Sweet Freedom

Possibly only Mike will get the Michael McDonald reference, but oh well. Anyways, another update for you. Hopefully I don't curse him, but my dad's out of the hospital again. He was let out Friday afternoon, and is doing pretty well. Knock on wood he doesn't make yet another trip there. I'm sure the nurses are pretty sick of him by this point. Thanks for all the good thoughts!

Frustration

I'm sure some of you are looking for an update on my dad, so here it is. It's been a frustrating week. Last Saturday he went back to the hospital again because of some atrial fibrillation. The episode on Saturday morning was the (new) scariest moment of my life because it caused his defibrillator to go off, which is absolutely horrible to watch. He's had a few more cases of fibrillation this week, although his defibrillator was set higher, so it doesn't go off. They've been trying some different drugs this week to help with the fibrillation, but so far they haven't worked too well. I guess there's a different drug they can try, but it's pretty rough, and makes you pretty nauseous.

In any case, while the fibrillation is serious, it's not as bad as ventricular tachycardia, which he is not experiencing. The fibrillation is somewhat common in patients who've had open heart surgery, and should lessen as the swelling goes down in his chest. Unfortunately that could take a couple of weeks. So like my friend Hye says, please send some good thoughts my dad's way. I'm sure he'll appreciate it.

A Free Car? I'll Take It.

Winter in Minnesota brings snow, sometimes lots of it. Unfortunately, the Porsche and snow are incompatible, and pretty much mutually exclusive. Seeing as I had no other form of transportation, I needed something, preferably inexpensive. I lucked out that my brother is moving to LaLaLand and no longer needed my parent's old '94 Explorer. Sweet!My parent's only condition when taking the car was to get rid of it. As in, my title, my insurance, they wanted nothing more to do with it. Having spent a year or so in the care (or lack thereof) of my brother, it wasn't in the best shape, but a free car is better than no car. A few areas of rust, non-functional 4 wheel drive, less than ideal heat, a missing passenger window and horrible gas mileage were the biggest concerns. Or so I thought.

On Wednesday I had the passenger window replaced. No more duct tape and plastic, and a relatively quiet ride. Except when turning left, which hummed, and starting/stopping, which clunked. How bad can those noises be? Well, about $1000 bad. Seems that the left wheel bearings are completely shot, and that two bushings are missing(!) and a rubbing suspension arm are the culprits. I've had the car 4 days, and I've had to drop $1250 on it. But the mechanic said that beyond the suspension parts, the car is in remarkable shape for having 178,000 miles on it. Prior to my possession, the car had the brakes and shocks replaced, so if I get 10k miles out of it without laying out more cash, I'll be happy.

(Not My) Home Repairs

So as I relayed yesterday, I am in O-town, hangin out, and doing some minor things around the house for my parents. It seems that their disposal went out, a few days after everyone left for Christmas. According to my dad, the previous disposer was approximately 17 years old, and just couldn't cut it anymore. I agreed to tackle the job, not aware of what I would face.

Now, I'm by no means a very handy man. I've done minor plumbing before, but what should have taken 3 hours, instead took 3 days. But how hard can a disposal be?
The old unit. As you can see, I've already begun disassembly. I ran into a serious problem right off the bat. The ring that holds the unit up had been there for a while. And it wasn't gonna go without a fight. The ring was rusted solid together. I tried all sorts of screwdrivers, hammers, and penetrating oil to no use. This called for more serious determination.

The serious determination. I'll just bend the shit out of the flange, and it will come out the bottom! That metal looks thin, but it was a pain to bend like that. I only had to bend a bit more than shown, and the unit fell out.

Dead disposal.

The glorious new unit! The In-Sink-Erator Evolution Compact. It doesn't really need a name like that. Anyways, installation was much easier than removal, and required almost no work. This thing is so quiet you can hardly tell it's working. I'm impressed.

While I did the disposal, I also re-sealed the sink to the counter, as it had begun to leak, and was knocked loose when trying to remove the old disposal. Tonight I'll try to fix the faucet, which is also leaking a little bit. I'm afraid I'll just break something worse, and then have a real problem.

Is The Opposite of Progress, Congress?

Like Ms Paula Abdul sang, two steps forward, one step back. Or something like that.

So my dad is back in the hospital tonight. A couple of scares this afternoon/evening. I came down for work today, and to help around the house some. Update on that tomorrow. But while talking to my dad after dinner, I headed into the kitchen. He doesn't respond to my question, so I go back into the living room, where it looks like he's sleeping, although we were just having a conversation. I shake him and ask if he's alright, and he kind of wakes, looks at me, and is totally out of it. About 4 seconds later he comes back to, and is feeling weird. It's called a syncopy, and it happened three times today, the final time while at the hospital.

At the hospital, they said everything is looking good with his heart and blood pressure. Although his asthma seems to have come back a bit, and that could be causing the syncopy. It seems to happen when he is trying to cough and clear his throat. They decided to keep him overnight to monitor him and get a good reading on his heart rhythm if it happens again.

All I can say, is that is by far the most scared I've ever been in my entire life.

Update:

After a night in the hospital, he's coming home. The syncopy is harmless and isn't related to his heart or bypass. Good news.

