Life Choices

At what point in life does a person go from being spontaneous to overly stable? I used to be severly spontaneous, almost to a fault. I used to be all about the "life story". I would do something just say I did it. Never really giving thought to the outcome, or how many times Sadie was going to have to take jogging class because of my..."hey get in the truck, road trip!" Stuff like that I used to do all the time, granted I didn't have a morrage, a truck payment each month, and I didn't have to really work for my spending money. Now I don't even like to put gas in my tank because I don't like to see my bank account go down. I always think twice about going somewhere because that's money I really don't have to spend. Grown up life sucks sometimes. I'm not saying I hate my life or that it's not fun. We find ways to have a great time without spending a lot of money, but it's times when I need to make a huge life choice or a decision that could/would effect my life and my families life that I have a hard time with now. I have gotten to a point where I'm to scared to step out of that comfort zone now, because I'm affaird that it will effect my stability. Now I'm not saying that being stable is bad, but when you're TO stable, to the point where you caution on the side of NOT doing something, that's when it might be a problem. I remember a time when I was scared to be stable because I knew it would be boring. I just wish I could get back to a happy balance of stability and spontaneity. Maybe that's something I can work on next year...I need to plan this out.

A secret I have to share

I have a dirty little secret that I have to get off my chest. Since I only have four readers, I might as well just confess what I have been hiding and prepare myself for the backlash that I might receive.

Are you ready for this:


I'm hook on the new Melrose Place and Glee. Those are my two favorite shows of this season. I still have my other favorites of course. I consider those my staple shows of the week. I tend to build my week around my staple shows. I will soon be adding these two shows to my staple roster.
On Melrose Place, the actors are fresh and surprisingly good. Except for Asslee Simpson. She isn't that good but her character is actually interesting. If you were a fan of the original show, you might want to give this show a chance. It's surprisingly good. Plus it's just some hotties on there. So the eye candy factor is at least a 9. The plot is ok, it's a true blue Melrose Place plot but it's nice to see the apartments again! Even at 30 and knowing that it's a made up address, I still want to move there.
On Glee, the acting at times is kind of rough and there isn't much of a eye candy factor going on there. Lets fact it, I like the show because they break out into song and dance...IN HIGH SCHOOL. I have read several other blogs and I think we all agree that being able to break out into song and dance in real life would kick ass. And that for every situation there was the perfect song that expressed just how you felt at that moment. Well in Glee that is how it works. The main thing about Glee is that it suck you in and actually makes you feel something for the cast of misfits. If you choose to start watching this show, you have to start at the pilot episode to fully understand every one's roles. This show comes with a warning though...you will be very jealous and sad when you realize that life isn't a song and dance. Oh and that you're voice isn't as good as the ones on TV.

So there is my dirty little secret.

A Grandmother's fear.

This weekend I went back home to spend time with my grandmother and aunt. My aunt was staying a few days with Granny. As everyone that follows my blog knows, granny has cancer and it's only a matter of time. I have my suspictions that it's more than just the tumor the doctors are telling everyone. Granny went from having a tumor on her bile ducts, liver cancer and pancreatic cancer to just having a tumor on her bile ducts. Either way, it improved her mental state of mind as well as ours. Well this weekend it was clear that she is losing that fight. She has no strength and of course gets really tired really fast, but Granny is Granny and is still hanging on.
Something she said struck me and made me sad for her and my family. She has made statements like this before and it still left a ball of fear in my stomach. Granny made a comment about how families fall apart after the parents die. Now, I don't like Granny talking about being dead in the first place, but I realized that she is really worried about her family falling apart when she is gone. Granny, in many ways, is the glue in our family. She has been the one that made this family as close as it is. She has worked her entire life to making sure her family knew what love was and that it was the norm to get together every sunday for lunch. That it was the norm for the family to get together on weekends just to hang out. I can honestly say that when Granny takes her last breath, she will rejoyce in saying her late loved ones, and the wonderful family she has made.
There is now a new fear in her, that all her work is going to become undone when she is no longer with us. I wonder if it's just tender hearted Matt that feels the same way or if that's a fear that everyone in the family has. I honestly don't see it happening because we're so close now, but what's going to happen when Granny isn't here. What's going to happen when all the kids and grandkids get up on the weekends and Granny isn't cooking a breakfast that would feed the Texans football team. Is there someone in the family that has the strength to keep us together? How different is the family going to be when Granny isn't there...ok gotta stop...crying at work sucks...and I can't play this many tears off on Allergies...HA.

