Exhaust

Matt's company picnic was mostly fun. Somehow we'd gotten the wrong address and started out wrong, but once we got there, things were in full swing. Braz and Adin and their collection of kids arrived just as we did, so the kids had a grand time running around together, right up until Penny got her leg hurt (a bruise and a scrape, but one of those really bad surface scrapes where even the air makes it sting, poor kid).

But once she calmed down, the rest of the evening was actually quite fun. We ate a metric ton of food, and cheered Braz on in the pie-eating contest (in which he took first place) and sang karaoke (well, I didn't, but I'd meant to -- we just didn't have time) and then cheered on Matt and Braz in the three-legged race (in which they took first place). By then, Alex was starting to crack under the pressure of tiredness, so we packed up the kids and headed home, got them to bed, and then sat up until 11 or so chatting with Karen.

I'm not sure about today, though. I'm obscenely, draggingly exhausted, despite a pretty reasonable night's rest. I didn't get a shower last night, so I feel vaguely grungy. Alex suddenly decided about two blocks from school that he didn't want to go, and instead of his usual cheerful hug-and-kiss-and-bye-Mom! he cried when I picked him up out of the car and clung and cried when I took him inside and wept some more when I put him down with his teachers. "I don't want to go to school!" he sobbed.

"Why, baby? Is there someone mean to you?" Head shake no. "Is there something yucky?" Head shake no. "...You just miss Mommy and Daddy?" Nod.

Sigh. I tried to reassure him, and then walked away, because staying was just making it worse. I know he'll calm down and be fine within half an hour, but I really have no idea what sparked this off, and I hope it's just that last night's festivities wore him out and he was still tired, and not an honest-to-god phase that I'm going to have to deal with for weeks, because I hate having to walk away from a crying kid.

So today has plenty of room for improvement, already. Whee.