Still Sick

Well, we had a quiet day at home today with only a brief foray to go to the bank (still moving money from A to B and back again to make sure everything that's coming out is covered).  Came back wobbly and shaking.

Dear Child managed cereal, oatmeal and soup today.  I had tonic water with my Tamiflu.  For dinner I got really daring and had tea and toast.  It stayed down, although I did have a few bad moments about an hour after eating.

We're definitely still staying home tomorrow as DC has to be temperature-free for at least 24 hours before she can go back to school.  Hubby will have to go by the school tomorrow to hand in the picture order because it's due.  I learned my lesson today.  I'm not going anywhere until I'm able to eat properly.  I don't want to be worrying that I'm going to pass out when I stand up.  It's just that I had to make the deposit in person, at a teller, in order for it to go in right away.

And Eldest Daughter has declared us to be "in quarantine".  Her kids aren't allowed down, we don't go up (not up to climbing narrow, twisty stairs anyway) and she talks to me on her cell.  She has things planned out for the duration of the week with the little girls and school, etc.  All I can say is "Good luck".  If the girls don't get it from us they're likely to pick it up at school where lots of kids are already away.  I understand that she wants to minimize the risk, of course.  And frankly, neither of us feels up to seeing anybody at this point anyway so it really doesn't matter.

I'm reading blogs and playing computer games when my eyes and head aren't bothering me.  I always use my laptop in bed anyway.  And DC has been watching TV and sleeping.  I guess it's one way of not spending money.  And maybe I'll lose some of that 10 pounds I've been trying to get rid of (though I'm not holding my breath on that).

The Flu Comes Home

Well, it's official. Dear Child and I have the flu. Today was pretty rough. I took our temps around 3:30 pm. Dear Child was 103.7F and I was 100.2F. I found a clinic near our house that was open and called to find out if we could get in. They said there was a 2 or 2.5 hour wait and aked if someone could come in and sign us up. Then we could turn up closer to the time we'd actually be seen. So Hubby took our Care Cards and did that. Then we all went back about 6 and were seen between 6:30 and 7 pm.

The good news is that DC's chest is clear and the doc feels she will recover okay on her own without anything. He gave me Tamiflu (which I picked up totally free at London Drugs, as one course of Tamiflu is completely covered by the provincial government) and I've started taking it.

Of course, it didn't stay down more than an hour or so. I'd been avoiding drinking (yes, I know that puts me at risk of dehydration) because I knew how close I was to throwing up and that drinking would tip me over. DC, again, is doing better than I am because she's been able to take sips of water every 5 or 10 minutes through the day. She even had a little soup for dinner. Me, I'm warily sipping Tonic Water (my standby when I have the flu as it stays down better than anything else) but I'm not at all sure how things are going to go.

Right now, the only thing that's clear is that she's not going to school and I'm not going to work for the next few days. Not sure what Eldest Daughter decided about tomorrow. Understandably, she's not too keen on her 2 catching this, not to mention that she's expecting too and should be careful. She thought it was all a lot of media hype. Not sure if she feels differently now that it's hitting closer to home. I haven't felt well enough to talk to her more than momentarily a couple of times today.

I really, really wish I'd been able to get my H1N1 shot. Giving a doctor 80 doses is just ridiculous and I'm willing to bet that some people who didn't fit the earliest set of criteria managed to get the shot, because most doctors were only discouraging others from line jumping, not preventing it. If I end up in the hospital I'm going to be royally ticked off.

How does this affect me from a PF viewpoint? Well, I'm not fulltime so I don't get sick days. If I don't go to work I don't get paid for those hours. Just what I need at this point.

'Tis the Season...to Get Sick

Dear Child came home from school on Friday complaining that she felt warm and achy and had a headache.  She's been just a little warm since then and pretty much herself, only a little toned down.  We had a quiet Shabbos, just stayed home, napped a lot and hung out on my bed.  I read her a whole bunch of Curious George stories and we played some games.  She didn't hang out upstairs at all today.

