Sick daughter

Well, Friday was more of the same.

Just as I was getting ready to leave work, there was a problem with the logging of the jobs in the data warehouse. I made Darren aware of this and sent him some information. He left me an email stating that Tom would want to look at it and I assumed that he would call Tom in on this. Later that night I got an email that one of my jobs had finished working on my blackberry, so I assumed that everything would be fine. I was wrong.

When I arrived home Friday evening, I found that my daughter was asleep in our bed. She seems to have some flu-like symptoms (although she isn't throwing up). My wife took care of her through everything. I was really grateful for that. I slept on the couch both Friday evening as well as Saturday evening. My wife slept on the couch in our room on those same two nights while our daughter was in our King size bed. I slept OK, but not wonderful, and I am sure the same is true of my beautiful wife. I love her and all that she does for our family.

Soon after waking up Saturday morning, I got looking at the blackberry that work has given me and found that I didn't get notification of the main jobs finishing, but I did get notification of another job that finished and I got notified of a problem (that really wasn't a problem) based on what had or had not happened. When I logged into work from home, I found that the jobs weren't logging as I had thought. I decided to call Tom, but he wasn't at home and he wasn't by his cell phone. I made a couple of calls and played around with a few things (bouncing the server and such) but to no avail. Paul mentioned that I should clear the log out with a job that does that weekly and I ran that job. The problem was, it took down the logging and it didn't come back up.

Tom finally called me back because he saw that I had tried to call him a few times. I let him know what was going on (or what was supposed to be going on) and despite dropped calls from my blackberry, we were getting some things done. I had to call him on my land line. That was kind of bad because he would call back on the land line and wake up my daughter who was trying to sleep.

In between what I was doing at work, I was also taking care of some of the laundry. But, I ended up working most of the day on Saturday. Things were finally fixed, and I was able to run my jobs from the night before. I was glad to get it all done. I finished up, just before my 6:00 PM Saturday jobs kicked off.

This morning, I checked my blackberry again, and it seems that one set of my jobs did not kick off at 7:00, so I had to get up and manually kick off those jobs. I am going to have to find out on Monday what happened there.

Our daughter was still sick, and my wife knew that the two students in her class would not be there, so she volunteered to stay home with her. My son and I went to church and it was Ward Conference. The Young Men and Young Women met together and I went in to be with them. They had the Stake Young Women President and Stake Young Men President speak to them as well as our bishop. Overall, it was a good meeting.

Before I went to class, I talked with Bishop Dial (from another ward) and he talked to me a bit about my daughter and one of the youth in his ward. I then went to Sunday School. Not much in there that was new (of course there usually isn't).

Our daughter seems to be doing a bit better tonight, and hopefully she will be well enough to go to school in the morning. We really didn't do too much tonight. I played a little bit on my sons Ipod Touch as well as the Wii system that we have. My wife and daughter watched the Academy Awards and that was about it for the night.

A couple of Thoughts

I know it's hard to believe that I have thoughts, but I do have one or two.

First of all, I am going to mention that last night we all went to a concert that was a combined concert which involved both of our children. Bingham High had what they called a "Monster" concert. It was Bingham High with the South Jordan Middle School and Elk Ridge Middle School. This concert was done in an effort to get to know the 9th graders and get them ready for band at the high school. With all the changes going on currently, they are afraid they will not get enough members into the band. First of all, there is the Herriman high that is being built and then add to that the split up of the Jordan School District. I certainly hope the band program doesn't go down as a casualty. For my own personal family, we need three more years of a good program. But even then, it shouldn't go down in flames. The state legislature isn't making any of this easy either. They seem to be messing with the arts programs in the schools which will be a huge mistake.

Anyway, the concert was quite enjoyable. We listened to a couple of songs from South Jordan Middle School, then a couple of songs from Elk Ridge Middle School. Both of these bands did quite well and my wife and I were impressed. My daughters school band has improved from Christmas time even. That was good to see. Finally, there were a couple of songs played by Bingham High School. Then to end it out they brought up the other two schools with the Bingham High Band. It took them a long time to get situated because they have never practiced with each other, but they played quite well. I was impressed with my daughter and my son for their performances in this combined band. My son had to go back to school again tonight to play for another group.

