What a Wonderful Wife

It's been 17 years (to the exact day - it was a Friday, it's now Friday) since we held a small ceremony in my father-in-law's church.  17 years where things have been up, down, sideways, bent, spent and mutilated.  17 years that I don't regret for even a moment.  As Garth Brooks said in "The Dance", "I could've missed the pain, but then I would've missed the dance."


For Better or For Worse - We've had rocky patches over the years.  What pair if humans can live in close confines with another without SOME disagreements? And if you says "My parents didn't fight", I just say - they were better at hiding it.  It's natural to disagree, even with your mate.  What's not natural is for you to allow that disagreement to come between you.  We've had to work hard (extremely hard at some points) to manage the disagreements in a healthy manner, but we did.  Still together 17 years later and she's still my best friend.

For Richer and For Poorer - We've never been rich, money-wise.  Many years ago, we made a decision that I do not regret.  Even knowing what I do now, I'd still make the same decision.  We decided that the best thing for the children (of which we have been blessed with four) would be She Who Must Be Adored would remain home with them.  It's made it ... interesting ... from time to time dealing with a single income, but with loving family on both sides, we've managed to survive.  Seeing the way the kids have turned out, we would do it again. She Who Must Be Adored is a wonderful mother (even if she doesn't always think so) that has done right so far by her kids.  Oh, and by me.  But I tend to forget about me.  :)

In Sickness and In Health - Both of us have health issues that make it difficult sometimes.  Between her health issues and my fibromyalgia (and associated conditions), it's been difficult sometimes.  When the pain or the depression hits so bad that it's hard for the other person to understand what's going on, that's when we depend on each other the most.  I know that I would've been hard pressed to make it through the last couple years as the FMS symptoms have gotten worse and my arthritis has become almost unbearable, at times.  Having the support of a loving, caring mate has helped me get through the worst of it.  Having her and the kids in my life gives me a reason to push myself to not allow this disease to beat me.  From the bottom of my heart, her unwavering support for me during this time says more than she's ever been able to vocalize (and since she's where the kids got their chatterbox tendencies from ... that's saying something.  :D )

Til Death Do Us Part - Today marks the start of our 18th year of marriage (21st year of being a couple).  For me, it's just a down payment on the time we're going to spend together.  She Who Must Be Adored completes me (and this is just one of the reasons she must be Adored.  :) When we aren't together (I'm away on business or she's off with the kids somewhere for a couple days, what-have-you), I feel a chunk of myself missing.  The bed feels empty.  The house echos.  There's a feeling of missing something.  When she returns, all of the emptiness is filled again and I feel complete, once more.

For my beautiful wife, thank you for making the last 17 years special for me.  Happy Anniversary, love, and here's to another 53 years.  'cause 70 years together has that nice round feeling to it, don't it?

Things I Am Thankful For

There are many things in this life that I am thankful for.

I am thankful for:

•  My wife.  After almost 17 years together, she's still by my side.  Considering how much of a stubborn, pigheaded, grumpy pain-in-the-neck I can be, well, this definitely tops my list for this year.
• My family - my wife's been nice enough to play host to four wonderful children.  They are smart, talented and the light of our lives.  I might not show it to them as often as I should, but I very proud of the people they are growing up to be.
• My extended immediate family.  I'm thankful that I've got family in the area that are more than willing to help when we need a hand.  I'm thankful that they are there.  Our lives would be much less without them in it.  From my mother and brother (the one that's in town) and the other brother and his wife (both of whom moved off to Texas and rarely wander back this way).  On the wife's side, I'm thankful that her mom and dad have both accepted me into their family with open arms.  They've even gone so far as to make the same invitation to the rest of my side of the family in town.  They're a very loving and generous couple.
• My health - as miserable as I am due to health issues, I am very thankful I can still function relatively normally.  On any given day, it's in doubt, but on average, my health is reasonable enough to let me live a semi-normal life.
• My job - Given the current economy, I'm truly grateful to still be employed.  Pay cuts hurt, but being unemployed hurts worse.  With my health making it difficult some days to be at work, the fact that I'm still employed, even with the health issues, makes me very grateful.
• Our cats - It's little things in life, like watching two fuzzy friends grow from a small kitten to full size cats that make the world seem even more amazing.  Guen and Bel are both very opinionated furballs but definitely members of the family.  Guen loves to come and lay beside a family member that's not feeling well.  She'll lean up against them and just lay there purring and keeping them company.  A little ray of sunshine to make it easier to deal with illnesses and fatigue. Bel (aka Bellatrix and Mud depending on what she's up to) is just like another kid in the house.  She's cute, she knows it, and she intends to use it against us.  :) She's also a very loving little pest that tries help make everyone feel better.

