Lightweight

So after THAT happened, Ezra was once again knocked back to dietary zero. Liquids only, then small amounts of bland foods, then slightly less small amounts of bland foods, and so on and so forth. 

Ezra was...not pleased. Ezra had other ideas. Ezra found my box of Secret Mommy & Daddy Valentine's Day Cake.

Caaaaake? Chocolate caaaaake? Dis one? Peas tank you welcome? 

The thing is, there was nothing in the world I wanted to give this child MORE than his very own chocolate cake. Look at his little neck! The thinned-out cheeks! His arms are toothpicks and his backbone is knobby! Child, just keep that dinner of white rice down overnight and I swear, I will pump you so full of milkshakes and sticks of butter that even Paula Deen will finally be like, "okay, yeah, even I'm getting a little judgy now, y'all."

Where my Weight Gain 5000 be at?

He cried, of course, when he realized I was serious about No Cake For You, but refused to part with the box for the rest of the night. He sat hugging it on the couch for while, tracing the lovely delicious pictures with his fingers, talking to it, a little bit. SOON, PRECIOUS. SOON.

Last night he ate a meatball with some tomato sauce. He's eaten close to half a carton's worth of scrambled eggs and all the toast in the house. Every once in awhile he still sort of stalls out mid-meal, though, so I'm hesistant to declare him fully recovered. (Also because the Fates are still up there, watching and listening, lightning bolts of plague and pestilence in hand.) 

Pediasure makes me twitchy (especially after the horrible amounts of day-glo artificial Pedialyte I poured down this kid's throat last weekend), so we're slowly trying to amp up the weight gain the old-fashioned way, with food. Peanut butter, whole milk, guacamole, good fatty oils...and all that goddamn hippie crap I drive everybody crazy with. 

But also, yes, I will absolutely make some Secret Valentine's Day Cake for you, Baby. 

His shirt doesn't lie! He could still be a kicker! Special teams, son! DON'T GIVE UP ON THE DREAMS YOUR GYMBOREE HAND-ME-DOWNS HAVE EMBROIDERED ON YOUR BEHALF!

Mother's (Not Even A Significant Chunk of a) Day Out

After finishing up yesterday's entry, I closed the laptop with a flourish, satisfied that it was the last time I would have to discuss anything related to the Great Stampedeing Stomach Illness that had consumed us all for nearly a week. I could, perhaps, finally get around to writing the VERY IMPORTANT entry about my hair that I've been putting off day after day. 

But first, I had some equally important mental-health-related things to take care of. So I stood up and got dressed and put on some makeup and grabbed my purse and Kindle and got the hell out of Gastroenteritis Dodge. 

I drove to a sushi restaurant -- the one that has the tuna dish I like but nothing the kids are willing to eat so we never go there, especially since it's three doors down from a place that serves peanut butter and jelly and Noah KNOWS IT, DON'T YOU DENY HIM THE CHANCE TO ORDER THE SAME DAMN SANDWICH HE EATS EVERY DAY OF HIS LIFE, EXCEPT THAT IT COSTS $4.95 AND COMES WITH A SIDE OF FRUIT HE WILL NOT EAT. 

And then...I just...ate the tuna dish I liked. And some soup. I took as long as I wanted. I ordered a glass of wine and surveyed the embarassing backlog of books on my Kindle that I've never gotten around to starting, and then got so engrossed in one that I ordered a second glass of wine just to prolong the experience. 

(That may have been a mistake, as the second glass simply made me extra goopy and emotional and then I started to cry over my book in public like an idiot.)

(And since I know my blog is your one-stop-source for Hot Emerging Literary Trends, lemme tell you: I have a really good feeling about this whole Hunger Games trilogy. I think it might, you know, turn out to be something of a very popular thing! Get in now on the ground floor! Party like it's 2008!)

I decided to skip the planned pedicure because I'd lingered so long at lunch, but I did wander around a CVS for awhile. I bought some hair spray.

Oh, I need to do that again. Even if it's just a cup of overpriced coffee that I could make better myself at home. Even if it's just the pedicure and hitting the drive thru. Even if it's not spending a single dollar but just allowing myself to sit on a bench and read somewhere for as long as I'd like. 

I came home awash in all manner of lame cliched adjectives: I was refreshed, renewed, recharged.

I paid the babysitter (how I love her!), checked in on a napping Ezra and Ike (my precious cherubs! angels straight from heaven!), then met Noah at the bus stop. He greeted me with a huge hug, like always, and we chatted about his day on the walk back.

I was suddenly aware of how glorious the weather was. And since I had already made the mental break from feeling any compulsion to "check in" on the Internet and email hours earlier, I suggested Noah ride his bikes with a neighbor while I sat on the stoop with my Kindle (seriously, they should like, make a movie of this book! I bet it would be v. exciting!). Ike woke up and I brought him outside too. 

I chatted with another neighbor and filled her in on some of the less-graphic details of our week of illness, that the boys were all officially on the mend, and now Jason just needs to recover from his night of misery but after that we're out of the woods. Into the sunshine! The rain is gone! The clouds have lifted and I swear this isn't the wine talking I AM JUST BUZZED ON TWO HOURS OF FREEDOM.

And then we all came back inside and I discovered that Ezra had barfed all over his bed again oh my God in heaven have mercy the end.