Families and Illnesses....

The Gnome had been in hospital for a gruelling month or so, got out, and then went in again. The 2nd time, it was for his surgery on the brain, which took over 12 hours. From what I could decipher, it involved opening up the brain, and then inserting some battery over his heart to be powered or something like that. Sounded very frightening to me, given his age.

They were also having problems with Wati - a good maid-turned-bad.

Over the course of the last couple of months, the Goose seemed to have aged a lot.

Chronic illnesses take a terrible toll on families. The Goose insisted on rushing daily from TTSH in Novena to home in Yew Tee to cook for the Gremlins. I felt like boxing the Gremlins and giving them a piece of my mind because the purported reason was that the Gremlins refused to eat Economic Rice bought from outside - because they "looked like vomit". I don't know where these kids get their perspectives from . But you have to know, this Gremlin takes 2 hours to eat dinner because he is simultaneously watching CartoonNetwork, has to reheat his soup 4 times in the microwave because he dislikes cold soup, and can't hear you while he eats dinner.

The Gnome's temperament had gone haywire. After the operation - he seemed to have lost his emotions and took out all his frustration and anger on the Goose. I think the Goose finally stopped trying to cook for the Gremlins.

Two weeks ago, I brought Little Pixie via MRT from Bukit Batok to Novena. I burnt off an entire day's worth of meals just carrying her 3.5kg stroller on one shoulder, 5kg bag on another shoulder, 9kg Little Pixie on one arm, and swiping the MRT card on the other arm.

Once at Novena, I was rather miffed because people at the 2-way gate refused to give way to me, a stroller-toting, baby-carrying mother. They, the single commuters without any wheelchairs, prams or what-have-yous as excuses to use the 2-way gate, just kept swiping their cards at the opposite direction, preventing me from getting out of the freaking station. I had to jump in and pounce on the swipe whilst there was a split-second gap between 2 SINGLE commuters rushing to use the 2-way gate, before the gate would turn in my favour and I could finally get out.