The 43

I've said before how I rarely get a whole weekend off. Well, this weekend is one of those rare occasions, so what did we do today? Stayed inside and straightened the house! Eldest is still under the weather, though his fever is down under 100 but his throat still hurts a little (and he didn't like the throat spray, saying it was "spicy" -- I admit it, I got it not at a pharmacy but a Thai restaurant). It was also hot today, really hot, around 100. It's supposed to be like this for a few days, too. Anyway, it was the perfect combination for an inside day. Lori got really focused on some minor projects, I got all the laundry put away and played video games with Eldest. The temperature finally dropped, and I'm typing this post outside. After wrapping this up, I'm going to water the lawn and look forward to another blistering day, more likely out and about, depending how Eldest feels and how much shade we can find.

We were going to go to the pool Friday morning. We had made plans with the mom of a girl from Eldest's pre-preschool class (a 3-year-old girl, by the way, who has told her mom she was going to marry Eldest! That's my boy!) to meet their family late morning. Eldest was excited to go, as usual, and was in a good mood. I started getting Littlest ready, and by the time I got his trunks on and applied sunblock, Eldest was out of commission, almost asleep, running a fever. The amazing thing was that not 5 minutes earlier, Eldest looked fine. It hit that quick. The evening before, he complained his mouth hurt, but he was only pointing at his mouth, what I realized this morning was that it was his throat that hurt. I now was suspecting strep after he pointed at his mouth again and realized he hadn't eaten much over the last 18 hours. I checked his temperature -- 103 on the first reading. That's warm. After some Tylenol, it did drop to about 100-101, but he still wasn't in a...

Eldest got me really pissed today, at Wild Oats of all places (of course, it was a totally natural anger, with no hydrogenated oils). Every other Wednesday is my big shopping day, and aside from Wal-Mart and Costco, today I hit Wild Oats with both boys. There is a little play area which we went to first, when Eldest says he needs to go pee-pee. I say fine, and try putting Littlest into the cart, then notice the straps to keep him in there are broken. We walk back to get a new cart, I'm trying to get Littlest in, when, for whatever reason I'm not sure, Eldest takes off through produce. I'm not sure where he was intending to go -- I don't think it was the play area again. I saw him running but couldn't keep up, with the cart and other shoppers in the way, but I tried a different aisle to cut him off ... except he never emerged where I thought he was going to. Now I'm starting to get a little nervous. After about a minute, we found each other, he was wondering wher...

I have a fun sleep pattern. A couple nights a week, I work until midnight, come home, need at least an hour to unwind, then finally get to sleep. Some mornings I sleep later, some mornings I wake up early and try to sneak a nap during the day. The other nights of the week, I'm home. Theoretically, it should be easy for me to get to bed early, get eight hours of sleep, be refreshed the next morning and the next day. Not quite. I still find it difficult to go to sleep before 11 on my nights off. This was the case before I went part-time -- I couldn't get off the late-night routine. I thought it would be easier to flip it the other way, but after almost six months, that hasn't happened. There are some mitigating factors -- I do sometimes get sucked into whatever I was doing before 10:30 p.m. Like tonight -- I took the first season of "Murder One" out of the library and watched a couple episodes tonight. At least I try multitasking, like updating this blog, for exampl...

Sundays are our one whole weekend day off together, so we try to not just lugs. We didn't make it to the pool today, or got out into the summer heat that much, but we did have an adventurous few hours at ... IKEA! I slept late this morning, then Littlest took an uncharacteristic 2-hour nap. As a result, the four of us didn't get out until about 2. We had been going to the pool every Sunday, but skipped it in favor of the IKEA trip. This store just opened last month, and we hadn't made it there yet despite Wife's love of the store. It was worth the trip. We didn't buy much, just some hooks and an inexpensive kids play tent for the boys. But just the spectacle of the store (I hadn't been to one in years) was something to behold, even Eldest liked it. We got something to eat at the cafe (Swedish meatballs for the parents, mac and cheese for the kids that Littlest was devouring), looked at bunk beds (no rush, just for the future), and pondered future design decision...

(Transcribed from a notebook, I hope I can read my writing :) A year ago on the first day of summer, I drove to a park near our house that had a clear view of the sunset on the longest day of the year. I sat and wrote, keeping an eye on the setting sun. I wrote about how fickle summer can be for adults. For kids, the first day of summer, the actual summer solstice (not the last day of school) means little, because there still are several weeks before the realization actually hits that summer will end (about Aug. 7 is a good realization point). But for adults, at least for me, the first day of summer means you made it to the top of the mountain -- and it's all downhill from here. The days will get shorter, the weather eventually cooler, that perseverance to make it through all those dreary months paid off, only to face it all again. Seasonally, summer really gets going on the solstice, but also reminds us it will end. I don't know if other people feel this too -- maybe is hits...

I hate being inside on summer afternoons, but alas, that's what the boys and I have mostly done for two days now. I caught either a weird cold or a sinus infection, and though it's not so bad, it's knocked me out enough (the cold medication isn't helping my energy level) that it hasn't been the two most productive days. I'm not totally out of it though, we did get out for a drive up a canyon with the intention of going for a little walk (the boys fell asleep before we could get them out of the car, however), then grilled some burgers when we got home. And I am outside tonight typing this -- hurray for extension cords (the battery on this laptop is barely working) -- and I'm going to water the lawn after. These ho-hum summer days drive me bananas, because there are only so many summer days per year, but these just-annoying-enough-to-alter-your-day-but-otherwise-not-too-bad colds piss me off as well. I'm left with not quite enough energy to chase the boys ...