Despite vowing to catch up on life this week, I still appear to be treading water, so this blog post finds us still in the midst of the flu.  It wasn’t pretty…

Monday:

I started the week writing my blog into the early hours of Monday again, with the guy over the back fence accompanying me by blaring his music at full blast! Friday or Saturday night would be more understandable, but why on a Sunday?!  Antisocial is an understatement!  So I had a grumpy husband, full of flu, calling the police at 2am!  Surely if we keep calling and logging the disturbances, they have to do something about it?!  Anyway, it finally stopped around 3am, or I was so tired I became deaf, so I managed 3 peaceful hours before my alarm rudely jerked me awake!  Will I ever start a week as fresh as a daisy?  Probably not.

So Ian and Mia stayed at home in “La maison de snot” and Ian rang me at work mid-morning to inform me that Mia had woken up at around 10am!  Was he kidding?! Nope!  How annoying that she had been up at 6am on the weekend, but Monday morning she can have the world’s longest lie-in! So unfair! 

I had a pretty frustrating day at work: I drove to a school to pick up assignments to be greeted by no assignments, so it was a wasted trip!  I was fuming, but was advised by a colleague to sleep on it and send an email in the morning when I had calmed down.  Of course I ignored the advice and sent a ranty email, if only to make myself feel better!  I quickly got replies apologising.  Still no work, but at least they’re sorry at the very least!  And now think I’m a psycho!  Hopefully they will do their work in future then!

While I was out on my wild goose chase, I got a call from Ian, who was at the supermarket checkout with no bank card! I’d borrowed it yesterday because I’m still waiting for my new bank card to arrive in the post, and forgotten to put it back…whoopsie! GH was not amused.  He came to retrieve it with a substantial amount of side eye!?

I spent the majority of the afternoon realigning tables in documents, printing documents and binding documents, which was as fun as it sounds.  I hit a metaphorical wall around 3:30pm but zombied my way through to 5pm somehow.

I had decided to cook the patients an uber-healthy dinner, packed with garlic, to try to aid their recovery.  I opened a new jar of sea salt and the top burst off, dropping half of the contents into my dinner pot!  Ian helped me scoop the majority out and we tried to eat it, but it was like eating the sea.  Foul!  Even the dog wasn’t interested!  An epic fail of a dinner!??

Tuesday:

Ian got up mega early to cough and bang around in the kitchen, so I figured he was going to work, way before he was ready might I add, but there is no telling stubborn husbands, who clearly don’t understand the concept of sick pay, or not spreading germs!

I was looking forward to a lie in following Ian’s 10am yesterday.  Bloody 6:30am Mia decided to make an appearance today!?

I looked at the calendar: “Wow! It’s the first of August, Mia!”

“Yay!” Jumping around like a loon.

“Why are you so excited?!”

Stops.  “Oh. I thought it was a good thing!”??‍♀️

To be a kid again and get ridiculously excited for no apparent reason!?

I had a few errands to run in the morning and thought it was a good idea to get Mia out of the house as she was a little brighter.  The trouble with kids, and husbands come to mention it, is that as soon as they start to feel slightly better, they think they are cured and end up doing too much too soon and actually prolonging their illness!  Mia was adamant she was well enough for kindy and after a couple of hours out in the fresh air was zonked!

Not tired at all! Just catching flies!??

I left her in the garage with the door open for this nap, as I knew if I tried to move her she would wake up in a foul mood and she was there for two hours!  I eventually heard a “What is going on?!” so went in to enlighten her!?

When Ian got home, I realised he had cultivated a bit of a “Max and Paddy” beard during the flu period and, each to their own, but I’m not a fan of facial prickles.  I was gobsmacked when I asked Ian to shave it off and he actually went to do it straight away!  I should have known better!  Now instead of Max and Paddy, I had a 70s porn star!?

My husband is a 70s porn star!?

Thankfully, after a bit of pleading from Mia, he wouldn’t do it for me, let’s face it, he went and shaved the rest off!?

I dragged myself to Pilates, but I feel like I am teetering on the edge of the flu now.  It’s not fully rearing its ugly head with me yet, but I can feel it simmering!?

Wednesday

I got a decent night’s sleep but still woke up feeling drained.  Still teetering on the edge of the flu, but haven’t fallen in! Dragged myself to work, but it was another “force myself to get through it” kind of affair.  

