Zach Dotsey

I had a dream last night that Amanda, Milly and I walked out to our usual spot at Wrightsville Beach, and when we got out there I saw nice large, rolling waves that looked easy to get out to and catch, but there were very few people out in the water.  It was warm out, but the water was still chilly.  Overjoyed, I ran back to the Frazelle house to get my wetsuit on and grab my board.  I told Barry and we headed on out for a session.

I’ve really been missing surfing lately.  There hasn’t been much out there and the water’s so cold right now anyway.  I’ve been thinking of Nosara, Costa Rica a lot too.

As we usually do when Karen comes to visit, we had breakfast this morning at Cracker Barrel.  On the way there Karen sat in the back and played with Milly.  She was laughing, which is always so great to hear.  It’s the best.

Michael and Jenn joined us, and afterwards they came over to our place.  Michael had burned his hand pretty badly at work on Tuesday (though work did nothing about it) and he, Jenn and Karen stopped by a drug store on the way over to pick up some salve and bandages for it.

We played some MarioKart and I did pretty well, though I haven’t unlocked some of their usual cars and characters yet and they’re used to playing with a regular controller, not the Wii-mote.  I’ve been assured that the two of them are much better playing as they’re accustomed, which I’m sure is true.

Amanda and Karen took off to go shopping or some such and the rest of us stayed to watch Carolina defend the Dean Dome against Georgia Tech.  Jenn didn’t care at all about it and Michael has hardly watched any games this season, but he was still pulling for his Heels.  I, of course, was not. My prediction though, given my luck and the fact that the game was at Carolina, was that the Yellow Jackets, after beating Duke and losing to Virginia (who is supposed to be towards the bottom of the ACC but actually has the best conference record so far), would lose.

Georgia Tech got out to a 20 point lead and they were up 16 at the half.  I never felt comfortable though, and Carolina took the lead with just a few minutes to go.  They swapped lead changed a few times, but Carolina did end up losing.  Amanda got back home just before the end and we were pretty happy about it, though we tried not to flaunt our joy until Michael left.

My mom called to see how things were going and how Milly is doing.  She was stuck in Rochester this weekend.

A little while later Amanda, Milly and I went to have dinner and a game with the Warkentiens.  Milly was off and on fussy but didn’t want to take a nap.  But then, she hadn’t napped much today, so I can understand her being cranky.  We put the kids down around 8:00 then played a game of Puerto Rico.  I changed my strategy but still came in third place, though I was surprised by even that.  (Thanks for losing to me, Nick.)  Amanda absolutely crushed it for the win.  The game was fun, of course, but we imposed a rule where the Governor (which is a position that switches every goes) had to speak in some kind of accent.  We all had a lot of fun with that, too.

When we got Milly up to leave through the time we put her back down in her own crib, she was in a very happy mood.  I almost don’t want to put her back to sleep when she’s like that.

Zach Dotsey

Amanda and her mom got up early this morning and left the house at 9:00 to go shopping in Raleigh.  Mainly, Amanda wanted to use some Pottery Barn Kids and Babies R Us coupons.  She only spent $6 and some change out of pocket and got a bunch of stuff, so she did a good job.  They had lunch with Aunt Joanne.

So what did I do?  Well, I got up at about 9:30, didn’t do too much for a while.  When I was in Costa Rica, Christian Quinn, well, Christian Galtieri as she is now named, posted something on my Facebook wall about sending a postcard, but since I didn’t see mailboxes, much less street signs, in Nosara, I have been meaning to make up a postcard for her.  I finally did that today.  After that I mowed the lawn then I waited for Michael to get off work and met him at Wrightsville to go surfing.

The surf wasn’t great today.  I thought the waves were supposed to be of some decent size to I took out Barry Terry Senate board, which is shorter than mine, in an attempt to do some more manuevering on the waves.  Well, I caught some, but like I said, it wasn’t great out.

After I got back home I decided to paint the nursery some.  I turned on some music downstairs and spent a couple hours coloring the walls until Amanda and Karen got back home.  They thought about going out to eat, but Amanda wasn’t feeling it much and it was getting late besides.  I took a break from the painting and put the Pack & Play together.

Karen, bless her, had an idea to finish the nursery tonight.  That didn’t happen, but it’s getting pretty close.

