Sarah's Ribs

No it's not another rib joint in town - Sarah's cracked a rib from coughing. She had a terrible cold about 2 months ago followed by weeks and weeks of coughing. She called me from school complaining about a good deal of pain on the left side of her chest, kind of under her arm pit and I suggested she see someone in the school infirmary. She even said that she thought it looked a little swollen on that side. She went to the infirmary and they just said they thought she was just sore from all of the coughing that she had been doing so we decided to wait it out. Well things weren't improving so I made an appointment for her last week at Detrick. They did an x-ray and sure enough, she has a cracked rib. Crazy, huh? We were joking about that possibility before her appointment. The x-ray actually showed that she had a "healing" cracked rib so apparently this happened back when she first complained about the pain. She went back to Detrick today and the wrapped her up like a burrito to help support the rib so that it will be able to heal completely. The thing that's a little puzzling to me and to the doctor to some extent was the fact that she's young and they don't typically see a young person crack a rib from coughing. Hopefully it doesn't happen again in the future.

What is it with boys?

This morning it was snowing outside when Sam left the house for the bus stop. He was out the door when I noticed that he was not wearing a coat. Short sleeve t-shirt and jeans, that's it. I called out to him "where's your coat?" His reply was "the bus is coming and I don't need one anyway." Now ... it was snowing so of course it was around the freezing mark and any normal person would have been cold, but not Sam. When I was a kid I remember that there were many, many, times when my brothers would leave the house in the wintertime wearing only the barest minimum of a coat and my mother just figured if they got cold enough they'd put on something heavier so I guess I'll just follow her example and try not to worry about it. I think it must be a guy thing. :)

ACC Results

The band prepares to take the field.

Drum majors and senior class band and guard members line up for awards.

Urbana students help the pit crew assemble the props.

The band was awesome this past weekend finishing 6th with a score of 92.85. Way to go TJ! Our percussion section finish in 3rd place and the color guard finished 1st. Way to go TJ! It was a cold and windy weekend but we managed to get by with only one minor catastrophe. We have 5 giant size snake charmer type baskets on the field during the show and we we able to stabilize 4 of them by positioning 6 people behind them, 3 adults and 3 students that we were able to borrow from the Urbana HS band. But on the remaining 5th basket we only managed to have 3 Urbana students. Well .... that basket decided to take sail. No one was hit or hurt and the band was able to continue with their show as if nothing had even happened. The Urbana students on that prop were so apologetic as if it was their fault but let me tell you even the folks on the baskets with 6 people said they could barely hold them in place. So I'd like to say huge kudos to the 15 band students from Urbana for giving us a helping hand. We had to take a 1 point penalty because there are to be no adults on the field during competition, only students, but i'm sure things would not have went as well if they were not there.

Jenny is the snare drummer on the far left.

ACC's - Here we come!

Look out Allentown, PA. The TJ Band is heading your way. The band competed in the USSBA (US Scholastic Band Association) National Championships help in Annapolis at the Naval Academy last weekend in Group IV competition, finishing 5th out of the 20 bands entered in our group. GO TJ! On Sunday we will be traveling to Allentown, PA to compete in the TOB (Tournament of Bands) Atlantic Coast Championship competition. TOB and USSBA being two different marching band circuits each with their own judging criteria. We are heading into the TOB competition seeded in 7th place out of 30 competing bands and we hoping for a finish of at least 6th or better. 6th place being the highest that the TJ band has ever finished in TOB competition. That occurred last year in 2007. Sam and I will be riding the parent "party bus" as it has been named, which will require us to be at school at 5:15 am to be ready for a 5:45 am departure! Yikes! I'm excited! It's always a long day but always a lot of fun for the parents and the band kids alike. This is the "Super Bowl" of marching band.

The Weekend Results

We had an exciting weekend. Sam's football team made it to the playoffs and competed in their 1st game on Saturday. Unfortunately they lost 7 - 6, but it was sure a close one. Sam made several key receptions that ended in quite a bit of gained yardage but they just weren't able to score that last touchdown to win the game. If I can figure out how to do it I'll add a video clip from the game to the blog.

The TJ Band traveled to Liberty HS and competed in the Chapter 5 Championship. They won the group 3 division giving them an automatic berth to compete in the ACC's (Atlantic Coast Championship) in Allentown PA on November 16th. They are seeded in 7th place out of the 30 bands that will be competing in the competition. Last year the band came home with a 6th place finish at the end of ACC's, their highest finish to date. Jenny's hoping for a higher than 6th place finish this year so she can finish out her senior year in marching band with a bang.

I Voted

I got up a little early this morning and decided to head to the polls to cast my vote before heading into work. I arrived around 7:30 and was out in about 15 minutes. Things weren't to hectic at that time. Sarah was so excited about this election since this is the first time that she could vote in a national election, and what a historical election for her first experience. She drove home from college last evening so that she could vote today. She'll be heading back to school this afternoon. She wanted to tag along with me this morning so she rolled out of bed a few minutes before I was leaving and decided to go vote in her PJ's. Only a 19 year old could get away with that one! At least she brushed her teeth!

Be sure to get out there and vote today!

Tricare Update

My faith is restored in the military healthcare system ..... at least for now. I had an appointment this past week, with a different provider. After the appointment, I had blood work done, 3 scripts filled and I was out of there in an hour and a half. Much better.