"Friends of Jaclyn"

I wanted to title this one "Friends of Jaclyn, and Kim, and Frenchie, and Alex, and Emily and Merideth and Kathy, and Johnny, and Courtney, etc. Sorry if I didn't name all of you.

We have recently got involved with the "Friends of Jaclyn" program and have made friends with a whole new group of great people. This program pairs up a child with a brain tumor with a college athletic team. We were fortunate enough to get paired with the Lawrence University Girls Fastpitch Softball Team. For the last 2 months we have been meeting roughly once a week for social interaction, and friendship making events. First was a pizza party where we met the team for the first time. Emma walked into the room and commanded the attention of all 16 girls and the coaches every time she spoke. We got to know each other and an instant bond was formed.

We since have had movie night and pumpkin carving, and an Alumni game where she was adopted into the team. Complete with her own uniform she is armed for the season in spring. Until then this team I am sure will provide very special moments for our family.

We had one of those special moments last night. It all started about 3 days earlier. Emma needs to have an MRI in a week and surgery on her leg in 3 weeks. Not wanting to risk any of the family to get H1N1 prior to these events we made the decision to not let the kids go out and do their Trick or Treating. We tried to compensate by taking them out and buying them a bag of candy of their choice. This only lasted for a little while but it wasn't enough for them gain memories for a lifetime. We then thought about what cold we do in a short time frame? Our friends were sick so we couldn't have them over. The next option was to ask the team if they could help. That is all it took. Coach Kim sent out and E-Mail to the team to see who was in on the event. An overwhelming response from the team, they dropped or put off their plans to come to our house to spend some time with Emma. First we ate dinner. I forgot how much college age kids love home cooking. Emma then took over the evening. Spreading all our guests to different rooms of the house with a bowl of candy. She and her sister then trick or treated our home. It wasn't just any trick or treating, Emma made sure to ask for all the candy in each bowl because she knew nobody else needed that candy more than her. Armed with sugar the entire team started to sing High School Musical song with Emma. This is one of those moments that I don't think words or pictures can accurately describe. Picture 8 girls surrounding Emma and here sister all sining and dancing to these songs. I really thought her smile was going to wrap around her head. Not to mention the teams smiles also.

We have not only got to enjoy the Softball teams time but we went to a football game at the university also. Their football team also adopted a boy and are doing similar events with him. So we are getting to experience the entire athletic department as I feel adopted into all of it. Even though we have only been with the team for about 2 months I still think "this is the start of something new." (Gosh, I can't get the HSM songs out of my head.) After last nights party we are now calling the team the FOJ sisters rather than "The Team." I/We are looking forward to spending a lot of time with this new family of ours.

Somber Day

Today started out like most. I "Woke up" and took my shower, headed off to work. Made my pot of coffee as I do most mornings while in the office. As I headed out to the plant floor to talk with all the guys and see what concerns they had for the day and to see what I could do to help them out.

Before I got out of the office I was pulled aside by one of the supervisors. He said to me, "Did you hear about Lewis?" (names changed) "No, what about Lewis" I said.

"He was the one who got electrocuted yesterday." The supervisor continued to tell me what transpired when the Plant manager told the entire plant. "Lewis" passed away as a result of his electrocution. Lewis was putting up a portable garage on his cottage property. While putting a post in the ground he hit an underground power line causing his body to fry under the continuous surge of electricity passing through his body. A relative was standing by watching helplessly. The power could not be shut off until the power company could come out a turn off the power.

So with a heavy heart I made my through the plant talking with the employee's some of which worked with Lewis for over 30 years. I only worked with him for 16, but still felt a great loss. With every tragedy there seems to be a lesson. Te lesson I see here is a simple phone call to diggers hotline would have prevented this useless death. Another lesson could also be applied as well. Make sure you can look at all the hazards in the area with which you are working. If you are using an aluminum ladder be sure there are no power lines above.

Time will ease this mood from my memory but it will never bring Lewis back.

Door County Run

Door County is the peninsula of Wisconsin. Known for its scenic views and Scandinavian Hospitality. My wife and I got our first chance in 4 years to get a weekend away from the kids and spend some time together. We spent 2 nights in Sturgeon Bay, spent a day driving up one side of the county then back south down the other. We stopped whenever we saw fit, like a small park in Bailey's Harbor just to walk near the water out on a small breakwater.

All the way to the north we stopped at Door Bluff Headlands County Park. Looking for a Geocache we parked the car and walked down to the shoreline. The path was steep but well noticeable. When we reached the shore we noticed a couple of things. First was a Tee Pee made of all the drift wood that someone took the time to gather. Then we spotted the "Bench." Some one a several someone's built this bench with just the rocks that they were able to find. This was a perfect spot for a quick rest and Photo Op.

