"Time is Relative" ** is something I never really believed until lately. In my day to day world, days pass like molasses up in Sarge's neck of the woods...in January. However, weeks/months/years seem to fly by at nearly light speed. In my most recent example, MBD announced she was pregnant with Grandchild #1 (GC#1) just last week, I think. However, her due date, officially, is Oct 28th AKA less than 3 weeks from now. She may have a different interpretation of how fast that time passed, but, as I said, seems like last week to me.
So, earlier this week, she asked if Mrs J and I could come to College Station and help her set up GC#1's room. "Get out of the house, take a road trip and see you? Let me think about it for a nanosecond. Why yes, yes we will!"
At that point, the dormant fighter pilot personality took over. We've been making fairly regular trips to College Station (C-Stat in Fighter Pilot vernacular, or at least mine), since Little Juvat started there in 2003.
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| The "usual" route |
While that routing hasn't changed, there are several things different about it. First, on the good side, it's Freeway now, virtually the whole way. Second, on the not good side, Austin has spread out and Austin Traffic now starts at Dripping Springs/Bastrop and ends at Bastrop/Dripping Springs (depending on direction of travel). Third thing is a combination of the two, Austin traffic has never been sane and with Freeways and larger population, the traffic is much more dense, lasts longer and is populated by several vehicles per mile who think that number on the sign is a minimum speed, that the dashed lines in the middle are extra lanes and blinkers are for sissies.
But...I digress. Where was I? ...Oh yeah, dormant fighter pilot personality...
I think to myself. "High Threat environment? Why not avoid it? Might take a bit longer, but your cardiologist will thank you."
Based on that logic, I decide to try to sneak around enemy defenses to the north. The distance is about the same, although the road is a bit more twisty turny. It'll take a bit longer, and I like my cardiologist, but not enough to visit him more than necessary.
So.
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| Why not try something new, juvat? |
Well....There's another old Fighter Pilot adage, "No plan survives first contact with the enemy." We leave on time, The drive north to Marble Falls is uneventful although quite a bit of highway construction is going on. Get onto the east bound Farm to Market road and enjoy the swoops, climbs and high g-turns, pass two farm trucks, get passed by one Porsche (of course) enroute to Cedar Park.
You know that part where I said Austin had spread out? Well, since my last visit 20 years ago, Cedar Park has been swallowed by Austin and traffic was bumper to bumper from there to Taylor. But, at least the race car drivers were not around...so...We got that going for us!
Once we got past Taylor, everything started running "Hot, straight and Normal" which is a phrase used by Fighter Pilots since time immemorial to describe a missile shot. Don't let Navy sub drivers try and tell you different.
Yes, it took 4+30, and yes, my heart rate monitor beeped a few times and yes, any Navy sub drivers in the back seat would have learned some new swear words, but we arrived.
MBD promptly took charge. She and Mrs J quickly filled out my "To Do" List. Fortunately, it was mostly things I had done before, so I actually knew what I was doing. Got the Mesh Wireless network up and running in about an hour. Theoretically, the house can now sustain up to 100 wireless devices simultaneously. I was a little nervous about that as our system (the same make and model) starts to really slow down with about 5 devices on it.
But when I ran Speed Check on their network, they were getting 85MBPS from their home network. I ran it on ours when I got home. 3.5MBPS. Oh the joys of country living.
As to that 100 wireless devices limit? The next phase of the operation was to attach all the wireless baby monitoring devices MBD had received at her Baby Shower.
Things sure have changed in the Blink of an Eye time wise since my kids were born (37 and 30 years ago respectively), Back then, the primary baby monitoring device was one or the other parent waking up at every noise in the night and checking.
Now, there's a listening device, which if it hears the baby cry, starts gently rocking the bed and only sounds the alarm if that doesn't settle her down after a short period of time.
At which point, the parent(s) can activate the app on their phone which controls the wireless camera above the crib to check on her. If nothing serious appears, the parent can then, again using their phone, turn on the wireless white noise generator to lull her back to sleep.
Modernity!
After a bit of trial and error, all monitoring equipment is up and running. So, we got THAT going for us. At about this time, MBD informs Mrs J that her OB doctor said she "might" be a little early and it's time for more frequent appointments. Mrs J and her counterpart went into a huddle and created a scramble roster. Seems my counterpart and myself were not needed for labor hand holding.
