30 October 2008

Word for the day

Chick-mate: n. female friend.
As in: "My chick-mate has a little boy around his age".

A guy came to fix our windows today - nice bloke, friendly but not too nosey as some tradies can be, and he arrived on time and worked efficiently. And I learned a new word from him...

24 October 2008

11 October 2008

Sub prime

This news clip was a bit shocking - I thought it was a joke my brother sent me at first, but it's for real.

I can't get over the image of a large house packed with goods, furniture, toys, but the family being bankrupt. Can people not go without these days? Can they not save up until they can afford something, the old fashioned way? (clearly not - don't bother answering).

Sad, though, innit?

Must have needed that

Last night I put E-chan to sleep and emerged from his room at 8pm, with REALLY tired eyes. I thought "I'll just lie down for a bit and rest them", slipped into something more comfortable, and lay down on my bed.

Next thing I knew it was after 9pm, my Mr was in the room asking what I'd been doing (poor thing was downstairs waiting for me complete with a glass of wine, as we'd literally seen each other for a few minutes since he got home from work), and I was in one of those weird half-awake states where I could see and hear, but just couldn't manage to get any coherent words our of my mouth (or even assemble an answer in my head).

That was the earliest night I've had in ages, and boy did I need it.

That night I also had weird and wacky dreams. One bit I can remember is in my dream, I was walking around the University where I studied with some of my (real life) uni mates, and we were heading from the pub to buy a falafel somewhere. I was talking to one of my male friends about his divorce (in real life, this has happened in the past year or so), but I just couldn't seem to say anything wise or tactful, and everything came out wrong. I think I know what this dream is about - let's just say it's about gender architypes and roles and letting go of some bits and embracing others....

09 October 2008

Blaargh!

Breathing a sigh of relief today, as life has somewhat returned to normal.

We are all recovered, E-chan is back at kindy today, and we are trying to make up our lost hours. Nanna has left and taken all of her lack-of-personal-boundaries issues with her, which of course came to a head again as it always does when she stays with us for more than a couple of days, and always when C-chan isn’t around. I mean seriously matriarchs of the world – drop your “need to be needed” approach to everything once your kids have grown up, and leave the issue alone if your offer for help is turned down on occasion. It’s not the end of the world, and independence is healthy for your adult kids. My own mother would have been like this too, had I not given her grief as a teenager with my fierce independence. And she has at least worked out that it’s best for everyone if you organise the odd activity on your own and away from the house when staying somewhere for extended periods. But I sound ungrateful. As well as looking after E-chan for a week, she helped out with the dishes, vacuumed and a few other helpful odd tasks!

Other issues and thoughts:
– perhaps we will get a cleaner mostly to clean the bathroom and maybe do some ironing??
– Toilet cleaner commercials ridiculously overstate the dirtiness of your average toilet, as well as implying that a good old toilet brush and a bit of elbow grease won’t do the trick most of the time.
– We have some ferals over the back fence! What would life be without some weird neighbours to scrutinise?
– Must clean up my language. NOW. Picked up E-chan to carry him to his pram when it was time to leave this morning, and he objected and struggled out of my arms, causing me to lose me balance and almost fall to the ground. Uttered “S—t, Ethan!”, to which he called out “S—t Mummy!” as if it is the appropriate response, whilst continuing to squirm out of my arms. Attempt 2 involved coaxing to the pram with favourite toy in hand, which worked much better and involved no expletives.
- Radio going on about the economy, whilst I can hear "tractor tractor tractor tractor...." to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star!

What is happening in everyone else’s world? Betty Sue, do you still exist? B Sharp, are you still frantically busy? Seagreen, read and loved your zine which arrived on Tuesday. Angel, how are you now? We are free of gastro now and there is no risk of contamination. Who else is reading this thing?

06 October 2008

Mathematical genius!

Did anyone else spot the mathematical error in my post before last? The bit about if every american got a million dollars, it would cost less than a billion?

Of course, 300,000,000 x 1,000,000 = 300,000,000,000,000 or 300 Trillion.
Ooops. Notably more than 700 Billion. I realised this a day or so after thinking it, but didn't have a moment to correct myself.

Seems I'm not the only one who had this big idea - that's right, I can count myself as in the same intellectual class as Russell Crowe.

Back on track

We've had a bit of an eventful week. Last Sunday, our little boy woke up early from his nap, screaming. This had happened a few times while he had gastro, but his sore tummy would subside and eventually we could distract him from his discomfort. This time, the screaming went on for an hour or so. This, coupled with the fact his gastro didn't seem to be going away, convinced us to take him to hospital.

He screamed the whole way there, didn't stop to look at the ambulance (a sure sign things weren't right), and screamed in the waiting room. Luckily they took us in right away - the paediatrics ward seemed to be quite empty, or was it they wanted to stop the screaming?! Anyhow, they had to give him painkillers and put him on a drip, and he was poked and prodded in his belly by the doctors on the ward followed by the paediatric sugeon on call. A decision was made to tranfer him to one of the city's children's hospital, so that he could have an ultrasound that evening and they could check that his bowels were OK.

We went for a ride in an ambulance (they had a little kiddy-car seat strapped to a stretcher to transport him!), then once at the children's hospital, they had little mobile DVD-players, so at least we could watch some things while we waited. The nurses and doctors were much better at handling kids. After a couple more doctors poking and prodding and an ultrasound, we were finally transferred to a ward at about 1am. The ultrasound didn't pick up anything unusual. What a long day!

That night was hard - they had a difficult time keeping him still while they tried to tap his vein, and at some stage he had a tube down his nose, which he kept trying to rip out (they decided later it wasn't necessary, and took it out, thank goodness). I slept on a fold out bed just next to him, so at least he wasn't alone.

He didn't really seem better the next day. More poking and prodding from the doctors on the ward and the paediatric surgeon doing his rounds. Finally at the end of the day, after a minor dummy spit from us* trying to find out from the doctor what was causing this prolonged gastro and how long he'd have to stay in there, there was a breakthrough of sorts. E-chan had been to the doctor the previous week, and they'd taken a sample, and we told the ward doctor this (we'd thought we'd told them already, but maybe we'd only remembered to tell the previous 6 doctors we'd seen...). He'd had other pathology samples taken in hospital, but it would take a day or two to get thes results back. She went away, and came back buzzing 30 minutes later - apparently the results were back and they'd identified a parasite (a unicellular thing). The parasite was treatable with antibiotics, and he was started on a course that evening.

The next day thank goodness, he was notably better. He told the Doctor to "Go away!" when he came by to check up on him (hmmm). He was drinking and eating well, taken off the drip, and we were discharged after lunch. He's recovered completely now. Never been so happy to see a normal, solid poo in my entire life!! Sorry for giving too much information there, but that's how it is. I'm hoping we never have to take him to hospital again!

His Nanna (my M-i-L) came over to look after him last week fortunately, so we were able to go back to work and catch up on things, and know he was being well looked after. She'll be here until tomorrow night.

* We had forgotten this is sometimes what you have to do to get answers in hospital