The sale is FINAL!!! We closed on our house Wednesday afternoon and the buyers close on the house Friday morning at 8 or 9am! I am so thankful that house is sold! I cannot wait to use that money to pay off debt!!! We have been so fortunate and blessed that the Lord has helped us make both mortgages! Now maybe I can focus on making my new home look the way we want. I still want to get some parlor chairs for the front reading room and a small table and lamp to go between them. We need to get curtains for all rooms! We would like to paint too...not sure how soon we'll get to that. Oh well... Our bigger concern right now is getting the front yard in order. We are going to get some topsoil hauled in and buy some sod for the front yard. Ben wants to do some landscaping as a center piece for the yard so I have to figure out how we want to lay that out and then how much sod we will need. Fun stuff!

Ben is finishing his refresher course tomorrow then he will study a couple more weeks and try the paramedic test again.

Ben's sister Brittany and husband Jay are coming in for the summer and supposedly she is going to be taking my place at the sleep center. This will give me a summer "break", even though no one has discussed this with me. I keep telling them that once I leave...I'm not coming back. I need a break! So hopefully by the summer Ben will have his paramedic and get his second job like he wants and life will be great: I will go back to just 3 nights a week, Ben 24 on 48 off with SFD and then work an occasional shift once a week or so on an ambulance service...normalcy...that would be nice. :)

**WARNING** Rant Session

OK...I try to take most things in strides and brush off the bad and try to look for the good, but I believe this week I have had more than my fair share! So to update everyone I will share the good, the bad and the ugly.

THE GOOD: The house has a closing date of March 31st. YAY...God bless you Rusty for sticking in there with us! We have to fix a few minor things on the house and hopefully will be out from under that monster.

Ben has been able to work a couple shifts on the Service Co. He enjoys working on this truck because they do all the medical assists and wrecks in addition to the house fires. He told his captain that he loves working there and would be more than happy to transfer. The captain acknowledged his interest and we'll see what happens at the next transfer.

THE BAD: Ben is still extremely frustrated with the entire Paramedic testing program. His refresher course is coming up next week. I hope that this helps him out a great deal. We will see how it goes.

THE UGLY:
1. Monday afternoon I got a call from my friend Ashlie from work. She had spent most of the morning at the St. Thomas Orientation for employees. She was there with another girl from work who is being trained how to use our software and generally how we work at the sleep center. She was expressing to Ashlie how she was so nervous about our software and how she had never worked this program before. Then she made a comment to Ashlie that about made her chin drop to the floor. The girl said, "Oh well, I guess it won't be that bad. Mom says I will be ok because even a MORMON can do it." Ashlie said, "Excuse me, what did you say?" Ashlie knew that the only LDS person at work was me!

This girl's mother who said this, Karen, is a PRN employee that I have NEVER met. Karen's comment implied that people of the LDS faith are not smart, directly put my intelligence down and was inappropriately singling out the LDS faith in a way that doesn't even make sense to me. My religion has nothing to do with my intelligence level nor my work ethic and skills. How can you make a comment like that about someone when you do not even know them. My only conclusion is that this woman has worked with some people on the B shift who knew me and it might have been mentioned that I am LDS. She then might have known someone in her past who was LDS and she is now associating me to be just like that person.

I immediately called my supervisor and complained about how offensive her comment was, even if it was not intentionally directed towards me. My supervisor was shocked and said that none of the full timers have had anything negative to say towards me, which is nice, not that I really care how they view me. Paul said that he is going to handle the situation and speak with Karen about how she needs to be careful what she says and that she can not make blanket statements like that about anyones religion or gender affiliation. If she feels a certain way then she and her daughter need to keep their views at home. I have recently learned that Karen used to be a teacher at Vol. State and she likes to take her book smarts and use it in a way to make herself feel as though she is intellectually elevated above those around her when in actuality I have heard she is horrible in the application of those thing in which she feels so intellectually advaced in. If there is one thing I will defend it is definately my intelligence. I have worked very hard for my credentials and me degree. I'm not the quickest learner but I am good at what I do and my work reflects that. My patients speak highly of me and the doctors have nothing bad to say so she can take her comment and shove it!

