No Rest for the Weary

I knew it was coming, though I didn't expect it all at once.

Cameron had the stomach flu on Saturday and Sunday. Last night at 2:30 in the morning, Cortlen woke me up with the news that he had just vomited all over his comforter.

While my husband and I were cleaning up mess #1, Kellen realized that he didn't feel so good either. While he was in bathroom, Camber emerged from her room. Her face was as white as a ghost.

While my kids all demonstrated clear symptoms of being sick last night, today was a different story. Everyone turned down breakfast (claiming upset stomachs), but ten minutes later, I caught my boys jousting with plastic swords.

"Are you sick or not?" I asked. "If you are sick, you need to lie on the couch and watch a movie. If you are well, you can help me fold laundry."

Everyone was sick.

After several hours of indeterminate behavior (one second moaning on the floor, the next playing with a hula hoop) I decided that everyone was well enough to go pick up a prescription at the pharmacy.

The trip wasn't necessary for anyone's physical well-being (the medicine wasn't for any of them), but getting out of the house was essential for my mental health.

I was going stir-crazy.

"I don't feel so good," Cortlen cried as I pulled out of the driveway.

"It's a drive-thru pharmacy," I told him. "You don't have to get out of the car."

Suddenly, he felt well enough to ask for a piece of gum.

"I feel yucky too," groaned Kellen, who was sitting directly behind me.

"You can have a piece of gum too if you want," I told him.

Two seconds later, he threw up on the back of my head. And on my husband's work-issued Blackberry, which, for some unknown reason, he was holding.