September 2006

Sabrina's Birthday; Mom's Healthcare Adventure!

Hello, everyone!

Sabrina's B-day marathon party was the talk of Westfield! Well at least the 4th grade girls at McKinley. Thanks for the wonderful Birthday cake card and $ you sent Sabrina. She loves money and saves it all. It was a whirlwind weekend with all the soccer practices/games getting ready for the party and seeing mom, but it was all worth it. The 12 girls that came had a marvelous time and partied thru the night. All finally settling down for their sleepover around 2 AM. The house, Deb, Angel and I survived having thirteen 4th graders, two 6th graders, and two 9th graders sleeping in one house.

Deb and I have been meeting with Sanford Mann the new Executive Director at Brighton Gardens about many of mom's issues/complaints etc. It is nothing new in the life of your mom and her healthcare. She has always had difficulty dealing with any kind of change in help, especially when she got that added personal attention from someone she liked. I feel all the current issues have been addressed and hopefully the new staff will respond in a positive and satisfactory manner. We continue to encourage your mom to address her issues immediately with the staff or Sanford, rather than letting it build up for a week or until we visit her again.T hanks for your involvement in addressing your mom's issues. Like I tell you mom "the squeaky wheel gets the oil.". Keep communicating.

Glade to hear everyone is well. We are busier than ever with each girl in three different schools and activities. Deborah's and my day starts at 6 AM and ends at 10 PM.

Love John

Daytona Beach Invitational

We are back from a long, frenetic weekend in Daytona Beach (actually Port Orange, just 5 miles South). This is the home pool for Ryan Lochte, a Gold Medalist in the 2004 Athens Olympics, but he wasn't there; only his up-and-coming brother. The facilities were terrible; clogged toilets, no paper, timing computer issues, mud, mosquitoes, and overcrowding. Enough of the bad news. The good news; Natalie finally got her first Junior Olympic time cut, in the 100yd breaststroke! Not to be outdone, Karl dropped his 100yd breaststroke time by a whopping 7 seconds, making the finals on Saturday evening! He had to race some of the best 11-12 boys in the state, finishing in 7th place out of 23 entrants!

All in all, both kids dropped time in every event, with Karl poised to acquire his first JO cut at the next meet (probably the 50yd backstroke). As a fitting touch to the weekend, we all saw the launch of the space shuttle, a mere 60 miles away. Unfortunately, one young athlete stopped in the middle of his swim to watch, only to be DQ'd for illegal kick in the butterfly! Here are some pictures from the meet.

The Space Shuttle

Post-Race Assessment

Karl, Good morning!

Your well recorded performance, by your father, of the 100yd Breaststroke on 9-5 was to us, a smooth performance, displaying frictionless synchronicity in your strokes, like a well-oiled Volvo engine!

We all wish you and Natalie, besides your parents, a great meet with lower results!

Opa.

Swimming Meet Video Followup!

I finally got around to capturing and rendering a short clip of Karl's 100yd Breaststroke Final at the Area 3/5 Championships. It can be seen Here.

I am still working on reducing the file size without significantly affecting video quality. Let me know how it looks!

We are headed to Daytona Beach this weekend for another major meet, the Daytona Beach Swimming (DBS) Tom Kingston Invitational. This meet is unusual in that the age-groupers will have prelims and finals, while the seniors will have timed finals. Karl and Natalie are excited, as they will have a good chance to make some JO (Junior Olympic) cuts. However, Karl is a bit worried about the 200 yard IM, because he has never swam that event, and will be going up against some excellent swimmers from Georgia, Tallahassee, Orlando, Miami, and Jacksonville. There will be about 20 teams at this meet. We will report back as soon as we get back home on Sunday evening. Until then, we remain Wet behind the ears!