long week

It's been a long week. Took about 3 days to get over the jet lag from the trip. I caught a cold in Spain and I am still not over it yet, almost, taking all kinds of meds. I think I gave it to Angela because she now has a cold and of course, it is my fault.

Had a follow up visit to Doctor this week about some test results:

• Cholesterol - fine
• triglycerides - fine
• liver - fine
• everything else fine, but
• My PSA was a 10. This is an indicator for prostate cancer, the normal range is 4 to 10, but since my dad had this type of cancer, I need to follow up with a Urologist.

No one wants to find out they have cancer, and I am praying I do not, but I know God is in control. My dad has been clean for several years, so I am not really worried about it.

Brandon lost his job at Nationwide due to cut backs, so he is thinking about going back to school to teach.

Corey still working for A&F, seems to like it

Tyler and Rachel doing fine with the granddog, Dodger. Tyler found out about a new program through the University of Memphis that after 2 years, he could become an assistant principle, which is the next step of his professional journey. This is huge, because without it he would have to go back to school for his Doctorate.

Angela doing fine, except for the cold. I found out she held a "Big daddy's out of the country" party for her lady friends while I was gone last week, didn't even save me any dessert!

That's all for now, taking a Bruno's pizza home for dinner. That was our favorite place to eat when we were dating, and we also ate there on our wedding night.

Press On!

It is a small world after all

To close the loop on my trip, I continued the tradition of eating my last meal in a foreign country before heading home at Burger King. Do you think I could a commercial or sponsor contract for this? I went the the BK in Granada and ordered my meal in Spanish, quatro, grande, coke. Yes a number 4 combo meal with a coke.

After dinner, I did some shopping. I picked some some EVOO for Angela. If you do not not know what EVOO is, you are not watching the food channel enough. While I was checking out, there were 4 college girls next to me talking. Since their English was so good, I could tell they were not from Spain. In taking to them I found out they go to the same college as my niece Jordan! Not only that they knew her and were good friends with her! It really is a small world. I was just glad that I said something and talked to them.

The trip home started in Granada at 5:00 AM Saturday their time, which was 11:00 PM Friday in Ohio. 1 hour flight to Madrid, no problems, 10 hour flight to Chicago, no problems, land in Chicago and it was snowing. My plane was stuck in Milwaukee for about an hour, delayed total of about 2 hours before it got to Chicago, got home about 10:00 PM Saturday night, very long day.

Glad to home, back to work tomorrow, busy week, PRESS ON!

Need a place to go to dinner?

I would recommend this place, I ate there last night, probably the best meal the Angela did not make with the best view imagined.

http://www.lastomasas.com/en/

Why you should always order your own food

Last night I went out with some people who would be attending my class today. There were 3 Dutch, 1 Irish, and 1 USA (me) in attendance.


The Irish guy knew of a good Spanish place to eat. So we started on a 15 min walk to this beautiful, but small restaurant. As you could imagine, no one knew any English, and no one in our group knew Spanish, so I knew it would be interesting.



1 of the Dutch guys thought he knew Spanish, he ordered a starter (appetizer) for the group and then told to waiter to "surprise us with 5 dinners". The waiter had a puzzled look, so to make sure I got something, I pointed to what I wanted, the menu was in Spanish and English.

To make a long story short, I was only one who got any dinner. The waiter did not bring the other guys anything after the appetizer. I felt bad an offered to share, but the Dutch guy was so confident their food was on the way they did not want to eat mine. BTW : I had monkfish with prawns and clams, very good.

When the waiter cleared my plate away the dutch guy realized that was all that was coming and went into the kitchen, found a busboy that he thought understood English and ordered 4 more dinners. About 10 mins later, they brought 1 dinner with 4 forks!

At that point, it was already 1030 PM, remember Spanish people start dinner after 8:00 Pm. I was tired and had to teach today, so I left and walked aback to the hotel.

At breakfast this AM I asked what happened after I left. 1 of the other Dutch guys went and got a menu and pointed to what I had and ordered 4 of those. They finally got their food about the time I fell asleep. They got back to the hotel about 12:30 AM, they looked a little tired today.

2 more nights and then coming home!

Press On!

travel day

We left Sligo about 8 PM Tuesday and drove to Dublin and stayed at the airport Radisson hotel.

I got up this morning very early in Ireland to fly to Spain. In fact it was so early some of you were probably still awake. I got up at 5: 00 AM Ireland time which was midnight in Ohio. I thought about calling all my family and friends, but decided it was not worth the risk, since I will be coming home this Saturday (YEAH!)

About the only other thing I wanted to mention about Ireland was how hard the beds are. Think of sleeping on a rock or the old medieval torture device the rack and you will know what I mean. That may explain why Irish people drink so much, to numb the pain caused by sleeping on a torture device.

Flight to Spain was uneventful, slept most of the time. Arrived at the Granada plant after a 2 hour drive.

I am traveling with an other Abbott employee, who lives in Ireland. We got to the rental car place in Spain and all they had left were cars with automatic transmissions. David, who is 36, told me he had never driven a car that did not have a manual transmission, very weird. At least the cars in Spain are like American cars, driver on the left, and you drive on the right side of the road. After he accidentally slammed on the brakes about putting me through the windshield, we were fine the rest of the way.

Another interesting thing about Spain I forgot, was that lunch is at 2:00 PM and dinner tonight is at 8:00 Pm. There people flying in today for my class tomorrow from the Netherlands, so we will probably eat with them.

Classes Thursday and Friday and home Saturday. Wonder what Angela has been up to? I know some of my friends from church (Sam?) will update me Sunday.