Well, I titled this a couple of thoughts. Today I was reading a book called "We Plan, God Laughs" written by a rabbi minister named Sherre Hirsch. Near the end of the book she writes about Moses asking God His name. She then writes that Gods response was. "Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh" or "I will be what I will be". In the King James version this is, I Am that I Am. I found this intersting because my own religion believes that God continues to move on. She says that Moses knew that God doesn't stay put, that He moves on. God sees himself as a work in progress. She then compares us to God saying that we too are works in progress. Then she says that the Torah teaches us "For a person to be like God, he must be a partner in the act of creation". She talks about each day we work with God our position shifts.

I was thinking that this fits in very comfortably with my own LDS beliefs. It was refreshing to see this coming from somebody who studies the Old time religion. Another point of interest was when she discussed that doubt and faith are not in opposition to each other, but rather doubt is a component of faith. She used examples of Moses doubting as well as another prophet (I think she said Gideon). This didn't make them any less of prophets, but they did not lose faith through doubt. Another person we can point to is doubting Thomas. Thomas waited until he saw the Lord and Savior resurrected, but once he did, his faith was enhanced. Well, that is the real reason I decided to write anything tonight. Just a couple of insights.

Nothing much

I just thought I better put something here so people know that I am not dead. There really isn't anything to report though. Things have just been the same.

I am disturbed about one thing in my life right now. I got a subpoena to go to court from the accident I was in a few months ago. The other guy is fighting his ticket on that. I am being called as a witness. I hate going to court, especially when it is no benefit to me. It makes me nervous to be on the stand. And, although I have been told this shouldn't affect the insurance or me as far as the fixing of the vehicles, it still makes me wonder. Anyway, that court date is set to March 10th.

Winter Camp

There isn't a lot going on right now, but I had better write while some stuff is fresh in my mind.

Not a lot happened on Friday during the day. I left work (a little early) so I could get home and get some stuff together for the Winter Camp at Camp Tracy. I had put the stuff together mostly the previous night, but had to get it out into the car. I also stopped into Pep Boys to get a filter for my car and a headlight for the Pilot. The filter was fine, but I tried to put the headlight into the Honda Pilot and they had given me the wrong one. This made me a little bit late over to Glens house but that was OK because nobody else was there either.

Finally, all seven boys that were going up showed up and were ready to go. We had Glen, Scott and me as the leaders taking these boys. Scott is one of the boys fathers and he is a good man to have around. We drove the three vehicles up, and I wasn't sure if they would allow me to sleep in the lodge or not instead of in the tent site with the rest of the group. I wouldn't sleep in the tent site because then I would have cold air being driven directly to my lungs via the C-pap machine that I have to take with me. I would've come home if that were the case. It wasn't. They said I could sleep in the lodge but they would probably have staff up and playing around really late.

The boys had a hard time getting their tent up. The stakes weren't going through the ice as easily as they thought it should be. We told them they couldn't eat dinner until their tent was up and gave them some incentive. It went up a bit more quickly then.

We all headed over for the dinner and nobody complained about it. After dinner, Glen started carving and some of the boys headed up to take their finger printing merit badge. This was done in good time and then some of them started to carve. I went out to look at others who were going down the tubing hill. I talked with a leader from another troop for awhile, and he was interested in my blackberry storm. I let him play with it for a little bit and then went back to the lodge. It was at this point that some of the boys decided to go down the hill. We also found that two of our boys didn't think to bring their own boots. We told them they couldn't go down the hill that night without the boots because we didn't want any frozen toes from the cold all night long. Scott ended up letting one of them go down the hill anyway. He felt bad for him and those puppy dog eyes. They close the hill down around 9:45.

In the meantime, I went back to the lodge where they had started a bingo game and had other activities going around. They then had a camp fire program. There was nothing else to do, so we were there with them. I met up with Elden Read from a previous ward I had been in many years ago. My wife still does his wife's hair, and it was interesting to see him there. In talking with him, I found out that he has been a bishop since April of last year. He was there for the two deep leadership from his ward, but they only had two deacons (one being his son).

The camp fire program was kind of lame (as they usually are), but the boys seemed to enjoy the stupidity of it. I guess it has its place and it is good clean fun. There was one troop there that had about 50 boys in it. They were a Samoan troop and were from the Samoan ward. I talked with a couple of them and they seemed like a bunch of good guys although they didn't have as many leaders as they should. The leader ran them like an Army unit. I didn't like that much, but who am I to tell them I thought they were nuts (most of them are a lot bigger than me).

