Turkey to Turkey

Each year the time between Turkey-centered holiday 1 (Thanksgiving) and turkey-centered holiday 2 (X-mas) is different, ranging from extremely unproductive to insanely busy. This year seems like it is leaning toward the busy end of the scale and I am not sure I have the health or energy to keep up this year.

Anyone who shares their home with a baby or young child can probably relate to the lack of energy. I've been running on fumes for a while. Like an idiot, I thought my opportunity to refuel would come in the form of 4 days off, a.k.a. Thanksgiving vacation. After all, we were only making a quick trip to a nearby city (a 3h drive) on Wednesday night and returning home on Friday afternoon. That leaves a full weekend with nothing to do besides the regular bullshit like cleaning, etc. I am pretty sure the second I thought I could use the long weekend for rejuvination is also the second I sealed my fate.

Instead of leaving for nearby city on Wednesday evening, we left at the ass-crack of dawn on Thursday morning as my husband's employer thinks the day before a long holiday weekend is an awesome time to roll out a new application. He didn't finish working until after midnight. I'm still blissfully unaware of the events to come and still think I'll arrive at work on Monday rested and ready to go. I was so wrong.

On the way to nearby city, we got pulled over for speeding on a road that we wouldn't have been on in the first place had we taken the correct exit. We also made a few stops that took longer than expected, but managed to roll into Thanksgiving lunch minutes before it was served. After we ate, the day progressed OK even though mini-xx deemed the travel crib utterly unacceptable and after a battle of wills (which she won) went without napping for the rest of the day.

That night the temperature outside was near freezing and unfortunately the temperature inside the room we occupied was only a few degrees "warmer." As a result, my three-person family ended up sharing a full-size bed. Mini-xx does not sleep in my bed at home (which is a king) because I am terrified I will roll over and suffocate her. This fear was not alleviated by the cramped quarters of the full-sized bed. I think I maybe slept 3 hours, but not consequtively.

The following day was mostly fine and we managed to not get pulled over on the drive home. We also enjoyed sleeping in our King-sized tempurpedic bed sans baby that evening. Well, except for the the fact that we were up about a hundred times due to crying. At some point I realized mini-xx was getting sick and a rapid downward spiral of the remaining days of the long weekend began. Thanks to the fact that my husband's band was playing a show that Saturday, he was busy most of the day and night, arriving home at about 4:00am Sunday. As you can imagine, he was completely useless on Sunday. Of course, it didn't make a difference since he figured out he was getting sick by mid afternoon.

At this point, I am exhausted. I haven't slept in days and I am on day two of sick baby and day 1 of sick husband (which might actually be worse than sick baby). I can almost feel my immune system waving a little white flag. I confirm this at about 2:00am Monday morning when mini-xx wakes me up and I realize that I don't just feel like shit because I am tired, I feel like shit because I am sick.

By 6:30am Monday morning, I'm sure something sinister is setting up residence in my throat, so I decide to forgo work and shuttle off mini-xx, who is feeling much better, to my Mom so that I can lapse into a much-needed medicine-induced coma. That was the bright spot of my week. Since then, I've enjoyed little sleep due to screaming, snoring and sleeping on a futon and despite working late Tuesday and Wednesday, I think my productivity was actually negative.

At this point, I'm just hoping next week is better.