Oh yeah, I gave Amanda her birthday present.  She wanted a waterproof digital camera and we’d looked at the Fuji Z33, but in doing my research I decided that it wasn’t the best.  From what I read, the quality was only so-so and it doesn’t have any image stabilization.  I decided on the Panasonic TS1.  It was a bit more expensive, but it was also waterproof, takes good pictures, is very rugged and even takes decent HD video.  I can’t wait to try out the video part to see how it compares to our camcorder.  While I’ll be a little sad if it’s better than our camcorder (because it was a not-cheap wedding gift from my parents), I’ll also be happy because we’ll be able to take HD video when Milly when she’s born.  (Not of her birth, mind you.)

I was going to get Amanda the orange one because she wanted a fun color.  When I ordered it last week they said they’d be out of stock on those until Monday.  I called to check on Tuesday because I saw that it hadn’t shipped and the guy I talked to them said they were on backorder for two weeks.  I was a bit upset at this.  Anyway, not liking the drab green color, I ordered the silver one.  Amanda was a little disappointed not to get a fun color, but I wanted to actually give her something on her birthday.

I haven’t been able to test the video yet because to do that it requires an SDHC card, which is basically a suped-up SD card.  I found a great deal for them online and put in an order for it today.

Zach Dotsey

Work was pretty busy today.  I finally did the paperwork for a sale I made last week then got a lead for two good sites that I’ll have to work on tomorrow.  I’d have done it today, of course, but I had to leave the house a little before 3:00 to pick up medicine for the pets (very late in doing that) and to meet Amanda at the baby doctor.

Things were fine.  I’m not sure exactly why she wanted me to come with her today.  I didn’t go to the last one and at this point they’re just checking to make sure everything is on track with her.  We did get to hear the heartbeat, which was very loud and strong.  Dr. Brown said that Milly’s heart sounded like a full termer.

When we finished up there we went to go see Nick, Amy and Eli Warkentien, but not until we stopped by a Port City Java to pick up smoothies for us, Nick and Amy.  Nick had told Amanda a couple weeks ago that they’d want some in the hospital, so we upheld that for them.

When we got to the hospital we saw that someone else had beat us on the guest list, but Amanda and I were the first people to the room.  Eli was doing better, but he wasn’t breastfeeding very well and when we got there Amy was feeding him out of a syringe.  A few minutes later Amy’s parents showed up.  They’d just arrived from Michigan and were eager to hold their first grandson.  So they beat us to holding him, but Amanda was the first person to hold Eli outside of nurses and family.  (I was second).

Amanda and I left after a little while to go back home.  Nick asked if we wouldn’t mind grabbing a few things from their house, so while Amanda went straight home I went and picked up a Boppy, a hard dryer and the USB cable for their digital camera.  We picked up some BoJangles for ourselves then went on back.

Not long after we got back to the hospital, Tim and Jenny Cain and Joel and Mia Kay showed up.  Everybody hung out for a little bit and most of us had some of the cake that, I think it was Joel and Mia, had brought.  Tim and Jenny went to check in on Sarah and Jerod Coe.  Sarah’s another Port City Community Church staff member, and they had their daughter, Emma, on Saturday.

We left after a bit with Amy’s parents following us.

Here’s the update Nick sent out today:

Eli did so good today! By late afternoon, he was pretty much acting like any healthy baby would. Last night, they were able to get a lot of blood/fluid out of his stomach (from the birth; stuff that shouldn’t be there). They had gotten a lot of this out of him an hour or so after he was born as well. We’re pretty sure that it played a huge part in his behavior. He probably was not feeling very good, which may have caused the jitters (which are gone now) and contributed to not wanting to breast feed. He has perked up since then, and made a lot of progress with the breastfeeding, although it still takes quite a while to get him started. It’s very difficult to keep him awake while trying to breastfeed. He seems to do better when he’s awake by his own will. Amy did have to pump once so that we could feed him from a syringe (that was the first feeding today), but he has been doing better feeding on his own. As for the fluid in his stomach, they had to put a tube in his nose that went to his stomach to try and drain any remaining fluid that could be there. The tube was put in last night and taken out late this morning.

