Time to De-Brief (or should I say De-Compress??!)

Well it's been a week since I posted. Not acceptable. Sorry. Let's see if I can recap the last week or so, this will be a true test!!!


Friday - Mom flew in for the weekend! Nice surprise! Uncle Bryan and Auntie "Lecia" babysat Kailee and Alex. Alex was in heaven playing with Cameron's cars, and Kailee might as well have been at Le Peterson Spa ... bath, hair, pedicure. The works. She loved it. :)

Saturday - We live close to Theresa - I think there's less than a half mile between our houses - so Cameron rode his skateboard, and I rode my bike over there for a Saturday morning visit. Kids played, and we had our coffee. Then I called Bryan for a ride home. Just kidding. Saturday night the neighbor's watched Cam while Bryan and I headed out to the WigWam Resort to meet up with my friend Kim. She was here on business for the weekend and cleared her schedule to have dinner and drinks with us. It was great - hadn't seen her in over a year, and we had a lot to catch up on. Dinner was fantastic, the cocktails were even better!

Sunday - Dropped Cam off at Mike & Denise's so he could spend some time with Grandma and Papa! Video games, skateboarding, lunch ... what more could he ask for? Bryan and I ran some errands, went to lunch, did some shopping, and had a nice day hanging out together.

Monday - felt like crap and stayed home from work. Highlight of the day: Bryan and Cameron are at the grocery store, and have to go to the bathroom. So they're standing at the urinal going, when Cameron says to Bryan, "Wow - yours holds a lot more than mine." Classic. When do they start learning about anatomy? Guess I'm gonna have to pull out a picture of the human body here soon ...

Tuesday - Feeling a little better, think I have a cold. Sucks. Cam had another skateboarding lesson - still absolutely LOVING it! He is doing so awesome. Right now he's in the "Rippers" class. He has improved incredibly since the first lesson, and is about ready to move up to the "Shredders". :) He "dropped in the bowl", grinded the 4 ft rail, and has a back turn flip or something before he can move up. He is completely motivated, no fear whatsoever, and really thriving on the improvements and progression he has seen himself. Oh by the way, did I mention I have YET to see him? Yeah, I know. His lessons are usually at 4, so that sucks. Do you think Bryan has taken the camera like I asked? Nope. Guess I'll just have to wait.

Found out that Jim and Becky are having a BOY! So excited for them, and Cameron is super excited knowing he has another "cousin" to add to his list. The Keene's Blogspot will keep you up on all the adventures of little JT Keene and his mommy and daddy. :)

Wednesday - This was a busy day. And to be honest, I'm glad it's over. It really kind of sucked for all of us. The only good thing was that it was Cam's first meeting for baseball! After getting the call from the coach on Monday about the first meeting, we went through the whole "I'm not sure that I still want to do baseball now because I'm in skateboarding ..." Well we knew it was going to come. So we had the "you need to take responsibility/you wanted to sign up for it/give it a shot/you don't have to LOVE them both/etc." chat. Seemed to be okay. Meeting was good - coach seems nice. I would say that for never playing baseball or t-ball, Cameron was in the top half of the kids that had some "skills". He figured he was the "second best hitter because I hit all three balls". Admitted some of the other kids were better at catching, which is good for him. Our conversations with about having fun and trying YOUR best vs. having to BE the best certainly surfaced. He let me know this morning (Friday) that he was going to give it a shot and that it should be fun, but that he was more excited for skateboarding. Nothing wrong with honesty. Just don't want to see him in the outfield, sitting down, pulling dandelions or worse, pulling his Gameboy out of his pocket during the game.

Cam also got in trouble at school. He apparently "yelled" at a recess aide. Well he raised his voice, but only after this aide raised her voice, asked him the same question, four times, and after Cameron answered her, four times. I'd be frustrated too. Kind of puts us in a tough spot. Understand where the "respect and kind words" come into play, but also feel that "hassling" is just as inappropriate. To make matters worse, we went through the exact same scenario/situation, with the exact same teacher's aide a couple of months ago. Raising his voice because she kept asking him the same question. Had a meeting with a couple of the teacher's over that one. We'll see what happens with this. Needless to say, he lost two days worth of recess, had to pick out an appropriate scripture for the situation, and write the aid an apology note.

Bryan hit the Urgent Care, his other "PCP" for his knee. Had been having problems with it, can't remember doing anything in particular to cause the swelling and pain, but yesterday was really bad. Didn't sleep the night before, and was limping quite a bit. Doctor said there was a bit of fluid, and he thought his meniscus was irritated, but not torn. Gave him a brace to wear for work, told him to take ibuprofen, keep it straight when he's resting, and use heat packs. Seemed to work pretty good last night, because he wasn't limping today, and there was no swelling. We'll see how THAT goes. In the meantime, we're hunting down an orthopedist just in case.

And the highlight of my day: getting pulled over by a DPS motorcycle cop on my way home, and getting a ticket, for being in the HOV (carpool) lane. I wasn't in the HOV lane. At all. Seriously. I'm still so damn irritated with the whole situation that I cannot talk about it without seething. I left work at 6:00, get on 1-10 from my exit, and proceed to US60. 8 minutes into my drive, I call my hairstylist and let her know that I'm on my way for my appointment. I'm in the far right lane to begin with on the 10, which eventually turns into the middle lane once it merges with the 60. Once on the 60, I move into the left lane, which is the lane closest to the HOV lane. For those of you wondering, the HOV lane in AZ is restricted to 2 or more passengers between the hours of 6-9am and 3-7pm, weekdays. I'm barely on the 60, and notice a piece of crap, older model cabriolet convertible flying in behind me from the HOV lane. One guy in it. I'm thinking he must be paranoid about a cop, or there's one sitting up ahead. Couldn't see anything myself. Then this guy moves over another couple of lanes to "hide out". Then I see the motorcycle cop and am thinking to myself "this is GREAT!" I love it when they get caught. The cop pulls in behind me, with his lights flashing. Okay, maybe he's trying to get someone ahead of me. I change lanes. So does he. Then he's doing his little weaving back and forth to slow traffic down when I realize I'm the one that's getting pulled over! What the french toast? So I pull over. He comes up, asks for all my info and then says "Do you know why I pulled you over?" I answer that I have NO idea. then he says "So you don't think I had a reason?" Okay, did I say that? I don't think so. Does he WANT me to remove the lid from freshly brewed coffee and splatter it all over his too-tight helmet and ugly brown uniform? I answer him "Well I'm sure you had a reason, I just don't know what it is." So then he asks, "You want to tell me how you got on the 60 from the 10?" Then I knew what he was inferring. So I asked him if he thought I was in the carpool lane. He says, "I know you were in the carpool lane. You were the only one with your headlights and fog lights on, so it was easy to pick you out." What the hell is the color of the sky in your world? Seriously.

It's 6:10, sunset was at 6:28 (I looked it up) and you're facing west, looking into the sun, my lights are automatic and already on. I'm going out on a limb here and say that most newer model cars have automatic headlights. But I was the only one on the freeway in rush hour traffic, doing no more than 20 mph, bumper to bumper, with headlights on, that switched from the HOV lane into the left lane. So I then say, "Well I'm not going to argue with you". He comes back with a ticket - $378 - and lets me know that I can pay it, or go to Traffic School, or utilize the Online Traffic School if I want, he's "given me until April 15", or I can contest it in court. Your damn right I am. I sign the ticket, hand it back, and before he gives it to me, he wants to know if I have any questions. Oh, do I. "Nope." Bite your tongue, Alicia. Breathe.

So just to recap ... I WAS NOT IN THE HOV LANE.