Goodbye Little Elliott

Fifteen years ago I got a cat for Christmas.  T.J. 

Twelve years ago I got a cat for my cat.  Elliott. 

The funny thing about Elliott is that I committed to having her before having met her and she looked exactly like T.J.  We even had an apartment once where we said we had one cat. The landlord would never know the difference, assuming there were not two cats standing together. 

Last week, while we were gone, Elliott passed away. 

My poor neighbor.  Before we left, I gave her instructions that the cats would be in the garage and they would be fine.  If she could just stop by a time or two to make sure they still had food, that would be great.  She said she would come by everyday.

When we left I couldn’t find Elliott.  She was roaming free.  I let my neighbor know that she was hard to catch and if she found her, great, if not, that was ok too.  We hardly ever caught Elliott.  She was truly T.J.’s cat and never cared for us much (although, there was that time during law school when she liked to lick Greg’s head.  I always told Greg she was his cat).  I didn’t have my hopes up that Elliott would remain safe in the garage during our trip.

I received a text from my neighbor on Tuesday morning: We found Elliott, she is in the garage.  Have a great trip.  With both cats tucked safely in the garage, I enjoyed the trip.

Upon arriving home, we pulled into the driveway and my neighbor was already there.  Still in the car, I asked her how everything went and she responded by saying she needed to talk to me.  A little perplexed, I asked her if everything was ok.  She shook her head no and very softly replied that Elliott had died.  Elliott died??  I didn’t expect that at all. 

Apparently, she put her in the garage Tuesday morning and when she checked on them that afternoon Elliott was gone.  She picked up Elliott and took her little body to her work. (Luckily she works for a vet!)  They had a hold on her until I arrived home. 

We are headed to my dad’s today to lay her to rest.  She will be buried with the other animals that have passed before her..Zeke and Sam and a few pigeons. 

Dear little Elliott, 

Thank you for being our cat for 12 years.  We will miss you and your scared little ways.  I hope you are happy wherever you are.

Love,
Me

A class of her own…

In case you were wondering, Kristi did come to Puerto Rico with us, and were we ever glad she did. 

She took care of babies in the ocean when their moms were too scared to get in. 

She did her best to contain Ivy in the car while Greg drove. 

She was brave enough to order chicken, local style, at our favorite restaurant, La Hacienda (there is still some debate as to whether local style chicken = iguana). 

She pre-boarded the plane with me while Greg was finding dinner, leaving her own kids to board with dad. 

She taught us how to sleep on a plane. 

She found a frog on her shoulder at the restaurant and calmly picked it up to take the poor guy to safety.  (I would not have been calm).

She promptly declared Monday at 4:00 pm the end of her vacation.  (I am still trying to figure that one out, but nonetheless, it was hilarious!). 

She played in the waves.

She bought white bread for her kids as a treat. 

She got my dad down to the ocean. 

She brought children’s Motrin and picked out some ear drops to help Owen.

She knew when we needed a baby break.

No trip would be complete without our “Kiks”.

….poor Cinderella, if only she had my step-mom, she would have been one happy  princess. 

One Last Day

For our last day in the sun and warmth, our group was going in different directions.  Some were kayaking and then snorkeling, others were not.  The others thought it sounded positively torturous to wake with sleeping kids at 6:15 am, drive to a ferry, travel on the ferry for 1.5 hours, then wait on the beach for 4 hours while the kayaking and snorkeling took place.  The others (those with kids were going to lounge by the pool. 

On the eve of the excursion, Greg received a phone call that the day was canceled due to weather.  Greg let Eric and my dad know and went to bed.  Promptly at departure time of 7:15 (it changed when the rest of us chose to stay behind), the middle connecting door of our hotel room flung open and in the doorway stood Ben and Kelsey, backpacks on, sunglasses on, bags packed.  Ben looked around the room and saw Greg snoozing away.  “What is he doing! Why is he sleeping?” 

