Chicken Pox and Birthday Wishes

Okay - mid June - how the heck did that happen? I don't even know where to start. Maybe I won't even bother - I don't really want to remember it, anyway. So skip it. Here we are, and it is finally summer - as in, hot and humid and smelling yucky. But, hey, the mosquitoes aren't too bad yet. And our airconditioning is working (unlike, oh, about 3 weeks ago during a brief heat wave that happened to coincide with Brian's and Rachel's cases of chicken pox). But, no - I'm not going to talk about it. And what's 275 dollars between friends, anyway? Because that's what that airconditioning repairman is - he's my friend. Even if it did take him 4 days to show up, and Brian and Rachel were both prostrate on the couch, each in front of his/her own fan. Fans only move that humid air around, by the way. They make you think you can breathe, but it's an illusion. And they make your sweat feel a little cooler. But that's it. So I love the airconditioning repair guy. And so do my neighbors, because they finally got their fans back.

So now it's summer (let's get back on track here). Summer in these parts is really more an endurance test than a season. I sit here and think, "Okay, I've just got to survive these next 3 months." That's all. 3 months. Of course, if you extrapolate that out to all the years of your life (which I have time to do, as I sit around just surviving), that's one fourth of my life here. One fourth of my life spent hiding inside because it is too disgusting and mosquito-ridden to go outside. Is that any way to live? The only bright spot is the pool. There are no mosquitoes at the pool, and the children are happy at the pool, and we eat popsicles there and generally pretend that summer is still fun. But only at the pool. Because as soon as we step outside its sacred confines, life once again resembles one of those circles in Dante's Inferno, and I think, "Just 3 months..."

Larry, of course, has the right idea. He and Theo are taking off for New Mexico for 2 weeks in July, where they will be hiking at some Boy Scout Reservation and generally roughing it. At least, that's what they tell me. Maybe they'll actually be lounging by some hotel pool in the hot but arid Southwest and making up stories to tell me when they get home about how they ate nothing but beef jerky and dehydrated lizards for 14 days. Larry says the cell phone won't work where they're going. Oh, yeah. Good one. And then they'll come home with whatever plagues they've picked up out there, because Lord knows, we don't want to go an entire calendar month without some weird sickness laying low the entire family. That would be just too boring. The last hiking trip Theo went on, he brought home some sort of stomach flu. That was nice. It's all sort of a blur, mixed up with that heat wave and the broken AC and the chicken pox. Larry was all sympathy for me, of course. He came home from work to find me practically comatose on the couch (I believe I had a pen in my hand and was trying to scratch out a last will and testament on the coffee table) and had the temerity to ask, "Does this mean you're not coming to Anna's flute recital this evening?" That warm, fuzzy feeling from Mother's Day sure doesn't last long, does it?

Was I complaining again? I have to stop that. Things are looking up. Susie is almost done with her chicken pox and we finally managed to celebrate David's birthday (a week late) and we even contrived to throw in some Father's Day festivities to boot. My birthday is in 2 days (ahem), but at this point my sincerest wish is that everyone just leave me alone. In the airconditioning, of course. With a nice box of chocolates and a good book. While Larry and the kids clean the house from top to bottom and throw out all the extra crap they have lying around. Ah, paradise...

More of the Same

I'm thinking of renaming this sporadic blog "My Journal of the Plague Year." That has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? Since I last wrote, we've managed to contract both the real flu and the stomach flu. Any time now, the CDC should be sending men up here in hazmat suits to officially declare our house a hot zone. Currently, having run out of viruses to catch, I am suffering from a bacterial infection on one side of my face (very attractive). "Cellulitis," I heard the doctor mutter, with a look in her eyes I didn't quite like. So I went home and looked up cellulitis. A piece of advice - never scroll to the bottom of these disease pages and check out the "Possible Complications"; it's a hypochondriac's nightmare.

Despite the obvious danger, Grandma C and Auntie Kate showed up for their annual week-long visit on Tuesday. Maybe those CDC guys should leave a couple of complimentary hazmat suits for them. We're enjoying our traditional sewing/knitting/crocheting frenzy with Auntie Kate; she even has Brian sitting there, poking a needle and thread through some scraps of fabric. Grandma isn't repeating herself quite as much as usual, because she keeps falling asleep.

Brian's birthday was this past week, and he spent many hours making plans for the big day. Most of the plans revolved around food - you'd think he didn't get to eat the rest of the year. I love 6-year-olds. His dearest desire was to go to the McDonald's with the outdoor playland - so we did. Anything to avoid having to throw a real party.

