Snow, melting, and the dentist

Surprise, surprise! We woke up to snow and ice pellets (sleet for you southern people). Guess what? The kids had school! Most of the icky weather cleared out by noon and then the sun came out so it was good that there was school. It actually warmed up to above freezing, which around here means you might need to break out the shorts. Okay, maybe not but it definitely feels good to have warmer weather. Too bad the warmth isn't sticking around. Tomorrow the temperature is going to be cold (aka below freezing). The weather people said spring is going to be late this year up here. Apparently we won't see any signs of spring until late April. Yay?

Of course, with the warm-up, the bajillion feet of snow (okay, slight exaggeration) started to melt and that snow melt started sneaking into the garage. Thankfully it was slow enough that I was able to keep on top of it and keep the garage from flooding. We have a drainage pit in our garage that catches the water but it doesn't drain anywhere. The water runs in there which is nice but then it needs to be vacuumed up. When the thaw finally goes arrive I plan on getting a pair of waterproof insultated fisherman's gloves because that water is going to be freezing cold. I have enough problems with cold fingers and toes as it is, I don't need to add to it with snow melt!

As I said, the kids had school today although only one kid actually made it to school. S came home Monday with a nasty cough. She was coughing some yesterday and we encouraged her to rest in hopes she could shake that cough. That was not meant to be. She was up twice last night because of her coughing with the second time involving a fever. I got some ibuprofen into her and got her back into bed. When she woke up this morning she had added a runny/stuffy nose to the cough. At least the fever seems to stay at bay for most of the day. So...she stayed home. We did manage to get her to rest and drink a lot of water today but that cough is still hanging on. I suspect that she may stay home tomorrow, which would be fine with me.

Why is that, you ask? Because tomorrow I have a dentist appointment - a two hour long (or possibly longer) dentist appointment. It is my first time going to this dentist so they have lots of things to do - pictures, x-rays, an assessment of my gums, teeth, facial muscles, etc. Sounds like fun, eh? All that and they won't actually be doing a cleaning at this appointment. That gets scheduled later. I hate going to the dentist. I was trying today to figure out why I hate it and it's because I've never had good appointments.

I think it started when I was young and the orthodontist put me in braces for FOUR years. Yeah, you read that right. FOUR YEARS. And that included one of those oh so attractive headgear things as well as retainers when I was finally done. Then as I got older there were three nasty root canals on two teeth - yeah, one tooth needed to have a second root canal. And then I ended up with major stomach problems from the antibiotic the oral surgeon gave me to help with second root canal on the same tooth. It took years to get my stomach back to normal.

I've had a strange deep cleaning where they pulled the gums back from the teeth slightly to clean below the gum line. Doesn't that sound fun? At least I was numbed up for that. And then there were the cavities the dentist said I had. I still question whether I actually had them or not. One thing I've had very few of is cavities at least until I started going to a dentist in Virginia. Then it was suddenly I had a bunch of cavities. It made me suspicious. And the more I went to this dentist, the more resistant I became to the Novocaine. The last time I went to have a cavity filled they had to give me 3 shots of Novocaine before I was finally numb. My mouth hurt so bad after that - not from the cavity being filled but the stupid shots.

So, if S is still sick tomorrow and needs to stay home, I'll have to reschedule my dentist appointment. And honestly, I won't mind rescheduling. I don't really want to go but I'm trying to set a good example for my kids. They have both been recently and they had very easy appointments. I doubt mine will be as easy as theirs, considering their appointments lasted 45 minutes at the most and that included a cleaning. But I will be good and go if I'm able. And if I can't I will be good and reschedule it for another day when hopefully both kids will be healthy. With things have been going, that may be a while!

The Best Laid Plans...

Yesterday afternoon I received a call from my friend. We're expecting a blizzard here Sunday, or at least a winter storm (I expect it will get kicked up to a blizzard once it starts) and her husband was scheduled to fly out to a conference on Sunday. But because of the impending bad weather, his flight got changed to Saturday at 9 am. She had hair and nail appointments set up for today for a party tonight and it was too late for her to cancel the appointments without a penalty. So she asked me if I could watch her daughters for a while so she could keep her afternoon appointment.

I said yes because I figured S would have more fun playing with her friend instead of running wild at the hockey rink. Oh yes, J has a hockey game on Valentine's Day. And we have games on Easter and Mother's Day AGAIN this year. Yeah, we had them then last year too. S was very excited when I told her about the play date and kept saying this morning she was going to help "babysit" her friend (who is only a year younger than her). Ah, the best laid plans...

I had to run out to the store for a few minutes. I was gone maybe 15 minutes and I came back home to find that S was running a fever and her head hurt. C had given her some Advil and I was able to talk her into bed because she was shivering. Next thing I knew she was asleep. Yup, she is definitely sick because the only time she takes naps is when she's not feeling well. This was at noon.

I immediately let my friend know what was going on. C had to take J to hockey at the same time I was supposed to be watching the kids so I couldn't leave S with him - she was too sick to take to the rink (and she was asleep at the time). And I was worried about taking her to her friend's house because the last thing I want to do is get my friend's kids sick when her husband is going to be out of town for the week. Our backup plan was for her to leave her youngest, who was napping, with me and S at her house while she took her oldest with her to her appointment. But thankfully she was able to get another neighbour to watch her kids.

