Maui, Sept 28, 2012

Today's adventure started with a drive to Ahihi bay.  This is at the far south of Maui among the lava fields. The landscape down there is amazing--fields and fields of crusty black lava rocks and scattered vegetation.  There were some black lava goats grazing on the scattered vegetation.  I read that they were brought here by farmers but have run wild causing untold harm to the environment.  I was impressed they could survive the lava fields.  Those animals are tough.

We found our parking lot for the best snorkel bay the Killpack way by driving past it while saying something like 'we're looking for a dirt parking lot a lot like that one'. Then we had to turn around as the road got considerably more narrow (when it was already narrow to begin with) and unpaved. Luckily, our little red rental Jeep has a great turn radius.  (And a lot of head room for a tall driver. Kip is thinking it might be time to retire the '95 Sentra and buy something headier.) We got back to the parking lot, which is kind of dirt spread over lava rock.  I appreciated my fancy yet sturdy new croc sandals as we crunched across it, only slipping off their slight heal a few times. The walk to the bay was over lava rock that had been crunched under the feet of thousands of tourists and local surfers and snorkelers.  In some places it was fairly smooth, in others it was quite rough.

The bay was in two sections.  In the first, the waves were mild and people were snorkeling.  In the second, the waves were boisterous and people were surfing.  We walked out about 2/3rds of the way into the first section and looked a little lost.  The shore was made of sharp black lava rocks.  Where were we supposed to enter the water?  A nice looking local man probably in his mid 40's pointed it out to us.  He showed us the slightly-less-sharp-and-pointy area where you can walk into the water and put your fins on.  He also pointed out where the best fish could be seen and said that he takes his kids there and they enjoy it.  I wasn't sure if he wasn't also suggesting that if his young children could do this, we were lame mainland wimps to be just trying it out for the first time as old as we were.  In any case, his help was appreciated and we took off our shoes and headed to shore.

I think it's important to mention at this time that my feet are very sensitive.  They are used to soft carpet and smooth linoleum and even then usually cocooned in a fluffy-lined slipper with custom orthotic inserted.  Walking on the concrete sidewalk barefoot is torture for them, although I have to say that whoever came up with the crazy, rock-heavy concrete of our neighborhood sidewalks was a loony.  I mean, sidewalk chalk is useless on that rough stuff.  Where's the fun in that?  But the beach sand mixed with lava rock of Ahihi was a particular type of torture for my foot bottoms.  I hobbled out into the waves like a wounded animal, no doubt to the amusement of all the visitors at the bay that day.

In the water I faced the next struggle: not getting crashed up the beach by the waves while struggling into my snorkel mask and flippers.  I am certain that this again was a source of great amusement to onlookers.  The challenge of the endeavor was only heightened by the fact that my hair kept getting stuck in my mask and said mask kept fogging up. The ultimate struggle eventually was conquered and Kip and I managed to stick our faces in the water and breathe through our snorkel tubes.

We paddled for a little and suddenly came upon what people go snorkeling to see--a coral reef!  There were fish, yellow little ones (yellow tangs?) and bigger black ones with a white or blue line outlining their bodies.  There were fancy coral structures and strange foggy voids.  I think I saw a starfish once, and I know I saw pokey anemone-things.  At one point I saw a little yellow fish chasing a zebra-striped fish.  It was really neat and definitely better with the corrective-lensed snorkel mask.  That was a fine development by the snorkeling world.  And it also helped that Kip was a master at unfogging my mask.

My body, I have discovered, is built in such a way that floating is quite easy.  If I lay on my back in water, I can float almost indefinitely.  Even my knees and feet are buoyant, bobbing up to the surface and poking out of the water.  On my belly, it turns out that it is pretty much the same.  I could float with my snorkel mask in the water staring at the fish forever with hardly any effort at staying on the surface.  The effort is in fighting the current to keep from getting too far out to sea or too close in to shore.  Kip isn't the same.  He has that type of body that gravity drags toward the sea floor.  He can float, but his legs get pulled constantly down.  I feel pretty lucky.

