alligator

There's an elevator at the pediatrician's office.  My kids find this endlessly amusing, this whole "pressing the buttons, riding the alligator" thing.  You know what I'd find endlessly amusing?  Other than not having to listen to bickering about who's going to get the honor of rubbing their little finger all over the germ-smeared elevator button (the bickering, you guys!!  What is going ON with all this bickering?!  "I PRESSIN' THE ALLIGATOR BUTTON!" "NO IIIIII PRESSING THE ALLIGATOR BUTTON!"  All the way from our house to the pediatrician's office.  All.  The.  Way.  Nothing I said or did calmed this bickering.)  (Until I cranked up 90s on 9 and drowned it out.)  Anyway, what would amuse and tickle me straight up pink is NOT GOING TO THE DOCTOR ANYMORE.  Also known as, having my poor Mabes healthy once and for all and ending the madness.  Last Monday, urgent care.  Last Tuesday, emergency room.  Last Friday, pediatrician's office.  Today?  Pediatrician's office.  Because little babies?  Who throw up their amoxicillin five out of six times?   Their flu-turned-infected-ears, it turns out, get no better.  (Not even with hippie voo-doo magic tricks.)  So they continue not sleeping, they continue cranking at everything and everyone, and they end up hauled back in on Monday afternoon (when the whole crew SHOULD'VE been sleeping) to get a shot of something super druggy shot up into their leg.  And then?  Their leg hurts.  And there's a lot of fussing about that. And then?  When daddy walks in (FINALLY OMG FINALLY) at 6:30pm, I toss the whole lot of 'em in his direction like a hot potato and go lock myself in the shower for a whole lot longer than necessary.

And so also, three and four year old children whose naps are cut short because baby sister has to go to the pediatrician and, of course, the only appointment is smack dab in the final hour of nap time?  They're not very pleasant by 6:00pm.  They're just not.  They don't want to read, they don't want to do a puzzle.  They want to jump on the back of my couches and they want a popsicle and they want HALLOWEEN CANDY and they don't like no for an answer.  Not pleasant.  And neither, it turns out, am I, after all this.  I'm going to retire to my bed with a Mikearita and some mindless show and regroup.

Here's hoping tomorrow's the day when the ears clear up and the clouds part and the strange tumor-like thing on the bottom of my cat JUST DISAPPEARS.  And all that.  Because, BLAH.