Sadie’s Leg, Part 2

Posted on June 18, 2010 by

Just a followup, since I didn’t post what happened subsequently yesterday.

We saw the same orthopedic guy Sadie once saw to have her walk/gait evaluated on doctor’s concern. He looked at the X-rays and pointed out the spot, which is both clearly visible and not large. It’s near the top of the large lower leg bone, and is something like a tiny hairline that doesn’t appear to go far into the bone combined with a buckle into a bit of a point.

To our surprise, she did not get a cast yesterday. The ER people did a superlative job on her splint, so nothing needed to be changed in the meantime, and Monday we go back for a fiberglass cast, which allows enough time for any swelling there may be to have happened first. Good thing we no longer have the original dental appointments in Boston on Monday!

Speaking of which, the cast will be on for a minimum of three weeks (or, as Sadie said, “three weeks!!??”), which puts us close to the time of the rescheduled and expanded dental appointment in Boston for all three kids, on Bastille Day. I may have to reschedule that now.

Work missed me badly, yesterday, more so because another guy was also out, though that didn’t directly affect the worst problem. Ripple effects: Someone I work with was unable to go to her day job as a result of Sadie’s injury, and some packages did not get onto their delivery trucks.

Anyway, so far I have had to carry Sadie everywhere. Otherwise she sits, leg propped up, making the recliner ideal. It’s been kind of a style-cramper for those who work late and use the living room after work, having Sadie camped there. The bad thing is the doctor passingly remarked that I would continue to carry her once she has the cast, so nothing would really change. While I was unsure if they’d give crutches to a kid so young, Deb says she’s big enough. We’ll see what happens. That would make things easier. Even if not, being in the real cast should allow her to sleep back in the bed. Just that I’ll have to put her there, where she normally puts herself to bed after I have gone, since I need to be early even to get a few hours of sleep. Speaking of which, even without the heat and the roof being worked on here today, with Sadie immobile, it’s going to be hard for me to nap during the day. I could face a lot of days of 3-4 hours total sleep, except the weekends (Sunday and Monday) when I can generally get a full night worth.

The other two kids have been remarkably good so far, not climbing on the recliner or doing anything that might hurt Sadie.

This whole adventure brings to mind the phrase “there’s always something.”

Posted in Kids, Medical | 1 Comment

Broken Leg

Posted on June 17, 2010 by

Last night just after 8:00 I was trying to coax Henry to get into a pullup for the night, while Sadie and then he started, per usual, jumping on the bed like maniacs.

All of a sudden I hear a distinct snapping sound and Sadie is writhing on her side in pain on the bed, left leg having spasms it hurt so bad.

Based on sound and all, I assumed it was broken right from the start. Deb headed home from work. I got Sadie comfortable enough to hang in there while I read Henry to bed and got dressed to be able to leave. Deb covered home while I took Sadie, sitting across the back seat of the Buick because no way she’d manage a booster, to the ER.

I’d been up since 2:30 AM, having not managed, and oddly not missed very much, a nap during the day. It’s only 5 hours, but it’s more work in 5 hours than I ever did anywhere else, so 3-4 hours of sleep doesn’t cut it. Speaking of, I called in before I’d even read to Henry, with a probably don’t expect me due to injured kid.

The ER took forever, naturally. They’re good there, though. It’s where we took Henry for allergy attacks, once in the ambulance and once when I drove him.

She got a couple X-rays. It’s so nice she’s old enough to answer questions, showing and saying where it hurt. Everyone felt bad for her, and admired what a trooper she was. She has high pain tolerance, and even when it’s intolerable she tries to be stoic. It’s as if being hurt and showing it is weakness, and she just can’t let that imperfection show.

She has a buckle fracture, which the doctor found odd. Usually that’s something like jumping off furniture to the floor. They put her in a splint and I had to pick up Tylenol with codeine on the way home.

Just now I learned we can’t take her to the guy they referred us to, insurance incompatibility, so I tried to call my doctor. Managed an appointment with orthopedics there at 1:30 and have to pick up X-rays in Taunton on the way, since they are not in the same network. Wasn’t thinking about that when I could have gone to ER in Brockton versus the closer one in Taunton. Considered Brockton because it wasn’t so critical, but the distance still seemed important.

