avocado8

Sick AGAIN

We arrived safely home—but sick—from San Francisco on Sunday night. Austen caught a cold on his second day in SF, and he passed it on to me on Friday night. For some reason the version I got was more virlulent, and... well, you probably don't want to know the color or quantity of the goo I'm now hacking up with every coughing fit. Never have I been more glad that I work at home, where I can drag my laptop into the bedroom if necessary. (And if this shaking doesn't stop, it may soon be necessary.)

As I alluded to in my previous post, I totally underestimated how much work it would be to bring Austen with me to SF, even though Hannah was there too. How do regular work-outside-the-home parents do it? The childcare handoffs and mad dashes to and from the office are ridiculous.

I was glad to have Austen with me, and it wasn't *too* hard to bathe him and put him to bed each night (even though he cried through every bath, and on Friday night he went completely ballistic at bedtime, to the point where *I* was sobbing and begging him to JUST STOP CRYING). I'm also really glad he and Hannah got a chance to explore San Francisco, and that Austen and Ellen (Jean and Sho's daughter) got not one but TWO opportunities to play together. But for all that, I'm not sure I'd do it again. I guess it depends on the length of the trip, and whether Al is coming with us or not, but at the moment I'm thinking no.

Incidentally, we'd already decided before this trip that I'd be going to the Vancouver Tournament alone this year; now that Austen's walking, it's too hard to watch him at hockey games, and it'd be no fun for Al to chase Austen around all the time while I played. Plus, it's just damn expensive (not to mention difficult) to get from Philadelphia to Vancouver with a toddler. We decided we'd rather use the money to send Al on a weekend by himself, doing something he wants to do.

Anyway, at the moment work and sleep are my highest priorities, but I'll upload the few photos I took in SF (mostly of Austen rather than of the city itself) to Flickr as soon as I feel better.