Rachel is in big-girl underpants now. Miracles never cease. Now if she would stop waking up every other night screaming that her bottom hurts, we would really be getting somewhere. Either something is very wrong with her, or I am sleepwalking in there and spanking her in my sleep. Anything is possible. Susie has likewise decided that there is no real reason to sleep all night. Don't they realize I need to live long enough for them to grow up?

In case it seems that I have accomplished nothing these past few months (aside from dosing little people repeatedly with over-the-counter meds and complaining to anyone who would listen), I would like to announce that, since mid-January, I have lost over 20 pounds (being ill doesn't hurt the weight-loss effort - there's my silver lining). Larry didn't even seem to mind paying all that money for Weight Watchers. He is going to mind all the money I'm going to spend on new clothes, however. So much to wear, so little time...

Sick, Sick, Sick

That's right, it's been a while - we've been mighty busy the past month or so catching every cold and flu virus available in our geographical area. We hate to miss out on anything. I feel like a nurse on a hospital ward, walking around every evening dispensing decongestants, painkillers, and/or cough medicine to people in various stages of sickness. I've purchased so much Sudafed in the past 2 months that I expect the local narcotics squad to come busting down our door any time now in search of the methamphetamine lab I am obviously supplying. Every once in a while we stagger out to the library, pay all our overdue fines, and stagger back home with a pile of books to last through the next illness. Larry seems to have ducked a lot of it, somehow; I guess it pays to sleep at the office.

Brian lost his first tooth. I mean, really lost it - apparently he swallowed it and didn't even notice it was missing for hours. We had to write a note to the Tooth Fairy requesting his quarter anyway. She (he?) was very understanding about the situation.

Both Rachel and Brian are theoretically learning to swim. I have a feeling that these little-kid swim lessons are simply a way of plucking yet more money from the pockets of hapless, clueless parents such as Larry and me. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Rachel knows how to dance (she wanted me to tell you that). She also knows how to talk nonstop until I want to lock her in a closet just to turn off the sound. It's a good thing little girls look cute.

David got the flu with a particularly vicious sore throat and ingested nothing for 3 days but Jello and cranberry juice. I have a feeling that he will look back fondly on that time as the best days of his youth. Now he is back to his peculiar set of food neuroses that are apparently calculated to drive me over the edge. Good thing he doesn't know that Theo and I found a bug in the snow peas as we were stringing them this afternoon.

Anna vacillates between hating me and being my best friend. Nothing like living on a rollercoaster for the next 6 years.

Theo is having a hard time getting his schoolwork done, what with sitting around reading seed catalogs all the time and letting lettuce seedlings crowd out all the workspace on his desk. Or else he spends his time prepping and cooking dinner. Yup, the teenage years are pretty rough around here (permit me to gloat while I can - we're in for it with Anna - see above).

Who have I left out? Oh, the baby. Susie's been experiencing baby boot camp lately. Scheduled naps, scheduled bedtime, no nursing at night - it only took me 6 kids to figure it out. I told Larry that now that we have what it takes to keep these babies in line, we can have 6 more. Now that I think of it, that may be why he's sleeping at the office.

January Blues

Well, the post-vacation euphoria has worn off, to be replaced by the winter sickness blues. We seem to have 2 versions of the plague moving (slowly) through our house. You know your weekend isn't going to go as planned when you're informed in the middle of your leisurely Saturday morning shower that someone has thrown up outside the bathroom door. I was able to duck that one by staying in the shower until Larry had cleaned up the mess (hey, I had conditioner in my hair, all right?); but I had to handle the next episode, because Larry was hiding in the basement again. On top of it all, the baby is teething; she may also be sick, but we can't tell, as she still doesn't know how to talk.

We're excited because the Verizon guys are coming tomorrow (once we take the QUARANTINE sign off our door and hide it) to install an Internet connection that is faster than, say, 2 horsepower per kilobit, or whatever it is that we have now over our phone line. Actually, these Verizon guys were here a month ago; but it turns out that they are the "inside" guys (as they patiently explained to us), and they can't do their work until the "outside" guys have shown up. Tiny little mix-up on Verizon's part, but I do think we would have gotten faster remedial action if Larry had followed my suggestion and held the inside guys hostage until the work was done. Nobody ever listens to me around here, however.

