Slingers in House Springs, MO

 Slingers in downtown House Springs, MO is a classic Midwest diner that serves a solid breakfast. Also, we have found it to be a very good place for special parents to dine with their children.  We have the tradition now of eating here the first weekend morning after school is out for the year. The only downside of Slingers is the smoke, but the rest of the place and the food make it worth the old school smokey atmosphere. I had the bacon, eggs and hash browns, which I highly recommend.

 Teddy had a serving of bacon and a stack of delicious pancakes. He was also happy that diner has plenty of ceiling fans!

Teddy loves sitting at the counter and Slingers has a long counter with plenty of stools. We are hoping to hit Slingers one more time before summer break is over! One more thing: as the name implies, yes you can order a slinger here or in fact several slingers if you are really hungry!

Bob's Drive In in Imperial, MO is one of our favorite places to enjoy classic American dining and an excellent restaurant for special parents to bring their kids. This is a classic drive in with classic American food. We often bring our exchange students from Germany here to see  and experience American Midwest culture and food. The restaurant was opened in 1959 and recently was renovated. The restaurant is only a few miles from our home. Teddy always has the chicken strips and then a vanilla shake for dessert. Sue and I usually have a cheeseburger (in my case a double cheese) and a side of fried Okra. If you are traveling I-55 get off on the Richardson/Vogel exit and drive 5 more minutes further off the highway and you can enjoy an American classic experience and get away from the normal interstate exit restaurants. Yesterday morning Teddy was pretty excited--two of his favorite things: Mowing the lawn then going to Bob's for lunch. We always eat outside on the tables and Teddy especially likes the ceiling fans they have under the little shelter. Also, I recommend the corn dogs and the ice cream is every bit as good as Ted Drewes without the hassle of the large crowds. Many of my students work or have worked here and I often see people I know when dining here.

The Wrong Stuff by Truman Smith

This review was originally published on my history blog, but the entry also might be of interest to Special Dads as well:

I began this book once again reluctantly...I had made a nice "friend"  or something of a companion when reading my last book in Siegfried Knappe....my "book friends" are important to me...generally they are going through some type of epic struggle, generally in war...something very different than my epic struggle: raising my son as best I can, helping him navigate the world and keep him healthy. The struggles of others are a great diversion for me from my own worries and in that sense, history is a great comfort to me. I have tried to read about other special parents and what they deal with, but it strikes to close to home generally and only compounds my worries. So, luckily, I found a new diversion in the Wrong Stuff, learned more about the bombers in WWII, which will eventually help me and give me more depth when I write my book about the Hetzler Crew. Also, I did find a new book friend in Truman Smith or "Smitty" as some people in the book called him and now so do I! Smitty arrived in the ETO just a few weeks after the Hetzler Crew were shot down and killed. He was one of the few Co-Pilots that have written books and he became the PIC or head pilot on his last few missions...and amazingly he was only 20 years old!!!
At first, I wasn't so fond of the book. The overview and simplification of history I found annoying at the beginning, but I stuck with it and this turned out to be one of my favorite books. Smitty ended up flying 35 missions!! There weren't supposed to be many German fighters by this time in the war, but Smitty would definitely tell you that there were!!! Not just a few, but dozens and sometimes hundreds! The flak was always present. Smitty truly felt a lot of heat and it was a miracle that he lived through the war. I had so many favorite parts of this book, that I won't be able to cover them all, but a few do come to mind. The overriding back story in the whole book is Smitty's quest to lose his virginity...he comes close a few times and losing the "sure things" and bumbling some great opportunities with women in London due to his age and inexperience. Also, he points out how strange it was to feel so old as a combat veteran, but so young in regards to women! At one point, he finally meets an 18 proper English woman riding her horse and all  is going well and it looks like this will be IT, but...he woke up...turned out all to be a dream and even stranger, the young woman was "Queen Elizabeth"!! His brutal honesty about his lack of success with women gives the whole book added credibility and the story he tells of his combat experiences while unbelievable are no doubt completely true.
Another amazing part of the book to me was when he goes to another base to visit a pilot with whom he had graduated flight school--Paul Stout...his vivid description of the base reminded me of the Hetzler Crew's 458th bomber group's base, so I looked Stout up and sure enough, Smitty had visited Harold's base!! Sadly, Stout finished his tour of combat, but was killed later in a training exercise.
Smitty worked in TV and radio after the war and even eventually married a German woman. I did a quick search to see if Smitty were still alive and if so, what he is doing currently, but I haven't found anything yet.

Special Parenting

Originally posted on 8/28/11
Yesterday, we attended the wedding of Sue's cousin. Teddy was really excited about dressing up and going to the wedding. Of course, as soon as it started...he was ready to go! But, amazingly, he did really well. He went the full 45 minutes without even a slight outburst. A wedding for most parents is a normal event at some point. They expect their children will get married. For us, what would be a "happy" day for most parents would be an ecstatic, winning the lottery, reprieve from the governor, crying for joy, miracle before our eyes type of day. One of our greatest hopes for Teddy is that he would be able to get married someday and with our help be able to raise a family. We have no idea what the future holds in this regard, but he is a tall, handsome boy with an interest in girls...so maybe it isn't just a dream on our part. So yeah, watching the wedding was a melancholy sort of moment for me and I wasn't sure why until later when I thought about it. I actually heard a man the other day, a man that actually makes over $100k a year bragging that he didn't have to pay for his daughter's wedding, like he had gotten out of a burden. When you're a special needs parent though, you get a new perspective on the miracles in life that seem so mundane to so many people. If Teddy gets married, we won't be worrying about how much it costs!! For us it will be one of the ultimate victories in this long struggle. Same with college....I hear so many parents complain about paying for college, even parents with means, to me that is a champaign problem. Of course, it is easy for me to see and judge them for their lack of gratitude and I quite possibly don't understand "normal" parenting any better than they understand special parenting. All of this said, I would never trade with the "normal" parents. I would love to not have the stress and worry of being a special parent...but I have never for one second ever wanted to trade.

