ok, maybe not "hazel orchids" but Hazel and orchids are sort of the subject here. not a whole lot of house related stuff to discuss ... too much NCAA tourney and too busy at work(and a bit lazy at times). our storm door has arrived at Lowe's, so i might try to get that installed Saturday morning before we head north for my cousin's wedding.
i mentioned a while back that i got a new orchid for my birthday ... so here it is. it's purdy-like. i also included a pic of one of our other orchids that is blooming.
i also included some new pics of Hazel for you cat-curious readers. she has some strange facination with sitting in the laundry basket ... we don't quite understand it. she also likes to be lazy and lay around ... i can understand that. funny story ... i was playing with her the other day. we have what is basically a stick with some feathers on the end that she loves to chase after. for some reason the other night, she was chasing it really intently ... and i started her running in a really tight circle. she just kept chasing and chasing. after probably 7-8 very quick loops she gave up and walked away ... then started to fall over. she had gotten herself so dizzy she could barely walk. it was mighy humorous ... for me anyway. i think she has a growing hatred of me for reasons such as this.
in other birthday related news ... i must share about some other exciting gifts i received. from Chrissy, i got that awesome Far Side collection (i love the Far Side) that has every cartoon Larson everpublished. a very cool, very nicely done collection (it must weigh 30 lbs)! this past weekend, Michael & Kim were down and brought my birthday present/our housewarming gift ... TIVO! also very cool. we can be so much more efficient in our TV watching now :-)
well, i think that's about it for now. looks like Duke is turning it around vs LSU. Ben will be happy.
Update: sorry Ben, Duke sputtered out after all. my NCAA bracket takes yet another big hit. ouch.
hello again. it seems i forgot to mention a fairly big event 2 posts ago ... Chrissy started her new job about a month ago! she's over at Community Hospital now, splitting between the East and North campus. so far, it's going well ... she has met some very nice people and enjoys a somewhat different caseload. she really misses her old friends at St. E's, but the drive and unknown direction/future of the hospital were wearing on her. Community calling her out of the blue turned out to be an amazing blessing.
things have been pretty good the past week. i'm feeling quite a bit better, in all regards. so that is good. i do appreciate the nice calls and emails i have received. thank you! i did manage to get what i believe is poison ivy or poison oak from doing that outside cleanup the other week. it's not too bad, but i wouldn't mind just being done with it. i'm reacting a bit different than i typically do with poison ivy, that's why i wonder if it's poison oak ... although i kind of thought they did the same thing. it does seem to be getting better, so that's all i care about. i think humanity needs to hire someone to go out and kill ALL poison ivy/oak/sumac. it can't possibly do any good. seriously.
in other progress, Saturday we did quite a few errands/cleaning around the house. we hung up some more things, including a neat shelf thing over the range (maybe a picture when we get the camera back). i "built" a mini entertainment center in the office ... and if you know me and building entertainment centers, you know it involves some concrete blocks. only 4 this time, so rest assured for those who help us move next ... it won't be as bad as previous moves! we also bought a dead bolt for the back door, but the locksmith up the street couldn't make it out to install it yet. hopefully next week sometime, providing some surgery goes well for him. he's a nice old man, so i hope all goes well for him. i also put a few "final" light/outlet covers on. i THINK i've found them all now. i think. i'm sure somewhere there is an outlet laughing at me, thinking it has won. mark my words, i will find you ... and put a cover on you.
Saturday evening we had a good portion of the "Indy folks" over for a game night. after lots of the usual hanging out and chatting and giving the tour to first-timers to the house, we had 2 entertaining games of the classic, Clue! it's really funny to watch a room full of post-college, think-we-are-all-very-smart, competitive people discussing winning Clue strategies as quietly as possible with their teammates. the various "systems" people had were quite interesting. the whole evening was a great time, it's something we've wanted to do for a while, just hadn't had the chance.
today was a bit of a lazy day ... i was enthralled with some good sports, much to Chrissy's enjoyment. did anyone see that BC/Duke game?? wow, that was great ... JJ Redick is an unreal shooter. and it was nice to see the US pull out the bottom of the 9th win against Japan in the WBC. go team. i'm quite pumped for March Madness time again ... gotta love hours and hours and hours of non-stop college basketball. funny, no one ever says that about NBA basketball. Chrissy is really looking forward to it as you might guess.
oh, and it's raining a lot ... you'd think we were in Portland. which, by the way, we are currently making plans to visit in July (to visit Nate & Deb --- my bro and his wife). we are very excited about this trip ... we really miss spending time w/ N&D. so, if anyone sees or talks to them, make every attempt to persuade them to move back to Indiana. i know, its probably a lost cause, but you never know.
wow, i turned 27 today. 30 sure is creeping up quickly. that is pretty unbelievable. shouldn't i only be like 18 or something?
