The Champ

I almost forgot..I won my fantasy football league. I won $300...but it's not about the money..it's about the trophy..the trophy which is coming home..home to THE CHAMP. I had my worst team i've had the past 3 years too...I got lucky, but i had a ton of bad luck during the seaon with guys getting hurt or suspended, and making the worst trade i've ever made by trading alexander to todd. Which, made it extra sweet when i beat Todd with alexander in the finals....oh, one thing i'll bring up again that Todd said at the draft "This is JJ's worst draft in recent memory" if he only noticed i took larry johnson in round 5...BWAHAHAHA!!! I Fantasy Rule Fantasy football!

Heck, i can win another 50 bones in joffe's league this weekend..i'm on fantasy fire!

Holidays!!

Christmas was great. The girls had a blast..well Shelly did. Carly opened up her first gift which unfortunately for me, was a 3pack of barney dvd's and immediately wanted them open and she was up the stairs on my bed watching em' for the next 2 hours. Shelly Was a ball of energy tho. We left out milk and a piece of candy (didn't have cookies) for santa.which I made sure to drink and eat before she got up of course. And, she couldn't sleep as every 10 seconds i heard "is santa here? what time does he come? why do i have to be asleep? the people across the street aren't sleeping...will santa come to their house?" Then at 2;45 when i was up to take a leak, she comes up behind me "Daddy, has santa come yet? What time will he be here?" It was really cute. She loved the morning and thanked santa for everything.

Of course every freakin' toy she got had about 50 wires and different little pieces. Took me 30 minutes to get Barbie's magic pegasus horse out of the box and assembled...unreal. The house looks like something really big and pink threw up in it. Worst gift?? That's easy..the Barbie drum set. seriously...why was that purchased??

i got some good goods...digital camera so i can start my own albums with the girls was at the top of my list and i got that. So i was happy. It's funny how i've never been a picture guy as i've always had someone else around to take them...but it's definitely something I want to do now as obviously, i'll be the only one doing it that i'll be able to see and get the pics for. I also got a bose sound dock for my ipod..i haven't gotten into that yet, but have heard they are awesome...and i got my yearly ice scraper and tube socks. I FLY thru socks...my feet are freakin' animals i think.

Al gave me some jack and coke...so, i got a pretty mean buzz goin..which of course led to a nap. Great Christmas gift. I hadn't had my own jack in awhile.

Oh, and Al also called to invite me to stay with him. Which I think i will accept. Scot has been unbelievable for me and to me the past 6 months, but I can't keep imposing on him. I need to mooch off someone else for awhile.

The nicest email I have ever gotten

I wanted to make this post cause 1) It's Christmas and the time for giving and 2) It was really random and caught me off guard. I hope nobody thinks i'm trying to be conceited by sharing this, but I had to post it. It comes from Geralyn, who is a mgr here at my work. Super nice lady who has had her share of health problems this year and has been friends with me here since I started. Well, i sent her an email of a half naked david hasselhoff slideshow as a joke, and this is what she sent back to me:

You are so sweet to think of me and share your special “guy friend. “ J



On a serious note Josh, I do think about you a lot and all that you have gone thru. I just want you to know how much I admire your ability to stay positive and upbeat, no matter what is handed over to you in life. You truly are an amazing young man. I wish you the best not only for this holiday season, but especially for 2006 and hope that some wonderful things will come your way.



Geralyn


Really, surprised me as i really wasnt' expecting a response like that, and it completely made my day. It got me thinking why people don't do or say the little things like that to other people very often. Something so easy, and simple and it really gave me so much..seems like if we all did things like that more often life would be easier! In the book i'm reading "Don't sweat the small stuff" It talks about things like this. How doing the little something extra, writing a note, being the first to break the silence, etc..is so rewarding, as life is short and if you spend your time protecting your ego and yourself from it, you will miss out on what makes you happy.

That email seemed like a perfect example.

You know what bothers me?

People that talk about thier pets like they are their children. Seriously. Not much really drifves me crazy, but that drives me nuts. I get Christmas cards in the mail and pics sent in the mail all the time with little snippets like "Here's our children!" Only to see a pic of a schnauzer chewin' on a slipper. Come on people. If you want to children get knocked up and push one out. I know Jeff reads this ( not my bro) and sorry man, i'm not directly referencing your holiday card..altho that was something i'm keeping FOREVER to pull out at a later date (And, Jeff MC..if i can figure out how to ever scan that letter into this blog...i'm going too. It was one for the all time archives.) Of course often times these are the same people that give people who have kids crap when they can't do something because they have kids.

Anywho, the girl next to me is on the phone to a client talking about her german shepherd and how he looked at her and it was so "pathetically cute" she could eat him up. I feel like my flu is coming back. Now, she has a "nails on the chalkboard" quality about her anyways at times, so my tolerance for her is less then others as is...however, The ironic thing is I began bloggin about it immediately cause of the overwhelming sense of nausea in my stomach yet almost instantaneiously Kaytee one cube over instant messaged me the same thing. Good to know i'm not alone on that...