My friend messaged me to bail on Zumba, which felt like a bit of a blessing with the way that I was feeling.  I couldn’t be bothered to cook, so it felt like another blessing when we were invited out for a curry by some other friends.  Ian was still suffering, so we decided that a curry would be perfect…except that the curry house turned out to be completely booked out! On a Wednesday?!  Disappointed, but not enough to stay home, we relocated to the local pub.  

Now I know he was disappointed not to be getting his curry and was still struggling with the flu, but I was taken aback to be called a “dickhead” by Ian, for suggesting I get the Moreton bay bugs!  Apparently I always go for the most expensive thing on the menu (in my defence, the nicest things usually cost more!) and I should have had them while we were at the Coast because, allegedly, they are cheaper and nicer (well we’re not at the Coast now and I can’t help wanting a champagne lifestyle on a lambrini budget!). 

We had a bit of a bicker (fun for the whole table!) and then I chose something cheaper, because, frankly, it wasn’t worth the argument!  Then I was told that if I downloaded an app, I could get a free garlic pizza, so did it and ended up with way too much food!  Ian refused to eat it because he was still sulking over “Moreton Bay bug gate” and both Mia and I were stuffed from our main meals, so I did what any “unfrivolous” person would do and asked for a doggy bag! I would have it for my lunch tomorrow! See, I can be thrifty!??

Thursday

Woman down!  Just when I thought it might never manifest itself fully…hello pounding head, sore throat, snotty nose and aching joints! The dreaded flu!  I cancelled my tutoring session, but it turns out he, along with everyone else in Toowoomba it seems, also has the flu!  I spent the day in bed: hot, cold, hot, cold, hot, cold…

Thankfully Mia pretty much amused herself: watching movies and playing with her new fave toy: fart goop! And there was me thinking I would miss out on all the gross stuff by having a girl!?

The face she pulled every time it made a fart noise! So cheeky!??

Friday:

Due to having so much sleep yesterday, I woke up feeling much better!  Unfortunately this was a false sense of security, as by 9:30ish, I had used up all my beans and was feeling awful again! Mia was at kindy, so I managed to struggle through playgroup more easily than if she had have been with me.  

I went to the bank to chase up the bank card I have been waiting way too long for and they said it definitely should have arrived, so it’s been cancelled and reissued again! Third time lucky hopefully!  Meanwhile I’ll have to keep stealing Ian’s!

I thought I would take advantage of an afternoon to myself, by grabbing some birthday presents for friends in the UK and an anniversary present for Ian for tomorrow!  Ian rang me to see where I was at 4pm and when I said “shopping centre”, he said “You’d better not be buying me a present because I haven’t got you one!”  Wow, he is just so romantic!  I’m not sure if it is customary to piss your partner off more than usual on a lead-up to an anniversary, but we were most certainly on a roll this week!

I got home and he was moaning that he hadn’t had time to go shopping this week with being ill and work, so I said “You can go now if you like?”  However, he had a drinking date with his workmates arranged which obviously couldn’t be missed, so he took himself out on the piss, while I seethed at home.  I’m feeling very high up on his priority list right now!?

In funnier news though, I brought the pig colouring craft from playgroup home (she doesn’t like to miss out!) and this was her creation!  “Um…what’s that, Mia?!” asked with a sense of dread.  “It’s a Cass (our dog) pig!  There’s his black fur and there’s his doodle!”   I had no response!?

Exhibit A: The Cass pig with the doodle!????

Saturday:

Woke up feeling like sweaty socks!?  Happy 7 year anniversary to us!  Forget about the seven year itch, it feels like the flu has been around for that long by now too!  We celebrated by Ian taking an extra shift at work, getting up at 5:30am and coughing and banging about in the kitchen as he loves to! I pretended to be asleep, so we didn’t exchange cards and gifts yet, although from the sound of it, that would have been a bit of a one sided exchange!?

I managed to take Mia to her swimming lesson,  but probably shouldn’t have been outside the house, not least because I hadn’t brushed my hair in 24 hours! 

I went straight back to bed afterwards and by the time Ian got home I had admitted defeat with regard to dinner plans.  In possibly the least romantic move ever, we decided to get pizza and ice cream cake and watch a movie, but we didn’t even get that far, as Ian was fast asleep on the coach by the time I had put Mia to bed!  Romance is alive and well in the Tolcher residence!?

7 years ago when Mr T actually wanted to kiss me!?