Unfortunately, as we were swimming, the large cups of water I drank over the course of the morning made their way through my system.  I remember once on a family trip to Florida being in the ocean when Anna realized she needed to pee.  Our rental house was two blocks away and we had only just gotten to the beach for the morning.  In spite of our assurances that it was OK to pee in the ocean, she just couldn't do it and one of us was forced eventually to take her home.  I felt like Anna this morning.  Logically, I knew it was OK, but years of training to ONLY pee in potties left me trapped.

Kip and I were both tired at this point and had had a good swim, so we headed back to the shore. As we neared the beach, I considered keeping my flippers on to avoid the torture of walking on the rocky sand again, but the waves were too strong and after falling onto my hands and knees, I gave up and pulled off the flippers.  I found a mildly painful place to wait and Kip got me my shoes.  By this point I really needed a potty.  I ditched Kip and trekked back to the parking lot where I knew there were two lovely though well-used port-a-potties at my disposal.  I hadn't realized how long the trek was until taking it at breakneck walking speed back.  The little heals on my sandals kept slipping out from under my hurrying feet, but I didn't care to slow down.

I finally came in site of the parking lot only to realize that there was a port-a-potty cleaning truck parked at the potties giving each one a deep cleaning.  I laughed ironically and crossed my legs and waited.  I did a little dancing.  It was awkward since there were people sitting in the cars parked on either side of our Jeep.  If they hadn't been there I might have been tempted to use the Jeep as a shield and just go for it.  As Kip started approaching from the beach, I couldn't take it anymore and headed to the potties.  The potty-cleaner saw me and stepped to the side saying something about having cleaned them out just for me.  I thanked him heartily and went inside.  He said something about making sure of locking my door that I didn't understand.  I mean, who wouldn't lock the port-a-potty door, especially with a cleaning guy in the stall next door?  But I must say, if you have to use a port-a-potty, a freshly cleaned one really is a treat.  I don't know how they do it, but it smelled like mint and sparkled.

Once that was out of the way, we were able to get back on the narrow road and head back up to Wailea and our cozy condo.  We had a relaxing lunch there and then spent the afternoon at the Maui Ocean Center, where we got to see all sorts of fish and coral from behind glass windows.  It was definitely less effort, but I'm glad we did the snorkeling and saw them in their natural environment.  It was neat to be a part of it and not just watching fish someone put in a display for us to observe.

Of course, we didn't see nearly as much variety in our little swim.  There were turtles, all sorts of fish, and even sharks and rays at the aquarium.

We happened upon feeding time at the shark and ray tank.  They had some divers come in and give the rays treats.  They then swam around with their bellies to the glass sucking the fish into their mouths.  The female ray was gigantic!  After giving the treats, the divers got out and dropped in the main feeding of fish.  The sharks and other big fish swam around in circles selecting their foods.  There wasn't a feeding frenzy.  Everything was pretty calm.  But it was interesting to watch.

One of the bonuses from our rental car company was a free item coupon for the aquarium gift shop.  We weren't sure if we had to purchase something to earn it.  There had also been Hilo Hatties coupons for us but you had to spend a certain amount in the store for your free gift.  There, you got a t-shirt.  It wasn't fancy, but there were several choices and they weren't bad.  So we chose a couple souvenirs from the aquarium gift shop and turned in our coupons.  It turned out the free item there was a luggage tag in the shape of assorted sea animals.  Not terribly exciting, but we chose one each and called it good.