This doesn't change the fact that I feel really bad about not being able to help her out. I know we can't control when our kids get sick. And I hope my friend isn't too mad at me - she has kids of her own and knows they get sick without warning. But I don't like letting people down when I agree to do something. I let her know I will make it up to her by coming and watching her kids one day later this week when S is better. And I'll make her some more hats because who doesn't like hats? :-)

Anyway, that's my exciting Valentine's Day - at home with a sick 5 year old while the other half of the family is out at the hockey rink. At least she's stopped shivering so yay for Advil. And there are cupcakes for the kids for later and a chocolate cream pie for me and C. I'm looking forward to it. But then maybe I shouldn't make any plans for eating it with the way my plans have been going today. Happy Valentine's Day!

Galavant

Today I had planned to do a detailed recap of Galavant. I had planned to sit down and watch the show again, taking detailed notes. Notice I said 'had planned'? S has been running a fever off and on for the past few days. She woke up at 4:30 with a headache and feeling very hot. After giving her some ibuprofen, I tucked her back into bed. When she woke up this morning her fever was down but not completely gone. So I kept her home from school today. With her home from school I won't really have a chance to rewatch Galavant. I could try to watch it with her around since most of the jokes would go over her head but there was some stuff that just isn't for a 5 year old. What follows is what I remember from the episode. If I get things wrong, I'm sorry. :-)

First, I thought it was funnier than the first episode. Our hero, Galavant, and his companions Sid and Isabella are still traveling to Valencia to rescue Madalena and Isabella's parents. They stop for a night in Sid's hometown of...wait for it...Sidneyland. Apparently the people in the town don't travel much because they believe Sid's letters home saying he is a dragon-slaying, joust-winning knight of the realm. Sid begs Galavant to play the role of his squire and Isabella, who reveals that the Valencians love theater, takes the role of Sid's betrothed. Sid's parents are thrilled he's come to visit them and even more thrilled that he is engaged to Isabella. Galavant, who has reluctantly agreed to be Sid's squire, hangs out with the other squires and realizes how much of an ass he has been (through a song no less). Galavant apologizes to his companions and they leave Sid's town.

As they get closer to Valencia, Isabella advises them from traveling a certain way. Galavant ignores her advice and proceeds to get them captured by pirates led by the Pirate King, played by Hugh Bonneville. It was awesome to see him all scruffy after seeing him all prim and proper as Lord Grantham in Downton Abbey. The pirates had been stranded on land when their boat washed ashore and are terrible at being land pirates. Galavant agrees to help them free their ship if they will transport our heroes to Valencia. The Pirate King agrees and are heroes' journey continues.

Meanwhile in Valencia, King Richard is bored. He questions the people about what they used to do for fun. They tell him about how they used to spend hours in the evenings performing theater productions. Richard doesn't like the sound of that. He asks a bald-headed man about what else they used to have and his reply is "Balls" which causes Richard to laugh like my 9 y/o son does when he hears balls. Richard discovers the man is a eunuch and encourages the people to kick him where it won't hurt. He even demonstrates how to do it when he feels some of the people aren't doing their best.

Did anyone else notice he was bald and wearing robes? Now maybe they were just playing into the stereotype for eunuchs (is there even a stereotype?) but my first thought when I saw him was they were giving a nod to Varys from Game of Thrones. Maybe I'm reading too much into it or just wishes GoT was back on.

Richard decides to host a ball but of course he's killed all the musicians. He and Gareth, his right-hand man, manage to scrape together a band composed of the executioners. Their song is truly unique. While the Valencians are dancing, Richard realizes they aren't having fun and some are even fainting from hunger because Richard destroyed all their food. He invites them to share their feelings and they call him and Madalena all sorts of names. The last person to speak is the eunuch, who says the king is so stupid he doesn't realize his wife is sleeping with the jester. Oops...

Richard is upset that his wife is sleeping with the jester. But he's not upset that she's cheating on him; he's upset because the jester is funnier than he is. He goes to the jester (whose name we find out later is Steve) and asks him to help the king be funnier instead of asking him to stop sleeping with Madalena. The jester, scared out of his wits, agrees to help Richard. But Richard is clueless and everything he tries comes out wrong. He ends up putting on a comedy show for Madalena. He tries different jokes but the only thing that makes her laugh is when Richard hits Gareth in the face with a pie. Richard takes this as a sign of success. Later,Madalena sees the jester and asks him if he wants to go to his chamber. After his encounter with Richard, Steve declines and this makes Madalena angry and she has him hauled away to the dungeon. Poor Steve!

Okay, there we go. It's probably got errors in it but it's the best I can remember.

As a side note, I usually drink a cup of tea while I write. I had bought some pumpkin spice tea back in the fall when pumpkin spice was "the thing". I hadn't had any for a while so I thought I'd try some today. Bad choice! I forgot that it was icky. The more I drank the worse it tasted. I should have stuck with my Captain Swan blend tea that my good friend gave me for Christmas. It never disappoints me! Pumpkin spice and tea just don't mix.