TUESDAY. Middle of TAH

TAH stands for: Time At Home
Our day started earlier than usual. I had to take Regina to her doctor's appointment. Just this & that.

After the appointment and breakfast, the four of us went exploring. We took a series of short hikes along access points to the James River. It was meaningful to me to be able to finally take my boys into wooded, wet and wild areas – the kinds of places where I had spent significant amounts of time as a child. Forest picked up a tick during our adventure. As soon as I was able to do so, I plucked the tick out with tweezers and disinfected his scalp.

We spent some time at the cemetery this afternoon. The boys still clearly remember their great-grandma. They were very close with each other. Her absence still brings a significant sting to my emotions, from time to time. I'm glad that it does.

I fueled up the car today. Although gasoline prices are lower than they have been in quite some time, I was still stressed by the final price tag of my gasoline acquisition. It was about $60. Regular unleaded gasoline is about $3.27 around here.

My grandpa received a phone call that my uncle's gate was wide open, not closing as it is supposed to automatically do. My uncle is currently out of town. The five of us went on down there to attempt a remedy to the problem. The gate wouldn't budge, so we called in a professional gate technician. Dwayne arrived within 10 minutes of the phone call. We were amused that his first name was the same as my uncle's. Dwayne. His personalized license plate read: "G8 MAN." This man knew what he was doing – he had the gate fully functional within seven minutes of beginning work. A sensor simply needed recalibrating. My boys enjoyed the playground equipment while we grown-ups fussed with the gate.

We had a rich and satisfying dinner at a Mexican restaurant. After returning home, we were in the mood for a walk. Hunter stayed at the house, to play with the neighbor kids. Forest agreed to come with us since we let him drive the mini jeep. Occasionally we had to remind him to drive close to the curb, but over all, he did really well. He is the best-driving 4 year-old I have ever known.

Tomorrow will be my last full day in Nixa. There are a few things I have yet to do. Such as: getting a haircut and grocery shopping.