Sunday:

I had the worst night’s sleep, including a nightmare where two of the playgroup volunteers were trying to run me over!?However, I had to be up at 6am on a Sunday (why me?) because Mia had a drama workshop at Loganholme, which is approximately 1 3/4 hours drive from Toowoomba.  Mia belongs to an agency where they get her TV adverts and photo shoots every now and then.  They are very few and far between and I think it’s good for her confidence, but she hadn’t had anything come up for ages.  Then she got called to an audition for a TV show on the Gold Coast, which got cancelled due to a cancelled flight in the US.  That was rearranged but it fell on her birthday so she couldn’t do it.  So, you see, the same kind of luck that follows us around in everyday life obviously transferred to Mia’s projects, so I felt I should make an extra special effort to take her to this, as it seemed like a good opportunity.

Not even halfway there, I realised it was a terrible idea for me.  What I had thought was the flu before, was a mere sniffle compared to how I was feeling today and the further I drove, the progressively worse I was feeling!  We stopped at a McDonalds drive thru for breakfast and I found the email and clicked on the underlined address to take me through to maps.  I followed the directions and pulled up at the address half an hour early, feeling quite smug!  Except this didn’t look anything like a studio, more like your average house in suburbia!  I checked the email again and the map again…and then again…and then again just to be sure.  SHIT!  I was at the correct address, but I was in Redbank Plains, not Loganholme!  Lognaholme wsa another 45 minutes drive and I only had 25 minutes to spare now!  Aaaaaarrrrrggggghhhhhh!  Foot to the floor, I tried to achieve the impossible, but the traffic was now building up since it was later and I eventually got to the correct address in the correct suburb 15 minutes late! Great start!

It is probably worth mentioning that I had been feeling much worse as we had been driving and I almost gave myself a heart attack when I caught sight of myself in the mirror when we pulled up!  My eyes were bright red and puffy and had swelled so much that my actual eyes looked like slits in a red mottled face with a bright red, sore from too much wiping, nose and my throat was so sore and swollen, my voice was all husky and lilting!  I staggered into the office looking like an extra from the Walking Dead and signed Mia in.  What a great first impression!  I made my apologies, but because they had already started and were filming the kids, Mia was whisked away from me and her face was like a little fawn in headlights! I felt terrible, but parents weren’t allowed to stay, so I had to just walk out of there and leave her behind.  “It’s alright”, I told myself.  “Sink or swim.  This will be good for her!”  

I, meanwhile was rapidly sinking!  I made it to the nearest shopping centre and bought some cold and flu tablets and then just sat in the car for an hour and a half before driving back to pick Mia up!  Unfortunately, then they wanted to showcase everything they had done with the kids, which any other day I would love to see, but today I just wanted to get home to bed!  I sat through it feeling like I might spontaneously combust, while some crazy little girl, who had taken a shine to Mia, practically had her in a headlock under the guise of a cuddle and her mother had her face in her phone and was oblivious!  In the end, I got so fed up with her, I whisked Mia up and sat her on my knee so she was out of the reach of “over affectionate girl”!  At the end, I tried again to apologise to the lady running the workshop, but the way she looked at me made me feel like a leper, so I explained I had flu and took complete responsibility for our tardiness.  I don’t think she cared either way to be perfectly honest, but Mia was buzzing with excitement, so that’s all that matters I suppose!

“Can we go somewhere nice for lunch, Mummy?” asked Mia.  I actually wanted to cry I felt so ill,  but we did need to eat and make sure her energy was used up before our drive home, so I strayed to follow signs for a tourist drive.  As the majority of my decisions, this turned out to be a mistake, as it was way too long for someone whose head is being bashed by hundreds of tiny hammers inside their skull!  

We eventually arrived at a place called Redland Bay, which had a pretty cool pub with a great playground, live music, outdoor seating area…on a normal day, it would have been great.  Mia ran off to the playground and I tried to look inconspicuous.  I had my sunglasses on and the amount of sniffing I was doing could possibly have led people to believe I was a massive junkie, but the alternative if I took my glasses off was looking like I had myxomatosis, so I stuck to the druggie option!

I decided I couldn’t be so public feeling like this, so we ended up in Subway instead.  Mia was upset until I told her she could have a cookie!  Bribery is a must when you are on the verge of collapse!

Driving home was hell!  My body was now aching and shivering and my eyes would barely open.  I stopped at services to get a can of red bull and it was 2 for $5, so got both.  It turns out I needed both to keep my body and mind barely functioning and get us home in one piece!

We walked through the door, Ian took one look at me and said “You’d better go to bed!”  I clearly  looked just as bad as I felt!  Over and out for the count!