Stating the Emergency

I'm going to make it an effort to resume blogging weekly.  Between the commute and the somber nature of the work I do, I never seem to have the time to write and entertain myself. No, I'm not a mortician or anything so grave (pun intended), but I might as well be because I think I might have to do a post mortem on my sense of humor at the rate I'm going.

After work, the evenings are spent in a blur of exhaustedly trying to catch up with playground politics and news of jollier offices on the home front and the weekends come and go faster than Wonder Woman's outfit changes between trying to cook for the week, running errands and *shudder* ironing. Gone are the days where I would give clothes a good shake after the spin cycle and chuck them in the dryer.  My theory was that it gets all the wrinkles out. Sadly, it does not seem to work on office attire.

The good thing about being really busy at work is that it makes the time fly by when I'm there. However, if you blindfolded some hapless stranger and walked him into our office, except for the constant beeping of security clearances to enter the premises, the fellow might feel free to pass gas loudly thinking he is alone because most of the time, one could literally hear a pin drop in my office.

Asides from all that, I got requests to blog during my commute, but I am prone to getting motion sickness if I so much as attempt to even read, let alone write or type on anything that moves. As such, I've opted to squeeze in writing on a random weekend and keep the contents of my stomach to myself.

In other news, my little offspring, Lanes, has not taken after me in the living to sample every buffet in town department at all. She would be happy to skip all meals all together. Eating is a speed bump in her plans to pounce from and conquer various pieces of furniture.

In fact, on Friday, she spent the day running around the playground in the hot sun and proceeded to come home and throw up all over the carpet in the kitchen.  Yes, I know it's odd to place to have a carpet, but it was the only hand my meticulous spouse, P, had in decorating this crazy a$$ ghetto fabulous apartment of ours. Prone to random bouts of sensibility, and having worked in insurance, I thought of it as a hazard.

I was very concerned thinking she had a bug, but she seemed to feel much better after that episode. She slept well that night, which is more than I can say for myself. I slept beside her with a bucket in my hand, much to P's horror. The next day, she ate a little and produced a lot of gas. I'm sure when she is older and reads this blog, she will make it reason number one hundred and seventy two to pull my life support.

That evening we went to a friend's house. She was so sweet, she made each of our favorite dishes. In Lanes' case, it was a shrimp stir fry.  Our little pumpkin was so delighted, she set the table and was sitting there swinging her legs in delighted anticipation. I have never seen her that excited about a meal.

We were so relieved to see her eating and even trying to scrounge some shrimp off our plates. I wanted to tell her to stop, but I let her have at it because she had not eaten properly for the last two days. Soon after dinner, she started to scratch her eyes and her head.

Next thing we knew, her left eye was swollen and her forehead was red and she had a dry cough. I told P that she has an allergy and we have to go get her some Claritin immediately.  This is where watching copious amounts of TV pays off. A few years ago, I was on the edge of my seat watching a show on allergies and symptoms to look out for.

P was trying to put a warm compress on Lane's swollen eye, but I insisted we should get the medicine right away. We rushed out leaving our very concerned friend and popped over to the nearest pharmacy.  I took Lanes in for the pharmacist to look at just to make sure we were giving her the right medication. I also knew if we had to wait hours at the ER, this will help slow down the gravity of the allergy.

By that time, both eyes were swollen, as was her upper lip and she had hives all over her face. Luckily, our friend lives right near a hospital and we rushed the poor child to the ER. The nurse there said we did well to give her Claritin. I took a moment there to be proud of my TV watching skills.

I remained calm on the outside, but inside I was doing my best Italian soap opera impression of dramatic wailing soliloquies. Meanwhile, Lanes, who has inherited nosiness from my nutty sibling, in the middle of nearly scratching her nose off, spotted someone in handcuffs strapped onto a hospital bed, behind a glass door, at the other end of the ER.

P and I were so anxiously waiting for her name to be called that we didn't hear her whispering and inquiring if all patients had to be handcuffed. I didn't realize until another patient smiled at her and told her that was only for very naughty big boys.

I tried to divert our little munchkin's attention but she was opening her swollen eyes as big as she could to watch what was going on. Luckily, because of her age and the severity of the allergy, we were seen to almost immediately.  Lanes was given some additional medications and kept for observation.

She must have misunderstood what they meant by observation because as soon as she felt better, she left her bed and was trying to watch the other patients. We were instructed to get two Epipens that night itself and to see our family doctor at once to get a referral to an allergist.

Poor little Lanes is feeling much better today. P and I are rather exhausted after all the drama. I have to miss work tomorrow to take Lanes to the doctor. Plus, with a trip to the motherland coming up, we need to do fun things like get a letter from the doctor to take the Epipen on the plane.

With that I must sign off. I have procrastinated ironing all day, and so I must go do that. More musings from BC next week...