Now Playing: Walking on Broken Glass by Annie Lennox
Topic: just letting off steam
Other than the nasty cold I contracted Saturday I had a really good day, the kids & I got up late & in our every other Saturday semi-tradition made homemade pancakes. I had woken up with a little tickle in my throat & was dumping 32 ounce cups of water down my throat along with chewing up 500 mg, vitamin c tablets like they were going out of style, but my head started aching & my nose getting stuffier. On the plus side it was a beautiful day, over 65 outside & Sunny.
Around noon Miss16 took off to walk towards a friends house & the friend headed out in the direction of our house so they met in the middle & walked back here, meanwhile
Miss10, Mr7 & I went to town to get some groceries & run some other errands. We got some subs for dinner too so I wouldn't have to cook. We came home & I was feeling some pressure over the report cards the little ones had recieved on Friday, they weren't much better than the previous marking period (miss 16 carried the same, 3 a's & a b but the b was in a different class) So I was looking for things we could do which would promote learning, especially in the reading & english departments (I think I mentioned previously 10 & 7 take after their dad rather than me & are better in Math than English) & decided we would play Scrabble, Mr 7 & I were a team, Miss 10 played on her own & 16 & her friend played as a team, we had a great time, good enough that after 2 games of scrabble we decided to play rummy,
which took us through the rest of the afternoon, un-fortunately I was getting sicker & sicker, my throat was closing up, I was getting more & more stuffed up, my sinuses began pounding & my cough kept getting deeper & deeper (as a daughter of 2 heavy - a pack + a day smokers- & a former weekend/party smoker, every cold I get goes right to my lungs) I consoled myself that just sitting & playing rummy was restful, after a little tv I went off to bed at about 11pm. I got up Sunday morning feeling very unlovely, I could barely whisper, an axe had taken up residence in the center of my forehead & I couldn't breathe at all Man, I have read some bloggers who described their colds in (fairly amusing) detail & I have always thought I wouldn't do that, but here I am, describing the depth of my misery just like everyone else!
Anyway I called work & left a message for the attendance people & my boss & went back to sleep for a few hours, after my boss had been there for an hour or so I called him back to see if I could arrange for an emergency paid day off (I have one for next Sunday in honor of my birthday & at that point was very willing to swap
so as not to get in trouble etc.) He said he doubted that was going to happen & suggested I try some Zicam for my cold, he said that it helped him kick his last cold really quick. I remember that cold & I think it was the same one I have - though he got it back in early October- he was out for 2 & 1/2 days with no voice himself- I went back to sleep for awhile longer, I can always sleep all day when I'm sick, I then sat up when Miss 10 who wasn't feeling a lot better than I (though her throat isn't so sore or her voice as hoarse- the price I pay for talking for a living) Crawled into bed with me & started talking. She's abducted my old cell phone which no longer can charge a battery, she was pretending it's on & making calls, later she found the old battery which I had swaped with the new battery in my replacement phone (same phone- same battery) to make the newer battery last longer, I swapped back to the new one about a month ago when the old one started only being able to hold a charge for about half a day. She inserted the old battery & was able to make the phone work to play ring tones & so she could take pictures, she can't download the pictures but she's happy just being able to take them. we listened to the radio & I played tetris on my phone while she took pictures of everything (60 pics in about 10 minutes!) while playing the dial on the radio I heard an ad for that same Zicam stuff my boss recommended & never being one to take a hint lightly I got dressed & made everyone else get dressed & off we went to the store, it was a lot more at my local grocery store than my boss had told me it was at wallyworld but if it really worked/s then it could be worth it, it did say on the package that it has to be taken within 48 hours of your symptoms in order to help but at 11 am sunday I was only about 26 hours into my symptoms & felt pretty good about it. Miss 10 & I both used it, Miss16 flatly refused & mr 7 has a slight runny nose but nowhere near what the rest of us do & also has no real cough to speak of so he declined. Got lots of dirty looks in the grocery store for coughing in public (I guess that was what it was for, mr7 insisting on riding on the back of the cart, making it hard for me to steer & my rasping at him to get OFF the cart may have had something to do with it) Back home I couldn't even face the computer, or read, trying to focus on anything that closely was next to impossible & intensified my headache something awful, I settled in on the couch to catch up on some movies & tv shows on my dvr & worked on the kid's Christmas gifts to their teachers & other family members this year, I'm making cloth bags for them to fill with rice & Lavendar or Mint which people can keep in the freezer or microwave them to heat them up & then use the bag on a neck, ankle, forehead or any other part of the body giving them pain, I made them for everyone about 5 years ago & they were quite well recieved. our own bag tore & spilled the rice about 6 months ago & so I figured it was time for new ones. So I'm just sitting running a needle & thread around pieces of folded cloth 3 or 4 times to make the seams sturdy, I accidentally stictched up the fill holes on 3 of the 4 bags I completed yesterday afternoon & even
ing through not paying attention & a little too much cold medicine. (though I'm grateful that I had some in the medicine cabinet still)
It dawned on me at about 8:30 last night that if I didn't go to work today, Monday, it being my last scheduled day before the Thanksiving holiday that I would n't get holiday pay for Thanksgiving, (of course I still have to make it there Thursday & Friday to get that extra days pay) So I went to bed at 930 & slept as well as I could, got up at regular time & went to work this morning, I remembered after I was there that my boss is off for the rest of the week & so I had to have the person taking his place find out from human resourses how long I had to stay to be able to qualify for holiday pay, it used to be 3/4 of your shift, they've recently changed it to 1/2 so I left at 2pm today, after hearing from nearly every person I talkd to today that I sounded terrible, I did have a good day on the phone, except for too much between calls time (we're alotted 10 minutes a day, at 5 hours, halfway through I'd used about 20 minutes) On the way home I stopped to get some cold medicine & came home to 3 sick kids, Miss16 had put the dishes in to soak (I admit I had left Saturdays & she had not done Sundays so it was a lot of dishes) but not done too much else. Miss 10 was still on the couch & mr7 was full of beans as usual, he's got to be pretty sick before he actually stops running around & jumping off things etc. That's how I know to worry about him if he slows down he's REALLY sick! Considering Miss10's cough she's probably going to have to stay home tommorow too. Not good since I have to go & get tires replaced on my car, I love sitting at the auto parts store/garage with a semi hyper 10 year old!
