The little angel is determined to keep me from recovering from bronchitis. Okay, she's not that vindictive, but it feels that way.  Last night, for instance, she wanted to party all night long. I have no idea why.  I don't know where she gets her energy - perhaps she has a secret Ecstasy stash of which I am not aware.   This was last night's screenplay:

8 p.m.  The baby is so tired she could die. Can't even finish more than half her bottle. Too tired. Pooped. Mama, put me to bed.

3 a.m.  Cry, cry. Someone come in and look at me. Remember how you rocked me when I was sick?  Do that again.  DO IT!

3:30 a.m.  No, the rubbing-the-back thing is NOT the same as rocking. ROCK ME!  Okay, at least look at how cute I am as I race back and forth in my crib and la la.

3:45 a.m. Hey, Dad, where are you going?  COME BACK!!!!

3:45 a.m. - 4:15 a.m.  SCREAM.....CRY CRY CRY CRY....cough cough cough....SCREAM....SCREAM SCREAM CRY SCREAM...cough cough...cough...choke...lalalalalalala....SCREAM...cough cough

4:15 a.m. - FINALLY!  Where have you been?  Didn't you hear me calling for you?  Now ROCK ME!  (At this point, the little angel has the aftershocks from crying - those little tear-filled hiccups that make me want to rip her from her bed and rock, rock, rock, but no...I will be strong.  I can feel Dr. Ferber smiling at me.  When she was sick, it was okay, but now she's not sick anymore...oh, be strong!)  I rub her back for three minutes and leave.

4:50 a.m.  SCREAM!!!  CRY, CRY....cough cough....SCREAM....sigh....silence.

5:30 a.m. Alarm goes off.  Oh, yeah, I wanted to exercise this morning after a week straight of lethargy.  I peer wearily at the clock, disbelieving it is really time to get up. Consider staying in bed.  Feel fat.  Get out of bed and head downstairs for Pilates.  The cat, who did a chorus with the little angel around 4:45 (she's nocturnal), looks at me like I am a big sucker.

7:15 a.m. Drag the little angel out of bed after she has slept through me flipping on the lights and picking her up.  She's tired?

8:15 a.m. Drop the little angel off at Oz.  She immediately puts her head down on the table and closes her eyes.  Lucky dog.

8:30 a.m. I'm driving to work.  Cough, cough, cough...sniff...cough, cough, SCREAM.

Wonderful mother went home yesterday.  I returned to work, compared horror stories with the vice president who was, perhaps, even sicker than I last week.  I even was able to teach my class until the point when I became overcome with coughing and let them go home a bit early.

This morning, I woke up to my new, silent world (I can't hear anything but the blood pounding in my ears - actually kind of peaceful.  Hey you, annoying co-worker, I can't hear you) and, despite the pressure threatening to split my sinuses like hot-dog casings, felt almost cheerful.  My throat no longer hurts.  I have slept nearly through the night for two nights in a row.  I might even get to leave my house this weekend.  It might be okay again soon. 

My boss once said two particular weekends were her bookends of crisis.  I know when mine started, but I haven't seen the other one yet.  I hate to complain, but lately, it's what I do best.  Here are some highlights from the past week.

Wednesday, Feb. 16 (Kansas City)  Not feeling well, I learn at the airport that our vice president has been flat on his back in bed, sick as a dog, for days.  Literally unable to move.  I am coughing already at this point. I mumble feebly, "Hey guys, let's change the subject, okay?"

Wednesday, Feb. 16 (Cambridge, Mass.)  Sinuses triple-compacted from two-leg airplane flight. Throat definitely sore, not ticklish. Have trouble finishing wine at business dinner. Something is definitely amiss.

Thursday, Feb. 17 (Cambridge, Mass.)  Hack my way through nine-hour meeting held in small, airless conference room.  By 4 p.m., have reached Epicenter of Disease.  Co-workers start to look alarmed and sit further away. D. gets me a cup of tea.  No one is making jokes any more.

Thursday, Feb. 17. (Cambridge, Mass.)  That night in hotel room, seriously consider getting in cab and looking for emergency room. Throat nearly closed off.  Pain is almost surreal. 8.5 on a 10-point scale.  Call my mother and cry with what voice I have left.  No sleep for the weary.  Use one box of Kleenex and one roll of toilet paper blowing nose for hours on end. 

Friday, Feb. 18 (Cambridge, Mass.)  Co-workers even more alarmed at my morning appearance. In airport, can't tell if people are talking to me or not. Doze in haze of pain through three hours of plane rides, pausing to wince in pain as I physically feel the pressure rise up and down in my eustachian tubes during take-off and landing.  Cough up significant amount of icky stuff in airplane bathroom every hour.  Yes, some blood.

Friday, Feb. 18 (Kansas City) Drive straight from airport to urgent-care clinic. Wait three hours. Get breathing treatment and prescription for antiobiotics and inhaler. It's bronchitis, just as I suspected. Thank God no pneumonia.

