So, it has been a few days since I posted here -- we had parent/teacher conferences, report cards, birthdays, annual physicals, and lots of baseball games since I wrote last.

The parent/teacher conferences went well -- the guys' teachers are very happy with their progress and everyone is doing well grade-wise. Andy has even improved his spelling grade. Elias is reading, according to his teacher. I have yet to see any evidence of this, but I am hoping he will do it for me this week sometime. Benjamin is doing great things in second grade and has managed to get a reputation around school. We don't know what the reputation is, but when we told Andy's present teacher that we were going to request her for Benjamin next year, she said that she had already heard all about him. She didn't expand on this, but did say that she might retire over the summer. I hope she was kidding.

The guys are all doing baseball these days. The three older guys are all on different teams which means that I am at the ball park continually. We either have a game or a practice every single day. They are enjoying themselves most of the time, but I did have to explain to Andy that "there was NO CRYING in baseball" even though you just got struck out. Elias is having a great time, and Benjamin is too, but I haven't managed to get a picture of Benjamin yet.

I had my annual physical this week and it was quite an appointment. I dread this appointment and I tend to get very tense about it about a month beforehand. I usually am able to assume that I am healthy and everything is fine, until I have to go for the bloodwork. Then, I immediately begin to assume that something really nasty is going to show up in the bloodwork. I went and got blood drawn on 17 March and got the results in the mail about 4 days later. There were two values that were way out of whack and I had to look them up. From the information I had gathered on the internet, the bloodwork was showing that I was well on my way to kidney disease and dialysis. Obviously, this was a problem. So I went in to see my doctor and we were making a plan for how to deal with this whole thing, when he asked me if I had exercised before the blood was drawn. Well, I told him that I had done the Tucson Triathlon the day before the blood was drawn. He said Well! That is the answer then! His feeling is that the labwork was screwy because I had raced the day before -- this is an excellent thing since it means that my kidneys are still normal. He asked me to re-do the labwork after 24 hours of no activity to see what it was then -- I did that this morning. I should know in a couple of days whether or not my kidneys are fine, but I expect that they will be good to go.

The other thing I talked to my doctor about was the fact that I wasn't going to follow the high protein diet anymore. I have reached the point where I was starting to gag when facing chicken on my plate. Also, is life worth living with no white sugar? The answer is NO. So, I talked with him about it, and told him that I wasn't going to do the diet, and I have given up on losing weight and he said that as long as I continued to be as active as I am now, he was fine with that. This was nice to hear. I really like this doctor -- he actually listens and doesn't just tell me to lose weight. Obviously, losing weight isn't going to happen, so I might as well just give up on it and keep on trucking exercise-wise. Why obsess about it anymore?

Benjamin's birthday was a huge success -- he was happy with his pesto and with his chocolate cupcakes for dinner, and was THRILLED with his presents. A good friend of mine sent him a set of bad teeth and the funny thing is that Benjamin's teeth blend right in with the fakes!

In other news, Brigid has taken a giant stride forward today! She got her hair cut!!! This is very exciting, but nerve wracking. I think she looks just great. Ron said, and I agree, that Brigid looks much more adult now -- more sophisticated and modern.