A Change of Plans

Tuesday: Dalton gets sent home early from Daycare with a fever. Dr. H. picks up both kids and comes home early.

Wednesday: Dalton stays home with me. He seems better but tired. I get some stuff done - cleaning my home office which has been collecting junk and toys since Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, I feel sick too, so I am not moving very fast.

Wednesday night: Curie has a fever, which somehow went undetected at daycare.

Thursday: Curie wakes up with a horrible cough and stays home with me. We go into my office in the afternoon because I had to check in on things for Friday, when we are interviewing a candidate for a tenure-track position. I discover the Nick Jr website has full length Dora episodes on line. Curie happily sits at a computer in the lab's alcove while I clean the lab. Her cough is infrequent, but sounds awful. The fever from the evening before seems to have broken.

Thursday night: Uneventful until the midnight when Curie begins to cough on and off, waking up Dalton and Dr. H. every half hour or so. I'm a sounder sleeper than Dr. H. Eventually, though, she wakes me up too and I convince her to sleep semi-upright on a few pillows. We finally all get a few hours of sleep.

Friday: Kids wake up happy. A quick hand check of foreheads results in a maybe/maybe not diagnosis on the fever end. Maybe/maybe not via the hand check usually means no via thermometer, so I decide not to tempt fate and investigate further. Kids go to daycare with Dr. H., I go to campus to participate fully in the interview and dinner.

Friday night: Dr. H reports that Dalton slept for 3.5 hours at daycare and remained listless afterwards. They called him to pick up the kids a little early. He begins to feel awful himself. Kids are restless, develop fevers. Curie can't stop coughing. Dalton is really uncomfortable and hot. Cough medicine for one, ibuprofen for the other.

Saturday: Kids continue to have fevers. General repeat of previous night, only now Dr. H. feels even worse.

Sunday: Curie wakes up on the upswing, but still tired. Dr. H. can't breathe, can't really think and has two nosebleeds. Dalton has three nosebleeds and his fever hasn't gone away, but he does start eating again, so we are optimistic. He has trouble sleeping, announces "My ear hurts!" Okay, this sucks, but it explains a lot. Dr. H. can't sleep at all.

Monday early morning: We get up, decide Curie is able to go to daycare. She wants to stay home or go to work with me because she thinks then she will get to watch Dora. I call the pediatrician. Yes, 1:30 is their earliest appointment. I quickly run the cat with the treated UTI to the vet for a post-treatment urine sample and return home. Dr. H. leaves with Curie.

Monday mid morning: Dalton's ear hurts. A lot. I give him ibuprofen. After that kicks in we do a floor puzzle together then he goes off to play on his own. I decide to clean and organize the kitchen, because everything else I have to do I can't do with a child interrupting me every three minutes. In cleaning the kitchen, I discover a plastic bubble sheet of pills and determine that the cat was supposed to have two weeks of antibiotics, not one. I call the vet.

Monday afternoon: Dalton and I head out to the pediatrician. Yes, ear infection, antibiotics. We drop the script off at the drive through pharmacy next to Trader Joe's. We go shopping until the prescription is ready. We start to drive home. Crap! Forgot the cat. Back to the vet to pick her up. Graciously, they don't charge for the urine draw (already done by the time I called, bummer) or make me feel bad about being an idiot. Back home, Dalton takes his antibiotics and falls asleep on the couch.

Monday evening: Dr. H. finds NyQuil that expired in 2000. He decides to rummage further and finds some that didn't expire until 2006. He finally gets a decent night's sleep. The kids do too.

Tuesday morning: Smiles! Laughter! Running! Dr. H and I determine it is easier to get the kids dressed when they are sick. I get the leaking tire on my car fixed (nail) then finally get into the office around noon.

The problem? Call me crazy, but I was kind of planning on using this past week to prepare classes for the spring term. We start Monday. I still have three days of daycare this week. No problem.

A phone call from my uncle

Over the holidays, we were at my mother's house in Arizona. My mother is divorced and has been for over ten years. My Uncle Joe (her older bother) called while my mother was out. The conversation went something like this:

Dr. H: Hello?

Uncle Joe: This is Joe, [Mom's Name]'s brother. Who is this?!

Dr. H: Oh, Hi Joe, it's H, her son-in-law.

