News July 14th 2009
Hello from Charles,
As usual here is the bad news first - B's last Red Wag fish died to the ich. She lost 1 just before we went on vacation and then the other 2 when we got back. She is handling it well but I have put on hold buying anymore fish for the tank. Currently we still have S's 3 Tetra and 2 small Algae fish.
My job hunt still continues. Usually notified of an opportunity every couple of days however they are all over the country and at this time I am focusing on the South Eastern States.
A week or so ago the Ants tried another raid on our pantry. They were crawling through the cracks in the wall of the pantry. One of the best tools I have at Seminary is a caulking gun with a tube of silicone caulk. We have used it to close up spider holes and it made quick work of the cracks the ants were coming through. Since doing that I have not seen the ants.
In the past month we drove over 1600 miles on vacation - Through the states of South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennesse. Our van held up well and chose to break down (would not start after Sunday service) the following day after we got back outside of our closest church which considering we did not get in till just before Midnight on Saturday was very fortunate. It would not have been nice to have to try and fix the van so late and in some remote place. Solution to get it going again was to clean off the battery terminals as my Battery Tester said all was okay. However we did go through a Wiper Motor during the only rainstorm of our trip when my wipers stopped moving and made a deathly screech for several seconds. A run to the local part store the next day for a new wiper motor soon fixed that problem.
So our trip consisted of stopping off in Charlotte for a weekend and visiting the folks at church. From there on Monday we headed up to Diane's parents in Ohio. You can see some of what we did in the Photos I have uploaded. The kids enjoyed themselves. On Friday we then headed to the little town of Gallion Ohio where one of Diane's brothers lives and spent the night there. Was surprised to find out on Ebay that Gallion is the home for the GhostBusters Mobile It was just for sale there.
From her brothers house on Saturday we headed to Columbus and visited the Science Museum which is great fun for kids. They got to play with water cannons, go inside a real submarine and do other fun stuff. We left Columbus about 1:30 pm and drove non-stop back to Decatur, arriving just before Midnight.
This week the kids are both in Camp. S in Soccer and B in Swim / Tennis. Both of them seem to be having fun. S is at camp with our old neighbor's kids and so afterwards they have a daily play date either at their house or ours including B. B passed her swim test today which allows her to be in the deep end. I had no fear that she would not pass since she is able to swim to the bottom of the deep end and pick stuff up.
Diane is enjoying her summer off and getting in a lot of sewing which she enjoys. B was even putting together a shirt for her American girl doll the other day.
So all is going well just now and it should just be a matter of time before I find a new job. In the meantime I enjoy getting the opportunity to play with my kids and watch the Tour De France live on TV.
Cheers,
Charles