Led Zeppelin - Thank You (Live)

If the sun refused to shine
I would still be loving you
When mountains crumble to the sea
There would still be you and me

Kind woman, I give you my arm
Kind woman, nothing more
Little drops of rain
Whisper of the pain
Tears and love lost in the days gone by

My love is strong
With you there is no wrong
together we shall go until we die
my my my
Inspiration's what you are to me
Inspiration- look, see

And so today, my world smiles
Your hand in mine, we walk the miles
Thanks to you, it will be done
For you to me, are the only one

What I say is
Happiness no longer sad
Happiness, I'm glad

If the sun refused to shine
I would still be loving you.
When mountains crumble to the sea
There would still be you and me.

Ahhh,
Thank you.

As I said in my previous post Summer took some pictures of the results from a few of our youngest sons tantrums. Don't know if this is a good idea or not but when people see these then they get an idea f what we are dealing with. They see that this is real and not made up.

This is of his bedroom door. He got bad and kicked it off the hinges. The holes are stripped now and won't take screws.


Here we have the china hutch that Summer got when her mom passed away. He broke the glass out on one side.


This is the taillight cover to Summer's Explorer. He threw a bungee cord at the truck when we said that we would not buy him a toy. If it isn't bungee cords it's rocks or anything else he can fins to throw. If not our car it would be our neighbors car.


This is the brand new security door that I 9installed less than a year ago. He kicked it and busted the screen. This is supposed to keep burglars out?


This is the hall closet door that he kicked.


His bedroom closet door.


This is looking from our older sons room into our younger sons room.


This is my bedroom door.

This last one is in the living room.

The rest are of drawings on the walls with permanent markers. I'm next going to start documenting any bruises that he gives Summer or myself in his outbursts. I'm still considering getting a video camera to record his different moods. Then take them to the Dr. visits. Maybe even write another letter to Dr. Phil and send along the video tape and pictures. Who knows?

I can't believe it's been a week since I last posted. Even more I can't believe how busy we have been around here the last week or so. So now I have to see what I need to put in as an update.

First off I had a meeting with my therapist on the 18th. We spent the entire appointment talking about youngest son and the issues that we have been having with him. He actually spent the last 10 minutes of the appointment trying to get him an emergency psychiatrist appointment. To no avail. He did ask that Summer and I stay for a few minutes after the appointment (Summer and youngest were there as well but in the waiting room) so that he could find someone to see us immediately. He was able to get someone or rather 2 people to come and see us. They put it in his file that he was seen on an emergency basis. and that this should help in the future as far as getting things done.

On Tue last week I took youngest son to see his therapist again. this time he saw the Dr. alone for about 20 minutes. After that was done the therapist made a new appointment for this week and said that he will continue to need to see us at least every other week if not every week. When we got home there was a message on the answering machine saying that we finally got an appointment with a psychiatrist and that it would be the next day.

So that night Summer took a bunch of pictures of the things that our son has done around the house so I could take them to the appointment with us in the morning. The appointment went pretty well. The Dr. was able to see his behavior change from being really good and cooperative to starting to be destructive and hitting me. We saw this Dr. for almost 2 hours. She said that he will need to be seen by her and the therapist quite often so that we can teach him the tools necessary for him to calm himself down. She also said that he does not have autism, ADHD, ODD, or any of the other things he has been diagnosed with at the other facility. She said that he never should have been put on Wellbutrin to begin with because it is an anti depressant and he doesn't have depression. She believes he is Bi-polar. The problem is that there are no FDA approved meds for children with Bi-polar mood disorders. But she prescribed him a new medicine to take. Depakote. It is a mood stabilizer. She said that he needs more than just medication and that she wants to continue to see him on a more regular basis than his other Dr. did. So that is a plus.

Other than that things have been so-so. The whales are finally out of the area. At least as of 3:00PM yesterday they were finally leaving thew area. So that is a relief. I was on vacation yesterday and today is a holiday so I have had an extended weekend. :D I've been able to catch up on sleep, eat real dinners with the family, and spend a little time with Summer in the evenings.

We attempted to set up the pool over the weekend. That was a flop. Big time. We started to add water to the pool Fri. evening. It was full by Sat. morning and I started to run the pump. By 7PM we heard a loud noise from the back yard and saw the pool collapsed over and emptying itself out. I fixed it and started to refill it. But the torrent of water from the pool draining washed a lot of sand away. So I could actually see the pool slipping and sinking down. Which would cause it to fall over again. So now we have been draining the pool since yesterday morning. Funny how it drains so much slower than it fills.

