So I haven't written in a while...

So what, neither has Shakespeare.- My sister said in her blog that she always liked that quote. It's from a postcard I used to keep in my room when I was a teen. In this case, it's true. I have not written in a while. I have been keeping pretty busy though.
School is tough this semester. It seems that my course load work has increased quite a bit. Many of the classes I'm taking are now dealing with my major, so I feel like I may finally be learning something relevant to teaching. I took my first test of the semester yesterday. It was in a math class. For those of you reading this who know me, you know that I have a love-hate relationship with math. I love to hate it. Despite my math phobia (which is probably just in my head) I'm fairly sure that I did well on the test.
In other news, we've discovered why my wife kept having headaches. Apparantly I like to smother her at night time. (what can i say, i'm a snuggler). In fact, I snuggle so close that all 215 pounds of me was directly on her head and neck. Needless to say, that probably has something to do with her migraines. I've taken pains over the past ten or so days to keep to my side of the bed, and sure enough, not one migraine. The lack of migraines may also have to do with our new stress relief hobby. Rachel and I have been kayaking down the Coosa river. We like it so much that we have both purchased kayaks. Rach bought one called a Ripper. Her kayak is a sit on top, and it's pretty nice. I decided that being the adventurous kinda guy I am, I needed something more challenging. I got a kayak called a Dagger GTX. My kayak is the real deal. Which means that starting tomorrow, I'm learning how to roll in the thing. The Coosa doesnt have any BIG rapids like the Ocoee, but it still wouldn't do for me to go floating down the river with my head bumping all the rocks on the riverbed. Anyway, I'll post a pic of me learning how to roll tomorrow.
In Tech news, the latest hot item is the Ipod Nano. I'm saving up my pennies and dimes in an attempt to get one. I've gotten to play with one already. It's a really neat design, and it's so small that you can't even see it when it's in a pocket.
Other important news- we now have an official webpage. www.alabamamckinneys.com I have yet to really start working on it, but feel free to check it out in the coming days and weeks. Thats all I have for now. - Oh yeah- Aunt Jane is doing very well. I think she's getting around the house better now than she was prior to the hip replacement. She doesn't go out as much as she used to, but we're working on getting her out more. Now that's all I have to say for today. cya guys-
Russ

Update...

Well, since my last post, a lot of things have happened. Hurricane Katrina is right at the top of the list. We were lucky here. The hurricane made landfall well southwest of us, and then headed northeast. There was damage to the south of us, the north of us, and to the west of us. No damage to report here.
Great Aunt Jane's hip replacement surgery went well. She is now walking better than she did prior to breaking her hip, albeit she is using her walker more. Right now she's out of the hospital, living at a rehab center. I think she's ready to come home. Rachel has told me that Jane should be coming home sometime this week.
School has started back for me as well. I'm taking 10 hours right now. That'll change in October. I'll jump to 13 hours then.I think it's going to be a fairly rough semester. Lots of math classes and papers to do. It'll keep me out of trouble anyway.
Well, thats it for this update-
Russ

Rachel's B-day- and other crisis...

Well, today is my Rachel's 31st birthday. She's looks great to be 31 I think- of course, she's told me yesterday that from that now on, she'll only be 29. Of course I had to tease her that as of today, she's 2 years older than I am. At noon I took flowers, a balloon, and a card to her office. When I saw her there, she looked upset...She told me that Jane, who I've written about before, actually did break her hip a few weeks ago. This is really wierd, because she complained about pain in her knee , but when Rach, AND Jane's ortho doc examined her, they checked her hip. She said she felt no pain there at all. All she said was that her knee hurt a lot. In any case, Jane is sceduled to have a hip replacement tomorrow during the day. This news has pretty much tanked Rachel's birthday. She's really worried about Jane. We love Jane a lot, and breaking a hip is not good news for someone her age. We're praying that she'll be ok. Anyway, the only pics I have are of Rach having her office B-day party today, and a few new ones of the kids. Enjoy-
Russ

What was I thinking!???

Another day...

