I sneezed this morning and pulled a muscle in my back and could not be more annoyed about it. It's not terrible, but it's definitely going to prevent me from doing my S & C class* on Monday, which really sucks, because I was finally ready to attend full-time again, now that my finger is on the mend. But no. I sneezed and felt a sharp pain shoot through my body, emanating from my left lat, and I knew instantly what was going on, because it's happened before. Goddammit, that's me out for at least four days.Then I had to go sit in bleachers with no back support for two hours, which certainly didn't help.
*That's strength and conditioning, to those of us who do S & C classes.
It's just been that type of week -- one disruption after another. I just want things to get back to normal (even though there really is no such thing). For starters, work has been uncharacteristically busy, as we are trying to get a product out to market ASAP, and a lot of the bug-fixing falls on me and my team. Then I had three appointments for my finger (two therapy sessions, one follow-up with the orthopedist), and although it has gotten much better, it's still not 100%, and the doctor recommends at least another month of occupational therapy. Then I got a cold, and then I hurt my back because I sneezed because I have a cold. On the plus side, we had family plans during Lil' S2's baseball game this morning, so I didn't have to fight him on it.
The in-laws were here this week, which, let's just say, doesn't not add to the unsettledness. It used to be a big help having them come in, because they could aid in childcare. But as everybody, children and adults alike, have gotten older, that's less and less the case. The kids are faster and the grandparents are slower, and it's to the point where S doesn't like leaving her father alone with the boys, because she's worried about him. He's really getting frail. He has the physique of Montgomery Burns. We have an electronic deadbolt on our front door, and he can't press the buttons on the keypad hard enough to enter the code. He'll tap it in, but the lock will only register like two of the four numbers, and then it'll time out, and he'll get frustrated and start cursing it in Kannada. Toward the end of the trip, he wouldn't even bother with it. He would just wait on the porch until somebody let him in.
And I say all this with love. Dude is getting old. That's just how it goes. It's going to happen to all of us (probably). So, we might as well have fun with it while we can. If my kids aren't poking fun at me when I'm that age, I'll be disappointed... or dead already.
They left this morning. My sister-in-law gave them a ride to the airport, while the four of us (me, S, and the boys) went to S's graduation. She's been taking night classes for the past few years and just earned a master's in legal studies. It's pretty impressive, and she wanted to do the whole cap-and-gown thing, so we all went. It was cool, but the fateful sneeze occurred immediately before entering the auditorium, and we got there just as the last of the good seats were being taken, so we had to sit in the backless bleachers. We picked a spot at the very top, so that I could lean against the back railing, but it wasn't at all comfortable. And of course Lil' S2's iPad died within five minutes of being there, because he's terrible about charging it, so he was bored out of his gourd pretty much from the get-go.
But we made it through. There was a lot of pomp -- pomp and circumstance, as it were -- but we got that sweet payoff of hearing somebody you don't know say a loved one's name and then watching them walk across the stage, while you squint and say, "I think that's them right there... no, no, the one next to that one." Afterward, Lil' S1 said, "We waited for two hours for something that was over in a minute. That was worse than a track meet!" And Lil' S2 said, "It wasn't even a minute. It was, like, five seconds." He's right too. If you started the clock from the moment S came onto the stage and stopped it the moment she left, it would have been very close to five seconds.
After this past week, I would love a nice, chill normal night at home, but that's not happening. S wanted to celebrate (she also had a birthday recently), so she invited our friends over for pizza and cake, and then their kids are staying the night. It's a great idea… for a different weekend. I so don't feel like hosting anything, and I feel like chaperoning a slumber party even less. And that always falls on me, as S is zonked out by like 8:30. But I'll keep my opinion to myself on this one (other than putting it on this blog -- don't say anything). Unless I'm going to cancel everything, which I'm definitely not going to do, there's not much to be gained by saying something. It will only irritate S, and then I'll have a salty wife on top of everything else. That would just be cutting off my nose to spite my face -- at least I think that's what it would be. I have to admit, I've never really understood that idiom.
Until next time...
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