Diary of a Diehard

After a one day hiatus from Christmas decorations, we were back at it today. It is the big day around our house as we begin to put up the Christmas tree. Notice I said begin, I did not infer that this was a one day job. In all my years since we moved to Arizona, we have never been able to put up the tree in a single day. Part of the reason for this is that the tree itself in 9 feet tall. When we moved to Arizona, we bought an artificial tree. Partly because real trees had become so expensive, partly because I could never find a tree that looked just right. The other reason it takes so long to complete the decorations is my fault. I am a light junkie. I am under the belief that you can never have to many lights on the Christmas tree. For this reason, I insist that we have a minimum of 1000 lights on the branches of the tree. In order to put that many lights on the tree, it becomes necessary to wrap each branch individually. This takes a tremendous amount of time and patience neither of which I have an abundance of in my life. We have decided that the best way to attack the tree decorating chore is to break it up and use a tag team approach. So Trina and I take turns wrapping lights and walking away to cool off from our frustration level. I know I should just go out and purchase one of those trees that already comes decorated with lights but again I haven’t found one I like. This year, Trina decided she would try to install the lights while I was at work and the kids were at school. By the time I returned home this evening, I could tell she was in a less than stellar mood. To try and help her out, I offered to fix dinner. She was grateful for my offer until she realized that I meant I would go and pick up a pizza. For some reason, she didn’t think that was quite fair. She worked hard all day putting up the tree while I came home and called to have a pizza delivered. Looks like I will be spending some time doing manual labor so that the scales of marital justice are again level.

This morning I awoke and turned on the radio to listen to some music as I went through my daily routine. During this time, the news came on and one of the stories was of the Space Shuttle Endeavor and its mission to the International Space Station. Endeavor was carrying a payload for the space station which included a giant truss which will be used to unfurl solar energy collectors to produce power for the space station. According to the news story, the shuttle would connect the truss to the space station today in a series of maneuvers by astronauts doing space walks. I quickly ran downstairs and turned on the satellite dish. One of the beautiful things about satellite television is that you usually get the downlinks from the space shuttle to mission control in Houston. Sure enough, the NASA channel was showing the shuttle unloading its payload in preparation for the connection with the space station. I watched eagerly as astronauts Noriega and Tanner began to guide the 17 ton truss into place and bolt it together. Their space walk lasted several hours and it was amazing to watch. The shuttle circles the earth every 90 minutes meaning it is night for 45 minutes and day for 45 minutes. To watch these two astronauts hanging 40 feet above the space shuttle connected to the space station with a small tether while traveling over 5 miles per second was incredible. The mission was not without its problems as one of the solar wings did not deploy correctly. This is where the astronauts differ from other do-it-yourselfers. They did not get out a hammer and give the space station a good whack. Instead, they left it there for mission control to best determine what would be the next steps. I just kept thinking to myself, they wouldn’t have had this problem if they would have sent up Norm Abram from This Old House. He is after all a master carpenter and would have had it fixed in no time and been able to provide it with a decorative crown molding. Sometimes these NASA guys make things to complicated.

Good day and welcome to day two of the Christmas decorations marathon. Yesterday was filled with light as I hung the outside decorations. Today the focus is on the inside and the roof although not in that order. As a child, my Grandma and Grandpa Summers had a lot of Christmas decorations. Grandpa was responsible for the outside while Grandma decorated the inside. At the top of their house stood a 3 foot Santa Claus and his sleigh. The sleigh was pulled by 3 reindeer (it was a small sleigh and a smaller house). The lead reindeer was Rudolph whose nose glowed red. I remember going to their house every Christmas to see their lights. As Grandpa got older, he needed help in putting up his decorations. I would gladly volunteer and go over every season to help him put them up. It soon became me doing the decorations while he oversaw the proceedings from the ground. When my Grandma passed away a few years ago, he decided not to put up the decorations any more. To my surprise, he brought them over to me as a gift. From that time, I have made an effort to continue the tradition of having Santa and his sleigh and reindeer adorn the top of my house. This year was no exception as I got the characters out of the box and plugged them in to verify all parts were in good working condition. It is amazing to me that these decorations are still in such good condition considering they are nearly 40 years old now. By the end of the day, Santa was standing majestically watching over the reindeer from the top of our garage. It is always a special time when Santa and Rudolph light up for the first time each holiday season. Each time, I take a moment to reflect on my grandparents and the love I have for them. Merry Christmas Grandma and Grandpa.

