Technical Difficulties

T.G.I.F.! It’s just been one of those of weeks…

Towards the end of last week Sean came down with a fever, followed by a brief bout with the stomach flu. He got better just in time for Abby and I to catch bad chest colds with coughs and runny noses over the weekend. It has not been a fun week for me feeling like crap and trying to also take care of my sick toddler. But I know that hopefully we will be feeling a lot better soon and that this is all part of being a parent.

In conjunction with our house been less than healthy, it seems that a number of the electronic devices in our home also chose this week, of all times, to malfunction. Our printer has not worked well for awhile and once again I started out “just trying to fix that.” Famous last words…

I did not have success getting our printer/copier/scanner to do any of those things again and in addition to that, I either somehow managed to do something that made our router and modem stop working (and thus our household wireless and Internet connections too) and/or they coincidentally started having issues at the same time I was trying to fix our printer. How fun does that sound?! Right?!

I ended up spending way to many hours this week on the phone with a very kind gentleman named Pete who works in the AT&T tech support department, as well as a really nice guy in the IT department where Bob works (since our router actually belongs to his company and they configured it so he can work from home at times). As I am sure many of you have experienced, having such “technical difficulties,” especially while you (and one of your children) are not feeling well is less than ideal.

I probably picked the wrong time to take another crack at fixing our printer. I did not feel up to exercising during Abby’s naps this week, because of my chest cold, and knew that I should take it easy to try to get better. However I was feeling a little antsy (probably from not exercising for almost a week now) during a few of her naps and thus I decided to go there.

I have been thinking about that scene from the movie Office Space a lot lately, where they take their printer/fax machine out into a field and destroy it with a baseball bat. It pretty much sums up my feelings about our overpriced/over promising (and under delivering) printer. However, I resisted the urge to do that so far…

Something that made me smile and feel pretty good in the midst of all these difficulties, were a few quirky and kind things that Pete, the AT&T Tech Support guy, said to me while we were on the phone for hours trying to get our household computers back online. Early on in our conversation, when I seemed to have a pretty good handle on what was wrong (but not how to fix it), Pete said to me,

“I must say you are fantastic with computers!”

Aww, shucks. Thanks Pete.

I had to write it down, while it was fresh in my mind, as I just thought he/what he said was so cute and sweet! Then towards the end of our conversation, after he was finally able to help me to get at least one of our computers back online, until we get a new reconfigured router that should arrive today (after being shipped overnight) from Bob’s work’s IT Department, Pete told me,

“I’ve never come across a customer who is so patient, so understanding and who’s memory is so amazing!”

Pete, I bet you say that to all the stay at home moms you talk to who are trying to fix their computers/Internet connections. But it was still nice and fun to hear. Thank you!

Anyway, Abby and I, as well as our computers, modem and router on are on the road to recovery now. The printer is still another story, but I will get back to that eventually. As a result of all this, we did not have Internet access at home for a few days this week and thus I have not been able to keep up with reading and commenting on as many of your blogs as I would like to have done. Lucky for Bob and me, our smart phones still worked, so we were not completely cut off from the digital world. But it is a lot more time consuming to try to do all the things you would usually do on a laptop or desktop on your iPhone or Blackberry. I know, I know, oh poor me I could only use my iPhone for a few days this week, what I a rough life I lead.

Thank you for letting me vent! I know our health and technical difficulties this week could have been a lot worse. I am grateful that we are on the mend and appreciate your support, thoughts and prayers.

I am really looking forward to the A Gift of Time Book Tour that I am hosting here on my blog next week! Watch for the participants Q & A discussion posts to go up on Wednesday, March 30 (I will post links to their blogs that morning) and the Authors Q & A post will go up on Thursday, March 31. Even if you are not formally participating (on your blog), but you have read some or all of the book and/or this topic (Perinatal Hospice) is of interest to you, please consider participating through reading and commenting on the book tour posts.

I am also excited that I will be announcing the next book tour that I am hosting, here on Four of a Kind, also with author participation, early next week!

This weekend I am signed up to participate in a retreat hosted by some women in our parish church, called Christ Renews His Parish (C.H.R.P.). Though I am not back to 100% with my chest cold, I am still hoping that I feel up to going. For those who are Christian/Catholic and familiar with Kairos and/or Koinonia retreats that many high school and college youth and campus ministry programs do, I get the sense that this experience may be somewhat like that.

I was fairly involved in the St. John’s Catholic Newman Center at the University of Illinois in Urbana/Champaign, when I was in college and grad school. I went on three Koinonia retreats, serving on the planning team for two of them. In high school I actually belonged to a protestant youth group, as there wasn’t a very strong one at the Catholic church my family was a part of during my childhood. That youth group also did retreats once or twice year. I always enjoyed those, along with participation in Operation Snowball Retreats both as a high school student and later on as an adult staff member.

So you could say that I am a bit of a retreat/self help/faith sharing junkie… That being said it has been a long time since I have had the opportunity and the availability to be able to participate in something like this and I can’t wait. It will be the longest I have been away from Abby so far, but I think it will be a good experience for both of us. I also think it will be great for Bob to be able to spend some quality time with Sean and Abby this weekend, while I am retreating.

During this season of Lent, I look forward to returning home to my family on Sunday faith filled, feeling refreshed and with a renewed spirit.

My only regret to being away on Saturday and much of the day on Sunday is that I will miss some of the March Madness NCAA Tourney. I really enjoy watching the games with Bob, especially because I run tournament pools for my family and some neighborhood friends. For those who are following the games and care about the outcome, who would have thought that Duke might not make it to the Final Four this year?! I DID!!! I actually picked UConn and am hoping they win again on Saturday! That could be my ticket to tourney victory this year! 🙂 Though a lot of other teams that I picked still need to win a few more times for that to happen…

Two more things (I know this “kitchen sink” post, just keeps getting longer and longer, so I thank you for your patience), but they are important and they are prayer requests:

1) My dad is having surgery as I type this to repair stenosis in his spine. Please send healing thoughts and prayers his way today and in the week to come as he recovers and heals from the surgery. The spinal stenosis that he has been suffering from for months now has caused him to be very uncomfortable and in a lot of pain. We are hoping and praying that this surgery will take away that pain, as he and we understand it has great potential to do. Please also send your thoughts and prayers to my mom, who will be my dad’s primary care giver in the week to come after his surgery.

2) An old friend of mine gave birth this week to twin boys at 24 weeks gestation. Sadly one of them has passed away. Please send my friend and her husband prayers for healing and strength as they deal with the loss of one of their sons, while trying to stay focused on and positive about the future for their living son who they hope and pray will survive.

Thank you for reading, for your comments and again, for your thoughts and prayers.

I hope that whatever plans that you have for this weekend that you and yours have a wonderful time!