Special Olympics

I had the opportunity this past week to spend two days at the International Special Olympics in Boise with the rest of the dental hygiene crew. They have a program called Healthy Athletes where all of the athletes can come and receive free care. The Healthy Athletes Initiative is made up of seven disciplines including Fit Feet, FUNfitness, Healthy Hearing, Health Promotion, Opening Eyes®, MedFest and Special Smiles®. It's great because the athletes get everything they need free of charge including free eye glasses, hearing aids, emergency dental care, tennis shoes, etc. We helped out at the Special Smiles venue (of course) doing screenings, giving education, providing fluoride treatments, and making mouthguards. I had a blast. On the first day my job was to greet the teams as they came in and escort an athlete to the first station where they were screened for tooth decay, pain, missing teeth, etc. If they were in pain we tried to get them downstairs where they had a bus set up for emergency fillings and extractions. I spent most of the second day at the education station.This is Jenn, me, Alisa, Heidi, and Michelle all waiting for Vice President Joe Biden to complete his tour of Healthy Athletes. We all had to wait downstairs for security purposes. We were hoping he would come to the top of the stairs and at least wave to all of us, but he snuck out the back. So we just saw him and his entourage of twenty police cars driving away. It was still kind of cool though. The scarves we are wearing came from the scarf project. They had a goal to collect 5000 homemade scarves to give to the athletes to help welcome them to Idaho and the winter Olympic games. They had such a great response from people around the US and they ended up with over 55,000 scarves, so we all got to pick one out for keeps.
These are my hygiene girls (minus two). Monday through Friday, 8-5, this is who I spend my time with. As happy as I am to be graduating soon, I will miss all of the great friends I've made in this program.Alicia, M'Lisa, Kylee, me, Jenn, and one of the athletes at the education station. We would use the stuffed animals to show them how they should be brushing and flossing. The language barrier made this a little bit interesting with some of the athletes. It was funny how we would show them how to brush their tongue and some of them thought that was the most hilarious thing they had ever seen and refused to do it.
We went to watch some of the floor hockey games on Friday morning. This is Italy vs. Cyprus. It was a lot of fun to see some of the athletes in action. They are so talented in what they do. I'm so grateful that I had the opportunity to participate. I met so many wonderfully kind people from around the world. Even amongst the intellectual challenges that they face, they were all so happy and grateful for what they have. I really appreciate the professors that went to bat for us against the other professors to make sure we were able to participate.

This is why, this is why, this is why I'm (and Dani are moving somewhere) hot!!

So we apologize it has been a long time since we last posted anything. Dani and I have found ourselves busy in school and work. Dani did write a nice Christmas post but couldn't get the video to load and then our computer went on the fritz. So, I have been summoned once again to write a message to the masses. Here it goes.
So I had an interesting experience the other day. Any of you who have had the joy (or shame) of calling themselves a Bengal, or at the lease have toured our campus, know of a certain hill between the hospital and the College of Tech. It is a steep hill and can be risky if traveling up it in the snow. Well, I had always wondered what would happen if it was slick enough that your car actually slid back down the hill. I am proud to say that I no longer have to wonder anymore. I have looked that situation dead in the eye and emerged victorious! But first I must start at the beginning of my day.This is how it went down. (No pun intended)

