Hey! It's Jess's birthday! She's two! Happy Birthday, Jess!

So, as I thought, Penny was pretty much fine for the whole rest of the day, though her appetite was a bit suppressed and she was acting a little tired.

She woke up at 5:45 this morning, and though I really wanted to just stay in bed and let her talk to her toys, I figured I should haul my ass out of bed and make sure she hadn't thrown up again.

But no, she was fine. Rolling around in the crib and talking to her toys, just like usual. Of course, it was late enough that she wasn't remotely interested in going back to sleep. But she was cheerful and happy about it. I told her it was still sleepytime, and she asked for a book. So I gave one to her and left the lamp on and went back to bed for half an hour.

Savannah's mom called us last night, because she'd heard from the daycare staff that Penny was sick (Penny and Savannah are essentially unseparable) and she told us that Savannah had been sick, too. Worse, Savannah's sleeping in a big-girl bed now, so what she did was get out of bed and go throw up in her parents'.

(Every time I start to think it might be a good idea to move Penny out of her crib, I hear a story like this and change my mind right back.)

But after my four hours of work yesterday, I went over to the spa to use up the last of the gift certificate Matt had given me for my birthday last year, before it expired.

I know, I know. You'd think I could manage to use up a spa gift certificate in one visit, never mind a whole year. I told K.T. it was like her and her chocolate-covered cherries. If I used it, I wouldn't have it anymore. But since it was going to expire anyway, that lit a fire under my butt.

The guy who was on-staff for massages yesterday is actually the same guy who does physical therapy massages for my chiropractor's office. I haven't had one from him before, but at least when he asked about my preferences, I knew he'd be able to do it. (I like very deep, very hard massages, which sounds dirty but isn't. Except when it is, of course, but I don't get that sort of massage from the spa.)

Anyway, it was lovely. He went over my shoulders twice, even, practically prying up my shoulder blades to get to all the knots that build up under there. (Which sounds painful, but it wasn't really.)

Muscles that have poor blood circulation -- including those that are tense -- store a lot of weird toxins in them. A good deep massage will force the blood to flow, which pushes the toxins back into the bloodstream to be cleaned out, the way they're supposed to be. I walked out of yesterday's massage feeling slightly nauseous and crampy from the sudden huge rush of toxins in my system. (Which sounds unpleasant, but it didn't last long and was proof of the worth of the massage.)

Better still, it turns out that the October special for the place was 25% off massages, so I didn't go over the amount left on the gift certificate by as much as I'd expected.

Better believe I'm going back. Maybe next time I'll book the deluxe hour-and-a-half.

--Liz