Grandpa Update

Grandpa will spend another night in the hospital as he still has a fever. There seem to be no other symptoms and his temperature goes down when he has Tylenol in him, but goes back up when the medication wears off. The concern at this point is how weak he is.When we visited this afternoon we suggested he try to go for a short walk, with our help. He said he was too tired and would try tomorrow. A physical therapist showed up while Jim and Grandma went to the cafeteria for a cup of tea and she wanted to take Grandpa for  a walk. He said, "no." I asked if there was  chair that he could sit in, thinking that that would be an improvement over him laying flat on his back. The PT left the room to track down a chair and sure enough came back with one. She put the chair on one side of Grandpa's bed and made him get out of the other side and walk around to the chair. It was all he could do. She told him he could get back in bed after sitting up for a half hour and he had it timed to the minute and called for a nurse as soon as 30 minutes were up. Grandma is pretty tired these days, but did get to the YMCA this morning for some exercise. I will update the blog with new info as we get it. I took this photo of Grandpa, with his permission! I'm not the paparazzi! 

This morning I had my third spinning class and I may have found the spinning wheel I would like to own. In the two and a half hours I was at class today, I spun two bobbins of single ply yarn and the plied the two strands together into a 2-ply yarn. I have 62 yards and it is great! It is off-white since the fiber is in its natural state. I could dye it if I want, but at this point I think I will focus on spinning and not try to learn about dyeing too. I felt so comfortable in front of this wheel and was able to solve my own problems as they arose. I will post a photo of my skein of yarn in the near future. 

Before going to the hospital, we went to the Barnes and Nobel in Pittsford for a presentation and book signing by J-Mac. For you out-of-towners, J-Mac is a young man from Greece, who rose to fame when he went into the last basketball game of the season for the team for which he was the student manager and scored 20 points in the last four minutes of the game. J-Mac, or Jason, as we knew him, has autism and was a much loved team manager. We knew him and his family because he also ran Cross-Country and track. The coach called the opposing coach in the days before the game and asked for permission to let this boy play as a reward for years of service to the team. The coaches agreed that he could play near the end if the outcome of the game had pretty much been determined by that time. With 4 minutes to go, the Greece Athena team was up by quite a bit, so the coach signaled for Jason to go into the game. This was the first game he wore a uniform and the fans knew that he might get a chance to play. He missed his first shot, then hit a 2 pointer, followed by 6 consecutive 3 pointers! The fans and his teammates were going crazy! The video of these last 4 minutes is a real tear-jerker! The local news picked up the story and then it ran on the national evening news stations and ESPN. The coach, a PE teacher in the district was given a leave of absence to deal with all the publicity as a result of those magical 4 minutes. J-Mac, as he is now called, was nominated for and won, a national award from ESPN. Book and movie offers came pouring in. Magic Johnson came to town to meet J-Mac and talk about doing a movie about Jason's life. When President Bush was in town, he wanted to meet J-Mac. Jason has become a spokesperson for the Autism Society. This week was the release of his book, The Game of My Life, so we went to get our signed copies. Below is a photo of J-Mac signing a book for Corey, who ran in many races with Jason. Corey, he wanted to know how you were doing, as did his father. The book signing was very well attended and we are glad to have a copy for us and for Corey. If you want to read an uplifting story, go buy a copy. It will benefit a great kid. 

On our way home from the hospital we stopped at Davinci's for dinner and near the end of the meal we commented that we hadn't seen anyone we knew. Five minutes later, I looked up towards the front door and there are Gram and GrandDad waiting for a table! 

Have you voted for your favorite Valentine treat? If you voted for "Other" and can or want to share what else you would like to receive for Valentine's Day, leave me a comment. Remember this is a "G" rated blog!

Stay tuned for Grandpa updates.

Hope all is well.