SleepAde 20 May, 2008 at 4:36 pm

Last night, after our trip, I was exhausted. So Kiir went up to bed ~10ish (maybe 10:30?).

DK followed her about 30 minutes later. And by that, I mean he went over to the gate when I was going to the kitchen for something, and then started climbing the stairs :o So, I tossed a pair of pants on him and took him up. I came back down to do a few things (yesterday’s post, for instance) and wait for the dryer to cycle, take K out etc.

K actually was having none of that. I think that’s b/c it was raining. But thats OK, about 11:15ish, DK is up and happy and crawling all around on the bed. So I went up, rescued Kiir and brought DK back downstairs. We sat down and started playing Lost Odyssey some more. It’s actually basically a nighttime routine that I play some video game while he sits on my lap and eventually passes out. Then I wait for Kiir to come down and get him, b/c there’s no chance in hell that I can move him upstairs without waking him. Lets start with how I open the gate (needs a committed hand, he takes two), and end with I’ve been sitting cross legged with a baby laying across my lap for an hour so my feet are so numb that i can’t put weight on them :o

Luckily, I’d thought ahead when he started to fall asleep and shifted so my legs weren’t under him. Even more lucky, he was willing to stand for it. Because Kiir was asleep, so not coming to get him :o Got him upstairs about 12:15 and settled, then K and I came to pack up and shutdown, and switch the laundry since it was ready now obviously.

Get up, kiir’s got a Gatorade in her hand next to his bottle of water, and they’re both asleep. I change, lay down and holy crap! her bottle tipped and it turns out there was no lid. I don’t know for sure how much got poured on the bed, but it looked like a fair amount. I hopped up and started griping as I got a towel to put on the bed, she tells me that she wants me to sleep upstairs, she likes me in the bed. I politely (shut up) informed her that I wasn’t sleeping in an inch of gatorade, took my blanket and went to sleep on the sofa. After putting another towel down to make sure DK didn’t roll over into a pool of gatorade …

Surprisingly, having 5 or 6 oz of poured down your back at 12:30 in the morning, not that conducive to sleeping.

Back from our trip (miscellany 2) 19 May, 2008 at 9:32 pm

Got back from our trip this evening. Cost a little less in tolls on the way back, although delaware did it’s level best to cover the difference.

I swear, DE is bitter about the fact that no one lives in the state and that they exist solely as a tax shelter for companies. The full ~120mi length of the NJTP: ~6$. The ~80mi in MD that we drive (and, I think, most if not all of the tolls in the state until the new toll hov lanes are built and the new cross county connector that, near as I can tell, connects two places you wouldn’t really need to get between). Anyway, 80mi in MD: 7$. NY does it’s share for those coming in from NJ (8$ for the Washington bridge, and I think 7$ if you take the Tappan Zee instead); but they let you leave for free, so really only 4$ average.

DE? 4$ at the MD/DE border. 3$ at the NJ/DE border, although I don’t recall paying that on the way to NJ Saturday. But 7$ for ~5mi of state!!!

Took us about 7 hours to get back. We left at 10:30, arrived at 7:30. Stopped and had brunch with a friend from a forum of kiir’s, left that ~12:15 to drive down. on the NJTP, it took us an hour to go 15 miles. Put another way, it took us 50 minutes to go 5mi. Because there was some big accident yadda yadda complete stop etc yadda etc. SUCK! Babe woke up for that, of course :/

Gas in MD: 3.73$ ; gas in NY: 3.95$ ; gas in CN: 4.09$. Gas at the full service stations on the NJTP and Garden State in NJ? 3.64$. We tossed a couple gallons in in CN when we left to make sure we had enough to make it to NJTP :)

Apparently Kiir’s car gets ~350mi to a tank, not bad really. Of course, we started and finished each time with half a tank. Costco’s Debit readers were broken saturday, so we didn’t fill before leaving, filled in NJ. tossed a couple gallons in in CN and saved 45c/ga and filled in NJ again :o

DK slept for ~5hrs of the 7hr trip, yay for that. He was awake for and hour and a half in the middle (from 3-4:30 in the trip) wherein we stopped for gas and let him run around the service mall and eat some lunch. Thankfully he fell asleep after screaming at the traffic jam for 20 minutes. Woke up again just North of Baltimore again, and kiir gave him her iPod with Word World on it. He didn’t want anythign to do with the headphones, but he watched for a while :)

Kiir slept for ~3hrs of the trip, I think, although she tended to wake up every 15 minutes or so, so it probably wasn’t very restful.