The measure of a person

So after my first week of crutching around has passed and having to ask brian and everyone else do EVERYTHING for me, I started realizeing a few things. First let me ask you this, how does one measure one's self? Do you stand in the middle of your living room and see all the high dollar flashy stuff you own, is that the measure of a man? Do you live in a really expensive house, or drive a real fancy ride? I'm sure most of you realize where I'm going with this. I have started to realize that the measure of me is my friends. I would say family because that does count, but then again for the most part, family has to value and love you. I really think the measure of a man is the friends he has surrounded himself with. Over the past week, I have seen more caring and generous acts of kindness from my friends. Brian, even though he is family, has waited on me hand and foot. If I get done with my dinner first and he hasn't he will stop eating to get me seconds or something else to drink. He has been absolutely wonderful to me. I'm not saying that since he is my partner that he should, but he has really gone above and beyond to really take care of me and make sure that I'm 100% ok. I know I have found the person that I will gladly spend the rest of my life will and love every minute of it. Besides that, my wonderful friends have also gone far beyond the call do duty to make sure I'm ok and that I'm takin' care of. It really has amazed me, not saying that I'm not worth it, but seriously when I can't do one thing for myself, it's great to know that my friends have stepped it up. That's how I have measure my life, by the people that I call friends. Everything I own, I can replace, I can buy it again. I can't replace any one of my friends. I am the person I am because of the friends I keep. I have felt like the richest person over the past couple of days because of my friends. I know when my time is up, that I was loved and that I had the greatest friends God could give me.

Peace

Epic Fail

Wow when I say epic fail I mean I crashed big time yesterday. I was going good until I got home and found a pack of cigs on the counter. I was like a little boy that had just found his dad's dirty mags. I went nuts, about blew a few nuts when I saw how full the pack was. I chain smoked like there was no tomorrow. So much that I made myself sick. I guess if i'm going to fail, do it right. Oh well I'm still on the ban wagon about quitting, I'm just going to have to get through the this low point and get back to working hard. It will happen.

On an upside, we're in the process of getting a new truck. We're trading in both the car and my truck for a '09. The only bad thing is we're upside down in the car so that makes it a little hard to haggle a better price. However, we have worked out a plan so now we're waiting to hear back from the dealership. It is clear to us that car dealerships don't always have to make a sell! Let me tell you about this truck. I would feel like I'm king pimp of the road. Leather seats with seat warms/coolers. No more sweaty ass crack in the summer. The only thing that I didn't like was the wood grain paneling. That was a little to flashy/ghetto for me. Now if the dealership calls back and agrees to the deal I gave them this morning...I can ride ghetto style and learn to love it. Oh get this, we get in the truck last night and find two packs of cigs and it already had 500 miles on it...I think you need to come to the table with some better deals!!! If I get it I will post pics on facebook.

Peace

Set back but not fail

Ok so I didn't quiet make it 3 days, I didn't really even make it 2 full days but I'm ok with that. In 48 hours I have only had 2 cigs. Now this brings up a good guestion, is going cold turkey the smartest way to go about something so strong as quitting smoking? I know myself and I know that the urge will be way to strong if I just out right try and quit. So I'm going to continue on with the no smoking but I'm going to have a few set backs from time to time. It good news is that it tasted like ass last night so I'm going to add that to my arsonal. I'm not mad at myself for caving so fast, actually I'm pleased that I made it that far. Ok on to another day, but the weekend is coming up and that has me worried, but I'm going to give it my best and hope that I only have a few set backs if any. If I can just make it to sunday, then i think i will be good. Ok time to eat my breakfast and cost through an easy friday.

Day 2: After work

Ok so I thought I was going to have a lot of well power going into this because I'm really trying to be strong...i'm determined to make this work. Round one of just how determined I am began on my way home from Rehab...not AA rehab, but knee rehab. Anyways, I found myself trying to rationalize this thing out and tell myself that I can have one cig as soon as I get home but that was it. After all, why stop what you like doing. Plus that one smoke after work really is a good thing. I like crossing the line in a race, instead of a metal you get a smoke. Man I had it all worked out.

***side note, dexter keeps looking at me with these sad eyes and I can't tell if he feels my no smoking pain or if he feels sorry for me about my knee. Wow I must really be jacked up on vicoden. side note over***

So anyways, the do it for your son phrase isn't cutting it. I think if there would have been smokes at the house I would have lit up. I realize it's just a habit that i have to break but damn why does it have to be a good one. What's even worse is I know that it's killing me softly (thanks old 90's song) and I don't even care, that's what gets me about smokers. We know it's bad, we know it's killing us but we love it anyways. Ok so I think the craving is gone and there aren't any at the house anyways so I'm safe for now.

Day 2

Good morning bloggers, ha like anyone is reading this. Day 2 is ok, actaully it was good to wake up without that smokers throat. My chest isn't all tight with the smoke from the night before. Today will become increasingly hard. Once the body realizes that I'm not giving it the drug that it wants, it's going to get pissed. I'm hoping that now that I have my mind set right that I will be able to over come it. I'm going to try and do this cold turkey. It's going to be rough but I think I have some gum some where around the house. I wonder if the smokers gum expires, either it's going to expire or it's going to be some strong gum. My intentions with these blogs are when I have a craving to smoke I will blog and get my mind off of it. I mean that's part of the issue, it's mental.

