Documents, rashes and one Norwegian blogger

Life has been rather hectic in something something world, lately, hence the lack of blog entries. The Little One has been sick on and off for the past week, beginning with a throat infection last week and ending in a rash and swelling that was serious enough to warrant a trip to the hospital yesterday evening, at his doctor's suggestion. According to the Husband, he's already looking better this morning, and with any luck, they should be on their way home soon. One humorous moment passed last night during a visit to the eye doctor, who asked us if the Little One has any allergies. Husband and I looked at each other, and then looked at our son, whose face, hands and feet were severely swollen, and whose body was covered from head to toe with a rash. I turned back to the doctor, answered, "apparently", and the Husband and I laughed.

And of course, while this whole situation was unfolding, my old friend Murphy came to pay me a visit. For the past few weeks, I've been totally swamped at work, drowning in over two hundred pages of last-minute documents and tight deadlines. The individual managing the project believed that it wouldn't take too long, given that the documents only required formatting, and that checking the English wouldn't be necessary. Ummmm… Yeah… Sure… They believed that checking the English was "extra", especially since the target audience isn't made up of native speakers either (and are living in a third country, not known for excellence in its mastery of the English language). Knowing that I was essentially shooting myself in the foot, I begged to differ, and won approval from my boss to, ahem, "do my job". Suddenly, I was drowning in a torrential sea of badly written documents, I had other work-style projects on the burner as well, and at home, we were in crisis mode. Hopefully, now that the Little One is returning to his usual dimensions and he's no longer the color of a strawberry, life will revert back to its normal hectic state.

There has been one very bright spot during this period. Last Thursday evening, I had the opportunity to meet up with a really terrific politics and current events blogger, Jan, from Secular Blasphemy. Jan is a Norwegian blogger whose blog I've been reading for years, and whose writings tend to be very pro-Israel, unlike a great deal of the Norwegian mainstream media. Anyway, while reading Jan's blog just over a week ago, I discovered that he was vacationing in Israel. I quickly sent him and email and left him a comment, asking if he'd like to meet up at some point during his trip. He quickly responded in the affirmative, and on the day he arrived in Tel Aviv we all (all being Jan, his two friends, and me) met for drinks and dinner. It was a fascinating, very enjoyable evening, where we discussed everything from politics to lutefisk, and I was once again amazed by how well Norwegians can hold their beer.

Anyhow, I really must go read Harry Potter do something productive before the family returns…