Scott Hardy

My buddy Scott just got married today and he has been waiting for this moment all of his life. He is the consummate family man, and he has waited patiently for his true mate all his life. He has remained pure in body and spirit to the ripe old age of 29, which is unfathomable to me. Good luck to him and to his new bride.

Word of the Day

Brobdingnagian \brob-ding-NAG-ee-uhn\
adjective:
Of extraordinary size; gigantic; enormous.

Usage:
Rich, Dan, and Nick laid thier brobdingnagian sacks on the table for all to inspect.

Word of the Day

self·ish
self·ish [sélfish]adj
1. looking after own desires: concerned with your own interests, needs, and wishes while ignoring those of others
2. demonstrating selfishness: showing that personal needs and wishes are thought to be more important than those of other people

usage: The neighboring cottage at Mills Home was extremely selfish in staying on the beach trip an extra day, thereby ensuring that our cottage will have less time to spend there.

Encarta ® World English Dictionary © & (P) 1998-2004 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

The Sox

Well, the Sox just got swept by the Tigers in the last three games before the all-star break. Halfway through the season and we are having quite the year so far. We are first in the majors with 53 wins and 34 losses. Too bad we didn't end the first half on a better note.
On the other side of things, the Yankmees are 10 games behind us at 42 wins and 43 losses. Yay.
Time to gear up for the most important month of the season for us. If we can maintain our lead on the Spankees then maybe they won't make the playoffs and we will take the division.
Sweet.
Round two here we come!

Word of the Day

Obstreperous \

1. uncontrollably noisy

2. stubbornly resistant to control

usage: Rich, you need to get control of your obstreperous wife.

Child - Care Work pt. 2

So there we were, living in a house full of teenage girls. Eight of them in fact, and we had no idea what we were doing. Just a sense that we were supposed to help those less fortunate then ourselves, and a need to feel like we were making a contribution. Some sort of payback for the help that we had received over the years. That is not to say that Molly nor I had a carefree childhood or that things came easily for us as young adults, but we never went without.
Not like some of these kids. It is hard to imagine unless you are born into it, or are related to someone who has these difficulties, that there are so many kids these days that are abused. We had all kinds of kids from all kinds of backgrounds in our care. It's also not like they are all from the same neighborhood either. There were poor Hispanic families, affluent white and black families, and a spattering of middle class families all represented in our cottage. We had societal orphans, kids in the Juvenile Justice system, and kids in DSS custody. Those that had been taken from their homes in the middle of the night because of abuse or neglect.
There was one girl who was 13 when we got there and she worked as a prostitute to help support her household. We had another whose family was so filled with strife that she resorted to cutting herself with razors to escape from it. Her self esteem was so low that she had intercourse with three boys that snuck into her room all in the same night.
Kids raped by family members.
There was one girl that was so mean she rallied the other residents against us and went after Molly (who was pregnant at the time) with a studded belt wrapped around her fist.
How is it that one of the richest and arguably the most powerful nations on the planet can't seem to care adequately for their own? I blame us for all this mess and those generations before us, that as time has gone on have seemed to care less and less for the proper raising of their youth. How do we decline so fast as a nation? Think about it, we are not even 250 yrs old! At this rate it will be a wonder if we still exist in another 250 years. Maybe Christ will come back before all of that happens and then we won't have to worry about it anymore.
More to come...

Word of the Day

n·go·ma [ əng gṓmə ] (plural n·go·mas)
noun East Africa
Definition:

1. drum: a traditional African drum
2. dance party: a social gathering for dancing
[Early 20th century. < Kiswahili, "dance, music"]

Word of the Day

allege
verb meaning to claim that someone has done something illegal or wrong, typically without proof.
-DERIVATIVES alleged >adjective allegedly >adverb.
-ORIGIN originally in the sense 'declare on oath': from Old French esligier, from Latin lis 'lawsuit'; confused in sense with Latin allegare 'allege'.

Child-care work

Ok. Lets talk about what it is that I do. I am a child-care worker. I work for Baptist Children's Homes of NC and have been there for nearly 5 years. I started doing this type of work when my wife decided out of the blue to quit her very good , very high paying job because she wasn't satisfied. We were living in Greenville, NC at the time. I was going to the local community college and working next door at Lowe's Hardware running forklifts and unloading trucks and such. Molly kept running across this child-care worker position at Boys and Girls Homes of NC and she called about it. Well she drove down for and interview with my blessing not really thinking anything was going to come out of it. She didn't know anything about being a houseparent. Nevermind taking care of a house full of rowdy, disadvantaged youth. Well, she never came back. To stay that is. She got the job on the spot. She came back to Greenville to pack her stuff and was headed to Lake Waccamaw. I was hired, sight unseen, to work with her as a couple and when I finished my semester at the community college, I quit Lowe's and moved down there too. Let me tell you, nothing that you can do will prepare you for the job of taking care of a house full of teenagers. Not even raising your own kids.
More to come...

Going home

My (lovely) wife is headed out of town today on a trip to Massachusetts. She is bringing Jordan and Jessica, of course, and will be staying with family most of the time she is up there. Her sister was kind enough and in the position where she could pay for a hotel room for them to stay in for a few days as well. I guess I will be a bachelor for the week. I'm not quite sure what that is going to mean for me. I will be working all sorts of hours at the Drive-Thru this week. My boss will be away, as well as the other guy that works most of the hours when I am not there. My friend Scott has asked that I help him move some furniture that belongs to his girlfriend into his house sometime this week. I will surely help out with that. Rich and Caroline have also recruited me to help them do some painting in their home as well. They claim they have never painted before and frankly the thought of those two with paint, rollers, foam brushes, and other various tools unsupervised scares me. JK. Love those two. Anyway, I am sure I will be busy enough this week that it will preclude me from causing or getting into trouble. Unless of course there will be beer somewhere at this painting party and then it's on. Hand me the camel hair cause Michelangelo is back in town!