Missing cellphones and germy children.

Pictures of cellphones (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I headed back to work today.  They managed just fine without me, although I’m pretty sure that my co-worker, who had to take my place at Toddler Time, would have rather I had been there.  Not that she doesn’t like kids, it’s just that it’s an exhausting hour and a half, and having it sprung on you without warning is not the best way to be ready for it.  I think I need to bake her a thank you gift of some sort.

I seem to have caught a head cold somewhere.  I don’t know if it’s the same thing that cause M.’s croup, and I don’t think it’s what H. had because my throat isn’t really sore, but I do also have quite a bit of contact with the public at work.  Especially with children who, as we all know, are little tiny petri dishes just waiting to infect someone.

Tomorrow is the family party for H. and M.’s birthdays, which were  both this month.  My in-laws, my mom and some family friends will be here.   I have work to do around the house, a cake to bake, and things to prepare.  I also have a headache, possibly a slight fever and the attention span of a ferret.  It’s not going well.

As for my cell phone, I use it as my alarm clock.  I distinctly remember setting it last night to go off this morning for work.  It has since vanished.  I thought I put it in its usual spot on my nightstand, but it’s not there.  I don’t remember it going off (which really means nothing since I turn it off in my sleep on occasion), and I tried calling it with no response.  So that’s another thing I’ll have to hunt down today.

Or maybe instead, I’ll take a nap.  Who needs a clean house, right?

Related articles

• Spring’s welcoming hello. (famelessramblings.wordpress.com)

 

Spring’s welcoming hello.

Cough and the Common Cold (Photo credit: RobertFrancis)

I thought we were safe.  We’d made it through all of our (admittedly mild) winter without a single emergency room trip for M.  No sickness, no hands slammed in windows, nothing.  Then, two days into Spring, M. woke up at 1 in the morning with a bad case of croup.  She was coughing and choking so hard she actually broke blood vessels in her cheeks, so now she looks like she has freckles, only she doesn’t.

The usual in and out of the steam and the cold(er) air outside didn’t help, but it rarely does with her, so off we went at 2.  She had a vapor treatment, a nebulizer treatment and 2 doses of steroids since she threw up the first dose.  We got home finally around 5 a.m. and she needed a snack because her stomach was now empty and she was hungry.  I finally got her back in bed, and went to sleep myself for less than an hour before I had to drive S. to school, get H. out to her bus and then call work to say there was no way I could run “Toddler Time,” or drive there to do so, on this little sleep.  My boss happens to be very understanding and not easily rattled, so she said not to worry, they’d figure out coverage and I should stay home.

Since my mom was coming to watch M. while I worked, she just came anyway so she’d be here when M. woke up so I could sleep for a more reasonable amount of time.

M. is doing ok now.  She still sounds a little scratchy and coughs every once in a while, but she’s on steroids for 4 days and has her inhalers too.  She’s just such a cheerful little thing.  Even at the hospital, she just wants to be friendly and tell everyone things about her birthday, and her toys, and her brother and sister.  She’s like a friendly little puppy.

How is your spring going?

 

Today’s Wonders

We’re having a very unmotivated day here today.  M. has been feeling a little under the weather over the last few days, although you wouldn’t know it to watch her run around in her usual crazy way.  She has had tummy trouble, and is on a temporary diet of bland, bland and more bland.  Luckily, she likes most of those things anyway.  She does get rebellious however when it comes to no milk.  She LOVES milk.

The farmer’s market in town is today, but I think we may skip it.  It’s not much fun when you’re not feeling well, and M. isn’t yet.  We might go tomorrow to the one in the next town over, but I’m not sure.  We love the farmer’s markets.  There are so many good things to eat there, and the people are usually very nice.

The older kids are having a great time in Florida.  I miss them both, but this has been a great experience.  They got to meet an astronaut, and she gave the kids autographs and let them take pictures with her.  They also went to a very cool science-type museum called WonderWorks. If you haven’t seen you should definitely look them up.  It looks very cool.