Finally, we got all the boys out of there and ready for bed. I was able to put up my cot in a corner in the lodge and got ready for bed. I was left alone for a bit, and I put in my earplugs and got into bed. It wasn't long after that that the staff came down and played a bit with the fire. They were there until somewhere between two or three in the morning. I woke up periodically and looked at them and they at me with my mask on my face. They kept me up a little bit but not a lot. I didn't get the best rest of my life but it wasn't because of discomfort but rather them periodically. The kitchen crew came in around 5:30 in the morning, and I got up around 6:00. This made for a tired day all day long.

I put my stuff away and took it all to my car. I then wandered the camp for a bit. When that got a bit boring, I looked around at some news on my blackberry as I watched the Samoan troop get up and do some exercising. I couldn't believe that they would get all of them to do this exercising. Finally, my own troop woke up and we headed to breakfast.

After breakfast, we headed to the tubing hill. This time I had put on my snow pants and was ready to go down the hill with them. Some of the boys were surprised that a leader would actually go down the hill with them. I had a relatively fast tube as well. I do have to say that the climb up the hill was a little bit taxing to this old man. I did some more wandering around the camp looking in on those doing the wood carving and then took some of the boys to the rifle range. We had lunch, and then it was time to go. It took a little while for the boys to get their tent down.

While the boys were taking down their tent, I got a call from my wife. She was wondering how long we would be. There wasn't very good reception so we really weren't able to talk, but I knew that something was wrong. As we were heading out, and I got to a better place to call from, I gave her a call. Sure enough, she was upset. It seems that Brandon has been stealing from his grandma (my wife's mother) for quite a few years by electronically paying his bills. We don't understand this at all since she has been so good to him through the years and helped in raising him. She has also helped him out of hard places through various points in his life (including last month). How he could come to her for help after helping himself all these years, I just don't understand.

I dropped the boys off at Glens home and then headed home myself. While I showered, my wife went to pick up a birthday present for her sister. We then headed over to my in-laws house to celebrate a birthday. We found out that you don't want to go to Chuck-a-Rama at 5:00 on a Saturday evening. The place was crowded. We did have fun though.

When we went back, I was feeling way tired from my day and I tried to take a nap. A little later my son was complaining about his Ipod and I looked up a site on my blackberry telling him how to reset it. This took care of the problem.

We came home soon after that. I went to bed almost immediately upon arriving home.

This morning, we woke up and prepared for church. I went to Deacons quorum and they weren't very well behaved today. We got through the lesson that Andrew had prepared though, and let them know that they had to be a bit more reverent and respectful to the person giving the lesson. Since Ally didn't show up, my wife was able to go to Relief Society and then to Sunday School. After Sunday School we were invited to go to a Empty Nester's group tomorrow evening because we are getting pretty close to the age of some of the people in that group (even though I don't feel we're that old). Because of where we are, we don't quite fit with others that have kids our kids age. Anyway, that should be kind of interesting.

Well, that's the last couple of days. More to come later.

Father has great view of son's accomplishment

There really isn't a lot to say, but I thought I would put an article here that was written about my brother and my nephew. It was quite good.

Father has great view of son’s accomplishment
by JIM GREEN
Clayton News-Star Feb 4th

Randy Rose never had the opportunity to see his son, Oran, perform on the wrestling mat.

But on Saturday, Randy Rose was in a better place and had a great view for his son’s transformation into a championship competitor. He had to be smiling from heaven, tremendously proud of his child’s accomplishment.

Oran Rose became a champion when he won three matches in the 145-pound weight class, all by pinfall, in the Greater Neuse River 4A Conference Tournament Saturday in Smithfield.

Randy Rose was killed in an automobile accident in the summer of 2006 when Oran was 15 years old. He was the last one to coach Oran in youth baseball that summer. While Oran’s siblings Alan, Gordon, Karen and Brian pursued soccer and baseball growing up, his mother – Eileen – wanted him to be the wrestler (and also football player) in the family.

Unsure of what to expect, Rose – who didn’t make the junior varsity baseball team at CHS that spring – decided to pursue football in the fall and wrestling that winter, three years ago.

“My mom always wanted a wrestler and a football player,” he said. “I am the only one in our family to do that. All my other siblings played soccer and baseball.”

Undersized but displaying a solid work ethic and tremendous heart, Rose became a wide receiver on a team that doesn’t throw the ball much. He still has made some catches on the gridiron and never used the lack of size as an excuse.

But it is on the mat where Oran has found his niche – particularly this season.

The junior termed this season as “amazing.”