The first of December is traditionally the beginning of the holiday season in our household. It is at this time that the Thanksgiving decorations are stored away and are replaced with those celebrating the Christmas holiday season. This year, I am feeling less than helpful as I am still quite ill. The children though are adamant about the decorations being put up. So I got up, donned my Hard Rock Cafe sweatshirt, my Atlanta Olympics sweat pants, my Diamondbacks hat and my Goofy slippers and decided to just get it over with. Some of you may be wondering about my attire but I assure you, this is standard issue for sick people in our house. I find that there are only certain outfits that can be worn when you are sick. If you try to dress in regular clothes, you just feel worse and then the clothes become tainted in your mind. Hey, I may be delirious but I still think about things. Ok, maybe I don’t think clearly but that is debatable. Once I had my outfit on, I went to the garage and began to unpack the Christmas decorations. Christmas at our house is quite an ordeal. We have literally dozens of boxes filled with all sort of decoration for the house inside and out. I decided it would be best to focus my efforts on the outside of the house. For that, I began pulling out strings of lights and having the kids test them to verify they were working correctly. I am of course referring to the lights here, not the children. As far as I can tell, the children never work correctly. The remainder of the day was spent climbing up and down the ladder hanging the icicle lights from the eaves of the house. It does seem weird hanging Christmas lights when it is 76 degrees outside and I am passed by people in shorts and tank tops. By the end of the day, all of the lights have been hung on the house with care in hopes that Saint Nicolas would visit us there. I only wish all of the decorations were up. This tends to be a week’s worth of effort.

I have been off work nearly all week suffering from pneumonia. Given that I have to take breathing treatments numerous times per day, I have been working from home. With all of the medication, I find myself drifting in and out of consciousness. My sleep patterns have been disrupted to the point that I have difficulty setting my biological clock to coincide with day and night. All of this has been bizarre enough but I have found my thought processes have also been disrupted. For example, for the past several days, I have found myself drawn to Mister Rogers Neighborhood as I followed the happenings in the neighborhood of make believe. From the moment that the red trolley makes its journey into the kingdom I have followed along. It seems King Friday has decided the Neighborhood of Make-Believe is in need of a swimming pool. The kingdom residents are very excited at the idea of having a pool so close to home. Problems have arose though after a site inspection found the ground to be a hard dig and excavation would be much more expensive than originally planned. The residents thought they would be able to dig the pool on their own thereby reducing the cost of the project but there was infighting among the commoners which led to the project nearly being scratched. Finally today, a resident from an adjacent kingdom offered to help by placing the pool between the two kingdoms, the other kingdom would cover the cost of excavation while the Kingdom of Make-Believe would cover the remaining construction costs. I was relieved that this problem had been worked out so that everyone could enjoy the pool. Trina happened to come in as I was watching and gave me a puzzled look. I explained what had happened and she had one comment, “You really need to get back to work.” Maybe she’s right. It didn’t really seem like such a beautiful day in the neighborhood anyway.

It has been quite a day around our house, especially for Tiffany. A few weeks ago Tiffany was involved in an accident at gymnastics where several of her teeth were knocked out. This has led to multiple dental appointments with several different dentists and specialists. Today was another day in that saga. Tiffany had to go in to be fitted for braces and a spacer. I had not anticipated having her in braces this young but the doctor felt it necessary if we are to move the teeth around that were dislodged in the accident. At first, Tiffany was less than thrilled with the thought of having braces on her teeth. After much coaxing by her sisters she has at least come to grips with the idea. It is interesting how braces have changed since I was a child. I remember seeing other children getting braces when I was a kid. Their mouth looked like some sort of metal recycling center as they had all sorts of silver metallic surfaces throughout their mouth. You definitely did not want to introduce a magnet anywhere near their vacinity for fear of what would happen. Today’s braces tend to be clear or in many cases different colors. The kids are allowed to change the colors regularly at scheduled intervals. This morning before her appointment, she was busy going through the color charts trying to decide which color of braces she should get. Trina suggested green and red to celebrate the Christmas season. Dakota suggested black and blue to match his cool bruise he had on his leg. Whitney wanted her to get pink since she was a girl. I of course suggested she get purple and teal. After all, what would be better than to show team spirit through your teeth? In the end, she decided for yellow and orange in honor of Ashley being a senior at Corona del Sol. I was disappointed that she took family over the Diamondbacks but she assured me that she would get teal and purple to celebrate opening day in April. Now I have two things to look forward to when the season begins.

