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Had a great moment today and wanted to share. I think I've mentioned here in the past that my wife was diagnosed with MS a little over 20 years ago shortly after we were married. She's luckily been largely in remission since then but has lost some leg/muscle functionality and she struggles with balance and a few other things. Years ago she put together a bucket list of things to do while she still could. Whitewater rafting was one of them. Today we checked that off her list on the Pacuare River in Costa Rica, one of the better rivers in the world for whitewater apparently. I'm a pretty str

I've been hesitant to make the final percentage update, but I think I'm going to go ahead and do so. We've discussed this thing being "a relationship" and I think it is, for both of us, regardless of what we label it or don't label it. We have mutually expressed non-interest in seeking attentions from other parties. She has referred to me, in gest.. (or was it?), as her "boyfriend" when talking with her dad, who had been giving her #### about me being her "boyfriend" even before the first hug took place. She text me that her 11yo, after noticing us sitting closely and talking a lot when

So I'm not sure exactly what I'm hoping for out of this thread, but here goes. Maybe somebody else has a similar story and will find this helpful. Or maybe it can just be used to promote acceptance. Some of you may have seen me mention my 16-year-old daughter Talia in the past, mostly in the Political Subforum. Most notably here in the Pete Buttigieg thread, where @Sinn Fein managed to get the architect of Pete Buttigieg's campaign to shoot a happy birthday video in an attempt to dispel the conspiracy theory that Buttigieg was just faking being gay. Anyway, in late March, the c

Depression sucks. Mental illness is so draining and sucks too.Work has become too overwhelming and have talked to my supervisor about the situation. Its the hardest thing to admit when you need help too. I made the plunge and checked myself into a day program. Hopefully things will get better soon. ETA, thank you for the encouragement and support.

Got word yesterday that my ex-wife, the mother of my kids, was found dead in her apartment. She was 39. She had made some bad choices and had some struggles over the last several years and had just not taken very good care of herself on top of that. The kids have been with me the majority of the time since she and I separated about 8 years ago, and pretty much all of the last 2 years. I had made my peace with her situation long ago, and knew from the path she was on that this day would come sooner rather than later, but you're never ready for that phone call from a police officer. My heart b

Blog: www.thepanickydad.com The Genesis Day 0 Day 17: Praying to go to Target Day 20: The Long Descent Into Fatherhood Day 46: Finding the Meaning of Life, One Breadstick at a Time Stupid Baby Item of the Day A quick review of Disney World’s EXTREMELY Weird Avatar Land Stupid Baby Item of the Day: 5/16/17 Wow, you have GREAT insurance! Looking for names A Boy Will Lead Them Off to shopping So much to do! Grandpa's Story THE FINAL COUNTDOWN First 48 Hours One month in Meeting Santa, and the Long Descen

I've chronicled a bit on here my wife's and my rollercoaster ride of trying to have kids. From improbably unlucky bouts with IVF to fostering children (see the "trouble getting pregnant" thread) and having the state clear us for adoption only to essentially tell us "just kidding" a short while later (chronicled mostly here in this thread: https://forums.footballguys.com/forum/topic/759463-preparing-fordealing-with-the-loss-of-a-child/page/5/#comments ) it's been a ride. That ride ended today with us adopting two chidren (including the little boy we had from his birth until two when the state

I’m now in this club. 2 nights ago I took my Lab for a 45 minute walk then went and did a 30 minute Peleton class (bike is in our house). Good sweat as usual. Felt great. Showered. Still felt great. Went down to get dinner as Mrs Smails had some roasted chicken and salad ready. Took the plate upstairs to watch the President’s Cup. All good. As soon as I sat down that all changed. Chest hurt and I started sweating profusely. Thought maybe it was just indigestion (I did burp twice) and maybe still running hot from the Peleton ride. Pain/constriction continued and I walked outside to see if

I exec produced a film project late last year. I posted a few things here at the time, but mainly talked around it, as the crew wanted to minimize advance word until we finally got it in the can. Its a romantic comedy (if you have to classify it, which is hard), called Mustang Island. Its stars Macon Blair, who also starred in Blue Ruin and Green Room. He also won Sundance this year with his feature, I Don't Feel at Home in this World Anymore (now on Netflix). I'm really proud of it. Its a good movie and I would like to invite all of my friends here at FFA to come to the premi

Trash day. Tell her you really admire her cans and ask if it would okay if you could look at them when you take your junk out next week.

Not to derail anything, but we had our baby last night! She's doing amazingly well. Due to the hospital's pandemic policies, I had to leave her right after my wife was released from recovery. I can't wait to bring her home in a few days and hold her again.