“I came into the season hoping to be on varsity and get some matches,” he said. “I didn’t have a good season last year and didn’t have any idea of what my season would be like this year.”

Rose won several matches this year but was still not sure of his fate. He drew inspiration from teammate Shane Johnson, who reached the finals of the 137-pound weight class in last year’s tourney and took second place.

“Last year I was really inspired watching Shane,” he said. “This year, I wanted to become a better wrestler. To be a conference champion – even second or third, just to place – was my goal. This year was my year.”

After winning his first two matches by pin, Rose faced Knightdale’s Travis Newton in the 145 title match. Newton had pinned Rose earlier this season.

“I knew exactly what I was going to do this time. I had to beat him,” Rose said. “I knew if I stuck to what I knew and what my coaches had taught me, I could come up with a win.”

When the referee’s hand slapped the mat for Rose’s title win, he got up and smiled as he had his hand raised. The first person he thought of was his dad.

“After the match, Coach Jack (Sibrizzi) gave me a hug and I thought I was hugging my dad,” Rose said. Fighting back tears, he said softly, “It felt so good.”

Rose said he felt his father was guiding him these past three years as the team went through several coaches.

“I think the main thing I get from him is my drive to do things,” he said. “My dad would always stick with something. No matter what happened, he would always keep going.”

Rose said he felt his father helping him even during the worst of times, when the program was suffering from a lack of leadership and direction.

“I felt like he was telling me to keep working harder, whereas before, I didn’t have much drive to keep with (wrestling) in my freshman and sophomore years because we had different coaches telling me different things,” he said.

Rose gives a lot of credit to his new coaches, Scott Hadding and Sibrizzi.

“They have helped me and our team a lot,” he said. “We actually have a program this year and believe we can only get better.”

Hadding said Rose has never used his father’s death as an excuse.

“He never has used that as a crutch,” Hadding said. “He doesn’t want that to define who he is; he wants to be treated like everybody else. He never opts out of drills and usually the one leading them – he’s our Energizer bunny. To do all the things he does within the community (school, church and athletics) because he’s such a well-rounded kid, and to come to wrestling and accomplish what he has this year, is a testament to his hard work. His work ethic is paying dividends because in baseball, soccer and football he has always been undersized. Wrestling is the one sport where he gets to compete against kids his own size.”

It is not uncommon for kids who lose their parents at a young age to just shut down. Rose never did that, in part due to the support system he has around him. In talking with him, it’s easy to tell he draws inspiration from his father and mother, who have been his biggest supporters.

His mom is his biggest cheerleader, telling him he can accomplish anything he wants.

Oran Rose became a conference champion in wrestling on Saturday. His mom was there, as proud as any mother could be of a child.

Even if he hadn’t won the conference title, Oran Rose is a champion because he has never given up pursuing his dreams despite the adversity he’s faced.

Randy Rose is looking down from above, smiling. He is proud of Oran, medal or no medal.

It's been over a week since I last put something in here. There really isn't too much to tell though. It has been a regular week. From work I did get a new cell phone that I have been playing with. It is the Blackberry Storm. I have been having fun playing around with the various features that it has. I have also been playing around on the Internet to see how that goes.

On Saturday, we had Pam and Anne come over for a haircut and color. They brought Zach with them. I had started to work on our bathroom faucet which was leaking. I talked to some people and did what they said in taking it apart, but it didn't come apart. I broke it in trying to get it apart. This made it so I had to buy a new faucet for that third bathroom. I got it installed OK, and it is a fancier model than what we had before.

Also, on Saturday, Zach decided to stay over at our house so he could go see a movie with us. My wife was too tired to go, so I went with him to watch Valkyrie. It was a great movie, but not one to watch if you want a feel good movie. Sometimes these movies based on real events don't come out too good. I mean I knew they would fail, I just didn't know if they would be killed or not. You have this hope that they will get away with it, but then in the end, that doesn't happen. I think my wife was glad she didn't go to it. Our two kids went to Mall Cop. They said it was kind of a stupid movie.

Sunday, after church, we headed over to the in-laws house for a Superbowl party. We had made some Little Smokies with Sweet Baby Rays Barbecue sauce, as well as took some crackers and Christmas cocktail (cranberries with jalapenos and other stuff), as well as some fruit and vegetable trays. Pam and Anne brought some chicken, ribs, and Mexican corn. It was quite enjoyable just being around family. I can't say that we watched too much of the game though.

Well, that's about it.