Heads Up
Some updates on Finn’s headaches.
First, he’s liking school better now. The tear-filled I-don’t-want-to-go mornings only lasted 2-3 days, so for that we’re thankful.
Second, his pediatrician suggested we adjust Finn’s blood pressure medicine. (I’ve not ever gone into it here, but yeah, he a medical condition that causes high blood pressure, so he takes two medicines to bring it down.) He’s taken these these medicines for almost five years and never had any problems or side effects, that we know of. But one of them — I’ll call it Drug A — lists headaches as one of it’s side effects. The doctors felt it was worth trying. So we cut the dose of Drug A in half. Instead of taking it in the morning and at night, he has only taken at night for the last week. The plan was to see if this had any affect on getting headaches. The dr. would also check his blood pressure after a week to see if it was affected.
He had his first blood pressure check yesterday and it was actually lower than it was the week before. Hmmm. Strange. And, he had less headaches this week — one on Sunday which I believe he totally caused because he got upset about getting in trouble before church, and one on Thursday that wasn’t a bad one (he was able to take Motrin and go back to class). In general, he’s been less moody and not as tired, but I’m trying not to force things to fit. We’ll keep taking the half dose for two more weeks until our check-up with the blood pressure doc.
A Real Live Finn
You don’t hear the name “Finn” all that much, at least we had never met anyone or heard of anyone with that name when we chose to name our son that 10 years ago. Yeah, he’s only 6, but his first name was picked out before his father and I were even in engaged.
So the uniqueness of his name makes it rather fun to see things with his name on it. The most obvious is the Pepperidge Farm Goldfish crackers. Their main fish character is named Finn so he shows up in commercials, on their packages, and is host of their Goldfish Kids Web Site.
Occasionally we’ll see a shirt with a fish or sharks that says “give me some fin” or something. Even though his name is not spelled with one ‘n’ it’s still fun.
Often people have trouble understanding what he (or we) are saying when they ask him his name. They often think we’re saying Ben, or sometimes Vin. So when he was a baby I would tell people his name Finn, pronounced like a fish fin — even though it’s not spelled that way. Using fish fin doesn’t work well if the people asking are Sunday School teachers, school teachers, etc. and are going to be writing his name. So now we either spell it out or say “like Huck Finn.” I even heard Finn say the other day “like Huck Finn,” and he doesn’t even know who Huck Finn is! (I explained it was a character in a well-known book and made a mental note to add the movie Tom and Huck to Netflix.)
I sometimes refer to him as my “lucky fin,” (er, lucky Finn?) after the reference in the movie Finding Nemo.
And there’s also the movie version of Great Expectations, where he got his name.
I emailed the Pepperidge Farm folks not that long ago to offer that if they ever need a real live Finn to let us know!
The End of Summer
This was the first year in a while that my summer had a definite beginning and a definite end. I remember thinking when I graduated college (‘01) that summers were over. From now on years would just roll on as one continuous loop with no “breaks.” Because let’s face it, summer is not really defined by the solstice or the equinox but by the ending and beginning of school.
I dreaded the lack of a summer. It meant I was an adult and life was going to drone on endlessly, or something like that. It wasn’t quite that bad, but summer seemed so much longer when it wasn’t tied to a school year. I became quite spoiled at being able to take a “summer vacation” any time between May and September.
This year? Eight weeks was all we got. All of June. All of July. That was it. With my oldest officially in elementary school, my summers are back to being dictated by the school calendar. And it will be that way … for a long time. At least 15 years until the youngest graduates high school and possibly longer into their college years.
Tierra Luna Grill
On a work trip to Houston last year, two of my co-workers and I asked the group we were there to work with for some restaurant recommendations. The recommendations included a list of BBQ places and Mexican places — the two things Texas is known for I guess. But one restaurant stood out not for it’s food but for it’s owner. The Tierra Luna Grille, we were told, was a newly opened restaurant by astronaut José Hernández. Huh? An astronaut running a restaurant? Is his day job not satisfying enough? And how does an astronaut have the spare time to own his own business, especially one as taxing a restaurant? Certainly he’s not actually running it. This we had to see.
I half-hoped but didn’t really expect he’d be there. We walked in and were seated by nice young Mexican server who wiped our table and took our drink orders. The three of us all looked at each other like, “uh, was that him?” The Co-worker With The iPhone googled José Hernández to pull up a picture. Sure enough, it was him. “Are you kidding me?,” I thought. An astronaut just bussed my table and asked me what I wanted to drink? This must have been what the disciples felt like when Jesus washed their feet. I mean seriously, this guy was selected from thousands as the best of the best to fly in the nation’s space program, and he just brought me a Sprite?
Turns out, it’s Hernández’ wife’s restaurant — and she cooks all the food — and he was just there after work to help. We, of course, acknowledged that we knew who he was and were recommended to come there, etc. His wife came out from the kitchen to talk to us and asked how we liked the food (food was great, btw). Some of his children were there too.
Who knew that astronauts were just real people! Well, I did, it’s just hard not to put them on a pedestal. In some ways it’s a very deserving pedestal. But when you meet them they’re so humble about it.
I’ve been following Hernández on Twitter (@Astro_Jose), and it was great fun this week to watch him get suited up and loaded into the space shuttle for his first spaceflight. I know he’s having a blast up there finally living his dream.
