Ugh

I still haven't been writing for a couple of reasons - first of all, I'm still not feeling completely resolved about the presidential election. I'm still a little depressed about that. But then, as if that hadn't been enough for a while, there have been a number of rough spots on the road these past couple of weeks.

I've been sick for a little over a week with a cold that has me all plugged up. I thought I caught it from Thomas but since he got it from me it must not have been the same virus. Of course when he gets it he gets asthma and that's always scary. It was rough. I want to get him the flu shot, but it's so hard to get this year, and I've been feeling guilty about taking one for him when there may be other children out there who need it more than he does and there is such a shortage. However, this asthma thing is really making me feel like I need to do this this year.

Next up my I've finally gotten to the point where I need to pay the piper where my car is concerned. I've been driving my car for the last 3 1/2 and have put next to nothing into it. I attribute part of this to luck and part of this to good judgement on the part of my father when he picked the car. So finally it's time to pay up - and the car needs about $1000+ worth of repairs. In addition to this I need to update my registration and make sure the car smogs, so at the end of the day all of this is going to cost $1500-$2000 over the next couple of months. It's very frustrating, but I can't deny that I'm due to pay this money - I've really gotten off easy over the last few years. The two biggest problems are the rear brakes which are non-existant and need to be rebuilt entirely and also something is wrong with the throttle and the car jerks all over the place while you are trying to drive down the street. It's very jarring and embarassing - a total ghetto cruiser. So I got it all diagnosed and we're going to get the throttle thing done this week and go from there. All of this is on top of the fact that Emmett's car is completely broken down, we definitely can't afford to fix BOTH cars right now and so we're totally dependent on my semi-broken down Jeep. So I've been taking the bus to work some nights and we've been trying to coordinate every day so that we both can get where we need to go. To be honest (when I'm not busy feeling sorry for myself overall haha) it works out okay and I think we could really manage with one car for a while if we needed to until we can gradually save the money to get all this resolved. And I want to do this one step at a time rather than jacking up a bunch of credit card debt.

Anyway, so there's the election and the car situation. Then the other night I got on the city bus going the wrong way and it took me 3 1/2 hours to finally get turned around and get back home. I was wiped out, crying and had blisters on my feet by the time I got home because I was wearing heels through all of this since I had dropped off a resume at Seton hospital. I hope that that is going to be the good thing when all of this turns around - that I'll get an interview there. It's a night shift job, two nights per week, Tuesday and Wednesday, 11pm-7:30am, which would work out really well since no weekends and also benefits. I could fill in with a couple of days a week at UC and things would be on at least a little bit better schedule. We'll just have to wait and see.

I'm so tired right now and I still need to go out and put the clothes on the line outside. Did I mention that the dryer broke? I'm telling you it's one thing after another right now....

I worked last night. I guess I've been sort of putting off the most difficult thing till the last. I work with this guy Rodney, who is an xray technician in our department. He's a super friendly guy and we've had countless conversations about our lives and stuff. I probably know him better than anyone else at U.C. Anyway, Wednesday night he was shot and killed by his brother-in-law. Apparently his brother-in-law had a psychotic breakdown of some kind. It's in this morning's paper, although the names still aren't there yet.
http://www.marinij.com/Stories/0,1413,234~24407~2530528,00.html#
It was in the Chronicle as well, but I think there was a problem with their reporting because their headline didn't fit with the rest of the story - so this one seems a bit more clear. I'm just feeling in shock. I can't believe he's gone. I'm so sad for his wife and family. They've been married for 20 years and have two kids, the youngest is 5 years old. God, he loved that little girl. He also was very much in love with his wife, even after all those years. She had recently lost 100 lbs and he brought over all the pictures she had taken to show them off. What else can I say? I'm just so shocked and sad. I am keeping my eyes open for news of a service, I'm hoping that I can go with a couple of my coworkers. I just want to say goodbye. He was really nice to me, especially in the beginning when I was feeling so shy and overwhelmed in that whole huge place not knowing anyone.


Ahhh well. It will be good to get back to a time when I can just write good stuff about Tommy and our family events. I was hoping to get back to that days ago, but it looks like it's going to be a couple more days at this point.

Time for some prayers.

Take care,
With love,
Melissa