My Hero.

No, he isn't giving anyone the finger; Ted snapped the tendon (or ligament? I always confuse the two) in the front of his middle finger a few weeks ago playing basketball, making it impossible for him to hold upright his finger above the top joint. When he got home from the gym that day, it actually was sort of cool--the top part of his finger just hung limp. It didn't hurt at all when it happened; he just noticed that he couldn't control that part of his finger, so he got a fellow player to pull as hard as possible on his finger since that's Ted's way of doctoring anything that might be dislocated.

The doctor is keeping this strange plastic cast on the finger for two months, during which time the tendon-ligament will grow back together. It fascinates me how the body can heal itself. Ted is only supposed to take this cast off every two weeks at the doctor's office, when he goes to get it replaced with a new one.

This became a problem today when we went to get fingerprinted, an issue neither of us had thought about until the technician noticed. We experienced a small bit of panic when the tech said that it just couldn't be done and that we'd have to come back later. Please don't make us wait another two months for something!

So this is where Ted's "can-do" attitude came in handy. He just pulled the cast off and showed the tech that he could still get fingerprinted. It took some convincing. The first tech refused to touch the finger for fear of getting sued if anything happened. So we all sort of stood there at a stand-still until another tech, a lady with some sort of medical background, stood up from her desk with this attitude of "Oh, will you people give me a break" and did the job.

Ted then slipped the cast right back on, and we're hoping no damage was done. The good news: we've officially been fingerprinted.

That Rooney "where there's a will, there's a way" attitude came in handy yet again later this afternoon. We had overnighted to our house yesterday a package that I really needed for the wedding I'm in Saturday. It was super-important that I get it today, so when we got home and I saw the postman turning our corner, I figured it would be waiting for us.

Except it wasn't. I just had a notice saying to go get it from the post office. I waited an hour or so, thinking I was giving the postman time to finish his route and get back to the P.O., but when I got there, the very Newman-esque postal boss said it wasn't there and wouldn't be there until the next day.

I went home and told Ted about how frustrating it is that we pay to have something arrive the next day and are told we have to wait until the morning to get it. That's the whole point of having something over-nighted! So we seethed about that for a while until Ted said, "Give me the slip and your driver's license" before taking off.

He went to the post office and found out who was delivering the mail to our street, then explained how the p.o. had failed us here. Newman told him there was nothing to be done, that the package wasn't there and that our postman wasn't due back until after the p.o. was closed. Ted doesn't give up though, especially when faced with Newman telling him to quit.

So Ted went out back behind the p.o. and asked the workers there when our postman was coming back. He then parked there and stopped every postman who arrived, asking if he had our package. Apparently, people inside had been discussing the dude outside determined to get his package, so someone came out to give Ted the exact route of our postman.

Ted took off, following the route, until he found our postman to get the package from the truck. The problem was that our postman didn't have it. Another postal worker had delivered it to our house that morning while we were gone to get fingerprinted and took it back to the post office since we weren't there to sign for it.

So it had been sitting at the post office all along, and Newman had just been too lazy or inept to figure that out and go get it. By the way, our post office is pretty small, so it couldn't have been that hard to do a slight bit of investigating.

Ted went back inside and complained, saying he wanted our package and that he'd wait for an apology. It was pretty awesome. Newman never came out, but another guy did and basically told Ted how hard it is to work with that particular Boss-man.

Ted came walking in the house an hour later with the package that had been sitting there all along. He was flustered from the experience, but just shrugged and said, "Where there's a will, there's a way."

Amen to that, Mister.

*

We're off to Miami tomorrow morning for lots of funky wedding fun with parrots, karaoke, and Cuban food, so hope your weekend is Harry Potterific. I have to wait until Sunday night to start reading it!