2006
The Hadick Year in Review
Nothing to complain about this year, just like last year. In fact, except for a bit of detail, it was almost exactly like last year. Piles of clutter moved from one spot to another, and different projects were started and abandoned. The kids grew, the adults gained weight. We could end it right there, but, what the heck....
Emily, who is 10 and in fifth grade, was in two stage productions this year. She just finished the second, in which she played Virginia in “Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus.” She did get that part in the situation comedy, as promised, but as you’ll learn, it hasn’t gone anywhere. During the summer, she had a lot of success in talent/karaoke contests with four first-place finishes and one third. She was a cheerleader, once again, this fall. She also sang the National Anthem at an MSU Women’s basketball game, which was very scary for her but she did fine. Finally, she got a palate expander as a precursor to braces, and will be dealing with pain for another month. She has been a very good sport about the whole thing. She is also keeping up with her piano and dance stuff, and doing just fine in school.
Alex, who is 12 and in sixth grade, was on a soccer team in the spring that won a tournament, same team that did so last year, but at a different tournament. This was the team that went to the National Indoor Tournament, which was fun but they didn’t win. They were competitive, and none of the parents got into a fight. His baseball team did better than expected; the occasional “Slide Dimaggio!” is all you need to keep going. He tried the french horn, but decided it wasn’t his thing. As this year winds to a close, he is understandably obsessed with the Nintendo Wii. The supply constraints are very frustrating. Damned capitalism. He is also doing better at school this year than he did last year. That’s a good thing.
The dogs and the cat are still with us. We briefly added a hamster, but, as so often happens in these cases, it suffered an untimely death. There is also a hermit crab in an aquarium, but it mostly looks like an aquarium as we never see the hermit crab. Duh.
We bought a pop-up camper for some family-riffic fun. It’s first duty was in the backyard. This required removing quite a bit of fencing to get it in there, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. Then, on the day we needed to leave town for the soccer tournament, there was some problems dragging it out of the backyard. The skies opened up with the heaviest rain in recent history, and the damn thing got stuck in the mud and had to be towed. Turns out AAA does not cover anything you take off road on purpose. We did make it to the tournament, and used it at another, and again on a family visit trip to Wisconsin. That trip was memorable before it even started, as Mickey destroyed the neighbor’s mailbox while backing out of the driveway.
Mary is still on contract at the State on the same project. Mary is busy with lots of kid-coordinating, but still finds time to feed the birds and work the flower gardens around the house. This is almost a straight copy from last year, but that doesn’t do justice to the intensity she brings to the mundane tasks we all face. Especially laundry. Mary played a big role in the sitcom, filling in for the lead actress at the last minute. She followed this up with a role as a lunch lady in a summer play (sort of) with Emily.
Mickey is doing fine at that insurance company. Even if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t complain now in case a coworker reads this. He made that film, the first in what he hoped would become a series, but making a film is way more work than he anticipated. It was acceptably not bad, and he submitted it to various film festivals, but none accepted it. He hopes it might yet end up in the East Lansing Film Festival; if not, it will go to Google Video for sure. In the meantime, he is continuing to fill the scant few free moments he has with playing the accordion and various web-based projects.