Good Golly, Ms. Molly

What a whirlwind week it’s been…I haven’t looked more forward to a Labor Day holiday than I have this one. I think we all needed a long weekend. We’ve done all we can to help out the economy this week. On Monday we got our week going as is the norm now, as Matt headed back to football practice, Luke back to soccer and Abby to her dance classes. On Tuesday, Ann took her car in to the shop. She had new tires put on our Pacifica a couple weeks ago, but the ‘check tire system soon’ message popped up the next day. We figured it was only in need of re-calibration or resetting; but when she called me, the first words out of her mouth were, “I think I’m going to vomit…???
As it turns out – all of her tire sensors were bad, the brakes & rotors need replaced, it needed a new steering rack and the tie rods were so bad that it was not considered safe to drive. What a bombshell… The repair bill wasn’t cheap, as you might expect. It made us look at either repairing or buying a new auto. Of course, the cash for clunkers promotion just ended less than a week earlier – which may have made this decision a little easier. We were caught totally off guard and just don’t know what we want as a replacement car. We toured the local car lots here in town, only to find about 10 models…total! All of the lots are either greatly diminished or completely empty. It was a little scary to see how things have progressed with the economy and the car dealerships here in town. We found nothing at all we were interested in purchasing…not even remotely. Ann did finally go online to look around and was looking at the Honda Pilot; but ultimately, I think we are going to just bite the bullet and get it repaired. That night, Matt & I facilitated Abby’s practice. The other coach (who broke his ankle last week) had his wife come out and help. She is also coaching a younger team as well and she was really, really good with our kids. I was very thankful to have her volunteer to help coach this team. We had a great practice, drawing in an extra 5 or 6 kids and parents at the end and had a big scrimmage for about half an hour – we had a ball!
On Wednesday, I picked up the kids at Mom & Sandy’s house after mowing and Ann went scrap booking with her friends. We (Ann!) had finally decided on a refrigerator after I re-measured again; going with the Whirlpool Gold model. So, I called Lowe’s and spoke with a great gal named Gina. She is the bomb! She was able to get a third of the price knocked off by pursuing various discounts and talking directly with the manufacturer!!! By my measurements, we should have less than 1/8th of an inch clearance along the top. On Thursday, we headed to Rushville after work to watch Matt’s football team. We got there just as the 7th grade game was wrapping up. Greensburg lost that game by a single point. The 8th graders got off to a lousy start as they allowed Rushville to march down the field and score on the opening drive. Penalties plagued the Pirates all evening. The referees were a little biased at times, much to the displeasure of the raucous crowd on our side of the field. The Greensburg coaching staff were furious a few times, as the referees had trouble interpreting rules and even corrected a couple of the most glaring issues. There were 4 horse collar tackle penalties at very inopportune times that allowed drives to continue (2 of them were called on 4th down) and on one they penalized a personal foul 15 yards from the twenty (any one with any common football sense knows that it is always half the distance to the goal, once inside the 30 yard line…). The crowd and coaching staff really let them have it when they tried to pull that one. Rushville was mysteriously charged with only 1 foul the entire game; compared to Greensburg’s 11 – and that was off-setting fouls in the endzone after one of their boys kicked one of our kids on the ground, after the play. Our guy jumped up and shoved the guy away from him. We never really even came close to scoring. After the defense gave up that initial TD, they clamped down, even making goal-line stand, culminating with a fumble recovery on the 1 yard line! Our kids fought hard the entire night, but came up short, 8-0. Afterward, Rushville’s coaching staff was very unprofessional and inappropriate as they cursed and called our kids rude names that I won’t repeat here. To say the experience that night left us with a ‘bad taste in our mouths’ would be an understatement. Both Luke and Bu had to miss their soccer practices in order for us to go to Matt’s game. We didn’t get home until nearly 10.