I think I'm ok with that. Twice was quite enough, thank you. That having been said, I may experience a bit of Bachelor-ship in the near future.
But now, it's Friday afternoon and time to be headed home. Fortunately, the Aggies are playing 'Bama in C-Stat, so traffic is coming INTO town as we're leaving. (Just in case you didn't hear, the unranked Aggies beat #1 Bama. WHOOP!!!!)
Yes, Beans we took the southern route home, we left early enough to avoid most of the evening traffic at the "Y". (The commonly used base name for an enormously outdated highway junction in Southwest Austin, extra expletives are usually added.)
Arrived home to the joyful howls of our pups, the expressions of disdain from our cats and the whinnying of the horses. (Yes, Beans, my Sister filled in and fed them while we were away)
It's nice to be needed and loved. Grandpa...I like the sound of that!
*I'm horrible with commas, or forgetting them ;-)
**An interesting article on this statement is here
Sounds like this month the frequent driver miles will add up, good luck juvat! Lets hear it for the Aggies winning.....YEA!!
ReplyDeleteMost likely Nylon, most likely. I'm not an Aggie, but I am a fan and a Father/Father-in-law to four all of whom were pretty Jazzed about it. Little J and DIL watched the game in HK at 3AM. Gotta love 'em.
DeleteAmazing how Austin has grown. It's attracting more and more folks from all over, including an acquaintance from Ohio who just retired and, of course, all the folks from Tesla. I stopped considering it as a retirement home location about 40 years ago when it got too big for me then. Good luck on your transits of Moscow on the Colorado met area related to the blessed arrival of GC#1.
ReplyDeleteYeah, it is Tom. Tesla, Oracle, and one of the really big banks, I forget which one, have all moved in in the last year or so. We're starting to feel the effects in the 'Burg already. Housing prices are way up, driving skills way down, heckuva lot more people around. Heck, I used to enjoy going the the grocery store as it was more of a way to catch up with friends and acquaintances than mere shopping. Now it's more of a miracle to see anyone you know.
DeleteProgress has its price I guess.
At Bergstrom late 70's early 80's. Best place ever. On retirement '93 spent a week there -- didn't find a job I wanted. Disappointed. Now as I look at Austin I am oh so very happy I did not retire there.
DeleteBob,
DeleteYeah had a similar experience in '98. When I joined the AF about the same time you were at Bergstrom, Austin was a laid-back middle sized town. So that was the memories I kept as I never made it back to Texas except to refuel at Bergstrom. The year before I retired, we flew in to DFW to begin looking for a place to settle. We rented an RV and started down I-35 as the Hill Country was where we generally wanted to settle, and thought we'd look into Austin. Arrived at the split on I-35 (the center of Austin, Beans) at 4:30 on a Thursday afternoon. It quickly became obvious that Austin had grown up and was not the place for us. So the next morning we headed west on 290 arrived at the Burg where the RV broke down and we were stuck for about 4 days. Liked what we saw and figured the Guy upstairs was providing "guidance". So, we moved here the following summer and haven't had any regrets.
I have spent hours of my life approaching the Y. Ugh. We used to have a repeater at the old Motorla plant over there. Glad you made it there and back again!
ReplyDeleteI don't know if you've been through there recently. They've made some improvements in traffic flow that would have been very effective with traffic levels ten years ago, but...Getting through the Austin side intersection is better, the western intersection hasn't been changed, so traffic backed up there extends into the other.
DeleteWhich is just an easy way to explain how effective the Austin Government (D) is.
Austin: Effectively Ignorant. You know, when you said the Y, I had never heard it called that, but I knew EXACTLY what you were talking about...
DeleteIf I have to go thru that part of Texas, I'll take the Pickle Parkway. It's worth the money. But for you, 290 is right over the fence...
Yeah, we tend to take the toll roads when we transit north/south and also in the vicinity of the airport. Only costs a couple of bucks and saves several million heartbeats. Not sure I understand the reference to Pickle Parkway, but...
DeleteI think you're going to wear that Grandpa callsign very well.
ReplyDeleteI shall endeavor to do my best. I've had some good teachers all of whom are now in eternal overwatch but still providing guidance.
DeleteThanks
I think a standard observation for any major urban area is that the more you can route around the city, the happier your drive will be, even if not any faster.