I forgot to mention in my last post that his white blood cell count was high. They said this could be stress related, or he could be fighting some kind of infection. If it was stress related, they expected that it would come down by this morning, but it had not, so they decided to do a blood culture, to test for infection. This requires that the bloodwork be monitored for 48 hrs. His blood was drawn at 3:00pm on Sunday. As of 3:00pm today, it looked really good. If it still looks good tomorrow (Tuesday) at 3:00pm, they will determine that there is no infection, and its quite possible we will be able to go home then. This morning, they decided that he needed to be given some antibiotics in case there is an infection (they did not feel that they could wait 48 hrs. to start treating this). So, Eli has an I.V. in his head where they give him his antibiotics. That will be taken out tomorrow, given that his blood culture comes back well.

Our poor little guy has been through a lot in his first couple days, but we are so glad for the progress he has made! He is a very happy baby. He likes to sleep whenever he is not being bothered by the nurses. He doesn’t cry very often, and when he does, it’s not for long. He tends to just be fussy more often. When he does cry, his lower jaw quivers, which causes his cry to quiver. It’s quite pitiful!

Amy is doing great. Of coarse, she’s still very sore, especially in her neck and shoulders, from having to look down so much while trying to breastfeed. We’re both quickly getting used to this whole idea of having a baby to take care of. He’s got quite a personality!

I chatted with my brother-in-law, Michael Mercer, tonight via Facebook.  He was commenting on some of the Costa Rica pictures which told me, before he actually did tell me, that he’s missing the place.  I think he’s nearly depressed in missing it, (posta-Costa depression) and I can hardly blame him.  There, we ate and surfed and checked were immersed in a completely different culture.  Here he works and goes to school, which is not nearly as exciting.

Zach Dotsey

I slept the last hour or so of the ride home last night, waking up just as we were passing exit 420 (the last exit on I-40, signifying Wilmington).  I woke myself up a couple times when I leaned on the (very sensitive) window button on the door and accidentally rolled down the window.  Michael had a good laugh at that.

I got home a little after 4:00 in the morning.  Michael took me home from the Frazelle house but we had to stop and get some air for his tires, then when going down Gordon Road he turned one road early and went the back way through his old apartment complex.

Bruce and Harvey were, of course, the first to greet us (Michael had to come inside to get his apartment key and laptop, both of which Amanda had used during the last week) and Amanda came down the stairs shortly after.  My how my baby Milly has grown!  Amanda’s belly is definitely bigger than it was a week ago.

Amanda and I talked until about 5:00 before going to sleep and waking up around 9:00.  After taking our time getting up I headed to the shower and washed the last remnants of Costa Rica from my body.  No more sweat, no more dust, no more nada from Costa Rica remains on me.  I was a little sad thinking about it.

Amanda and I celebrated being back together by grabbing a late lunch from Cracker Barrel then decided to spend the day just hanging out together.  We watched Duke beat Florida State (for the third time of the season) to clinch the 2009 ACC Tournament Championship.  Jon Scheyer won Tournament MVP, which was a great thing for him.  Milly moved around a good bit during the game, rooting on her team.

Speaking of Milly rooting for Duke, Stephanie (Talley) Woodside, a girl I went to high school with and keep up with some on Facebook, sent a package to us.  She’s a Carolina fan but works at Duke and we talk about games now and then.  Anyway, she sent us a Duke onesie, bib and set of pacifiers, which was just amazingly cool of her!

Other than that Amanda and I mostly caught up on TV for the night.  She watched some shows without me but we did have a full week of shows to catch up on.  We went out to fill the Jetta up with gas and pick up some more prenatal vitamins and milk then came home and continued to clear off the DVR.

Amanda went to bed around 8:30.  She was tired and Milly’s been pressuring her right side a good bit.  She also had a spot in her back that needed rubbing all week that I was put to service on for a good portion of the day.  Once she went to bed I cleared off a few things I knew she wouldn’t care about watching on the DVR, most notably the Duke-Boston College game, which was a tight one.  I think I’ll watch Duke-Maryland tomorrow.

The NCAA Tournament brackets came out today.  Duke is a two seed in the east, which means they’ll get to stay close to home and play in Greensboro, which has been good to them in the past.  It’s a pretty tough bracket though.  Carolina got a one seed and there were a total of seven ACC team that got into the tournament, a tie for most from a conference with the Big East and the Big Ten.

