pool, lunch at home, then get ready and go to my father-in-law’s *last* church service. I use the word “last” loosely, since he’s retiring from his primary church, but he’s not actually “retiring.” Ah, I’m not going to get into it again. Whatever.

Cycling

6/19/2011 - my Father's Day ride -- 40 miles

Sunday morning, the kids were sleeping, and my wife was working on her speech for later that evening. I got ready in my cycling clothes, made myself some eggs and stuff for a hearty breakfast, and mapped out a decent ride around the area. I used a book that my wife got me for my birthday last year with routes all around NJ. A little after 8 AM, I was out the door.

I rode for a little while heading up to Cranbury, when I realized that my cyclocomputer wasn’t registering any mileage. It still said 0.0! Argh, I said, and stopped to figure out what was wrong. Now, I figured that the magnet and sensor got jostled on the bus ride back from Tuckerton Seaport last month, but I took the bike for a tuneup last week, and specifically told them it may need alignment. It seems they never bothered to check this out. Speaking in the 3rd person, I will say that Joel was annoyed. I messed around with the sensor, and it started registering, so I got back on the road heading up to Cranbury, NJ.

6/19/2011 -- I've racked up 175 miles so far this year

I didn’t quite follow the route listed, as I decided to not go all the way to the “starting point” marked in the route. Instead I thought I’d try to find one of the streets, and just go from there. Unfortunately, using the route and my iPhone’s Google Maps, I still had issues trying to find some of these streets. I eventually found my way, but I wasted a bit too much of my morning trying to find my way back to the route. I was probably better off just going to the specified starting point. As the morning drew on, it got progressively hotter, but I rode decently. In hindsight, I’m very glad I went for the 2nd bottle cage and water bottle, as I finished both on the ride, and then stopped at the Clarksburg General Store to get another large water bottle for a refill. I was only eight miles away from home, which would get me at about 38 miles in total, so I figured that was pretty good for today. I, of course, after using Google Maps, still went the wrong way, and had to backtrack again. I reached home a little after 12 noon. In total? 40 miles for the day, and 175 miles on the 2011 odometer. I think I can hit 200 miles next ride, which I hope is very soon. Since my personal best is just short of 600 miles in 2004, I’d like to beat that this year. I’m 1/3 of the way there now.

Surprise Father’s Day Gifts and Pool Time

The family had a little surprise for me, with cards and gifts, which I appreciated. I can’t wait to try out my new Swiss army knife. We had a short but closing window to hit the pool, so my wife got the kids ready for the pool before I got there, and I showered and got into my swim trunks. We hustled over to the pool, and swam around for the a while. My wife stayed out of the water, enjoying the rays. In too short a time, we had to get back and get ready. I picked up a quick lunch from 7-Eleven for the kids and me, and then we raced to get everyone showered and dressed.

Some of my Father's Day gifts and cards. I like the Star Wars card a lot!

Sunday Evening’s Church Service / My father-in-law’s Retirement Service

Naturally, we out of the house a little later than expected, and still had to get gas for the car. However, we now had less than an hour to get up there and get seats. I won’t mention all the details, but… the good news is that we made it there before 4pm, and the bad news is that I certainly made some enemies on the northbound NJ Turnpike that day. It was hot that day, but the kids were mostly behaved. After all the speeches, we went downstairs to eat and talk. We got out of there around 9pm, but then we had to get a few groceries (and pool shoes for Josh), so we hit ShopRite around 10:15 pm with the whole family. By the time we finally got home and got the kids to bed, we were all very tired.

While I was at the animal hospital with that injured kitten, I saw four of the cutest (yes, I said cutest) kittens. Three males and a very pretty female kitten. We’ve been looking to adopt 1-2 adult cats or kittens, but haven’t found the right match.

Early Saturday, our family went over to the animal hospital to check them out. Unfortunately, the girl kitten had already been adopted this morning! We looked over the three brothers, and here are the two I like. I filled out the application, so I hope to hear from the vet on Monday.

What an eventful and heartbreaking morning. I was working from home on Friday so I could attend a Father’s Day lunch at Luly’s school that day. This morning, I dropped off my daughter to school, and was on my way when I saw something black and oddly shaped on the street near my house. Was it a black sock? I got closer, and saw that it was a black kitten lying down on the street.

I quickly pulled up, and realized it must have been run over, and too hurt to move. I called my wife, told her the situation, and asked her to bring me the old cat carrier and a towel, and some gloves. I had to get this kitten to a vet, and without getting injured in the process. It looked to be a stray, and you never know about rabies. The kitten was hissing a lot. It was wet, so I think it got run over during the night, then got caught in the rain, helpless to do anything about its predicament.

We got it into the carrier, noticed an open wound on its leg and I called our local vet. They couldn’t get me an appointment right away, so they gave me the number of an animal rescue organization in nearby Englishtown. I called there a few times, but only got an answering machine. Now what to do? This kitten was severely injured, and I had no idea where to begin to diagnose and treat it. I said screw it, you can delay a person on the phone, but you can’t do much when they’re right in front of you. I decided to simply drive to the animal hospital, show them the kitten, and make them to force me to turn away.

I got there, told them who I was, and said I would cover expenses. They saw me (us?) within 30 minutes, and our old vet saw the kitten. It had a broken left front leg, possibly dislocated. There was indeed an open wound, and the entire body was infested with lice. The kitten was also dehydrated.

The vet decided to treat her right away, and if I would agree to surrender her to them, they would cover all expenses. Surprised by their generosity, I repeated my offer to cover some of the fees, but the vet said again not to worry about it. The vet said the kitten may lose its leg, but we’ll see.

I hope she makes it.

On Friday, I requested to work from home. Lily’s school (and Josh’s former school) has hosted a lunch in honor of Mother’s Day for years now, but nothing for the fathers. I’m not taking away any credit from the mothers here, but we fathers could use a little respect. . Hey, it’s he sentiment that counts.

My wife wouldn’t let me go the cheap route and buy pre-made supermarket pasta salad, so she got up early to prepare it for me to take there. That’s how these parties usually work — parents in each class sign up to bring in a particular item. I got to the school around 12 noon, and yes, slight bedlam. Most of the tables, chairs, and food were out, but it was still in progress. My daughter’s class was already seated, but the teachers were trying to keep the kids seated and hydrated. Not being a lazy jerk, I helped out where I could with getting various kids juice boxes, and putting additional tables out.

Father's Day BBQ Lunch

Once all the kids were out and seated, and fathers had arrived, everyone started eating. Oye, more bedlam. For some reason, the dads were relegated to a separate table from the kids. Uh, what was the point of this? I got food for Lily, and sat for a minute or two at the dads tables, but got bored, so I decided to just stand behind Lily’s seat. At least I could interact with my flesh and blood.

The other fathers weren’t really talking to each other anyway.

While eating my lunch, I tried to be helpful by bringing juices and extra stuff for Lily and her classmates. I give credit to the teachers, because without naming names, some of those kids are crazy. Two boys were spraying juice and water all over, then stomping in the resulting puddle. I had to separate them twice. One of those boys then proceeded to entertain himself by running through the parking lot.

Towards the end of the lunch, the fathers started disappearing, leaving cleanup to the teachers and whoever else was left. Unbelievable! I stayed with maybe three other parents to help the teachers clean up the trash, and bring tables and chairs back in. A few more hands would have helped, so I can’t understand how these other parents can just walk away and let someone else clean up. How are these young female teachers supposed to watch YOUR kids AND clean up after everyone’s mess?

Jerks.