I get in these crazy, time-consuming predicaments all the time. This one is about tires. I have completely bald tires--slick at something you'd find at a racetrack. The tread is so worn that it's amazing the tires haven't popped (especially given my predilection for hitting potholes and knocking big pieces of my car off). So earlier this week, I went to the Costco tire center to buy new tires. They were all out of the kind I needed, since they're having a sale where you get $70 off a set of four. So I came back a few days later, and I thought everything was fine. I went in the store, bought myself a book and a frozen yogurt, and kicked back in the cafeteria to wait. About 45 minutes into my escapade, the tire guy came in and told me that my tire locks are preventing them from getting my tires off. I have no idea where the key is. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I threw away the key when I threw away lugnuts, since I was routinely sweeping these things around the garage in a flurry of leaves and cat litter that hopped the box. All I can say is that I really and truly don't have the key.

What is a person to do? I actually asked if was going to have to get a new car! No, I don't need a new car. But I do have to sit out at the Honda dealership with four kids for probably an hour or two in the morning. And then at Costco with four kids for an hour or more. I am not thrilled. Woo-hooo spring break!

This morning was my second tennis match of the suburban season. It was a hard one. I played one of my former reproductive endocrinologist's wives, so it was very interesting to talk with her afterwards. My partner and I lost 10-5, which was not too bad. Last week Michele and I won, which felt awesome after my very bad suburban fall. The trouble is that we are really playing beyond our ability level. Poor Michele, a 3.0, lost this morning to a 4.5. It wasn't a very good matchup! But I look forward to more wins if I'm able to play some doubles. I have been typed as a singles player for so long that I had forgotten the many joys of playing with another person. It's more fun (singles is primarily intense), it's more relaxing (someone else gets the ball part of the time!), and there's someone else to share the responsibility for winning or losing a point or game. I like it not all being about me, even as I selfishly enjoy the fame that comes with doing it myself.

We have some kind of interesting news in the past two days. Kerry was asked how he might feel about starting up an office in Blacksburg. I can answer how Nancy would feel. She would feel awesome. It's kind of like going to Colorado but not leaving Virginia. It would honestly be a dream come true. I was so giddy and busting with excitement yesterday that I thought I would burst. I think it's a long shot, and because I'm so very super happy, I doubt it will happen at all, but I have never felt such a sense of something being the right thing to do. There are so many reasons I want this to work out. I would be about 30 minutes from my Dad, and I'd like to spend more time with him and see him with more frequency but not need to spend the night when I go. I'd like for us to be able to do things together without my whole family being a burden. I miss the mountains. It sounds weird even to me to write something like that, but when I'm in the mountains, I feel like I am home. I never took for granted how very lucky I was to live in such a gorgeous place when I lived in Roanoke and Blacksburg and Charlottesville--I want to be where there are waterfalls and rocky streams and mountains to climb. I love being near the A.T. I have many special places--Pandapas Pond, the Cascades. I would love to live in a college town again, especially one where you can get around so easily on a bike or on foot. There seems to be a highly competitive dive team at Blacksburg High School, there is an excellent dance studio right in town, and I think we would easily find Boy Scouts, music instructors (maybe Tech students), and pretty much anything else we might be looking for with activities. I'd look forward to, well, doing less. I'd like to just start over and rebuild what we do from the ground up. I love the compactness of a town like that, and yet with the university there are so many things that come in--concerts, plays, performances, lectures. I would consider going back to school to study speech or occupational therapy. We could get a place with several acres and have chickens. I'm so sold on the prospect of moving that I'm thinking that I'd almost be willing to let Kerry stay home with the kids and I'd work retail or wait tables or whatever I had to do to make this a reality!

My Walter saga is still totally stressing me out, but he's doing the best he can eating. He is so petrified of the prospect of the feeding tube that he is complying with my force-feeding and food obsession. I have been meticulously tracking his food intake for five days now, and it's really quite encouraging. His intake has ranged from 2000 to about 3700 calories. He hasn't been doing much more than he typically does except for the milk, which adds quite a bit of calories. I also talked with a nutritionist to help me work on finding foods that are calorie-dense. Unfortunately, Walter and I both like calorie-less foods--things like fruits, vegetables, meats, water. I am optimistic that if our visit from CPS comes, my house may look messy, but we will still appear to have a most basic clue about nutrition and be able to demonstrate that we own and eat a balanced diet. Meanwhile, we have totally cleaned up on the gluten. No more McDonald's at all. No questionable foods outside the house. I hope that both of us will see more positive results.

Poor, poor Hokie is looking really bad lately. His weight loss continues, and he is terribly unhealthy looking. I am selfish because I am not ready to put him down. He was my baby before I had human babies. He was the most gorgeous beagle ever when he was younger. He was a brave explorer with tons of personality, even though it's hard to imagine that now. He had enormous energy, bold good looks, loved to play at the park with his doggie friends, was a tireless hiker, and was once a tiny, adorable puppy. Now he is a bag of bones, full of lumpy tumors, has trouble walking, and gets confused and will think a wall is a door or will have his lets fall out from under him. It breaks my heart. I am selfish. I want him to be with me forever. I want to make time go backwards and have him be who he once was. I want to have all the pictures I never took of him. I want to have an album of nothing but him and to tell the story of his life with us. I want to not look like an awful dog owner with an underfed dog. It is so hard to tell when it is time to let someone you love go. Is it when he can't walk at all? Is it when he finally dies on his own? Is it when he looks so bad that you know he will never get better? If he can still empty trashcans and rummage through the recycling and raid the cat litter box and pick a fight over food, does that mean he still has some quality of life? What I can say for sure is that my life has been better for knowing him and for getting to spend more than 16 years as one of his best friends.

I can't believe our spring break is almost over. These breaks make me realize how very, very lazy I really am. I want to do nothing. My lack of ambition really bothers Kerry, and on some very lost level, it bothers me as well. But the truth is, I'd love to spend a year just kind of coasting. Not working. Not helping out with a zillion things. Just taking care of my own family, having some time to read or watch TV or play board games or take walks, and getting my house in order so that I'm not always feeling like I can never have anyone over. We didn't do a lot this week, and that has been the best part of it.