Woe is Me

Remember this? I'll forgive you if you don't. To summarize, back in July 2008, I was playing with Lucas while on my knees, and thinking I was younger than I actually am, I tried to jump from that kneeling position to a standing one. Well, instead of that happening, my big toe on my right foot got caught under my full body weight and bent forward, causing a ridiculous amount of pain. I thought it would go away, and after my first visit to the doctor (probably around 2009), I was told it was likely something to do with my ligaments or tendons and that it would eventually heal. In early 2012, I realized the pain was probably never going to go away so I returned to the doctor, who sent me for X-rays and then to a specialist. I was on a waiting list for the better part of a year, but this summer, I finally got to see the guy, and it turns out I fractured it pretty badly way back when.

So tomorrow morning, after over 5 years of not being able to bend my big toe forward without excruciating pain, I'll be having surgery to clean it up. I use those words since the foot specialist said he wouldn't be able to fix it due to the fact that it's been so long since it happened, but he says there is an 80% chance it will relieve some of the pain. Can't argue with those odds. Hell, even if it was much less than that, I would do it since I've honestly given thought to just having my toe removed altogether. At least this will be less drastic. So yeah, that's what's going on with me today.

In other me-related news, I was so focused on studying for my accounting mid-term today (which is next Saturday), that I completely forgot to submit the bi-weekly quiz, which was due at midnight. What's ridiculous about it is that I finished it last night--it's open book so we have the questions beforehand--but it just slipped my mind. I'm pretty sure I had a 100% too. Messed up toe and I'm senile...what a life.

Here's a random picture of Lucas from January, wearing Marilu's pajama bottoms, to keep you happy.

Massachusetts Summer Holiday 2013, Part 3

And now, the last of the Massachusetts photos. In one of the rare occasions we left the lake, we took Lucas and Kyle to Webster's candlepin bowling alley.

Afterwards, they played in the arcade. I'm not sure what Lucas is doing here in front of the Skee-Ball.

Along with the crawdad, Lucas found this "pet" one day, swimming by the dock. Just like the crawdad, he released it the day before we left.

Like most of our trips to see family, Lucas ended up with a bunch of cash. I brought him to Toys R Us one day, and he selected a baseball pitching machine (not pictured), as well as a magic set that came with this nifty tophat.

Toward the end of our time there, Marilu and my mom brought Lucas to the circus with Kevin's sister-in-law Judy and her grandson Dominic.

And here's a few more random photos of Lucas to close out the trip. Making a vinegar and baking soda volcano with Marilu.

Playing the card game War with my mom.

Showing off his sweet 'stache. Watch out, ladies!

Before I wrap this up, I wanted to mention that Lucas just wrapped up his second weekend of hockey practices today, and everything is going well so far. He's wearing jersey number 7, and his team voted on their team name today. Lucas proposed Super Dragons, but they ended up going with a combination of two other choices: the Zombie Minions. The coach even put together a quick logo.

We haven't taken any pictures since his practices started, but as soon as I get one of him in his jersey, I'll be sure to post it.

Say hello...

...to the newest member of the Deal family. Spot the leopard gecko! And by that, I mean his name is Spot. You don't need to try and spot him. I mean, he's right there. 

The Penultimate Massachusetts Post

Regarding the title of this post, ask Marilu or my mom what "penultimate" means. See if they remember.

Not much new to speak of. Lucas's school had its "meet the teacher" night so we got to see his classroom and, big surprise, meet his teacher. She seems nice enough, and she had nothing but good things to say about him. Whether she was lying through her teeth remains to be seen. :)

Enough, jibber jabber, let's get to the pictures. I mentioned previously that we spend a lot of time hanging out in the yard when we visit Massachusetts, whether it's BBQing or sitting by the fire. Here are a bunch of photos to support my claims. Apparently, we also like making faces.

Here's a few more from the lake.

For the record, that's Kyle (he who I spoke so highly of last time) with Lucas and my mom in the last picture. We'll see him one last time in the next entry when we all go bowling. Speaking of Kyle, he helped Lucas catch this crawdad near the shore. Lucas kept him as a pet for the whole trip, releasing him on our next to last ("penultimate") day.

On one of the nights we planned to sit by the fire and relax, the heavens decided to open up on us and pour rain. While everyone else went in, I defied the rain gods (at one point yelling, "I defy thee, rain gods!") by staying out there through the 30 minute downpour and kept the fire going. I may have had a few beers to drink at that point. This is the picture my mom took of me from the house at about the halfway mark of the downpour.

