Thursday, May 19, 2011

Earplugs

I feel so remiss.  In my attempt last night to thank so many people responsible for a spectacular event, I completely forgot to thank all the generous souls who donated products or services for the raffles.  I can't possibly name everyone, but thank you all so much for your generosity and willingness to help my family, even when most of you have never met us before.

One person I have to mention is Mark Aguilar, a Metropolitan Division officer who owns a business that, after reviewing his website, sells custom earplugs among several other items.  Yesterday at the barbeque, Mark had a booth for his business, Flashbang Gear, and he was creating custom earplugs for those interested.  He donated the proceeds to our family, so with all my heart, thank you, Mark.  

My daughter, Janie, is one of countless numbers of kids who have required the placement of tubes in their ears to deal with recurring ear infections.  Janie had her surgery about six months ago so she hasn't been through a summer yet where she's had to wear earplugs for swimming.  Kids with tubes can't submerge their heads and risk water in the ear canal.  Of course, we intended to buy her the custom earplugs because she loves to swim so yesterday, when we saw that Mark had set up shop and was creating earplugs, we jumped at the chance to have them made for all three kids.  You see, even though the other two don't need the earplugs for swimming, we could never have left there with only one set of earplugs...we'd have never heard the end of it.

After the barbeque, the kids asked us all night long when their earplugs would arrive.  They couldn't wait to have them!  Well, the earplugs arrived today while the kids were in school courtesy of our friend and Steve's old partner, Steve Wills, who delivered them on his way home.  When the kids got home from school, they saw the earplugs on the table and it was like Christmas morning.  Shortly after that, everyone went their separate ways throughout the house to wind down from their day.  Steve laid down to take a nap and I just wanted to watch Oprah.  A little while later Steve told me this story.  He was sleeping soundly on the couch when suddenly he heard the blaring volume of cartoons on the TV in the next room.  It was SO loud it was as though the characters of whatever cartoon was on, likely Sponge Bob, were screaming in his ears.  Steve sat up and yelled, "HEY!!! HEY!!!  Who's in there?!"  No answer.  He yelled again.  Still no answer.  He yelled at least five more times (which I actually heard but was in no way interested in what might be transpiring so I stayed far, far away).  No answer.  Steve, pissed off and unable to hear himself think, was just about to leap off the sofa and into the next room when Ryan dawdled around the corner, probably looking for some sort of snack.  As he walked in Steve's direction, Steve noticed the unmistakable bright blue color of the earplugs stuffed into both of Ryan's ears.  "Gimme those things," Steve said to Ryan and snatched the earplugs out of his ears.  So as it turned out, that crazy kid went to watch TV with those earplugs in and couldn't hear so he turned the TV volume up to full blast.  Kids...  I guess Steve and I should've had a set of earplugs made too.

Mark's website is http://www.fbgear.com/.      

3 comments:

Patrick said...

Too funny. I work for Pomona PD and have been following Steve's recovery. I saw the earplug post and had to reply. Mark is the best!! I've had 3 sets of earplugs made. One for the Harley and another to sleep good. Love them! Glad he could help you guys!!

Unknown said...

That's. Funny..score one for the kds....

Mark said...

Beth, thank you so much for sharing. Making earplugs for your children was awesome, They had me cracking up along with Kelly. I told Steve, my son does the same thing, cracks me up every time, After I yell and get him to lower the TV. Be sure to keep me posted on how they work out for the pool....Love you guys. Mark