Thanksgiving Visit

Well, I had my Thanksgiving visit with my son this past weekend. My mom went with me. I still have not found a camper/motor home yet, so I planned to stay in my van again. I knew that it would be a bit crowded with all three of us in there, but we would just make it work. I packed everything we would need and tried hard to leave any extras home. We of course were taking food for a proper Thanskgiving meal. I had a whole chicken that I hounded from Meijer for just a couple of dollars, potatoes purchased on sale for only 99 cents, carrots purchased on sale for only 79 cents. That would be the bulk of our meal as it could be prepared in the nesco cooker all together with minimal fuss. My mom made some homemade chicken and noodles to go with our chicken that we would heat in the crock pot. We also took some things like applesauce, canned green beans (did you know that you could get the little cans and they have the pop tops so no can opener is needed!?!), and of course some puumpkin pie with spray whip which is really fun for my son who loves to spray it on his pie and in his mouth! So we got the cooler loaded and we were off.

It got to be time for me to call my son and as we are talking I ask how was school. He tells me he was sick again. He did not go. He is trying to tell me what he has but in the end just puts his dad on the phone. Now it really is not funny that my son is sick, but my conversation with his dad is really amusing. I say he tells me he is sick. He says yeah its just a virus, I took him to the doctor today and he said that it is just a virus. I ask what kind of virus. He tells me I don't remember what he called it, just a .....viral virus. A "viral virus" I ask. Yes is the answer, he does not remember what it is called but it is highly contagious and they gave him and antibiotic. An antibiotic for a virus? Yep they gave him this medicine. I ask is it a respiratory infection, and he tells me he does not know what the doctor called it. Then he asks me if I have heat in my van. At this point what I really wanted to do was say something that would probably end up starting a fight and him not allowing my son to have the phone back so we could talk. I wanted to say Nope, no heat in the van it is really fun to drive around in Illinois in the winter time with no heat whatsoever, and even more fun to sleep in it with no heat at all. And wouldn't that be great to drive around in with my son who has a "viral virus" with an antibiotic? What kind of fool are you? But in the interest of being able to talk to my son for our phone call I merely say, Well yes I have heat. Good because the doctor said that "son" should not be out in the cold air. That is fine I say, it is cold out and we did not plan on playing outside anyway. So my son gets back on the phone and we get to finish our conversation. What did you do with your day off I ask. I went shopping with grandma. You went shopping, like just to pick up your medicine and a few groceries. Noooo, we went shopping, like to kmart and walmart and sears. We went christmas shopping. Now I am unsure if our conversations are still being recorded so I let this go and changed the subject. I do not want to get my son in trouble again for telling what is going on at his dad's house. I figure I will have all day to ask tomorrow. I get off the phone and ask my mom if she is up for staying in a hotel as I did not want to stay in the van if my son was sick. Mom was totally up for it as she was dreading staying in the van all weekend anyway. So we either have to stop for me to get a visa gift card to use to pay so I can write a check at walmart to pay for the hotel which of course does not take checks, or my mom has to pay and I will pay her back. She says she will pay and I can give her the money when we get home.

We pick my son up the next morning, and he is sick, with some sort of respiratory "viral virus", and his antibiotic? It's a cough syrup. We go to the hotel which my son is really excited about. He like to go to the hotels, cuz he likes jumping back and forth across the beds. And hiding behind one bed on one side and us hiding on the other side and we fight aliens. The creepy outer space kinds, not the illegal human kinds! We also gave him a vapor bath with the johnson's vapor bath. The whole room smelled like menthol! He seemed fine after that, he said he could breathe, he blew his nose and got a lot out, and hardly coughed at all. I gave him some Tylenol just to see if it helped him. He said it did not, but I could tell a difference in his behavior after it would have kicked in. He was a little more pleasant.
But dinner did not go as planned to start with. We got the chicken out of the cooler and opened it up, and it was smelly and no good(so much for my hounded chicken!). So my mom made a quick (read-not so quick, but my mom cannot go in get what she needs and get out) trip to the store. She brought back all sorts of things, like triscuits, wheat thins, cheese ball, two loaves of bread, a bag of apples and a whole chicken. Except the chicken she bought was much larger than the one I had bought. So the potatoes did not fit into the roaster with the chicken, but I was at least able to squash the carrots in. We did get the food cooked and we ate, but not all at the same time because we had been snacking all morning and the food did not get done at the same time. But it was all tasty. And my son ate really well. Which is always a concern as his diet at his dad's is dismal at best. From what my son tells me the only veggies he gets are if he eats a can of veggie soup or the tomato sauce on pizza. And of course french fries, if they can still be considered a veggie after deep frying. So we try to take home made veggie soup, canned veggies, can fruit, applesauce cups, apples and bananas, and even yogurt. I usually sneak in a lot of different types of veggies in the soup so he gets a good variety every other weekend. At least he gets some is my attitude right now. It is better than none. When it was time to take him back he was sad but not distraught and was really looking forward to the next day. So we go back to the hotel room, pick up the toys, take showers and go to bed. We pick him up the next day and proceed to have another day of alien fighting, chicken and noodle and apple eating, and playing board games. We watch a movie, or rather we put a movie in the dvd player and it plays in the background while we play. We "waller" (as my son says) on the bed, and of course he jumps on the beds. Then it was time to pack up. So we packed and loaded the van and headed for the walmart parking lot. We went there so my son would not think he had to play outside, which he would have wanted to do if we had gone to the park. I figured we would just hang out and watch him play his gameboy Pokemon game. Nope he wanted to play more board games. So we did. Course we did not play any games according to the rules and ended up using the cards to play an entirely different game, but we had fun. It is always sad to leave, but my son did not cry this time, which really makes it hard for me to leave him. He did keep telling me that he wanted to come home. I tell him I know and that I am still working on it. I will not give up trying until he gets home. Then I also call him a couple of hours after I drop him off to make sure that he is okay and to tell him I love him. He was pretty much okay as he was cleaning his room, "but this sure is hard work" he tells me. He is coughing again which I assume is from dust, but seems fine other wise. He does get in his "want to go home" comment. Which he tries to get in fairly frequently. I am sad that I do not get Thanksgiving with him on the holiday, but that is not in the order this year. I will just take everything I do get and be thankful everyday that he still loves me and I still love him.