Well, I help take Jane to the doc yesterday. He mainly wants her to try and keep moving her knee, so it won't stiffin up any more than it already has. I was glad to hear that there were no problems with her knee replacement. I'll be going over to her house later today to check on her. I think I got on her good side yesterday...I took her flowers, and some sugarless candy (for her diabetes). In any case, I'm just glad that I was around to help them out.
In other news, I got Will and Sarah up early this morning. We watched the space shuttle Discovery land at Edwards AFB. Sarah had never seen the space shuttle before. lol even Rachel had no idea about how it worked. She told me she assumed they still landed in the ocean at the end of their mission. Honestly, I was amazed...these things have been flying since 1980, and she thought they still landed in the ocean!? wow. Sometimes I wonder about my wife...I guess her brain is all filled up with medical stuff, rather than spacey stuff.
Anyway I watched Discovery land, and it reminded me of sitting with my grandfather (Pop-pop). We watched the first takeoff and landing of the space shuttle (Columbia) together in 1980. I guess in a way history repeats itself. It didn't hold Sarah's attention as it held mine in 1980...of course, I wasn't missing cartoons to watch the space shuttle land either.
For the tech side of my blog- I got a replacement Ipaq yesterday. (to replace the one I accidentally destroyed) It's a bit nicer than my old one I think...I believe they've updated the model some. Thankfully I didn't lose any infomation, because I had it all backed up on my laptop.
It's kind of interesting...When I first started getting "into" technology, I did it mainly because it let me play bigger and better computer games. I hardly have time to play computer games nowadays, but now I'm learning about the technology behind things because I want to see how far I can push them. Take blogging and Podcasting for instance...3 years ago these technologies didn't exist. We can now do what amounts to radio and television broadcasts over the net'. This is a new technology called IpTV . It amounts to a television show you can download from the internet and watch. Initally, many of the shows using this tech had fairly poor production value, but now they're getting really good. Some of the shows I watch or listen to are: Systm , From The Shadows , and This Week in Tech . All of these shows are tech related.
What I like the most is that the line between TV, Radio, and Internet is beginning to blur so much, that you can't tell where one begins and the other ends. Take a look at some of the links in this blog and tell me you don't agree. cya all later-
Russ

What an exciting 2 days!

As my title suggests, the last 2 days were very exciting. It all started yesterday afternoon, when, suddenly, I realized, "Wow...it's really hot in here." Yes friends, my AC had died. The only good thing that can be said about that, was that at least it wasn't too hot yesterday. The temperature topped out at around 88. Unfortunatly, it was a good 5 or 6 degrees warmer inside than it was outside. So, Rachel packed the kids into the car yesterday evening, and took them over the grandparents house. I waited in the heat for the repair man. When he showed up, it took him all of fifteen minutes to diagnose and fix the problem. It was still too hot for the kids to come home, so I went over to Bill and Dianne's (Rach's folks) house. They were nice enough to put us up for the night. While I really appreciate them lettin us stay, I dont think I need to sleep over there very often. My allergies and asthma were killin me throughout the night. (So - note to self take meds to inlaws house when spending the night.)
So after surviving the night, I got to teach my new sunday school class. They're good kids. I think we're going to have a good year together. I only had six students in the class, while the other 1st grade class next door had 16. I have a feeling some of them may be coming my way. Anyway, after teaching class, I met up with Rachel and Sarah. Sarah is now a big 4 year old, and she gets to go to big church! She was very well behaved too. In any case, about 2/3 of the way through the sermon, Williams number starts flashing up on the wall to let us know there is a problem. Rachel got up and went to check on him. 5 minutes went by, and I was starting to get a little concerned. About that time I saw Rach stick her head out the sanctuary door and gesture for me to come with her. It was then I found out the problem wasn't with William, it was with Jane. Apparently she had fallen during visitation at an assisted living center. So we gathered up the kids and took off to see Jane. Due to poor directions, we ended up dring all over town looking for the center. We finally made it there, and found Jane sitting in a chair with her leg looking broken. We didn't want to wait on an ambulance, so we loaded her up in the minivan. She was hurtin so much that it made her nauseated. After gettin her in the van, I got to play ambulance driver. We made it to the hospital in Montgomery, and got her looked at right away- It pays to be married to the Doc...you get to cut right through the red tape. I kept the kiddies busy while Jane got xrayed and examined. It turns out that the bone isn't broken. Since it's not broken, Jane will get to see an orthopedic doc sometime tomorrow. The leg Jane hurt had a knee replaced a few years ago, so we need to have a specialist take care of her.
Anyway, we got Jane a wheelchair, took her home, and tried to make her as comfortable as possible. It's been fairly quiet since she got home...I'm just hoping that it isn't a serious injury and she can get back on her feet soon. Other than that, I've had a slow day! cya all later-
Russ

Can't Sleep?! blog about it!

hey- i can't sleep...which is never a good thing. My poor wife has been suffering through her worst ever migraine. Thankfully I don't get them. Unfortuantly, after something like 12 hours, her headache still hasn't gone away. She's on the other computer, because, due to her head, she can't sleep either. In any case, i've taken the last hour of so to work on the settings on my blog.
Initially, I started out using a different blog service(Yahoo 360)...But I decided to try this one (Blogger)...it just seems more user friendly. Of course Yahoo 360 is still in beta stage (for you non techie people, this means they're testing it to work out all the bugs, and get feedback from their users) I like being involved in beta tests though, its kinda like being out on the cutting edge of something new. I'll probably keep both of the blogs going.
For anyone paying attention, you'll note that I've added some links on the right side of my blog. My two favorite links are to my sister Ginny's Blog, www.ginnymckinney.blogspot.com , which is always an interesting read. The other is to one of my fav tech related webpages. It's called Digg.com . Digg's main page describes it as "a tech web page that uses social bookmarking and blogging..." yada yada yada..the description of Digg is boring, but the site isn't. I suggest you all check it out- you never know what kinda cool things you'll find there.
Anyways i'm getting tired so i'll leave this post with some good pics of the kids...good night-
Russ

My 3rd entry! Such creative blog titles!

