Mellen’s Weblog

It has been a long time since I’ve talked to many of you so here’s what we’ve been up to. Chad is in the midst of his fourth and final (thank goodness) year of pharamacy school at University of Arizona in Tucson. The last year is spent doing six week rotations at various places. There is no coursework. Chad was in Prescott for six weeks doing a rotation at the VA and living with my parents. He would either drive home for the weekend or I would go up to Prescott for the weekend. When he finished that rotation he headed to Fairbanks, AK for six weeks. He got home two weeks ago and it’s nice to be done with that. Fairbanks wasn’t the greatest experience of his life and he was happy to be home. He was able to do some fishing on the Kenai River, where he caught a salmon, which is now in our freezer an quite delicious. He also got to spend a weekend a moose camp, shooting guns, hunting and doing other Alaska man things. I had very helpful family and friends while he was in AK but it’s not the same as a husband. We missed him terribly and are happy to have him home. Chad is an elder’s quorum instructor who rarely gets asked to teach, so it’s his favorite calling. He was the ward website administrator and loved that because he could do it on his own time and didn’t have sunday committments.

 I am still working full-time for Donau & Bolt practicing family law, doing divorces, child support, child custody etc. I was going to start my own firm at the beginning of the year but my bosses were willing to let me work on a flexible schedule solely set by me and my court obligations so I stayed with the firm. I just have to keep working as hard and making them enough money and they won’t care when I do it or how. At this point, I have a full-time case load but I’m not in the office full-time. It was too hard to be gone every day from 9-5 with Grant. I only got to get him up and ready to go and then get him home to feed him, bathe him and put him to bed. Now I am with him much more during the day. It’s still not ideal but it’s better and soon enough I will be able to take a break from practicing law. I am the Laurel advisor for one active Laurel. I will have another Laurel in October. It’s a good calling. It beats primary.

 Grant is 15 months on Friday. He is as stubborn and strong willed as ever. He’s been that way since he was born. He crawls like lightning but refuses to walk. Just as with every other milestone in his life thus far, he will do it when he’s ready and not one second before. Grant will not be moved until he wants to be. Grant is a true Mellen in that he loves to sleep and loves his naps. He sleeps about 12-13 hours at night and takes 1 or 2, 2 hour naps each day. Without them he’s a disaster. I certainly don’t complain about nap time. He has a good time at this babysitter’s houses. He spends one morning a week with a lady in the ward who has two young girls that just love Grant and three days a week with another lady in the ward who runs an inhome daycare that right now only has one other little girl. I couldn’t ask for a better babysitting situation for him.

We have two dogs now, Barry, a white lab and Sooner a black/brindle Australian sheperd/Chow mix. Barry is 2 1/2 and Sooner is 1 1/2. Barry seems like a saint compared to our over-active Sooner. They take patience and really are our other children but we love them. They were good companionship and extra security for those many nights this summer when Chad was gone. They kept me safe in bed and made sure I was aware of every noise outside.

Next spring Chad will be graduating and we will likely be heading out of Tucson for unknown regions of this country. Chad will be doing a one year pharmacy residency at a yet to be determined location. I will begin my hiatus from the legal profession and Chad will begin his career as a pharmacist. We are both excited for the end of this chapter and the beginning of the next.

For my first entry, I thought I’d share our little adventure with drunk driving this evening. We were driving home from eating dinner tonight and we got stuck behind about 10 other cars driving at least 20 miles below the speed limit. Chad noticed that the leader of the line, the car holding everyone up, was weaving in and out of the lane. We finally reached the road we needed to turn on and guess which car was directly behind us! You guessed it…the slow, weaving car. We started following it because we had no other option. The car stopped at green lights, swerved off the road and back on, turned its headlights off then on several times. I called 911 to report the drunk driving. We kept following the car expecting to see a cop car any minute. Our next turn approached and sure enough the swerving car turned the same direction. We kept following it and no cop car appeared. I called the police again to report the drunk driving. We kept following the car. At our next turn, the other car also turned. We kept following the car but no police car appeared. Our next turn came but we decided to continue following the car. Shortly after we passed our turn, another car started following the drunk driving car as well. We kept following the car. It almost side swiped a car. It continued to drive about 20 under the speed limit. It stopped at a few more green lights, straddled the lanes and almost drove off the road a few times. I called the police a third time to report it. We kept driving along with the other car following this menace. The car finally turned and we turned but Chad decided he was done, the police were useless and he didn’t want us to end up in some weird, scarey part of town. Chad flipped a “U” to head home, but just as he did, a police car with flashing lights whizzed by us toward the drunk driver and then another one and then another one came. We quickly turned back around and pulled in behind the other car that had been following the drunk driver. Another cop car pulled in behind us. I got out and was told to wait a minute for someone to take my statement. A minute or two later, a sheriff came and took my statement about what we witnessed. Chad saw an officer make the drive walk the line, which Chad reports she did very well, considering how she was driving. I gave my statement and we were on our way. It was shocking to us that it took three calls from us and who knows how many from the other car following the drunk driver and at least 20-25 minutes for any police to pull this woman over. Thankfully, the woman was driving 20 under the speed limit almost the whole way, rather than 20 over or she could have killed someone.