The Great Curse of 2009

This has become a legend in the O’Brien household. 2009 began with my car getting hit not once, not twice, but three times IN ADDITION to being broken into AND the window getting stuck in an open position (in Minnesota in January…) from a break-in 4 years ago (apparently we are lucky it has been working this long). None of the collisions were our fault and two were hit and runs (i.e. the girl who hit Will paid for one bumper, but we now have a hole in the other)….Needless to say we have become good friends with the workers at the auto body shop and they are actually really wonderful and helpful-they have even met Mosby and recommended dishes at local restaurants to us. Note that all of these things took place before the month of February!!! After the first two incidents, we thought, “this is weird” but after the fifth problem we were looking for hidden cameras thinking Ashton Kutcher might be around the corner waiting to tell us we were punked and that we actually won a brand new car and maybe a trip to Hawaii or something. Maybe we should be the first couple featured on Extreme Car Makeover- Ty could come and demolish civic and replace it with a shiny new one with seats made out of baseball bats or canoe paddles or whatever hobby we tell him we have.

We were hoping this bizarre case of bad luck would stay behind in January. After all, I was headed to southern California for my friend Ashley’s wedding over Valentine’s day weekend. I was going to escape the frigid temps, spend time with some of my favorite people in the world, and enjoy all of the wedding festivities. We had been planning for weeks. Before leaving for the airport, though, we thought we’d give Mosby some extra fun and bring him to a dog park so he could run to his heart’s content. Long story short, Friday the 13th + ice covered dog park (there was literally no grass or snow showing in the entire place) + really fast dog + dansko’s (which have zero traction) + spindly wrists = TROUBLE. Mos was loving the park and was running towards me as fast as he could, but he couldn’t stop on the ice or go around me. I was actually expecting him to run into me, but I figured he would jump up so I was bracing myself for going backwards and figured at worst I would just land on my butt like most of us Minnesotans do at least once a winter season. However, he didn’t jump so I went right over top of him with no time to brace myself. I knew pretty much right away that my wrist was broken, but having broken my wrist/hand 3 different times as a kid (the spindly wrists), I think I was more upset that I was going to miss my flight. I figured, throw a cast on that thing, and let’s get to the airport!

It didn’t take long for me to realize that this was a little different than my other breaks. Taking off my coat at the ER was the only time that I actually looked at my wrist and let’s just say I couldn’t look at it after that…yuck. They had to reset my bone, and with all the expenses of our modern health care, the “high-tech” contraption they used to do this was made of a clothes hanger and four Chinese finger traps hanging from it (the things that you got as kids where you put your pointer fingers in either end and when you pulled, they would be stuck inside). The doc hung my hand upright from the traps and then hung weights over my bicep to pull the bone down and then about 3 people pushed it back into place. Crazy, huh?!

The next week we met with the orthopedic surgeon- I had broken the bone in about 3 places, breaking a section off and knocking the joint out of its place. So, they pieced me back together with a plate and some screws. Losing the use of your dominant hand is pretty challenging and Will needed to continue on with work and school, so my mom came up to help out for a few days after the surgery and my dad took the dog down to Caledonia for a couple of weeks. Those first three weeks were pretty painful and challenging, but by the end I could move my fingers pretty well and my life was slowly returning to a routine. I was excited to get my removable splint and get on with recovery. Unfortunately, things were not healing quite right. At my two week appointment I was unable to move my wrist past 90 degrees (think handshake) to a palm up position. You know there’s something wrong when a whole team of doctors come in to check out your x-rays! Apparently some bone was sliding out of joint or something when I would turn my hand. This was very discouraging to hear. They were going to try to gradually turn my wrist and hope that my muscles would grow strong enough to hold the bone in place, but if that didn’t work I’d have to have another surgery.