See you then.

Ireland Day 2

Here is the link to the hotel I am staying at. www.clarionhotelsligo.com

A couple of interesting facts about the hotel from my perspective:

1. It is an old mental hospital
2. The heat comes on at 7:00 PM in the evenings and goes off at 8:00 AM
3. The floors are numbered, 0 = ground floor, 1 = second floor, 2 = 3rd floor
4. The rooms numbers do not match the floor they are on, for example all the rooms on the 1st floor which is the ground floor start with 2xxx, the second floor they start with either 1xxx, 3xxx, 5xxx to 8xxx.
5. My room is on the 3rd floor starts with 4xxx, very odd
6. I had to wait 90 min yesterday to get a room, due to the valentines weekend crowd. They said every room in the hotel was full on Saturday night. So I took a nap in the lobby and watched people checkout.
7. My room is huge, 3 separate rooms. The sitting room is a large as my CONNECT Group room at church.
8. The bedroom has both a twin bed and double bed in it.

Class today went fine. Teach again to tomorrow then 3 hours drive to Dublin to stay the night. Have an early flight out Wednesday AM for Spain. Jet lag worse today than yesterday.

Ipod is now working! Reading Winners Manual by Jim Tressel, so far it is a great book.

Press On!

Hello from the Emerald Isle

Made it to Ireland with no problems. Hate that I had to give up my Valentines Day with Angela, but duty calls.

In keeping with the family tradition, Angela headed to Columbus for shopping and dinner with Brandon and Corey before my plane even landed in Washington, DC. Have not check the with Park National Bank to see how much it will cost us, but glad they all had a good time.

She did buy a web camera at Circuit City. Don't know why we never thought of that before to keep in touch with Tyler and Rachel. Angela said she plugged it in and talked to them last night.

Only odd thing so far, is when we went to the gate to board the plane for Dublin, there was no plane. It was the first time I have ever gone through a boarding gate and got on a shuttle bus. Kind of defeats the purpose in boarding by rows. Same thing when we landed in Dublin, we had to get off the plane using a ramp. Can't figure that one out.

Watched a couple of movies, Wall-E, and Righteous Kill, both were OK. Could not get my iPod to work. It comes on, but nothing plays. If anyone has an idea on how to fix it, please respond to this blog.

So, it will be a hectic week, Ireland till Tuesday, fly to Spain on Wednesday, then in Spain till Saturday, fly home Saturday. Thanks to Andrew Roth and Michael George for teaching my class today and next Sunday.

Pray for family of Dave Smith from our church who passed away suddenly. Dave and his wife Linda are good people. She will need lots of support and prayer.

It is 5 hour ahead here so I am going down to dinner.

Press ON!

Grandparents!!!

Relax, Tyler and Rachel only got a dog. German Shepard mix I think. They just wanted the protection and friendship a dog can provide. wonder if this means the honeymoon is officially over? The are starting to act like a typical middle class couple in America.

Corey got a new job, some kind of store setup and modeling for Abercrombie and Fitch. They are based in Columbus. About 10 hours a week, he said. He and roommate Eli seem to be getting along fine, nothing too funny to report, that he has told us anyway.

Brandon still working hard. I did his taxes for him and he gets back more than I do this year! At least he is taking us out for dinner when he gets his refund. Martini's sounds good!

Angela went back to work Monday. I woke up and my clock said 6:15 AM and she was still in bed. I woke her up and told her, she jumped up and was headed downstairs, when I realized I was looking at the alarm setting, the actual time was 1:23 AM. I was in big trouble. We went back to sleep and the batteries in her alarm clock must have been low, because the alarm did not go off. She was almost late.

Nothing much going on with me. Got back on Wii fit last night after being off for a week. Thankful only gained 0.2 pounds. Getting ready to head to Ireland and Spain next week on business. Those trips are fun, but they are also tiring.

Press On!

Fireproof the Movie Returns

Our church 1st Baptist Church of Heath, Ohio, http://www.firstbaptistheath.com/, is hosting a free showing of the movie Fireproof. The following was my review from last September:

"We went with 6 other couples from our CONNECT group (Sunday school class) to see the new movie Fireproof. It was made by the same church in Georgia that did Facing the Giants and a few others. Overall it was pretty good, it does a good job of reminding men (and women) that keeping a marriage alive and growing is a continual process and that it takes 2 people to make it a success.

If one person is a "giver" and the other is a "taker" no relationship can last very long.I am very lucky to be married to a wonderful woman whose heart is a big as the sky. Who takes great pride in keeping a clean house, laundry under control, and meals ready, even though she works full time and is turning into a "counselor" for family and friends. Because of my love for her I try to help out around the house especially with laundry and dishes, but I could do better. One of the things I love about Angela is that she does not keep score. We are a team and we both are the better for it."

This is a wonderful movie for any married couple, if you have not seen it, you should plan on attending this Sunday @ 5:00 PM.

That's my boy!

Our oldest son, Tyler, teaches 5th Grade English in Memphis, TN. Today he won the following award.

"Give the award of a lifetime. Give the National PTA Life Achievement Award—the highest honor from the nation’s largest child advocacy organization—to the person who daily lives out his or her commitment to children.

How will you say: “Thank you for your outstanding service to our children”?
Give the award of a lifetime.

Give the National PTA Life Achievement Award—the highest honor from the nation’s largest child advocacy organization—to the person who daily lives out his or her commitment to children.

Recognize and thank that special person you know who goes above and beyond for all children—the one who acts as a tireless advocate for children’s education, health, and well-being."

Way to go Tyler, we are very proud of you!