While we were talking this morning Amanda told me some bad news.  She had heard early in the week, Monday I think, that my mom’s papillon, Schatzi, had been run over and died.  She had gotten out and wandered down to the road.  I don’t know the exact details but I know my mom’s got to be taking it hard.  I can’t stand thinking about it, because she had a personality, you know?  I just keep thinking about the way she’d do her little growl when she wanted your attention, which was so cute.  She was such a sweet dog and she’ll be particularly missed next time I go home to visit my parents.

Zach Dotsey
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First off, happy birthday to my little brother, Adam Dotsey. I celebrated his birthday by traveling most the day halfway or more up North America. I didn’t sleep the best last night, well, this morning anyway. Barry, as he has done every morning we’ve been in Nosara, Costa Rica, got up and went out to look at the surf. He came back a little bit later and said the surf was like it was last night. Hannah said she’d go out if Barry went out. Michael said he’d go out if they went out and I said what he said.

We ended up not going out at all. James and Warren had gone out and they said you had to paddle like fifteen minutes straight to even get out past the thirty set waves.

Instead, Barry and I went ahead and returned the rental boards to Coconut Harry’s. I also picked up an Imperial tank top. Imperial is the beer of Costa Rica and while I did have a few of them throughout the past week I mainly wanted it because I like their logo, which you can find all over Costa Rica.

So we all ate breakfast one last time. Jim sat with us for a few and James and Christie were at the table next to ours then Warren and Torri joined us at another table a little while later.

When Barry was settling up (and paying for a good portion of my food, which he shouldn’t have) we were talking to one of the owners of La Casa Romantica, Sylvia, and she told us a story about toy monsters and how they help her kids remember to clean up after themselves. I’m definitely going to use that with my kid(s).

We packed up and left La Casa Romantica a little bit later. No telling if or when I’ll ever see that place again, which makes me a little sad.

The trip back to the airport was largely uneventful with the exception of a time when Warren slammed on the breaks then Barry slammed on his. Of course this was just a few miles from the airport.

We also saw a horse running free in our direction down the dirt road towards us. That was followed by two kids on horses, presumably trying to catch the free ones. They had some catching up to do though.

We also saw several cows literally standing in the road. I tried to get a picture of one but the little camera was giving an error and wouldn’t focus at all. It also had some issues turning off and on.

The trip, particularly on the dirt part, seemed to go faster this time, as usually seems to be the case when returning from a place as opposed to going there. It also seemed a bit greener this time through.

The airport in Liberia was hot. While waiting in line to check in I didn’t bother taking off my backpack for a while but when did the back of my shirt felt like it had been dipped in water.

Barry, Hannah, Warren and Torri grabbed a bite to eat then we went through security. I didn’t have to remove my laptop this time, which was nice because both of my bags were very tightly packed. Michael and I both ate hot dogs from a place by the gates then we waited with hundreds of other people in an open air waiting area that reminded me of a cattle barn. They had the largest ceiling fans I’ve ever seen there.

Our plane was late, which I didn’t realize until the pilot mentioned coming in late on the airplane later on. Before we could board everyone went through a manual baggage check. Our group didn’t bother getting in line until mist everybody else already had. There wasn’t much point in it, really.

For the return trip I was in the row in front of Michael, Barry and Hannah seated between a middle aged man next to the Susie and a middle aged woman by the window. They were both supposed to catch connecting flights and tried to hurry off the plane once it landed.

Not much to report on the return flight except there was more turbulence than I’m used to. Nothing terrible though. I spent most of the four hours of the trip listening to MuteMath and The National while reading The Shack, which is started on yesterday.

We went through customs whereat I accidentally lied and said I didn’t have any food in my bags. I actually still have a few protein bars.

I called Amanda after Customs when everyone else was taking potty breaks. She was watching a movie with Amy and Nick Warkentien.

Before I could even ask she told me that one of  Duke and Carolina had won and the other had lost, meaning one was out of the running for the ACC championship. I told her that since the Internet had been down I didn’t even know if they’d both won yesterday. She said the Duke vs. Maryland had been a low scoring affair then went on to tell me after some coaxing that Duke had won and Carolina had lost, which was sweet, sweet music to me. Amanda said that the Heels had been down by three at the end if the game and that Tyler Hansbrough had missed a three pointer for the tie. Of course, point guard Ty Lawson was out with an injured toe.

