April Fool's...

I have been thinking about getting a new car. While my car is nice and I do like my car...I still miss having a convertible Porsche. Unfortunately the Porsche comes with 2 seats and we are a family of 3. There just doesn't seem to be nice sedans out there that doesn't feel old fogey style.

Last week I went and test drove the new 2009 Jaguar XF. It was nice but expensive. Jaguar can't even come close to the deal that Mercedes or BMW can make. Thus, I dunno if I would pay 40% more just to have something different from others since Benz and Beemers are dime a dozen in LA. I have to rule out some of the exotics since Oscar has the Aston Martin and Lotus already...can't be a copy-catter.

This isn't your dad's Jaguar XF:
So why am I looking to get another car? Well April Fool's on me...but not really. Aya and I both had to take our cars in for service this weekend on Saturday. $2000 dollars later we got our cars back! $2000 bucks for oil changes, brakes on my car, a new battery and two crummy car washes!

When the service manager called me to say Aya needed a new battery and that it would cost $300 bucks, I said, "How come you can't go to Pep Boys and throw one of the $19.99 batteries in there?" Aya and my mom thought it was funny...but I didn't think it was funny. 19 bucks compared to 300 bucks!! Gimmie a break. It is just ridiculous that Mercedes charges that much for routine service.

Yes, BMW and Jaguar will be expensive as well so by looking at another car it won't solve my problem. I guess I am just looking to spread my business and give it to others and not Mercedes.

I was going to buy a new bbq-er if my car repair bill was under $200 bucks. Forget that now. I even debated about my pre-order of Grand Theft Auto IV....but then I thought, "I can scrounge up $70 bucks for 30 hours of entertainment."

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Yoko update: Aya visited her mom today and Aya was encouraged. Aya's mom was awake the entire 2 hour visit. She ate 5-6 ozs food compared to the usual 1 oz of food. She took 15 steps today in therapy. Those are assisted steps where she walks holding onto bars, so she isn't walking unassisted but at least she was vertical today. She got a haircut and that made her feel better. So, small steps today. Hopefully 2 steps forward, 1 step back...well maybe not the 1 step back but at least there is progress.

Wedding...

Friday afternoon we went to Aya's coworkers wedding at La Venta Inn in Palos Verdes. I don't know if it was because I worked a 1/2 day on Friday but it just seemed like Aya and I had a longer and nicer weekend.

The wedding was nice. The food was good, there was an open bar and we always have fun with Aya's coworkers. Hopefully Aya and I won't ever have to host one of the dinner parties but they are pretty fun.

Mike and Courtney:

Derek and Brett:

Dave and Rose:
And of course me and Aya. I have no idea what Aya is pointing out....she was boozing it up as usual:
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Yoko update: Apparently the anti-depression medicine kicked in this weekend and Aya's brother said that her mom is doing better. She wants to leave the living assisted home and her brother said the only way that will happen is if she gets up and walks out on her own two legs. Yoko then said, "I guess I better try harder in rehab."

Hopefully that is a good sign. For the most part I think she still lays in bed and rests. She eats maybe 1-2 ounces of food per meal.

Thanks for everyone for all the well wishes, cards and flowers. I wish I could post better news or more progress but this is something that will just take a while. Hopefully with enough time, Aya's mom will be as good as new.

Easter...

It was the annual Easter Egg hunt at my parents house on Sunday. This was the first year JT was really able to participate and know what he was doing. The first time he was about 4 months old and could barely hold on to an egg. Last year he was 1.5 and kind of stunk up the joint even though we practiced. He couldn't hold the basket and get an egg.

This year he did much better but still dawdled around and didn't have that killer instinct to horde all the eggs.

Here is the competition...I mean cousins:

JT was lesiurely gathering eggs with his head start:

This year there was something new...hula hoop contests. Apparently hula-hooping is like riding a bike, once you learn you never forget how. This was Aunty Paul's idea....she is an elementary school teacher so I bet she practices all the time.

But then Aunty Nora did it too...and she said she hasn't hula hooped in 50 years!

Aya NEVER hula hooped before so this was her first time! We all know she can't ride a bike either, but at least this time she didn't get hurt.

Happy Easter!

Ian's Birthday...

After the zoo, JT and I went to Ian's birthday party at Under The Sea. Under the Sea is like a gigantic play area, with a bouncer, slides and lots of tricycles and bikes. Just imagine a big playground that is indoors.

