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Sunday, March 31, 2013

It's Here.


The long winter of my discontent is over.

Or something like that.

Tomorrow, 1 p.m., the Bronx.

Thank God.

Thursday, March 28, 2013

The Birthday Dirt Dog


From the age of, well, birth to..... yesterday, this child has been the human equivalent of a barrel full of monkeys. He rolled down our staircase at around 6 months old, taking 5 years off the end of my life and after catching his breath and convincing his Mom and I he wasn't dead took off crawling again.

At 9 months he had tubes put in his ears, got Mersa at the age of 2, and following 3 1/2 years of merrily urinating in every conceivable place he could find? He contracted Alopecia and had all of his hair fall out while battling a speech impediment.

Despite all this he has constantly amazed me by having a perpetual smile on his face all the time, laughing and running and roaring through life like some pint sized version of John Blutarsky, complete with the eyebrow wiggle. He's never met a stranger, the entire world is his friend and even though he doesn't know it he lives his life by the motto "If you're gonna go, go BIG."

Tomorrow he turns 7 and I honestly can't believe it.

Seems like yesterday he was standing in the van peeing on the garage floor.

Happy Birthday Trot.

I never thought I'd make 7 years.

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Manny Still Being Manny


After forcing myself to wait until the price came down some I finally bought this book yesterday on my Kindle for $5 and at about a third of the way through so far I'm loving it. The fact it was written by the CHB scared me at first but it feels like Tito wrote it instead. Full of stories and language formed by a lifetime spent in baseball parks across the country you can hear Tito's voice in every sentence.

Best part of the book so far? The back story behind the home plate argument between Manny Ramirez and Yadier Molina in Game 4 of the 2004 World Series. While the two of them screamed profanities in Spanish at each other, Umpire Chuck Meriwether waved Francona out onto the field.

Upon arriving at home plate Meriwether said he couldn't understand Spanish, thus he couldn't understand what in the great wide world of sports was going on.

Francona: "What do you want me to do about it? I don't speak Spanish either." Turning to Manny he asked "What's this about?"

Ramirez: "He thinks I'm stealing their signs."

Francona: (chuckling) "Chuck, Manny doesn't even know OUR signs!"

I miss goofy, pre-steroid knowing about, blissfully unaware Manny.

And while I think John Farrell is going to be a fine manager?

I think I'll always miss Tito.

Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Blessed

For the past year and a half we've been dealing with Trot having alopecia, which is a virus that attacks the hair follicles. Yeah, I'd never heard of it either until he woke up one morning and looked like he had gotten the mange virtually overnight.

If you ever want to feel fear all the way down to your core? Have a 5 year old child have all his hair fall out, seemingly at once. We took him to his pediatrician, who referred us to a skin specialist where we spent the better part of a year going twice a month and nothing working.

Finally we got him in with a specialist at Duke University in October. I'll let the pictures tell the story.

These were taken at Duke on our first visit. He looked like Uncle Fester, only a lot smaller.


This was taken a few weeks later at a Fall Festival in our town. You can see some hair coming in.


This was taken around the middle of November. Still seeing a little come in.

This was taken in January at Duke. 3 months after our first visit.


And this was taken 2 days ago while they got ready for church. Or took 3 years off my life, whichever you prefer.

It's been a LONG 1 1/2 years, but at our last visit at Duke we made an appointment to come back in May and if all is well? She's cutting us loose. To say I'm thankful for all this is an understatement and the look on his face when people come up to him and say how great his hair looks instead of "What happened to your hair?"

Priceless.