We saw a nearly one-hundred-degree swing in temps this week! From -35° wind chills last Wednesday to 60° this week. Luke was again a two-sport athlete as he attended both football and baseball practices this week. He also enjoyed spending time with his friends for most of the weekend. Abby was nearly reunited with Tonya but we ran into yet another snag. She finally had a full week of second-semester classes and even got a job. Matt continued being a mentor at the college and student teaching at Union Elementary. He splits his time between staying with Katie in Zionsville and Taylor in Indy. Ann continued her uphill battle as she rehabs her new knees at home and at physical therapy. Still, she is as strong-willed and determined as ever and powered through the pain this week. With Ann continuing to make significant progress, I was able to return to work for the first time in three weeks. In addition, I was able to resume my workout regimen, reaching my goal for the first time this year with fifteen miles of walking. However, I continued to struggle getting back into my diet. Although it was better, it wasn’t good enough and I actually gained weight this week – but damn I ate well! We received several inches of precipitation this week – both rain and snow – causing major flooding in the area. Hello again and welcome to the latest installment of the Scheu Family Blog.
The kids returned to school on Monday while I stayed home with Ann again. Ms. Lola was feeling better. The poor thing had been acting pitiful and not moving much – shaking, staring into space and just acting dramatic. We think she strained a muscle, acting like a puppy. Today she was her energetic self again. Luke had a fast day at school. His baseball practice got cancelled due to the girls’ sectional game, which they won. So, he came home and enjoyed a rare night off. I got up early and worked from home for a couple hours. I took the day off so we could do a “dry run??? to see how Ms. Ann would do without any intervention from me while still being here in case she ran into any trouble. She did great so we both feel comfortable with me returning to work tomorrow. About mid-morning, Ann & I ran over to Columbus so she could attend physical therapy while I went in to work to get my mail and touch base with my folks. We came back and I grabbed some lunch before getting out and walking for a couple miles around the neighborhood in the mist. I had to cut it short when it started to rain harder and simply got too cold for me. I came back inside and worked from home until the early evening while Annie napped. When Luke got home, we went and picked up Tonya from the shop. I have to hand it to J & A Auto; Jerry did a great job on her car. Luke hopped in the van while I drove Bu’s car home. It was only his third solo drive and he did awesome. I was concerned with a couple of new noises in Abby’s car, so we ran it back out and had Jerry look at it. He wanted us to drive it a bit to see if they would go away or get worse. So, Luke drove us to Memaw & Gigi’s house and then on home. The noises just kind of stayed the same, so we’ll see. Later, we watched a couple TV shows before I fell asleep after only a few minutes on the couch and ended up going to bed early and sleeping for about eleven hours that night. Here are pictures of Ann progressing through her knee surgery rehab and Luke’s basketball pictures.
I was up early on Tuesday as I headed back to work on a foggy, rainy, overcast day that resembled England all day. Luke had a good day at school then later enjoyed baseball practice. Ann had a good day alone with the dogs. We touched base a couple times through the day and she got along just fine without me. I had a fast day at work then walked a 5K at the mall due to the cold weather. On my way through town, I stopped by the Abrell’s house to pick-up Luke’s basketball pictures. They came out great and we’ll share them next week. I was thrilled to get my next shipment of my Hot Sauce of the Month product. The one is a green, jalapeno sauce with big chunks of peppers and the other is a red pepper sauce that isn’t very hot but has a great taste. I like to use it in combination with my pepper flakes from Scott. The current batch is a mix of Trinidad Scorpion, orange habanero, Ghost and Dragon’s Breath peppers.
Luke & I were up early to take him to the Fieldhouse for football practice on Wednesday…but thought it was strange when we were the only ones at the school. Come to find out, all morning workouts are done for the year, so we headed back home and he rode in with Mary. Luke said he had a good day at school and had the night off to play Fortnight with his buddies. It rained pretty much all day while I was at work. When I finally got done, it was warm – sixty degrees – and dry enough to walk outside. I got in about a 5K around the airport property for the first time this year. It was just less than a week ago it was ninety-five degrees colder! Ann called in an order at Koch’s and I picked it up on the way home for dinner. Ann’s friend Lynn picked her up and took her to PT today. She did really good…but she worked very hard and was overly sore that evening. Because of her knees aching, she missed her After Prom meeting. Thankfully, Ms. Kristie went in her place. She was a little discouraged at the poor turnout, but they made some progress. I believe Kristie is involved in Ann’s exit strategy here in a few years. She came over to the house afterward to brief Ann on the meeting minutes and stayed to visit for a little while. Here are random pictures of our recent adventures.
