How Not To Spend Your Wednesday

First? Don't go to bed at 9PM the night before. You just might miss an all-important e-mail reminding you to be on the high-risk perinatal ward at 10AM the next day for your second and final volunteer orientation. Because when you wake up at 7AM the next morning, and saunter downstairs 30 minutes later to feed kids and check your e-mail? You're going to be cussing. A lot. Because you have no babysitter and you haven't showered and you haven't eaten and you have no babysitter and you have to fight Atlanta traffic.

Did I mention that there's no babysitter?

So, your mom will graciously come over and take care of kid duty so that you can haul ass to the hospital. The next four hours will pass quietly with lots of uncomfortable, tired, bored pregnant women.

When you finally get into your car to go home? Your phone will ring and your mom will tell you that your youngest has green gunk pouring (yes, she will say pouring) out of his right eye. So, as you cruise out of the parking garage, you'll be on the phone with the pediatrician making an appointment for the afternoon giving you just enough time to drive home at 90 mph, stop off at Kroger for the all-important milk and peanut butter, throw the groceries into the fridge, grab the goopy-eyed kid, and toss him into the soccer-mom-mobile for a 10-minute drive to the doc.

And it's there you discover that he has pinkeye. Oh yeah, you heard me. Pinkeye, a.k.a. rampant eye crud that's going to travel through the five members of the family like a California wildfire.

Finally, it's off to the pharmacy for eye-drops when immediately afterward you will discover that a two-year-old can be really strong when presented with the possibility of having drops of liquid forcibly squeezed into his eyeballs. Yes, you'll be sporting bruises for two weeks.

And that, ladies and gents, is how you do not want to spend your Wednesday.