Well I've survived my finals...I think I did ok on them. I expect to pull at least a "B" in both my classes. In any case, I'm just glad the semester is over.
You know...kids are fun. Just now, I found William using a toy teacup to take water out of the toilet, and then poor it in his bathtub. He was havin a good ol time. I guess it's ok...I needed to bathe him and mop the floor of his bathroom anyway. He just gave me an excuse. Another William story- This week Sarah taught Will how to long jump off the furniture. I saw him jump from the couch, to the far side of the closest recliner. If you aren't familiar with my house thats nearly 4 feet. Pretty impressive for a 2 year old. While I give him a 10 on the jump, I'm afraid I need to deduct points on his landing...or rather his crashing. He landed and turned his ankle pretty badly. Initially he couldn't even walk on it, so I was, of course, a little freaked out. I thought he may have broken his ankle. (he didn't) He's still limping around, and I'm beginning to think that he may be proud of his boo-boo. I think he's shown it to everyone. It's like a badge of honor for the little guy. In a year he can call it the booboo caused by the "Great Jump of 05' "
In other news, I've decided to leave my job workin as a VA rep. School is getting a lot harder now, and I do not need the extra stress on me. I've helped train two new people people how to do my job over the past few weeks, so I won't be leaving my office in a bind.Speaking of my office, tomorrow is my boss's last day. I'm really gonna miss her. She made working there a lot of fun. Since it's her last day, I'll be taking my kids into the office to tell her bye-bye. I expect that we'll still see her around, mainly because she is gonna be a stay at home mom, and I'm somewhat familiar with the job (from a stay at home dad point of view.) I think we'll invite her and her son to come over and play when he's a bit bigger.
Anyway, thats it for this blog entry- have a good one guys-
Russ

2nd entry

Well, we survived the Wiggles. It was actually pretty fun.When ya see them on TV, it looks like they aren't actually playing any instruments. But, during the show you can see that at least two of them are actually playing instruments. We also got within 10 feet of Jeff Wiggle. He ran up into the stands where we were.Those guys really look like they're having fun...of course I'd be having fun too- all the way to the bank. There must have been nearly ten thousand people there, and at a minimum of 20 bucks a ticket, well, you do the math. The Wiggles didnt collect roses either. Sarah was bummed about that. They did have their dancers come out and collect them though,which was better than nothing. After the show we went and bought the obligatory Wiggles t-shirts, and a feather sword. Will was funny on the way home...one of the Wiggles (Jeff) likes to fall asleep. (hes evidently narcoleptic ) Anyway the kids in the audience would yell "wake up Jeff" and he would. Well, on the way home, Sarah was goin to sleep. Will had no intention of letting her sleep. Every time her head would droop, he's scream at Sarah "AKE UP EFF" (Wake up Jeff). Needless to say Sarah was NOT happy with Will.
...in other news I've decided that I'll keep teaching 1st grade sunday school this coming year. That ought to keep me out of trouble for the next few months anyway :D...and with that I'll close out this blog-
-Russ

1st blog

Well...I've seen my sister blog from all over the place...and she mentioned that it can be somewhat therapeutic.So here goes...
There's a lot goin on in the McKinney house...I have final exams this coming week. (fun fun fun), but before that happens on Tuesday, I have to teach Sunday School tomorrow. After teaching Sunday School, I'll be piling the family into the car and driving to Birmingham to see.....THE WIGGLES. yes...tomorrow i'll be seeing the most highly paid entertainers in Australia. Of course I needed to prepare for such a momentous event, so (following the advice of my best pal Luke) I went out tonite, got roses and posterboard and wrote in BIG LETTERS on the board, "William and Sarah have ROSES for Dorothy" Luke had told me that the Wiggles like to go out and collect the roses from the kids... I hope they do, otherwise i've wasted my time lol.
Anyway back to the Sunday School issue...Tomorrow is our last day to teach the 1st grade class.. I've had a fun year doing it too...Rachel was initially the teacher, and I wasn't teaching at all, but with her work sched. I picked up more and more of the slack till I was doing most of the actual teaching.( at least i think i was- Rach may debate me here) In any case, it was a good classroom management practice for me. BUT, we got the church newsletter during the week, and there's a severe shortage of Sunday School teachers.(no 1st grade teachers) I feel bad about not teaching next year now. I'm not sure what to do...I know that we need fellowship with people our age, but 1st graders probably need a teacher more than I need fellowship. Plus I feel that I helped make a difference in the lives of some of my students...4 of them have become Christians this year in my class, I'd like to think i had some part of helping guide them to the point where they could make decisions. Who knows...
Anyway, I realized this week that I need to help out more around the house...so I have been doing just that..Rachel's probably wondering about which variety of space alien has inhabited her husband. I think she likes having dinner ready when she gets home...I'd better be careful though..I d0nt want to spoil her...
and with that I think I'll call this 1st blog entry quits.
-Russ
PS This Pic was taken back in May at Disney