I have work around the house that I should be doing, and work online that I’ll do throughout the day.  Plus, there might be a nap if M. takes one too.  Who’s with me?

 

Good News and Bad

I realize I’ve been lax in blogging lately.  It’s been a tough week here.  S. woke up feeling tired on Monday morning, but went to school.  By the time he came home, it turned out to be the flu.  H. got a mild case of it, and by Thursday I was sick.  Chris came home from work sick too.  Sean and I seem to have been hit the worst though.  He missed school all week, and I’ve been barely able to stay awake for an hour at a time.  Chris took two days off to be home with me, one to help with M. and one just to take care of me while M. went to my mom’s house.  I’m still feeling awful today, but M. is doing her best to behave and stick close to me, and only ask me for things if she really needs something.  She’s a good girl.

The good news is that I got a job reviewing SciFi books.  It’s only occasional, probably monthly, but it’s a start.  The first book is one I’ve already read more than once, so I just need to remind myself of the details since it’s been a while.

That’s how things have been here.  I’d write more, but really I’m just too tired right now.  How are you faring this spring?

 

Getting Back on Track

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Today I am feeling somewhat better, but still pretty crappy by comparison to “normal.”  Which means I still have a headache lurking, my nose still won’t stop running, and I’m still coughing quite a bit, but I am able to stand upright for 5-10 minutes at a time.  I’m trying to keep a handle on living room toy clutter, and order less takeout today.  Plus, do laundry.  Lofty goals, I know.  I’d skip the laundry, but if I don’t do at least one load Chris won’t have clothes for work tomorrow.  I do have to run to the store because we’re low on some important things (like tissues!), but it’s two minutes away so I think I’ll make it.

My writing goals for today are as follows:

1) Start review of Shutter Island.
2) Write one article either to put up on one of the Associated Content/Helium-type sites, or for my file to query to magazines.
3) Spend at least 1/2 hour editing my novel.  I realized last night that, as with everything else in my life, if I don’t just start doing it I’ll never do it at all.  I’m not sure how many of you read my post about “finding time” for things, but my view is that it never happens.

I’m going to spend no more than an hour looking for freelance work today.  Not because it doesn’t deserve more time, but because I have so many other things on my list and I don’t want to over-do it.  Like I said, I’m still not feeling 100% today.

I do want to say that, no matter how bad I felt or how sick I was during the last couple of days, I have kept up my daily writing.  I’m on an 18-day streak on 750words.com.  Today will make 19.  That’s every day this month so far.  I have every intention of finishing.  I was initially very disappointed that I missed a day so early on in January and screwed up the challenge for that month, but now I’m glad in a way that February is my first month.  It is the shortest month, so I feel like it’s a good place to start.  It feels like I’ve barely started, and I’m more than half way there now.  Only 11 days to go.  I like looking at the statistics too.  I like seeing how many of us are sticking with it.   Today out of the 1,098 people who started on February 1st, only 407 are left.  Only 37%.  I’m happy to be in that 37% instead of on the other side.

One thing I realized I didn’t mention last month or this month was that the site gives you the option of assigning yourself a penalty and a reward.  I like that, because it’s just a bit of added incentive.  And I need every kick in the pants I can get.  Last month my penalty was to give $10 to the site if I didn’t finish the month, and buy a new book for myself if I won.  Since I missed a day, I gave money to 750words.com.

This month, I pledged a $10 contribution to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.  If I finish, I’ll buy myself that book and move the donation to next month’s challenge, and possibly make it $20.  I plan to finish every month, but if I don’t I’ll at least be supporting a charity I believe in.  I plan to pick a new one every time I give money to one.  If I get to buy my book, I may choose a different reward, or just keep it the same.  I really like books, as you might have guessed.

 

Cold-induced babbling. Readers beware.

