Now I Know How Charlie Brown Feels

Poor Chuck. I feel his pain.

Today as I was walking Austin to his class, a big bunch of heavy snow fell off of a branch above me and landed right on top of my head. I couldn't believe it. As I was shaking it off and thinking it was kind of a Charlie Brown moment, another load on the next tree tried to get me. Luckily, with my cat-like reflexes, I dodged it and it only got my shoes and shoulder.

Later, in the grocery store it wasn't really our day either. Halfway through my list, Austin started complaining of a stomachache.

"Will you be okay until we're done?" I asked him.

"No, I want to go home."

"Are you going to throw up?"

"No, my stomach just hurts."

I quickly scrambled to get the essentials; milk, bread and apples. I really hate grocery shopping so I didn't want to have to come back later.

"Can I get a few more things?"

"No, my stomach really hurts."

"Do you need to use the bathroom?"

"Yes, I really need to go."

So we rushed to the bathroom. I had the nice lady at the Play Place watch my cart.

He used the bathroom but (how do I put this delicately?), not as much came out as I was hoping. Not enough to help his stomachache anyway.

He then proceeded to sit on the bathroom floor, stark naked from the waist down. I thought I was going to have a heart attack. I was mentally making a note of everything we were going to have to sterilize once we got home; him, his clothes, socks (why did he take them off?), etc. (He had also dropped his ever-present colored pencil in the corner of the stall. I had to pick it up for him. I then added myself to the sterilization list.)

We got him put back together and washed our hands and headed back to our cart. I asked him if I could get some more groceries and he started to cry. I took that as a no. I did ask if he thought he was going to throw up and he again said no.

We got in line to pay for our groceries. Austin ended up spread eagle on the floor on his stomach in front of my cart. Germs were the last thing on my mind. I just wanted to get him home in case he really was going to throw up.

We paid and I hustled him and the groceries to the car. Luckily I still had some towels kicking around in the car from the Activity Day that we used them for. I strapped him in, handed him a towel and told him to just rest. He was asleep by the time I loaded the car and got us home.

At least I'll get some time alone while he sleeps, I thought to myself. We got home and I hurried to make a little bed on the floor of my bedroom, complete with more towels in case he threw up. I carried him in, got him settled in on the floor and started to unload the car. By the time I had the second load in the house he had popped up and was in the kitchen asking what he could eat. He said he felt fine and that was the end of that. I'm not sure what was really going on. He's acted normally since he got up.

I am a little unhappy that I only got half of what I needed. We'll see what we end up eating this week.

The last episode of my day (so far) happened after I dropped Ally off at karate. It's only a mile or so away from my mom's house, so sometimes I head over there to help her do things or drop off or pick things up. Today she wasn't home yet from town, so I parked in front of her house. The walk wasn't shovelled all the way to the road, but there was one set of footprints. Since the snow is pretty deep, I tried to walk in the prints. I'm not sure what happened, but somehow I ended up slipping and sliding way down into the ditch, with snow up to my waist and all the way up my back. It was wet and it was COLD! (But it was soft, so I didn't get hurt. That was a plus. Hal reminded me later that there was re-bar in that ditch, so I was lucky I didn't get impaled.)

I wanted to come home and eat some Easter candy to make myself feel better, but it was on the part of my shopping list that I didn't get to buy.

What would Charlie Brown do?