It's good to have pets. It's good to love pets, but they are pets!!

Probably only me and Todd can appreciate this...

Well, unless you are the daddy of a little girl, this probably won't mean a whole lot to anyone else..but i'm gonna talk about it anyways.

Carly has been makin' really big leaps and strides lately with her language development. I can have a conversation with her basically..in her own little way..and can understand almost everything she says, with the occasional mystery word or sentence thrown in there.

Anywho, I was in the kitchen making a sandwich Friday night..I was tired from just workin' out and really a bit crabby. She was standing at the fridge which she usually does playing with the magnetized letters and putting them in her little machine that makes the sound of each as she hits the button (" B says Buh for instance). All of a sudden, I hear "Daddy" and i look down at her and she gets a huge smile on her little face and says "I love you". Really made my day. She'd never said that out of the blue before and she used it correctly which really added to it for me. I know, that's cheesy, but still...it really brightened me up and rejuvenated me.

I always say and hear how God acts in weird and unusual ways, without always taking the time to think about how that is. In this case though it really sunk in for me, as her three little words and smile really took me from 0 to 60. I think it really helped too in that she was SOOOOO difficult as a baby. Shan had her serious depression issues and I was left to care for Carly a lot of the time on my own..and every single night. Carly and I didn't sleep a whole night thru for over a year while she was collicky..wether it was with me walking up and down the hall with her, rocking her in her carseat, or taking her for a drive in the car...we had a ruff first year together. I really think that's why she is more of a daddy's girl then Shelly is. I think we imprinted on each other during that time and probably also why hearing her say that meant so much to me.

Just wanted to write about that...

Bologna

I musta fallen asleep this afternoon. I was wearing a t-shirt and boxers while on the couch..Carly and Shelly were watching blues clues and i dozed off, for what couldn't have been 20 minutes. So, all of a sudden I feel something cold on my legs. I wake up to see they were covered in what used to be an 18 pack of bologna slices. Not an inch of skin was showing from the boxers to my ankles. They were laughing hysterically..the dog was bloated and my legs smelled like beef.

The Retirement Home

Tomorrow i'm takin' the girls to see my grandparents again in their retirement home on Carpenter road. Ever see the Simpsons episodes when they visit Grampa in the home? it's freaky how similar that depicts these places. The last time we were there the instant we walked in we were swarmed by the elderly. Everyone wanting to touch and squeeze the girls and i got more warm smiles that day when i won the quiz bowl for my 7th grade student body.

It's cute, but sad because you know these people are lonely and don't have anything else to do nor have regular visitors in most cases i imagine. I'm still keeping my wallet in my front pocket just in case we get mugged again :).

My grandparents will love it tho. My grandma is super excited and my grandap, while he's losing it fast will enjoy for what he can remember. So we have to get a gift for em' first which is always a challenge....and then take it up there by 10am.

Afterward we'll hit Red Robin..i love that place. Can't get enuff and it's right across the street from their home on carpenter. last time there carly got torked and began throwing fries..but i'm sure it will go better this time..i haven't seen the girls much the last three days, so i'm lookin' forward to spending the whole weekend with them.

Well, I"m in the fantasy football playoffs

I know that doesn't sound as sexy as to you all as it does to me. But it's something right now. Mainly cause i've paid little attention to it (comparatively to past years). So, i guess i'm kinda proud of it :). Altho, my team is really held together by sticks and mud at this point. A strong huff and puff and that roof will blow right in. But it's, something for me to pay attention too, which i enjoy right now. Same time, i'm not gonna be disappointed to see th season over, it is also one more thing I have to think about and right now i try to keep those at a bare minimum. AFter consideration tho..good things to think about are good :) so i'm gonna enjoy it even tho i'll probably get bounced early from the playoffs.

Unrelated, yohey was over for 3 hours today and couldn't get the spyware entirely off my computer. He is like head techie at csi and couldn't figure it out..not good...altho really, as long as i'm not throwin' my credit card up on the net, it's just an occasionaly pop up..i can live with that. Especially considering i won't ever use this computer again after the next month..BWAHAHAHAHAHAA!!!!!

Glad this week's Over

Long week man...glad it's over finally. Great being with the girls, but lots of little stressful things came up that made things difficult pretty frequently. The girls have been great! However, with Shan gone on her cruise and her and I still splitting finances, we had decided it was best for me to use the visa card for all expenses and my Christmas shopping..(online of course). WEll, about $200 in..the card maxes out..not sure why, but i called and sure enuff the limit was reached. My problem is i to this time know very little about our expenses, allocations, bank info..etc....oops on me there. Luckily, I don't live extravagantly, so i was able to get by on the $60 in my wallet.

Then..I decided to take my mind off that by going online and fiddling with my fantasy football roster...5 minutes in and BLAMO. Spyware. Great. One of the big tech guys from work lives in my neighborhood tho and is coming by to take it off for me as i'm having little success...VERY annoying tho.

