Tendering my resignation, effective today.

Reason #1: I am, apparently, unable to schedule appointments "correctly" with Naval Medical Center San Diego despite years and years of experience.
Granted, I am a hormonal nightmare but this morning, I was forced to succumb to tears in the middle of the Peds Sub-specialty clinic b/c they had no peds neurology appointment in the computer for Tim even as he and his mother stood before the check-in desk promptly at 8:14 a.m. for a 8:30 a.m. slot. (I made it on June 30 after Tim's trip in the ambulance to the ER) and I rather freaked out (more accurately...flame-sprayed any civilian receptionist-types in my vicinity) when the universal response was to ask me the name of the clerk who made the appointment by phone and the date/time I MADE the appointment and their social security number. "WHAT?!" As frequent visitors to this blog fully realize, I am an appointment-making machine and visit the hospital at least once per week. I thought it was good that I show up at the appointments, but apparently, I'm supposed to conduct a Quiz Bowl of my own for the hapless souls tasked to enter my info in the computer.

I'm sort of committed for about a month from now and thought if it took me another month to get an appointment, Tim would still be on massive activity restrictions and would miss his surf camp. Trivial stuff and yet waste of time, effort, etc.

For the record, I was controlled rage-mother until the poor clerk tasked to go talk to the actual MD until the clerk reported that the MD would see him by 11 a.m. The thought that we'd gotten here at 8:15 a.m. and could spend 3+ hours sitting, trapped (as Charlie would say), waiting to be worked in was unsat. After the tears rolled for a minute and after Tim responded with his signature "huh-huh" laugh at me, I started looking around the waiting room, noticing that one is here for genetics, that one for speech, that one for urology...how curious no one is HERE for the blasted 8:30 a.m. appointment that is supposedly booked by someone last-name "London". Hmmm...London is in England, which would be Britain, which could sound-by-phone or be-mistaken for Allbritton, couldn't it?

Short story (NOT), at 8:35 a.m. we were shown to an exam room and by 9:15 a.m. were on our way to continue our dreamlike existence elsewhere.


Reason #2: My eldest son has committed an unspeakable act of utter inanity.
Background: Developmental services caseworker was at my home today for 2-hours to do annual paperwork for Charlie and Tim. This is a joyous enough event but both kids were acting out. Around 4:05, the gentleman announced he would need about 15 minutes to write out "outcomes" so I excused myself to the kitchen to make my once-per-month home-cooked dinner (the oh-so-complex corn-flake chicken). Just as I finished dipping and dredging the last breast of chicken, he calls that he's ready for me. I turn to my mother, who has been painstakingly supervising, critiquing and offering other forms of narrative services while I was up to my elbows in raw poultry, and request, "Please cover that" (thinking that I was referencing the pan of chicken). I go out, sign some forms, exchange some pleasantries, and we start the farewells.
Unspeakable act: Tim emerges from the kitchen to bid adieu to Bob, his caseworker. As he ambles past me, I take note of strangely-familiar tan crumbs extending from his lips down his royal-blue shirt. I race to the kitchen, where yes, the chicken pan is exactly how I left it, only with fewer crumbs dredged lovingly across the top of 2 portions. I emit a muffled hissy shriek, "TIM...DID YOU EAT THE RAW CHICKEN?"
Bob, to his credit, opted to make a hasty departure (probably to hit traffic vice having to spend the next hour making a child services or ELDER ABUSE referral).
At this point, I go absolutely apoplectic. I race him into the bathroom, scrub his hands, stick him into the shower, brush his teeth and return to the kitchen, armed with Clorox (TM) to retrace his hand-steps. My mother, God bless her, is truly mystified at my comportment and upset.


Aunt Patty Cake smart-ass contribution: "Don't you know, Crab Queen, that she fed us raw meat on a routine basis because it boosts children's immune systems?"

Note: In fairness, Grandma MK professed to have thought I meant to cover the chicken with the remaining corn flakes -- not cover the pan with a barrier to inquisitive, hungry paws.

For the capping irony, after the chicken was overcooked to my satisfaction and the children's dinner plates served, my mother suggested that we head out during our 2-hours of respite to dine at Sushi Ota, which serves -- you guessed it -- RAW FOOD.

Reason #3: I hate cleaning, especially after the cleaning lady was JUST here. See close encounter with my hands and a Clorox spray bottle (above)


Reason #4: I can no longer take change in any of its forms.
Case in point, my cleaning lady who has come every Wednesday morning for 7 years, informed me that my morning o' cleaning would be changing to Tuesday effective next week. It was not a request or a suggestion or a favor; it was the way things are going to be.

So, in addition to my trash day changing from Monday to Friday after 13 years in mid-July, I'm now faced with another significant readjustment in our weekly routine.

Reason #5: I am, apparently, unable to control the course of bacterial and viral infections -- no matter my hypervigilance or correct administration of medication.
Charlie is still sick. My throat remains of dubious quality.
As Chicken Little (staying with the chicken motif) would chirp, "The sky is falling!"

Reason #6: Even my ability to name my own child "in a sensical way" is challenged. By, surprise, Grandma MK.
Problemo Uno: "No one will know how to pronounce it!"
Rebuttal: I raise you this little life experience of mine:
"MOY-ra, Maria, Mara, Laura, Mor-eye-ah, More-ah"??
Frankly, giving her a name no one can pronounce embedded between 2 names that are easily recognizable is a gift.


Problemo Dos: "You can't call her by her middle name."
Rebuttal: You mean like Dad (named James Michael) doesn't go by "Mike"?


Problemo Tres: "This will be a nightmare on college entrance forms."
Rebuttal: That's why they put those clever "nickname" blanks on the forms, Mom.

Problemo Quattro: Why not name her what you plan to call her?
Rebuttal: I made a deal with the Blessed Virgin Mary. If she interceded on my behalf to bless me with a girl, then I'd name her Mary. Having spent too many hours of life in IEP meetings, I paid attention to the details and didn't promise to call her Mary.
Mom's rebuttal to my rebuttal: "You could attend Mass regularly and probably circumvent that arrangement."
My rebuttal to the rebuttal to my rebuttal: Yeah, I'm just the girl who's planning to break the Mary-streak.

Aunt Patty Cake's smart-alec question, "Isn't this discussion rather sacrilegious?"
To which I replied, "Only if we weren't Catholic. We're allowed to make side deals with saints, which is why Blaise (Patron Saint of Throats & Speech Therapists) is still under consideration."


Reason #7: I am unable to deal with the apparently required care and feeding of caregivers.



The sitter who I thought was checking in with me on Tuesday did not call on Tuesday or this morning. The shift was slated for 12-7 p.m. today. Being the employer (i.e., being that the kids and I were at the appointed location of services at the agreed-upon time), I did not envision the need to initiate contact, figuring she would be here unless I heard otherwise. But not so much. So when mid-two-hour-meeting, my cell phone beeped at 3:01 p.m., I didn't suspect it would be my sitter. Cooly professional and suggesting that it was I who was supposed to have contacted her before she didn't come at noon.
By the time my meeting was over, I was living the dream of not having Salmonella-related, foodborne illness afflict my eldest. In short, so not in the mood to hear about my shortcomings.


*********************
Therefore, effective today at 7 p.m., I'm cooked. (Get it? Safe food preparation humor!) The writer bears no responsibility, liability, or other fault for any injuries sustained from others acting stupid in her immediate armreach.