My Favorite Veteren

I will always remember Veterans Day from an old memory of someone doing an impersonation of a speech giver saying "the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month". I'm not sure if it was my Dad or maybe a school teacher.

What I like about this holiday is that it is celebrated on the day of the week it falls on and not on the closest Monday. Some years it may fall on a Wednesday. That is a strange day for the banks to be closed. *scratches head* Oh! It's Veterans Day. Falling on a day during the week really helps people pay more attention to it rather than falling on another 3 day weekend.

My Grandfather, Howard Bennett Sr. was about 21 years old when he was stationed in beautiful Hawaii when the Japanese attacked. He earned a Purple Heart that day for helping someone. I'm not really sure about the details.

In actuality, I don't know a whole lot of details about my grandfather. I've spent quite a bit of time with him throughout the years though. I know that he likes to joke and he was always keeping us on our toes.

While spending time with out grandparents, Jason and I were in the backseat of the car when we passed a cemetery. My grandfather asked us how many dead people were there. We scrambled to count as many as we could. We gave our response. "Wrong", my grandfather would respond, "All of them". Jason and I would roll our eyes. We got outsmarted.

On the way back my grandfather asked us the same question. Jason and I were quick to triumphantly respond "All of them". "Wrong", my grandfather would respond. "All except the guy mowing the grass".

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01 Jason picking muscadine grapes with Grandma in Alabama
02 Grandpa with his cane. Every now and then he'd whack Jason or me with it just to make sure we were still awake, paying attention or just because he wanted to. Sometimes Jason would take it and pretend to whack Grandpa back with it
03 Jason riding the golf cart around
04 The only time anyone was ever able to pull one over on Grandpa was his surprise birthday party in 2005.

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08 Notice how the numbers on the cake are reversed? That's how I will remember my grandpa.

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09 This picture was taken right after a nice birthday kiss :)
10 My cousin Clint dressed like Grandpa today
12 Even though my mom divorced my dad, she drove 5 hours to make it to her in-laws surprise party. The whole family continues to make her feel like she's still part of the family. Even here, my grandfather is always watching and usually in the background.

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13 I don't know what they were discussing here but it was probably Grandpa telling Jason to behave or maybe he was just giving him a good speech about how to be a gentleman or something.
14 I wish I could remember this joke, it looks really funny; or at least to me and Grandpa, Jason and Jeremiah look like they are just smiling for the sake of the camera.
16 Grandpa taking a nap with my Uncle Jimmy and his grandson CJ.
17 Grandpa wakes up to take a family picture.
18 He's back asleep again. I love you Grandpa.

I'm glad you are no longer in pain. I'm really thankful for your presence in my life and I feel really lucky to have known you for as long as I did. I love you Grandpa.

an update

Hello to everyone. If you haven't heard yet, my grandfather passed away October 19, 2007 .

I haven't really been in the mood to blog since then. I'm currently working on a memorial blog for my grandfather. I have all the pictures organized but I just can't find the right words yet.

Other than that, everything is okay in the Remus household. We had our first Halloween in the house and we managed to give most of our candy away so we didn't have too many leftovers. I'm sure the rest will be gobbled up by our friends.

Thank you to everyone for all your wonderful messages. It means the world to me. I love you all.

In Alabama

Since my last update, my grandfather was not doing too well and was sent back to the hospital. I drove down Friday too see him. He is no longer in ICU. He has his own room now but everything is up in the air.

If there was to be a silver lining, I got the chance to meet family that I haven't seen in ages so that's really nice.

I'm going back to the hospital today and then probably leaving tomorrow morning to come back home. I want a good night of rest before I make the drive.

I'm currently reading up online in the hotel lobby while eating a quiet breakfast. Reading everyone's journals and blogs has helped with my mood this morning. I still feel pretty heavy hearted though but I'll be fine.

Thanks to everyone with their well wishes. I appreciate it a lot more than I let on.

good news!

My grandfather got discharged from the hospital today so he's doing better. I'm planning on a trip soon to visit him. Thank you to everyone for your kind thoughts. It means a lot to me.

In other good news, Dan and I won a grill!

A new ACE hardware store up the road from us, had it's Grand Opening last weekend so I dragged Dan to it. I had to coerce him with a free bucket the store was giving away. Since they were also offering a 20% discount for anything in the bucket, we stayed to fill the bucket up. While we were there we also filled out a form for raffle prizes. The grill was the grande prize! WOWZA!

We were using a grill that we "borrowed" from a friend of a friend so it's nice that we have our own grill now.

In other news Dan and I have started the room shuffle. We're moving his room to the spare room and then my room to his old room and then the spare room to my old room. *We still have our master bedroom that is staying put* It turns out that we didn't plan out the rooms too well the first time around.