It rained all day and night on Thursday, causing major flooding all over this area. I got notifications all day long about flood warnings in all the surrounding counties, including Decatur and Bartholomew. Thankfully, both my work and our home are located on higher ground so we were never in turmoil. The routes to and from work, however, were challenging. Ann continued to rest her knees, still very sore from PT yesterday. I had a busy day of rounds then walked about three miles at the mall, getting in nearly 14,000 steps on the day! Ann called in an order at El Rep on my way home and I swung by and grabbed it as I came through town. Luke had a very long day: he had a busy day at school then went to football practice that afternoon and wrapped up the day by going to baseball practice that night! The temps dropped drastically that evening, freezing everything in sight as the wind howled late into the night…
I went back to work while Ann slept in and nursed her knees on Friday morning. Luke had a fast day at school then came home with Shack to play Fortnight and spend the night. I took the maintenance boys out to lunch at Five Guys and was a bad boy…but it was oh so good… It was a fast day for me then I walked about three miles at the mall because the temps dropped like 40 degrees in 12 hours! I had a challenging ride into work due to all the flooding: Park Rd was still closed due to water being over the road at the country club and then 450 N was closed, down in the valley by Marr Rd. By the time I came home that night, though; it was clear and most of the flooding had actually subsided! Abby came home with Garrett to get her car that evening. I went out to start it and noticed that it had a puddle underneath the front left of the engine. One of the reasons we ended up hanging on to Tonya was because she had no engine leaks. I popped the hood to see what was going on and found that the power steering fluid reservoir was bone dry. I called Jerry and he wanted it back to see if there was a loose hose or something. So, Abby & Garrett followed me back to the shop to drop off Tonya and then I ran them out to Walmart to get supplies to take back to school. I accidentally scratched my leg getting out of Abby’s car and that damn thing bled for the next twelve hours, saturating my sock and getting all on my shoes. Thankfully, we live with a shoe guru and Luke got it all cleaned-up for me (thanks bud!). While we were gone, Amy brought over dinner (she’s so freaking awesome) – baked cavatini – that was delicious. After dinner, the kids decided to head back to campus instead of staying the night so we said good-bye and settled in to watch a movie and keep warm. We watched a suspense thriller called ‘Overlord’ on the big screen. We have lots of social media pictures to share this week.
Ann & I didn’t sleep well overnight but we ended up getting up early due to the damn dogs. Luke & Dray slept in while Ann iced her knees in the chair and I did a few chores around the house. In the late morning, the boys and I picked up Brody and we went to Walmart to get more ammo before heading out to the Messers where they played Air Soft most of the day and even did a little sparring. Later, he & Oakley went to Shack’s house to spend the night. Ann napped on and off while resting her aching knees. I don’t know what that therapist did to her, but I hope she doesn’t do again next week! After dropping off the boys, I did some shopping and even got in a little Hot Wheel hunting uptown at the junk store. Abby said she had an interview at Buffalo Wild Wings in Franklin and that she got the job! Way to go, Bu!! Ann & I took it easy the rest of the day then got take-out from Pizza King for dinner. We tried to watch XXX (with Ice Cube & Sam Jackson) on the big screen but we fell asleep – neither of us saw the end of the movie and we turned in early that night. Damn, we’re old!
The dogs had me up early again on Sunday while Ann slept in a little. That gave me a chance to watch some classic sci-fi in peace: Star Trek, Buck Rogers and Stargate Atlantis. Once Annie got up, I did our weekly household chores and watched #15 Purdue defeat Nebraska by twenty to remain in the hunt for another Big Ten championship. Eifert and Edwards had great games, but the team as a whole is really jelling at the right time. As we watched the Boilers, it began snowing again and continued for several hours that day. I’d say we got between one and two inches. After the game, I picked up Luke and let him practice driving in the snow for a while then came home. We watched the first Daytona action of the year – Hendrick got the top four spots in qualifying and then won The Busch Clash when Johnson wrecked the whole field and it began pouring. We took it easy the rest of the day and later we enjoyed the return of the Walking Dead and Talking Dead that night. It was a great way to wrap up the week.
Next is our Waybac segment which has a couple of surprises, along with the normal batch from photo album #17. It contains pix of our family vacation at Walt Disney World in June 2004. We lead off with those aforementioned surprises. They come from Mom O, who found these newspaper clippings while cleaning this week: Ann dancing with her Dixon Dance class in July 1983 and then Keith & Rosie’s wedding announcement from March 1993. These were both in the Greensburg Daily News. Then we move on to the Disney photos: we lead off with what appears to be either a monorail ride or one of our quite long bus rides to / from Animal Kingdom; then we head back to the Cinderella castle for more pix at the Princess character meal in the Magic Kingdom; more safari pictures in Animal Kingdom; then luau pictures at the Polynesian; more Bear & the Big Blue House / Playhouse Disney show in MGM (now called Hollywood Studios); next we have more sights from Main St. USA in the Magic Kingdom; and finally, we end with us back in Animal Kingdom where we met up with Amy, Baili and Rob at Mickey’s Jammin’ Jungle parade.
Next, we have our video segment which has one short, new home movie this week as well as several from around the internet.
And that does it for this week’s episode of the Scheu Family Blog. Thanks for keeping up with us this time out and we’ll catch up with you again next time. Until then, have a good one. We miss ya, Mom.
Later, Scheu