Where in the heck have you been?

Wow. I feel like I've been on a roller-coaster ride since last Wednesday. It's weird to be saying this, but it feels great to be back at work where I can relax! I haven't worked since last Tuesday.

My cousin and his wife and their two sons from Accomac, Virginia, came to visit my family last week. The wife and I took off work so that we could go down and see them. They wanted to go to Mammoth Cave, so we met them there on Wednesday afternoon. It is always fun to go to Mammoth Cave. We went on the 2-mile 2-hour "Historic Tour". They were fascinated. It's really funny, because when we go visit them in Virginia, we always take buckets so that we can pick up shells at the barrier islands. They came here to pick up rocks. There aren't any rocks in their sandy soil out there, so when they came here they wanted to pick up rocks. We took them to the creek to pick up creek gravel and they had a blast. We had dinner with them on Wednesday and Thursday, and enjoyed catching up with them.

On Thursday, the wife and I set up a meeting with a Remax realtor. He took us around and showed us 12 houses that are going to be in our price range. We found three that we really loved. We're really hoping that I get offered the job that I interviewed for two weeks ago.

My sister is really having a hard time with everything that she is going through right now. I won't go into any specifics, but stress and health problems are about to drive her crazy. So we volunteered to help her out by keeping my 4 year-old nephew for a few days. We got him on Wednesday, and we have had him since. As of right now, we'll be taking him back home on Saturday. He'll be away from Mommy for over a week. So far everything is going great. We drove back to Jeffersonville on Friday afternoon. My wife had to work on Saturday, so I had him all by myself. It was fun. I am definitely getting glimpses of fatherhood over the last few days, but it has been great. He really is a good little boy.

The thing that we were most afraid of was having to take him to a babysitter for a couple of days. We were afraid that he would not like this at all. My wife called her boss and asked if she could recommend a babysitter in the area, and she recommended her own babysitter. We took him to meet the babysitter last night and we had to practically drag him away. She has a 7 year-old son and a really cool dog, and their next door neighbor has a pool that he can swim in. So going to the babysitters will be like a vacation for him. Today is his first day there, as my wife and I are both working today. This morning I had to get him up early, put him in some clothes, and take him. It all happened flawlessly, like we had been doing it all summer. I've called to check on him once, and he was having so much fun he didn't want to talk.

So now you all know why I haven't been around lately. I spent the first hour of work this morning catching up with my blog reading. And don't expect to see me logged onto instant messenger anytime this week either. The computer is in his room, so I can't be in there on the computer while he is in bed.