Me and my crocs, stare into the abyss.

My three or so readers have noted my blogging absence. I have been under a karmic cloud, that's fer damn sure. We'll start with the migraines. Six out of seven days. There's a dad of a kid at Callum's school who gets them too. We have the same triggers, and if Mike leans into me in the hallway between Kindergarten and First Grade to say, "How's your week?" I know exactly what he's talking about. We seem to be on the same pain/trigger cycle. And earlier this week, I got into the back of a friend's car after lunch (see below for more lunchtime karmic woes) and picked up her newly purchased copy of this. Flipping through, I somehow turned to a stunningly beautiful and accurate description of migraine pain. I wish I could copy the text here, but go buy the book. I hear it's even better than The Kite Runner. I love owning books, but I hate buying hard backs, so I'm going to borrow Megan's copy as soon as she's done and buy my own in a few months.

So first the migraines. Then there was the golf tournament that I've been working on with some parent volunteers for several months. It rained all day. At the beginning of the tournament, as all the golfers were lined up in their cute little carts (seriously, those carts looked just like the copper and blue version of the Mini Cooper Convertible...might need one of those) it started to pour. Not the scattered showers that were predicted, but one of those all-day soaking rains. I have to say that golfers really impress me. They really will go out there in anything and have fun. It wasn't until several days later as I was thinking back through everything that had been going wrong that I thought of that rain, but from were I stand right now, I feel sure it was my fault.

Then there was the stomach flu. Earlier that week, I'd walked into our Main Building to see a preschooler sitting on the bench by the office with a trash can pulled up next to him. Not a good sign. I suppose you could say it was good karma that I managed to hold off until after the rainy golf tournament, but sitting by the toilet for 5 hours on Friday night, I wasn't really thinking about the up side of the situation. Also on Friday, my computer broke (that's the reason for the inadvertent blogging break). Sunday my cell phone died and all it's chargers threw themselves off a cliff after it in grief. After three attempts, I still can't manage to purchase the correct charger. What do we do when that happens? Buy a new one of course! Seriously, I'm due a new phone and was planning to get it this week, so I went silent on the radar for a few days rather than buy a charger that I'll only use for a little bit.

After that it was the bad lunch karma. On Monday a group of us took a friend out for lunch at the same place we'd had my birthday lunch. Remember the deliciousness? The lovely server who, unprompted, brought us champagne? No such luck this day. Lousy service, obnoxious server. He got our soup wrong and never apologized. What's up with that? And of course, no champagne.

The bad lunch karma continued at this weekly stand-by. This little place of Mexican awesomeness. I seriously love this restaurant. But we had to sit in the hall (never good, like being sent to the kid's table), my normally sublime veggie taco was not at its standard. It was fine, really, but I am so used to that veggie taco being the best thing I'll eat all week that it was a particular let down. The conversation was not sparkling and it felt more expensive than usual. Don't worry, I'll consider it a personal duty to try again next week (and to get there a little early), but the karma clearly continued.

Tuesday evening seemed better until I went outside to tell Neel something and must have put my foot down wrong. First goes my ankle. And I think, okay, it's just my foot, I can get back upright. Then suddenly I'm on my knees. Okay, it's just my knees. I can get back upright. And suddenly I'm lying sprawled out on our flagstone path. I have a bruise on my hip that looks like this. Only purple and without the shade. Cheaper though.

Still, things might be looking up. I sense a shift. Like a slow clearing in the west. The problem is that the cloud seems to be hovering near me. My friend Shoshana was walking out the door yesterday with a birthday cake in hand when her dog ran in front of her, tripping her and slamming the cake into a wall. (That's some good dog karma, though.) Oh, and she's a little concerned about identity theft right now too. The cake was still delicious. Then Megan was trying to get out of a parking lot yesterday when it got shut down due to a gas leak. At first no one was allowed to start their cars. Then a nice firefighter let Megan go ahead and leave (don't worry, she didn't trigger an explosion...it's not that bad around here). As she was pulling out, she clipped a fire hose and another firefighter ran after her threatening to charge her with a felony. A felony! Who knew?

Last night, when I was on a walk with my neighbor Jean, she pointed out that perhaps I should have mentioned all of this on the phone rather than waiting until we were in person, but I'm sure things are going to be fine for her. (Hi Jean! I'll be thinking about you guys today with that minor surgical procedure you're heading in for!)

And really, today's the day I can get a new phone, and I think that might just do the trick. My dad always says that if you leave electronic things alone long enough they'll heal themselves. I'm not sure exactly how that applies, but I'm just certain that it will. In the meantime, I think I'll follow the lead of my canine friend here and hibernate until the skies are truly clear.