Thursday December 17, 2009-Rayford Crossing

Today we were to go down to Texas City for Cameron's birthday and to watch Tyler's first band concert. Before I went down for coffee, I sent a message to Kristine Schaffner, my former Fire Marshal in Manvel, in Facebook, to see if we could meet for lunch today. As soon as I got back to the trailer, I found that she had responded to me and we made a date to meet at Kelly's in Alvin. I knew that Mike Jaimes, my former Code Enforcement/Animal Control officer in Manvel had been fired, but didn't know where he was working now. She told me that he would meet us there, so I assumed that he was either not working or was working with her in Alvin. When we all arrived at the restaurant, I learned that Mike is not working yet, but is volunteering in Alvin and being paid for only a few hours a week. He is making valuable contacts in Alvin, so I am sure that when an opening comes up, he will go to work.


Mike and Kristine told me that I had left Manvel just at the right time. The administration there seems to have lost their grasp of reality. There are many instances of violations of employee's rights and violations of city policy.

After finishing lunch, we went to our house and picked up the mail and checked the house while we were there. We ran some other errands before we went on to Texas City to pick up Tyler and Cameron at day care. We took them home and before long, it was time for Tyler to leave for his band concert. We brought Cam with us to the concert which was held at one of the new Junior high schools. The parking was terrible, and we ended up parking on a sidewalk with one wheel on the sidewalk and the other in the street. It turned out that there were five school bands performing tonight with Tyler's band being one of them. With that many students and their families there, it was very crowded in the gym where the concert was held. Luckily Kim and Jeremy had gotten there early enough that we got very good seats. Also luckily, Tyler's band was the first to perform. The "performance" was them playing a set of warm-up notes and only one song. The band performed very well and of course, we were very proud of Tyler, but the entire event was poorly run and should have been held in a much larger room.

After leaving the school, we took Cameron out to eat for his birthday. He decided on IHOP for his meal. We all enjoyed our supper with him, and Jeremy arranged for him to get an ice cream sundae for his birthday. From there, we went back to their house where Cam opened his gifts. It was still a school night, so the boys soon went to bed in Tyler's room, allowing me to sleep in Cameron's bed. I didn't sleep well at all, and got up around 4 AM. Stella and Kim had not slept either, so they went to bed to try to get some rest before going to the hospital.

The procedure that Kim is having is relatively minor surgery and will be handled in the day surgery area of the Clear Lake Hospital in Webster. I will give you the details on how she came through in tomorrow's entry.

So long.