Snorkel and Luau, Sept 27, 2012

Today we went snorkeling.  It was my first time ever and I was a little nervous.  We went to Polo Beach and walked out into the surf.  We'd managed to find snorkel masks that had corrective lenses, so we were set for a good session.  We pulled on our masks and flippers and floated out.  The idea is to just stick your face into the water and look down, but whenever I felt the water over my mouth and tried to force myself to breathe I would panic.  I knew my mouth was under water and if I breathed in I would fill my lungs with salty sea-water.  I contemplated calling it quits and just hitting the beach with my Bill Bryson travel book, but I wanted to push through.  'I am in a glass bubble filled with air,' I told myself, and put my face down and forced myself to breathe through my mouth.  And I finally got it.  I could breathe with my face in the water!  And I could see!  Unfortunately, all there was to see at that particular spot was sandy water.  We found one place where there were some rocks and little fishes, but it was pretty small.  There were black lava rocks on either side of the beach, but I was nervous to head over there because of the surf.  The waves were pretty strong and I could just imagine being dashed into sharp unfriendly black rocks while trying to look at the fish through my prescription goggles. Kip wanted to play in the waves, but I get dizzy from the up and down of it all, so I headed to the beach.  It was a hotel beach with hotel-owned lounge chairs that I technically couldn't use.  I didn't feel too restrained.  I found a vacant lounger and asked the lady next to it if I could sit there.  She was fine with it.  Plus, our white beach towels almost matched the hotel-issue ones the residents all had.  I didn't feel too conspicuous.  I got some good reading done and Kip tried to perfect the art of body-surfing without a board.  He did pretty well--maybe it helps to have a long body.

Tonight, we had our luau at the Grand Wailea.  We got there a little late, but had reserved front seating and were in the second row at the front of the table.  It wasn't bad.  Our table had a couple from Vancouver BC, Seattle, Brazil, and a mom and daughter from here.  Everyone was very friendly.  I think when you visit, you must temporarily adopt the Hawaiian friendliness.  We all introduced ourselves and talked about why we were here. We took pictures for each other.  It was fun. The food was pretty good, but after finishing the buffet, I was hit with a migraine.  Was there something in the food?  It just seemed odd to hit so fast after a pretty relaxing day.  I took excedrine and watched the show.

I thought the show was pretty good.  The dancers are so smooth.  Their hips and feet move and their upper bodies stay almost motionless.  It looks pretty cool.

There was a rain goddess who did a dance on ribbons.  I'm not sure that's traditionally Hawaiian.  But it was very neat.

The best of course was the fire dancer at the end of the show.  He was amazing, throwing his fire stick all around.

Although the boy dancers doing the sit-on-fire dance were pretty funny, if not quite as impressive.

We ended the night with a group photo for Casey, the local girl there with her mom.  Kip and I get to email it to her because her phone camera didn't do a good job of it, so we took it with our camera.  I guess we made a friend in Maui!

Traveling in Hawaii, Sept 26, 2012

In honor of the fact thatwe're traveling and this blog was originally created to chronicle our travels, I thought I'd post some of my journalings from our current Maui trip. I'll add pictures later since we don't have the connector to get them from our fancy new camera onto my iPad. We're in Hawaii!  Wailea, Maui. I had a tough night.  I didn't put on enough sunblock yesterday and managed to burn.  My right shoulder is the worst.  Then there's a bright red V down my chest.  There's some blotchy paler areas from where I did manage to put some sunblock on in the middle of my chest, but some areas are definitely red, hot, and burned. In honor of my weakened physical state, Kip and I opted to hang at the condo for most of the day.  It's a pretty posh place to hang.  It's got a direct view over the rest of the neighborhood to the ocean.  Sunsets are amazing from the lanai (what the rest of the world would call a balcony of course).

The interior is very modern/island/comfortable.  Everything is recently totally remodeled and in pretty  close to perfect shape.  The bathroom is a work of art.  In fact, there is so much art on the walls that Kip and I let ourselves wander into an art shop in Lahaina. We both fell in love with a giant poppies painting that would have cost us $7k for an artists edition. Funny. So hang out we did.  Kip made us mexican omlettes with the leftovers from our first night here (last Saturday). They were good.  We played a little Milles Bournes. I cheated so I could win handily.  Oops.  I didn't mean to. Kip made his special jalepeno poppers on the lanai grill. He dropped one down on our neighbors porch and they had a good laugh when he went down to clean it up.