I don't know how to describe it...there really was nothing wrong with it...but my heart kind of sank a little. Maybe it has to do with the male ego, but all the kids were running around, going on the slide, going in the bouncer, riding all the cars and JT was playing by himself with a kitchen set:

JT saw the oven and was saying, "COOKIES". I was thinking you are just like your mom. Not that Aya bakes...Aya eats cookies! To be fair, JT goes to the park daily and we were at the park at the zoo! So the kitchen set was something new but since Aya didn't go to the birthday it was just me and Jack...I didn't think it was cool to hang out in the kitchen area.

With that being said, I guess it wasn't cool for me to take a picture of JT in the mermaid cut out:

Aya and I plan to keep these pictures so if JT ever asks us for a motorcycle we can say, "NO".

Crash!
Getting back to JT and food. Under the Sea served a snack and 30 minutes later served cake. All of the other kids ate real quick and went back to playing. JT was getting 2nd and 3rd helpings of snacks and didn't leave until he ate ALL his cake. Ugh. Just like Aya. Give him food and he is one happy camper.

2 hours with about 15 kids running all over screaming and hyper. Just me and JT. It was painful...almost wished I went to Jenny's birthday....ALMOST.

Spring Fling...

A very busy Easter weekend for us. We were hardly home and this whole week of updates will be from this weekend.

We started off the weekend by going to the Spring Fling at the LA Zoo event. JT got to pet rabbits:

JT took a picture with the easter bunny and then got it printed on an Easter t-shirt:

Next up was the rabbit face painting:

Finally we met Tony the Tiger!

Puddle...

JT loves to play with water. Aya and I got JT this nice pool so JT can pour water and play with some boats.

However, JT liked splashing the water out of the container:

Then instead of playing in the nice pool of water he played in the puddle of dirty water:

Dirty hands...
Happy Friday!! I hope everyone has a good weekend!

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Aya's mom got transferred from St. Joseph's to a living assisted facility near her home in Fullerton. All of the living assisted facilities are kind of depressing. Hopefully she will get enough attention because it is about a 12 patient to 1 nurse ratio.

I know "living assisted" sounds better than ICU, but to be honest, Aya's mom sleeps a majority of the time. Rehab has not really started. The progress is slow but at least now she is out of critical and/or life threatening condition. Hopefully within the next month their will be some sort of improvement so we can actually gauge what the next step will be and have some idea of what kind of life Aya's mom will live out.

Happy Birthday!

Happy 53rd birthday to Jenny. You don't look a day over 55 if you ask me!

I love this part. It made me laugh almost every day. There was an evite for Jenny's birthday which I actually read on time and then declined for better offers that day. =)

The funny part is that 4 of the 5 people that did not reply to Jenny's party are long time friends! hahahahahhaha!!

What is even better is when I went back tonight to try to cut and paste my rude comment in I found out that the party was now cancelled! hahahaha. Oh yeah....HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNY!

As an early bday present I researched your butt problem and maybe this is what happened:

According to WebMD, an anal fissure is “a tear in the lining of the lower rectum (anus) that causes pain during bowel movements.” Anal fissures are caused by vigorous stretching of the anal canal. A fissure may develop if you are constipated and try to pass a large, hard stool; if you don’t relax your anal muscles (sphincter muscles) during a bowel movement; or sometimes after repeated diarrhea.

Maybe Ron and Jeff will buy you some Ex-Lax for your bday! =)

Night and Day...

Good news to report. Aya took the day off because she thought her mom was going to be transferred from St Josephs to an assisted living facility. However, when Aya got to the hospital she was informed her mom was cooperative with the physical therapist and that she did really well. Better than she has ever peformed and did not complain.

Aya go to see her eat bites of food and drink water for the first time since she has been in the hospital...which is close to 1 month now. Aya's mom even sat upright in a chair and stayed awake today.

The news was so good that St. Joseph's wants to see if this trend continues. If so they might re-evaluate her and she can go be transferred St. Judes instead of a living assisted facility. Aya will be going tomorrow when the therapist is there because family encouragement can aid recovery. Hopefully this was not a one time deal. Cross your fingers...

Out of ICU...

This weekend Aya and I went to check out 3 living assisted facilities for Aya's mom. 1 was in Fullerton and 2 were in Orange. I had no idea what to expect, but all 3 were depressing.

Aya's mom was moved out of ICU on Friday into a general room. Due to health care insurance, the insurance company wants Aya's mom moved to a living assisted facility on Monday.

This was the first time in 2 weeks that I went to visit Aya's mom. Her face looked better as the swelling from the surgery was down and she looked pretty normal again. Unfortunately, she spent the day sleeping. I also did not see her move her right arm and right leg. I also heard her speak and it was more like a whisper but you could understand what she was saying. She did moan and cry a lot.