They both went to bed just now. I’m waiting for the diapers to finish first dry cycle so I can set them up for second. I put my work pants in the wash, and I’ma need them tomorrow :o

Soon as that’s done, K and I are going to bed too. I’m TIRED.

Miscellany v1: Driving Edition 18 May, 2008 at 10:32 pm

So, this post is primarily about the drive up to Connecticut this weekend

First off, it cost 7$ to get out of MD. Then 4$ more to get into Delaware. WTF am i going to go when I’m going across an effing bridge from MD to DE??? LAEM

Then 7$ for the NJTP, and 8$ more to get INTO NYC on the GW? Which is right after the NJTP … come ON people.

—-

Directions from mapquest are insane. Actually, most online directions are, but we tend to print mapquest. First off, they tend to take you into every local-lane cut off. Even when you’ve got another 100 mi on the same road. Riiiight.

Then coming off the NJTP to the GWBridge, they had something like “take lower (local) lanes, bear left, merge into upper (express) lanes. Follow lower lanes, take upper” Of course, I never even saw a legal method for switching from upper to lower, so I don’t know what that was about, unless it was to get into the lanes to go from lower to upper, and then NOT go to upper. Maybe.

Followed by NY having trouble with math. And by that, I mean my mom, who is number dyslexic and failed her way through high school math, is better at counting.

Because we wanted exit 1C. Saw 1. Saw 2. Then saw 3 was the road we wanted. Then it was 1C, then it was 3N, then 3, then 3S. Then 1C and 3N and we were on the road.

Which eventually we wanted exit 4. We got on at 8, and we’re supposed to go ~7 or 8 mi. Maybe it meant 14? Well, 4 mi we hit 14 (wow, fast exits!), and then another mile and … uh … exit 1.

12 …. 13 …. 14 … 1. … uh …

took 45 minutes to go ~5mi over the GW and to the exit we wanted. Partially this was because we had 12 toll plazas open, thus 12 lanes. Then within ~2 buslengths we were down to 3 lanes. Then 6 more entered. Then we were down to 2, 4, 3. Why do tolls always do that? “Here, spread out so we can take the money faster, then we’re going to not label a godsdamned thing for about 10′, by which point you should all be in a single file line again, because that’s effing obvious”

I hate tolls.

And this trip has reminded me why I NEVER DRIVE IN NYC. And, I suppose, why I don’t drive into DC, either. We shoulda taken the train :o

Baby vs Bathtub, Round 1 15 May, 2008 at 9:42 pm

So …

As I’m getting home this evening (literally, I was halfway up the 10-15′ walk to the house), my phone rings. Kiir is calling to find out when I’ll be home. I’d been planning to go past the farmers market, see if it was open for the season yet or not (I forgot, but I suspect not yet), and she was going to suggest I come straight home.

Because during bathtime, DK slipped and whacked into the side of the tub. Or maybe the cup toy he had in hand hit the tub and he hit it. Either way. Stand. Slip. Whack. More to the point, he was not bleeding at the eye.

After I got in, I took him and we called the Dr’s office, closed (they close at 5PM, it was 5:05PM , *sigh*), then called the emergency line at the office. They took information and said they’d have someone call back soon. Apparently the phone message got lost somewhere, because we called back an hour later and they just went and talked to the doc whilst we waited on the line instead of the standard procedure. They suggested that we take him to the ER and get an X-Ray of his eye, make sure he hadn’t fractured the orbital.