When it is empty we need to move it closer to the house and hope that fixes it. If not I need to haul a lot more sand. Which I am NOT looking forward to. I thought I was going to break my truck last week. I had it WAY overloaded. I used a front loader at work and dumped a bucket load of sand in the back of my truck. Can we saw 'Maxed out the suspension travel?' My shocks were bottomed out and the springs were bending the wrong way. The front of the truck was almost off the ground. It wasn't pretty.

Other than that I need to get away. Or rather Summer and I need to get away. Together. Alone. Without the kids. For at least one night. Maybe two. A place where we can just lock ourselves up in a room and not come out. A place where talking about the kids is strictly forbidden. Even punishable.

God that sounds so good right now.

My stress levels as of late have been through the roof. Surprisingly enough they are not all due to my youngest son. Most of them are work related. Or to be more truthful whale related. The dam things are back. Again. I wish they would just leave for God's sake. Everyone is making such a huge deal out of this. The news media isn't helping matters either. They keep broadcasting "This is a once in a life time experience. Come out and see 'Delta' and 'Dawn' in person before they go back to the ocean." Whatever.

Seriously if these people wanted to see a whale that badly just go to Vallejo and get a ticket to Marine World. Better yet drive down to Monterey Bay and visit the Aquarium. But don't come by the thousands (YES THOUSANDS!) and clog up my highways and bridges. You idiots are interfering with the operations of our draw bridge. These damn whale lovers obviously have no brain cells left either and can't read. We have a locked gate on the bridge for a reason. It is even posted with a sign that says 'Walkway closed. Use other side' So what do they do? Step over the rail, into a LIVE lane of traffic doing 50 miles an hour and climb back over the rail on the other side of the gate. Then proceed to walk where they are not in sight of the bridge operator. Therefore they are putting themselves in very serious danger. The Coast Guard is telling the tender to open the bridge and she can't because of the people that are standing on the span that is supposed to go in the air. Just annoying the hell out of me. And causing the bridge operator a lot of grief. She's freaking out because if she don't open the bridge in a timely manner the Coast Guard can fine her quite a few bucks.

Enough of that. There has to be better things to talk about.



Let's see......






Something better..........




Summer and I were able to connect last night. For some real love making. Not just a quickie 'let's hurry up before we have to get the kids up for school' kind of thing. We took our time last night. The only down part was that we were both so tired that it didn't last as long as we would have liked it to. but it did work it's magic on me and helped me to relax and fall asleep must faster than normal.

If only we could do that every night when I come home. I wouldn't be tossing and turning for 2 hours before I finally fall asleep. I think maybe I need to rethink how I do things when I get home from work at night. Right now I walk in the door and go straight to bed. Maybe I should spend a little time watching TV or on the computer. Or better yet playing my new Playstation 2. Did I forget to mention that earlier? How rude of me.

So Fri. night right after Summer pulls out of the driveway to go on her women's retreat the guy from across the street walks up. He asks me if the kids have any video games for the TV. Yes they do. It's just an old Gamecube but they have something. Then he asks me if they would like to have a Playstation 2 with a bunch of games. I ask how much and he says FREE! Apparently he went to a store that buys old games and game consoles for re-selling. Well they told him that they would only give him $30.00 for the system and about 18 games. He says screw that I'll give it to the kids across the street before I sell it for that price. The cool thing is half the games are rated M so the kids can't play them. So I finally have some games for me the adult to play! :D I can play Tomb Raider, OO7, 2 versions of .........Oh crap! My mind went totally blank. The game that you are a guy that car jacks people.....Grand Theft Auto! That's it. I have the Vice City version and GTA III. And some others. Really the only one that appeals to me on a remote level is G.T.A. So I'll see about talking to a guy at work and see if he wants to trade some games or something.



**I actually started this last night at work. I saved it to finish this morning but now I have other things on my mind so I'm going to just publish as is.**

Time for something a little more upbeat. Unfortunately I can't seem to come up with something on my own. So while browsing blogs today I came across this over at Therese's. I figured what the heck? It'll do until something of my own pops up. :D

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

Does it make you a bad parent if you are actually willing and wanting for your child to be placed in some sort of in patient program?