Image via Wikipedia

I have editing to do.  I have laundry and cleaning waiting for me.  M. and H. are sick, as are Chris and I.  We all feel horrible.  I took M. to the pediatrician yesterday, and the doctor gave her a nebulizer treatment, restarted her inhalers, and put her on antibiotics because she’s headed for pneumonia based on the way her lungs sounded post-treatment.
My house is less of a mess than it was because my mom came by today, watched the kids so I could nap, and while M. napped she did my dishes, straightened my living room and folded a load of laundry.  She can be a real life-saver.  I hope she doesn’t catch this.  I told her she shouldn’t come, but she doesn’t pay any attention to me.  She also picked up diapers, pull-ups and generic Tylenol for M. so I didn’t have to go out.
I’m doing the bare minimum of writing today–my 750 words–because I don’t have the energy for anything else, and once M. is in bed I plan to go to bed myself. I’d be there now if I didn’t have to wait out her next dose of inhalers and get her to sleep again.  I can always tell when it’s close because her coughing gets worse.
I hate feeling like this, and I especially hate it when the kids are sick.  H. went to her dad’s for the weekend.  I know she would rather have stayed here because she wants to be with me when she’s sick, but I explained that with me sick too she was better off with her dad since he can wait on her hand and foot.
Right now we’re watching “Sleeping Beauty” (Disney version).  It’s been our usual sick-day Disney marathon yesterday and today actually.  We’ve also watched “The Princess and the Frog“, “Peter Pan“, “Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas” and “Mulan”–although that may have been the day before.
I slept for three hours today in the middle of the day, and I still am having trouble keeping my eyes open.  I’m just hoping that once I do get M. to sleep she doesn’t wake up a bunch of times during the night.  That’s not good for either of us.
I just finished reading Shutter Island, and I’m planning on possibly doing a combined review of the book and the movie, but I haven’t got it worked out in my head yet and I’m too incoherent to think about it now.
On another Leonardo DiCaprio note, I’m in the middle of watching “Inception” too.  I can’t help it, I’ve liked him since “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape,” and I still do.  The movie is very strange, but seems good so far.  Although I don’t know if I’ll still think that by the end.  I guess I’ll just have to watch it and see!
I’m fighting with my Blackberry (Pearl 8100) because it won’t let my email work.  Every time I try to go in, it says that the “program requires a working data connection” to run.  I have a data plan, I have a wi-fi in my house, and I get mobile reception here.  I’m not sure what else it’s looking for, and I can’t seem to find an answer.  I’ll probably find it online eventually, but I think I need to rest more before I tackle one more piece of technology being irritating.
Sleeping Beauty is over and now M. wants to watch “The Nightmare Before Christmas.”  And she’s yelling at my water on the end table because she hit her head on it.  “Water!  Don’t bump my head!”  Because clearly it’s the water’s fault. That’s a new thing with her.  Yelling at inanimate objects when they aren’t doing what she wants. I’m pretty sure she’s picked it up from Chris, who does the same thing only with swearing.
Chris will be home late tonight, which is about the last thing he needs.  I’m not waiting up though.  I need sleep, and he won’t expect me to stay up.  That’s about the only good thing about him being home late.
I’ve been trying to post a story I wrote onto Associated Content since last night when I finished it, and I keep getting an error message.  I get all the way to the end, but when I hit the “Publish” button, I get directed to a screen that’s completely white except for the error.  It’s very unhelpful.  I’ve tried everything I can on my end to correct it, and finally emailed the support department to find out what’s going on.  I hate to have something written but not submitted.
Tomorrow, I’m going to continue my search for new freelance work, and barring that I’ll get back to editing my book.  I’m hoping we’ll all start feeling better tomorrow.  See you then!

 

End of the weekend update

I finished a new article and submitted it to Helium.com‘s marketplace, but it hasn’t been reviewed yet so I don’t know if it will be.  I’m pretty confident that it will.  It was a decent piece on a subject with which I have some experience.  I haven’t accomplished much else lately though.
M. has been sick on and off for three days.  She’s had a cold even longer, but she woke up the night before last with a bad stomach ache that ended with her throwing up a couple of times before she fell back asleep.  She was fine all day yesterday, then right before bed got very sick again.  She’s only been sick once today, but she’s had a fever all day.  Her temp. has been around 102 degrees, and she’s just miserable.  She was up at 6:30 this morning, and we were both exhausted.  She took her nap around 11, and so did I.
I won’t have much time to write tomorrow beyond getting my 750 words done.  I have an appointment at noon, then have to meet Chris after he brings in his company car so he can have my car.  I’m dreading that.  By the time I get home, it will be nearly time to cook dinner.  In any case, I’ll get the 750 done and see if I can do any more other than that.