Things you don’t want to hear as a parent? “Take him to the ER for an X-Ray, make sure he didn’t fracture his FREAKIN EYE SOCKET” No matter how much you assure me, beforehand, that it sounds like it’s probably nothing. No matter how much “better safe than sorry.” NO MATTER! It still scares the living daylights out of me when you then suggest that I need to get his skull CTd for fractures!!!

*shudder*

Packed up and went to ER. Kiir packed a bunch of toys etc, since the last three times (yay, I’m only 50% of our total ER visits now! uh, lets not have that fall any further, kthxla~) it’s been like a 6-hour visit each time. Including 3-hours in waiting while I’m bleeding from slicing open my hand, before anyone checked to make sure I hadn’t severed a nerve. Oi. Not that I’m bitter (mostly, probably, because I HADN’T severed a nerve or anything permanent and damaging). Packed up my folks, too, since I’d invited them up tonight, since otherwise it was nearly a month between visits for them, which seems excessive what with them only living half an hour away frankly.

Get there, fill out the admissions paperwork, get sent within 10 minutes to Pede’s ER. Straight into a room, nurse comes in under a minute to take some info, look at DK, temperature, etc. Less than 5 minutes, Doc’s in and checking him. Decides it’s just a small cut.

Right Peri-Orbital Laceration
Right Peri-Orbital Abrasion

And, yaknow? Looking at a medical form that says “R. P-Orb Laceration”? Strangely frightening. Even thought I’ve watched enough medico shows to understand that it just means he has a small cut by his eye.

Mentioned that the pediatricians after hours emergency line suggested bringing him in for an X, and doc said he felt around, bone seemed solid and showed no softness or give that would suggest a fracture. So DK didn’t get xapped with alien rays or anything.

THEN another nurse/staffer came in to take insurance information and get us to sign the papers to approve being seen by the doc and billing the insurance. While he was in the midst of getting our info, doc came in with the discharge papers to send us home, lol!

Dinner with my folks (DK likes black olives, it would seem), then they played with D and K for a few hours before heading home.

DK had a big day today. Here’s hoping, as Kiir said at bedtime, that tomorrow is significantly more boring :)

In Sickness and Illness 14 May, 2008 at 2:32 pm

I hate being sick :/

But I seem to have come down with a flu or something, quite the nuisance. Headaches for three days now (not too bad today ; I think it was being aggravated by the stormy weather). Muscle aches. General exhaustion

At the office yesterday, between the tired and the headache, I was running <50%, so when I roused up this morning and didn’t feel better, I decided to call the day off and stay home. Went back to sleep.

Managed to sleep way late. Was kindof surprised no one else had woken up yet. Finally pushed myself out of bed and … and … WTF it’s only a quarter of 9??? Apparently “way late” doesn’t mean what it used to :/ Still, went to bed 12:30 or 1 to fall asleep finally, so not too bad I s’pose. Came down with K, logged in for work, etc. Touch of headache, not as bad. Not shivering cold today either (and it was 70 outside, and I STILL wanted a heavier coat yesterday). Shoulder and back ache, but I think that’s just my shoulder and back are all effed up. I can probably do work Thursday and Friday. Then drive to Connecticut saturday and back monday … uh …

DK got up around 10:30, I want to say. So I let him wander for a bit, then I took D and K out for a walk, and played XBox for DK when we got back. Hes up for his nap now. And I’m tired, but I don’t know that I’d fall asleep. I’m loathe to go try and end up just waking him up, however :/

I hate being sick.

Ear Infections and Money for Nothing 13 May, 2008 at 11:04 pm

So, K had his “comprehensive physical” today. Basically they have me drop him off before 9 and pick him up after 3 (so, 7 and 5:30 :/) for what is, really, about 30 minutes of tests. When I worked at Goddard and could stay home easier, or take half days meaningfully, I’d usually go in and sit in one of the rooms for the 90-minutes that it drags on. But I can’t do that now, so he gets to sit in their small metal cages and be bored out of his effing mind all day :/

OTOH, the physical is free annually (or twice annually maybe?) and so are his shots, covered by his plan (so, not really free, since I’m paying a monthly fee, but whatever). I signed a bunch of forms and filled out a bunch of information they should really already have (like, pets name, phone #’s, etc) and on the billing form I wrote in to call me if the price was over 25$.