I can't speak for Summer but I am getting closer and closer to seeing if Kaiser has a place that does that. I hate the idea of even thinking about it. But at the same time I just don't know how much more we can take. He was kicked out of his after school program this week. They said he cannot return until next year. The school reduced his hours from full day to half day. They are no longer trying to integrate him into the regular kindergarten class. He stays one on one with his helper the entire time he is at school. If the school determines that he is having a bad day and don't want to listen or becomes violent in any way they send him home. As usual but they are sending him home at the onset now. They used to wait to see if they could calm him down.

The problems with youngest son are just running down and causing problems in other areas as well. Summer and I are snapping at each other quite a bit anymore any time the subject of him comes up. She is just so upset about this whole thing. I am too but she is taking this much harder.which don't make it easy on me. Especially when she shows me bruises that he gives her or when I come in to see her crying because of the problems. I just don't know what to do. There has to be some place out that can help us so that we can live a normal life with our kids. Right now that just isn't possible.

We used to get a small break on the weekends when he would go play with the neighborhood kids. But now most of the kids won't play with him. Or their parents won't let them play with him. That just makes his tantrums and outbursts get worse. He wants to play with kids but the kids won't play with him. So he throws fits and destroys things in the house.

At least if he goes to an inpatient place that would hopefully serve 2 purposes. It will hopefully give the Dr.s enough time to do better evaluations on him and come up with better solutions. It would also give Summer and I the much needed rest we need. We just need to get away from our son.

And saying that makes me feel like a shitty parent. I mean what kind of parents wants to ship their kid off just so they can get time away from them? I'm not talking send them to the sitters for the evening or to the grandparents for the weekend. I'm talking an extended period of time. How long? Who knows. We have had 2 places say up to 90 days. But they are also the same places that say they can't help out because of Kaiser.

Maybe that's the solution! I'll quit my job and go on Welfare. Then I can get all the help we need free of charge! Then the county can't say that they can no longer get involved. They would be able to say "Oh you don't have insurance? We have just the help you need! Come on in." Instead we are getting "Well we'd really like to help you out, BUT you are a contributing member to society. You work 40+ hours a week and you have insurance. You don't sit at home and have babies just to get money from the state. So we can't help you."

It's pretty bad when a person that is doing everything right in this world like working, paying taxes, contributing to society can't get shit. But a crack whore mom can get knocked up every few years, live off the system, get free housing, free food, and a check that I help pay for can get all the free medical help she wants.

What kind of fucked up world is this?

Some people just really annoy the hell out of me. So we have 2 hump back whales swim up through the San Francisco Bay and on up through the bay into our little neck of the woods. SO WHAT! It's like some great big huge deal now to some people. They are loseing their f'ing minds.

I know that i'm about to reveal a little much in the information department but I don't care at the moment. It's not going to be to hard to find out where I am anyways from previous posts.

I'm at work yesterday and part of my job is to deliver paychecks. So about 5:45 or 6:00 I go out to the ferry boats to deliver our measley boot allowance checks. If you want to call them that. They tax our boot allowance checks at 43% so we only get about 29 bucks. WooHoo! Like where are you going to get a quality pair of work boots for that much manoey?

Sorry. Side tracked there.

So when I get to the first ferry the cars are backed up for a 1/4 mile. All lined up. There are people parking 1/2 mile away and walking to the ferry. so I cross over turn on the rotating light and drive in the wrong lane. I get to gate of the ferry and there is close to 100 people standing around hoping to get a glimpse of the whales. When I walked onto the boat the deckhand asked me to stay at theshack to keep people from going where they don't belong.

No problem I say. I'll stay here for a few minutes. A few minutes turned into a few hours. We had people doing the stupidest things. Trying to climb the pillings and walk out the pier that makes the boat slip. Not designed for walking on. We had news reporters walking out our feul dock. Even though there is a chain across the walkway. I tell one reporter that he can't walk out there. He says you talking to me? Yes. But I'm with the press. I don't care who you are you're not authorized to go out there.

We got people trying to walk down the boat slip. Kinda like a boat ramp. While the ferry is trying to come into the slip! All to get a better view. The worst thing is that some of the local people that just want to cross the ferry to get home can't get to the ferry because of all the looky loos. I'm ashamed to say that my parents were 2 of them. And if I didn't have Summer's truck she would have been too. I hang my head in shame.

I finally had to call my supervisor when we almost had a fight break out. Some guy in the line of cars got tired of waiting so her pushed the car inn front of him forward with his bumper so that he could turn around. Get this: CHP didn't believe my boss so they wouldn't dsend someone.

