Karwoski Life

Well, another busy week has come and gone and Matt and I are on the countdown until we are reunited. 28 days until I go back to China and we can see each other again…YAHOO! Hopefully these next few weeks go well, and the time passes quickly. As you can see from this recent picture that Mary sent me, Matt still has his goatee...I thought he had shaved it all off...but clearly he left most of his facial hair! Matt had a visit from Ruth yesterday and they had a good talk. Ruth told Matt that Professor Bian is pleased with his progress so far, especially with his tremor. Matt told me that the tremor is more relaxed, especially when he’s at rest…it does still fire off more when he’s doing something like talking, but it sounds like it’s not quite as active. He also talked about an exercise that he’s been working on which really calms it down. He presses his hands together out in front of his chest, then he brings them out to the side and down. Ruth also said that while he may not see a...

Well it’s a beautiful day out today and I have the day off…YAHOO! Hope and I went to see Bon Jovi last night…and WOW it was soo much fun! It totally brought back a ton of memories from the good ‘ol days and they played some of their new stuff which was good as well. We just had the best time rockin out to the old stuff though…and I have to say Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora are still looking good!! The other two guys look good too…but let’s be honest, who cares about the other guys!? HA! Oh, we just had the BEST time! My face is still sore from all the smiling and when we walked out my voice was about an octave higher than usual from all my screaming…and singing, of course! I’m pretty sure I’ll be walking around with a goofy grin on my face all day! It was so much fun!! I talked to Matt this weekend and he’s definitely doing well. He said one of the things which does help him feel less homesick is logging on to our local new station’s website and checking out the forecast.  He like...

Well, I do believe that Spring has finally, FINALLY arrived. It was warm and breezy yesterday, and while it’s supposed to be cooler and rainy today…anything is better than the 30’s and 40’s we’ve been experiencing! I worked from home yesterday while the AC guys came and installed the new unit. It felt good to have one more thing to check off the DONE list for the new house! It was such a warm day I decided to put the screens in the windows and open them up a bit. It was SO nice! Both Steve and Buddy were in heaven smelling the air and watching what was going on. The house across the street was having their sidewalks poured, so I’m crossing my fingers that HOPEFULLY they can get to ours soon as well and we can finally put the yard in and bring Miss Penny back home. Since there was a lot of commotion over where I normally walk Buddy, and the yard was all dried up, I decided to take him out the back door and let him explore on the lead that I had bought and hooked up to the deck. H...

Today is the first day in nearly a week that I didn’t wake up groaning, sniffing, reaching for my Kleenex and moaning all the way to bathroom! YAHOO! I decided last night that I would stay home from church today, just in case. I got some extra sleep and I think I’m finally over the hump of this nasty cold!! Today it is also SUNNY out this morning! Oh sunshine, where have you been? I woke up yesterday to SNOW, so my pitiful grumbly walk to the bathroom was littered with a few ‘come on’s?’ and ‘are you kidding me’s?’. Waking up this morning to sunshine and much milder temperatures today really helped lift my spirits. Yesterday I noticed that my Japanese maple seedling that I over-wintered in the garage has made it! BUDS! So surely, Spring has to be here right!? Yesterday I went out and found some art for the house. I had read about this artist Rodney White who likes to paint things which look like old advertising signs with positive sayings on them. I was tickled to see they had a ...

What's worse than a sore throat? A sore throat AND the hiccups...not fun. Did you ever watch that show Thirtysomething when you were like 13? Certain things, like worn out college sweatshirts remind me of shows like this...and how when I was a kid I looked up to the 30 somethings around me with their worn out college sweatshirts. I pulled on my favorite Iowa State sweatshirt today...one I bought at the Union when I was in college...and I couldn't help but notice...I've turned in a 30 something with a worn out college sweatshirt. How did that happen? My friend Holly stopped over last night to check out the new house and say hello. She was my first non-family visitor since moving day AND the first person to pull up in the driveway (besides me)! She brought me the cutest little begonia as a housewarming gift...it totally made my day! I worked from home again this afternoon...my sore throat getting the best of me and of course Misters Buddy and Steve had to keep me company ...

Well, it’s a cold, drizzly day here in Iowa and it pretty much mirrors how I’m feeling today. I think I’m coming down with a cold and stayed home this morning. I just hope that it’s nothing that keeps me down for too long…since I just had strep throat in March. Fun, fun. I talked to Matt and Ruth both last night about the computer situation and it sounds like they’re going to be able to replace his hard drive fairly inexpensively! They should have it back to Matt in a few days. In the meantime, he’s got the loaner and is receiving messages on the yahoo account just fine. I’m not sure if he’ll be able to set the MSN account back up on the computer or not…we’ll have to see. Either way, I’m glad there is an easy and fairly cheap solution…though I am kicking myself for not saving the pictures and documents we had stored on there onto a separate drive. I should KNOW better. Grumble, grumble. Everything else is going pretty well for Matt. He mentioned the other day that he thinks per...

Matt has been able to borrow a laptop from Ruth temporarily while we figure out whether to replace Matt's hard drive or get him a new laptop. In the mean time, he can get e-mails at his yahoo account: matthewkarwoski@yahoo.com I know he'd love to hear from you!

I just got off the phone with a pretty distraught Matt...seems our laptop is on the fritz!! :( He is getting an 'operating system not found' error...which could be a pretty bad problem with his hard drive. He's going to speak to Ruth about repair options, or if he can just buy a new laptop there. But in the meantime, he won't be able to read his e-mails. The laptop has been down since his yesterday afternoon...so if you sent him a message recently, and have not heard from him, he probably hasn't received it yet. He's going to see if perhaps he can borrow Mary's computer to get to his yahoo account. I'll update the blog as soon as I know he's back online. Poor guy...this really makes him feel disconnected. Please send up a few extra prayers; he is pretty homesick and this just makes it worse.