Jack came home yesterday and got to sleep in his own bed for the first time in almost 2 weeks He's tolerating chemo very well so far. Just some fatigue. Hope this means he'll be able to power through with few side effects. His protocol currently calls for 3 different chemo drug combinations... he's already been through 2. The third is still several weeks off. He lost about 10 lbs while in the hospital, mostly due to a couple days of not being able to eat because of scheduled surgeries/procedures. The catheter has been removed which will make his quality of life significantly be

I attempted suicide about 4 months ago now. I went through a brutal divorce. One that completely blindsided me due to her infidelity. I was in therapy and medicated for the past 2 years just to help mask a lot of pain. I retired in February at a younger age (37) with the dream of seeing the rest of the world. I had an open ended ticket booked starting in Sweden. About a week into my trip, I was ordered by the President to basically come home or face uncertain reentry into the US. So for the past 6 months, I sit here, doing nothing, in my house with no ability to socialize or volunt

Hi Folks, I’m sorry to have dragged this out but I wanted to give this the attention I felt it deserved. I also value you, the people who make this board what it is. So I wanted to be respectful and thorough with a decision here. The cut to the chase version is this: The Political Forum is not shutting down today. But if it’s going to survive, things will have to change from where they’ve been. Here’s the (incredibly) long version. The Big Picture Of How The Forums Fit With Footballguys It’s important to understand how the forums fit with Footballguys. Foo

Hate to say it...... It's over, folks. This place has the feel of a once very popular bar with regulars who made it great, but started leaving when new corporate owners took over and started making changes. Still the same bar, still the same location, decor similar...but the atmosphere is gone. Corporate owners serve different masters and it isn't the patrons that helped make it what it once was. I'm finding less and less to read here or reasons to post and I've been a message board nerd here since 2000ish. I just don't care anymore. It's so bland. The creativity is gone. Th

My oldest son is being deployed to the middle east. Tonight I witnessed the awkward interaction between our youngest son and him saying goodbye. As a parent of a soldier, it is one of the hardest, most proud moments you will ever experience. It was also one of the most difficult things I have ever witnessed. The two of them couldn't be any more different, but to see the raw, true emotion between them was something I didn't expect. My son is leaving behind a 2 year old son and a 2 week old daughter. We are thankful he was able to be here for her birth and luckily we are an awesome sup

My Fab Four segment recorded 4/30: Full show Just my portions in case you want to skip the songs (but you shouldn't!) My intro to song #11 in the top 100 countdown You might have noticed my Beatles song countdown thread hanging around the first page for several months. Or you noticed all the music threads it spawned - sorry! SiriusXM has a Beatles Channel, and one of the segments on the channel is called My Fab Four, in which a celebrity or a regular schmoe plays four of their favorite Beatles songs. Kind FBG @Kilgore Trout sent the Beatles Channel people a link to m

Jack had an ultrasound this morning that showed the mass has shrunk by about 1/3. Doctor seemed pleased about the reaction. Hopefully the last of the 5 day infusion protocol starts on Monday. After that it should just be one day a week. He has tolerated the heavy chemo well, for the most part. Only experiencing some fatigue and a little nausea. He is having trouble eating enough (just never feels hungry)... need to put some meat on his bones. Continued T&Ps please...

As of yesterday, my family is now credit card debt free. The only debt we have is our house (where we just refinanced to take 6 years off of our note) and 1 car. 11 years ago rocked our world. We had a 4 year old and a 2 year old. My wife worked part time, but only a couple days a week because we wanted her home with the kids as much as possible until they went to school. Plus, the cost of day care basically made her paycheck even-steven in terms of what we would outlay in day care. I was working full time, but my insurance was not very good. We were lower middle class but could pay

Hi Shuke, I want to let you know about a change I've made to my life. One I'm guessing will not be popular with some. We will no longer have the "EAT-OFF" type threads. That means the polls or the threads where the intent is basically posting pictures or videos of grown men power eating unhealthy food and guys talk about the men eating. This is not the result of any incident or drama. It's something I've thought about for a while. Well before the recent #FatShaming events. I'm not mad at anyone and nobody's in trouble. It just finally hit me today that these aren't somethi

Hello friends, I have been offline for a long time due to my ongoing health issues. In Sept 2016 I was told that I had NASH disease, and would eventually require a new liver. On Dec 8/16 I was put on the transplant list. I have not been able to work since Sept 16, due to the illness. Since that time, I have progressively gotten worse health wise. Muscle wasting, weakness, lethargy, pain, ascities, unsteady on feet, memory lose, fogginess, word dropping. It was aweful So, since Sept of this year, I was called into the hospital 2x for a potential liver, but both times I was sent home

Hitler reacts to NRJ's "lovemaking" (NSFW language and make sure you turn subtitles on, it defaults to off for some reason.) A collaborative effort between Gianmarco and myself.