We had to be in Makena at 3:45 to catch a boat for the sunset sail we had scheduled. The weather had High Surf alerts, which made seasickness a concern since motion sickness in our family isn't entirely limited to Becca.  But we gave it a go. The boat sails from a super fancy hotel and golf course.  There was supposed to be free parking somewhere, but we stumbled on the valet option first and went with that.  The friendly valet gave us directions to the launch site and took off with our red jeep. (Anytime you see a jeep in Hawaii you know it is a rental.) We walked through the hotel and manicured gardens down to the beach.  There we found a little hut selling drinks, renting snokle gear, and offering expeditions to swim with turtles or the like.  A super-friendly girl behind the counter told us we were in the right place.  

Watching her greet all the people, I realized something about people in the tourism business in Hawaii.  They are extroverts.  They greet everyone like they just met one of their best friends.  Well, actually I realized later that some of the people on this particular cruise really were tour-guide-Amy's best friends.  But either way, the general feeling we've gotten from people here is one of immediate friendship.  Take the girl who rented us our snorkel gear yesterday.  We learned all about her and her 4 kids and her honeymoon in Vegas (a real one, not the show).  And we told her all about us and our kids and this being our tenth anniversary trip.  She drove by on her way home while we were eating pizza next door and we smiled big and gave each other a friendly wave.  And we really meant it.  It wasn't just, oh, she saw me looking, I'd better wave.  It was, hey, she is my friend now.  I'm glad to see her again.

So, sunset sail hostess Amy totally fit the friendly persona I've come to expect here.  She stole all our shoes (it was a barefoot cruise, of course) and met us down on the beach when everyone had been checked in.  The boat pulled as close to the shore as possible and had two fold-down staircases for us to run up onto the deck.  The choppy waves from the high surf came crashing under the boat right at the foot of the stairs.  Amy stood there holding the railing and told us when to run for it between the big ones.  Kip and I got on pretty quick and didn't get too wet.  When we were all on, Amy and the friendly bartender guy from NY/Houston pulled up the stairs.  We had a little safety talk in the cabin and were let loose.

The boat was a rectangle with big pontoons on either side and a deck all around the outside. The deck surrounded the step-down cabin with seating and The Bar.  The free alcohol was quite the hit with most of the crowd.  There were probably 20-30 of us on board and it was very comfortable.  Not overcrowded.  The crew said it was less bumpy at the back of the boat, so when they set us loose, Kip and I got sprites (wahoo--free drinks Mormon style!) and went back there.  My drink went down OK and my stomach felt good, so we moved to the very front and sat on the deck (there weren't many seats outside of the cabin) with our feet in the nets between the pontoons and the stairs.  It was a bouncy ride, but we both enjoyed it.  Every now and then a wave would smash into the boat and splash us.  I was glad I wore my swim suit.

Eventually the crew put the sail up and appetizers were brought out.  We moved to seats against the cabin windows when everyone rushed the food and talked with the barman for a while.  Down in the cabin I snatched the last shrimp (sorry, Kip!) and made a plate full of veggies, fruits, and cheese and sat down to eat.  We got into a conversation with some of the passengers and learned how Amy really was already friends with them and that this was by far the best sunset sail in Maui and that some local music celebrity was singing at a nearby Irish pub that night.  Then, the seasickness hit me.  It must have been that last piece of cheese.  It was perr-jack and I was expecting something mild and creamy. I headed out to the back of the boat and thought about asking for some of the natural seasickness remedies the captain had mentioned during the safety breifing.  It was just coming into sunset time and the captain stopped the boat so the back right side, where I was holding in my stomach was facing the view.  