So with all that, it just doesn't seem like she is ready for assisted living...but I guess she doesn't need to be taking up a hospital bed either. Looks like our temporary plan is to have Aya move to the Fullerton house while I take care of JT.

It is about 50-50 now that JT takes off his pants to watch TV. Here he is "with" pants this time...just chillin.

Happy Monday!

The Grand Canyon...

As soon as JT turned two his two favorite words have been, "NO" and "MINE". He listens but he doesn't obey and always wants to try everything we tell him not to do. Yes, some of you are thinking just like the way *I* do not listen. Well, this is proof that he is part my son and part Aya's son.

A few weeks ago I caught him standing on the chair trying to leap from one chair to the other like he was jumping the Grand Canyon.

This is my favorite picture because on his attempt to jump the chairs he missed and ended up just being like a bridge over the Grand Canyon. However, why I like this and why it reminds me of Aya is because he didn't even put his hands out. He just had his face in the arm rest...kind of how like Aya fell shoulder first when trying to play defense against me in one on one basketball. Dork.

The recovery:
Over to the other side:

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Hopefully this Child Height Predictor comes true for JT. Based on JT's current age, current height, weight and my height and Aya's height the predictor says:

Height Predictor

Your boy will likely be 5 ft. 10 in. at age 18.

Young men often continue to grow a little past 18 until they reach 21, but their height at age 18 is very close to their final adult height. This prediction is a "best guess" but it's still just that -- a guess. Based on the formula we used* there is a 50 percent chance that your boy's full-grown height will be within 0.8 inches (above or below) of this prediction, and a 90 percent chance that it will be within 2.1 inches.

Even if it is off by 2.1 inches he will be 1 inch taller than me. Hopefully.

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Mother in-law news:

Yoko had more tests this morning and things are looking better. The vasospasms have been reduced and they think no longer require medication. In fact, they have started weening her off all her medication now.

The doctors think that with 6 months of physical therapy she could be in pretty good shape. They also want to transfer her out of ICU this week if things continue to progress. If so, she would only be in a general room for a day or two until she can get transferred into a living assisted facility.

Aya is going to look at two facilities this weekend. One is in Santa Ana and the other is in Fullerton. I am hoping the Fullerton facility is nice because that would cut done about 20-30 miles for Aya's daily 120 mile commute. In addition, Aya could just live in Fullerton the next 6 months or so.

Even though Yoko is medically doing better, mentally she is not cooperating. Yoko is battling some depression so that is causing her to refuse physical therapy thus delaying the evaluation of what she can or can not do. She refuses to swallow or eat solid food so the doctors can not remove the feeding tube nor is she rehabing the right side of her body that is showing slight paralysis. Although she has moved her hand and leg so that is encouraging. Thus, it is fustrating for Aya to go and spend the time and be away from JT when her mom is refusing treatment.

Hopefully the anti-depressents will hope and we can begin therapy and start the road to recovery.

No pants...

Yesterday when JT and I got home I needed to make dinner. I let JT watch a video while I went to make some ravioli, rice and chili (not together...two separate meals). Normally I can hear JT bounce around when he watches videos but he was kind of quiet so I snuck upstairs to see what he was doing and this is what I saw:

He was sitting there looking at his dinosaur book without any pants. He had taken off his pants and was just lounging in his diaper. Good thing Aya wasn't home because I just let JT go pants-less the rest of the night.

Garbage Truck...

JT loves the garbage truck. About a month ago my mom got JT this trash truck:

He loves the truck and it is amazing that he remembers every morning to take it grandpa and grandma's and then he remembers to take it home. One day he left it at Grandma's and I figured he just forgot but on the way home he remembered and wanted me to drive back. I tried to distract him into forgetting but it didn't work so we had to drive back and get his truck.

So look at JT's truck again. It is like the commercial garbage truck that picks up the bins. Before JT got his trash truck he used to imitate the trash truck lifting up the bin and dumping the bin into the back of the truck.

Here it is on video:

Nugget...

For quite some time now we have been empting JT's crap from his diaper into the toilet. If not we would have to take the trash out every day and I am just too cheap to pay for that many trashbags. Plus, it is two fligths of stairs to the garage trash can.

Aya had dumped JT's diaper contents into the toilet and a few hours later I went to take a leak and this is what I saw:

Notice that little brown nugget on the bowl? Yup, that is crap. Apparently Aya did not put all the crap in the bowl but then neglected to clean up after herself.

