I need to change my Tuesday routine. I am just not cut out to spend the day with the boys. They are driving me CRAZY!

I’ve felt this way for a while, so as part of the new routine, I took them to the library right after school. We chose and read 3 books there, and checked them out to take home.

That killed about an hour.

Afterwards, we came home and had lunch. Another 45 minutes.

Then we have a few hours until our 3:30 class at Art Sports.

Sigh.

They played nicely for a while. Not long enough.

So I let them do computer games for a while. Probably too long. About an hour. While I played on the computer…

Then I had them turn the computer games off. And in that hour before Art Sports, they drove me NUTS! Fighting, whining, attitude. I was tempted to turn the computer games back on. But I didn’t.

I did make the mistake of telling them that I was picking up a copy of Mario Kart for their Nintendo64. What was I thinking telling them that? I thought it would make them happy, which it did, but then was followed by requests to play it right away. That’s when I invoked the heretofore-never-mentioned “We only play video games on weekends” rule.

Which was met with groans and protests, and then with Zander saying, “How many days until Saturday?”

Finally it’s time for ArtSports! YAY for ArtSports!

First of all, after not working out all weekend, and eating some really yummy stuff yesterday at our Superbowl party, it could have been much worse.

As it is, I am up 0.2 lbs from last week and sitting at 136.8. Sigh.

Overall loss – 1 lb in 2 weeks.

May is sick, so I had to run all alone today.

But I ran 5 miles in 55 minutes, so that’s something. I made an appt with Dr. Daugherty for tomorrow. My left butt cheek was hurting during my run today. I think I’m out of alignment again and my right leg is longer than my left right now. Ouch.

We hosted our annual Superbowl shindig today. It was a good time – lots of good food and friends and laughter.

The kids did pretty well together, considering how many of them they were – and the age range – 11 kids – 10 mos, 15 mos, 19 mos, nearly 3, 3, 3, 3.5, 4, 4, 5 and 7

See how many around 3 years old? That’s trouble!

Zevan and Alexa had the most issues together. They like to hit each other. And the Rokenbok was a big point of contention, particularly for the older boys. Zander enjoyed taking control of the monorail over Elijah and Paxton. Sigh.

Sadly, the Schwartzes were missed. Poor Megan was in the ER again, this time with Anna’s 105.5 fever, who turned out to have a double ear infection and the beginning stages of pneumonia! How much is a mom supposed to take??? Kurt is staying the night again at the hospital, so hopefully Meg can rest with her girls tonight before having to take care of Kurt at home.

The game was a bit of a dud other than early in the first quarter, and then the last 6 minutes of the game. While I would normally not root for either team, I chose the Giants because of my dislike for Tom Brady. So, those last 6 minutes were AWESOME!

http://www.gazette.com/articles/buffet_32575___article.html/pizza_biggs.html

Smaller portions for kids at Biggs?
Obesity concerns lead fun center to end all-you-can-eat pizza buffet
By BILL RADFORD
THE GAZETTE
January 31, 2008 – 7:15PM

With children’s waistlines expanding, Mr. Biggs Family Fun Center in Colorado Springs is eliminating its all-you-can-eat pizza buffet in favor of more healthy alternatives.

“There’s nothing right about selling kids all-you-can-eat pizza,” said Steve Bigari, coowner and chief executive officer of Mr. Biggs.

So even though the $4.99 buffet has been a success financially, Bigari said, it will be replaced in the next month or two with a line of “healthful, low-fat, greatvalue options.”

A salad buffet will remain and cost less. There will still be pizza, but it will be sold by the slice and will include a whole-wheat, low-fat pizza. Kid favorites such as fries will be available but sold in moderation, alongside new options such as turkey burgers and panini sandwiches.

Bigari, a former McDonald’s franchisee who sold his dozen McDonald’s restaurants in 2006, said the decision to end the Mr. Biggs buffet is a bad one from a business standpoint. But with childhood obesity labeled a growing crisis, he said, “I don’t see that I have a choice.”

I am disappointed in this decision.   

Have you seen the pizzas at the buffet?  They are small, maybe 12-13″ diameter.  The slices are kid-sized.   

How much are they going to charge per slice?  Do we have to buy by the slice only or will they also sell whole pizza pies – hopefully for less than the cost per individual slice times the number of slices.

Their arcade prices are already expensive,  their party packages are inflexible, and now they are going to make their restaurant charge more as well?

I wish he wouldn’t couch the decision under the guise of being healthier.  He simply wants to make more money, period.

Kid favorites such as fries will be available but sold in moderation

What does that mean?  Will we only be allowed to order one serving per child?

I think he needs to spend more time fixing the broken laser tag equipment and the problem of people having to wait in line for 30-40 minutes for attractions on a 2 hour pass.

My kids are active, high energy kids who can eat 2-3 slices of pizza and still remain at a healthy weight.  They even eat vegetables along with their pizza.

If this decision were truly based on concerns of childhood obesity (and I don’t believe that it is), I feel that the parents who do make good choices for their children are being penalized because of parents who let their children overeat and don’t encourage their children to be active.

If he was *truly* concerned about childhood obesity, then perhaps he should also discontinue the arcade games, Go Karts and Battletech and replace them with more calorie burning activities.

