August 2005

At this point, I must put in a plug for Servage, my new website provider. I have badgered them with no less than 7 problem tickets in just over a week and every one has been dealt with quickly and efficiently. And they offer me far more space than I could ever hope to fill, at a better price.

We’ve just been watching the cooking dish (crumbed turkey chops) get pushed all around the floor of both the kitchen and the dining room. Datsun has his paw right in the dish!

Um, yeah, it wasn’t me.

I’ve been rearranging my shotglass collection.

Walking the dogs.

Kelly looks like an Ewok.

Yep.

Julie’s Pulsar is now on the market. She’s not using it and we could do with the cash.

I got a phone call at work from Julie today, to say, “It’s snowing here! Like real Seattle snow, big flakes!” The whole office heard about it. Then tonight, it started snowing with more really big flakes.

We’re heading for Melbourne this weekend, hopefully for Kiana’s birth. If she hasn’t popped out by then, we figure we’ll stick a pin in Lisa’s tummy to get something moving.

A big welcome to the newest member of the family, Kiana Lee Fiddaman. Delivered by Caesarean at about 10:30 pm Saturday 13 August, after she couldn’t be turned into the correct position.

This is some country humour on the way down.

When we saw Lisa, she was awake but pretty groggy. Paul wasn’t much better when we woke him up as we were leaving Melbourne.

I heard from Great Aunt Dorothy when she came into mobile phone range, She was of course delighted with the news and had to stand still on the beach so that she could maintain the phone reception. They’re about 50 kays north of Mackay – been there for a week now.

Later.

Simon, Paul, Me, Dad.

OK, I got Julie onto the plane, now what? She called me an hour or so later, to say that she had missed the flight from Sydney to San Francisco, but United had her on the next flight, to Los Angeles. All they have to do now is switch her from the SFO-SEA flight to a LAX-SEA flight and she’ll be there at about the same time. We’ve spent sooooo much time together in the last 8 months that I’m not quite sure what to do with myself. So I’ve started by taking the puppies for a walk and re-arranging the garage. We can now fit both cars in there again. And then someone was coming round to look at Julie’s car, so I needed to find the registration certificate, so that started a wholesale review of the pile of paper, which means that I have finally started on the filing. What a weekend!

And more news this morning, which is of course was yesterday the 23rd in Seattle, Duncan Michael Laughlin was born. At present, that’s all I know.

This in today from Julie:

April had her baby at 4pm Tuesday (Wednesday for my Aussie Friends). Duncan Michael Laughlin came in weighing 7-1/2 pounds and is 20 inches long. He has a head full of hair and seems to not be a crier. He already has a mind of his own as he wasn’t warming up as fast as the staff would like, so they bundled him up and put him on his stomach. When they came back he had kicked all his covers off and was on his back!!!! He will have to stay in the hospital another 48 hours or so as he came into this world with an infection. The Doctors thought he might (though hoped not) as April had a urinary infection but they decided not to give her any antibiotics due to the birth being so close. I haven’t seen him yet at and this has been the trip from hell so far.

1. Missed my flight in Sydney to San Francisco so re-routed to Los Angeles. The booking agent had placed the times too close.
2. Arrived in Los Angeles at 1030, went thru customs okay. Since my San Francisco flight was supposed to be on Alaska, United sent me to them.
3. Los Angeles is a HUGE airport – walked about 1/2 mile from Terminal 7 (United) to terminal 2 (Alaska).
4. Stood in line for about an hour and was told by Alaska that United had to take care of me.
5. Walk back to United and stood in line for another hour. By this time it is the afternoon.
6. United was full, wasn’t sure they could change the tickets, etc. but said they would put me on stand-by for the 4:30 but that it was over-booked by 10 people.
7. Asked when next flight was – 7:30 pm which would put me in Seattle about 10 pm, then would have had to get the rental car and drive another 2 hours to my folks place on Whidbey Island.
8. Decided to stay the night in LA and catch the early flight so spend $200+ that I hadn’t planned on.
9. Got there in the morning – Loooooooooong lines. Got on plane and it was over crowded too, so the nice thing was they up-graded me to first class. Wish I could fly that way more often.
10. Got rental car and drove up to see April. Had a nice chat and was surprised as when I left in Dec ’04 she was skinny but she was definitely pregnant that day!!!! <smiles>
11. Drove to folks house and then that evening proceeded to get a cold – sore throat, chesty cough, snot nose, etc. GREAT!!!!!

So as you see – it hasn’t really been fun yet. My parents are okay though Dad has lost about 15 pounds due to the arthritis and is actually gaunt. He can drive a little but I will do most of the running around for them, they can strip the bed but I will need to make it for them. Neither one of them has much strength. Mom fell the other day in the bathroom and Dad couldn’t help her back up, so he went and got a chair, sat in it to make it stay in place and then Mom pulled herself up. ‘Tis kinda scary though the neighbours and friends are helping as much as possible. They are the ones that will have to make the decision on whether they will move or not to a smaller place. Dad has mentioned it, but Mom doesn’t want to hear it.

Well enough of this – I’m taking the parents to a Doctors appointment Friday on the “other side” so hoping we can stop by and see the baby.