Looked up the type of fracture. Apparently it’s fast to heal, relatively, but that still means 2-3 weeks in a cast and 4 weeks to heal. And that assumes accurate info, that what I read wasn’t specific to arms, etc.

Posted in Kids, Medical | Leave a comment

AWOL and the Tooth Fairy

Posted on June 16, 2010 by

Poor Sadie.

A couple days ago, she lost a lower front tooth. I mean, lost it, when it fell out in an unknown place, time and manner. She had been telling me it was loose, had been excited, and I’d thought nothing of it. Had no idea it might be that close to a done deal, with the successor well underway beneath it.

Deb noticed it missing yesterday, and apparently it had been lost the day before. Sadie was mortified to have lost the tooth, and claimed absolutely no idea when or where, apart from being sure it had happened the day before, or overnight.

We have yet to find it.

Less than an hour ago, we were eating corn on the cob. You know where this is going, don’t you?

Sadie asked me why her ear of corn was getting red stuff on it.

I looked, realized it was her mouth bleeding, looked and saw a two-tooth gap where one had been gone before. Oops! It was bleeding slightly where the tooth had newly self-extracted.

No sign of the tooth, naturally. Sadie is opposed to the ossibility that she swallowed it, but hello, logic. So sad!

That’s two for two, out of the blue.

I investigated the Tooth Fairy, and got a consensus of a buck per, maybe a bonus to as much as five for a first or multiples. I also understand there’s precedent for missing teeth, or even the lack of or desire not to use a pillow. Thus I am sure as the budget allows the Tooth Fairy can come along and leave a stipend somewhere.

Meanwhile, Sadie opined that it’d be a good idea to use her side teeth as much as possible next time.

Posted in Kids, Medical, Money | Leave a comment

Blogging

Posted on March 21, 2010 by

First, I’ve increased my blogging, but most of it you will find elsewhere. Some of that is strategic, building a new set of blogs explicitly around the things I want to cover, purposefully for brand and prospective revenue building. Some of it is staleness. Hey, we were here far longer than at Accidental Verbosity, and Deb wanted a change from that after only that short time. I wasn’t as keen on the change, but loved the idea of this domain name after one of us coined (we thought) the word “blogblivion.” People still like the AV thing, but I don’t see any going back there because that more than this was really our marital blog. The timing of this place was like an unintentional demarcation point.

Because the brand has merit and it’s a revenue generator, if a dying one, I don’t plan to cease posting here altogether. That may yet come to pass. It’s quite possible to generate a few residual ad bucks off of a retired blog and Just Move On. At the same time, I don’t want or plan as yet to tear it down (more than I already did with the half-assed switch from Expression Engine to WordPress, which needs to be reversed or completed but is not up high on my huge agenda) (how is it possible for an underemployed single dad to have this many full plates spinning overhead?) completely and start fresh with a new concept. So…

I may put some of the family stuff here. Obviously I’ve slacked at putting up pictures, and I am not sure what will happen with them, except that they should go somewhere in reasonable quantity and frequency. Hold that thought. The big thing is I’d like to segue into fitting some of the new content to the name. I have a lot of blogging history behind me, and am well aware of blogs and trends having come and gone. I’d like to attempt to post about blogs and bloggers past, perhaps about blogging itself, as the place moves forward. The theme also needs updating. Bored now. Long ago. We’ll see what happens. Google hates this place currently, and I am not sure how readily that can be recovered. It’s not just ads we ran, though some of them probably didn’t help. It’s also probably the change of content when moving from EE to WP, and possibly the lack of posting. Though that has not hurt other sites at all.

Eventually I might port everything to an entirely new domain for safekeeping. At the least, I am liable to port selected posts I’ve written here or there. The pictures of kids may get their own site, for no other purpose. However…

I didn’t mention the other new blog I’ve been developing, alongside Frugal Guy Cook. It’s called Divine Hamster, a name inspired by an employee of my former big client. The content there is about kids, culture – especially with respect to kids, my memories and childhood, and the memories being made now as my kids have their childhood. That is why I am pondering putting some, if not all, pictures of the kids there, or at least posting some of the cool art they (mainly Sadie) create. I’m still working out the parameters and hitting my stride there.