ReplyDeleteI agree, just got to do a little bit more map study and a little less GPS trusting before the arrival date.
DeleteIs "Hot, straight and Normal" anything like "Fat, dumb and Happy"?
ReplyDeleteThey are related Rob. When the missile is running "Hot, straight and normal" you hope the guy on the receiving end is "Fat, dumb and Happy". Makes things easier.
DeleteJust sayin'
Unless air-to-air missiles were used in WWII, "hot straight and normal" was the hoped-for result of launching a torpedo, whether from a Destroyer or a submarine.
DeleteBoat Guy
Thought that might get a rise from someone! Mission accomplished. 😊
DeleteI've said it here before, "Had I known how great grandkids are, I'da had them first!"
ReplyDeleteAs far as the avoidance routes go I go over to 281 traveling south to avoid I35. Been doing that for years, haven't done it recently.
In reverse order. Yeah, but 281's getting pretty bad in and of itself. The places between Johnson City and SA where it's still 2 lane get jammed up pretty badly. Haven't traveled it much farther north than Marble Falls in a while, so don't know much about that.
DeleteRE: the second. Looking forward to experiencing that first hand. :-)
Your description of that parenting AI was very eye-opening for me. I had no idea that existed. It might even help provide a tiny bit more sleep for mom and dad. With both our kids being premature, (10 weeks and 5 weeks) sleep was extremely rare.
ReplyDeleteYep, I was pretty amazed also. Course the system check ride will be the first night GC#1 comes home. We'll see. As to the last, I'll bet! Having two full-termers, sleep deprivation was still a factor, and I was still on flying status when Little J was born. That made it even more fun. Sleep Dep and teaching 2Lts fresh out of UPT to fly air to air? Not a good combination. Fortunately, I was the squadron scheduler. With a nod from the Squadron CO, I took it a bit easy on myself. (And with first hand experience, did the same for other guys in the same boat.)
DeleteFortunately I was on shore duty for the daughter. My son slept ok, but the damn heart/O2 monitor going off all night, usually due to a sensor coming off, was tough. I think sleep dep is SOP for me now, as I'm lucky to get 6 hrs. I function well enough as far as I can tell though.
DeleteI'd bet that monitor going off produced a similar reaction as the Klaxon did going off at night when on five minute air defense alert at Osan. Get's the heart pumping and adrenalin flowing and it's darn near impossible to get settled back down when you get the stand down code.
DeleteYeah, pretty much but after a month or so, he was healthy enough that it was ALWAYS the sensor. We didn't sleep through it, always checking, but we also didn't have the massive adrenalin surge when it did go off.
DeleteFortunately/Unfortunately, we couldn't avoid the adrenalin thing as 5 minutes is 60 miles supersonic, so regardless of the probability of a practice or alarm malfunction, the NORK's were just dumb/foolish/dangerous enough to try it. I've heard the sound on some TV movies I've watched since. Yep, reaction is still there.
DeleteBut...I am glad your kids got through their health issues.
Yikes on the trip. Back in the day when we were mobile and travelling, Mrs. Andrew and I would prefer to travel at night, as the reckless and feckless tended to not be driving at 4am. And it tended to be cooler (as in temperature, juvat) so much preferred in vehicles with so-so or no-no functional air conditioning. (Have you ever noticed that the a/c and the power windows conspire against you? If one goes out, so does the other. Funny that.)
ReplyDeleteAs to the wireless devices, er, weird. Too new-fangled. Don't trust them. Nope. Not at all. It's the Devil's work, it is. Or something. Seriously, detects noises and autorocks? What's next, uterine replicators?
Other than that, one of the few nice things about my cable company is the blisteringly fast cable internet. Not the customer service, not the many other ways they stab me in the back or toss electronic caltrops in my way. The internet is good.
Have you considered SpaceX's starlink? I probably queried you about it before but the non-evil space mogul said recently that the system is designed for people like, well, you, who are not already connected to blisteringly fast internet pipes.
Good luck trying to find a decent route around or through Austin. Maybe your wife can haz mad navigator skilz?
Around here, night is when the Deer take over the roads. Over the past couple of years, there hasn't really been a need to drive at night, so I didn't. Had the opportunity to do it a couple of weeks ago, and realized my night vision isn't nearly as good as it once was. So...I try to avoid it if possible. Gets pretty darn dark on Texas highways when you get away from the big cities, which pretty much defines my circumstances.