If we decide to go there again, we’ll just eat lunch at home before we go. Or at McDonald’s

Want to read how the West Side Moms feel about it?

One of my best friend’s husband’s has been in and out of the ER for the past two days. What we all thought started out as a bad reaction to drinking water out of a moldy sports bottle on Monday turned into an ambulance ride on Friday morning.

Two of our friends took turns watching her children. By the time I found out about all this, in addition to debilitating fever, inability to eat or drink and uncontrollable shakes, they found this oxygen levels were very low. And that whenever they took him off the oxygen, his levels would drop into the low 80s immediately. After I finally got my car back from the dealership, I drove up to the hospital to give Megan some support.

After a day of x-rays, a CAT scan, blood and urine tests, that were inconclusive. So, they SENT HIM HOME – with oxygen tanks and medication – for his wife, with a preschool and infant daughter at home, to take care of. “Call your doctor in the morning.”

WTF?! Seriously?!

I just missed them leaving the hospital, so I drove to her house and arrived shortly after she had settled her husband in bed – WITH OXYGEN. We all simmered with the incredulity of the hospital sending him home. I offered to pick up her favorite comfort food for dinner, which was the least I could do. Then I told her I was on call for her, any time of night, if she needed me.

The boys were at their grandparents, spending the night with their cousin Joshua, and Doug and I had planned a date night. Instead of the dinner and movie, we ended up just going out to dinner at The Blue Star. Much wine, food and conversation. It was really nice. Until I got too tired to stay out any longer. So we went home, watched tv and turned in early.

I slept well, but just before I woke up, I had a dream that I woke up and found 7 missed calls from Megan on my cell phone. When I called back, I was berated by a man (her stepfather?) for being so irresponsible. I felt TERRIBLE. Then, I really did wake up briefly, checked my phone, and there were no missed calls. I went back to sleep.

At 8:35 AM, I did awake to Megan’s call. Kurt had a 103 fever, still wouldn’t eat and was still on the oxygen. She had to go back to the ER! Doug offered to pick up the boys from his parents’ house, so I got dressed and headed over to watch the girls.

When I got there, she was understandably shaken and upset.

“Now the possible diagnosis is meningitis, and that meant a spinal tap, and OMG, it could be contagious, and BTW, Anna has had a fever, and what if she has it, and what if anyone who watches the children gets it, and y’all have children, and they could all die because of this… I don’t know what to do.”

We’ve all been on that thought train, haven’t we?

After I assured her that we didn’t need to go there yet, I reminded her what she needed to do. Just take her husband to the hospital, while I watched the girls.

We distracted Anna and Silvia with my pictures with the Little Einsteins, while Megan got things together for Kurt to go. And I saw Kurt for the first time in a while, and while he looked exhausted – kind of like after an all night bender – he still looked like Kurt. So I thought that was promising.

I had a great morning with the girls. Anna was just so super sweet and helpful, and Silvia was just oh-so-adorable. Silvia napped for 2 1/2 hours! Anna went on the potty. We played a little bit outside with snow.

And then Candy brought us lunch and took over for the next shift. Megan called to say that they still hadn’t seen a dr yet (it was after 12 noon!), but Kurt had more x-rays and tests, was resting and she would likely come home to see the girls and recharge and then go back.

I headed home, and just enjoyed my guys. Zander and I played catch, then we played 2 rounds of Candy Land. When Doug got up from a nap, we had a giant Scott family hug. It was all very good.

I checked in with Candy and found out that they finally got a diagnosis – pneumonia! So Kurt was going to spend the night for observation, and Megan was going to go home in the evening to be with her mom and children.

I can’t help but be frustrated with the hospital and doctors for how this all turned out. I can’t imagine how much more frustrating this is for Meg.

But there it is – one more reminder to be thankful for things like health and love and good friends.

I had a bad, bad morning. I couldn’t find my Nike+ iPod transmitter for my shoe before the run. I couldn’t find the remote fobs that I wanted to get programmed at the dealership. I spent the morning berating myself and asking myself what was wrong with me that I couldn’t keep track of these things?!

I even have a spare set of Nike+ iPod transmitter/receiver, which I have had in my nightstand for months. I moved it. I know not where.

I was on the verge of tears most of the morning, being very harsh, cruel and angry with myself.

Just when I was about to head out the door, I checked my jacket pocket – and there was the Nike+ iPod transmitter. I ran upstairs to retrieve my cell phone and there were the remote fobs. I felt a teensy bit better about myself, but not much. Because all this searching made me late.

May and I agreed to run about 7 mi this morning. Out to the overpass and back. When I got there, I apologized for being late, and we headed on the run. May said something about hoping that I was going to cancel (I *did* consider it), and then mentioned something about cutting our run shorter! May did! She offhandedly remarked, “You know me, I’ll always take the lazy way out…”

Excuse me?! I think she confused herself with *ME*

So I had to take the coach role for once – “NO! We are running out to the overpass and back. That’s it. Let’s go. We can take it easy, but we’re doing it.”

And we did. And for some reason it was painful. My calves were tight, tight, tight, most of the run. How in the world did I just run 26.3 miles?

So we actually ran about 7 miles and walked a half mile or so. My calibration is off on my Nike+ iPod. It logged us at over 8 miles. Very odd.