2. I came home this morning, unlocked the front door, went to the back door and called for my dogs...they didn't come. I called and I called and I called...no dogs. It was pouring down rain so I walked outside to try to coax them in...my dogs were no where to be found. No holes under the fence where they got out. No damage to the fence. The lock was still on the gate...so where were my dogs? I panicked. I ran through the entire house calling and searching for my dogs in the false hope that I had made a mistake and left them inside when I left for work. No...no where. I called Ben in a panic and he told me to immediately leave the house and wait for him to get home.

Ben got home the same time the cops arrived and they searched the house. No sign of anything being stolen. Strange...The only thing missing were my dogs. No obvious signs of forced entry. The cops were baffled but told us there was really not a whole lot they could do. Ben and I briefly told them what had happened a couple weeks ago when a Kirby salesman came by at 9pm at night and giggled the door handle seeing if anyone was home...Not knocking...Not ringing the door bell...trying to OPEN my door. Yesterday a teenage girl came to the door while I was getting ready for work. I told her I didn't have time to listen to her because I had to get ready for work. I am just wondering if the saw my car leave and took the opportunity to poke around...but still why take NOTHING but my dogs?

While we were standing there talking hopelessly to the cops, I see a dog pop up in a yard 4 houses down...It looked like Sammie. I screamed for him and he came running. I was so relieved. I knew if Sammie was there...Surely Pepper was nearby. Ben went running down the street looking for her. He found her but she did not recognize him until he got very close to her. Once she recognized him she followed him back home. They looked scared and traumatized...We thanked the cops and they left knowing there wasn't a whole lot they could do to help us figure out why this happened.

We got the dogs inside and inspected the yard one more time...nope...no way to get out of the fence. The ONLY way the dogs got out was by the front door...so WHO came into our house and WHY did they do nothing, take nothing, and let the dogs out? We inspected the front door a little closer and noticed visible damage to the lock. We had a locksmith come by and replace ALL locks and add deadbolts to ALL doors. He had to completely replace the guts to the front door knob because of the damage from the burglar. Pepper has not been herself since today. She is acting very sore. She wont go upstairs without coaxing and she won't get on the bed without help, when she usually bounds and jumps all over the place. We are hoping that whoever came in the house did not kick or hurt her in any way. Thankfully Sammie is acting fine. If Pepper has not perked up by tommorrow then we are going to take her to the vet to get checked out for any internal injuries. We feel so violated after this incident. I just can't make sense of it. Why come into my house and the only thing you do is let my dogs run loose in the neighborhood? My dogs are well behaved. They do not bark that much; no more than any other dog in the neighborhood. Both neighbors to left and right have dogs....so they understand...sigh...I just don't know...

Learning patience and understanding...or trying

We found out at the beginning of the week that Ben did not pass his paramedic exam. He felt so confident this time around that it came as a major shock that he did not pass. Ben has done everything he knows to do in order to prepare for the exam. Now he has to take a 48hr refresher course to be able to take his exam again. He is signed up to take one at Vol. State the end of march. We've been told by the EMS director in TN that Vol. State has an excellent program and pass rate. Hopefully this refresher will give Ben the edge he needs. Until then he is going to read every chapter, word for word, which covers his weaknesses. All we can do is hope and pray for the best. This is a goal and a dream, and once set, Ben will not give up till he reaches his goal. It doesn't help though when you really feel let down by your education. We were told that Chattanooga State has not had a very good pass rating over the last few years...if we'd only known...

Ben went out the other day and looked for a part time job in EMS. Most places are wanting Paramedics but Ben wants to get in as an EMT so that he can keep his skills up and pick the brains of current paramedics. He applied over at Spring Hill, TN EMS. It is a Rural Metro corporation, which is who he worked for in Franklin co. They seemed very positive about getting him on board and he met a guy there who has some pull in Rutherford county and he is going to try to get him on there as well. This would be a great blessing. Ben wants the second job so he doesn't go stir crazy in the house and I am getting very worn down working my 4-5 nights a week. So we hope to hear from them this coming week!!

Other than that, we are still trying to sell our house...
I am still trying to get out of working in Winchester...
And I am still trying to get everything settled here in the new house, but this thankfully is coming along nicely. :) We got our new sectional couch, so our loveseat recliner will be going on craigslist shortly, and we got our new bedroom set in today except for the footboard to the bed which was damaged. So my bedroom set will be finished this friday. As soon as everything comes in I will take some pictures. Now if I can only settle on curtains and eventual paint color...

24...

