WHAT I'VE BEEN UP TO LATELY

I originally posted this over on my other blog but thought that some of the things might be of interest to those that check out this one.

Lately my life just seems to be going full speed ahead. Between work, family and just everything else that almost everyone has to deal with on a regular basis, I feel like I never stop. I just thought that I would mention a few things that have been going on with me lately.

A good percentage of my time at work lately has been occupied with construction administration. For the past few months I've been handling the CA on a parking garage for CUICAR (Clemson University International Center For Automotive Research). CUICAR's vision is to be the premiere automotive and motorsports research and educational facility in the world. BMW and Timken currently have headquarters on site, and the development is just getting started. The parking garage we designed will be the largest in the upstate, and I must say despite it being a parking garage it has a lot of nice features. Attached to the garage is a six story tower which will house a two story gallery space, two floors of office space, a fitness center and a roof garden. Here is a shot of the southeast corner of the tower that I took while on a site visit today:



I've been trying to spend some time on the weekends advancing my career by studying for the A.R.E. exams, so hopefully by next spring I will be a registered architect. I'm waiting to hear if I passed the last exam I took, so if I passed that I have four exams left...General Structures, Lateral Forces, Pre-Design and Mechanical and Electrical Systems. I'm currently studying for the two structural exams and hope to knock them out within a week or two of each other.

Connor celebrated his first birthday this past week. Lisa spent all day Saturday baking cakes and cooking food. That evening Lisa's family came over to celebrate. Everything went smoothly, and Connor seemed to enjoy his cake and presents.



Tuesday we took Connor to the doctor for his one year check-up. We ended up getting flu shots for both Ethan and Connor. Connor also had to get his toe pricked and three inoculations which he handled really well. Ethan on the other hand acted like he was being given a lethal injection or something. Everything went fine, but we are having a little bit of a scare. Connor is just starting to stand, and we noticed that he tends to stand on the inside of his feet. We pointed this out to the doctor, so she sent us to a podiatrist next door to have it checked out. After waiting about forty minutes the doctor came in and basically scared us to death. He says, 'I'm not the man for this job.' He ended up telling us that he would refer us to the Shriner's Hospital to see a pediatric podiatrist. He said that there is a ninety percent chance that it is nothing but a ten percent chance that it there could be something wrong. Going to the Shriner's Hospital is appearantly a fairly involved process, so we have to apply to see if they will see us. On top of all that we have to take Connor to an allergist next week since he seems to have an allergy to milk.

My parents didn't get to come down for the party this past weekend. Unfortunately they seem to be having a few illnesses as they start to get a little up there in age. Just last week my dad had to have surgery for kidney stones which he has had a problem with for the past couple of years now. Hopefully they will get to come down in a few weeks.

Now that I've gotten through all that stuff, I get to go to a free sneak preview screening of Christian Bale's new movie, Harsh Times, tonight with my brother-in-law. And tomorrow, Lisa and I will be celebrating our sixth wedding anniversary a little early. I got us tickets to see Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood in concert. Lisa's parents are going to watch the boys, so it will be nice to have a nice long night out together.

What have you been up to lately?