Of Shirts, Ambulances and Late Nights Out

Turtle has a shirt that reads "My Parents are Exhausted" and I think we should permanently attach it to his body. We Are! With everything we've got going on lately, we can hardly get a snore in edgewise. We've signed up for a city-sponsored program called Slim Down Sandy (or more affectionately known by our friends Scott and Missy as Fess Up Fatty, Trim Down Tubby and Lose It Lardo). This has added the time-consuming tasks of eating healthier, exercising and a weekly family walk to our schedules. We enjoy it, but it does take time - in fact, last Monday I forgot I was supposed to babysit the neighbor's kids because we were out on our family walk. Yikes!

In addition, we've been rehearsing for our Stake Play - Phantom of the Op'ry - which we're supposed to perform next week and, as a cast, we've not yet run through it from beginning to end. I think that will happen a total of ONCE before we begin performing. This calls for a lot of late nights out in order to rehearse, and today I can feel that it is taking its toll on my body. Regardless of how late we stay up, Ben still has to get up for work at 5:30 and the kids still wake up around 6:30, so there's no sleeping in!

And what of the ambulances in the title, you may ask? Well, last night we were a half hour late for rehearsal because we couldn't get out of the parking lot of our condo. An ambulance, a fire truck and two police cars were blocking us in. So, like all good neighbors, we stood and stared as they took care of business. Ben had heard a loud pop a few moments earlier and was wondering if it were a gunshot. A life-flight copter landed on the street next to the condos, and then a man in a stretcher was brought out and rolled down to it. This morning we found out that a man and a woman were cleaning a condo that had been foreclosed. The woman found two rifles under a bed and as she was moving them, one went off and shot the man in the stomach. She called 911 and I already told you what happened next. We could see the woman and she was frantic. The man was flown to the U of U Hospital, and later pronounced dead. I feel horrid for that woman and the man's family. My heart goes out to them and I am praying for them. I would take exhausted over that any day. Any Day.