Dashing in to say I had a lovely time in SF and was so thrilled to get to meet many lovely Buffistas (and occasional hangers-on). Special thanks to Java cat for organizing the hike on Saturday, Deb for hosting dinner that night, and Suela for very kindly putting me up and plying me with ginger ale when it became necessary.

I know I am basically a lurker and I have met no one, but I am in need of health~ma. My mom is in the hospital with kidney failure, they are starting her on dialysis, my 7 year old son is having a hernia operation in 2 weeks, and both my husband and daughter have colds. The stress is about to knock me out.

Even though I feel like an outsider, you are the warmest bunch of people and I am constantly blown away by the generosity of spirit exhibited from each of you.

Ehm.

Hi.

I'm incredibly nervous about posting in this thread after all the debate about what is Beep-me worthy and what is not...but...I've been online so frequently since I started posting here that I thought a few people might wonder what happened if I suddenly disappeared.

I will be going dark from this Friday night the 16th to sometime on Monday the 26th (when I will be skipping what is likely to be thousands of posts) because I am leading a group of 27 high school students to England for a 9-day tour.

I request not-losing-any-kids and no-major-disasters ~ma if you can spare it. Decent airline food and going the whole trip without hearing any of the kids shout "pip, pip cheerio" or something equally embarassing would be nice too.

Thanks!

I got accepted to my Wales program! Which I'm going to in the fall now for certain. Thank god.

Also not sure if this passes the current Beep Me threshold, but....

Milk-ma requested.

Annabel had her routine pediatric visit today, and though she is in most ways a very healthy baby, she's yet to regain any of the 7-8 oz. or so she lost in the first few days after birth. (The losing the weight is normal, and many babies lose more. What's not normal is that she didn't start regaining once my milk came in.) So there's concern about my milk supply, and I'm now supposed to feed her every two hours during the day and every three at night even if I have to wake her up, supplement each feeding with formula, and take various steps to improve my supply. Hopefully after a week or so of this regimen, she'll be gaining well and we'll be able to resume demand feeding, with longer gaps between night feedings.

I feel terrible. Here I thought Annabel was fussy and insistent upon constant feeding the past two days because she was about to enter a growth spurt, and it turns out the poor thing was hungry. And while the pediatrician reassured me that we caught this well before it could harm her developmentally, I'm having a hard time not thinking things like, "What if she could've gone to Harvard t or insert other marker of extreme intelligence here , but now I've screwed up her brain?"

I am going dark-ish with a range of houseguests and baby showers. I'll be checking e-mail if anyone needs anything F2F-ish.

(tosses glitter behind her as she exits)

Not the apocalypse. Not even an apocalypse. But, if anyone's got spare test-ma tomorrow (Really, anytime after 10 est as long as there's daylight, it's probably fair game. Either that or the Level 2 people are screwing with us.), I'm taking my first krav test, and would appreciate it.

Hi All - I don't wanna wear out my welcome, but I need to ask for some more ~ma for my family.

My mom was supposed to be discharged today, so I took the kids to go pick her up. She was just returning from dialysis and had expected to get dressed and go home. As she was sitting on the edge of the bed, sorting out her street clothes, she went all shaky and then lost consciousness. It was scary as heck as we called for help. Anyway, long story short, her blood pressure dropped too low due to the dialysis and they kept her another night. We try again in the morning.

I called my father since I have not talked to him in over a week and found out that my uncle (his brother) passed away yesterday. It was the first time I have ever heard my father cry. My uncle had brain cancer and has had 4 rough years, so this was a definite case of it being both expected and sudden.

Both the kids and I are shaken, mom is doing better, and I hope my dad is coping.

I'll need some unexplained-ma for the next week or so. Call it week and a half. Just cause, and maybe one day I'll actually tell y'all why.

I have unlimited comps for todays 3pm and 7pm shows of My Old Lady at Apple Tree Theatre. If any Chicago area people would like to go, just call the box office and ask for comps courtesy of Gina Patterson.