We realized after the fact that nobody could appreciate what we went through last night without physical evidence. There are a few little spots on the door's honeycomb blinds, but if you don't know where to look, you probably won't notice them. Even the smell is mostly gone. If you don't know what you're smelling, you might think it is just the new bunkbed and shelves that have a slight odor still.
So where do I start. I guess it begins a month or so ago when Dave's cousin Denney's wife Johnnie announced her surprise party for Denney's 40th birthday. They recently moved from their lifelong home state of AZ to a suburb of Chicago, so the surprise was a trip back to AZ to see friends and family. We were invited to the family party on May 17th at around 3 pm to see Denney and Johnnie and hear how well she pulled it off. Since we had plenty of advance notice, we figured it would be no problem to be there.
Well, Dave's original call week in April was postponed waiting for the hospitals to give him privileges (since he changed practices he had to jump through a bunch of hoops for some hospitals he hadn't been with before). It was postponed until this past week, which meant that he needed someone to cover for him for the party since it is 2 hrs away. He found someone early on so everything was great until he called yesterday to say that he could no longer cover.
So Dave, already tired and stressed from his first week of call, then had to decide who else to inconvenience to cover any emergencies for him. He really didn't want to bother anyone, but he really wanted to go to the party.
In the meantime, Elaine had two birthday parties and a swim meet to consider. Alex had a birthday party that we had already RSVP'd no to on account of the surprise party. So, it was a busy weekend and I was pretty stressed. I hadn't planned on taking all the kids to the swim meet, but had to throw them all in the car last minute to get Elaine there on time. Liam was still in pajamas. I threw some leftover pancakes and go-gurts into a cooler, filled the water jug, grabbed all their swim gear for the party in case we didn't have a chance to go home first and off we went.
Liam fell asleep in the car on the way. That should have been my first clue that something was not right, but I was so preoccupied with the stress of scheduling the day that I didn't think much about it. So I dropped off Elaine and spent some time driving to a gas station and filling up so that Liam might wake up happier and not make me hold him for 3 hours. Fortunately when we got back to the meet, he woke up fairly chipper. I got him dressed and we went to the wonderful park with three playgrounds adjacent to the pool. Jeremy was a little mellow (clue?), but he has had a head cold with a really stuffy nose and it has made him grumpy.
Elaine swam phenomenally well, by the way.
We went straight from the meet (now it is 1:30 pm) to Fry's to pick up dessert for the party, then to Elaine's friend's house 3 hours early for her party and dropped her off (thanks, Noell), while calling Jimmy and Melissa to coordinate a caravan up to Mesa, which we were not entirely sure yet that Dave was going to be able to do.
We had time to go home and spend 20 minutes debating if Dave should take his own car (he did find someone to cover for him in case of a dire emergency, but many emergencies are not dire, merely needing assistance within 2 hours by the time they are prepped for procedure, etc.) We decided to tempt fate and drive together in one car.
We met up with J and M, J passed us a walkie talkie while we waited to flip a U to get on the freeway, and off we went having an enjoyable if sometimes unintelligible conversation with the green minivan in front of us. Liam fell asleep which was not surprising in any way.
The party was fantastic. The kids had a blast with their cousins at Bart and Suzy's house. They have a wonderful great room with a spiral staircase up to a loft which was an endless source of fun for all the kids (age 9 and younger, 12 kids, I think). And of course the pool was fun. The adults had a great time reminiscing about their experiences and escapades with the guest of honor.
My third clue should have been that Liam didn't want to eat much, but he was in great spirits.
We left at around 8 pm, deciding we'd better not push our luck, since all of Dave's calls so far had been relatively minor. (Which reminds me of a funny story about Chelsea and Matt's improvised Clue Charades game . . . more later.) We drive without incident (other than taking the I-10 west turnoff instead of I-10 east and having to drive a few extra miles before turning around . . . oh, and being stuck behind a police car bizarrely weaving back and forth with his lights on keeping us going 10 miles an hour in a 45 mph zone while lanes went from 5 to 4 . . . what was up with that?) listening to the Barenaked Ladies children's CD "Snacktime" until we get to Picacho Peak. Then, Dave gets a call about a woman with a chicken bone stuck in her throat at TMC.
Just then, Liam starts to whimper. I recognize the signs, but I'm too slow to completely prepare for the surge of stomach contents escaping his cute little body. I do capture most of it in his blanket, but there is a fair amount on the seat next to him, in his seat, on his legs, on the floor, and on my arms. We are still 30 minutes from home. But not even from home because we have to pick up Elaine from her party (it is a sleepover, but not for her.) I try to call to see if someone can bring her to a corner so we can save time (for 2 reasons . . . Dave needs to get to TMC, and we are going crazy with the smell.)
We can't get in touch with Noell, so we pick up Elaine from the house (10 pm). I shake out the blanket in their yard and use wipes to clean off Elaine's seat, my arms, and the floor, then we continue home in putrid silent suffering.
The instant we get home, Dave takes off for the hospital. Elaine gets Ben ready for bed. I bathe Liam, convince him to use my old yellow afghan in lieu of his blue one, get him to bed, help a crying Jeremy (another missed clue) put Afrin in his nose, and start to work on the vomit damage. I end up taking the carseat completely apart and washing the pad with the blankie and clothes. Then I'm disgusted by how gross the carseat is (It is Elaine's original carseat) and wash it as best I can. I think we are retiring it and moving everyone up to the next seat. I vacuum all the junk that fell out of the seat when I was taking it apart.
Now it is 11 pm. I'm pretty energized from working, and I want to put the blankie in the dryer before I go to sleep, so I catch up on the Office online, and putter around a little bit. A few minutes before Dave gets home, Jeremy comes in muttering something incoherent. He is shaking. He says he feels like he is going to throw up. This should have been the major clue, but I am obviously tired beyond reason and don't take note. Nothing happens and he feels better after I give him some Tylenol. He goes back to bed.
Dave comes home and is too wired to go to sleep, so we watch a rerun of a Top Chef episode until we hear the patter of feet. Jeremy announces he has thrown up. He says it wasn't much, just a little on his ladder. Dave says, "let's wait until the episode is over" (he loves Top Chef . . . we really want to know who is leaving.) All the clues are finally coming into place for me and I jump out of bed hoping Jeremy is not minimizing the damage.
The smell hits me as I pass the computer. I flip on a light in his room, and cannot comprehend what I am seeing. Did you ever see the X-Files episode where a room has been cleaned from some sort of horrible "sewage disaster" that the ceiling fan blew everywhere? That was my first thought. "Where did all this come from and how did it get where it is?" was my second thought.
I see not a little bit of vomit on the ladder . . . rather I see vomit dripping from every rung into the open trundle drawer full of clothes and onto the floor. I see splatters of vomit on the window blinds, the door's honeycomb blinds, the walls behind the bed, behind the toy boxes, on the toy box upholstered lids, in the open toy box, all over Liam's bedding and guardrail, on the bunkbed ends . . . (refer to previous post with pictures of the clean room if you want).
90 minutes later, after hosing things down outside, wringing out towel after towel, changing sheets, emptying every article of clothing from the trundle drawer into the washer (earlier load into dryer), and finally mopping every square inch twice (including the bathroom), Dave and I finally dropped into bed in a daze, musing about why on earth I didn't send Jeremy to bed with a bucket after he tried to throw up the first time.
Now I am home with Jeremy, Ben, and Liam, while Dave is at church with Elaine and Alex. Sigh. What a weekend. Now I've got to finish up the laundry. Ickk. The moral of the story is: keep buckets attached to bunkbeds OR keep a camera handy at all times.