 

Freelancing, Fitness and Financial Responsibility

It’s official.  I had my first freelance job that paid an amount that was actually worth the work I was doing, I finished it and was paid.  Admittedly, to a long-time freelancer I’m sure it wouldn’t be much, but for me it was great.  It wasn’t one of the “$1 per article” jobs that seem to abound on many freelance sites.  I’m very happy, and hope it turns into more jobs since the company may have some ongoing projects.
Even if this doesn’t turn into more work with the company, I feel like I have accomplished something.  I’ve taken my first steps toward becoming a freelance writer.  Until I’m making at least part-time money on a regular basis, I won’t really think of myself that way, but I’m getting there.  I’m very excited about the idea that I have finally found something that I enjoy doing, can do from home, and that actually pays money.  I love the idea that I might actually be able to support my family, or at least help, without having to stick M. in daycare full-time.
I also said I would post an update on whether we actually made it to the gym.  I’m proud to report that we did.  We went to the community center and I brought M. to the childcare room.  She ran right in and involved herself in the art table, barely taking time to say goodbye to me.  I went upstairs to the fitness center to work out.
I spent half an hour on the recumbent bike, did a little upper body work on the machines, which went quickly but left me sore today since my upper body strength is…let’s just say I have stringy arms and leave it at that.  After the machines, I walked on the walking/jogging track (indoors) for about 15 minutes just to cool down and have some time to myself while listening to music.  I still had time to shower and partly dry my hair before going to get M.
She was thrilled to see me when I got there, and if she’d been there any longer than two hours I think she wouldn’t have liked it as much.  As it was, she had a blast.  She brought me four pictures she had painted, played, watched part of a movie, peed in the potty like a big girl (I know, TMI), and got pushed by a boy who made her fall down.  That’s what she reported to me in the two minutes it took me to sign her out and get her things.  She later told Chris the same things when he got home from work.
We even got to return some overdue library books because there is a book drop at the town hall right next door to the community center.  I took M. to lunch at Friendly’s and let her get a strawberry Fribble to drink with her meal, so it was a great day all around as far as she was concerned.  It worked out very well for me too.
I thought about going back today, but decided that was overkill.  Plus, paying the day rate every day would be a little much.  We’ll go early tomorrow to play in the Open Parent/Tot gym before I take M. to childcare.  I’d like to start going every Monday, Wednesday and Friday so I may look into at least an individual membership.  Plus, that would make childcare cost $1 less per hour too, which would also save money.
Speaking of saving money, has anyone tried the “Cashish” app on iPhone/iPod?  I’ve used it to track the cash I carry and what happens to it.  It’s easy enough, at least in theory, to track the money I spend on my debit cards.  It’s online, and in my statements monthly.  But keeping track of cash?  I’ve tried everything.  Well, ok, I’ve tried writing it down in various formats.  I have written it into a notebook with notations for where I spent it and what I spent it on, either with the exact amount or recording to the nearest dollar.  I’ve tried tracking it using a check register.  I’ve tried keeping the receipts and then entering them into a spreadsheet each night.  Every single time, I’ve lost track before long, and no matter which method I used I may have been able to see where my money was going but I still never knew how much money I was actually carrying.
I’ve used “Cashish” since the beginning of the month, so admittedly not long yet, but I’m loving it.  I just enter in a round number every time I spend cash or get cash and put in its category, and on the first screen it shows exactly how much (to the dollar) that I should have in my wallet.  Some categories are there for you to choose, but you can enter in your own categories any time you want.  There are reports you can pull up, and you can even email yourself an exported CSV file if you want.    I just like the app and thought I would mention it in case any of you are looking for something similar.