Never heard of the show so I looked it up: Look, fella....if you've got a chance for the great Emily Ratajkowski to have simulated sex in YOUR house, you take it. You take it and you run with it. You do it for free. You do it for us! You go live in a box under a highway bridge if you have to, but you do it. Do you hear me?

Ok here is a more detailed update. June 24th will be 2 years since my wife passed away. June 17th will be 5 months since my surgery. Start with my son. He was diagnosed as a type 1 diabetic in October. He's doing very well managing his sugar. He is about ready to graduate Culinary School at the end of June/beginning of July. His class leaves for a week in England the last week of June (part of the tuition). He's going to a Gordon Ramsey Michelin 3 star restaurant for dinner/wine flight while there. If he has free time and can work it out, he wants to watch a World Cup game

Hard to believe I haven’t updated since June. A whole lot has changed. I’m much weaker physically, but more stable emotionally than earlier in this experience. Physically I don’t walk at all, other than using a walker to get from the 2nd floor steps to my bed - probably 25 ft - and then getting from bed to the bathroom. I can’t really dress myself any more, and my hands are probably at 25% strength and dexterity. My speech has also gone downhill- I try not to speak too much as my mouth and tongue and breath get tired quickly. I have to repeat myself more often, particularly with my 9

I debated actually putting this story up here because it reveals more about me than I probably want known. As a warning, this story probably won't be that funny. So if you're looking for humor, be forewarned. It is me being honest an vulnerable, so go a little easy. Shtick is always welcome. About two weeks ago, my idiot boss and I get into it again. I know he's been trying to set traps for me and I'd been doing a great job of navigating through the mine filed. But I slipped and replied in an email something I shouldn't have. Nothing major, but still not good. That was a Friday.

My drinking thinks I have a wife problem.

Chapter Six The aftermath and “Where Are They Now?” EG – Had to go to work drunk/hungover on Monday. Got billed $500 for the broken painting and took a month to get remuneration from Jer-Mac. Otherwise unscathed. Now posts drinking stories in the FFA. Sports a genius-level IQ and a magnificent penis that all of you would kill your own mothers to have been born with. Kev – Also had to go to work hungover on Monday. Emerged unscathed. Continues to drink absurd amounts of beer. Now 47 and lives in Hoboken, still unmarried as multiple girlfriends have gotten ann

On a positive note, my wife gave birth to our first child this morning!! We were expecting our daughter to be born in the first week of April, which does not align very well if this hospital sees a massive inflow of patients over the next month. This is the last place I would want to be at that time. I was really dreading the timing of all of this but alas, my lil one made it easier for us and her. This hospital used to be extremely lenient with visitors but yesterday they just limited visitors to just one person per patient. Today, they are implementing mandatory face masks for everyone walki

Update: feeling a tad better doing a clinical program for depression at a local medical center. It’s hard finding a good therapist and right meds for depression/ocd. I took up hiking, cooking, yoga and painting in the meantime. Thanks for the support! You guys are an awesome community of people. Im hoping to get back to work ASAP doing archeology stuff.

I won't know for a while, but my final chemo treatment was a week and a half ago, the side effects are subsiding, and I feel better than I have in a long time. Thanks for asking.

For those here who don't remember, my middle son is now a freshman at a small DIII school in PA that recruited him to play ball there. As a freshman, he was warned that playing time would be hard to come by, but given that his baseball history is replete with such warnings, he has once again proven the naysayers wrong to rise in the ranks on his team, and due to an unfortunate injury to one of the starting outfielders, he was inserted into the lineup and has, today, hit his first home run ever, at any level.

So early in the evening, Marissa finishes up some work she had to do, and she and her girls finally make it outside, where my son and I are goofing around in the front yard playing whiffle ball. After a bit, she comes over and kind of whispers that they are begging her to ask if they can jump on our trampoline. So of course we all head around to my back yard, and the kids are all playing. Marissa stays in pretty close proximity to me most of this time. Eventually it begins to thunder and lightning ( ) and it was also starting to get dark, so we all head in. She texts me a bit later, ask

Jack Update: Followup radiation complete on lungs, pelvis and foot. CT indicates some spots in lungs that are being attributed to radiation related inflammation. Baseline MRI today before his next 4+ month chemo protocol begins next week. He will graduate HS next weekend Summa Cum Laude. Planning to attend MSU in the fall. They are being awesome about accommodating Jack and his situation by giving him is own room in a centrally located dorm with 2 HS buddies as his suite-mates. Hoping and praying it all works out for him. Headed to Dana-Farber in Boston in a couple weeks f