For now, it is my intention to keep blogging, and increase it, at Bizosphere (business, economics, jobs) and Reality Bucket (intended for politics and a touch of stuff like culture and economics, with a snarky edge). I love the names/brands involved, even though they may take some rebuilding and recovery. I’m more focused on the others, though. I’ll blog somewhere on a general and personal level. There are a couple options I not only already have, but that are well respected by That Which Would Not Be Evil. I am ambivalent about both, and both need sprucing up or more. I moved Carnival of the Capitalists, which gets too little attention but does happen periodically from links I accumulate of my own accord.

I don’t have plans to do any tech blogging. Which seems silly, with Geek Practitioners pretty popular for advertising and not in the doghouse. I seldom feel inspired to post along those lines, though more than I had been. I don’t anticipate getting back into that as a field, though I have had doubts given some outbreaks of tech gibberish people have been amused and mystified by lately. The place will sit there bringing in revenue without further intervention for a while. I don’t like the domain, and the historical accident of it being a .net instead of .com bothers me. The .com was supposed to be a business and the .net was supposed to be the affiliated/feeder blog. Then I changed the business name. Then I de facto went out of that business too, for all the site remains in place, awaiting other plans and getting me near daily spam calls from an SEO service. If I decide to tech blog again, I am liable to start something new, with a name I prefer, even if I do import all the old content.

The big thing is to produce content. Write and write and see where it goes. I already know that money can be made from building up the blogging. If that juices the writing, which is something I can do, increasingly so, alone in the house with the kids (and less one kid for part of each weekday, come September), perhaps it leads beyond mere blogs. It’s hard to treat it like a job when so much else vies for my attention, but that’s the trick… for job I love values of “job.” I’m trying to spread the content around logically, without totally abandoning what I’ve already built, but also building some excitingly new aspects that are all my own.

Posted in blogging | Leave a comment

Frugal Guy Cook

Posted on March 12, 2010 by

Of possible interest to the person or two still reading and in case you missed this, I have started a new food blogging concept to replace the old Married Guy Cook. Now it’s the Frugal Guy Cook. Besides food and cooking, it will incorporate shopping, saving money, cooking for fickle kids and coping with allergies.

Check it out, and by all means, links are welcome.

Posted in Food & Cooking, Medical, Money | Leave a comment

Where are all the pictures? (Updated -Fixed!)

Posted on March 3, 2010 by

If you happen to peruse through here or the old Blogblivion that was never fully ported from Expression Engine, you may notice pictures of the kids are gone. Mostly. Argh!

Once upon a time, when it seemed there was far more space on the web hosting account that has elhide.com as its root, my original one, than on this account, which has accidentalverbosity.com as its root, I started storing the pictures on the other account, linking them from posts here. Just required whitelisting this domain for hotlinking. Looks like I started doing that in 2006. In part of 2009 I recall switching back to here, due to role reversal. Went so long between posting pictures, though, I reverted on the last one because it was easier. Thus the post below for Valerie’s birthday without a picture (as of now).

Recently there was a brief spate of outages for this server, which went away, only to be followed by massive outages of the server hosting those pictures and various sites. I felt as if I broke the camel’s back, because it started, as far as I could tell, as soon as I setup my new Frugal Guy Cook blog over there Sunday. Before I did that, I backed up all three hosting accounts, which I do every 1-2 months. There is a utility that compresses and downloads the stuff for you, and can restore from the downloaded backups. Alternatively one might do a straight download of everything via FTP, which I wish had been a habit, even rarely.

They ended up migrating everything on the server that hosting account had been on, which I’ve gone through before and is not generally a problem. Or not a serious one, anyway.

I gathered what must have happened. But my blogs were gone! At least, the ones I checked, including the new one. I started investigating. Here’s what I know so far, sans another reply from support, which at last report had recopied my files and sounded like I should be all set.

