Dispatches from North Carolina

I've heard of medical tourism, but this is the first time I've personally undertaken it. Day one of our stay in North Carolina found us primarily occupied with getting my horrible sore throat diagnosed. An urgent care doctor spent about .5 seconds looking in my throat and told me she was pretty certain, based on the prominence of the exudates (the clinical term for all that stuff that oozes out of sore throat lesions), that I had strep. We filled my prescription and I spent the remainder of the day in a not-altogether-unpleasant-codeine-induced haze.

Day two, feeling much better, I was optimistic that we would be able to rally and enjoy the day celebrating Jesse's fourth birthday. Things were off to a pretty good start and we were getting out of the car at SAS to enjoy a birthday lunch when Thor suddenly emptied the contents of his stomach everywhere. We turned around and headed back to the house, where the afternoon was spent in bathing, cleaning up, and vain attempts to get Thor to nap. At least the car was rented, so we didn't contaminate Jonathan and Noelle's car.

After he spent the afternoon listless and crying, we took Thor to a pediatric urgent care a couple of hours ago. The diagnosis? Tonsillitis, on top of the ear infection he is already being treated for. Because this is his second round of antiobitics for the ear infection and he hasn't been able to keep the dosage down today, we went ahead and opted for him to have an intramuscular shot to keep him on track. That didn't go over so well; he screamed and kicked so hard he kicked the needle out and ended up with a nice needle scratch on his thigh. Now we're home and he's sleeping peacefully.

Here's hoping that Day Three finds us exploring something other than more exam rooms, and that the Gatlins aren't decimated by the bevy of germs we've apparently brought with us on our journey. I have a feeling this "vacation" is going to live in infamy.