Got a call ~10 or 10:30 (told you it only took like an hour). So, first off, I’m worried because they really have no reason to call me unless there’s a problem. Turns out K has an ear infection. Last time, this was a PITA because he did NOT appreciate people playing with his ears when he had an ear ache. Shocking, I know. But OK, we’ll cope. They want permission to run a 40$ test to find out what kind of ear infection, so they can prescribe the right meds. OK, sure, makes sense.

I go to pick him up. “Your total comes out to be 257$” Woah, come again? Last I heard it was around 60, counting the 40$ procedure. Are you telling me there’s 200$ worth of medication? “Oh, no sir, lets see. There’s X for his ears. Then there’s Y, that’s an antibiotic” “uh, then what was the first one?” “Thats for his ears” “For the EAR infection?” “yeah”

she pawned me off on the doctor because I wasn’t understanding “there’s these drops for his ears, and then there’s this antibiotic”. Doctor came in (oh, look, another new vet; criminy), and started telling me that this is for his ears, 3 drops, each ear, twice daily. “I thought he only had an infection in one ear?”

Then he went into a long thing about how animals were like people (really? mammals share traits with other mammals? Oh Em GEE!) and the ears, the nose, the eyes, the mouth, were all openings to a central shaft (uh, that’s not quite accurate, but thanks for dumbing it down) and if we just put drops in one ear it moves to the other, and if we put them in the second it moves to the first so we have to put drops in both ears so it has nowhere to move to! (uh, you just said “central shaft” and named 7 openings. Having now covered 2, technically, don’t I need to put drops in his mouth, nose, and behind his eyeballs? dude, c’mon) But OK, that makes sense.

“And this is the antibiotic” “uh, wait, what was the first one then?” “that’s drops, for his ears” were back to this are we? Another 5 minutes of him treating me like a moron, I finally get him to use his words long enough to establish “Oh, he has two kinds of ear infections?” He has a yeast infection in his ears, thus the eardrops, and a bacterial infection in his bloodstream, thus the oral antibiotic. Although I’m not sure the latter is actually an ear infection, but DK’s ear infection was handled by oral antibiotic, so I’ll accept it.

But I turned down the ear wash. I’d rather just fight for the ear drops, not pouring saline in his ears too. “well, this usually lasts people for years” Excellent. so it’s not really NEEDED per-se. I mentioned that he was handing out meds like an HMO doc. “I’ll prescribe everything I can think of, and hopefully I’ll get paid from something”

But, since I don’t have my research an’ all, I couldn’t really decide what I could skip, so I paid the 260 (I’m sorry, 240, I declined the wash. Three times) and got the meds. They tossed out during payment that apparently they gave him like 3 shots for the ear infection, too, arleady, bringing up the price.

But 60 to 260, and no one thought to say a gods damned thing? 100$ in meds, 100$ in meds they gave him without asking??? I’m trying to decide if I’m pissed enough to go back tomorrow, or just accept it since I do want K to get better and if they’d asked I probably would have granted the permissions. But approving a 40$ test does not automajikally approve the next 100$ worth of crap you feel like doing.

And WTF didn’t anyone explain WHAT they did? I’m reading the billing invoice, and it’s not exactly laymans terms. It’s a freakin’ BILLING INVOICE. The nifty directions for the meds, a full page, say “use as directed by the doctor”, but with a lot more words. Hello? Isn’t that what this page should include? Direction by the doctor???? Especially since I only talked to the vet b/c I was bitching about the 200$ in meds???

*sigh*

Docs, Quacks, and Babies 12 May, 2008 at 5:56 pm

This morning was my functionless psych appt. I say functionless b/c he just hands me a scrip and there isn’t really a lot else going on. And, frankly, I think I kindof need a new med technically.

