The Modernish Father

Man, last week was just one big giant suck. The only thing good I can say about it is that it is now over.

Why did it suck so much? Because the ladies of the house were sick. And that meant life was crappy for everybody.

As I mentioned last time, The Boy was recovering from an ear infection already. About the time he started feeling better, everything went downhill for The Wife and The Girl.

Young and miserable

The Girl came down with one of those annoying general viral infections that make your children miserable, yet doctors are powerless (or not inclined) to treat. She started feeling bad on Wednesday and ended up staying home on Thursday and Friday.

The Girl probably sounded worse than she actually was, since she wasn’t capable of clearing her throat or blowing her nose like us older folk do. It was pretty frustrating to hear her raspy breathing when I knew that a simple cough would take care of it. Patting her on the back didn’t work either. I guess it’s just another reminder that some of the things I take for granted are still pretty big accomplishments for her at this stage.

She had a minor fever and some drainage, but mostly her symptoms were crankiness, round-the-clock drowsiness and a lack of appetite. Fortunately her appetite returned on Saturday and her crankiness was alleviated at least temporarily by a new fascinating activity – watching television. By Sunday afternoon, she was back to her normal bubbly self.

Old and crusty

The Wife went through another bout of pink eye – something that’s starting to become to semi-annual occurrence. I don’t know if she’s rubbing her eyes all over small children or what, but she seems to be coming down with it every couple of months while the rest of us have so far been immune.

This round was particularly bad, with one of her eyes becoming a goopy, crusty, disgusting mess for most of the week. Her infection meant that she wasn’t able to help with the kids at all, but at least she was still able to go to work.

Fortunately she was able to mooch a prescription for eye drops out of our pediatrician while we were in his office for The Girl’s appointment. I guess a pediatrician prescribing medicine for parents isn’t technically an ethical violation, but it seems wrong somehow. It kept us from having to make another appointment (and co-pay), so I can’t complain too much.

Fries at the bottom of the bag

• While the girls were sick, The Boy and I still tried to carry on normal lives. More on that tomorrow.
• The Wife’s blog has undergone a bit of an overhaul. Still green though.
• The system I’m using currently to show photos on this site is acting wonky, so some of the pictures may not show up (especially on older posts) from time to time. I’m going to go through over the next few days and just start linking everything directly to my Flickr account. Not as pretty, but it works. (I just started hosting all of the files locally. Some of you folks are blocked from viewing Flickr at work.)
  
• I can hear my youngest stirring over the baby monitor. Time to go fix a bottle.