My quiet area was suddenly invaded by 20+ people in varying stages of sobriety carrying foul-smelling alcoholic beverages that make me nauseous on the best of days.  Things got pretty tense.  I wasn't sure I would make it.  Luckily, I did, but I have to say I have a new appreciation for Becca and her carsickness after tonight.  After the sunset event finished, we got our disembarkment instructions and headed for the shore.  Again, Amy held the railing and the waves crashed under the boat.  I ran down and broke the rule about not jumping off the bottom because I couldn't see the last step.  I didn't bonk my head and I was thrilled to feel solid ground under my feet. So now we're home.  Kip's asleep on the couch and I've spent far too long writing about this.  I think it's time for another layer of aloe vera on my flaming red sunburn and bed.

Trip to the coast

Kip and I, for the first time since the kids came into our lives, left them and went away together to the coast for the weekend. My friend Rachel and her family came to our house Friday afternoon so we could get away. I figure we owe her BIG TIME! I had a hard time getting out the door. Becca was so sad as soon as she realized I was going somewhere without her. She got her biggest sad eyes on and told me she wanted to go too. Rachel snuggled her in front of "Robots" and told us to get our behinds out of there. So we did.

The drive to Pacific City was fine. The weather was clear and sunny and beautiful but we had left early enough to miss any traffic. As we drove through the countryside toward our B&B, we saw a man standing on the side of the road next to his truck and a gas can. We met his eyes and smiled at each other. Kip figured he must be in need of some type, so he pulled over to see what the matter was. The man had run out of gas and asked if we could drive to his friend's trailer and ask him to come bring him some gas. We got directions and headed into Pacific City to find him. It was a little out of the way, but we weren't in too much of a hurry to reach the B&B and we figured helping the guy out was a worthy reason to be later than we planned. We managed to find the trailer park and Kip parked and got out. He went to the trailer the man had indicated and an angry dog alerted the owners that someone was coming. They came out and he explained what had happened. The friend (luckily it was the right guy) was at a loss for how to help because he had no gas to spare and his breaks were shot so he couldn't drive out to get our stranded guy. Kip asked if he had a gas can that we could go put some gas in and offered to take it to the stranded guy since we had to go back that way anyway. The friend was pleased with the arrangement and sent us on our way with an old empty gas can. We put a couple gallons in and headed back toward where we had left the first guy. As we drove we thought how funny it would be if he were no longer there when we arrived with gas for him and what would we then do with the gas. I suggested we could just leave it for some other unlucky traveler to find or we could dump it in our own tank and call it good. As we neared the 3-way stop where we'd left him, we realized that indeed he was gone. The man, his truck and his empty gas-can were gone. We pulled over where they had been and dumped the gas from the can into our car so it wouldn't end up spilling on the luggage in our trunk (the stoppers were broken or missing). It takes a long time to empty 2 gallons into your tank from a can. At least, it seems that way when you're doing it on the side of the road with car after car driving buy watching you do it.

We put the empty gas can in the trunk and headed to the B&B to check in. It was called the Sandlake Country Inn and was located outside Pacific City in a very quiet area. It was surrounded by trees and fields filled with birds, horses and crops. When we walked in, Dianne, the hostess, laughed and said "You must be in the Rose Garden room." I said we were and did she know because everyone else had already arrived. "No," she said, "our tallest guests always end up in the room with the lowest ceiling." The ceiling was pretty low, but it wasn't too bad. We'd chosen that room because it had a King size bed and the other king room was already booked.

We took our stuff to the room and settled in a little. I'll admit I was a little cranky about the whole gas episode. I thought we should just give the gas can to Dianne and be done with it, but Kip wanted to return it. So, for dinner we drove back into town and, before choosing a restaurant, Kip went back to the trailer with the barking dog. They came out to see what was up and were thrilled to see Kip with the can. Apparently and truck driver had stopped at the stranded man and offered him some gas. They had traded a tool for some gas and possibly lined up some future work for our stranded man fixing the brakes of the truck driver's truck. Everyone was happy in the end. Especially when they got their beat-up gas can back. I felt better about the whole event after that and Kip and I went to the town's Pizza place and had a good dinner and a walk on the beach.