Uncle Joe: H! Oh! Hi! Uh...tell Twice I said hi.

Dr. H: O.K.

Uncle Joe: Bye.

Dr. H: Uh, O.K. bye.

------

My mom comes home.

Dr. H: Joe called

My Mom: I know, he called me on my cell. He said he was so discombobulated that a man answered he couldn't recover his composure even once he knew it was you.

Me: What?

My Mom: He said "I called you house and a man answered! I was so concerned, I mean, what were you doing having a man in your house answering your phone?" Then he said he was so flustered, he didn't know what to do.

Me: So, you can't have a man over and allow him to answer your phone?

My Mom: I guess.

Dr. H: What?

Me: So, that's funny, he doesn't think you should date?

My Mom: I know, for goodness sake. I'm sixty-six years old!

I guess that over-protective older brother role doesn't go away with age.

Neighbors

I live in a cul-de-sac in a ridiculously typical suburb. It is a little snapshot of suburban life.

House 1: Anal Lawn Guy. Every street has one. He is the first one to mulch, to mow, to rake, to shovel. He makes the rest of us feel guilty look bad look bad and feel guilty. He and his wife have a grown son. The son, daughter-in-law and grandson lived with them for a few months recently while their house was being remodeled.

House 2: Middle aged quiet couple. We run into them once in a while at the video store or dry cleaners.

House 3: Newly divorced dad with occasional visits from three school-aged children. House was previously owned by mother of the man from House 2. She was quite elderly and passed away a few years ago.

House 4: Young couple with one six year old daughter. When our kids were a few months old, and their daughter was three, they babysat for us for two hours while we went on a tour at a local super-cool science facility. When we got back, the woman said "We are trying to have another baby. I think [husband] wants a boy." We walked in to their family room to find the husband with Dalton on his lap watching football. This couple has frequent parties. They are much younger than us. And much more popular.

House 5: Middle aged couple with two twenty-something aged children. The children sometimes live with the parents, and sometimes they don't, but the children (and their friends) are almost always at the parents' house. In a cruel cul-de-sac paradox, they have the shortest driveway, but the most cars.

House 6: A couple about our age with one child. They were almost as anal as Anal Lawn Guy, then they had a kid. Our children play together often. There son is quite large for his age, leading some people to be expect four year old behavior from his two year old brain. On more than one occasion people have said mean things to them about their child or their parenting. Our immediate outrage at this has brought us all closer together. The woman calls the city to complain about stuff they haven't done on our street: plowing, leaf pickup, potholes, that sort of thing. This is where having a somewhat anal neighbor pays off.

House 8: A woman with two teenagers, the younger of which we consider to be the source of the beer bottles in our back yard. The woman's new husband talks to Dr. H. He does not talk to me. I don't know why, except that perhaps he has figured out that I suspect he is a bit of a fictional storyteller. He has yet to tell Dr. H. he was once in the special forces, but I'm sure it is only a matter of time. The daughter was a great catsitter for awhile, giving our diabetic cat shots and doling out other feline medications as scheduled. She called us one summer when we were two states away to tell us that she had reconsidered and she couldn't watch our cats. Her explanation? She just "couldn't deal". We suspect pregnancy. Our friends from House 6 now watch our cats.

House 7: Us. Often overgrown with weeds, with the occasional burst of looking well cared for. When we first moved in, we painted the outside of our house, changing it from ugly to unremarkable, giving us some leeway with the neighbors. My recent major major accomplishment? After our recent snow, I shoveled our driveway in time to have the second cleared driveway in our cul-de-sac - right after Anal Lawn Guy of course. My classes have not started yet.

One more thing to take up some brain space worrying about

Well, I'd just come to terms with the planet being destroyed by an asteroid, and had begun to make peace with the whole super-volcano thing and now, thanks to catching a snippet of "Last Days on Earth" on the History Channel, I have something new to worry about:

Wandering black holes!

Great, I had no idea these things wandered around.

Just a few symptoms, for those who also enjoy worrying:
* mile high tides
* sucking sound as the atmosphere is sucked away from the Earth - fun!

When I was in elementary school, we used to watch disaster-preparedness films. You know, the ones with titles like Flash Flood! or Earthquake! or Tsunami!. These were supposed to help us see the warning signs and teach us what to do in the event of such a disaster.

