An auspicious beginning to the new year, for me to suddenly disappear for several days, don't you think?

Monday night, playing with Penny, I noticed she felt a little warm. I took her temperature, and the thermometer confirmed what the Mom Hand had told me - a temperature edging up on 101. We gave her a dose of Tylenol before bed, prayed, and made plans in case the Invisible Whoever wasn't answering prayers.

It wasn't. Tuesday morning, Penny was still feverish, and coughing nastily. Matt's on a tight deadline at work just now, and I had a major delivery Tuesday afternoon, so we split the day. I stayed home in the morning, and he came home at lunch.

That seems to work out pretty well for us, most of the time, actually - not only do we only have to take a half-day off each, but it means that neither of us is totally worn out at the end of the day from wrangling a sick baby all day. Though I should note that Penny remains a pretty damn good patient, wanting mostly to be cuddled.

And to watch a lot of TV. I know I was waxing poetic about the possibilities of DirecTV and TiVO a few weeks ago, but she's been begging for TV so much lately that I'm beginning to think it might be a good idea to move the TV into a closed and locked cabinet or something for the next couple of years.

But by Tuesday afternoon, she was still feverish, and the cough was getting worse, so I called the doctor. They didn't have any appointments open until Wednesday morning, of course.

Wednesday morning, Penny woke up and her eyes were glued shut from all the gunk they had been leaking all night. She didn't take that very well. Once again, I stayed home with her (more cuddling, more TV) and took her to the doctor.

"Sounds like a smoker when she coughs, I expect," the doctor said, listening to her chest. She promptly demonstrated for him, and he nodded. "Seepage from the eyes usually indicates an ear infection," he told me, reaching for the otoscope.

"But she's got tubes!" I protested.

"Well, that's good. It means there's an outlet-" He raised his voice to be heard over Penny, who hates to have her ears examined. "If it wasn't for the tubes, she'd probably have a hundred-and-three fever," he said. "Take a look." He held the otoscope in place and stepped back a little, and I gingerly leaned over to peer in.

Penny's tubes are a bright sea-green, it turns out.

"Did you see all that red?" Well, no, I'd been too startled by the plastic tubes. He rolled her head over and wedged the otoscope into her other ear. "Here, it's in this one, too." This time, looking for it, I could see it.

"So she's got ear infections?"

"Yeah, this particular strain of bronchitis seems to have a proclivity - there's a word I don't use very often - for causing them." Blinkblinkbronchitis???

He left the room for a minute so I could calm her down (she quieted significantly as soon as he was out of sight) and then came back with some prescriptions - a heavy cough syrup to help with the bronchitis symptoms, and an antibiotic to kill both the ear infections and the bronchitis.

"When will she be able to go back to daycare?" I hazarded.

"Day after tomorrow, when she's been on the antibiotic for 24 hours."

Well.

Luckily, my parents live close by. Mom came over around noon to take over babysitting, and I went to work. I didn't post a journal entry Wednesday afternoon because I had a stack of work waiting for me.

Wednesday night, we gave her the two prescriptions, well-spaced (did I mention that she'd thrown up a few times? A slightly queasy stomach from the extra mucous, plus a bruised/raw throat from all the coughing, add up to a hair-trigger gag reflex.) and a dose of Tylenol, and put her to bed and prayed some more.

Her eyes were glued shut again this morning, though she didn't seem nearly as upset by it once I sat her on the edge of the sink and let the water from the faucet drip on her feet while I cleaned off her face. And she was still pretty feverish. It's a good thing Mom had agreed to come up and babysit again.

This morning, I didn't post because I had a dentist appointment. (No real cavities, but I've got a huge crack in one old filling, so that'll have to be replaced.)

And then I got to work to find - once again - another huge stack of work. So I haven't been able to write anything until just now, mid-afternoon.

As I said: an auspcious start to the new year.

But, well, you know. My tester at work called in sick today - both her kids have some stomach virus. And the last time we talked to the Brandts, Emma had a cough. And Kris' sister's two kids have the flu. And K.T. said a day or so ago that Kevin was rather ill.

'Tis the season. We can probably expect to be home with Penny at least once a month, and probably more like twice, for the next several months.

Thank goodness for grandparents who live close by, eh?

--Liz