I didn't sleep at all that night. I never sleep well the first night in a new place, so even with Melatonin and Tylenol PM I ended up reading my book until 4am. Of course, the book was actually very engaging, so that probably wasn't the best thing to do to try to sleep. I was reading the current book-club book for my ward, "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society." I loved it. I finished it on Sunday before we drove home and felt like I'd lost a good friend since I no longer had more to read about the life of the main character. I wished there were books and books filled with more of her thoughts and adventures so I could keep our friendship going instead of losing it with the end of the last chapter.

Morning came on Saturday with the delivery of breakfast to our door at 9am (although I really wished I had requested 9:30 so I could have gotten half an hour more sleep). The food was really good: eggs and scones and fruit and oatmeal. I ate too much, but it was hard to leave it there because it just tasted so good!

I decided after our leisurely breakfast that instead of a shower I would try out the jetted tub with jet-safe bubble bath. Dianne had stocked the rooms with three all-natural bubble baths that wouldn't cause problems to the bath-tub jet system. She sold the bubble baths, too, so I had a moral obligation to try them out so I could decide if I wanted to buy some for our jetted tub at home. I tried out the Rain option. It smelled very fresh and clean. Unfortunately, the tub was meant for someone of less leg-length than myself and I couldn't actually fit all of myself that I wanted to fit into the bubbly water. But it was still fun.

Eventually, Kip and I dragged ourselves out of the room and hit the local market to get some souvenirs for our kids. We armed ourselves with a bag of shiny rocks for William (that Anna is jealous of), a butterfly bracelet for Anna (that Anna says she likes too, she just wants some rocks of her own since William has so very many), and some twisty crayons for Becca (that I hope she'll like when she wakes up because Kip was putting her to bed when I remembered we hadn't given them their gifts and I'm not allowed to interrupt that or Becca will beg me to take her downstairs and play with her all night and I sometimes crumple under the pressure and do it). Gifts under control, we headed for the main adventure of the trip and the one thing I was looking forward to more than anything else, a horseback ride on the beach.

I had told the woman who ran the riding group that I had taken some riding lessons before--I'd had one term at BYU and a summer of lessons when I was 10 years old. I told her Kip had never ridden. So they unloaded the horses for us from the trailer. Kip got a sturdy looking tan colored horse of the Norwegian Fjord variety. I got a paint mare named Pinky who they felt would be more of a challenge for me. I hadn't mentioned that in both my previous riding experiences I had ridden horses who didn't really want to do any more than they had to. I got the oldest, calmest horse when I was young. I got the biggest horse in college because I was the tallest, but he was starting to go lame and really resisted any attempts I made to get him to do more than walk. I got him to canter whenever I had to, but it took some work. Pinky was kind of like his opposite. She wanted to run and part of me wanted to let her, at least at first.

We headed through a grove of trees and out onto the beach. In spite of the fact that Friday's weather had been sunny, clear and warm, Saturday was a typical early spring day on the coast. It was overcast and drizzling and windy. The wind whipped the mist and sand into our faces and I severely regretted having taken the gloves out of my jacket pockets in the B&B before going riding. I don't know why I'd done that. But the waves were beautiful and riding felt good. Or, at least a little good. I quickly realized that I hadn't been on a horse in 10+ years and that the position used to sit a horse is not entirely comfortable if one has not done it for a long period of time. I realized that letting Pinky take off would probably leave me in worse shape than holding her in, so I got better at keeping her from breaking into a trot at the advance of every wave toward us.


We walked down the beach for about 45 minutes, enjoying the waves and the view in spite of the chill. Then we turned down the inside of an inlet where the wind was blocked and the ride became much warmer and more pleasant. My nose stopped dripping down my face. We walked through the water a little at this point and Kip's long legs dragged. We then headed into the trees. The trail was narrow here, forcing us to go single file so Pinky was forced to stay behind our leader Judy. She kept getting her nose on Judy's horse's tail and got the tail swished in her face a few times. Judy's horse was new. She's only been ridden a few times. As we rode through the trees some deer ran off to the side of us. Judy's horse jumped and Pinky almost ran into her. Later we came to a small, slow moving stream. Judy's horse freaked out about that. She didn't want to cross it. I held Pinky back. Judy's horse had to be coaxed until finally she buckled up and jumped the stream. I let Pinky go then, thinking she would casually walk across the stagnant water. She walked up to it and sprang across. I wasn't ready for that. My head snapped back, but I didn't lose my seat. I kind of wished we could try it again. Kip's horse walked up to the stream, unmoved, and walked through it. He felt a little let down.