So for the next two weeks I gradually twisted my wrist around about 1 degree at a time and velcroed it in place with this crazy butterfly splint thing. Eventually I did get it palm-up and the x-rays looked good at my last doctor’s appointment. So it looks like I might not need another surgery! So now I am doing a lot of physical therapy, working on getting my wrist to turn back to palm down (which I’ve pretty much gotten, but now it won’t go palm up anymore) and to bend my wrist, which is pretty pathetic right now. I have decided that my priorities for things to be able to do again are: 1. Type 2. Write 3. Eat with a utensil (I can always use my left) 4. CANOE 5. Play tennis 6. Throw a baseball. Typing and writing are getting there, my hand just starts to hurt after a few minutes. The rest seem like a long ways off, but I am really hoping. Given the break, it’s not realistic to expect 100% functioning, so these are my goals:)

So, we are thinking that we have some AMAZING luck coming our way for the rest of 2009 to balance out the beginning:) Despite the challenges, we have been blessed with wonderful family support, great friends, understanding coworkers, and a great marriage. Poor Will had to do the work of three hands (sometimes four because my left hand isn’t good for much) all while finishing up his master’s thesis! But we are slowly on our way back to normal and now are looking forward to his graduation. Wow, if you made it to the end of this post, good job! We have just been so focused on getting through each day and catching up on work, we have been seriously M.I.A.- so we thought we’d catch you up. We are hoping as appointments, muscle pain, and academic stress gradually diminish over the next couple of months, our social lives will be able to pick up again and we’ll be able to catch up in person!

Kirsten

Our Boy

Our dog, Mosby (AKA Mos, Momo, Da Mos, Momocita, Mosbaliscious, etc.) keeps us laughing everyday. We love having him in the fam and can't imagine it without him now! Here are some recent pictures of him:)

He can tell spring is coming and is already loving the squirrels that are out (who are probably confused by the unusually warm weather this week). We took him for a walk at Como Park today and it was warm enough for only a fleece! Heat wave!!! Ever since we've had snow on the ground (Nov.), Mosby likes to burrow into the snow, so we call him Torpedo Doggie. It's pretty hilarious, so we finally filmed it. It's even funnier when the snow is more powdery, but he still does his best in this icy snow:

So Long 2008, Hello 2009 (i.e. the year of the gopher's stadium)!

Hi All,

It's been a busy finals, holiday, and break season so we apologize for our blogging hiatus. We finished up 2008 with a bang on our 10-day trip to Seattle to visit friends and family. It was great to see everyone and we are so glad we had the opportunity to go.

This past year has been a busy one for us again with lots of new experiences and growth. Here are a few highlights of 2008 for the Bengtson-O'Brien clan:

* I did my first conference presentation at the Midwest Sociological Association's Annual Meeting in St. Louis, MO. We road-tripped with our friends Nick and Shannon and a great time seeing a new city.

* We spent the summer working at Clearwater Lodge on the Gunflint Trail in Northern Minnesota. It was an amazing time of camping, meeting new people, canoeing, and hanging out in our new favorite town, Grand Marais.

* We moved to St. Paul and have an apartment in a fun historic neighborhood, perfect for walking our new dog, Mosby!

* Will began his counseling internship at North Central University. He is counseling students and is working with a great staff.

* We again had season tickets to Gophers football. We figured we had nowhere to go but up after a 1-11 season last year, so we were shocked they started off the season 7-1. Unfortunately, they ended up losing the last 5 games of the season, but we still had more to cheer about this year and are hoping for even more next year.

* Stephen (my brother) and his girlfriend, Kirstin, got engaged! We are so excited to have a new sister in the family!

* Our friends, Jill and Tory, got married this fall in southern California and we were lucky enough to be able to go out to celebrate with them. It was a wonderful reunion with friends and it was great to escape the Minnesota weather, even if only for a weekend.

I know you must be thinking, "Wow, 2008 sounds like it was really eventful, how are they going to top it?!" Well, we are working on that. Here are some things that are in the works for 2009:

* I am returning to southern California for my friend Ashley's wedding in February. I will be happy to trade the -30 degree temps for anything above 50!