Finally after I was there for over an hour a local police officer comes out to see what is going on. By that time things have died down. The thriongs of people started to thin out around 7:40 or so. The whales swam further up the river and everyone disperseed. He asks me what has been going on and says if it starts up again to call him. Then when I'm finally ready to leave at around 8:00 a CHP officer shows up. He said he was responding to a call about traffic being back up on the highway. I told him he was a bit late and he should have been there when I called for assistance over an hour ago. by that time the crowd of 100 people went down to 10.

All of this comotion because a stupid whale came out to the wrong place. Everyone was there to get a glimpse of the whale. We had over 13 news vans out there for lve coverage. I'm sure some the coverage went national. You may have even seen me on the news. But here's the kicker. If all these stupid yahoos would have had the sense to stay home they would have seen a lot more than they did by beeing out there. No one there saw a thing. The whales never surfaced in front of our location. But the people at home got to see them on TV.

The even worse part is the whales have to came back through my little delta town to get back out to the ocean. Great. Even more yahoos to deal with when that happens.

All this means is that people that never even heard of this place are all of a sudden going to know about us and want to drive out here. Making traffic worse than it is now.

Nothing new

Things are neither getting better or worse. Just kinda in a limbo state. We had an IEP meeting on Fri. with the school. They had us fill out some paperwork with the county that is asking them for assistance with figuring out whats going on. Just what we need. Someone else to give us the run around. Everyone at the IEP said the same thing- there is no rhyme or reason for the outbursts. There is not one single thing that will set him off. What sets him off today will be perfectly fine tomorrow. What calms him down in the morning will set him off at night. There is no pattern at all. So we are going to try and have him go to school half days instead of full days. See if that makes a difference. We've only got till the 15 of June then school will be out. I told them that we want him in the non public school next year.

Still don't know what that means- non public. To me non public means private. But this is not a public school. Whatever. They are a national school from what I remember. At least they are in several states. Not all of them.

Enough about that. Happier thoughts.

Went fishing again on Fri. This time Summer came along with us. Started off pretty bad. The place we were at was terrible. Every cast we would get snagged. Youngest and I lost at least 3 fish each due to the snags breaking our line. So I got a little upset and went to a different spot. Turned out to be a good move. For me anyways! :D I got 4 catfish there. Summer reeled the first one in. Brat! It was the first fish on that pole and the reel. They were both virgins. She had to go and steal my stuff from me.

I B-B-Q'd some burgers on the beach and my sister came along to sit with us and spend time with the kids. In the middle of us eating she comes out and says "Well I guess it's now tradition in our family that we have some type of "issue" to deal with every 6-7 months. First it's *cousin* then it was *cousins dad*. So I guess now it's my turn."

That was it. That's all she said. How crazy is that shit? Not that she "came out" but that she just said it in that way while we were eating our dinner. So I guess it's hereditary. Interesting. She already told my mom but as of telling us still didn't tell our dad.' She has no intentions of telling grandma though. Grandma took it hard enough with our cousin and then his dad (her son). But she is coping with it. But my sister says it's going to be harder for her to accept that about my sister because she (to put it in her exact words) "plays for both teams, and grandma would see that as a choice". So what if it's a choice. As long as your happy to hell with what others think. That's just me though.


Yesterday we went to the May fair. Rode a few rides, walked the fairgrounds and ate fair food. This section is small because of how small the fair was. We walked the whole thing in an hour.

Almost forgot about the best part of the weekend. After we got home from fishing and got the kids to bed I got my red head back! There is something that is just so sexy about red heads. I've had a thing for red heads since I was a little kid. Well Summer had me dye her hair red for her Fri. night. Not just red but intense red.

When we woke up Sat. morning I had forgotten about it. Till she cam out of the shower. That was it. One look at her with the fiery hair and I just had to have her. So she needed an extra shower. :D

Last of all Happy Mother's day to all the mom's out there.

Things are slow here at work tonight so I'm gonna see what happens as far as creating a post. No promises as to the quality. Someone at work pissed me off tonight and I don't know who to be mad at. I have a bag of chocolate in the freezer at work. I have my name written on the bag of chocolate and my name is in plain view. Last night I thought maybe that a piece or two was missing. So I inventoried it all. Today I come to work and go into the freezer to take out my desert and ALL of my candy bars are gone! All that is left are 3 Cadburry Creme eggs that melted on the way home from the store. What good does it do to put your name on something if no one will honor your name? Now I am out 4 candy bars, and won't be going back to the 99 cent store for another week. At least they left my Hungry Man TV dinners alone. I'm tempted to go in the fridge and drink the RedBull in there that don't have a name on it. But I'm a better person than that.