Speaking of understanding: Friday night I had a dream that we were at a Wal Mart with Teddy and another girl with special needs...they both ran out of the Wal Mart with fishing poles, didn't pay for them, ran across a busy street and started fishing in a pond. I caught up to them and I was furious in my dream and I didn't have the best reaction...yelling and poking the both of them with my finger (which I don't think I'd really do, but I have had reactions I would have liked to have changed in real life)...I just remember and will for the rest of my life, the complete look of shock on both of their faces...they had had such a joyous and natural response to seeing an opportunity, and they didn't understand that I was going to have to impose the real world upon their more perfect world. I was sad about it all day, but on the upside I actually put this dream to use last night...after we got home from the reception last night, Ted threw some cardboard in the toilet (luckily it didn't get flushed this time...last time that cost $150 bucks) I caught him before he had a chance to flush...he was certain that I would be angry and he was yelling to himself how stupid he was...but I just told him "no big deal lets figure out a way to get this cleaned up" and instead of an hour of chaos, he peacefully went to sleep a few minutes later.

All Abilities Airshow!

Originally posted on 7/4/11

Yesterday afternoon we were invited to the Special Needs Airshow. It was a great idea. While the huge crowds were downtown under the Arch watching the real airshow, we were invited to the downtown airport, along with other families of people with disabilities, to watch the planes take off and return to the Arch grounds. They also did little airshows for us as well...the highlight of the day for Teddy was John Mohr in his old Stearman...Teddy enjoyed that part of the show the most. Another highlight was Jason Newburg in his Viper. The jets were great too, but the prop planes, not going so fast or so loud were exactly what Ted wanted to see. These two pilots were incredibly skilled and as a student pilot myself, I was in awe of what they could make those airplanes do. The heat was such that Ted didn't make it to the end, but if we had, the pilots were going to take time to meet all of the people with disabilities and sign autographs and let them touch the airplanes. I wish we could have been able to do it, but Ted did pretty well considering a little crowd and heat. But, whoever had this idea really understood special needs. They understood that if you are in a wheelchair, it is tough to get through the crowds on the Arch grounds on the 4th of July weekend. They also understood that for kids like Teddy, the noise and big crowds (of sometimes people who are judgmental of our children's outburst) can be problematic. So, we had a really short walk from the car, when we checked in they passed out hearing protection and then there were lots of free drinks and popsicles...first class all the way! This was the most understanding event that I have ever attended...you dream of events like this for your kids when they have special needs and it was amazing that it really happened.

Meet Ginger!

Originally posted on 5/15/11
We finally picked out a new dog at the county shelter last week. Teddy picked her out and named her "Ginger" from Gilligan's Island. He wants everyone to know that her last name is "Grant" too! She is a 25lb Beagle mix and Teddy really loves her. She is maybe a year old and exhibits a lot of puppy-like behaviors...but I think she will be a great dog for us.

IMHA is a dog killer

Originally posted on 3/10/11
This is the last picture of Buster...our very much loved dog who was only 5 years old. This was last Saturday when everything was fine. About 9 hours after this photo, he wasn't himself anymore and never came back. We went on a two mile walk at the new Meramec park along the Meramac River in south St. Louis County. As you can see we made it one mile before the flooding forced us back...so 2 miles with Buster pulling and jumping and being his energetic self the whole way. Later Saturday night about 10:30 I walked him another mile and he was totally normal. At midnight, right before bed I let him out, but when he came back in he wouldn't eat his treat...so we knew something was wrong...he was really sick looking...so we let him sleep in our room with us to keep an eye on him...he didn't move the whole night, next morning (Sunday) he was looking like death so we brought him to the emergency vet...they diagnosed him with IMHA...a horrible auto-immune reaction which destroyed all of his red blood cells and platelets...it might have been a reaction to his vaccines he just got on Wed, but who knows for sure. What is really horrible for us it that Teddy had something like this when he was born...so when the vet said it was complicated and tried to explain platelets etc and auto-immune disorders, we stopped her and told her we knew too much about it already. What is shocking is how this typically comes on instantly and is deadly the majority of the time...it especially attacks dogs in the prime of their lives. So, enough technical stuff, we are all just really in shock and devastated...we've had a run of bad luck since about December and this was just what we didn't need. We've been struggling with Teddy's seizures since December, which of course affect his behavior negatively, then we controlled the seizures with Zonegran, but it had terrible behavioral side effects...so just this week we switched to a new med called Banzel....hopefully that will somehow work out. Finally, Sue wrote a lot better story about Buster on her blog.