So tomorrow it’s Duke vs. Florida State for the ACC championship. Duke has beat them twice so far this year, so hopefully they can go for a full sweep. I think that would give Duke a strong chance at getting a one seed in the NCAA tournament.

Anyhoo, I left Adam a voicemail and we headed out from the Charlotte airport for the long trek back to Wilmington, stopping to gran some food at a McDonald’s. It’s about 40 degrees here; a stark contrast from the weather in Costa Rica.

The GPS told Barry to take I-85/40 and I think we should be about passing Greensboro soon. Longer route, but oh well.

I can’t wait to get home and see Amanda and how much bigger her tummy has gotten. I expect Bruce and Harvey will be very excited to see me too.

Zach Dotsey

Had an evening session that was pretty much just like the second morning session, only the waves breaking on the outside were bigger and it was even harder to get past them.  That and just about the only thing you could catch on the inside was white water, so Michael, Torri and I caught that.

The three of us went back in after a little while and cleaned up then went back out to watch the sunset.  Everyone was out there- me, Michael, Hannah, Torri, Jim, James and Christie,  Barry and Warren came in from surfing just in time for the sunset.

Michael and I bought some souvenirs and Hannah bought some thing for a couple of her friends.  Of course I can’t say what we got because there’s no telling who might read this before we get home.

Our core group, me, Michael, Barry and Hannah, are about to eat some dinner here at La Casa Romantica.

James was able to watch the Carolina game.  They were losing to Virginia Tech the entire game then won it in the last minute.  I hate it when they do that.  I really hate it.  Ty Lawson was out though, and there’s no telling when he’ll be back with his injured toe.

Zach Dotsey

Amanda told me yesterday that she thinks Harvey is depressed.  He hasn’t been eating all of his food and he’s thrown up.  The  night before, she said, he’s stayed downstairs during the night and whined.

Last night before going to bed I was checking the scores of college basketball games and saw that UConn and Syracuse were in double overtime.  Once I saw they were going to triple overtime I decided to pull up the game on Justin.tv.  It ended up going into SIX overtimes!  Syracuse never had a lead in OT until that one and they ended up winning by ten points (yay!).  This was the longest game in Big East history at nearly four hours and each team had most of their starters foul out.  That probably ended up helping though, because the guys they put in were fresher.  Cuse actually had a walk-on playing for the first time all season.  It was quite a game.

We got out to the beach at about 6:30.  Michael and I surfed the inside and caught a lot of waves, but there wasn’t a lot of power behind many of them.  Torri was out there eventually too, surfing on her own for the first time.  Hannah, Barry and Warren were on the outside getting worked.

I ran into Michael one time.  I caught a nice sized wave and was going left, but there was a lot of spray and it took me a minute to be able to see.  When I was able to see I saw that I was heading towards my brother-in-law, but that I should have been able to pass in front of him.  Unfortunately he started paddling, so I made a “Wooo!” noise.  He told me later he thought I was just making a noise, not warning him, so he went and stood up.  I tried to steer away from him, but I couldn’t do it in time and I ran directly into him.  Fortunately neither of us was hurt.

We surfed for about an hour and a half then came in for breakfast and went back out for another session a little while later.  Michael and I again surfed the inside.  It was pretty much the same as earlier, except that I caught one of the best waves I’d caught all week.  I was riding down the line when another person started paddling and stood up, but they were catching white water and it pushed them straight.  I had to bail or run into them like I had Michael earlier today, and since the person was Michael, I didn’t want to do that.

We came in after a bit then headed out to take pictures at the rocks again (see images below).  Barry and Hannah were heading back at the same time that Michael and I were heading out.  We stayed at the rocks for quite a while, taking pictures and just taking it in.  On the way there we found a bunch of sand dollars, but many of them broke in our pockets.  I still have two big ones though.  And while we were at the rocks we saw some small bright blue fish in the tidal pools.

After we got back we went to lunch with Hannah and Barry then grabbed some ice cream and milkshakes.  Now it’s siesta time.

We were going to check in on some basketball game scores, and possibly watch some of the Carolina-Virginia Tech game, but the internet is down here today.  I hope it’s back by tonight for the Duke game.

Hannah is having a skin reaction to something- the sunblock, she thinks.  And Barry thinks he might have a kidney stone coming on.  Yikes.

Zach Dotsey