As I wrote a few weeks ago my cousin was coming up from Costa Rica for some meetings this past week. I met him in Sac on Fri. afternoon and he gave me my box of cigars. I'm stoked! They are bigger than I thought they would be. I was able to find a guy at work that is really into cigars and he gave me a lot of info on humidors and what not. He also gave me 2 catalogs and 2 cigars just to test out. So I ordered my humidor and a few accessories and they should be here this week sometime. Here's the thing. I'm not really interested in smoking the cigars. I'm more into just the novelty aspect of having cigars that came straight from South America and were made from a person who was born and raised in Cuba. That and my cousin said that if I wanted to I could sell them for $20 a piece. I might have him bring me up another box when he returns in June. :D

In other news of my brief visit with my cousin, he and his wife bought a cabin in Oregon a few months ago. While we visited he said that he will send me the calender to the cabin and I can choose any open date I like to go up to use the cabin for a week. So we will try to do that towards the end of July, beginning of August. The really cool thing about the cabin is that it is on a lake and there is no driving to the cabin. It is boat in only. How cool is that?! There is good fishing on the lake, he has a fishing boat, ski boat, jet ski, and "skiff" that is used to get to the cabin from the marina.

So that is the plan for this summer's family vacation. we have gone to Tahoe for the last 3 years in a row. This year it is time to go take in some new scenery. Not that I'm tired of Tahoe. Believe me when I say it is my favorite place in Ca. and I haven't begun to explore all there is to do up there. But something new would be welcomed. Plus I like the secluded aspect of the place. So now we just have to wait for the end of summer to get here.




Sorry for the interruption there. Summer and the boys came to work and brought dinner with them! I got eat dinner with my family. Not only that but it was the first home cooked meal that I have eaten in over 2 weeks. This past weekend for me was hectic. After meeting with my cousin on Fri. I decided that I wasn't going to wait anymore and take the boys out fishing. So off to Subway I went to get dinner and we found a spot on the bank of the river and fished for a few hours. We had great time. youngest enjoyed himself immensely. He actually had plans on staying out fishing all night long. He wanted to stay out till the sun came up. That's a long time since we started fish at around 7:00. Jr. and youngest each caught fish. I didn't fish at all. I just sat back and enjoyed the time with my boys. I have never done that. I usually want to be right out there fishing myself and concentrate on myself catching fish. Not this time though. After we ate youngest came over and sat on my lap for a few hours except for when I was baiting hooks or taking fish off of hooks. Finally about 10:00 he decided that he was tired and wanted to go home to go to sleep. It was such a good time I think I might do it again this Fri. since Summer volunteered to work another Fri. night.

Then on Sat. I volunteered to help my sister move. So that was an all day thing. I got some things out of it though. She gave us her old entertainment center, which used to be my parents, and an old dresser to give to youngest. So when I got home I had to take down the stereo and all that goes with it, move in the new entertainment center, and then try to reattach all the wires in the correct place. Next thing I know it's 9:00 and we still didn't have dinner. So off to Mc Donald's I go to get dinner. I pop in a DVD to watch with dinner realize that I hooked the VCR up to the TV instead of the DVD player. The DVD player video cables were plugged into the surround sound where the VCR was supposed to be. So I had to fight with that to get it right. It's done though. I have conquered the home theatre system. I am man. Here me roar! Now if only I could get the DTS Surround to work between the DVD player and the surround system. They are both DTS ready but when I select DTS no sound comes out. It's annoying. I want the optimal sound with my movie watching experience! Instead I'm stuck with Dolby Digital.

Time for a new system complete with Plasma TV right dear? :D

What else can I right about? Summer is going on her church retreat again this month. I'm actually kinda nervous about it this year. When she was gone last year was when I had the "meltdown" and all that stuff that lead to my being on meds. That would be the time that I wrote this gem of a post. So I'm not looking forward to her going for the weekend. Although it's silly of me to relate her leaving with what was going on at the time.

Sorry

I'm sorry guys. I just haven't been "feeling" it this past week. All of the fasmily issues that have been happening have just taken it's toll on me. I feel drained mentally and physically. I will try to get back to reading and writing soon. Maybe tonight at work. We'll just have to wait and see. Just know that we appreciate all the comments and emails that we have received this week. They mean an awful lot to us.

Til I start "feeling" it again.
CH