Houston, We Have A Problem...

You all know I'm a DJ, right?  No??  Hey!  I'm A DJ!  Read about it here!

Well, way back when I was doing all the DJing written about at that link, I bought an amp and a set of speakers... and twenty years later, they're still with me! Most contemporary DJs today use these little speakers that sit up on stands and sound like little speakers up on stands. While those would be a lot easier to carry to and from the car, I love that my speakers kick out sound (and yes, BASS!) that would shatter the very poles holding up the minis!

Anyway, a couple years ago, Cindy had the great idea to give the speakers a facelift. Nothing internal, but she made some very nice looking cloth covers to replace the old scratched up metal ones they came with. While in the middle of that project, one of the speakers was showing some wear and tear (literally), with a little hole in the woofer, like so.



I made a mental note of it, knowing that at some point down the road I'd need to replace the woofers, but at the time, it didn't make any noticeable impact to the sound quality, so I decided to let it live out the rest of its days in the service of loud music lovers everywhere.

That brings us up to last Saturday.

Midway through the dance, I noticed that the right speaker was making truly horrible sounds whenever any deep bass tried to come out of it. I thought that maybe we had reached "that time"... But since it was the middle of the dance, I just cut all the deep bass from that side, and carried on, a little quieter than usual.

Finally, 11:00 came, I played the Lawrence Welk exit song, shut off the power, and went over to pull the cover off and survey the damage. The first thing I saw was little shreds of paper lying on the bottom of the cover. Then I looked at the front of the speaker, and even though I knew it would be bad, I gasped out loud at what I saw...



Everyone still in the gym at that point heard the gasp and came running to see the damage. The really amazing thing was that just a week earlier, I'd DJ'd six hours of Daddy/Daughter dancing and both speakers pumped out nice rich sound the whole time. It really held it together until it just couldn't hold any longer.

Now I'm on the hunt for that "just-right" replacement set of woofers - because while the other one has a heck of a lot more woofer in its woofer, it's showing its age... That's the one shown in the first picture, and I've been down that road before!

Oh, and the post title of "Houston, We Have A Problem"?  The speakers were made by a company called Ross, out of Houston, Texas.  It's a company that doesn't seem to exist anymore, but I will happily attest to the fact that it's not because they didn't make a great product!!

Hot Fun at the Hospital

For those of you not following us on Facebook (mike, cindy) you probably didn't know that Danee was in the hospital again this past weekend.  Same drill as before, she woke up Wednesday with a stuffy, runny nose, and by Thursday afternoon she was in the ER.  There were other ups and downs as well - we have a new favorite doctor, and will try to schedule her lung issues around his availability if possible...  We also know, from an extremely authoritative and self-assured source, that the laminate flooring in our room is backed with SEVEN INCHES OF CONCRETE, and they're just certain that if Danee fell out of the bed approximately 12" above said floor, that she would shatter into a million pieces.

Never mind the fact that Danee simply does not roll out of bed - she simply values the opportunity to sleep in Mom and Dad's bed too much to give any of it up by rolling out... and she's also got the very clear presence of mind that even in the throws of a raging two year old tantrum, she'll very carefully position herself over the carpet before throwing herself on the ground to kick and scream.

Anyway, it's a given that a 4 day visit to the hospital will have good and bad coming out of it, and we've gone into great detail in the past on those, so it's not really worth a recap...  but what was cool about this time, was finding a way to make the best of a bad situation.  The bad situation I'm speaking of, is that by Saturday afternoon, Danee was ready to come home.  She felt better, was no longer on oxygen, and had her endless supply of toddler energy back.  However, there's this pesky rule that she has to remain off oxygen for 24 hours with no issues before they'll let her go home.

That makes for a VERY long 24 hours, because Miss Daneekins does NOT enjoy being cooped up in a room for 24 hours.

One thing Miss Daneekins DOES enjoy, is playing in water.  Whether it's in the bath, the swimming pool, a water table, or just sneaking a chair up to the sink, this is a baby who LOVES water!  So on Saturday afternoon while I was off working (DJing 3 rounds of Daddy/Daughter dances!) and Cindy was being driven crazy by a toddler with cabin fever, she had the brilliant flash of brilliance that Danee should have a bath!

Luckily, our daytime nurses over the weekend were WONDERFUL, and they put a bag over Danee's IV to protect it, then put some towels down, filled a plastic bin with warm water, and soon Cindy was sending me pictures of a very happy BabyGirl!



On Sunday morning, that 24 hour waiting period was over, and the doctor issued our discharge order! Little did we realize that it would take about 5 hours to actually get from that point to leaving the building... Danee did get disconnected from all of her tubes, hoses and wires and now had free reign of the room.. which meant she could now play with the sink - she couldn't actually reach the water, but the hot water control was right within her reach, so she would turn it on, listen to the water, giggle, turn it off, and repeat.. over, and over again...

I was letting her do that - it was keeping her occupied, after all!

But...

Suddenly I heard a change in the way the splashing sounded... I went over to the sink to investigate, and found that the World's Most Determined Toddler had found a plastic bin, put it in the sink, and was filling it herself, since Daddy wasn't getting the hint!! I figured that kind of ambition deserved to be rewarded, so I laid some towels down, added some cold water to her hot, hot, hot tub, and stripped her down to her diaper for fun bath time!





A few minutes later, she proved just how compact she can make herself, and squeezed her whole lower-half into the tub... including the legs and feet! I got a couple pics, but she was so wiggly that none of them turned out. However, I assure you, it was one of the most adorable things I've ever seen!!