“Didn’t Greg tell you, it was canceled.”

“Nope, we are ready to go.”

“Greg wake up, you suck.”

Ben went downstairs to get a coffee and upon exiting the elevator, stumbled upon Steve in the lobby.  There he was, patiently waiting for the others, backpack on, ready for a day of snorkeling.  Greg sucks.

Since they were up, they all decided to go anyway and see what the beach was like.  We all still stayed to play.  The verdict was, it was a good day, they snorkeled in somewhat cloudy water, two of them were stung by a sea urchin and you can be sure one of the two was Ben, they had a horribly bumpy ride on the ferry which left them all glad that those back at the hotel with zero sea legs were just that, back at the hotel, and they hiked and played.  Ben, Kelsey, Greg, Steve and Felix.  What a crew.

In the meantime, Owen showed me over and over how he can jump in the pool with NO lifejacket.  With each jump he would ask, “Non, is this new to you?” before he jumped.  He was proud.  We ordered virgin pina coladas by the pool, we rested, relaxed, swam, walked and played. 

The trip was coming to a close.

Another good one

On Sunday, we forgot to live in Sunday and more than once drifted off to the departure date of Tuesday.  No one wanted to go home.  (well, that is not totally true, Owen wanted to go home for two reasons.  1. he missed school and 2. he missed our car).  You know it is a good trip when you make it from Monday to Sunday and still all like each other.  It had been everything that we had anticipated so far.  (Well, that is also not entirely true, after Ben twisted his foot earlier in the week, things got worse for him on Friday.  While we spent the day in our conference, the rest headed to Old San Juan.  We received a text or two that Ben was sick and couldn’t stop throwing up.  This made him stress out and then have a panic attack.  Back at the hotel they sent up a dr. who promptly gave him a shot in the butt, which made him sore for days and made him sleep.  My dad was worried he was going to sleep and drift off into a coma.  Well, lucky for Ben and us, he made it through the night and woke up refreshed after a 14 hour slumber.  So, with a twisted ankle and a painful shot in the butt, Ben’s trip took a twisty turn from good to bad to good). 

Angie, Ben and Eric went off to go caving on Sunday, while the rest of us hopped in our 14ish passenger van to visit Old San Juan again.  Ivy could live her life in a 14 passenger van with no car seat.  She was in heaven as she roamed from row to row.  I swear I tried to keep her still, but it was a choice between pinning her down and tormenting the rest for 45 minutes, or let her roam.  For better or worse, she roamed and roamed and wiggled and moved and climbed and wiggled and moved.

After arriving in Old San Juan, a few minutes in, it started to rain and pour.  We were drenched as we walked the cobblestone streets looking for shops and enjoying the day. 

We ate dinner at a so-so place, found and enjoyed some ice cream, did a little shopping and made our way back to the hotel.  For some strange reason by that time, Senor Greg was a natural and actually seemed quite comfortable in his new driver position.  Perhaps a 2nd job? 

Oh how enjoyable it was to free from my seminar and back to the fun.

View from the hotel.

 

   

Bring on the Pizza

By Saturday night we finally realized that to feed a group of 19, on average, was $250.00. (Bless you dad!!)  So, when you are tired of spending that kind of money, there is only one answer…. PIZZA delivery!!   

Couples Massage

We made it through one of the most boring seminars  I have ever been to.  Well, boring that is until we brought in the big guns..Steve’s iPod with Mancala and Moron Test.  I was down 2 games to 7 in Mancala, then I staged a wonderful comeback making the score 7 to 7.  Angie ended up ahead 8 to 7 but only because we ran out of time.  We are definitely not done. 

After the seminar ended it was time for our scheduled massage.  Emilee, Felix and Kristi were there before us and we couldn’t wait to hear how it went.  The people checked us in and took us to our locker with a robe, towel and shoes.  As we were changing the others came in to give us the massage info.  The report back was that it was ok.  We were a little nervous.  I know, who gets nervous for a massage… my family. 