Man alive, the last 20+ months have been....interesting. I have been homeless for...awhile. 661 days Or 1 year, 9 months, 22 days Or 21 months, 22 days Right, so...a long while. Before I forget, @El Floppo - sorry, dude. You confronted me like, IDK, 18 months ago? But I was in denial and going through trauma and my head was all effed up. I should have come clean and laid it out. You’re a good man & would not have been judgmental at all. In hindsight I should have allowed you to know my story. Next lunch is on me. Anyway, how d

Hey @MikeIke. You probably don't really know me, since I've never ventured much into the FFA. Joe linked me to this thread, though, and I wanted to come by and offer my perspective, too. When I was 13 and my brother was 15, my mom used to get her nails professionally done. Mostly because my mom is a hyper-sociable person, and professional nail appointments are professional chat appointments. (You gotta do something while the lacquer dries, right?) Her favorite nail tech at the time, we'll call her "Sharon", was around 26 and had a 12-year-old daughter, we'll call her "Mary". Sharon kept t

So my niece was born a boy. An identical twin at that. From as early as they could express themselves she wanted to hang out with her older sister, play with dolls, paint her nails, play princess, etc. Her brother is such a typical boy: loves sports, fighting, army stuff, etc. Then came the questions: why do I have a penis? I don't want it. Can I be Dorothy for Halloween? Will my penis go away? Mommy did you used to have a penis? Then came the kids at school making fun of her for wanting to play with girls, doll, etc. She asked for a My Little Pony shirt when she was like 6 and the

@timschochet I'm sorry. I was wrong. And You were right. To those not in the know, back during the 2016 Presidential election, tim took issue with me because I couldn't bring myself to vote for Hillary or Trump. His argument was that one of them is going to be worse for the country than the other. I disagreed. I figured we would be no worse off with one or the other, because they would both be equally bad. After seeing how poorly the US responded to the COVID-19 crisis, I can see how wrong I was. While I still am no fan of Hillary, if Hillary were president, many, many,

There once was a guy named Squistion Who had a fascination with a pigeon Hag live twitched one night Bird avatars raged through the site And Otis changed the title just a smidgen

at the replies this afternoon tl;dr; it went very well and possible playdate tomorrow (for the kids) I battled nature most of the afternoon, as it has been ungodly hot the last few days and the red wasps were out in force for some reason today. I didn't have time to put the first one's head on a toothpick so I just went guns (spray) blazing and wore their asses out. Our heroine and her girls showed up about 5pm, after my son and I had gotten pretty much everything set up. I don't have a particularly 'gathering friendly' backyard, but I got out a fan, some music, some citronella

Fine. I'll say it. Yoga pants thread. We all have to make sacrifices for the good of mankind, Joe.

Faust is a machine. A machine that just churns out quality reports and information day, after day, after day in the off-season. The Shark Pool forum is a community of ideas and fun arguments between football enthusiasts. Civilized and altruistic, for the most part (unlike some other forums here that will go unnamed). But this forum is also where many of us, with varying degrees of free time available to dedicate to this hobby, go for information. Accurate, consolidated and easy to access information to cram for our exams over the next couple of weeks. And Faust just br

Meh

Sweatpants and yogapants

Saturday night let's do this

Now that the holidays are over I can take some time to update the FFA on how things went. First, her family: The stepfather was arrested Christmas Eve for participating in a drug ring that supplied meth to prison inmates. This was happening in the grandmother's house where Padme lived until January 2017, and where her half-sister still lives. The mother got out of jail two weeks before Christmas. Christmas Eve, Padme went to see mom at grandma's house 2 doors down from us (not the same grandmother in the paragraph above.) While she was there, Mom went to the bathroom, injected he

Sorry for the lack of updates. A lot going on obviously... but I wanted to give a quick one. Jack has had a rough month or so as he was going through both chemo (every week - sometimes 5 days a week) AND radiation (5 days a week for 4 weeks). Biggest issue was his inability to stay hydrated (or nourished). Had several overnight stays in ER to get IV fluids. It was mostly due to the radiation as the field they were treating included most of his digestive tract. Nausea and diarrhea were common. Although the radiation oncologist (an absolute awesome guy) kept referring to Jack as "Lead

Hey everyone!!!!!! Been offline for a while enjoying life and recovering! Today I am 8 months post liver transplant. Tomorrow is my physical abilities assessment for returning to work. That last 5 or 6 weeks I have really started to feel like I am back. I am getting stronger, getting good rest and just loving every day. I must say though, that my outlook on life had changed profoundly. I am not a religious person, so I am very thankful to the people that have pulled me through this ordeal. I am now surrounding myself with all the positive people/enery that I can. I NEED to av

Update: Creepy dude has a terminated membership now, and can never join another YMCA again. Administration was very thorough and forthright. Now I will be contacting the Y legal department to determine if I need to have this documented via the police, or if they have already done so. Chalk one up for the good guys. Later creep.