I found the Tsunami! one to be particularly disturbing. It kept me up at night when I was nine.

Did I mention I was living in Arizona at the time?

But, what is it with the History Channel? It seems full of shows with "doomsday" "mega/super/mondo disaster" or "Armageddon" in their titles. Is that history? Is the person in charge of programming just really depressed? Sometimes the show descriptions even come with references to psychic predictions and biblical warnings. What is up with that?

Just wondering.

Here is one last photo from our cruise:



The views of a seemingly endless ocean with no land in sight really blew my mind. One night, while watching the sun set, I said to Dr. H.: "Look at this. This is one fucking amazing planet."

Cruise Blogging - Day Six

The night before the cruise returned to LA, we obtained our on-board charges statement and found one small charge that was erroneous. The customer next to us at the pursers desk was complaining about his Internet usage charges. He first explained how he wasn't able to get access, then what he had tried to do to get it working.

"So, I went to the help desk. The guy told me I needed to go up to the top deck to be closer to the satellite."

The customer clearly thought this was as silly as we did, so it seems clear that he did not just misunderstand the help desk guy. I wonder how many people this works on?

In any case, we had a great time! This was our first cruise. We hadn't really considered going on a cruise until multiple groups of people we thought would never ever enjoy a cruise came back raving about them. We may be converts now too. Not that we want to give up on the hiking/camping types of vacations, but this was definitely relaxing.

Things we should have brought but didn't:
* sun hat
* zip-up sweatshirt
* a conference lanyard for the cruise card which you always need with you if you want back into your room
* a watch

Cruise Blogging - Day Four

Oops! Skipped a day. Back one day for some images from the walking tour of Mazatlan:

Cruise Blogging - Day Five

We had a great time on the "sail and snorkel" excursion in Cabo San Lucas.



Worst anticipated experience: Not being able to see much due to lack of a prescription snorkel mask. I need to buy one of those.

Best anticipated experience: Seawater, sun, swimming and actually finally feeling like I was on a boat (despite living on one for the previous four days).

Worst unanticipated experience: Getting stung by jellyfish because I could not see them well enough to avoid them. Ouch!

Best unanticipated experience: Bonus whale watching detour before the return to dock.

Honestly, jellyfish aside, this was a really fun tour - the crew was nice, they played a something for everyone mix of pop music, and served drinks freely. And wisely, they served alcohol only after the snorkeling.

. . .

Back in the security line for the tenders to the ship, I said to Dr. H. "You know that woman you were speaking to?"

"Yes?"

"You've spoken to other instances of that woman before."

He thought for a second, "Yes, I have."

I said, "Once she started to talk to you, I thought, 'Oh, here is another one of those slightly older, athletic, married, highly educated, liberal woman with short hair who is going to want to hear all about H's research.'"

"It's true," he said, "At some point I had the feeling that this had all happened before."

Cruise Blogging - Day Three - Overheard

Overheard on the boat, after shore excursions in Puerto Vallarta:

A: Did you go drinking at Senor Frog's?

B: Yeah.

A: Was it pretty cool?

B: Yeah.

A: Yeah, I've heard the one in Meh-ZAT-lann is pretty cool too.

B: Yeah.

Photos from Mazatlan /ˌmɑsɑˈtlɑn/ [mah-sah-tlahn]

Cruise Blogging - Day Two

A few observations from New Year's Eve:

• At least half the women under the age of 28 do not know what "tea length" means.
  
  
• All black or all white outfits work as formal attire if sequins and scarves are involved
  
  
• This is far too many people for me. The more casual, less crowded, less glitzy after-party on deck was more my speed.
  

Cruise Blogging - Day One - Overheard

Overhead on the boat, while waiting in line:

"Never in my life have I seen a line for high tea. Bingo, yes, I can understand that, but for high tea?"

Relaxing and trying out "sunset mode" on my new fabulous digital camera:

Cruise Blogging - Day Zero

I decided not to blog from the cruise. The 50-cents-a-minute wireless charge was an excellent reason to go off-line. Instead, I've been saving up a few quick observations from the cruise for your amusement. And yes, we had an excellent time, thank you!

From the Cruise Answer Book under the heading "Clothing Suggestions":

You should dress for a cruise with Princess the same way you would for any stylish land-based resort.

Note to Princess: This information does not help me.