SoS started coughing on Saturday. Uh-oh, I thought, here comes the croup. He gets it nearly every year and since we have had monsoon like rain and wind the past few days, I was sure that he would be coming down with something. I started plying him with Emergen C, herbal wellsness drops, a stew made from eye of newt, anything I could get my hands on to stave off the feeling of impending doom that penetrated my psyche. We went to drop FB off at the youngest brother-in-law's because both the BILs were going to take him to a Seachicken's game. The oldest brother-in-law told me he would take SoS when he (the BIL) could get a prescription for Quaalude. No sense of adventure, that one. So I was upstairs on the laptop, conversing with the Nav's wife and experiencing all manner of jocularity, when I realized I hadn't heard from SoS in awhile. He must have fallen asleep; after all it was 2230. I go downstairs in time to see SoS get off the couch and announce, "Mom, I throwed up." Yeah, you did! How many seconds on dinner did you sneak when I wasn't looking? And it was chesseburger mac. Thank Zeus for leather couches. His body was the color of a Valentine's candy heart box and I started making bets with myself as to how high his fever actually was while SoS stood there barking like a sea lion. Yeppers, 101.4. I threw him in the shower, dosed him with ibuprofen and Delsym, slathered his chest and back in enough Vick's to clear the sinuses of a dedicated coke abuser, and pulled out the humidifier, all the while praying that I wasn't going to end up in the ED. (Been there; SoS had full on stridor and I had a fool MD tell me, after a steroid nebulizer, that if it happened again to bring him in, but have someone else drive because I would need to manage his airway. The look of death I gave him caused him to add "Or call 911." Ya think?) I then settled in for the night with a serious case of "mother's ear." Slept....not well. The next day I called my mom to tell her and let her know that we couldn't use the tickets she bought for us for the film festival. "Does he have the flu?" No, he has croup and only threw up from eating too much and coughing too hard. "Does he have any other symptoms?" A headache, but he's been coughing and he's stuffy. "Are you sure he doesn't have the flu?" Yes, I'm sure he doesn't have the flu. "Well...I hope he doesn't have the flu." For the love of God woman, I'm a NURSE!! It's under control! He spent yesterday listless and snarfy and continued to run a fever of 100-101. I called in sick for today, because I had no idea how he would be; plus daycare is off limits until they have been fever free for 24 hours. He had a normal temp before bed last night and was completely normal in everyway today. Enough to drive you crazy normal. No dude, you cannot go outside and play in shorts and barefeet. Because it's Fall, it's cold, and you've been sick, that's why. Back to school tomorrow. Then watch, the big one will fall ill. Little germ factories.

Today, since I was not at work, I decided to do a few things around the house that I've been putting off. Like soaking my showerhead in CLR. I have one of those huge shower heads that is supposed to give you the illusion of being in a warm spring rain. I am on a well. Full of minerals. My water is so hard, you could support masonry with it. So, instead of a warm spring rain, standing in my shower was like being spat upon by epileptic squirrels. A little soaking, a little rubbing, and a little reaming out of the little holes with a safety pin and we are back to our gentle spring shower.

How happy am I? It is the season for Monster Cereals (BooBerry, FrankenBerry, and Count Chocula), it's the return of Peeps, and hot buttered rum batter! Woohoo!

This is a S'more that I made with a ghost shaped Peep.  Except I forgot the chocolate bar.  Oh, well, it was damn tasty anyway.  Speaking of failed experiments:  I decided the kids and I were going to make a salt crystal garden.  You know the kind made with laundry bluing, salt, ammonia, etc.?  Very pretty and will peel your wallpaper off the walls from the smell?  Yeah, I'm not sure what went wrong, but I remember the crystalline structure growing up.  This is what ours did:

See, that mess isn't spillage from being moved; the stupid things grew that way.  And it was extremely powdery.  Either my memory is faulty, or we screwed this up big time.  I wonder if it's because I used sea-salt instead of good, old fashioned iodized don't-get-a-goiter table salt.  I may have to try this experiment again.

New funnies I found:

Click on to embiggen

Rights are rights

 Look carefully at this one.  There is the obvious, "My eyes!  My eyes!"  and then there is the not so obvious, "Someone in this picture agrees with you."

Cover that shit up!