After the fiasco that has been going on in Florida for the past three weeks, it is hard to get excited about democracy or voting. But today’s news of another upcoming election was welcomed. During the dark months of winter, there is little for the baseball fan to get excited about unless it is the endless dollars being thrown at free agents by the big market teams. That is, until this week. Around the country, ballots are being sent out to baseball writers to vote for inductees to the baseball Hall of Fame. It always interesting to see how the writers vote. Of course there will be the yearly controversy over whether Pete Rose should be included in the Hall of Fame despite his lifetime ban. There will also be those players who have been perennially on the ballot that will be overlooked again despite their accomplishments. Personally, I will again be looking to see if Dale Murphy gets any closer to induction. Murphy holds a special place in my heart. He was a gentleman who played the game as a fierce competitor. His back-to-back Most Valuable Player awards were unheard of at the time and he lacked only 1 home run of finishing his career with an even 500. Still, Murphy and his boy-next-door looks will probably again be overlooked and passed over. With all of the press that is garnered for the bad boy attitude that is displayed by the players of today, it would be refreshing to see someone rewarded for being a positive role model not only to the fans but also to his peers. I have never heard anyone, press nor teammate, express an unkind word about Murphy and the way he conducted himself. Instead, we will most likely hear about Dave Winfield, Don Mattingly and Kerby Puckett in their first year of eligibility and their accomplishments. Well, they may be deserving of praise but I for one will be rooting for Dale Murphy and all those like him who were a positive influence to me while I was growing up and in need of someone to look up to.

I returned to work after time off from the Thanksgiving holiday to find that I had a message waiting on my voice mail. I retrieved the message to find that the Arizona Diamondbacks had called last week about ticket relocation. My heart raced. Would this be the year that I would finally move from section 133 row 16 seat 13-14 to somewhere else? Would my prayers be answered and I would be sitting above the Diamondbacks dugout? The different scenarios raced through my head. I quickly went to the Arizona Diamondbacks web site and retrieved all of the seating maps I could find. I then dialed the number to the Diamondbacks customer service department. The first two call attempts were met with a busy signal. I hung up and frantically dialed again trying to get through. I hadn’t felt this much anxiety since I tried to call into the radio station to win some extra Diamondbacks tickets. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, I got through. William answered the phone and asked how he could help me. I told him I was returning a call and he asked if I happened to know my priority numbers. What a silly question, I know my Diamondbacks priority number better than I know my social security number. After being on hold for a few minutes, William returned to explain that the relocation process had not yet started but they hoped to be done by the week of Christmas. What? How could they build my hopes up then dash them by telling me nothing would happen for a month? For the remainder of the day, I began a countdown on my whiteboard to remind myself of when I would hear from the Diamondbacks. I can see right now, it is going to be a long month.

It is interesting how the Thanksgiving holiday progresses. For weeks before, everyone is excited for Thanksgiving to arrive. Each of the children make requests to their mother to include their favorite food as part of the traditional Thanksgiving dinner. Trina diligently listens to each of them and tries to incorporate the various requests into a single meal. The week before Thanksgiving is filled with the bustle of food preparation to try and spread the work out over several days rather than have to prepare everything at once. Vegetibles are cut up, pies are cooked, supplies are purchased and assignments are made. On the morning of Thanksgiving, Trina is up at the crack of dawn preparing the massive feast for this growing family of seven. By late afternoon, we all sit down to partake of this bounty and give thanks for all that we have.

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