It is apparent that I have REAL issues when it comes to genetics and the sickness of my children.

When I spend $200 at Sams and I end up with this gi-normous container on my counter, it just makes me wonder. Do I really NEED five-pounds of cheese balls?

Apparently, yes.

We made our way to the grocery store of giants today, as it was very necessary to the well-being of my family. We've been out of processed American cheese slices for a couple of days, and let's just say that our home cannot function without cheese of an orange variety. It is in 98% of the recipes we utilize (and by recipes, I mean sandwiches).

Also, in the absence of cheese we have unfortunately run dry of all other pre-packaged/ processed foods: Hot Pockets, hot dogs, mini quiches, nutrigrain bars. I don't want to over-dramatize the situation, but it was the perfect storm of desperation and hunger. Mind you, I do have an entire fridge and pantry worth of stuff, but is is all rendered useless without CHEESE.

However. This outing became a little trickier, as Big J has taken ill.

The power went out sometime early this morning, and as a result, my alarm clock blinked random lights at me this morning, which I understand to be alien gibberish. And as I do not speak alien or gibberish, I kindly ignored it.

Until.

I managed to look at my watch sometime later, and it read 9:02 a.m.

Holy crap, lunch is in two hours and they haven't had breakfast yet. Just so you're up to speed, lunch is the sun to which we revolve, as it determines the length of any morning activity or errand, and marks the 2-hour point to maps. We can probably navigate our way clear around the earth simply by tracking the lunch schedules of my children.

Normally, the littles wake me with joyous celebrations of screaming and squealing. But they were also eeerily quiet on this foggy morn. Because Big J was feverish and asleep, and not pouncing all over Little J. Hence, ours was a home of calm and inactivity...and it was weird.

A Tylenol dosing later, however, and he was fine. Not spunky, but fine. And he ate lunch and kept it confined to his stomach/intestines, so we ventured to Wal-mart and Sams. Where we purchased many products involving cheese. And so, apparently, I am the mom who takes her sick child to Sams, but in my defense, YOU KNOW the carts there are totally covered in the ebola virus anyway.

Just kidding, that's not an excuse. But we REALLY needed cheese.

And I learned that fever-ish-ness robs one of the desire to head-butt. Making this the greatest day EVER to run errands at Sams and Walmart.

Here is where I will also tell you that Big J is a fever-ish kid. It is his most common symptom, in times of sickness. And this year in particular, he appears to spike higher-than-normal temps at weird and random times, often as isolated instances from which he recovers in a couple of hours. Partially, I blame the set of genes he inherited from his father, who (at the age of 34) becomes sick whenever he: doesn't get enough sleep, gets on an airplane, eats dairy or makes ANY changes to his daily routine. Seriously.

Also, I am researching long-term medical issues and diagnosis' that involve random fevering. Because this is a definite possibility.

To recap: we have cheese and Big J may/may not have a genetic condition that reacts to change with fever OR a life-threatening disease involving low-grade temperatures.

Oh! And for good measure, let's throw in the possibility that it is STREP, and it will go undiagnosed for a week.