The Worst Day Ever...and a New Cake!

This blog should be two separate ones, but yesterday was so awful that I didn't have the energy to blog about it, so I am combining everything into this one blog. Be warned--long post ahead!!

First, the worst day ever. That day, at least for our household, was June 20, 2007. The day started off like normal. The first indicator of things going wrong occurred around 1:30 p.m. when our phones and computers went down at work. One minute they worked, the next, nothing. Despite my boss's phone calls to our phone and T1 providers, the problem remained unresolved for the remainder of the day. Unfortunately, my boss would not let anyone leave until 4:45, despite the fact that none of us could do any work. So I developed a pounding headache and a ravenous hunger that I suspect was fueled not so much by actual hunger but more by boredom.

I finally got out of that horrendous situation and headed to my car. I called Bryan, like usual, to let him know I was on my way to pick up the kiddo. Bryan said that he was going to be a bit late as he had a flat tire when he came out of work. Not a problem, I thought, so I drove to Jonathan's school to pick him up. There I am met by his teacher, Christina, who tells me that there was a problem. I will spare everyone the gory details, but suffice it to say that during the day, Jonathan had developed swelling, bleeding and an overall wholly unpleasant situation "down there." Apparently, the assistant director of the school was notified of the situation and tried to call me at work where she, like everyone else, was met by a busy signal. Unfortunately, she did not call any of the approximately 20 other contact numbers listed on our contact information. She told me that she figured it wasn't an emergency so she would just tell me when I got there to pick him up. I was infuriated because, if you thought it necessitated her calling me, it certainly necessitated her trying more than one number.

I was not happy, to say the least, but saved that argument for another day in order to focus on Jonathan. I called the pediatrician's office, who contracts out their after hours service to the most inept individuals I have spoken to in some time. After one of their nurses told me just to let Jonathan sleep on a towel overnight with no diaper and call our regular doctor in the morning (NOT a satisfactory answer, in case there was any doubt), Bryan and I took Jonathan to a local hospital that has what's called a "Kids Express" associated with their ER, where a pediatrician is on staff for situations such as these. We ended up spending two and a half hours there, but were fortunate to see a really great pediatrician who diagnosed the problem as an infection and switched Jonathan from the "pink stuff" to some mack-daddy antibiotic and also gave us a salve. We finally left with a cranky and hungry 23 month old around 8:00 p.m.

I headed home to feed Jonathan dinner while Bryan went to get the new meds. After he got home, we decided he would put Jonathan to bed and I would run out to McDonalds to get dinner. I went to the car and tried to start it up. I was met by an odd clicking sound and flashing dash lights. No engine starting and no radio playing. I almost cried but instead tried to keep it together. Our neighbor works on her car, so I had her take a look at it since Bryan was otherwise occupied. We end up jumping it and it started but while we were letting it idle so the battery could recharge, it died. A second attempt yielded the same results. So, we decided it must be something worse than just needing a new battery, so Bryan and I made a plan to have it towed to the dealership this morning.

After all this, Bryan and I ended up having a couple of cocktails and retreating, somewhat dejectedly, to bed. We got up this morning, had the car towed and everyone ended up arriving where they were supposed to be in a relatively timely fashion. Today was MUCH better--Jonathan is definitely on the mend and it turned out my car only needed a new battery after all. Bryan is still driving around on a donut, but he will get his tire plugged tomorrow (turns out it was just a nail). We are definitely thinking one or both of us committed a severe karma breach somewhere, though, because, seriously, what are the chances that all of these things would happen in the same day??

I was supposed to decorate my second cake last night and take it to a pot luck at work today but that, obviously, did not happen. However, I did complete it this evening and decided I would take it to school for Jonathan's teachers, thus the "thank you" message on the cake. I am not crazy about the clowns, but since we all have to do the same cake, I had absolutely zero discretion:



We are both completely exhausted after yesterday, but luckily tomorrow is Friday and the weekend looks like it's going to be perfect! I am going to try to enjoy it before I switch into full-blown second-birthday party mode!