Sunday, March 26, 2006

Where I've Been

Okay, so I know I haven't posted here in a while. I'm going to attempt to summarize the events of the last 3 or 4 weeks of my life, which have been a bit crazy. I could make this a huge long post, but I think we all know what would happen if I did that -- I'd never finish it, and then I still wouldn't have posted anything, and I'd still feel guilty posting the little bits of nothing that have been popping into my brain lately without explaining my month-long absence from the blogosphere, so I wouldn't post those either, and basically I wouldn't get back to posting here for even longer. So here is the briefest possible recap of the last four weeks of my life.

- The week of March 1, I put in about a zillion hours doing paperwork for the auction at the kids' school, which was coming up that weekend. That same week, Enthusio got sick with a bad cold and was out of school for three days.

- That weekend, I spent Saturday afternoon helping to set up the auction. That evening, we went to the auction and had a great time. It made a lot of money for the school too!

- Sunday, I went over to the school and helped set up the Scholastic Book Fair with my 4 fellow book fair chairs.

- Monday, I worked at the book fair from 2-5 pm, by the end of which it was clear that both Mermaid and I were sick. I mostly just had a cough, but she had a bad cold and stayed out of school the next two days.

- I continued putting in a lot of hours at the book fair and was exhausted all week.

- Thursday afternoon, I went to a conference with Enthusio's teacher with low expectations and didn't even have those met. I was informed that, in a nutshell, the entire month of February had been miserable. They hadn't called me a single time about any of this, but now they wanted to know what they could do to help him. I was PISSED. They'd let the situation deteriorate for an entire month without letting me know what was going on, and now they wanted to know how to fix it? Reasonable Man and I discussed it and decided we would pull him out of school and have him do independent study for the rest of the year.

- Friday morning, I kept Enthusio home. By 10 am, it was clear that I was ill, and soon I started vomiting. I couldn't keep anything down for the rest of the day, and that night at 10:30, Reasonable Man took me to the ER, where they gave me IV fluids and an injection to make me stop vomiting. We went home.

- Saturday I didn't feel better. I had a horrible headache and still couldn't stand the idea of eating anything. By 2 pm, I was vomiting again, and Reasonable Man insisted on taking me back to the ER. This time, in addition to IV fluids and anti-nausea medicine, they also gave me morphine, which didn't really help the headache that much. Nevertheless, I left the ER that evening feeling like I was finally feeling better, and I was able to eat a PB&J, drink some Gatorade, and take a couple of Tylenol that night.

- Sunday I alternately overdid it around the house with laundry, dishes, and general tidying up, and sat around on the couch, feeling completely wiped out. Monday, I drove on a field trip with Mermaid's class to the state capitol and the California History Museum, by the end of which I was completely wiped out.

- Tuesday, we met with the principal, who proposed having Enthusio do independent study for a month and then seeing if he could come back to school and function okay in the classroom. Since the teacher who is more of a problem will be out on maternity leave after that time, we agreed that it might work. We left that meeting feeling good about her being willing to work with to insure that things improve for Enthusio at school.

- Wednesday I felt strong enough to go back to the gym for a short work-out. Thursday was Enthusio's first official day of independent study. We are supposed to do 4 hours a day of school work. It became clear very quickly that he is able to sit and do his work without getting too distracted when he's someplace he feels safe and comfortable.

- Our new IKEA in West Sacramento opened in West Sacramento on March 1st. I went over and picked up a kitchen catalog, and also downloaded their kitchen design software, and spent about 10 hours designing the new kitchen I want. Monday we went over to IKEA to order it all, but it turned out to be more of a fact-finding mission, and we are now in the process of arranging things with a contractor. We're hoping to get the kitchen done this spring.

- I finished editing my Nanowrimo novel from this past fall and passed it along to a few friends and relatives to read for me. This got me excited about finally pursuing publication, and this past week, I've been doing lots of research about literary agents and working on my query letter summarizing the 3-novel series that I've now finally completed.

In short -- school events, illness, home-schooling, and obsessing about a kitchen remodel and becoming a published novelist. That's where I've been.

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