My Gourdneck Shame

Well, this past Saturday I loaded up my caving gear and rode with Joey to Gourdneck Cave, the same cave which I got all of 5 steps into last year. They've removed the ladders since then, but my friend John said it was "just a climbdown with a handline." We got there and I took a good hard look at the "climbdown" and decided not to go in. I'm pretty sure I could have gotten down OK, but the climb back out would have been nasty, and they might have had to haul me up it, which just wouldn't be fun for anyone. It can be climbed out of with just a handline, but people that were in a lot better shape than me had a hard time doing it.

I will master this cave some day soon, but only after I have some vertical equipment and a little more training on climbing. For now Gourdneck is still my master.

Around Again

As of approximately 0600 this morning, I've completed my 39th orbit around Sol, the homely G2 main sequence star in this solar system I've been assigned to. All systems are currently nominal, although Triglyceride levels remain elevated. Reproductive components of the mission plan have been completed, although many components involved in the education of named successor are still in the implementation phase. Said successor has recently acquired the ability to gain the attention of necessary parental units by the utterance of the phrase "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!" in a repetitious manner until said parental unit engages its bipedal locomotive appendages and ascends to the second level of assigned domicile to retrieve it.

Hatch Go Ugh

Ugh. I'm finally feeling better after being laid low for a week with a sinus cold. I've been walking some during the time, but I'm on a carb break for the countdown to my birthday next week.

I'm planning on going caving on Saturday, and it will be a return to Gourdneck, which defeated me last year. They removed the ladders recently, so supposedly it's a climbdown with a rope now. My friend John has promised to bring an extra long rope to hook up to his truck in case of difficulty. Should be interesting regardless.

There Goes the Neighborhood

I came home about 10:00 tonight after going to a Nashville Grotto meeting. As I pulled into the driveway and parked the car, I looked out to my left at the common grounds and saw a rabbit sitting in the grass about 30 feet away. After about 5 seconds, another rabbit runs up, mounts it, and starts going to town. A few seconds after that, another rabbit runs up and starts chasing both of the other rabbits, so there are three rabbits running around in big circles in the grass. The whole time I'm watching this, the saxophone music from Benny Hill is running through my head. I had to take a few minutes to stop laughing before I went into the house.

Baby Morning Blues

Yesterday started out as a "where the hell are my keys?" morning. We spent 10 minutes looking for them, but the girl was going to be late for school so we took my wife's car. I get back, get mostly dressed for work, then start looking for the keys. Marissa is convinced that the boy picked them up at some point and stashed them somewhere so he can pull them out two days hence and go "ta-da!" He did this same trick with her cell phone last month.

After about 45 minutes, I finally remember that I was using my keys out in the garage the previous afternoon to pry off something from the boy's wagon so I could get the wheel to be tighter. A quick dash out to the garage and I have them. I finish getting dressed, and as I'm about to leave, I hear a cry of anguish from Marissa...

Yes, the boy got into a bucket of paint. We turned the very small back deck into a play area, complete with astroturf and a slide, but somehow an old rusty bucket of white paint had materialized in the corner under the bench, and the lid was of course loose enough for the boy to get it off. After getting the majority of the paint off of him, I finally stumbled into work about 9:45, just thankful to be there.

Back Under

I got home at 11pm last night. My knees and elbows were sore, scraped up, and bruised. My boots were water logged, and most of my body was covered in mud and guano. What a great night!

Yes, I went caving last night. We had a group of 12 that went on a trip to Hardins Cave in Davidson County. This was my second trip to the cave, but I was in much better shape this time. Some of the group pushed almost to the back of the cave, but we various levels of abilities in the group, so since I was the "leader" of the trip I stayed behind to make sure everyone was getting along OK and I didn't go quite as deep.

We spent about 2.5 hours in the cave. There wasn't much water, but we saw probably 100 bats. Since it was fairly warm outside there were a lot of them flying around in the cave as well. At one point one flew close enough to my head that I could hear the wings fluttering as it went by.

I carbed out for dinner last night since I was going caving and needed the extra energy, but today I'm back on the low carbs until the next caving trip. I'll also be back at the gym tonight to keep the weight lifting streak alive. I'm starting my third week of lifting this week. No big results yet, but thong season is just around the corner you know.

Weekend Meat

Sometime in the last year or so, Heff and my brother have gotten me hooked on Chuck Eye steaks. Apparently the Piggly Wiggly in Columbiana has an endless supply of them. They cook up and taste exactly like a Rib Eye steak, but they cost less than half.

I've tried to find them around Nashville, but I've had no luck. The butchers I've talked to at the super markets here say that they rarely have them, maybe a few packages a week. Apparently the Pig in Columbiana has access to a bigger supply of them.

