Shots Across The Bow

April BlogFest: And a Good Time was Had by All

First, the attendees:

Glenn
Helen
Tam
Tam's friend (I got there late, so I didn't get his name.)
Djuggler
Cathy
Tommy
Evan (not old enough to blog yet without shorting out the keyboard(toddlers leak from both ends, dontcha know), but it won't be too much longer I'm sure!)
Mark
Lissa
Michael
Me

I was late getting there because I was visiting my mother in the hospital. (You know, that's the first time I've used that excuse and it's been true!) It's serious,but not really scary. She's had a history of heart trouble including two very mild heart attacks, some arterial blockage, and arrhythmia. The arrhythmia eventually became so frequent and severe that she had to have laser ablation, which worked wonderfully. Every now and then, she can feel the precursor to an attack, but her heart never runs away like it used to (300bpm or better). Anyway, she started having some chest pain on Friday, and the nitro didn't help, so she checked in today. Her enzymes are all good, so the doctor doesn't believe it was another heart attack, but suspects some arterial blockage of some sort. She'll have a cath tomorrow and they'll find and fix the problem.

It's simply amazing to me the progress we've made in treating coronary disease.

Anyway,I brought her her laptop, and some stuff from home and then left her with my sister. My mom tried to get my sister to leave as well, but that ain't gonna happen. Deedi is there for the duration.

Anyway,I went on out to Calhoun's and joined the reveling crowd. Cathy has posted pictures, and I'm starting to get paranoid. Pictures of my always come out looking like I've been drinking when I haven't. Maybe I'll look more sober if I take a drink or two.

The gathering was more intimate than the last BlogFest, but still very energetic, with several animated conversations going on at different ends of the table. At one point,I heard Glenn and Tam discussing the proper weaponry for blowing away zombies. I believe they settled on a shotgun, but I'm not sure. Lissa was happy to be there and not studying for a change. Tommy and I talked about video games for a while, while Evan tried to help the wait staff by running the sweeper over the carpet. Not even two years old yet and Cathy has him doing more chores than my 6 kids ever do!

I must be doing something wrong...

I wanted to talk to Dr. Helen about my horrible childhood and the deep scars it left on me, but she bailed on me and went to the other end of the table to talk about zombies and shotguns.

That seems to happen to me a lot these days...

We all talked about the Knoxville schools rezoning plan, which has something in it to irritate just about everybody. Listening to people talk about it makes me happy to be in Sevier County, where if you don't like the school you're zoned for,you are free to put your child in one of the other schools.

I wanted to ask Michael about all the ads I've been hearing on the radio about contract negotiations at the Sentinel, but I figured this was a social occasion, so why talk shop. On the other hand,he was there alone, and he claimed his wife was "out of town" again. You know, every time we have one of these get togethers, she's out of town somewhere.

It's starting to feel like a bad episode of "Murder She Wrote."

We wound it up fairly early tonight, leaving around 9:30 or so. Cathy stopped to take a picture of the rain chains Les was obsessing over earlier in the week, so Les, check 'em out on flikr. It's pretty cool; they look like, well, chains hanging from a gutter.

I was telling Cathy,Doug and Lissa that I'd like to do one of these out at my house sometime this summer. Make it a longer event,and one where the kids can get out in the yard and play. Or more likely, gather in the living room and play on the Wii.

So,how many of you would be willing to make the drive out to Sevier County?

Oh, by the way,Cathy, Evan was fine. The wait staff loved seeing him sweeping the carpet!

Posted by Rich at April 21, 2007 11:24 PM | TrackBack