But fancy new feature: DK woke up at 8:30, which meant he was quite awake still when I left for my 9:30. So I get there at 9:15 with DK in tow. Of course, it turns out that after moving my appointment from last Monday to today, they didn’t put me on the schedule. Bleah. But at least doc was taking in a patient when I got there. As opposed to showing up half an hour after I get there :o

~9:30, I heard a clerk telling my doc that “It looks like your next appointment isn’t here yet”. Uh, who am I? But I was busy, so I didn’t raise a fuss. About 9:45 someone comes in, says he’s late, signs in. Turns out, he was doc’s 9:30. His OTHER 9:30 I guess. Saw him leaving after changing babe’s diaper, so I waited a little bit …

Then I went up to the window. “Do you need to schedule another appointment?” Uh? Other than like 5 minutes to change the diaper (and I had to ask for the bathroom key, so, you know, they had to know I went to the bathroom) when was I out of this waiting room??? So I pointed out that, no, I was still waiting. Nice man apologized and went to talk to doc. Who, when he called me back, seemed annoyed. I guess I interrupted his morning nap :o

Looking at his appointment roster on his desk (it’s sitting there, and I’m carrying the baby, so … yeah, moving on) and the patient I saw going in initially was his 9:00. Then his 9:30 at 9:45. His 9:15 and 9:45 skipped. And when I left a little after 10, the 10 and 10:15 hadn’t signed in yet either.

And it’s my fault that I actually needed to see you? Of course, they hadn’t pulled my file since they hadn’t written my appointment up. And, apparently, during the 45 minutes after I checked in they didn’t feel the need to be bothered. So he had to write down my name, my DOB, and then asked what I was taking. And apparently I’m taking half the “normal” dosage of my Effexor. He wrote up a 150mg scrip, and told me to call him if it was the wrong dosage. Oi. Or, you know, your schmucks could have looked for the freakin’ file.

So, now I need to call and get the scrip changed. He says he’ll call the pharmacy. Mind, they don’t have the scrip, so I don’t know how he’ll do that. And if I give them the scrip, they’ll fill it. But I won’t have the chance to take it to the office for quite a while. Wheeee
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Happy Mother’s Day, Kiir! 11 May, 2008 at 5:38 pm

Last year was Kiir’s First Mother’s Day. (Did you know they make special mother’s day’s cards for that? I didn’t, so I didn’t get her one last year for it :/) But DK was only about a month old at the time, so while I got her flowers (and my mom, and her mom, and my grandmother, and BOTH of her grandmothers (holy hell wtf was I thinking??? even cheap sets add up!!!)), really, it barely counted.

So this year is her first “real” mother’s day (and when he’s like 5 and wants to make her breakfast in bed, that will be her first REAL mother’s day, I s’pose) (and wouldn’t you know, I didn’t think to get her the card again this year … oops ;wonder if they’ll still have them at Target tomorrow :o). So for Mother’s Day, I got her something special. Peace and Quiet.

DK and I left ~11 to go get the oil changed in her car (it’s only been 7500 miles or something, and like 7 months maybe?), and the itinerant bits there (35$ oil change ended up out 200$ ; some of it was stuff they’d wanted to do last time, too ; they did however skip the tire rotation after telling me I needed new tires instead (we skipped that followup errand :o)). Then lunch at Fuddruckers (mozerella sticks & fish&chips, although the fish was LOUSY ; mostly I wanted the milkshake for the next part of our journey)

Drove out to South Mountain and picked up milk for me & dk (our weekly home delivery hasn’t been fully setup yet, so I’m guessing this week that’ll process and we’ll get next week, but he needs milk in the meantimes). We were gonna stop at my Grandmother’s on the way back, but missed the exit or something, so we just came back and went shopping at Costco, then hit the liquor store (that was for me, though, not kiir ;) )

Target for various essentials (like the new Word World video for DK and bubble bath), and decided to stop at EBGameStop. Picked up Boom Blox for Kiir (I promise not to play it for at least 1 month, so she can get some enjoyment out of it before I play it every night with babe and she gets tired of it (I ruined Blue Dragon for her, and she won’t touch Lost Odyssey now either after me playing every night with DK)), a PC game called “The Guild 2″ which DK picked out, and a spare WiiWheel. (Whiil?) That’s so we can play together, as an excuse. Realyl it’s so DK can steer one and I might actually be allowed to control my Karts :o