Well, I had thought that a 2-hour ride would be wonderful, but the last half hour I was kind of praying for it to end. My knees were sore, my seat hurt, I wanted some solid ground under me. We finally saw the parking lot ahead and I was relieved. We walked up onto the pavement and I dismounted. Kip thinks they must laugh really hard after their clients leave when they remember how pitiful they are with their dismounts. I managed to get off the saddle then had to cling to it as my legs tried to buckle under me when they hit the ground. Unsteady was a major understatement of my condition. Kip got off--I didn't see his dismount because I was too busy trying to act nonchalant about my inability to walk. We teetered to the car and got in. And our horse-riding adventure on the coast came to an end.

I've decided I need to make a friend that has horse. That way I could help her maintain the horse and get some riding in but not have the responsibility involved in actual ownership.

After a quick break at the B&B, Kip and I headed to Oceanside to eat dinner at Roseanna's Cafe. I had the best dinner I think I've ever eaten. After some yummy clam chowder and salad, I had smoked salmon (done in-house) in a creamy sauce with scallops (could have passed on them), asparagus, spinach, and veggie ravioli. The smoked salmon was absolutely delectable! I think a serving of the salmon alone would have been almost as good.


After dinner, we walked on our shaky legs around the beach at Oceanside and through the tunnel. It was a nice night. I even managed to sleep well that night.

Sunday, we ate our breakfast slowly, packed our bags, walked on another beach and headed back home. It was good to get back, but sad to leave.

Broken Foot

(Warning: this is a long entry. Read if you wish. There is little mention of the kids or Kip.)

Last Wednesday I broke my foot. I wasn't doing anything unusual. I was trying to put William in time-out. And it broke my foot. See if I try to discipline him again!

We had a good morning that day. We went to our singing group at 10am and sang songs about apples and squirrels and autumn. Then, we came home to make some lunch. The kids decided to watch 'the horsey show' while I put lunch together (Spirit, Stallion of the Cimarron). I let them do it so I could have some peace and put together some really good bagel and veggie sandwiches for me and William and a hot dog for Anna. Then, William had a meltdown. He threw a little fit on the floor because he wanted the show off. There were just a few minutes left at that point and Anna wanted to watch it. Her hot dog wasn't done, so I wanted to let her. I got sick of hearing William slam his bus-shaped bin of Legos into the hearth and went over to stop him. I didn't feel up to carrying him all the way to the staircase to have his time-out, so I thought I would just swing him onto the recliner. I grabbed him under the arms and went to swing and something went wrong. My angle was totally off and he slammed into my left leg instead of the recliner. It twisted under me and something snapped. The pain was intense. I let him drop as I fell to the floor and tried to straighten my legs under me. As I lay there gasping and moaning in pain William crawled over to me and said urgently that we needed to go to the hospital. "What did I do to him?" I thought in terror. I didn't drop him that hard - I really thought he should be OK.

"Are you hurt?" I asked him.

"No, YOU are," he said.

Oh, what a sweet boy. He really cared. Of course, if he hadn't been acting like a ninny I wouldn't have been lying on the floor in agonizing pain in the first place.

I convinced him to sit at the table and eat his lunch after he turned off the movie. It had reached the credits while I writhed in agony below the TV. (I think Anna was still watching it.) I forced myself to hop to the stove and turn off the burner under Anna's hot dog which had miraculously turned itself and kept from burning all in one spot, although it was a little dark in a couple places. I then tried to sit at the table and eat the sandwich I had really been looking forward to just a few minutes before. Instead, I had to grab a nearby grocery sack and try not to puke in it. Eventually, I called Kip and begged him to come home from work to drive William to preschool and take me to the Urgent Care. He got to eat my sandwich.