DeleteI'm very much considering Starlink, not sure if I should get in early, or wait a bit until the undiscovered kinks get worked out. But either way that decision is migrating out of "probably" and towards "certainly".
Mrs J IS my navigator. We were in the midst of the Charlie Fox that is Austin, and she keeps telling me I need to go right. I'm firmly convinced I need to go left as East is left of Southeast when you're headed SE. As usual, in situations like this with her....I was wrong. Fortunately, I was following her directions all along despite vocalizing the need to go left. So, All that was injured was my pride. The story of my life.
These days I prefer driving during the day so I can see the scenery along the way.
DeleteYeah, I use THAT reason also! ;-)
Delete"electronic caltrops" You may consider that oh so very stolen. Har!
DeleteThat's the reason we keep Beans around. Expanding the English Language in an infinite number of vectors.
DeleteCongratulations on the upcoming event of GC#1. Before we made the full move to Bandera, my wife and I would go up and down 281 from the Fort Worth area. We then cut over on 290 to the 'Burg to hit SH16 to Kerrville. Did that about once a month for 2 years. It was a great drive.
ReplyDeleteOn the neonatal electronics, while it is asking the obvious, did you make sure all default passwords were removed? There have been so many instances of "weird" people getting into those things and doing obnoxious stuff. After working in aerospace for 30 years, I became a little cautious about my home network security. One time, I looked at my firewall logs, did a trace route on some IP addresses that were rejected and found them to be coming from China. As to network speed, down south here in the Bandera area, we have fiber to the premises with speeds up to 1Gb; we only have the 100 Mb option which is nice and fast.
I have tried posting this twice before using the Name/URL option and my comment just disappeared. Seems Blogger is blocking anyone that is not logged into Google. If my multiple postings show up, please delete this and one of the others.
Thanks, Bill. You know, none of the three devices mentioned passwords at all. Gonna look into that most 'Skosh. Thanks for the reminder.
DeleteThat route takes you within 1.277 miles of our house, Bill.
Sounds like Bandera is more modern than here. The only options on our place are West Central Wireless and satellite. Which is why I'm interested in Elon's version of satellite.
Maps are still useful, even if GPS is more convenient. That's all I have to say about going around large city areas. Even if it takes me an extra half hour time-wise, it doesn't feel like it because it is 30 min of moving along as opposed to 30 min of setting still, or, even worse, doing a slow roll forward while praying the yahoo behind you is really paying attention to how close he is to your back bumper instead of to his latest text message.
ReplyDeleteWhen I look at all the AI available to keep track of kids in their rooms...I just shake my head. And think to my self that the parents will never know what real sleep deprivation is. And, like Tuna, I went from being able to sit up in bed and talk with someone and not wake up, to being able to wake up completely 100% operational at light speed thanks to having a child who had a compressed trachea which was caused by a venous malformation that is so genetically rare it occurs in 0.0005% of the general population.
It was easily fixed using a surgical technique developed in the early 60's. When asked, the pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon told me he had seen this before, back when he was in medical school 20 years prior, but the year my son was diagnosed, he was the 4th child to be diagnosed with this condition. It was found because I heard this awful gasping intake of air, went rushing into the baby's room to see him standing at the rail inside his crib pulling on the neck of his footed pj's. I picked him up, he grabbed onto me so hard I smacked him on the back, thinking I was dropping him, he coughed, gagged, and then began to cry at the top of his lungs. When I looked sideways at his face, it was a deep blue from lack of oxygen. He pinked up pretty quickly, but I ran downstairs to call the doctor after waking up Dad and making him keep the baby sitting up, and we went right over to the UV center where I was working at the time. A couple of days later, a couple of tests later, and on his 18 month birthday he was in surgery having his vascular ring fixed. If I hadn't had heard that heh-heh-heh, and then that gasping intake, or if I had heard it and rolled over, I am convinced he would have died. The surgeon said that when he startled me by grabbing on so hard and my reaction of slapping his back saved his life. It knocked loose a mucus plug that blocked his restricted airway. AI is good, and certainly useful, but NOTHING beats a hands-on look. Folks have kids when they are young so they can handle the sleep deprivation.