Angie and I headed back to the relaxation room to wait.  They came back and said the massage would be together.  We thought they were confused, you see, with our free timeshare gift we could either do 25 minutes each of a couples massage with Steve and Greg – which was not an option, way too intimate I am sure, or a full 50 minute massage each.  We let them know that we were going to take the full massage each.  They knew that.  They said they prefer to do it together.  I guess that is what we get for free.  Ok, together it was.  Imagine if we were nervous before, how we must have felt now. 

Off to the massage room.  It was a big room with candles and low lights and music and two massage beds.  It was very romantic.  They said we could hang our robes on the door and lie down and they would be back.  We were laughing and couldn’t stop.  Angie said with big wide eyes that she was glad we didn’t take everything off!  I agreed.  We took off our robes and hopped onto the beds.  I looked over and saw Angie with her face in that thing and I could not stop laughing. Everytime I thought of us I would laugh.  I figured I better stop this before they came back or this could be the weirdest massage they have ever done.  Deep breaths. 

They came in and started the massage.  I almost laughed only a few times.  The massage finished and we were left alone.  I started laughing again.  Angie started laughing again.  We put on our robes and then we discussed our shoes.  I had the teeniest shoes ever.  I was telling Angie that as I was putting them on I thought, oh, Angie must have given them my shoe size when she made the appointment.  Then I realized they randomly picked a locker and I randomly picked my locker.  Angie could have had these tiny shoes.  We started laughing again. 

Our massage people were waiting outside the door with our water.  We opened the door and they noted that we seemed like we were having fun.  We were.  We took our cold glass of water, which was delicious by the way, it was flavored with cucumbers, limes, lemons, and strawberries.  We would totally recommend it.  As a side note, I don’t think they have lemons here, at least not very many.  At dinner, when we order water with a lemon, we get a lime, and the massage people were having a hard time remembering the “yellow one” to tell us what was in our water. 

We drank our little piece of heaven, changed our clothes and left. 

Our final verdict: we thought it was much better than ok, but we are sure that was because we did it together. 

Thank you Angie for all you do for me and for being there when I need you, and thank you for lying on that bed with your face in that thing.  It was my kind of massage – one full fun and laughs.  It was just what I needed and I wouldn’t have wanted to do it any other way.

This is so boring

The only reason we picked Puerto Rico was for us to attend a seminar.  A two day seminar about bankruptcy law.  We signed up for the Advanced Topics in Chapter 13.  Here we sit, me, Angie and Dad.  First off, let me say that this is not advanced topics.  I think I could  teach this seminar. 

My dad is desperately trying to get his computer connected to the Internet, I am editing pictures that I put on my computer last night and Angie is trying to get my dad’s phone to work like a modem. 

The worst part about this is that it is 12:00 on Friday.  We have to  be here until 4:45 today and then from 8:00 – 4:45 tomorrow as well.  But, on the bright side, I will take one for the team, after all, the conference brought us to Puerto Rico.  Without the conference we may have never came to an agreement as to the location of our long awaited, highly anticipated family trip. 

So, I will sit here and listen to hypotheticals and people who think they are back in law school and I will be reminded how happy I am to be in our office in the 9th Circuit (not the 10th – goodbye Utah) with my extensive knowledge about bankruptcy.  Seriously, attorneys are such nerds!

I will also be happy with our collected loot!  There are a lot of companies here trying to sell us their services.  We have collected thousands of pens, squishy stress pigs, beach balls, backbacks, visors, millions of reusable grocery bags, chapstick, a mug, snacks, a USB hub, sunblock, yo-yos, gold chocolate coins, and a flash drive. 

There is something so fun about free.  Even if we need none of it!  (except the pens and maybe the squishy stress pigs).

I would rather be doing this stuff and hanging out with these guys:

Sunday can’t come quick enough when we are free again to frolic.