kitty

tonight my neighbor came to ask where "miss" kitty had been for so long. i had to regretfully inform her that miss kitty is no longer with us. our neighbor sandy is an animal lover like me....when she came over tonight, ruby actually laid down at her feet and sat there. have you any idea how amazing it is for ruby to be still?

anyway, this post is for kitty.

last thursday made three weeks and two days since kitty had been missing. she's done this before but has always come back home. i suppose i was still holding out hope that she would come back. now, kitty was not nice. actually, as my mom frequently called her, she was a b*tch. but i liked her and i don't even like cats very much. she kept to herself, didn't complain, didn't ask to be rubbed on all the time and oddly enough, she loved drew. she wouldn't let anyone else touch her....tim was the only one and he would get maybe two good strokes down her back and she would turn around and attack him -- literally drawing blood. however, she must have sensed she would meet her demise had she scratched drew so she cautiously sat through his "petting" that inadvertently turned into heavier petting, then smacking and tail pulling.

when marie and i were running last thursday, we were on mile 6 when i noticed something laying in the grass by the road. i looked and yelled to her, "hey, i think that's my cat!" my friend shannon really got a kick out of this part of the story because i didn't stop running. when they asked me if i stopped i felt a little guilty but, it would have messed up my running time. luckily i was able to get another look on my next two trips by and was 99% positive it was her.
the only thing i could think of was that she had been out one night when it turned cold so she got up in my car to stay warm. the next morning she must have ridden in the undercarriage of the car and jumped out when i got to school. this is a long trip and i'm surprised she made it that far but that scenario has happened to me before.
i made tim go back by school yesterday on our way to beattyville to check and see if it really was her. we determined it most likely was and on our way home we used bright yellow dollar store bags and a coffee pot box mamaw supplied us with and got her into the box to take home. a few people drove by and i was hoping they wouldn't be parents/students of mine so i wouldn't have to explain what tim and i were doing when i got to school this morning. two adults standing in the pouring rain with a coffee pot box, dollar store bags as makeshift gloves, the back hatch of the highlander up and a screaming baby....what a picture.

we did get kitty home, wrapped her in her uk blanket and buried her down by the willow tree. i have a real soft spot for animals as most of you know, and i could not leave her on the side of the road like a bloated possum.

so, here's to kitty. i hoped she enjoyed her short 3 years in our home. i hope she enjoyed the hundreds of moles she laid on the doorstep; the baby birds she stole out of the wren's nest last year; the times she snuck in and laid on my bed, or the couch, or the recliner. i hope she enjoyed not getting banished when i found her asleep in drew's car seat once last year and i hope she enjoyed the warm place to lay, the food she was always fed and a dog that really adored her. she will be missed. rip, kitty cat, rip.

garbage bags, a lot of green and shaven heads

the garbage bags came into play this morning for our shamrock shuffle run. as i got all decked out in my green waco loopers shirt, i realized it was going to be a cold, wet run through the streets of lexington. i was excited however, because these runs with friends are always fun no matter what the weather. i realized this morning as well that we are becoming holiday runners....we did the thanksgiving morning run in 25 degree weather, the reindeer ramble in 20 degree weather (and in a bunny suit) and now a st. patrick's day run in a temperature around freezing with pelting rain. and to think, we pay to do these runs. ahhhh.

anyway, back to the garbage bag -- luckily jeanne thought to bring a box of garbage bags to use as ponchos. so, i tore three holes - one for my head and two for my arms - pinned my number on and we set off. marie and i got caught behind all the walkers but still managed to finish in 16:37. oh, and my dang shoe came untied as we hit the first mile! it was fun though and we all caravaned over to panera afterward for a postrun snack. mmmmm do they have good coffee! i'm hoping jennifer and marie will post pictures and i can rogue them since i didn't have my camera with me...hint, hint. when i got home i checked the race times and squealed loudly when i saw that jeanne won 3rd in her age group - congratulations, jeanne! :)

tim, drew and i came home, got drew down for a nap and i got a shower to both warm up and clean up. i went back to lexington this afternoon to volunteer for the st. baldrick's fundraiser at o'neill's pub. they raise money for children's cancer research by getting people to volunteer to shave their heads. most of you know one of the ladies that keeps drew a few days a week has a son that was born with a brain tumor. they had no idea before he was born and when he was three days old he went in for surgery to remove the tumor. connlay will turn one on the 18th of this month which is such a blessing and miracle. drew loves him and he adores nicole, connlay's mom. connlay's dad, matt, and grandfather, "bob-bob", raised money and shaved their heads today. many of you donated money to them for this cause and they ended up raising over $3,000 at last count!

the shavees were asked today to get up and share their stories before they went bald and when bobby took connlay on stage and shared his story i couldn't help it when the tears came. i was so happy they were able to celebrate such a wonderful occasion and that i could be a small part of it. my job as a volunteer became a bit hectic trying to keep all the shavees organized and money envelopes where they were supposed to go. this was such a great experience i can only hope i can be part of it again. on a sidenote, all the men were shaved looked surprisingly good after their turn on the shaving stool....one man's wife even offered to pay $1000 on the spot if he would not shave his head. he said he raised money with the intention of shaving it for his donors so the stylist promptly took a wide strip right off the top. :)

seeing and hearing some of those stories today made me even more thankful that my baby is so blessed and healthy.