There are many other things in my life that I'm thankful for.  I just wanted to hit the highlights for everyone to see, here.

Stupid People are Stupid

I really don't know which part of this story gets my goat more - the fact that the local NBC station is going into PSH over it or the guy thought he could bring a loaded weapon (even if the weapon itself was not loaded, his magazines were, ergo...) in his carry-on luggage. Note - I wanted to include the TSA in that little rant, but it appears that the TSA found it during screening, before the passenger could board a plane.

To summarize - a passenger attempted to bring a Ruger .45 and ammunition past security at Richmond International Airport earlier this morning.  Why this qualifies as BREAKING NEWS 5 hours after the fact ... I'll leave that for y'all to figure out.

Now, the guy could've very easily forgotten it was there if he routinely carries in the bag he had on the plane.  I know I've had items in my laptop bag that would've made airport security rather ... excited ... if they'd found them.  :P  While explanatory, it's not exculpatory.  It was a stupid move.  If you're transporting your weapons (and yourself) by plane, follow the rules and procedures.  Yes, it's a pain in the butt.  Yes, it's an intrusion into privacy, etc. etc.  But (and it's a big but), it prevents you from violating any number of federal laws.  Which means, you'll be able to keep that nice, shiny CHP (oh, and the firearms, too) that the Commonwealth of Virginia was nice enough to issue to you.

The local station is starting to get on my nerves with the hysterical rants about guns, lately.  Now, I know this isn't a change for them, it's just that I've started paying more attention to articles/stories about gun usage.  We've had several stories over the past couple weeks that the hysteria became in-your-face-obvious.  The first was a local deputy that used a personal weapon (not even his duty sidearm) to defend himself and his home from a burglar.  The local papers and TV news tried to play the story off as a vigilante mission by the deputy and were making calls for something to be done to the deputy.  Now, VA is NOT a Castle Doctrine state (yet, that is).  The legal precedents in the local courts strongly lean that direction, however.  The deputy was doing what any homeowner should be allowed to do - protect himself.  Almost two weeks later, the state police are still investigating, but likely won't do anything to the deputy.  However, the article makes it sound like the homeowner was in the wrong for shooting someone WHO BROKE INTO HIS HOUSE and THREATENED HIS FAMILY.

The second story happened just this past weekend and is making the rounds of the gun blogs.  Sebastian at Shall Not Be Questioned is just one example of the reaction.  Now, the guy was carrying a loaded Glock in his waistband without a holster.  Definitely falls into the category of Less Than Intelligent Moves.  Guy did something stupid and paid the price.  His wife is quoted as seeing him move it around when it went off.  GAAAAH!  Modern firearms (yes, even Glocks) don't just "go off".  On a bad day, surrounded by idiots, *I* am more likely to "just go off" than your standard firearm.  Holsters, in this case, are good for two things - making sure that the weapon doesn't randomly drop out and keeping outside objects from interacting with the bang switch.  Especially your finger.  The local coverage of this story played up the "evil gun decided to take the guy's life" angle instead of using it as a reinforcement of the importance of safety.  Yes, the man was less than bright for carrying that way.  A $10 piece of cheap plastic would've done him better.  Playing to peoples' fear, instead of using it as a means to instruct, is just sad.

I better stop this here, because the more I think on this, the angrier I get, and my co-workers would rather I keep the angry mumbling to a minimum.