No Such Luck

You may recall that Allyson and Bill suffered a stomach virus about a week ago, which is how I learned that you should NEVER leave your purse unzipped. Up until this weekend, I was feeling so, so lucky that all I got out of that experience was a valuable lesson about purses and a renewed appreciation for Bill's saintliness. No such luck!

On Saturday night, I was watching a movie with Ethan when I felt the first twinges of an upset tummy. "It's probably nothing," I thought, since I frequently have a sore stomach. It never crossed my mind that it could be a stomach virus since it had been a full week since Bill came down with it.

By midnight, I knew this was no minor case of indigestion. I was up until 2:30, when it finally hit in full force. As I was kneeling on the bathroom floor, feeling sorry for my cold, stiff knees on the hard, frigid floor, I thought about the unfairness of it all:

• I got sick AFTER I spent the entire evening making shrimp potato soup, which was to be served the next day at home group meeting at our house, for which Bill had just spent the entire day cleaning (I conveniently had other plans--a service project and a baby shower).
  
• Now the soup would almost certainly need to be thrown away, which seemed almost as awful as being sick in the first place.
• How could I get a stomach virus after a whole week? Isn't that a cruel joke?
  
• What if it was a different bug? What if Allyson gets sick again?
• How can two-year-old Allyson be so relaxed and resigned about barfing, yet no matter how hard I try to give in and not fight it, I always cry when I'm throwing up?

The worst disappointment--which isn't really related--was that I had ruined the stove making the soup that probably has to be thrown away. I used a metal simmering plate, which is supposed to distribute the heat evenly. Apparently I put it on upside down, and it transferred so much heat toward the cooking surface that it melted right through the ceramic top and made a big dent in the glass. It's utterly ruined. And we've had the stove for maybe six months. I cried the next morning when Bill took the simmering plate off and told me about it (which was pretty risky since any unnecessary movement could send me racing to the bathroom).

Oh well. At least Bill got to go to his hockey game before I got sick. It would have been really awful for him to miss two weeks in a row (since he was sick for the last one). At least I got sick on the weekend, when Bill could take care of everything without having to miss any work. At least our hardwood floor is so shiny you can see yourself in it, even if we didn't host the home group meeting. At least I was able to sleep (off and on) for over 24 hours. I'm feeling so rested today.

Now we have to decide whether to throw away that soup. If you know me at all, you know how much I hate to waste food. Either it was the shrimp that made me sick, or a stomach virus; if it was a stomach virus, I handled everything that went into the soup. But the soup did boil for quite awhile. What to do, what to do? Bill decided to take some soup for lunch and see what happened. He's OK so far (and he said the soup was fabulous), but I don't know...

What would you do? Take the poll at the top right corner of the page and/or leave a comment to let me know what you think.