One more year older tomorrow. I can't believe how quickly time is passing. Things are going well for us in Smyrna. Ben loves his job and is greatful everyday to be here. We are still high off his passing his Firefighter II, and we just found out that they have posted openings for the driver position. This would be another pay raise. There are some requirements with years of experience, but Ben was told by one of his co-workers that volunteer experience counts. So Ben is going to apply tomorrow for the driver's position. Then Friday Ben takes his paramedic test. We have prayed so hard for him to pass this exam! I'm SO PROUD of Ben. He has studied so much for the exam this time around. He has been taking numerous practice exams in all areas that he will be tested and he has been making 70s, 80s and 90s. He feels confident this time and I know he will do great! Everything is falling in place wonderfully and God is blessing us once again! Once Ben gets his paramedic he will find a second job and we are going to hit our debt hard...time to pay this stuff off. Now if we can only get that dern second house to sell....anyone want a house in Winchester??? oh well.

We traded our truck in yesterday for a VW passat. I know I know...why did we do it...gas prices are horrible and in less than one year we have put 20k miles on my car. We had to do something to even out the miles and me driving the truck to winchester was just not economical. We had the truck appraised and found out we were not going to get as much out of it as KBB said and it would only get worse the longer we held onto it. So we found one dealership that gave us much more than we expected and we took the opportunity to get out from under the truck. We'll miss the truck though...I know Ben will especially. oh well.

Ben's sister Ashley is coming to stay with us march 1. She has a karate turnament in Smyrna. We will finally get to have guests and not be the guests. So Ben is looking forward to that.

I'm in my 3rd week at St. Thomas full time and I'm loving it. It is nice to finally have some consistent hours. My co-workers are wonderful and we have a blast. I never knew how much fun you can have working. I just signed up for our benefits and life is good. :)

Do the shuffle...

I returned to St. Thomas this past monday after a month of no work. It was nice to get back into the groove of things and see where the shift morale stood. We are trying to stay positive on my shift. One of my coworkers is loosing her husband very soon to cancer and another coworker is having some spinal surgery done to repair a nerve that is keeping him from having functionality in his left arm and shoulder. My coming onto the shift is also causing some friction. Everyone on my shift likes me (thank goodness!) but I found out that the way they brought me in was a little underhanded. Somehow they found out about me getting offered a full time slot with Smyrna. That is why I got the email from Paul offering me the full time slot again. It seems as though my shift supervisor was fighting for me a bit. (Thanks James!). So as soon as they found out that I would take the full time slot, they moved Mike off of my shift and moved him to the back end of the week. The underhanded part was that they did not ask Mike if he wanted to move; they told him he had to move. Now, they had good reasoning in doing this. The back end of the week has 4 catty women to 2 guys. One of those guys just moved to day shift so they wanted to put another guy on that shift to balance out all that estrogen! Now...if Mike found this out he would probably make a fuss about how unfair and sexist this is...blah blah blah...but its true...that shift needs some men to keep the women from all fighting with each other. My shift is happy about the move because Mike got on their nerves. The main person who won't like it is Michael who is out right now having surgery. Mike and Michael have been pals for about 30 years...So I'm sure when he comes back from sick leave and finds out what has happened, he will be none too happy...I will just try to stay out of the line of fire.

He did it!!

Ben took his Firefighter II test today and he passed!!! We are so excited. I am very proud of him!! This will put him in a great opportunity for future promotions as there are many people on the department who have not been able to get their Firefighter II yet.

Now all Ben has is his paramedic test. He is going to take that in February!

What's one more exam??

Ben found out today that he will be eligible to take the in house Fire Fighter II exam Friday Jan 25. If he passes it then he will get a pay raise!! Ben is one of the few on the department who has already been through the Fire Fighter II course at the academy but the department still requires you to pass their in house test. This will help put Ben further ahead of others when trying for promotions. Many of the guys are on a waiting list to get into the Fire Fighter II course at the academy because they only accept so many students a year. So Ben will have more training over the guys for quite a while. This will help him when he wants to move up the ranks to Driver, ladder driver, lieutenant, etc... So hopefully all will go well with the test. Unfortunately, Ben is also focusing very hard on studying for his paramedic exam and was asked to give a talk at church on Sunday. So his focuses are in many directions and won't give him a lot of time to prepare for the test. I think he's decided to prepare his talk and put his faith in God that he will do ok on the exam. :)