Culture and Dad Update

On Thursday, Kelsey and I went to the Minnesota Orchestra, to see the 1812 Overture. It was a special show to pay tribute to Antal Dorati, one of the previous conductors. The current conductor, Osmo Vänskä, is hilarious to watch, in my opinion. He seems to be a small little man, with lots of energy, and dances around as he conducts. The opening piece was Hungarian Rhapsody no 2, which you would recognize if you heard it. The second piece was composed by Dorati himself, and they had a guest cellist. It may have been the worst classical music I've ever heard. It sounded like the lead cello and orchestra were playing completely different pieces, at different tempos. Fortunately there were some much better pieces after the intermission, include the 1812 Overture itself. I love that song. And, I may sound foolish, but I learned that it was composed for the Russian repelling of Napolean in 1812, NOT the US War of 1812, as I had thought.

And because I know you'll want to know, my dad is doing well. He is walking around the floor of the hospital, and will be going home on Saturday. He'll probably be off of work for the next 4 weeks or so, and then back on a part time basis for a while. I'm heading down Monday morning to see him and the rest of the family.

Hail to the Victors!

If you remember back to early September, I posted about the AGRA Fantasy Football draft. At the time, I said I was "cautiously optimistic." The first three weeks soon showed how fickly the NFL can be. I was 0-3, one of the lowest scoring teams in the league. My hope, fading. But then, my luck began to turn. 1-3. Then 2-3. Along the way I jettisoned some fading stars (Rod Smith, I'm looking at you!) Soon I had ripped off 10 straight wins, bringing me within reach of Brendan, and his cursed running back, LT. The last four weeks were thrilling, with a couple losses and a few wins, until Tiki pulled thru for me in week 17. Miraculously, I was the AGRA Champion!

I really can't say how much fun I think our league is. It's got staying power and consistent ownership. It really makes it a lot more interesting when you know everyone and there's history and rivalries. Here's to AGRA 2007!

New (Impractical) Toy

I guess the very definition of toy implies impractical. And it isn't really new, unless you count new-to-me. But after a long time of looking, I've finally got what I've wanted for so long.

A Porsche.

It's a 1987 Porsche 944 Turbo, also known as a Type 951. It's in beautiful condition for a 20 year old car, and goes like hell. I wasn't enamored with the Guards Red, but it's hard to find one in any other color. It has 17" Fikse wheels on it, and a number of modifications. I took a couple of coworkers out for rides, and I'm pretty sure they were quite impressed.

This is a spring to fall car exclusively, so it's been put away for the rest of winter. Today was it's romp in the sun. I've already sent for the Porsche Club of America application.

Everything Will Be Alright

So, most of you probably don't know this (or maybe you do), but my dad had heart bypass surgery this morning. Just so you know, I guess he did just fine, and everything is looking good. He had felt a tinge of something last week, and had a catheterization on Monday, where they found some of his arteries were 80% blocked. Genetics is not on his side on this. He had stents put in about 8 years ago, and they were all clogged. His cardiologist had decided to do a triple bypass, but it looks like it turned out to be a quintuple once they were in there.

Hopefully this will finally prod his stubborn ass into eating right, exercising, and losing some weight. Although if his previous laundry list of ailments didn't do it, I'm not all that optimistic. But one can hope.

For anyone who's interested, he's staying at Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center (of course). If you wish to call, ask for patient Jan Jarvinen, and not employee Jan Jarvinen. Hopefully he'll be back home this weekend.

Closet Re-org

One of the least desirable aspects of my home is the craptacular closets. The master bedroom closet was just a steel pole across and a cheap piece of warped wood on top. This leads to awesome closet organization like this:The second picture isn't even as bad as usual, because most of my clothes are still enroute from Hong Kong. Hopefully they arrive this week.

Anyways, it was time to do something. And Home Depot was there to help! First step, remove all clothes and place on the bed. This meant sleeping in the guest room for 4 nights or so. (I'm slow, and it was a holiday weekend)Next, prime and repaint the closet. Fortunately there was left over paint from the living room, so the closet is now tan/brown.Finally, install ClosetMaid organization kit. This only took approximately 16 trips to The Home Depot, mostly because I failed at measurement and remembering things. But the finished product looks good, and is much more functional than before. And I only screwed up a couple of times.Still waiting on those clothes.

New Year's Eve @ Maxwell's

Mike and I have finally learned our lesson. No more New Year's parties. Mark it. Remind me of it often. This year's party was a lot of fun, and more intimate, but we STILL fell short of our goal. You live, you learn, I guess. We still had a great time no matter what.

Kelsey and I to begin the night.
Josh and Polly, who are newly engaged! Congratulations!Heidi, Abby and Megan.Alicia and Rachel.Derek and Haley. Nicole stayed in Germany, and couldn't make the party.The fellas.Football, aka Mr Bryan Anderson.The men responsible for our refreshments! Thank you, sirs. Group shot, featuring another recently engaged couple, Aaron Zimmerman and Erin Peck. Another congratulations! Like someone mentioned, diamonds must be contagious.No diamonds here.Anton and Mitch, with nearly matching shirts.Haley's friends were a little out of control! Lots of fun though.Wee and Kelly. These two met at the last event at Maxwell's and now they're married. A good party overall. Like last year, the snow seemed to keep people away, but that's okay. You only live once.