*Will is graduating from Bethel with a Master's in Counseling Psychology in May. It will be the end of a long and busy road and he is really looking forward to being done with school (and I'm a bit jealous myself!).

* Will's brother, Taylor, is graduating from the University of Washington this year, so Will is planning a road trip out there for the early summer.

*I have a conference in San Francisco this summer and another in Atlanta in the fall, so we are looking forward to doing some more traveling.

* And I almost forgot, the Gophers' new outdoor stadium opens!!! We are STOKED!

Well, that's the scoop. We will do our best to keep up with this as school begins...

Till next time,
Kirsten

Trip Pix

New Years


&

Christmas

Into the sunrise

I cannot get over the final broadcast of The Current's Morning Show w/ Dale Connelly and "Jim Ed Poole" (Tom Keith). (Tom/"Jim Ed" is retiring)

For you out of state-ers, these two have been doing a Garrison Keillor-esque variety show for the past 25 years. Since we moved to these Twin-towns, we've been enjoying some solid radio play on The Current (much more enjoyable than KEXP...but that's another post). However, the morning show was a disconnected, zany show that was hard to stomach at first. With its birthday songs for loyal listeners, kid friendly folk sing along songs, and the last second prepared sounding skits about nothing it is different from the radio my generation knows.

Maybe it was the move to the elder St. Paul, or turning 27, but I've been loving this show for the past 3 months. A complete change of appreciation. And now it's gone. I'm sad that I wasn't in to it earlier on.

But today I'm sad that I was in the audience at the Fitz or having pancakes at the church next door. What a beautiful way to go. I hope my retirement party is half of this. From the packed house, to the bands that showed up at 6am to make the show completely live, to sad tribute songs, to the all the we wishers on the live blog burning their eggs at home while crying over the end of this era, it was a bittersweet tribute. I choked up...after just 3 months.

There's no way I can do this show justice. I'd encourage you to listen to it. Read the live blog transcript. Check out the photos.

And get into the next wave. Dale is starting a show on HD radio, but you can get the live feed online. Or check out the new Current Morning Show, starting tomorrow.

Enjoy.

Top Albums of 2008...oh how i love the current

(this list was heavily influenced by this weekend of studying with The Current cranked...)

Here's your completed ballot.

Your albums:

The Black Keys - Attack & Release
Passion Pit - Chunk Of Change
Calexico - Carried To Dust
Maps Of Norway - Die Off Birdsong
Terry Lynn - Kingstonlogic 2.0
Cold War Kids - Loyalty To Loyalty
Nada Surf - Lucky
Gnarls Barkley - The Odd Couple
MGMT - Oracular Spectacular
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - Pershing
Black Kids - Partie Traumatic
Mates Of State - Re-Arrange Us
Santogold - Santogold
Caesars - Strawberry Weed
Of Montreal - Skeletal Lamping
Animal Collective - Water Curses
Atmosphere - When Life Gives You Lemons…
Ben Folds - Way To Normal
The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing
I'm From Barcelona - Who Killed Harry Houdini

Your Write-in Selections:

Stars - Sad Robots
+/- - Xs on Your Eyes
School of Seven Bells - Alpinisms

Get Excited for Christmas Music

Gotta love Sufjan's contributions to Christmas music...

Thanksgiving Pix

Here are some pictures from Thanksgiving in Willmar. http://picasaweb.google.com/willo11/Turkey08#

Tory and Jill's Wedding Pix

Here are some pix from our 25 hours of bliss in Orange County

http://picasaweb.google.com/willo11/TKJBOCWedding11808#

Depressing

http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1148237/1/index.htm

AS YOU may know, the Oklahoma City Thunder held its first-ever home opener last week, against the Milwaukee Bucks. Me, I headed to the only place to be on such a historic night: Floyd's Place bar in Seattle.