And yes, the best job title I have ever been bestowed with is "Grammy". :)
Well done Suz! I don't know if it was luck, experience or divine intervention that caused you to do the right thing, but Well Done! Was there any particular reason that 4 cases popped up that year?
DeleteAs to the driving thing. Mrs J WAS using a map, I was listening to the GPS on the Cell, Austin traffic being Austin Traffic I couldn't look at the cell map at all. I'm really not fond of Cell GPS, the scale is usually too small to make out the important details. The older Garmins etc. did a much better job of showing the route from the driver's point of view, but you can't make a call on them. One step forward two steps back.
I'm looking forward to assuming the role.
I'd put my money on that divine intervention. After seeing my 2lb 5oz kid in the NICU, I'm sure there are angels on CAP over every hospitalized child's bed.
DeleteI'm in agreement with both hypotheses, Tuna.
DeleteDefinitely on divine intervention. I heard the heh-heh-heh, thought "Really?? I have 10 more minutes before the alarm goes off...cue the weird inhale sound...DO NOT REMEMBER getting out of bed, next thing I know I am standing next to that crib picking him up, he grabs on, I slapped him on the back, he coughs, gags, I think "Oh, man, he just got sick all down my back",(he hadn't) look back at his face, it is as blue as can be...Holy CRAP!! Honey, wake up!! The PA working the night shift that night was a fellow I often worked with, so when I called, the operator put me right through, he listened to my incoherent babbling for about 15 seconds, and said bring him right in.
DeleteBrought him in, he looked ok, but the more he ran around, the paler he looked, would pink right up with a little O2. So he got the X-Ray tech out of bed, and then looked at the film taken 3 weeks ago with "an anomaly, probably due to twisting" to the one taken that early morning, which showed the exact same thing--both me and the x-ray tech agreed there was no twisting going on. So, the on call peds MD was gotten up, came in, looked at him, at the films, turfed us to his new peds MD who spent his lunch hour going through page by page of a thick chart--ear infections had been a frequent problem, and recently a bout of what proved to be a pneumonia--which was why the first x-ray had been taken, because I refused to leave until the on-call doc ordered one as I was sure it was a pneumonia, he was convinced it wasn't...so just to prove me wrong and to get me out of his exam room, he ordered an xray...lo and behold, it showed a pneumonia... I was very nice and didn't gloat...much...
But after going through everything with a fine tooth comb, and doing the O2 on, O2 off test, we were given a referral for a Barium swallow. The diagnoses were cystic fibrosis, tumor, or vascular ring. So 2 days later, (with me NOT sleeping) we went at 2pm after not eating all day, and had the barium swallow done--no problem slurping down the barium, he would have eaten nails he was so hungry...sure enough, I could see the barium spill over into his wind pipe when he took a breath as he was swallowing--like having a slow pipe.
It is caused by when the baby develops, the trachea and esophagus grow a right hook instead of the usual left hook. By growing a right hook, there is an artery that turns into a ligament with baby's first breath as it is no longer needed to by-pass the lungs. In my son's case, the trachea grew up through the space, which as he grew bigger, the space got smaller and tighter, compressing his trachea, so he had a floppy spot half way up. So the surgery is to go in, snip the ligament, tack one half to the tissue behind the sternum, and the other half into the tissue in front of the back bone. In my son's case, he somehow had a double ring, instead of a single one, so the 3-4 hour surgery took 8 hours. To say I was a nervous wreck is a major understatement.
The good news is it wasn't cancer, or CF, and it was something that was easily surgerized in the early '80's. My guess is when an unusual case pops up, it gets written up, and the awareness level is raised, so more are found. But divine intervention is my definite go-to for why it was found. My husband's grandmother lost a baby brother about the same age as our son, with similar symptoms, slowing of weight gain, going from solid food back to soft foods, decrease in growth, went to bed one night, and didn't wake up. Later found out there is a bit of a genetic component to this. But, yes, we were very lucky, God was watching over us, and the nurses in the Peds ICU were absolute angels.
Wow, the angels were watching over you and your son!
DeleteYeah, that #@$%% Y in Austin... sigh And good luck with the alert launch that you 'know' is coming... ;-)
ReplyDeleteThanks, OldNFO. I don't know when the last time you went through the Y, it's interesting how they "fixed" the east end and seems to make the flow better. If they do the west side similarly, might make it somewhat passable. We'll see. Never underestimate the power of a politician to screw things up though.
Delete