Finally, here's your bonus video of the day. The world's least threatening ninja shows off his moves in the driveway. To his credit, he does have a nice catch right toward the end.

The Latest News and Summer Pictures

A little news before we get to the photos...

Lucas's first week of school went well. In the week leading up to it, every day he was complaining about how much he hated school and didn't want to go back. When he got off the bus after his first day, I asked him how it went, and he exclaimed, "It was awesome!" Pretty much what I figured. School's pretty fun for the first few years at least.

Surprisingly, none of his friends from JK/SK are in his class. In some cases, this is good since there is one kid in particular who is a catalyst for Lucas getting in trouble. So we were glad to find out they were separated. Of course, at this age, kids can make new friends in less than a minute, and by the second day, Lucas was already telling us about his "best friend" in the class. If only it was that easy once you were an adult, right?

In other news, Lucas had his second set of sort outs for hockey this past weekend. He did pretty well, all things considered, and we found out today which team he would be on. I'm not sure if they are ranked by skill level, but he is on the 7th team out of 10. If it is, in fact, skill-based, I'm pretty impressed, considering the fact that he only started skating AND playing hockey about 3 weeks before. You can be sure I'll be updating more with hockey as the season continues.

That's about all that's noteworthy for now so let's get to the pictures. I spent quite a bit of time this past weekend organizing the "To Do" subfolder in my Photos folder. Hopefully, that will speed up my updates a but since a lot of times, the sheer headache of trying to pick a couple photos out of the group of 700+ can be a bit overwhelming, and I just resolve to do it later. Now that I've organized at least half of them by "event," it might actually make the task less excruciating.

One of the biggest (and more recent) folders is the one from our trip to Massachusetts so I want to tackle that now and get it out of the way. Even after going through it a couple of times and removing so-so or similar photos, there are still 40 so it'll probably take a few posts to do that. So without any further adieu...

In past years, we've done some fishing off the dock, but for the most part, Lucas liked trying to catch fish in the net. This year, however, he really took to fishing and spent a surprising amount of time doing it. A big part of it was that he met a boy from the neighborhood, Kyle, who helped him out with it. I can't say enough good things about Kyle. He's 11, which you would think would automatically make him want to avoid a 6 year old, but he had the most amazing patience with Lucas. They would spend hours fishing on the dock or swimming in the lake, which helped make our life a little more relaxing! I really hope Kyle is still around next year since he was so great to Lucas this summer.

With all the buildup, you'd think I would have a picture of Lucas with Kyle, but this is just Lucas with one of the kivvers he caught. I think Kyle will probably show up in the next upload.

We got back from Las Vegas just in time for the 4th of July. As you can see below, you could hardly ask for a better vacation from which to view the fireworks.

As you might imagine, we took advantage of the nice weather and spent a great deal of time playing in the water. Here, we attempted to form some sort of floating pyramid.

It didn't last long.

For whatever reason, we didn't take many family photos. I'm pretty sure this is the only one with all three of us in it, besides the Titanic re-creation above.

I don't know that I've ever taken a good picture of the view we have coming down the stairs to the dock. So I rectified that.

If there's one thing we do as much as play in the water, if not more, it's hang out in the yard (particularly by the firepit) during the late afternoon and evening. While there are plenty of those photos to come, this is one that was taken while Marilu and I were in Vegas. Lucas hangs out with family friends Aidan, Brandon, and Bobby.

Marilu and Lucas put on their best faces for the camera.

I was only going to include the above photo, but then I noticed my awesome photo bombing in this similar shot so you get this one too.

Finally, what better way to end a summer day than a soak in the bubble bath? Well, for a kid anyway. I would answer, "Drinking several beers by a roaring fire," but that's just me.

Bonus video: here's our attempt at making the floating pyramid.

Psycho Killer

I was just reviewing the photos I downloaded from Marilu's iPhone earlier, and I ran across this one she took of Lucas during our recent visit to the Canadian War Museum. I almost burst out laughing when I saw it, thanks to the raving lunatic look he has on his face combined with the fact he is standing in front of a cannon. Hope you enjoy it as well.

First Grade!

Believe it or not, Lucas starts his first day of grade 1 today. Hard to believe he's already at the "real school" age. Here's a picture I took of him a few minutes before his bus arrived.