Larry's been having fun working out the yearly budget, and he's starting to get that wistful look in his eyes - you know, the one that says, "Why couldn't I have married someone with marketable skills instead of a baby factory?" Too late now, sweetie. It doesn't help that our gas bill doubled, and our electric bill increased by 50%. It also doesn't help that our kids insist on eating 3 square meals a day. Spoiled, I tell you.

Our local library is still letting us in, despite our embarrassing book habits. Everytime we go to check out, it turns into a 15-minute ordeal of being reminded of which books are still out, which are overdue, how many are on hold, and haven't we mentioned our 50-book limit on the library card, ma'am? This time I thought I had it well planned out - Theo and Anna both used their own cards, so as not to impinge on my 50-book allotment. We still went over the limit. Each week I walk in there, I expect to see a police officer standing by the circulation desk, handcuffs at the ready. It didn't help last week when I accidentally shushed a librarian who was speaking too loudly near my sleeping baby. I wonder how many people have ever had to tell a librarian to pipe down?

David and Theo have joined a chess club. Anna didn't want to join because you are not allowed to talk while you are playing. In her words, "What's the point?" We may have just hit on the primary reason that the world of chess grand masters is dominated by men. Anyway, David comes home and teaches Rachel (well, he tells her where to move - I don't think she's learning anything). She likes to capture his pieces so she can play with them. They make a nice sound when she jingles them together in the skirt of her dress. I'll bet that isn't allowed at chess tournaments either.

Well, I've rambled long enough - it's time to go see if Susie will let me put her down in her crib. Ah, to sleep, perchance to dream....

Larry and I are so glad to be home, in our own house. We're both sounding like George Bailey at the end of It's A Wonderful Life - Hello, drafty old house! Hello, falling down apple tree! All the kitchen chairs are breaking - isn't that terrific! You'd think we'd been away a year instead of a week. It just felt like a year. But we're back. We survived. Some highlights:

Rachel's potty-training progress has gone right down the toilet. I knew we were doomed the first day of our trip when I took her into a rest stop bathroom to go pee. She said, "It smells funny here. I'll pee at home." Good thing I brought some diapers.

We had to caravan, as we can't fit everyone into one vehicle. Even so, both cars were packed full of stuff. Unfortunately, I don't like doing the driving on long trips. My back starts hurting, my knees start hurting, my hips start hurting (no, I'm not done complaining). To top it off, I harbor the conviction that I am going to die of deep-vein thrombosis from sitting in one position too long. So Larry, in a foolish attempt to flatter me, congratulated me on driving all the way from Mass to Maine on the third day. Give me a break - what choice did I have? Refuse to go on and live at Westover Air Force Base the rest of my life? When I pointed this out to Larry, his face lit up and he said, "You're right - it's the deathground principle!" For those of you as uninformed as I am, he was referring to Chinese military strategy as discussed by Sun Tzu (apparently the East's answer to Clausewitz) - it seems Chinese generals would purposely place their troops in positions where they would have to either fight or die - no retreat possible. I don't know whether to feel flattered that I passed the test or annoyed that my husband deems it acceptable to manipulate me using battle tactics he learned at the War College.

Anyway, I survived the drive; I'm sure a few years of therapy (psychological and chiropractic) will undo any damage that's been done.

Anna is apparently the only person in our family to feel inconvenienced by having to share a hotel room with 7 other people. I almost left her behind in Massachusetts.

McDonald's is everywhere, but it is extremely hard to find exactly the same McDonald's as last year - you know, the one with the best playland ever. We had to settle for the second-best playland, which made certain members of our family very sad. The restroom there was pretty good, however.

I spent most of my vacation driving and doing laundry (not at the same time, but wouldn't that be a good idea?). The best laundryroom was at the Air Force base in Massachusetts - 4 stackable washer/dryers in a row, so I could do all our laundry at once. I am definitely installing one of those stackables in our kitchen once all the kids grow up and leave. Then I would never again have to walk into our laundry/utility room/Larry's storage unit. It would be very good for our marriage. I found myself wondering what sort of laundryroom Mrs. Claus has. Does she have to wash all the elves' clothes too, or do their wives do that? Do elves have wives? Does Santa Claus frown on civil unions? These are the sort of questions that run through my mind when I spend most of my Christmas vacation doing laundry.

Uncle Frank is apparently getting more lenient in his dotage. He actually let the kids help decorate the tree this year. Up until now, he has never even let them touch the tree. Maybe it's because we make him watch the Grinch every year, and he's finally taking the hint.

A lot more happened, but I think I am trying to block it out. It's less painful that way. I know I've said this before, but there's no place like home. There's no place like home. There's no place like home.