The root of elhide.com was there, but the entire /solo folder was gone. That was my original, premarital blog, which had become a postmarital blog. It would have been hard to recreate, being in pMachine, which is ancient and no longer available. Luckily I had a recent copy of the whole thing, so that was fixed. Some of the blogs are there, worst problem being one of them has errors from widgets that aren’t even being used, due to a change of permissions due to the server change. The legacy XTreme Computing site is gone. Married Guy/Daddy Guy Cook is gone. Some various files and folders are gone, like ones with pictures from Las Vegas.

Probably hardest to fix, pictures from 2007, 2008, 2009 and the one from 2010, and possibly part of 2007 but haven’t drilled into that – at least the 2007 folder is there with some in it – are gone.

Well great! I made a backup Sunday. When I wasn’t sure when or if the host would be able to restore things, I tried my first ever restore from the backup I’d downloaded. It took forever, and in fact I snoozed a little while it was happening after work this morning.

That didn’t help. I found some stuff I hadn’t looked at before was up, but I think it always had been. Just didn’t look closely. I’d seen that the add-on domains existed, and I’d see the mySQL databases existed and seemed to have everything at a quick perusal. Which is why the old pMachine blog was fine once the files and folder were replaced.

Eventually I wound up opening the backup files on my hard drive, starting with that recent one. What they contained was what was on the hosting currently! I spot checked all the way back to late 2007 and found the same thing in all the backups, obviously adjusting for the fact that some newer things wouldn’t have been there in the older backups.

It’s as if some of the files/folders flagged themselves “don’t back me up” and proceeded to exclude themselves!

Which would be bad if it happened to the utility customers can use to create backups.

What’s truly scary? If the same thing is affecting backups by the host. Whatever they restored from clearly lacked all those same files. The question is whether they have another backup that hasn’t been afflicted by the same problem and can or will restore from it.

Scarier still? By posting pictures on the blogs, I always figured if the building burned down or something, if we lost all the computers, if no pictures were left in our hands in digital form, we’d still have what I had posted.

Anyway, if we’re toast, I’ll see what I can do to restore everything. I should be able to generate a list of file names and locations from mySQL, locate and upload them in possibly even a semi-automated fashion. Either that or I’ll have to start fresh, but go way back. I was thinking of all pictures going forward being at a new location anyway. Just didn’t plan for there to be a disaster associated with it.

Update:
This is why I love my hosting people. Turned out a single corrupt file apparently caused backup failure. All the files except the one have been manually copied from the retiring server to the new one. There is some tweaking associated with a server change that I will need to do, and one single picture from May 2007 is now missing unless I replace it, but otherwise I am back in business. Yay!!

Posted in blogging, Geekery, Kids, Pictures | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday

Posted on February 24, 2010 by

To blogger Dennis the Peasant, who is 53 today.

Posted in Birthdays | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday

Posted on February 24, 2010 by

To blogger Sarah Dwyer.

Posted in Birthdays | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday Valerie!

Posted on February 21, 2010 by

Valerie is 4 years old today! Four years and a couple hours ago she was our least eventful of the three arrivals. She seemed so mellow for a while! Still, no amount of tempermental could ever make me regret my angel girl.

Now to go make the strawberry cake she requested…

Posted in Birthdays, Kids, Pictures | Leave a comment

Henry’s Allergies

Posted on February 20, 2010 by

On Thursday I took Henry for his annual allergy testing. He is still allergic to cow’s milk, egg yolks and whites, and peanuts.

They tested for bananas again, since I told them what happened the same day he got tested last year, even though my presumption was that reaction was the other kind of allergy, as opposed to “oral allergy syndrome,” which is what they test for. In the case of bananas, you can have an adverse reaction that includes them racing through your system, and that is related to latex allergy. Of which he has never shown any other sign, unless that’s what his sensitivity to screen printing on shirts also was. I believe he’s outgrown that.

He reacted modestly but definitely to the test. He is allergic to bananas.