We had some interesting weather in town. It had snowed, then melted, then rained, then froze, then snowed again. Therefore we had a dangerous combination on our hands. Dani had left for school, or so I thought, and I was still eating breakfast when there was a knock at the door. I peeked through the peep hole (I wasn't exactly decent or fit for the cold weather of that morning) but finding it was my wife I opened the door. She explained how the frost and ice on the car windows was too thick and she needed the assistance of my strong arms to scrape them. Well, as any good husband would, I donned a sweater and shoes and braved the arctic chill in my gym shorts. She wasn't kidding that stuff was a pain to remove. Also it had melted in around the car door and then frozen, which made it quite difficult to open the door. But, we made it and she merrily was on her way to school. I, not having school till later, returned to the warmth of the glowing baseboard heater and resumed with my morning activities, Sleeping. About 10:30 I was ready and prepared to go to school and also ready, or so I thought again, to brave the ice and snow. I had hoped that the sun would ease my clearing of the ice from the blazer window, but all it had done was created a light fog and mist that drifted across my view. I attempted to to open the car door but it was stuck and stuck good. I was able to finally get it open with a lot of effort and hanging onto the door handle so that I wouldn't slip on the icy road. I clambered into the blazer and thought I had better open the passenger door as well, because I was going to pick up my cousin and he usually would quickly jump in as I pulled over to the side of the road. You see, that door usually sticks anyway and so with the ice I thought we would be quite a scene blocking traffic as he attempted to get the door open. In other words, I was thinking ahead. This door proved to be quite a challenge and I had to literally shove my shoulder into it several times in order to break the seal of which the ice had formed around it. I know this was not a wise idea but I was frustrated and already running late for picking up my cousin. Finally, the door came free and I exhaustedly fell into my own seat, but the task was not done. I still had the windows to scrape. This actually didn't prove to be too difficult until I was working on the passenger side windows. You see the blazer was parked on the side of the street and so the passenger side was in the gutter which had been full of water but now frozen and then was camouflaged by the snow, sneaky devil. As you may have guessed I was working on the window when I began to feel myself slip. It is an interesting feeling when you begin to feel yourself fall but can do nothing about it. I, in my mind, slowly slipped with both feet and fell flat on my bottom in the deep drift of snow which had accumulated on the grass behind me. Frustrated, angry, and with numb hands I picked myself up and climbed into the car and drove off. I needn't worry about the snow which covered my butt, it was so cold outside, and in the car itself, that it wouldn't melt and I could just brush it off later. Now we come to the real challenge of the day.

As mentioned, I was picking up my cousin from school and taking him to his house. I was rolling in the Blazer, which was probably my first mistake, but Dani had the car. Well, it had snowed recently and thus the roads where slick. As we were approaching the bottom of the before mentioned hill I had a curious thought, "What if the Blazer couldn't make it up the hill?" I had only heard of such tales in legend, but I also knew the Blazer had limitations. Considering how I had bravely faced the earlier challenges of the day, however, I figured we would have no problem making it up the hill. Well, we did make it up the hill triumphantly and all was well, or so we thought. You see at the top of this hill I had to stop so that traffic could pass. It was then that the beast, which is the hill and ice upon which we were perched, reared its ugly head. The blazer was stuck and wouldn't move! Oh, yes the wheels turned and spun but we couldn't move anywhere. It was then that we started to go backwards down the hill! It was another interesting experience, thinking you should be going forward but actually going backwards! I soon learned that if I held the brakes the car would stop going downhill, crazy I know. However, if I pushed the gas the blazer was released from its hold and would slowly continue its downward path. In a panic I looked at my cousin and looked behind us. There was a car behind us and they weren't happy. My cousin bravely stepped onto the icy tundra (remember my falling experience previously) and waved the car to go around us. He then tried to push me up the hill. I warned him to be careful so that I didn't run him over backwards, yes I said that right, run him over backyards. Well he tried, but to no avail. We only found ourselves going further and further down the hill. All the while he was cussing at the other cars who would get behind us and yell at them to go around. "The dummies!" he would later say, "What?! Did they want to get ran into!?" He offered suggestions and I tried to hear them but communication was limited as the stupid window was frozen much as the door had previously been and thus would not go down. So our communication was limited to lip reading and obscene gestures. Just as I thought we would have to give into the beast of hill and ice and commit to failure by reversing our way back down the hill. A hero and good samaritan appeared from the mist and fog and offered to help my cousin push. I would later learn that this hero (or "stick boy" has my cousin referred to him as) was not your average college student, he had helped out another car earlier that day which had the same problem. Well, apparently, this was the trick the poor blazer needed, as we actually began moving up the hill! I knew what happed last time and I had no plan to stop at the stop sign again. I quickly looked both ways and gunned it, somewhat cutting off a large garbage truck. I then pulled into a nearby parking lot so that my cousin could catch up and we could continue our journey. I never did see the hero who helped us get out of that situation. When I looked back to shout a thank you he had already disappeared into the fog and mist once more. Or did he?
I guess we will never know what happened to the seasoned veteran with his pushing experience that saved us that day. Perhaps he was hit by the garbage truck. (Just kidding, my cousin saw him go back down the hill)

Anyway, I apologize for the long story. If you couldn't tell I like telling stories. But, this is why, this is why, this is why I'm (and Dani are moving somewhere) hot!! After we graduate:) The End.