Friday night, Abby had her best friend Megan over for the night. I worked late and picked up our favorite take out at Koch’s on the way home. We had planned to play a game and watch a movie, but as the girls went to Wal-Mart to “pick up a couple items for the night,??? they ended up being gone for nearly and hour and all the boys fell asleep by the time they got home…We were up early on Saturday morning, heading to the soccer fields before 8:30. Abby was up first. She played goalie for the first three periods, not allowing any goals! She played great!! We finally played a team we were equal to and beat them 2-1. I made a deal with the kids; if they stayed in the positions I wanted them to be in for the first ¾ of the game, I’d let them play wherever they wanted for the final quarter. They played so hard; I was very proud…they were more aggressive and played at a higher energy level than they had the entire year.

Next, we headed over to the small field to watch Lukey play. He played three whole quarters as both a forward and on defense. He had two shots on goal, but one was stopped and the other bounced off the side pole. He hustled the entire time, but was obviously tired by the time he got to sit out in the 4th quarter. Although they played hard, his team again came up short, losing 2-3.

Megan came back home with us and played for several more hours; until late afternoon. An hour or so later (as Megan went home), Grace came over for several hours to stay with us while Dee got out for while that night. Ann, Matt & I watched Angels & Demons in the living room while the little ones watched Charlie & The Chocolate Factory. The kids played nice until Gigi came and picked her up.

When we woke up on Sunday, it was raining. We were expecting delivery of our new fridge early in the AM so that we could attend a party at Uncle Chuck & Aunt Cindy’s house in Indy. However, it was an ordeal that would last nearly 3 hours. They finally arrived about 1230. We were supposed to be the 1st delivery, but it didn’t work out that way. We had several issues; from the rain, to them forgetting their dolly, to doorways being too narrow, to the fridge fitting “snug” in the hole…it barely fit…remember that 1/8″? …I can’t even fit a piece of copy paper between the top of the fridge and the cabinets above it!! 😛 By the time they were gone, it was nearly 3. In the interim, Ann had been talking with a gentleman in Muncie, named Todd; regarding Scottie puppies. She was able to talk him down a quarter of the original asking price, so she emailed him to see if he had any pictures. Well, that sealed the deal and instead of going to Indy and then on to Muncie, we had to head straight up to Muncie to get the puppy in Ann’s loaner Grand Caravan from Acra’s. The breeder had both a male and female pup left when we arrived. We decided to get the female. We loved them both, but the female was a little lover and cuddlier than the other…so we gravitated towards her. We got lost coming home and ended up by Mike & Nat’s house; so Ann was able to find our way back home through the country. However, we didn’t get home until almost 8. We really missed the DVD player in the Pacifica – the kids drove us nuts!! Mom, Gigi, Dee & Gracie had to come over to meet our new pup. We mulled over names for much of the journey home; finally deciding on one of the first names Ann came up with…Molly. Lola wasn’t sure what to think of Molly when she came home with us. They barked and jumped and ran and played for close to an hour outside. They were so cute to watch; Lola, the white Westie and Molly, the black Scottie; it was perfect. All was cool…until Lola started to figure out that Molly wasn’t just a play date, but her new roommate. When she figured out she wasn’t going away, she wasn’t quite sure what to think. She got in trouble a few times for snapping at Molly and just trying to be the alpha female – barking and being a little rough with her.

On Monday, we cleaned up lots of puppy pee and poo, cleaned up around the house, Matt helped me with yard work (in between rain storms) and then we closed the pool for the winter. Its official – summer is over…
I have a few Waybac photos to share with you. The first one is of Rob (sorry, man!). He and Mom are in the kitchen of our home in Temple City, CA in December of 1979.

Next up is a collection of school photos from the eighties. First up is my cousin Chris from 1980 and the other two are of my cousin Barney and I from the fall of ’86 – our senior years!

Here is a one of Dee in 1985.

Next up is a naughty picture of Rob & I in Florida; in August of 1994 with my fraternity brother, Jason. We ran in to one another at Mom & Dad’s condo in Treasure Island.

Finally, we have a picture of a young Burdine family. Kevin & I were fraternity brothers at Franklin. This is an old one from ’95 with Lavonne and Kayla. It’s been too long since we saw the Burdines; we need to get together.

Well, that’s it for this edition. Thanks as always for keeping up with the Scheu’s and we’ll catch up with you next time. Until then, have a good one. Later, Scheu