Friday, Feb. 18 (Kansas City) At pharmacy, pharmacist tells me he's never heard of the nurse practitioner who signed prescription. I cry and beg him not to send me back. He takes pity, tells me I'm the sickest he's seen out of 200 that day at pharmacy.  I win the prize.

Friday, Feb. 18 (Kansas City) Husband leaves me alone with little angel for 30 seconds to unload my bag from car. I am unable to attend to her. Instead, crumple on the bed and cry for my mother.

Saturday, Feb. 19 (Kansas City) Little angel feels hot at breakfast. I'll say - she's got a 105 degree temp. Little angel goes to the doctor with her father as I attempt to hide stuff so This Old House can get shown to another couple who won't buy it.

Saturday, Feb. 19 (Kansas City) Little angel has another virus on top of ear infection on top of cold. Still, lungs are clear.  Yeah.  She writhes in pain in the front seat as we wait for stupid couple who won't buy This Old House to vacate, wondering why we bother. With any of it.

Saturday, Feb. 19 (Kansas City)  I am now wearing a mask to protect husband and daughter from Worst Disease of Life.  Daughter is listless and feverish, actually fushia at one point. This weekend might break me.

Saturday, Feb. 19 (Kansas City) During lukewarm bath to bring down fever, little angel projectile vomits on three entire towels and me. I'm still wearing the mask.  It catches my tears as they pool and drip from the bottom. Wonder briefly if tears carry germs.

Saturday, Feb. 19 (Kansas City) Mother calls to say she can't stand it anymore and is coming to save us.

Saturday, Feb. 19 (Kansas City) Little angel wakes every hour on the hour to cough and cry. Beloved and I take turns comforting or sleeping.  Recovery from bronchitis may be slower than hoped, but at least throat now feels normal and nose is reponding to massive amounts of Eucharin lotion to keep the skin attached.

Sunday, Feb. 20 (Kansas City) Mother shows up. Little angel's fever breaks.  Mother makes family food.  Consider asking mother to move in permanently, then remember father can't iron.

Sunday, Feb. 20 (Kansas City) Despite happy day, little angel sleeps in one-hour increments until 4 a.m.  Need some additional medicine on top of antibiotic, Tylenol, Benedryl, saline spray. Now need something for cough. How long does it take to toast a baby's liver?

Monday, Feb. 21 (Kansas City) Call pediatrician, who recommends different types of cough syrup. Triminic = little angel crack. Note to self:  try cough medicine during day, not during night first time.  Work from home. Mother tends to little angel. Wonder if quitting job is viable option. 

Monday, Feb. 21 (Kansas City) Friends and co-workers begin calling, wondering if I've moved to another country.  Hope to be back in land of the living soon.

I think I mentioned I'm headed east this week. I leave tomorrow, just as Kansas City has morphed into a balmy paradise of mid-winter sunniness.  I'm sad to miss it.

Yesterday, I realized it was Valentine's Day only after my friend S. got a lovely batch of flowers from her honey.  I did remember it was V-Day in the morning, when the little angel and I left our cards for my beloved on the counter before whisking off to Oz, but by midafternoon, I was no longer feeling the love.

Around 2:30, I got called into my boss' office so that another manager could tell both of us about how her people think I never listen to anything they say. I believe the word "brainwashed" was used.  I'm not sure when I became the living dead, but it was, so to say, a wake-up call.  ha.

After this fun-filled afternoon, I seethed my way back over to Oz, where the little angel awaited me.  She was wearing her new pink shoes.  She put her head on my shoulder when I picked her up. She did not accuse me of starring in a zombie musical (a new genre of film to which my friend L. introduced me yesterday).  I love her more than my coworkers.  I decided she could win for the day.

The little angel is escaping from Oz.  The $150 in various daycare waiting-list applications has finally paid off!  She will entering the Emerald City on March 7, sans obstacles.

I'm happy and sad. I'm happy that she is escaping the threat of the one-year-old room at Oz (I actually have grown fond of the grandmas in Infant II, but I'm freaked out by the standard-stereotypical-daycare-worker-types in Pooh's Pals, or whatever it's called), but I'm sad that this comes at a time when we're trying to move. She may not be there long. However, it could be a sign from God that This Old House really WILL NEVER SELL, and he's throwing us a divine condolence prize.

I've been thinking more about that silly episode of The Apprentice last night.  Now, working in Corporate America, I know that show is all about product placement.  Did you know that the companies featured each week actually pay The Donald BIG BUCKS for the right to let ten or twelve glamorized interns muddle up their advertising campaign, product design or restaurant management?  I guess in my head I figured that was the case, but a few months ago I found out it was a fact when the show approached my employer, who said, I'm sure in a very Kansas-City-conservative-type voice, "Ah, no."

