Monday, March 27, 2017

Birthdays and Head Lice

I did the thing.  The thing where I wrote and wrote and wrote - telling all about my weekend. Which, truthfully, was not awesome. And then, I realized no one really wanted to hear anything about the little stupid details of my entire weekend, so I just erased the entire thing. Poof! Gone. Clean slate. Sticking to important stuff.

I'm starting over.

The very most important and significant thing which happened this weekend was that Boy-child is now an official teenager! He turned 13 on Sunday. Newly-minted and all that.

I will say that I didn't have one thing planned for him - which, as I alluded to in my last post - made me feel like the world's most awful mother. But he got to go to a trampoline park with friends and get his very first fishing license. Since he is a fisherman of some surprising ability, getting his licence was a very good thing. He is super-excited. I think he half-hopes to be asked to prove he's licensed. (So, TVA/TWRA folks - if you're listening - if you see a 4'9" blond kid somewhere in the vicinity of The Secret City, ask him to show you his license. He'll get a kick out of it!)

I did bake him a cake, though. Which, even though it kind of fell apart on me, icing and decorations hid it pretty well. I guess that's something.

The other thing which happened this weekend, which, while certainly not as important or significant, is not to be left out - and if you find it gross, I don't care - is we discovered Girl-child had head lice!

OH MY GOODNESS YOU SHOULD HAVE HEARD THE SCREAMING!

Though, admittedly, finding one has bugs in one's hair is scary, the screaming and crying was over-the-top! I tried to calm her down. I explained this was a relatively easy fix and all I had to do was go to the store and get some stuff. (Side Note: As I was kneeling in front of her, with my hands on her face assuring her she was not, in fact, dying, she said, "Mom, you have a lot of gray in your hair!" Yes. Yes I do. And you just gave me twelve more.)  I left her - red-faced and puffy - wrapped in a towel sitting in the bathroom while I ran to Walgreens.

The pharmacist there was super nice and helpful and answered all my questions because I haven't dealt with lice before and had no idea what to do. Head lice has a stigma that comes with it, but I suppose maybe not as much as it used to. I'd certainly never seen them before. But the pharmacist assured me it was extremely common and easily treatable. Where Girl-child picked up the awful critters is anyone's guess - but I have a couple of thoughts on the matter.

As we were treating her noggin, I messaged anyone I knew she'd come into contact with that day and apologized, suggesting they also check their children.

The entire process, start-to-finish, took TWO HOURS! She finally went to bed (clean sheets; the others, along with all blankets, etc, got stripped off and washed immediately) at about 10:30PM.

The pharmacist suggested I, too, treat myself. Yay. (Hear that sarcasm?) So I did. Repeating the procedure on my own head.  So I am - and truthfully already was - bug/nit free.  Even so, I've got psychosomatic itching, which, more than anything is simply annoying.

So, poor Boy-child ended his relatively uneventful 13th birthday listening to his sister scream. (Yes, he was checked, too: nothing.)

Yay for weekends! I need a nap.

TTFN
JMS

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