Tonight I let her go out with her big sister and the girls to a party for a couple of hours and she came back fine but then got hotter.  I know.  I'm probably a bad mother but she begged and Eldest Daughter didn't have a problem with taking her.  I feel guilty now though.  She also started coughing since she came home.  I gave her some Advil and she's asleep but sounding a little hoarse.  She's also giggling like a maniac in her sleep!  I want to know what she's dreaming about because it must be pretty darn funny!  It's been going on for several minutes.

I'm also coughing and feeling a little hoarse but otherwise I feel fine (bli ayin hara, no evil eye).  I just hope we're not coming down with Anything, if you know what I mean (pooh, pooh, pooh).  I still haven't had my H1N1 shot and now they're talking all over the news about how the lineups are huge and there isn't as much vaccine to go around as there was supposed to be.  I'm very frustrated that they didn't have it when I went in the 2nd day it was available.  I'm a high risk person.  I'm supposed to be able to get it.

Anyway, we'll see how things develop over Sunday.  Who knows if we're all going to be going to work & school on Monday or not at this point?  I just keep washing my hands but that's probably not a huge help considering all Dear Child wants to do is curl up and snuggle with me!  I should go and take my FloVent though.  It's supposed to reduce the inflammation in my lungs but it takes several days to really work.  Then I have to rinse out my mouth and gargle because it makes you susceptible to thrush.  Yeah, that would be fun.  Not!

PS Did you turn back your clocks tonight?

And They Say You Can't Go Home Again....

There are definitely times when I think it would be useful if I could clone myself! As I mentioned in my last post, I've been incredibly busy. My lunch with my Executive Director ended up being postponed to this week because we didn't have time last Thursday!

I did go to the doctor and the news was all good. She said all my blood work was normal. I'm not anemic and my thyroid was normal. The stress test results were normal too (meaning that I didn't have any kind of problematic heartbeats during or right after the test and that my heart rate slowed back down afterwards within the appropriate time frame). She feels that I'm not getting enough exercise and told me to do a half hour per day, every day. I'm trying, but it's not always working out that way. I think it will take a while to get in the habit and to manage to fit it around everything else.

Dear Child had her Kindergarten Graduation (which was very cute) and only has 2 days left of school. Tomorrow is a field trip and Thursday they pack all their stuff up to bring home and get their report cards.

My summer schedule is going to be insane. Mondays generally home with all 4 girls. Yes, four. This summer my oldest granddaughter is joining us, as her mother is working Thursday to Monday (and my Number One Son works Monday to Friday). Tuesday and Wednesday my daughter-in-law is off and has all the girls. The catch is that my son-in-law (the one we share a house with) has to take our 3 with him at 7 am and drop them off with her on his way to work! This should be, um, interesting considering that I spend about half an hour on average from 7 to 7:30 am talking to Dear Child, stroking her, tickling her, anything that will wake her up (while not putting her into a grumpy mood). Then we normally leave at 8 am. She moves fairly fast once she's awake but she's very hard to wake up (her father's daughter). There is No Way I want to get up at 6 am and start trying to wake her. I have a hunch she may be going in the van in her nightie with food she can eat in the car! Thursday and Friday are my son-in-law's days off and he gets all 4 girls here.

So, on the surface, it looks like I'm getting a break over the summer because I'm only responsible for one day per week instead of the current 3. However, my 4 year old granddaughter is registered for 2 or 3 weeks of summer camp (and the baby is registered for a week, as of today!). The older camp kids eat lunch there and finish at 1 or 1:30 pm; the littles finish at 11:30 am. That means on Tuesday and Wednesday I can only work until 11:30, go downstairs, pick up Boo Boo, hang out in the building until the older group finishes, pick the 4 yo up too and head home. Meanwhile, my own child will be happily playing with her niece, half an hour or so from home. Mondays should be even more fun. I'll be doing multiple pickup and hanging out at the centre for at least 1.5 hours with the older girls too. And I still haven't decided if I'm going to try to put DC in camp for a week too! The best part of that is that it would be an Orthodox kids camp instead of the community centre one, so it's in a different place and I don't know if it has the same pick up time ('cuz you know I'm good with being in 2 places at one time, see cloning comment above). I've been putting it off because I haven't checked with all her friends' mothers to see if their girls are going and which weeks, etc.