Not Just Another Pretty Face
Why is it that Barbie’s face is enviously gorgeous and action figure girls are ugly?
The jaw lines and foreheads are too square and manly, the noses are too big, the eyes are creepy — did they just use the man mold and add long hair and pink lips?
At least this one has sunglasses to cover up/distract from her bad features.
Music Remembers
What three songs remind you of a specific time in your life? Describe that time and these songs’ ties to it.
This was one of the Plinky prompts for last week.
Songs are so powerful that nearly any song I could tie to something.
The Macarena — junior prom.
Men In Black — college orientation counselor. We tried to do the dance. It turns out I can’t make my neck “work.”
Like A Prayer — me and my 4th grade clique memorized all the words and sang it together every day at recess.
Ice, Ice Baby — I memorized the words to this one in 6th grade, to impress a boy (he wasn’t impressed).
This Kiss — sang it with college friends on the way to and from this ropes course/team building thing.
Strawberry Wine — my high school friend Beth said she liked the song so much because the girl in the song is 17, and Beth was 17. I was only 16 and couldn’t relate.
Red, Red Wine — the UB40 version. This song came on the radio the day I got a ride home from the coolest girl in 4th grade. I missed the bus and Brandy’s mom offered to give me a ride in her maroon sports car. I wasn’t supposed to catch rides with people. I wasn’t supposed to miss the bus, but if I ever did I was supposed to call home which meant I would get in trouble for missing the bus. But Brandy lived down the road from us, so I thought that not only would I get to ride with (and be seen riding with) the coolest girl, I’d be home in about the same time as the bus would have dropped me off. So the odds were good that I wouldn’t get caught. Who knew my dad would be looking out the window for me to get the off the bus only to see me climb out of the backseat of unknown maroon car. Oops.
When I hear Red, Red Wine, I can easily flip to the pictures in my brain of Brandy, her mom, the car, as if I was right back there.
I Could Not Ask For More – If Hubby and I were to have a song, this would be it. Hearing it takes me back to our dating days since the song was in the movie “Message in a Bottle,” which we saw together, and since he bought me the soundtrack and played this song for me.
I had a co-worker start naming random songs just to see if I really could tie a memory to any song. And I couldn’t to all of them but most, yeah, my mind would drift to hanging out with friends, dating some boy, seeing some movie, having some conversation. Music remembers things. Memories are captured in songs. What an amazing power music has.
Friend, Follow, Tweet
Every web site I go to nowadays has a “Friend us on Facebook” or “Follow us on Twitter.” I was verifying a kids-eat-free promo at IHOP by looking at their web site and what was on the top of their page? The little “Find Us on Facebook” icon with a link to their Facebook page.
It reminds me of a few years ago when commercials were just starting to show web addresses. I remember being at a Superbowl party, watching all of the cool commercials, and someone commented on how many commercials were showing web site addresses. They said something to the effect that all the companies were getting web sites now and what a phenomenon that was.
Today, what company doesn’t have a web site? I get frusterated if I google bakeries in my hometown and can’t find a web site. (Yes, even small-town bakeries should have a web site.)
Are Facebook pages and Twitter feeds the new web site, that everybody has to have? It sure seems so.
Still Struggling with First Grade
Taking the first grader to school this morning was like leading a lamb to slaughter. I’ve never actually led a lamb to slaughter, but that adage is what came to mind as I watched him walking out of the house when it was time to leave and his head hung so low. He’s just not adapting well to the changes of first grade and doesn’t want to go. Yesterday I bribed him — if he went to school with no crying and had a good day I’d take him to the store after school and let him choose a prize/reward. I’ve never, ever used such tactics with my children, but desperate times called for desperate measures. A friend at church last night asked if I was going to do that now every day of first grade. No. At least I hope not. I hope that by giving him some incentive — even if it’s a material incentive — to get through the day that he’ll learn to like it and adjust and get used to it and then we won’t have this issue. But as long as he tells himself “I don’t want to go,” he’ll never change his mind.
We’ve tried pointing at all the good things about first grade and how much fun it is for him to learn so many new things. He’s come home this week sharing all the neat stuff he’s learned about starfish (their stomach is in their mouth and they have suction cups for feet ) and sharks (they can swim and eat in their sleep), so he’s somewhat excited about those things and is at least paying attention. But he dwells on wanting to take a nap and not wanting to do his math work and that brings him down.
We’ve also been very frank with him, that he is growing up and sometimes growing up means doing things we don’t want to do. But if we just decide to like it, decide to do it anyway, it can get better and we might find that we actually like it.
It’s so tough being on the other side of the parent/child relationship. I changed schools for 7th grade and all of my friends stayed at my old school. I cried every day for the first two weeks begging my mom to let me go back to my old school. I remember her curling her hair in the bathroom while I sat on the ledge of my parent’s waterbed crying, “Please don’t make me go mom,” and she would kindly tell me I had to go, it was the best thing, etc. I know now how hard that was for her to do. She probably wanted to send me back to my own school as badly as I want to rescue Finn from the horrors of first grade.
But after a few days, I adjusted, I made friends, I got used to it and I was fine. So I know what Finn is feeling, and I know that this too shall pass. I also know that when I tell him that — when I tell him, I know what he’s going through that I’ve been there and I know it’s hard but I also know that he can do it — that he thinks to himself, “No, mom, you don’t understand.” Because that’s what I thought when my mom told me all of those same things.