PS: i saw my first new (C6) Corvette Z06 on the road today (see "off road" picture a few posts down), in Carmel of course. i thought at first it was my birthday present, but the guy just drove past me. maybe the guy was just tricking me and will give it to me tomorrow when i'm not expecting it? yeah, i bet that's it.
welllll. sorry everyone. i'm back. i apologize for the delay. i didn't mean to leave you all hanging like that. i've been sick (more on that later) so just haven't had it in me to get anything posted. not all that much has happened in the past month anyway, so you haven't missed out on all that much.
there was one thing as was hinted at on that last post, we did indeed get a cat. i know, shocking, a Miller got an indoor cat! i think it was on Saturday, Feb 11. the cat we had thought we wanted (Lily from the last post) was adopted during the week, so she wasn't available. we visited several pet stores who offered adoptions, as well as the humane society. as i was just typing, the cat just climbed across my laptop only to sit on top of my right arm of all places (guess her ears were burning). ok, that's better. we were close to taking a younger cat from the human society, but we just weren't sure. it seemed just a tad on the over-energetic/mischievous side. the last place we checked was the Petsmart here in Noblesville. the first cat we played with was pretty much not interested in people. so, we played with this older cat a couple cages down. Chrissy was hooked in just a few minutes. the cat instantly took to us and was climbing all over Chrissy. we decided to go for it! so, Hazel entered our home.
Hazel is roughly 5 years old ... and fairly small (about 9 lbs). that's about all we know. she seems to have been part of a good home before, she definitely enjoys being around people. after only an hour or so of exploring her new home, she was comfortable with us and had found her litterbox! she loves to climb up on Chrissy's lap (she's definitely her favorite human) in the evening and just nap. if she's not around, even I will do (as in she is now leaning up against me and sleeping). all in all, she's a very laid back cat. she loves to nap on top of the air vents (i think she is hinting that i keep it too cold in here). she goes into crazy, psychotic play mode when given a "hit" of catnip. i always thought that was some urban legend ... NOT TRUE. she goes completely nuts for that stuff. i think we let her OD a little bit yesterday afternoon ... she took a LONG nap after the high wore off. she has gotten into a little mischief, mostly being in places where she shouldn't (on top of the stair rail, in the basement, counters, etc.). she also ate most of one of our orchids (grrrrr...). Chrissy has been doing a good job of keeping her and her litterbox clean (no bad smells except her breath after eating; only one or two episodes of me feeling allergic to her; minimal hair around the house). so, we have cat. Andy seems suspicious, but they haven't met yet ... and hopefully they won't.
in other news, we got a fun visit from my mom yesterday afternoon. we ate a great meal at The Cheesecake Factory (mmm, fish tacos and cheesecake) and strolled through the new Crate & Barrel at Keystone. she brought some great cake along, which reminds me, i need to get another piece in a few minutes. for my birthday she got me this awesome orchid (no pic yet) as well as ... get this ... Porta-pit chicken (not to be confused with the Porta-nailer that i used to install the hardwood floors)! for those of you who are unfamiliar with this ... you would be confused as to why this is a good present. it's only the best tasting chicken you've ever tasted! i've only ever seen it in northern Indiana, so it's always a treat for me to have it again. i can't wait to eat it tomorrow night.
apart from the above, not all that much is new around here. we watched a lot of Olympics. we were happy to see Crash and Reese Witherspoon win Oscars last night (but still think Joaquin Phoenix should have won, although we didn't see Capote to compare). we went out of town a couple weekends: for Chrissy's dad's birthday and my mom's birthday (left our camera at Chrissy's parents ... thus some of the better pics of Hazel are "unavailable" for posting). i was going to put a storm door on the house on Saturday, but it turns out our old house needs a custom door (custom = opportunity to charge twice the price). that should be here in about 1.5 weeks and supposedly will take less than 1 hour to install (thus saith the display model). that should help us with draftiness at our door ... something i should have done months ago. i also did a little outdoor cleanup to get a jump-start on spring and tossed down some grass seed in the areas where last fall's weed-n-feed showed us where exactly we had that weed part. so, that should help our lawn look a little more decent this year.