Anyway, to get back to what happened over the past few days, Dear Child complained of an upset tummy on the morning of her graduation and threw up in the car on the way to school. Into a plastic Safeway bag. The kid gets brownie points for not getting anything on her Shabbos clothes because they were all supposed to be dressed up for the graduation. I ended up taking her to my office for a couple of hours and we just took her to school in time for the event itself (I talked to the teachers and that was the decision as we didn't know if she was sick or just nervous and we didn't want her to miss the graduation).

After the graduation party I took DC home, we threw things in the car and I headed off on a 4.5 hour drive with a kid who had already been car sick once that day! Yes, I gave her Gravol and she had a fresh bag handy! Baruch Hashem [thank G-d], things went well and we arrived without incident and in enough time that I accomplished about 2.5 hours of intensive yard work before Shabbos. It was the first time in about 7 months that we've been to the house, so not too surprising that there was a lot to do!

Shabbos we just hung out, went for a long walk with Dog (who is in 7th heaven whenever we go to the house) and she played some with the kids next door. And yes, I did warn the mother that she might be sick. While she felt fine (no aches or pains, no fever, no further queasiness) she did develop the runs intermittently on Shabbos and Sunday. When she had to go, she really had to go. Within about 30 seconds. I was terrified of putting her in the car Sunday afternoon for the long car ride back to the city because I wouldn't even be able to pull over to the side of the road in that kind of time frame.

I did about another 4 hours of yard work on Sunday, some by hand and a lot with my neighbour's heavy duty weed whacker that you hold with 2 hands and swing kind of like a scythe, while holding down a button on the side and squeezing the trigger all at once. Do you think that was what the doc had in mind when she talked to me about exercise? By the time I finished I was in serious pain from my back, arms and right hand. When I say "finished", I mean I did all I could do but had to leave one of the side yards for next time. I ended up talking to Hubby and Eldest Daughter on the phone and the decision was to stay over Sunday night and come back some time on Monday. She worked something out for her girls and we just stayed and relaxed. I left a voice mail at work and that was that.

I took DC into town Sunday evening to buy a couple of things from the store, including a small pack of pullups for her to wear to bed and in the car, just as an insurance policy. She still had 2 more bouts, one about 11:30 pm Sunday, the other at 6:30 am on Monday, so it was a smart thing to do, although she's been out of that sort of thing for ages. We stayed until 4 pm Monday, then headed back and she's been fine. Whew!

My son-in-law took today off to do some work on their van so I worked the whole day and went back for some more time this evening. Now I'm not short any hours, even though I didn't work Monday. I'm really tired though and I'm covered in giant, itchy mosquito bites. At least 32 at last count. I don't think they liked me cutting the grass. Either that, or I just taste really good to them. So, I'm off to bed. Tomorrow is payday and Wednesday, so we'll see just what I can accomplish.

Catching My Breath

I know. I've been missing in action for just about a week. I don't even have a good explanation other than exhaustion.

I've been busy at home, trying to put away Pesach stuff and take out the everyday things. I've been busy at work with several things, including our upcoming annual gala. I've been busy with health issues. Dear Child went back to school Monday morning and then woke up on Tuesday morning with pink eye! This meant she had to stay home for a day, we had to go to the doctor, get stinging antibiotic gel to drop in her eye, etc.

