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Clunkers and Monkies
The sad followup from last week is that our truck is dead. We donated it to a veterans’ organization, and are making a go of being a one-car family for now. Luckily, we can probably get away with that here because I usually take the train to work. The only obstacle to that plan is that I am working on the campus in Schaumburg one day each week this semester, to which there is limited public transportation, so I will very likely have our car for the full day each week. Still, we should be able to manage alright.
Hakan’s health woes appear to be over for now. His eyes cleared up pretty quickly with our regimen of eye ointment and oral antibiotics. He liked the antibiotic because of the fruit flavor, but the eye ointment was not as much fun. We had to open up his eyelid and get a little bit of the ointment in there so that it could spread as he blinked. He was very brave about it, perhaps encouraged by the promise of an M&M candy after each successful application. The strange thing was that after there was no more need to apply it, he insisted that I do it. We’d finish his oral antibiotic, and he’d say, “Oh, we need to do my eye medicine!” I’d tell him that we did not need to any more, because his eyes were all better, to which he would respond, “Oh, but we just need to do it!” I relented and we did one more round. Luckily, the next day he did not insist that we continue.
We had an unusually warm and sunny day yesterday. We hadn’t seen the sun for what felt like ages, but it was out all day, and kept things in the cozy 50s. We took advantage of the situation and went to the free admission day at our local zoo. We weren’t the only ones with that idea, but it was well worth the crowds.
We even timed it just right (accidentally) to arrive to see the polar bear getting fed some fish and lettuce. We used the opportunity to point out to the kids that even bears eat their greens.
I had a productive first week back in session. About 50% of my students have taken other courses from me before, so I hope that’s a sign that they enjoy my style and not that my courses are too easy or something. In any case, I enjoy not needing to memorize names from an entirely new bunch each semester.
Now that the kids are all better from sicknesses, we have high hopes that we’ll get more hours of consecutive sleep soon. It’s been pretty rough with all of the interruptions.
Merritt continues to keep us on our toes with his exploration of every square inch of the bottom 24 inches or so of our home. He can now climb into the bathtub unassisted, forcing us to block off the bathroom and now other areas. He’s been slowly trying out letting go of supports as he stands, and he lasts about 2 seconds before losing his balance. He’ll be running around chasing his older brothers in no time.