Usually I would just clean it and mention it to Aya but then she would think I am joking or lying...thus this time I took picture for 'proof'. Further evidence that I already have to take care of two people...JT and Aya!

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It appears that the surgeons feel like a second surgery would be riskier than doing nothing....thus it looks like the decision will be to do nothing. The doctors plan to monitor Aya's mom (herein called Yoko) in ICU for another 10-14 days. If the vasospasms stop and if Yoko can stand the pressure/pain then she will be moved out of ICU.

Hopefully by then we will know where she stands in terms of recovery, paralysis and what kind of life she can expect to to have for hopefully the next 20-30 years.

Once again it will be a case of no news is good news. Aya and her brother are currently tag teaming on watching their mom. Aya is up next week so hopefully we can settle in a routine on when Aya will be home and when she won't be home.

Even more birthday...The devil...

Aya thinks that with my gote I look like the devil. I don't see it. I know some of you are going to take the cheap joke and draw horns on me, point out the fact that I am wearing red or just say I am evil. All those aren't very original.

In any case, when I asked Aya what she wanted for her bday she just wanted me to shave. I kind of hemmed and hawed about it because I had only been growing it for just over a month and Aya told me I could grow it for 6 months. Aya never thought it would grow as long as it did in a month and didn't want to see what 6 months growth would be.

I also did my best not to trim it, shape it or do any kind of grooming. I just wanted it to grow buck wild.

I suppose out of the goodness of my heart, I shaved it for Aya's birthday. I figure if I can't think of anything for Aya's birthday I can just grow the gote at the start of every year and shave it off for a present!

OH!! With Aya's mom in the hospital and my days getting all jumbled together I keep forgetting stories and what I want to write.

So one night Aya, her brother and I go out to a local mexican restaurant near the hospital. We were already tired but we all decided to get some drinks. Aya's brother ordered first...and then got carded. Aya ordered next...nothing. I ordered and I got carded. Hence that means the waiter thought Aya was the oldest of the group! hahahhahahaha. I had left my wallet in the car and I had to go and get it to show him my age before he would bring me my drink!! hahahahhaha!! Nothing like feeling young on your birthday by NOT getting carded!! Classic!

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No news about Aya's mom. She was having more beizo (sp) spasms today. It was not showing up on the doppler test they run but when they did an angiogram test the spasms were there and they did not want to do the stent operation if Aya's mom was having the spasms. That latest test do show another anuerysm is there but they think the stent procedure will work.

That operation won't be tomorrow...could be Wednesday at the earliest but they want to run more tests so I am thinking the second procedure won't happen until later in the week or weekend.

They did remove the 'valve' that was releasing cranial fluid, so now more pressure is building up but hopefully Aya's mom processes it normally so that is good news. Unfortunately as pressure builds so does the pain so she is back on morphine so that means she is not awake to talk or move.

Nothing new to report...

This entry was inspired by Saori. She has made a comment, "Please please let us know if we could do anything to help." Very nice thought....a lot of friends and family have made the same comments via phone, email or my blog.

Honestly, there isn't anything anyone can do for Aya's family at the moment. For our family (Aya, JT and I) my parents are helping out by watching JT whenever I end up going to the hospital to support Aya.

For the most part, we meet with the surgeon or various doctors. We see the speech and physical therapist and we talk to the nurses. Outside that we spend a lot of time in ICU just waiting for Aya's mom to open her eyes...check her progress...and see if she is going to speak or move. Basically just looking for some sort of sign of improvement.

I can understand why people call and want to the know the status but at times it is very annoying and stressful For each person that calls Aya, she has to basically tell them the story and that makes it hard for her because she has to relive it. Maybe because it is Aya's mom, more people call Aya than her brother. Maybe because Aya lives in So. Cal and her brother is in Seattle people call Aya. I don't know. All I know is that we can't take calls in ICU...we have really poor cell phone reception in the hosptial itself. People have no problems calling EVERY day for an update even though we say we won't know anything for the next week!

Yes I know people are concerned and want to see her, but the simple fact is ICU is limited to 2 people at a time. She is in no condition to see visitors. My mother inlaw is aware mentally so we don't want people coming and crying or being sad when this is a time to be positive and strong.

Tomorrow (Monday) we find out if Aya's mom will have another surgery. Odds are high she will but we don't know which procedure they will opt for. Thus, we have no news, we don't know what the outcome will be...but whichever it is there will be at least a 1-2 day recovery so again we will have no news. Hopefully people will stop calling...while it is very nice people have Aya's mom in their thoughts and prayers there is just no need to call everyday.