And I really haven't been feeling too good. I'm tired all the time and I've fallen asleep with the computer on 2 or 3 times recently. I find I'm out of breath after I take my granddaughter downstairs at work to her preschool class and I'm only walking back up the one flight of stairs. Once I get to the main floor I take the elevator the rest of the way up to my office! The other day we forgot her lunch kit and had to go back after we were already in the van. I was so tired by the time I got her back into the van and buckled up again that I could barely move my arms.

So I finally called the doctor today and made an appointment. The soonest I can get in is a week from now. I really can't afford the time I'll be taking away from work but I keep thinking about Grace talking about how her only symptom prior to her quadruple bypass was shortness of breath....

Not a Wednesday to Write Home About

I went to work for a couple of hours. I came home. I slept for a while. I packed the contents of the dairy pots and pans shelf. I did some banking. I picked up Dear Child and came home, then went back to work after dinner. I stopped at the grocery store on the way home. And I should be asleep now but I'm blogging instead.

The weather was disgusting. It snowed. Not much, and very wet snow, so it didn't stick. But really. It was April 1st. If I wanted to live somewhere where it snows in April I'd be in Minnesota or New York State or Toronto.

Today was Wednesday. Next Wednesday night is the first seder. I am so not nearly ready that I'm starting to have panic attacks. That was why I forced myself to get up and pack that box. I should have done the meat shelf at the same time and then scrubbed out the cupboard. But I didn't and I'll pay for that tomorrow or later this week. I did do a ton of work on Sunday but I've been feeling sicker ever since then and I'm tired all the time.

I work all day tomorrow and then am home all evening. I really need to do a lot of work then in the kitchen. Right now, just packing up all the everyday stuff so I can scrub everything down and then get out the Passover pots, pans, dishes, etc. is the most important thing. Friday is the last day I'm cooking. After Shabbos I have to clean the stove and self-clean the oven to clean it. Sunday night I have to self-clean it again to make it kosher for Pesach. Monday I have to start cooking for the seders and Shabbos. Plus I have to finish cleaning the rest of the house and be finished by Tuesday night!

Lots O' Progress and a No Spend Day

Wow. I was really busy today.

I donated 6 boxes of books (about 1/2 of them hard cover) to charity (and still have 2 more small boxes, 1 of non-English books to give to the nursing home and 1 of Jewish books in English to give to the Jewish library).

I took 3 boxes of household items to Value Village.

I donated 2 bags of clothes (one was a bag Eldest Daughter packed but it was mostly things I'd passed along to her to take what she wanted first).

The front foyer is not tiled but it is basically empty and it's clean for Pesach! All that remains in it are 2 boxes containing an IKEA wardrobe (to be built as soon as the tiling is done), a small stack of the floor tiles I'm putting down there, the bags of thinset and grout, the 5 gallon bucket for mixing the thinset and the trowels.

I also cleaned out my clothes from the master bedroom closet and went through all the boxes on the closet floor!

And I washed, dried and put away 2 loads of laundry. I'm exhausted, but I feel like I did a lot. I'm still disappointed that I didn't get the tiling done. I really want to do it before Pesach so I can get the bathroom finished. It would really be nice to have a sink back in there and to be able to use the new tub. I just don't know when I can do it though. It will take me the better part of a day to tile, the next day is for grouting and then things can go back into place. A Sunday is clearly the best time for the actual tiling but next Sunday is when I'm supposed to turn the kitchen over, which is pretty much an all day thing in and of itself. I don't want to put myself in the position of turning the kitchen over late and not leaving myself enough time to cook for the seders and Shabbos (which follow each other 1, 2, 3 this year so I really need to have cooking done in advance).

At least all of this work today has freed up enough good boxes (along with some I'd already accumulated) that I can start boxing up the kitchen now. Well, not right now. Maybe tomorrow.

Right now I'm planning on going to bed and to sleep. I slept a lot on Shabbos but I'm still on the mend from what turned out to be strep throat and I need more rest. But today was a very successful day and I didn't spend a cent!