Well, this Saturday when we were at the local Krogers, I finally found two packs of them, so I fired the grill up for the first time this year. This is what makes the Low Carb diet such a great thing. I let the grill heat up for about 10 minutes, and then put the steak on that had been soaking in Dales for a few hours. Three minutes on each side, then I chowed down on a pound of steak that I paid three whole dollars for. I'm sure there's some nit-picky reason that rib eye is so much more expensive, but I sure can't find any reason to pay twice as much for it.

Sunday Legs

Yesterday's step total = 19,136 = 8.75 miles. Nuff Said.

Doctor's Visit

Well, the two week follow up visit to the doctor was yesterday afternoon. Everything went well. My blood pressure was still a little high, about 20 pts or so, but much lower than it was two weeks ago. According to their scales I had dropped 10 lbs, and the doc was pretty impressed with that. We decided I'd keep exercising and losing weight, and stay on the same medicine, with another follow up in two months.

As for Baby Hatch, he's like a brand new baby after the tubes were put in. He's talking a lot more and is a lot more active. Marissa turned our small back deck into a play area, with a slide, and he gets angry if he doesn't get to go out there right after breakfast.

Sarah Ann Hatcher

As I said in a previous post, I've been doing some more family research lately. One of my ancestors that's been difficult to find information about is my 2nd Great Grandmother, Sarah Ann Hatcher. She was married to Andrew Jackson Hatcher, who is my 2nd Great Grandfather and is who my son Jackson is named after. Even today, nobody is completely sure what Sarah Ann's maiden name was. It could be Bircheat, Birgett, or maybe even Hyde.

The online resources I had found had Sarah Ann as being buried in "B'ville Cemetery in Birmingham." I wanted to find this cemetery so I could visit it on my next trip down to Birmingham, so I started trying to find it online. After a week of complete frustration, I finally contacted the Genealogy department at the Birmingham Public Library and within a few minutes they were able to confirm that it was actually "Bucksville Cemetery" which is in Tuscaloosa County. It's adjacent to the Tannehill Golf Course and is right off I20/59.

I had made some postings online before I figured it out, and this week someone who lives close by the cemetery was actually kind enough to take some pictures of Sarah Ann's tombstone. I still want to check it out myself, but it's great to finally know where she's buried. No one knows so far where Andrew Jackson Hatcher is buried, but he could be in an unmarked grave next to hers. He died in 1893, just 4 years after she did. She was also his second wife, so it's possible he's buried next to his first wife, but I don't know where she's buried yet. The search continues.

The Tired Ole Hatch

Well, with the big 3-9 birthday coming up fast, and a blood pressure spike the week before last which was too high to mention on a family blog, the time finally came for me to give up the delusion of the low calorie diet and just plain old get my fat ass into gear and lose some weight. So last Wednesday I polished up the old pedometer told myself I'd do at least 7k steps a day for the next 7 days. I also got back on the low carb diet after reading the Atkins book for the first time in a while to get myself back in practice.

So here's my chart of steps walked for the last 7 days including today:

2/28/2007	10320
3/1/2007	7350
3/2/2007	7373
3/3/2007	8954
3/4/2007	10091
3/5/2007	11165
3/6/2007	12215

This is probably the best overall week I've had since I first got the pedometer. I kept my pledge to do at least 7k steps a day, and for the week I averaged 9,638 steps a day and walked a total of almost 31 miles. Not too shabby for a fat hairy white boy.

I've also been getting at least 8 hours of sleep a night, but that's mostly because I'm just plain tired. This morning I weighed in at 280.9, so I've lost almost 12 pounds since the new year. I went to the gym twice this past week as well, but that was mostly to use the treadmill when it was freezing outside. I did a little bit of weights, but just with the arms. My next cave trip is March 14, so I should be in pretty good shape by then at this rate.

Oh Lawd!

Apparently Heff has finally gotten tired of having no outlet to abuse me on the Internet, since I've been heavily censoring his comments here for the last year or so. It appears that his blog has returned. Before you rush over there, be warned that Heff is one of the most disgusting and despicable bloggers that you'll ever meet, but he's also my best friend and my Fourth Cousin, Once Removed. His blog is NC-17 on it's best day, while I strive to maintain at PG-13 rating.

Don't click on the link Nana!

Hatcher Implants

Jack has had 5 ear infections in the last three months, so when we visited the ear, nose, and throat specialist on Tuesday he said we should definitely get tubes inserted as soon as possible. Both ears were full of fluid and it's probably been affecting his hearing for the last few months.

So we woke up this morning at 6am and got to Summit Hospital at 6:45 to check into the Same Day Surgery area. It was pretty nerve wracking, since they had to put him under for a few minutes to do the surgery. Everything went fine though, and he's already feeling a lot better this afternoon. The doctor said both ears were full of fluid and pus, and he's been on a strong antibiotic for a week now.

Jack now has something implanted within him just like his Daddy. Fortunately, his will be gone naturally in about a year, while I still feel like I'm part Borg. Actually, I don't really notice my pacemaker much now after having it for three years as of yesterday.