When we decided to go look for the Geocache (Caves of the Door Bluff Headlands) we had to head down the shore a quarter mile in the rough rocks that fell from the nearby cliff. We only recorded one fall on these rock, but had several bruises to prove the fall. Walking along the cliff

was one of the better hikes that I have taken even though it was brief in distance. We neared the location of the cache we had to scale a small cliff. A little teamwork and we both made it up. We found the cache in rather short order. Searched the next nearest cache as there is another in this park. "Hey its .15 from here lets walk in this direction" I cheered. Off we went with no marked trail, no water and a lot of ambition. Hiking off in the direction the arrow on the screen was telling me we made great headway to the cache. We were within 300 feet of the cache and we looked up and saw a 50' sheer rock face. "OMG" she said as I was trying to figure out a nice way of suggesting we keep looking for an easier route. I never was all that good at convincing her of my good ideas so we turned back towards our original trail. But rather than backtrack all the way to shore we stayed up on the cliff we had scaled to find the cache. "Lets just follow this until we get back to the first trail. Following dead reckoning and the tracks on the GPS we headed back in the direction that we came from. The trail got narrower and narrower until it was merely a game trail. We slowly got higher and higher from the waterline of Green Bay. This made for spectacular views if you wanted to stay close to the edge. The further we trekked the more pitch we encountered. Getting close to a 45' angle and a lot of boulders to climb over I started thinking about my earlier decisions. Remembering that she already fell on level ground coupled with the fact we had no water along we aborted our mission and re-backtracked to our original route. Safely back on the rocks that seemed like rough terrain before was more like a paved bike trail now. Making our way back to "The Bench" we stopped and rested for 10 minutes before heading back up the hill. Safely back at the car we hopped in and found the nearest source of water.

Leaving the northernmost part of the mainland part of the county we headed back south looking for more caches and stopping into shops. All the things we wouldn't have done had the kids been along. Lunch was an andoullie and chicken Po Boy sandwich with a smoked trout as a backup that was purchased at a local smokehouse. A few more Photo Ops and we were back at the hotel for the night. Nothing like Prime rib and a sunset with a pint of Guinness.

We didn't make it a solid Geocaching trip but we did make it our tour guide.

My Turn

Today was a bit of a role reversal. I took a vacation day to Drive our youngest to Madison to get her weekly chemo treatment. It all started when I just wanted a cup of coffee from McD's because there was a drive thru. Can't go there because she will want a Breakfast burrito, and that is an argument that I tried to avoid but had anyway so I didn't stop just in principle.

Can anyone guess how many questions there are in the world that starts with DAD? I didn't keep track but an hour into the drive I stopped at a McD's for coffee and a burrito just to slow down the questions for a bit. Then she decided to read some for her homework. Now I don't know about you but I like to watch the road when I drive, not look at books that are being pushed from the back seat towards my face. After several attempt to stop this behavior, it ended, not because of my power of persuasion but because she was bored and wanted to color.

Two hours after the journey began we pulled into the Hospital and she walked me through all the stops to ensure we did things just the way Mom does them. The staff seemed surprised that I brought her down this time, but we all adapted and moved on. No crazy new news on her health.(applaud)

The ride home was slightly different. It was an argument all the way because I didn't buy her some Funions. 45 minutes of screaming and being yelled, I am darn sure she is not getting Funions for Christmas. But when she finally settled down she told me she just wanted to cuddle with someone and that is why she was up set. So maybe a small bag of Funions for Christmas. So I held her hand for a few miles and that seemed to do the trick. When am I going to learn when she screams out like that it isn't really about the Funions.

Take care all as I need to get back to work for a day and then I get a weekend.

Where has the time gone?

It has been a while since I posted on here. Probably because I lost interest in writing and just focused on things here at home. Since I last posted my Daughter went through a year of chemo and a couple surgeries. She was out of chemo for 6 months and in that time we went on her wish trip to Florida and the big mouse. within this trip we got to feed dolphins at Seaworld and she got to go on air with JD Spradlin of radiomargaritaville. For a Parrothead that is quite an honor. Hopefully I will be able to keep on writing in this but life takes me on different turns so if I do, i do and if I don't well I guess I don't.

Anyway I though about getting back into this however it may be more about me that about just geocaching as I originally thought. So we will see what comes out of my "mouth" next.

My last post was related to my oldest daughter and an idea she had with making blankets. Well sheesh did that take off. She has now donated over 200 blankets to children awaiting or recovering from illness. She even has made it into a 501c3 non profit. Pretty cool eh? Come see her blog at Operation A Sisters Love.