Have a good day today!

 

Time to Get in Shape

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I think I’m going back to the gym today.  We have a great gym at our community center, and I was a member there.  I can’t really afford membership currently so I haven’t gone in ages.  I keep thinking that I must be a member if I want to go, but in reality since it’s a community center they have a per-day rate also.  I can just pay on the days that I go for now.  They also provide childcare for a very small fee so I don’t have to worry about what to do with M. while I’m there.
I’m excited about getting back to working out, even if it means going out in the cold.  I am in terrible shape.  Weight-wise I’m ok but as far as muscle tone goes, I have none.  I also have no stamina at all.  Physical activity just tires me out.  I was in much better shape, and I realize that at 38 I’m unlikely to have the same flat stomach I had at 22.  I just would like to go up and down stairs without it being tiring.  That’s just pathetic for someone my age.
So today I’m going to let M. know that she’ll be going to a fun new place with new toys and people to play with her.  Right now she’s watching a DVR’d movie (Beauty and the Beast:  The Enchanted Christmas) while I write and we have breakfast.  Then I’ll get us both dressed and we’ll head out before lunch.  I can keep her in the childcare center for up to two hours,  so I figure that will give me an hour and a half to work out (I really love the gym), and another half hour to shower and dress.  Solves the whole getting in a shower with a toddler running around issue too.  Then we can run errands together before we come home for lunch.  Unless we eat while we’re out, but I don’t plan on that.

So that’s my plan.  I’ll report back tomorrow and let you know if I actually follow through!

 

Nightlife

We ended up in the emergency room last night again. M. had croup. This is our third hospital trip for it in two years, our second this winter. I knew as soon as she woke up from her nap yesterday that it was coming. We planned to go out grocery shopping once she was up, but when I was walking in to get her I heard her cough that awful barking cough that croup causes. It only happened once, but I decided we’d better stay home so I could try to head it off. No such luck. She was fine all evening and went to bed after a good dinner and a hot bath. At 2:30 a.m. I heard the crying and coughing over the monitor and knew we were in trouble. We always try the home remedy first, a steamy bathroom alternating with a trip out into the cold, but it never works on her. Not even a little.

The first time it happened, Chris was in Florida opening a new office for the company he was working for at the time and I had his car, which wasn’t really working. We ended up going by ambulance because she got so bad. She had a nebulizer treatment and chest x-rays. The second time, she was calmer but she was struggling so much to breathe that you could see her really working her diaphragm to pull in air. The doctor worried about what would happen when she got too tired to work so hard, so there was another nebulizer treatment and some oral steroids.

This time wasn’t  as bad as it usually is. At home, it sounded like it would be but taking her out in the cold to drive her to the ER helped a lot. She was still having trouble breathing when we got there, but she was calm and happy and had the nurse and his assistant wrapped around her little finger immediately. She got a glove balloon, apple juice and TV as soon as we were in her room. The doctor gave her oral steroids and a cool mist treatment, but no nebulizer this time, and we got to leave around 4:15 a.m. instead of the usual 6:30 a.m. when she gets the inhaled medicine.

She has inhalers, but only needs them occasionally and hasn’t been officially diagnosed with asthma so far, but I’m pretty sure that’s coming. She wheezes when she runs too much, and her dad has it too. Today, she’s ok. She still has a cold, but it’s pretty mild. She’s a little cranky because she is tired, but otherwise fine. I am tired, but not as exhausted as I thought I’d be. Chris is exhausted, and at work. I’ve got my mom coming over to watch M. so I can grocery shop and maybe even sleep for a little while, although I think that’s just wishful thinking. So that was my night.

Yesterday I finished the first draft of a children’s book I’m working on for a client, the one that I mentioned in an earlier post. It’s back-story for a new series of educational children’s games. I’m having  H. read it because she’s 10 and the age range is 6-9. I figured she could let me know if there are any parts that won’t make sense to kids that age. I’m hoping to send it to the client soon. That’s about all I’ve been up to except for being a mom in the last couple of days. How’s your productivity?