IH8 FZKS (warning, this is a little graphic... i'm sorry)

Yes, that is going to be my new license plate....

This has been a rough day. Well, a rough week culminating in today being kind of a rough day. It started out with Lucy's huge rage against the daycare. She wailed her little heart out, which incidentally rips my little heart out all the way to school, clinging to me when I tried to leave. L-a, the daycare teacher that was solo first thing this morning, seemed a little preoccupied trying to entertain the seven other children that were already there so it was really hard to disengage lucy from my body. Finally, I had to hail the teacher and plead for her to comfort my child (I must say, I could have used a hug at this point, myself).

Then I hustled off to Harborview where I toil away in a back office on the burn floor. This was a bad weekend for the burn ICU - a 14 year old girl was babysitting her 4 young nieces and nephews, all toddlers/preschoolers, 2 pairs of siblings, when the house went up in flames. I think the aunt got out OK but it went up so fast, one child was lost at the scene and 3 are in the ICU. One most definitely won't make it - renal failure, guts in a bag outside the body cavity, limbs mostly gone, really really sad. The other two children will probably make it, but they are all severely burned.

I didn't go to the ICU, but the nurse I work with had just come back from rounds up there and shared with me the details. I got the feeling she needed to unload - no matter how long you are there, situations like that affect everyone deeply. She also tells me all the medical details, you know, why that baby's guts are outside the body cavity with such a severe burn.

Anyway, back on my floor, the regular burn floor, there were more babies which cried periodically throughout the day. I'm kinda used to that, but still in my state of mind this morning, it didn't help. There was a man on my floor who was moaning in pain ALL DAY LONG. And I mean moaning. "ow ow OOOOW ow ow. OW. ow ow OOOOOOW."

I got done there, grabbed a nasty sandwich on my way out and raced to Physics class where I nearly got knocked down and into traffic by some huge gusts of wind. I ran off to Physics, getting pelted by rain (oh yes, did I mention my tights shrunk in the wash, so i was at half-mast all day long?) and got there in the nick of time. I sat down and for 50 minutes i saw and heard

blah blah blah@#%Q$%@#$%FGKLNVNLKRWJ#$%iopjv writjtrwpoij5 bkmvpowj45 pwijg[pfjb sgjkj43ljt5 43w5 divided by and you can see why the velocity ADKALjt qjeqlknr vlk jponqortjqlk jrklj!@#$#$@%^$^% blah and so forth.

I just don't get it. I get the ideas... I understand what velocity is and acceleration and even free fall (oh man, my teacher's examples are all hilarious too) but the equations, i can't ever figure out which one to use when and WHY. It's dry and frankly I DON'T CARE ABOUT IT AT ALL.

So there.

I'm seriously questioning my plan here. I'm overwhelmed by an intro Physics class and it's all it's my ONLY CLASS! What am I thinking?! This is going to be my life, and it's going to get much much worse and it's going to last for NINE YEARS. WHY AM I DOING THIS??? It's already affecting my relationship with Lucy and that makes me sad. Maybe it's just today, but

When I picked her up from daycare, she was glad to see me, but shortly thereafter, things went south. In the car on the way home, she asked if she could watch a movie later. Yes, I said, after supper. NO. SHE WANTED ONE NOW. SHE WANTED ONE WHEN PAPA GOT HOME NOT AFTER SUPPER and so forth. I later asked her if she wanted to go for hot chocolate, a special treat we do about once a week. Well, that was met with enthusiasm, but she began a new rant about I WANT TO EAT SUPPER AT THE PURPLE TABLE NOT AT THE DINNER TABLE, I told her we were not eating supper in front of the TV, well, this turned into quite a screaming rage, I finally decided I didn't want to spend time with her at a place doing a special treat, I was feeling pretty thin on patience by now, well, that really freaked her out. I circled the block (by the way, i think i deserve some kind of award for NOT yelling at her at all) and said if she could calm down and be friendly with me, we could still do it, but I wasn't about to take her into a public place yelling like that and that I really didn't like to be treated that way. So we went.

We had a little good time, but I was wiped.

We came home whereupon we had another fight (to be fair, I was doing computer stuff - I have no time on my own to catch up on e-mail, do my finances, renew library books, shit like that - and not paying any attention to her for a while). She drew on my desk with a crayon, I flipped out and grabbed it from her after she refused to stop and clean it up.... then i got my very first

I DON'T LIKE YOU!

I almost cried. Not because I really felt she didn't like me, but because I feel like this is my new life now, I have no time, the time I do have I feel exhausted and wiped and pretty soon she will move on to
I hate you

I hope this is just the transition for me.

I am starting to understand some of my homework, maybe i'll get to actually enjoy it at some point.
Maybe lucy will settle in to daycare and our time together will be more joyous.

Maybe this isn't such a good idea after all.