You know what I didn't realize is that 09-09-09 upside down is 6-6-6...the number of the devil. I'm surprised all the crazy people weren't out in force. Ok gotta play like I'm working.

Peace

End of day 1

Ok so day one is over. It got a little hard after we left Freebirds to not smoke that one cig, which would have been just has good as busting a nut. However I stayed strong and didn't. I can already tell that Brian is going to have to move up stairs though. Twice tonight he has asked if I wanted to smoke...then asked him if I was trying to quit. I guess when I tell him something it takes a while to register, I told him this morning. Ok tomorrow is what's going to be hard. That first one when you get home from work smoke..."do it for your son" It's actually alot easier when you put those words in your head. What's going to be hard is about the third or forth day and I'm like what son, he isn't here yet. ha Ok well I think i'm going to get an hour of WoW in tonight before I go to bed.

"do it for your son" End of day one.

Day 1

So last night I had a talk with myself about me smoking. For a while now I have known that I have had an issue with high blood pressure. So I had started to take steps to correct that, and for a while it was actually doing pretty good. Well now that I haven't been about to really get out and exercise, my weight and my blood pressure has gone up. So last Friday I go in to have my knee worked on and several people have told me that I'm going to either have a stroke or heartattack at a very young age because of my blood pressure. Well smoking helps to raise that BP up. So I decided that I need to get serious about not smoking. The best thing I could come up with that would help motivate me is, "do it for my son". So starting today I'm going to stop smoking. I'm going to try my damndest to stop smoking. I will more than likely have to go get the gym but I'm going to give this a shot. While I'm doing this I'm going to blog about it. That way I can get my mind off the cravings and keep my hands busy. it's going to be hard to quit though because brian will have cigs here at the house. Even now as I write about quitting, my getting anxious about it and want to go outside and have a puff.
Hopefully my "do it for your son" campaine will pay off. I figured why not try to be around just a little longer and have that time with my family. I don't want to have a stroke at in my 40's, hell I'm already going to have to jacked up knee...why not try and prevent something that I have the power to change. Since today is 9-9-9, there might be some magic left in there for me to quit smoking.

Stay tuned...i'm sure that once this fully kicks in, it's going to be a bitch.

30 years

So I should have started this back in Jan. when I turned 30. That way I could have blogged throughout the year. It's been a year for many first in my life. Yeah it's been one of those years, and the sad thing is, it's not even over.

As most of you guys know, Brian and I are adopting and we just got our certificates in the mail last week. It's kind of cool though, except I would have thought our child credit was better than just 2 kids. I guess CPS only sees us fit to adopt 2 kids...for now. It's been an interesting ride through the adoption classes and all the "stupid" stuff you need to do to get a child. --let me just stop this now to point out that Chris is an ass-- Back to the adoption story, now all that's left is getting a case working and starting the process in finding the right child for us.
I'm excited about being a father, I don't think there is another greater joy in life then being a father...well unless you're the mom but last time I checked I didn't have the equipment. I'm excited about passing down the values and morals that my family taught me to my son. I'm excited about having someone to rough house with...brian isn't much fun because I"m stronger than he is. haha. I'm also very excited about bringing a child into my family. I have the greatest aunts and uncles. An amazing mom and dad, and a Grandmother that is probably going to be a Saint when it's her time. Then after you get past that, I have brothers, sisters, and cousins that are second to none. So I look forward to bringing my son into a wonderful family.

Another first was seperate vacations for Brian and I. He went to Prague and I went to Ireland. It was fun to go but it really made us realize that things like that are best to share with each other...however, I got to go with my cousin and had the best time ever. Next time will be a hard choice between Brian or Sam.

So got the adoption story down and the traveling story down, the last big event of the 2009 year was my grandmother getting cancer. Now if you know my family, then there is a chance...strong chance that you know my Grandmother. You probably only know her as Granny happy, the beer drinking grilled cheese making crazy lady from Teague. Well around the first part of the year she found out she had cancer. That sent the family into a frenzy. My aunt Mandi went event planner on us, my aunt Trudy prayed, Uncle Joe and Keith just drank more amounts of beers and my mom and I cried. Hey that's our roles in the family. To make really long story short...OMG why does this old ass lady, that KNOWS better, continue to talk with her mouth FULL OF FOOD, ghetto ass...sorry back to the story. So now we're almost through with 2009 and Granny is still with us and we have all settled into just drinking more. One of the reasons I love my family is because the moment something happens, the calling tree is activated and within ten minutes everyone knows and we're all on the way to be with one another.

So even though the first half of my 30th year has been eventful, the rest of it should be the greatest time in my life. I can't wait for it.