After the incident that appeared to be a reaction to macedamia nuts – just sucking the salt of one and not chewing it – I had the option of testing for tree nuts. To make it easier, they have sets they can test in one swell foop. Tree nuts are on one along with certain shellfish. Another has the eggs and milk, and some things we know to be inert, like rice, soy, wheat and oats.

Henry can eat crab, lobster, shrimp, and of course those things we knew were fine.

He tested allergic to almost every tree nut, and given the circumstances it’s safe to call it a blanket allergy.

Every nut he has ever eaten came up positive, even making the reaction to eggs on his back look mild: Almonds, Pistachios, Cashews, Hazelnuts. It started to look like walnuts and pecans were negative, but by the time we were done, he had shown a reaction to those. The only one to which there was no reaction was Brazil nuts. And those are the ones he’s least likely even to have had a trace of, for which an allergy exists in the family, and which seem to hit especially hard if an allergy is there or does develop. I’m happy enough to avoid them. Macedamias are not part of the prick test, and would have to be done by blood test, but hello…

Then there are all the things we know he can have because he eats them with no apparent problems. For instance, strawberries. Except… he never showed any reaction to tree nuts. He’s eaten a lot of cashews in his day. Because he could. Makes me wonder if it’s one of those crazy “tests positive but seems fine” instances. Better to be safe, and figure if he got away with it, that just means it’s not so bad he can’t handle a trace.

The other things that came out of the appointment were the doctor thought it was kind of funny I asked about trying pure goat or sheep cheese (just try the soy stuff, he said) without actually saying it was likely to be a crossover problem (it can be from what I read, but not likely – depends on exact protein, which is why it’s a hard question to answer) and, very significantly, he can probably eat stuff that contains milk or egg that has been cooked. It modifies the protein. For instance, a cake might actually be fine. This is why he didn’t seem bothered by bread or spaghetti sauce that contained milk. I forgot to mention that his eating maybe a dozen M&M’s caused a big reaction. That must not be cooked to the right extent to make the milk behave. I’m mildly skeptical, but willing to try it. At least to the extent of going back to buying Hannaford bread if that is where I am when I need bread, which we have been going through at a rate of almost a loaf a day because the kids have turned into locusts. We’ll see. I’m still going to make Valerie’s birthday cake using the allergy-free recipe.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday

Posted on January 21, 2010 by

To my brother Wayne, who is 43 today.

Posted in Birthdays | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday

Posted on January 15, 2010 by

To Weekend Pundit Deb.

Posted in Birthdays | Leave a comment

Happy Anniversary

Posted on January 5, 2010 by

To Michael and Esther, Deb’s awesome brother and his wife. They were married just three days after us, marking six years for them, but they knew each other longer, and had a good idea what to expect even after they were in a household of their own. Very important.

They are so astonishingly good at shopping for clothes for the kids we’d be tempted to delegate them the task, if they were a postage-free distance away. At least it’s good practice for when they produce some cousins. Because our kids have just waaay too few cousins. And none younger than them.

Posted in Humor, Kids | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday

Posted on January 4, 2010 by

To Noel, my brother’s first ex-wife, who is 57 today.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Rest In Peace

Posted on January 2, 2010 by

My cousin Wanda died at the age of 47 on Wednesday. I don’t know details beyond that, but in keeping with modern times I found out online, rather than via a call, and from my cousin’s elder daughter, rather than from my mother.

It strikes me as dreadfully young, and that makes me sadder, as tends to be true of less expected and less “appropriate.”

For all Valerie uncannily resembles my father’s mother’s family (“the Foster/Washburn look”), she has often reminded me almost eerily of Wanda, who was my mother’s late older brother’s daughter (not sure if that’d be more Irving/Johnston or Tranmer/Howland, but I believe it’s the former).

There’s also one particular scene in an episode of Firefly in which Jewel Staite, playing Kaylee, looks just like Wanda to me. Enough to always take me out of the story and make me think of her. Which I suppose makes a funny sort of connection, since we only mostly jokingly considered Kaylee as a name for Valerie.

I’m actually completing this post the next day. Kids. Still have no further details, and still haven’t talked to my mother. Neither here nor there, apart from being unexpected.

