Friday I left the girls with Sue for the weekend and headed out with Shawn. It was nice that we actually got to spend our anniversary together, even if all we did was eat cheese and crackers with lunch meat.

When we left SuperChic was running a fever of 103, but she wasn’t vomiting. Not knowing how long it would last we didn’t worry to much. Of course Saturday ,orning she started vomiting and was only able to keep down some liquids.

Sunday evening when we got back I was greeted by an exhausted Grandma, and wound up tween, and a lethargic SuperChic. Her fever came and went, but never got over 103. We loaded her up in the car, took her home, and put her in our bed.

Monday morning she woke up fairly happy and without a fever, but in it’s place was a rash on her face. As the day progressed so did the rash. By evening it had spread to her chest and upper back. She had a bath, with bubbles, probably not the best thing for her but it made her smile. After four days of I feel to yucky to smile smiles, it was nice to see a real one. After her bath we settled in one of the chairs and watched a movie. Then it was bedtime.

Tuesday morning she woke up with the rash extending all the way to her feet. After looking through the Mayo Clinic book and a few calls to Sue we figured out that it was probably Roseola. We called the doctor, left a message, a nurse called back a few hours later. Based on what I told her she agreed that it was probably Roseola. The good news is that it’s not dangerous, and doesn’t require anything more than Tylenol to help with the discomfort.

Since SuperChic was passed the feverish point her biggest complaint was that she itched. A dose of Benadryl and 20 minutes later and she was fast asleep, and so was I. About an hour or so later Shawn woke me up and we carefully pried my body out from under hers. I think she slept for another hour once I got up. The wonders of Benadryl.

SuperChic goes to the doctor in a little less than hour. The rash is almost gone and she should be able to go back to school on Friday, maybe.

Yesterday Rapunzel turned 11. We went to Disneyland.

Today SuperChic woke up with a fever of 102.8.

Now I’m getting ready to go out with Shawn again.

See you Sunday!

Yesterday SuperChic was pushed down by another girl, we’ll call her D1, on the way home from school. D1 constantly calls SuperChic names at school and on the way home so it really didn’t surprise me. Rapunzel chased after her and grabbed her by the shoulders telling her that she needed to apologize. D1 then started punching Rapunzel in the stomach.

D3, a friend of D1 and her brother D2, started hitting Rapunzel with his water bottle. Then D2 hit Rapunzel in the face with D1’s back pack, causing Rapunzel’s lenses to crackle like the paint on an antique dresser.

The school district has a “no combat” policy. Everyone involved, except SuperChic because she didn’t fight back, were suspended for one day. Lucky for Rapunzel her field trip wasn’t until tomorrow. She probably wouldn’t have been suspended but the one girl who was on Rapunzel’s side and saw what happened had to leave before the VP was finished talking with everyone. It came down to D1 and D3 against Rapunzel. Two to one, the VP had to side with them when they said Rapunzel grabbed D1 by the neck.

While the suspension sucks, I’m very proud of her. She never hit anyone, even though she wanted to. The VP and Principal even apologized that she had to be suspended along with the other kids.

The school says that they’ll pay to have Rapunzel’s glasses replaced or repaired, but I don’t know what to do about it. She was due for new frames and lenses anyways. We were going to have to wait a few weeks to get them, but it was time. Do I have the school pay for them or just take care of it myself?

It’s 12:30am Saturday and I should be sleeping, but who needs sleep when there is another night owl in the house? Not me, that’s for sure. I think it has to do with the fact that the last few days have not been good days for me and having someone to talk to, about anything even if it’s unrelated is a stress reliever for me.

My day was hijacked yesterday and then again today. I’ve spent the last week trying to get things done for Rapunzel’s birthday and instead spent hours on the phone trying to figure out what’s going on with Shawn’s disability insurance (which is a whole new post on it’s own) and when he was going to be home.

Being told over and over again that you’ll be home on Saturday is great except when your family plans on leaving town Friday night, and they want to send you back to Phoenix, meaning that you’ll be home some time Saturday, but no real idea of when.

I know that Shawn has a job with a pretty unreliable schedule. They can’t say you can go home at 5 because who knows where you’ll be at 5. Even though he basically goes from LA to Phoenix the times are always different for getting and delivering a load. You can’t predict traffic accidents, if the scales will be open, if the trailer will have a flat tire or a broken tail light. All those little things add up to more and more time that it takes to get home.

Throw a dispatcher that is not your own, because it’s the weekend and things that were set in motion are suddenly stopped, thrown out the window, and than ran over for good measure. Night/weekend dispatch isn’t good for anything but testing your patience and blood pressure. I know you think I’m exaggerating but I’m not, really.

When drivers have an empty trailer they’ll say that they’re hauling motorcycle doors, sailboat gas, and dispatcher brains. Dispatchers are quite frequently guys with some sort of schooling, so they’re smart, but they know next to nothing about actually driving a truck. It is a rare thing to find a dispatcher that has driven before and knows what really goes on. So when you have a great dispatcher, like Shawn does, and then he gos home and you have to deal with the “Other” it’s quite frustrating.

The “Other” doesn’t care that you don’t pick up your next load for 24 hours and you want to go home because you only live an hour from the terminal, and your car is parked 20 feet from you. No, they want you to stay there. They also don’t care that your load was overweight so you had to go back to the shipper and have them unload the trailer and then reload it more evenly. All this means that the hours you had to drive the load at least party way to where it was going have now been spent 15 minutes from the terminal.

Is any of this Shawn’s fault? No. Did he tell them how to load the load? No. Did “Other” actually do anything productive like tell him to take his load to the terminal before he ran out of hours? NO.

All of this did not help my mood today. Lucky for me Shawn took matters into his own hands and just drove back to the terminal before he was out of hours.

I know that sounds weird so I’ll explain. A driver has 11 hours that he can drive for the entire day. He can drive it all at once or in spurts but he can’t drive more that 11 hours. A driver also has 14 hours in which to do his loading/unloading/driving in. At the end of the 14 hours he has to take a mandatory 10 hour break. (10+14=24)

Here’s an example:
A driver starts driving at 12 pm.
At 4 pm he stops for fuel and checks his lights. He has a burnt out headlight. He goes to the shop.
They don’t finish his truck until 12 pm.
At 12 pm he starts to drive again.
At 2 am he has to stop for the day and take a 10 hour break. It doesn’t matter that he’s only driven 6 out of 11 available hours. He’s been up working for 14 hours.

For some reason “Other” can’t comprehend this. Considering that it’s their job to understand how it all works and make sure that the drivers have enough time to get the load to where it needs to be on time, they mess up a lot. It’s bad when a driver has to tell a dispatcher he can’t deliver a load because his 14 hour clock is up and they say, “but you still have hours to drive.”

All those things combined put me in an excellent mood. It’s a good thing I’m medicated, because if I wasn’t I wouldn’t have wanted to be in the same room as me. If I could have taken a second pill today I would have. It was just that bad.

Lucky for me we made it to Bethany’s house in one piece. Though there were definitely a few mumbled growls coming from the driver, who was not Shawn, on the way down about traffic, and commuters, and people tailgating, and cutting me off, and would you just stop riding my @55 already I can’t go any faster than the car in front of me, and I can’t get over because there’s a whole slew of cars in the other lane, people.