ok, regarding the sickness thing. this is a little more personal than i like to go on a blog ... but i know mostly friends and family look at this (if you don't know me, feel free to skip the rest of this posting) ... and frankly, i have a selfish reason for writing about it: i want your help (plus it will do me good to write about it). the sickness has really been two-fold. first, i got a pretty annoying sinus infection in late Jan/early Feb. mainly i was dealing with a lot of sinus pressure, congestion and tiredness. i finally gave in and went to urgent care about 2 weeks ago when i started feeling worse (you know it is bad when i go to a Doctor). i've been on an antibiotic since (1 more day). the actual worst part of the sinus infection turned out to be ... me. i was getting overly stressed about symptoms and thinking i was way sicker than i was (i went from "having" cancer to diabetes and menengitis, i might as well have been Mr. Burns -- having every disease known to man, but they were working in equilibrium, mysteriously keeping him alive) ... thus ending up making myself sicker (getting worked up, anxious, etc.). i went to our family doctor about a week ago to check the progress of the sinus infection and he decided to make sure nothing else was wrong with some blood tests, more for my peace of mind (blood tests all came back good).
i think the sinus infection part is pretty much done, but part two of the sickness is still there ... and this is where i want your help. i think that the the extreme stress of the rush to get things ready to move in, then an intense move-in day and "moving in"... plus the normal stresses in my life (work, etc.) left me physically, mentally, and emotionally spent ... empty ... gone ... toast. i found myself constantly tired and generally disinterested and unmotivated. yeah, probably a bit of that scary sounding "D" word snuck in on me (not officially diagnosed though, but the Doc said getting myself talking about my stresses would be advisable). i think that probably weakened my immune system, leading to the sinus infection. from there, my weakened mental/emotional state took me down a rough road. my lack of appetite during the worst times took me to a weight i haven't seen since high school. i don't recommend it as a diet plan.
the good news is (thank God there IS good news), i do think i am getting better. i've been generally feeling more like myself for about the past week now. moreso the last few days, but i still have moments of relapse. Chrissy has been doing a good job of getting me to talk about things ... something that is not exactly my strength. i'm not totally there yet, but the start is there. here is where i want your help. i really would appreciate your prayers for my physical and mental/emotional state. i have really felt God's presence through these tough times, comforting me when i really need it. it can only help to get some more of those requests lifted up to Him on my behalf. you can trust that they are truly appreciated. these next few weeks look to be very busy/stressful at work, so i'll need any help i can get to help me through.
i'm a firm believer that good can come from everything and i think my lesson from this situation became apparent about a week ago: i need to work much harder on my relationship with God and my relationship with Chrissy. its amazing what God and my wife can do for me, if i only open up my life and let them. i can't stress this enough. don't learn it the hard way like i am.
anyway, sorry about the "heavy" content of this post. since most of you i don't get to see regularly, i felt you deserved to know what was happening. plus, like i said, i think it is a positive step for me just to share what is going on. i'm trying hard to keep "unstressed", keeping a positive attitude, praying a lot, and getting lots of hugs from my wife. oh, and i think Hazel is trying to help ... she's still laying beside me, obviously, Chrissy isn't home from her Bible study yet :-). i promise, it won't be a month until the next post. adios.
for my birthday ... so here it is. it's purdy-like. i also included a pic of one of our other orchids that is blooming. 
for you cat-curious readers. she has some strange facination with sitting in the laundry basket ... we don't quite understand it. she also likes to be lazy and lay around ... i can understand that. funny story ... 
i was playing with her the other day.
we have what is basically a stick with some feathers on the end that she loves to chase after. for some reason the other night, she was chasing it really intently ... and i started her running in a really tight circle. she just kept chasing and chasing. after probably 7-8 very quick loops she gave up and walked away ... then started to fall over. she had gotten herself so dizzy she could barely walk. it was mighy humorous ... for me anyway. i think she has a growing hatred of me for reasons such as this. 
published. a very cool, very nicely done collection (it must weigh 30 lbs)! this past weekend, Michael & Kim were down and brought my birthday present/our housewarming gift ... TIVO! also very cool. we can be so much more efficient in our TV watching now :-)