All-in-all, we were out of the house for a little over 6 hours, so she got that all nice and quiet and peaceful and unassaulted :o Now we’re home, though, b/c it’s dinner time and things are closed now :o

And the games keep rolling 10 May, 2008 at 12:17 pm

So … I cancelled my EQ2 subscription earlier this week. Desmond’s been being a bit clingy, so I end up sitting on the floor playing something so he can take my controller and harass me. I really miss my media chair. But it wasn’t designed for my fat ass, apparently, and it broke*

Kiir’s been playing (a lot of) Toontown, since we set both our accounts up as annual subscriptions when we reupped shortly after we had a new baby in our lives. It was simple to jump in and out of, and with two of us we could tinker around. She had to start a new character a while back b/c we’d been playing still on the media account from stratics. We quit playing for a while, but now she’s back playing since she can play from both her windows and mac systems, meaning she can use me to help her when she needs without needing some awkward setup around the baby. Precarious and Babies do not mix well.

In the last few months, Des has watched me playing Lego Star Wars, Culdcept Saga (Magic meets Monopoly. Sortof), Mass Effect (I wonder if shooting all those people was a good plan …), Assassins Creed (I wonder if shivving them in the kidneys was really a better idea …), Mario Galaxy, Mario Kart, Smash Bros, Catan, Carcosonne, Poker … probably more

And he basically sat on my lap sleeping or falling asleep through most of Mass Effect and Assassins Creed. But since sitting in my lap gives him an opportunity to wind down … *shrug* if he’s willing to sit, I’m willing to play some.

* — We found a new “Video Chair” at RoomStore, but we weren’t sure about the other stuff we were looking at … I may go back memorial day and get the chair, though.

Haul 18 Tonnes …. 9 May, 2008 at 12:28 pm

Last summer, right? I spent most of a week working to clear the yard. took out like 10-12 bags worth of growth, from the front yard, then another two carloads of the backyard, cutting out the Mountain Laurel, the Butterfly Bush, the other bush, etc.

And the front grew weeds before the grass seed even germinated. Oi. but the back yard did a good job of staying clear. When we were out playing with the tye-die stuff that kiir’s talking about, back in late March, maybe?, it was nice and clear. Yay it worked!

Or did it? Turns out, no. When I looked out there like two weeks later, it was all regrowing. Even the miscellaneous bush (which, admittedly, I didn’t manage to dig out completely) was back. And I was looking because I was trying to figure out where to put Des’ new Water Table toy thingie.

Looks like ~125 to put weed netting over the front and back yards. Not sure it’s supposed to be used for that much space, but I think I’ll work with it anyway. Another 100 or so for the sod for the front (because the grass seed worked TERRIBLY last time, honestly, and I don’t want to go through a lot of effort and time for no result, again ; I’d rather play with my son, frankly). Need some kind of tiller to grind up the soil, IMO, which are exoensive (500-1000, and most of them will do my whole yard in one swath … if I had the riding mower to attach them to!), or rented (don’t know the price, but I’d probably have to rent the truck, which is like 50$/hr). Lowes has a portable cordless weed-whacker looking cultivator, which supposed turns the soil an’ all a few inches deep. 100$, sounds like what I want, no?

Then we want to expand the slab patio in the back. Pave a bit more yard so there’s a surface for Des. The stones we like, looks like ~200 do do a small chunk of the yard. And the yard is apparently much larger than it seems, b/c 10×10 is less than half the damned thing! WOW! but at 2.50 for 1×1, we’re leery of doing too much :/

yaknow, I may just go ahead and get the cultivator. I have no real use past the yard project, but I think it’d cost me as much, or more, to rent something. I’ll also need to work over the weekend to dig out the remnants of bushes and trees in the back, I guess. Make sure they’re gone this time.