Lilac Colored Glasses

I have not really blogged this week.

Believe it or not, I planned on it. I even have a good topic that I shamelessly swiped from pinolona and since I tore through the third Twilight book (yes, I caved, no I don’t like them much, but I need something to read on the train) faster than expected I was planning on compiling for the list this week and posting um…Wednesday.

But (and you’d know this if you followed me on Facebook), my week has been a complete and utter train wreck.

On Monday the metro was having technical difficulties so 7:00 am was just like rush hour with the crowd and I seriously came a hair away from having a total panic attack meltdown on the metro. Honestly, there were tears in my eyes and I partially assaulted someone who accidentally bumped me cause I was so terrified of having my wallet stolen again. Then, of course, the one day I don’t have my umbrella or raincoat, it poured rain on the way home and I was soaked.

On Tuesday my train was 30 minutes late and some drunk guy stumbled onto the metro, put a candle in a holder on the seat next to him, lit it, and proceeded to loudly insult me in French until I was able to get off a stop earlier than usual to escape his nasty breath and incomprehensible screaming.

On Wednesday there was a suicide on the train tracks and my train home was delayed, then canceled and I ended up getting home an hour later than usual after switching trains and being forced on a mini tour of half of east Flanders. Normally the suicide would make me reflective and sad, but at this point I’m just asking myself why the person didn’t just fashion a noose or get drunk and slit their wrists in the bathtub. I mean, seriously, if you want a thousand people to notice you, why not do something philanthropic with your life as opposed to delaying half the trains in Belgium? Then you might not have the urge to lay down on the tracks in the first place.

On Thursday on my way home in Brussels I was followed by some strange guy who kept talking to me in French, even though I ignored him. He followed me for a half block before I reached a bus stop and pretended to talk to someone at the stop. Then a car parked to close to the tram rails in Gent (second time this month in the exact same place) and everyone had to get off and walk, which left me walking home in the cold and dark an extra 20 minutes on top of the usual 10 minute walk.

On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I worked an extra 90 minutes each day to help the other girl because my colleague was on a holiday and my employers would rather overwork me all week and then give me a half day Friday so as not to pay me any overtime as opposed to having someone to substitute for people who are sick or on vacation. So today I have my much anticipated half day. It has been pouring rain all day and I’m running a fever and having body aches, a stomach ache and the chills.

But I suppose it could be worse. I’ve been thinking the last few weeks of constant nausea were due to a possible pregnancy. But the EPT today was negative so apparently I’ve just been incubating a flu.

For every to there is a fro.
And that’s what makes the world go ’round.

I am headed to Pittsburgh tomorrow for one week to visit family and go to my Little’s wedding.
The railway union in Belgium has a strike scheduled for the day I get back, so getting home will be interesting.

I got out of work an hour early this evening.
My wallet was stolen on the metro during rush hour.

sigh….

Hi people!

After one day of frustrated rumination and two days of blessed relaxation I was just about ready to discuss the last week and how I felt about not getting the job on Friday. I was really planning on breaking it down for you but then I realized that mulling the whole thing over and over was probably not the most constructive thing to do. Suffice it to say that last week was good because I still love working with kids and was so happy to have contact with children again, even for just a week. It also gave me a sense of purpose…again, just for a week, but still, having a place to go and kids to care for really made me feel more like myself again. Last week was not so good because, really, a 48 work week is not fun. I’ve done it before, but it was never 48 hours of childcare. Working weekends taking bets at a race track did not take the same physical toll on me that daycare did and I really felt that last week. Also, the philosophy in which I was trained was entirely different from the philosophy of the woman I was working with. I was willing to put my opinions on the back burner to try to get the job, but it was glaringly apparent that my idea of child care and hers are totally different. On Friday she indicated to me that her way is “the Belgian system” but when I voiced my concern to CB he said that everyone thinks their way is THE way, and that I shouldn’t assume that all independant daycares were like this one. Cause if they are? I’m boned. Majorly, majorly boned.

But!

All that aside.

Cause something else was brewing last week and it came to my attention around Thursday. On Wednesday I noticed some sharp pain where my underwire was rubbing under my left boob when I held some of the babies. When I got home I looked and saw that my bra had rubbed the skin raw, but there was also some other weird patches of discoloration on my ribs and under my boob. On Thursday I noticed the same thing under my right boob and also a much angrier, itchy, painful irritation in my belly button. So today I went to the doctor and I have….

Fungus.

Yes, fungus under my breasts from all the sweating I was doing last week in the unairconditioned, unventilated daycare. Because, really, what would my life be like if I didn’t have some sort of fungus, right? I mean, I finally got rid of the flesh dissolving athlete’s foot so it only stands to reason that I grow a fresh crop of spores under my boobies. Solution? The creme I used for the athlete’s foot now goes under my boobs twice a day.

And the belly button? That’s apparently bacterial as opposed to fungal, so the antibiotic cream I was using for the open sores caused by the athlete’s foot? Now going into my belly button twice a day.

But still….looking on the bright side, right? If nothing else, this has all proved that my fiancè really must truly and deeply love me, cause I don’t know many other men who would still be willing to cuddle with a walking, talking petri dish.

You finally were given a chance to work in a daycare and this last week was your trial period.
You worked 9 and half and ten hour days all week, commuting by tram to an independantly owned daycare in a house where there was no flushing toilet, chickens in the yard and fruit flies everywhere.
You were thrown into a rather chaotic environment full of babies and a few toddlers with the occasional preschooler and you were never actually shown where anything was.
You did all of this entirely in a language you were not totally fluent in, busted your ass to do what you thought was your absolute best in the given situation…

And were basically told today that you weren’t efficient or “take charge” enough for the position.

Yeah…when you’re absolute best is never good enough? Then you know you’re me.

This morning I had another appointment to check up on my fractured wrist.

And in the appointment guess what I was told?

My wrist?

Was never fucking broken.

That’s right…never broken. At the ER the doctor said they saw a “tiny fracture”. Two weeks later the assistant (I refuse to call him a doctor because obviously he can’t even read an x-ray) took a look and said that he “definitely saw the break” in the set of x-rays from the ER but he couldn’t see it in the latest x-ray, so that meant that there was no bone separation but that I’d be in the cast for at least 8 weeks.

This week an actual professor/doctor took one look at both sets and said it was never broken. The first fracture was 2 bones overlapping, and the second x-ray showed no fracture at all. What she did think was that I did some damage to the tendons in my thumb (which is still painful, swollen and a little discolored). So the 3 weeks I just spent in a cast where I did no job hunting, couldn’t shower and could only wear sweatpants?

Yeah, that was all for no reason besides the orthopedics guy not being able to read an x-ray.

This is the same hospital, mind you, where I had to have the same tooth root-canaled three times due to incompetance. I think I’m done giving them second chances after this. From now on I want real doctors.

But at least I’m cast-free 5 weeks sooner than planned, so it was a happy, if somewhat frustrating, “oops”.