I am your GPS

I've been playing GPS the past few days as my mother-in-law has so graciously joined me here in Houston while Lisa wraps things up in Colorado Springs. I don't drive because I am afraid my reflexes aren't what they need to be to drive, and keeping track of so much traffic (like here in Houston) wears me out. (And I don't have a lot of energy to burn) So for everyone's safety I drive rarely, if at all. I appreciate people willing to drive me around.

We've been to the med-center three times this week. First was on Tuesday for an appointment with a kidney doctor (Quote of the day from that one: "Not sure why they wanted me to see you, your levels look fine.") in which I had a migraine and was a little miffed no one called that off if the minute and a half the doctor was in the room really wasn't needed. Wednesday was blood draws, doctors and chemo. That was a long day, but they got chemo started an hour EARLY (which means we were told we would have a room almost two hours before my appointment time!) which made the day not as long as I was anticipating. Then today we went back to the med center area to visit the Zoo.

I really like how each Zoo is different and special in its own way. Seattle's Woodland Park Zoo is more "natural" environments, which is interesting in-and-of itself. Colorado Spring's Zoo, Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, allows you to get fairly close to some creatures you wouldn't normally get a chance at getting so close to. More in line with the "old school" style of Zoos, but it gets you closer to the animals. The Houston Zoo has one of the best collection of birds I have ever seen at a zoo. Being an owner of a bird and being quite familiar with his mannerisms it is quite entertaining to go somewhere like the Houston Zoo and see a lot of those same mannerisms played out across many different kinds of birds.

The Houston Zoo also has one of my favorite creatures: The Okapi. I think I might like to ride one. Or at least pet one someday. They seem to me to be the Platypus of the mammal world. (Aside: On each animal's cage they have a description of where the animal is from, what it eats, if it's endangered or not and some other details. The tiger info sheet says: "Eats: Mammals".)

I ran into a new favorite creature today as well. We rounded a corner and were admiring the flamingos when we turned around and there was this HUGE grey bird sitting there watching us. Turned out to be a Shoebill Stork. Not only does it look like he's got a big grin on his face, but he's got this great little tuft of feathers that stick up from the back of his head. We sat there for a while and watched him. Turns out baby alligators are part of his diet. Hard. Core. Plus the bird kind of reminds me of the big bird in the Pixar short For the Birds.

Lisa is back on Saturday, and we pickup our new keys on Monday! Then we wait for the movers to arrive. In the meantime we'll be changing our address in all the places it needs to be changed!

Thanks for the continued prayers and support! Seems like we are settling in for the fight!

~B.