I spent about 2 hours at the Urgent Care. When the doctor finally saw me he said he would send me off to x-ray. I informed him that I was 5 months pregnant and he said he would check. They decided not to x-ray. He suggested I go home and see if it got better and if it didn't they could x-ray me in a couple days.

I wasn't happy with that option.

I spent the next two days in a fair amount of pain. It really did get a lot better, but I couldn't moved all of my toes and I just wanted to know if it was broken or not and what to do to get it better. So, on Friday I called my OB and they said to go ahead with the x-ray. Back I went to the Urgent Care. (My PCP recently moved to another city and I haven't bothered getting a new one since I see my OB every month anyway, so the Urgent Care was the best option for getting a quick doctor's visit in, even though I'm not fond of the place in general.)

This time I was there three hours. I waited an hour to get in. Then, I waited an hour for the x-ray people to take me from the exam room. Finally, the technician rolled me down the hall in a wheel chair, stopped it next to a wall and walked a few more feet down the hall and around the corner. He then did some computer stuff asking me questions from around the corner from time to time in an Asian accent that was hard to understand without the challenge of not being able to see him. He eventually reappeared and pushed me into the x-ray room and took some pictures of my ankle. Then, back we went to the exam room.

A few minutes later, there he was again. The doctor had apparently asked him to x-ray my foot since that was where the pain was and there was nothing wrong with my ankle. Back we went to the x-ray room. He took foot pictures and then wheeled me into the hall facing the wall next to the corner around which sat his desk. He went to his desk and was there an annoyingly long time. I amused myself by examining the contents of my purse and creating a 'toss' pile of the junk I found. Finally, he came back into view and handed me a packet labeled "x-ray copies." I assumed that this meant my foot had been broken. I was right. The doctor told me to stay off the foot and to ice it frequently and gave me a phone number for the orthopedic specialists. After he left, the nurse came in to wrap my foot and give me a nearly knee-high boot to wear. It took her almost 10 minutes just to get the boot on me and my comfort level with her kept dropping as she grabbed long velcro straps and wondered aloud where they were supposed to attach and then swore to me she had done this before. In her defense, she was very pleasant and kind and the boot is annoying to put on. Eventually, she succeeded in applying it and I walked out to my car. She wanted to wheel me out, but I just wanted out of there, so I took off while she was out of the room and said goodbye to her as I passed her in the hallway.

On Monday I took my booted self to the Orthopedic specialists. They do a triage sort of deal in the afternoons and the office was crowded with moms accompanying their football-playing sons for examination of their sports injuries. I figured it would take another couple hours to get through, but they had my name called by the time I finished the paperwork and the doctor appeared as soon as I had the boot off. He opened my x-rays and looked at them in silence for a moment. Then, he turned to me and asked me where the break was. The Urgent Care doctor had tried to point it out to me, but where he pointed just looked like normal space between bones to me. Apparently, it looked normal to the specialist, too. After looking hard at all the x-rays for a few moments, he figured out what they were seeing. There was a small break on the end of one of the bones on the side of my foot. It was nothing to worry about, in his opinion. He suggested I wear the boot for a few weeks while it healed, mostly to prevent myself from damaging it more (since my children seem compelled to step on or bump my foot whenever it is unprotected). He said it would be fine to walk without the boot around the house as long as the pain level wasn't too bad.

Wahoo! This was exactly what I wanted to hear. No cast. No surgery. No crutches. Just try not to re-damage it and elevate and ice it when the pain gets too bad. The boot seems a little conspicuous, but I can live with that. Things are looking up. I may even attempt to hobble around a grocery store tomorrow so we can eat something other than canned and frozen foods. Some produce could be nice--and we're dangerously low on cheese (a staple in my pregnant state).