But last night was ridiculous.  Okay, the apprentices didn't do a good job coming up with the commercial for Dove. It was, in fact, a little like watching Skit Night at horse camp in Guthrie Center, Iowa.  However, I don't believe any of them came from ad agencies, even if oops-I-got-fired-Kristen's boyfriend is a director (of what??).  Still, the fact that in the boardroom both Donald and Caroline turned to face the freakin' camera and extol the advertising genius of Dove corporate (who just hired a really expensive agency - it's not like they probably thought that one up on their own) and then go so far as to AIR THE CLIP in the middle of the backstabbing boardroom scene was just too much.  They took it too far.  Let me believe that those companies were just entertained by the thought of being on television.  Let me think Donald really does just play golf with execs from various Fortune 500 companies with advertising budgets larger than the GNP of Zimbabwe.  Donald, you've gone too far.

We're getting ready to experience our first Valentine's Day weekend as new parents.  Tonight my beloved and I were discussing our hot V-day date.  The conversation went something like this:

Me:  Well, since you've been out of town all week, we should go out to eat for Valentine's Day this weekend.

Beloved:  Yeah.  Can you believe they tried to pass off a cucumber to sell Dove on The Apprentice?

Me:  But I'm afraid everywhere will be mobbed. And we'll have the little angel.

Beloved:  A cucumber?  For soap?  For tea, maybe.

Me:  Tea?  We'll want to go somewhere where we can get in and out before the little angel's bedtime.

Beloved:  You can put cucumbers in tea.  My grandma always did.  Sun tea, anyway.  Do you think she'll eat if she has something to look at?

Me:  (ponder whether or not we should strike the little angel blind in order to achieve satiation)  What about the Rainforest Cafe?  That's really romantic.

Beloved:  I could use a new suit.  I only have one suit. 

Me:  I need a baptism gift for our new godson, J.

Beloved:  I'll bet they wouldn't use a cucumber to hock suits.  Well, maybe in Boys Town.

Me:  I think cucumbers are more of a girl thing.

Beloved:  Maybe we could go to the mall.  Then we'd already be near food.

Me:  Yeah, food courts always say "Valentine's Day" to me. 

Is the romance dead?  Not really.  I have to admit, though, these days romance is having enough sleep to stare lovingly at each other as Cheerios are flung.  Romance is letting each other have enough time to use the restroom. When it gets really hot, sometimes we say good night to each other in a complete sentence.  Ah, parenthood.

My beloved just got home from a trip to Georgia. He's been there since Monday. My wonderful, selfless mother came down to help me out while he was gone, since I was supposed to teach on Tuesday night before the three-inches-of-snow-that-shut-the-city-down arrived.  Bless her heart, even though I got to high-center my way home and play with the little angel instead of busting one of my students for plagiarism on Tuesday night. Stay tuned for news next week about that one.

Next week, I have to go to balmy Cambridge, Mass. for a business trip.  I'm sure it will be a delightful trip, because it's always fun to go to New England during the winter to discuss tax season.   

At first, I felt horror at being asked to leave the little angel overnight for the fourth time in her first ten months. The first three times were for fun - once for a baby shower in Chicago, once for a wedding in Omaha and once to go skiing - but this is the first time evil Corporate America has pointed its paycheck revolver at my feet and started shooting.  The more I thought about it, though, the more I thought it might be okay. After all, I usually hog all the fun parts of parenthood. This is not to say my beloved doesn't help - he does, better than 99% of the other fathers I have observed - but he usually does the grunt work. He wipes the bathtub out after the little angel and I have splished and splashed.  He does the laundry while the little angel and I merrily throw pop-a-blocks all over the rug.  He wipes off the highchair tray after I clap, clap, clap when the little angel shoves a peace of green bean in her mouth.  I don't mean to hog them, he just sits back and lets me take the lead.  And I do love those times - they are the most fun, the farthest from work, the best times to make her laugh that happen all day.  It's only fair he should get to have them once in a while. She adores him, and daddy-daughter time is important.

Of course, I also won't feel so horrible if he is the one that has to get up with her at two in the morning after leaving me for three days when she has a head cold.

Hey, we can't always be pure.

The little angel went through a period during her ear infection when she would scream as though the hounds of hell were nipping her toes whenever she saw the bathtub.  We thought perhaps she was ruined for life, would have to go directly to stand-alone showers by the age of two, never able to partake in a reality show featuring a jacuzzi.  However, the end of the bubble gum-medicine parade coincided last night with the return of her love for the bathtub, if not the feeling of warm water being poured directly on her head.

As I made "ribbit, ribbit" sounds and lambasted her with water from her new bacteria-laden friend, the squirty bath frog, I wondered what she thinks when she is in the bath.  I can't wait for her to be able to talk.  Does she wonder why she's subjected to it a few times a week?  Is she cold?  Does she like watching the rivulets run between her fat little toes?  Do baths feel good to her?  How about the towel?  Is it too scratchy?  Fun?  Does she realize her hair is wet or dry, or that she even has hair?  What do babies think about when they are bathing? Usually adults stew on their problems.  She doesn't have any Kafka-esque scenarios to ponder.  WHAT??