BACK TO THE BEACH

Happy Maryter's Day!

Truly, I have NO IDEA what it is, but it got us a day off on Monday. We packed up the car, the kids, AND Margo and headed to the beach. All was fine until our first night, at 2AM, when Anna started puking IN the tent! It was a camping first for me and one that i hope to not again revisit. When we camp, we have a girls tent and a boys tent (Margo, of course, was in the girls tent). Turns out that the boys neglected to give the girls any flashlights. So, at 2AM when the puking begins, all i can do is cup my hands over Anna's mouth and hope to blindly catch as much as i can. Turned out that i missed quite a bit.

A few hours and a shower later, Anna wakes up and is burning up! I brought along medicine, but no thermometer. One of the families we were with had one, but it was in celsius and for the life of me, I'll never come to terms with temperatures in celsius (even going on year 6 in metric countries). I mean 39 degrees just doesn't sound very hot to me.

A few hours later when her temperature would not come down, another family we were with suggested i give her a malaria quick test (Malaria is always a concern here). There just happened to be a lovely Dutch doctor camping with her family who offered to plunge the lancet into Anna's finger. A few drops of blood and 15 to 30 minutes was all we needed. The test is supposed to be pretty straight forward. A vertical control stripe, then either no additional stripes (no malaria), or an assortment of vertical stripes that indicate the type of malaria. After 30 minutes all that appeared was a horizontal stripe of blood. Seriously, can we ever catch a break here?

By the end of the day, however, Anna was able to get up and dip her feet in the water for a few minutes of fun. The next day the fever was gone and she was back in action; but not for long as her fever is back and now accompanied with a wicked cough. I took her in for a professional malaria test today, so whatever she has I can assure you it's not malaria.

I'd say Margie got a solid B for her first camping trip. We are working on turning Margo into an "urban dog" in preparation for our move to Jerusalem. More than likely we will be living in an apartment and Margo needs to brush up on her social skills. Big time. She has led a very sheltered life here on her 2 acre country estate and has no idea what she's getting herself into (nor do we!). The thought of having to take the dog out to go to the bathroom every time they need to go is quite overwhelming. I guess we are all in for some big changes.

Mike took some amazing photos of a storm brewing over Mozambique. We are just entering the tail end of the rainy (and hot) season. Fortunately we were able to (mostly) dodge rain the whole weekend. We did successfully dodge this storm.