Posted in Kids, News | Leave a comment

Six Years

Posted on January 2, 2010 by

This would have been our sixth anniversary. Still is, technically, but we’ll have to be serious slackers to non-celebrate a seventh.

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Happy Birthday

Posted on January 1, 2010 by

To sometime blogger Dave Browning.

Posted in Birthdays | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday

Posted on December 31, 2009 by

To my cousin Billy, who is 50 today.

Posted in Birthdays | Leave a comment

Teeth and Acid and Gas, Oh My

Posted on December 29, 2009 by

Due to genetics compounded by parenting errors and circumstance, all three kids require a mouth full of dentistry under general anesthesia to fix their teeth, relieve pain mainly in Valerie’s case, and set them up to get through to their adult teeth and do better with those. They’ve gotten better about brushing. We’ve all but eliminated drinking things with sugar, and thrown away the sippy cups. Oddly enough, the youngest was the one most comfortable using a regular cup, and most willingly ready for the change.

Valerie has massive cavities in rear molars, and has had a course of antibiotics on suspicion of infection.

She has a long history of flipping moods like a switch, dropping into full blown irrational tantrum mode for no apparent reason. That includes asking for random this or that, then vehemently not wanting the same thing she asked for. I’d wondered if she had sugar crashes and maybe had a food-related issue that way. A snack could help, after all, if she calmed enough to eat it. I’d wondered if it was a psychological thing. It was a matter of time – not much time – before I’d have asked the doctor.

Her back teeth are especially rotted.

She tends to get a strained sounding voice, almost hoarse. Noticed but didn’t give it much thought. Sore throat, maybe. Not a tendency to cough, though, or to spit up.

While she was on antibiotics, helped by her being able to distinguish and communicate more clearly what hurts, it became clear she had a major gas and heartburn problem, probably reflux. Turns out the sudden tantrum thing is a symptom. She’s missing some of the possible symptoms, but once suspected, I could see that it would come on like clockwork a while after meals, varying with what the meal was. She seems to get heartburn from some of the same things I do, so I can predict it more easily, or get it at the same time she does.

I need to find out what to do for her other than mere gas drops, which help but not always as much as I’d like. It can be almost like an off switch, though. She’ll be hysterical, let out a belch, then be fine. The whole thing got more pronounced and obvious on the antibiotics – that is, she had obvious gas, so there was no way to miss it.

She still confuses and conflates the two. I am sure she has tooth pain, plenty of it, but it appears that most of her “my mouth hurts” pain and tantrums are on account of gas and acid. I feel for her, because I know just how awful it can be when that hits. I give her a lot of latitude in choice of treatment. She’ll ask for gas drops if that is the problem from her perception. She’ll ask for ibuprofen if it’s the teeth, or if gas drops didn’t work yet and she’s frantic, which is the tough part.

Thus I’ll be glad when she gets the teeth fixed and the immediate aftermath pain of that is done. Then if she hurts the same way, it’s not teeth. Hers are scheduled first, on January 11. Sadie goes on the 14th, and Henry on the 18th. Three back to back trips into Boston in the car I am not sure will pass inspection it’s due to have before the end of December, for which I don’t have the money. Fun.

Worse than the confusion between things causing pain or discomfort, she uses “my mouth hurts” like an attention getting cudgel. That is challenging to distinguish from the real thing. Sometime, anyway. Other times it’s obvious, though not sure I could explain how.

Anyway, how weird is it to get a real post here? Time to get a shower, throw in still more laundry, maybe call the doctor about what to give her for the above, get the kids dressed, go pay my car insurance, get gas, and probably go to my mother’s to get the camera I left there and some pea soup they have for me. Maybe leave kids there and get my hair cut, but don’t think there’ll be time. It’s long overdue, though, and that would save a trip. We’ll see.

Posted in Cars, Food & Cooking, Kids, Medical, Money, Totally Random | Leave a comment

Happy Birthday

Posted on December 29, 2009 by

To my oldest friend, Judy Giorgi, who was spared from knowing me all my life by virtue of having been born nine months after me.

Posted in Birthdays | Leave a comment