Strange thing, though. When I showed up just in time for the 5 p.m. tip-off, ready to watch the Sonics—oops, I mean the Thunder—Floyd's was cold and empty; it was like walking into a Kafka novel. The walls of the venerable Sonics hangout were still painted yellow and a green foam finger made its pointless boast behind the bar, but there was no game on the TV and not a fan at the rail. The only patron was a white-haired gentleman mumbling incoherently into his beer, and he didn't look much like a sports fan. Though, on second thought, maybe he was. That's how bad it is in Seattle these days.

Think your city's suffering? Imagine if your favorite team bolted town after 41 seasons, not for some cosmopolitan burg but a dusty outpost where oil derricks qualify as urban skyline. Now imagine turning to your city's other teams for solace only to find each to be avert-your-eyes abysmal. Welcome to Seattle, home of the Sportspocalypse.

Don't take it from me, though. Here's Sherman Alexie, the brilliant Seattle writer and National Book Award winner, summoning all his powers of eloquence. "It is," he proclaims, "the worst f------ year ever."

To recap: Last season, the Mariners lost 101 games despite a $118 million payroll, which is sort of like splurging for gastric bypass surgery only to get fatter. They had a designated hitter who couldn't hit (Jose Vidro), a high-priced pitcher who couldn't pitch (Carlos Silva) and a general manager (Bill Bavasi) who, judging by his record, seemed better suited to philanthropy. "A terribly misevaluated roster," says David Cameron of the blog ussmariner.com. "Probably one of the worst baseball teams of the last 40 years." And Cameron is an M's fan.

Football provides no refuge. The Seahawks were supposed to contend, but through Sunday they were 2--6, and lame-duck coach Mike Holmgren has begun to resemble a walrus with acute acid reflux. Beloved U-Dub is even worse. After an 0--7 start Washington announced it would let coach Tyrone Willingham go at the end of the season; the Huskies are 0--1 since. "It's so bad around here," laments longtime Seattle Post-Intelligencer columnist Art Thiel, "that people turn from sports to the financial pages to cheer up."

This is epic, once-in-a-lifetime badness. Don't even try to compare your city. Sure, the Bay Area's got it rough, and yeah, Cleveland is going through a dry spell of, oh, two generations or so. But to lose like this, on so many levels, is unprecedented—hey, even Philly is all sunshine and rainbows right now—not to mention bewildering. "We're not the Vanderbilts of losing, like Chicago with the Cubs," says Alexie. "We're like the nouveau riche of losing. We don't know how to react."

Everywhere there are cruel reminders. Instead of a Sonics game, Key Arena is hosting Disney's High School Musical on Ice. (What's worse, it'll probably draw twice as well.) Even the Seattle clichés are in the cellar. Coffee? If Starbucks were an NBA franchise, it would be clearing cap space; the company is closing hundreds of stores in the U.S. Grunge? Grunge got sent to the minors years ago, and only its bastard progeny like Nickelback remain in the Show. And rain? Well I suppose rain never loses—only those who slog through it day after day do. Like, you know, the people in Seattle.

Brent Barry, the former Sonics guard who considers the Emerald City a second home, is so bummed that he wrote a poem called When It Rains, which he recited on Seattle sports radio last week. ("A chapter left unwritten, a generation with a gap/Forty-one years of NBA action, and now no one can clap.") Says Barry, who's now with the Houston Rockets, "I know there are more important things in life, with the economy and the election, but it's like a black hole up there."

Alexie, an actual poet who was involved in the failed Save Our Sonics campaign, admits that he's cried 20 times in the last year. How many men do you know who've cried 20 times in their lives? "The other day I tried to watch [the Thunder]," says Alexie, "and I saw Earl Watson take a stupid jumper, and I missed him so much."

Now that is grief. Still, there has to be somewhere to turn. Cameron, the blogger, considers his options. "I don't know," he says. "Who are we supposed to root for? Go Boeing?"

Not a bad idea, though he shouldn't get too attached. I hear Little Rock is looking to land an airplane manufacturer.