gonna stop posting good news

yesterday morning, dagmamma calls in sick. minor panic ensues until girl from hubby's class agrees to take er pupo for the day. At great expense. So from now on, only bad news, in the hope I can purge my demons here and they will be shamed enough to leave me alone.

Healthy, happy, hurrah

Dagmamma recovered; we have managed to stay healthy. Pray let it continue. We celebrated the Chinese New Year and perhaps the pig is bringing us fortune. Er pupo resembles more and more the porcine race, in terms of appetite and table manners. He is thoroughly happy and keeping us in good spirits with his own joie de vivre. My mother is finally out of hospital, though "well" would be too strong a word. Hopefully that will all right itself soon.
What can i add? Since times of sickness, we have been very busy working to try to catch up and keep up, and running around after duracell boy who is now so uberconfident with his vespa that he drinks and drives, uses his mobile phone and drives, and tries to take it down the stairs. (Did you spot the oxford comma? Is that the thing now? It wasn't when I was taught at school but now I see it everywhere. The Americans use it, so that can't be a good sign. But then it's the OXFORD comma, so surely that counts for something...) Anyway, the vespa: I have to hide the damn thing in the morning to prevent the inevitable screaming and turning into an overcooked spaghetto when he's told he can't take it to dagmamma. Snow has returned, for which er pupo got a sledge. He found it fun for approximately 4.7 seconds (approximately, I say, could have been anything from 4.6 to 4.8) then got bored, climed off and insisted to be carried by papá. Hmmm... it might be very useful for getting boy to daycare and back. On the other hand, all depends on will of small boy. Big will of small boy.

20 months soon, still more or less baldy, loads of cheek, loads of energy and loads of love. Wouldn't swap him.

Dear God

Whilst I appreciate that you are all-seeing, all-knowing and generally omnipotent, it has crossed my inferior and imperfect mind that perhaps you have been concentrating so much in finding beds for all the innocent souls shot to pieces in Iraq and Sudan, that maybe you have not had so much time to concentrate on the affairs of random working mothers far away from the action and nice weather. Of course, being generally omnipotent, it does occur to me that you must be able to deal with all these problems at once. But anyway. Allow me, in my imperfection, to address you.

The thing is, I am not Job. I understand that Job was a patient man whom you tested to measure how deep his commitment to you. I am not he. I am not a patient man. I am not a man, and never have been. Patience also generally escapes me. I have been a patient, but I don't think that's quite what you mean. If this is a test, then I have failed. That's ok by me, I can accept my imperfection. On this matter at least.

I think what pushed me over the brink of tolerance was the false hope. Er pupo was better; he was off to dagmamma. Hubby was still moaning about being sick; I was still sick, but just getting on with things, because that is What Mothers Do. But then, for me to have him all ready to go back to daycare and then give the evil vomiting bug to the dagmamma. That really was rough. I wept. But you know that, because you know everything.

To give me my laptop back, at small financial cost, no less, and promise me full working order. And then yesterday, to come back from class to find that it had died again in exactly the same way, whilst on standby. A little hard to swallow.

I know that no single thing that has happened this year has been awful. Rather it is the accumulation that is pushing me to the brink of the cliff with Nervous Breakdown written on the other side. I also know that, all grace and glory be to you, my worst terrors were averted when er pupo and I fell down the steps on New Year's Day.

I will celebrate the Chinese New Year on 18th February. I know that this is a heathen festival, but it's timing is based on stars and things, and since you made them, then maybe the Chinese know something I don't. Forgive me if this is but a pagan ritual. But please stop all the bad things. And get my mother out of hospital and healthy.

Allow me to fail this test. Please.

With all high respect and regard.
Expatmamma.

anything you can do

Er pupo has lost his title in the World spew weight-for-volume championship. Beaten by his very own mam, no less.
I woke around 2am Thursday with that telltale bellyache that you just know is going somewhere but you can't help hoping if you go back to sleep it will disappear on its own. It doesn't. I soon found myself with one end on the loo and another over a basin as my body purged itself of everything I had eaten in 2007.

An hour later, my body discovered some left over Christmas dinner, and felt the need to fire that out too.

Another hour later and my body had searched deeper recesses to find a light breakfast from 1995. By this point, even water I was drinking was coming straight out again. Hubby, who admittedly has not been in great health either and who is knackered from both that and his own sick son, was sympathetic enough to call a cab to get rid of me. Even in my pitiful state at 4am I could see through the pretext of "you need to go to hospital" when the truth was "you need to pee off and let me get some sleep." (The clue was: "Is it possible for you to vomit more quietly? You will scare the neighbours."

A+E must have taken me for a drug addict on arrival, but soon had me on a drip where I stayed till lunchtime. My blood pressure had dropped to that of a sunbasking lizard in Tunisia, at a nearly-dead 91 over 47. Resting. Our attempts to take it standing up were aborted; the first to allow me vomit; the second because I fainted.

Yesterday I was slightly better and at least didn't vomit, but I still can't really eat. This morning, I woke at 5am with a hint of the nausea, which is why I am now here instead of sleeping to prepare myself for another weary day of sickboy. (Bowt time he got better as well).

My one silver strand of hope was that this year would actually start to improve is that I got my mac back, and on this I send you my greetings. That hope was quickly dashed when my dad phoned a couple of hours later to tell me that my mum had been in hospital since Wednesday with a fierce viral chest thing that wouldn't clear up. She's had it since Christmas, but now it has got really bad and she just can't shake it.

So, if anyone else would like to join me on 18 Feb to celebrate chinese new year, let me know. I'm done 2007 already.

Now back to bed for about 20 seconds of sleep till er pupo decides to join us.

Oops! Sorry commentors

er... yeah, so some time ago I set this thing to moderate comments, so I wouldn't get folks advertising through my blog. And, um, yeah, i kinda forgot. so sorry posters for not posting your comments. They have now been posted and i will try to pay attention in future.

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