A Jonah Day

What's a Jonah Day? One like the day Jonah had when he got swallowed by the whale! Today was just awful. First of all, I woke up feeling sick. I wasn't feeling 100% yesterday but I was much, much worse this morning. My throat is really sore right up into my ears. I have chills and really bad body aches. Add to that the fact that it was a Pro D Day at school so I had Dear Child with me at work this morning. She's well behaved and spent most of her time doing artwork and writing notes to her friends but I still had to keep interrupting what I was doing to do this and that for her.

Then I picked my granddaughter up from preschool and we went to pick up her little sister from Eldest Daughter's work. But she had a form that had to go back to the preschool and I was feeling just horrible. It was rainy and windy and I couldn't bear the thought of parking, taking all 3 girls out of the van, going in, coming out and putting them all back into the van. So Eldest Daughter came along and all I had to do was a) drive and b) sit in the van with the girls. That was great for me but my daughter was pretty ticked that I dragged her away from work. Sorry about that, but I was just about to collapse. I drove her back to work and went home with the girls.

I made them lunch and they put on a movie in my room. I huddled under the covers and slept fitfully while they watched "Joseph Prince of Egypt" and a Dora DVD. The baby lay down with me but I don't think she really went back to sleep. (She was asleep in the van but woke up when we got home.) She eventually started playing and found my camera in a purse I haven't used in quite a while (probably the best thing that happened all day). I took it away from her when I realized she had turned it on and was about to start taking pictures.

She was looking for something else to do so she grabbed my glasses off the night table and twisted them while trying to put them on. The right arm snapped about an inch from the temple. Lovely. I have a very strong prescription, astigmatism and progressive lenses. To replace them at a one hour place would be about $700. Last time I got glasses I shopped around and got them done at a place that took 2 weeks but "only" cost about $400 (and made a couple of mistakes). Our extended medical only pays $150 for glasses. I'm already a couple hundred dollars in overdraft with about 10 days to payday and we have no room on the credit cards.

Eldest Daughter came home early after hearing what had happened and I decided I was sick enough to go to the doctor. Since I almost never go to the doctor when I'm sick this should tell you something about just how bad I felt. I drove to the walk-in clinic nearest our place (wearing my mangled glasses and looking like a total loser) and was told the wait was 2 hours! The receptionist phoned another clinic but their wait was just as bad. I decided to stay where I was. Frankly, I didn't think I could drive anywhere else. After waiting almost 2 hours and having them apparently forget about me and take later patients although I was sitting there the whole time, I finally saw the doctor. I couldn't really tell because they allowed people to go out and come back but my clue was when the girl came over and asked me for my name again, then had problems finding me on her list.

The doctor took a swab of my throat and checked my temperature (yes, I had a bit of a fever even though I felt like I was freezing). I left with a prescription for penicillin and the promise that they'll call me if my throat culture grows anything interesting. She told me my tonsils were really swollen and didn't seem to believe me when I told her I'd had them out when I was 5! I knew my left one had regrown but both of them? Anyway, it can happen if the surgeon doesn't take enough of the tissue.

I went to London Drugs to fill the prescription and had to wait another 25 minutes for that. At least the prescription only cost me $2.50. I came home, took my penicillin and some Advil and went to bed. I even slept a bit, even though the TV was on, Dear Child was on my computer and Hubby was unpacking a box of tchachkes onto his new bookshelf. He made dinner but I didn't eat. I finally had 2 pieces of toast and a cup of tea a little while ago. The only other thing I had today was another cup of tea, back when the girls had lunch. I've just felt too queasy and my throat hurts too much.

I didn't go back to work this evening, which means I'm 1.5 hours short for the day. I just couldn't. I think I woke up about 9:30 pm, which was too late anyway, but I knew I wasn't going back to the office about the time I went to the doctor.

I'm going to get changed (still in my denim skirt and sweatshirt because they're warm) and go to bed. Boy, do I hope I feel better in the morning. I hope the Superglue Hubby tried on my glasses will work too.