i did get a few pictures of matt and bobby but they were with my phone so they aren't of great quality. if nicole or liz got better ones, i'll be sure to post them. in the meantime, enjoy.

bobby and matt ready to go.

yes i'm from eastern kentucky, but that does not mean i am toothless....yet.

in the last week i have finally had to give in to an 8 year hiatus from the dentist. after my last visit to my dentist/orthodontist when i was in college, she nearly killed me and i swore i would never go back again. tuesday as i was sitting in the hospital waiting room having bloodwork done, i came to the conclusion that i was going to have to actually go. i had made the appointment the day before with my old childhood dentist but i don't think it sunk in until the next morning. the odd thing is, i could not wait to go. i thought anything was better than the horrible pain i was constantly experiencing.

as i sat and listened to my audiobook, sTori Telling, during my bloodwork, (I know, the book was a guilty pleasure but it was very interesting), the throbbing continued to get worse and worse. i went to the hospital pharmacy and bought yet another bottle of tylenol. i'd already taken a bottle of advil since last thursday when the pain began to get unbearable but i couldn't help it, i was a little out of my head i think. it's a wonder i didn't just turn the bottle up and down a bunch. i really considered ripping the red wax off my bottle of jim beam (that i proudly made at the distillery) and taking a few advil with that but thought better of it. anyway, i went to the dentist, they took and x-ray and wonderful dr. hill said, "oh yeah, that's a dead nerve in that tooth with a lot of infection at the root." oh.

my next question was "what are you going to do to me?" he laughed in his slightly maniacal way (that i love) and then became very serious saying, "you do want to keep the tooth, right?"

in my head i was screaming I DON'T CARE! pull the flippin' thing right now if you want, just make it stop hurting!

i go back for a root canal during spring break. what's really bad is that i scheduled a root canal around my running schedule. i've got 5 miles to do that morning before i go.....

after driving from home to waco and back to richmond that morning, i had gone to irvine to dr. hill's then from irvine all the way to the pharmacy in richmond, back out to get drew in waco, then back to the pharmacy. i think i ran out a tank of gas that day but it was worth it because at the end of the day i picked up some wonderful pills and headed on home. thank goodness tim's mom called and wanted to take drew home for a little bit because i was completely done. i went to bed at 6:00 tuesday evening and did not get back up until friday morning at 10:00. tim had to bring drew down to say good morning and good night. i cried because i couldn't get up and take care of him....what a horrible feeling.

i was swelled worse than when i had my surgery on my mouth because all the infection was drawn out into my face. i knew it was bad but i didn't think it was that bad until jeanne and jennifer let out their ohhhh's today when i showed them the pictures. yes, i documented. nice, huh? i don't even remember taking the picture the first day. wonder what else i don't remember from last week?

i'm much better now and thank you to all my buds that called, texted (because you know i'm not answering a phone, ha!) and brought me a frosty. :) you guys are such good friends....and true friends. how do i know? because you give me your honest opinion about what my face really looked like, thanks.

and because i have no vanity left, here are the pictures documenting my face explosion.

a little perspective -- this is what my face normally looks like.

day 1

day 2

day 3

day 4

i kept drew with me on friday (day 4) and i think i swelled back up a little because i was up much more than i had been all week.

ooooh, what a mess!

tim and i are going to get new carpet in the next week or two....it is much needed and we've already been to pick out the carpet and set up times for them to come and measure the house. we have wanted to remove the brick in the basement living room since the day we moved in but we've never had the chance because we would have had to replace the carpet immediately. the brick from the fireplace was extended out by the builders of the house about 5 feet and shaped in a semi-circle. it was an absolute waste of space and u-g-l-y. we've always just placed the couch in front of it so you can't see it....drew now has a facination with the brick and we can't keep him off of it when he's downstairs.
today was the day we started tearing all that brick out. oh my, what a mess. bob came over to help tim while i took care of drew upstairs. oddly enough, a one year old is not the greatest helper when it comes to demolition. ;)
the boys didn't think they would be making as big of a mess as the demo turned out to be so they didn't move anything out of the basement before starting. the couch is now covered in brick dust along with the t.v. stand and all the other doo-dads down there. i snapped a few pictures to document just how big a mess this is becoming as they began moving stuff out.

you can see all the dust on the lens of my camera.

in the end, i'm so happy to be getting rid of the awful brick, i don't even care about the mess. after we get the brick torn out we have to repaint. the color is not good and we're going to paint before the new carpet is laid.
i've also included a few pictures of drew....of course. these are when i went in to get him up from an unusually long nap and he didn't wake up right away like he usually does. i actually had time to run and get my camera and get one of him fast asleep. the other is right after he woke up. so sweet. :)