Wed, Elaine and I took the girls to get their flu shots (more on that in a second)..talk about trying to hold down a pair of greased pigs. They both did well tho and after the screaming stopped Shelly was very proud that she got a shot and lived :)

So, then Friday, I get up and decided to shovel the driveway out before I go out to work...I fall 3 times. Seriously...the first two weren't bad..number three stung a little. So, I get home from work, Elaine had been there and told me she wasn't feeling good and was going to go home to go to bed early. Well, later that night, Shelly came down with a fever and diarhhea..not bad, but nasty. Then I woke about 1am and tossed and turned till 5am when i FINALLY forced myself to throw up and came down with the squirts. Carly woke up at 8:30..COVERED in poop. She had diarhhea...and it had tracked..all thru her room out into the hallway and into the bathroom...COLOSSAL mess. So from 8:30 till 9:30 i worked away at giving carly a bath, scrubbing her poop off the floor and making periodic runs to teh bathroom myself. Elaine came over about 10am and was almost as bad as iwas..she had been up all night sick too. I finally had a monstrous puking around noon and that seemed to help, but still couldn't eat. So, i got up..which was a mistake and went downstairs to get some water...on the way back to my bed (carly was sleeping luckily and elaine and shelly were watching tv in the living room) I got fuzzy and passed out. Cracked myself right against the bedpost..big welt there on my left thigh now. i was down for a good couple minutes...shirt was soaked in sweat. Just a mess. God Bless Elaine for being there, if she hadn't been, I don't know what I'd have done today. I'm really lucky to have her in my life.

that's it...i'm going to bed...i choked down some chicken noodle soup and just can't wait for the start of another week to begin tomorrow! Big fantasy football day too...

Dating your Cousin

This came to me while writing the Jonesville blog..and again..it's at my brother's expense. Story goes like this: My dad's family had a reunion party at a k of c hall in petersburg one sat night. My brother and i decided to go as we hadn't seen anyone from that part of the family in years. Well..they had a keg..we got bombed. Basically, we ended up talking with my cousing jennifer and her step sister..no relation (cough, cough). Jeff and the step sister really hit things off. They were talking about books..like really about books. Classic novels, foreign literature..the whole nine yards. Well after hanging out all night with the two of em', we got ready to leave and go over to my buddy Wanty's house over in Milan. As we got up to leave Jennifer (our cousin) asked Jeff what he thought about her stepsister. Jeff said he liked her which prompted Jennifer to then ask Jeff is he wanted her number. Unfortunately..I was in ear shot and belligerently drunk. I laughed..a good hardy laugh..the kind that comes from your diaphragm (sp) and causes you to bend over while wiping the tears away from your eyes.

Well, jeff refused the number, we haven't seen nor heard of the step sister since and My cousin Jennifer who we still see about once a year won't even make eye contact with me at intimate family events. But you know what? I'd do it all over again.

Story number 2 comes from my friend Todd. Todd and i were dating a pair of best friends from Wayne, or romulus or something...i forget. I just remember me and him waking up in this girls house after a party and we couldn't find our way out. There were like 12 doors and we couldn't find the one that led outside...but i digress. ..We were at a friend's house together getting ready to go to the bar one night when todd's girl said "hey..i remember who my family members are that live in dexter!!" obviously, they had talked about it before. She goes "yeah, my cousins are the Gregorys'. They live over on Wylie Road." Todd said "THE GREGORY'S ARE MY COUSINS TOO!!" Again, i lost it. To this day i haven't laughed as hard as i had that night nor for as long..probably a GOOD 45 minutes straight. Everyone else was getting angry at me as they were trying to watch Seinfeld and todd and this girl were visibly horrified. Then of course i had to rattle off some jokes like "So, if things work out with you two and you get married would there be a bride's side of the aisle and a grooms side? Or just one big group in the middle? Now, Who would walk the bride down the aisle? Todd's uncle? Hilarious. i'm laughing now thinking of it again..can't believe they didnt' work out..sigh...that would have been great.

JONESVILLE

What is Jonesville? It's a place between nowhere and nothing about an hour southwest of here. I took the girls and my dad down there for the "family" Christmas party. It was alright. It's always weird with my dad's side of the family. There are 4 succinct families there of about 3-6 people each and each one just sticks to themselves besides my Aunt's Karen and Dori. So, it's always full of awkward small talk, goofy head nods, quick handshakes and avoidable eye contact. I mean, my dad didn't even talk to his brother there. It's that weird. I know my dad likes going there so that's the main reason I go...altho it's good for the girls to get out and see their extended family too i think. However, once a year is plenty of time spent there. In the party's defense...the food was really good. No mayonaisse based dishes at all and they had a deep frier so we had fried turkey, chicken, ham..etc..it pretty much ruled. Not enough booze. I'm byobin' next year and having my dad drive us back.