E-Bay Live In Chicago

I went to eBay Live since it was in Chicago this year. I met with a number of vendors that had some great services and products for the World Neighbor store. I also met a number of very interesting characters there. Several of the eBayers were more interested in collecting the pins and free stuff than they were in talking to vendors and going to the education sessions. It appeared to be a tradition since all the vendors had there pins ready. There was one cranky guy named Tom (saw it on his conference badge). He apparently hurt his knee and he was tooling around on one of those little scooters. He always had a scowl on his face as he angrily asked questions of the vendors and demanded a free give-away. He cracked me up, what a waste of energy.

One of the best parts of the conference was when the gala on the final night. Demetria and I went to enjoy the dinner and the Chris Isaac concert that was planned. We had a great time and Chris was in fine voice. He was very entertaining and everyone of at the eBay conference loved the show. Of course, they were all begging for his picks and drumsticks so that they could sell them the next day on eBay!

Thalia's Rainbow

Please also see the URL at the end of this post for a special message to all our supporters.... As we were travelling back from Hawaii late Saturday night/Sunday morning, Thera had to endure a serious bout of diarrhea for her 8 hour flight. We thought it was a passing case of food poisoning - which in and of itself is not fun at all. Then we got home and she started having serious cramps, a low grade fever and finally lots of blood in her stool (sorry to be so graphic...but this is a health related page after all). Her doctor told us to get her to the emergency room immediately. I had to cancel my work trip to San Antonio so we had coverage for the kids (Thanks as always for the support Greg!). Well as parents of a child with Leukemia we of course expected and were preparing ourselves for the worst. In cases like this the wonderful world of the web is more scary than helpful. According to the web, she could have had hepatitis, juvenile diabetes, Leukemia, or any number of other life threatening illnesses. She lost 7 pounds in two days and was massively dehydrated. They ran a complete blood count and took x-rays to see if there was an obstruction. After what seemed like a century, all her tests came back clean...Thank GOD. They are currently running a culture which will take a few days, but it looks like she just has a particularly nasty virus or infection (salmonella, e-coli, etc.). The hospital gave her an antibiotic and pumped her full of IV fluids and finally sent Thera home at 1:30 am last night/this morning. The poor thing is still having severe cramps from the gas today, but she seems to be improving ever so slightly. Now I guess we can consider our Hawaiian vacation excitement complete! Here is a video that I made last night as I was nervously waiting for news from the hospital. This is a brief synapsis of Thalia's story over the last year with some of our Hawaiin vacation footage.

Thalia's Video Story

The Kids Hit The Ocean

Our first full day in Hawaii and we headed to the water! Our first stop was to Kona to dive deep under the ocean in a submarine. When we were talking about this activity back in dreary ole' Chicago, the kids were not too hot on the idea. The fresh Hawaiian air must have pumped up their mana because they were all begging to go on the submarine now that we were in Hawaii. While we were paying for our sub tickets we were suckered into the "pick an oyster, find a pearl" tourist trap. But for a cost of about $5 a kid, we couldn't refuse. Zacch, Thera and Thalia picked out the ugliest oyster they could find and the nice lady cracked 'em open. Both Zacch and Thera got a perfect white pearl, and low and behold, Thalia got a perfect pink pearl (her favorite color!).

OK…now the kids were ready to go be submariners. We dove over 100 feet down and became one with the surrounding aquatic life. We saw two wrecks and thousands of colorful fish on the coral reef. We even saw a 5-foot, free-swimming eel, which the captain said, was pretty rare since they like to keep hidden. I leaned over and kissed Demetria since the captain suggested that it would be the "deepest kiss we would ever experience"…needless to say Demetria thought I was a touristy dork…Ah, Demetria Aloha No Au Ia 'Oe (look it up for extra points!).









Our next stop was to Hapuna beach, which is consistently rated as one of the best beaches in the United States. This was the first trip for the kids to a beach so this was a great way for them to get introduced to the Hawaiian lifestyle. Needless to say the kids all loved everything about the beach. The sand and the surf were perfect. The salt water in the eyes, nose and mouth took a little getting used to for them, but they all acclimated quickly. Since we left the beach the kids have all wanted to get back as soon as possible.