Another one bites the dust

The Christmas holidays are nearly over -- Tuesday marks Ephiphany Day with the Last Gift of the Season for the girls, as well as a big, rowdy feast (maybe lasagna?) -- and all I can say is THANK HEAVEN. Because if the Christmas gladness went on any longer, who knows how many members of the family would wind up in urgent care?

Angie is the latest member of the family to go down like a bowling pin. Pat took her to a quick med center last Wednesday with sublingual glands "the size of golf balls," as he put it.

We had the boys over on New Year's Day for a massive taco feast and cards (me and the teens), computer games (Dayden), football (my husband) and sleeping blissfully stretched out over the entire surface area of the couch (Wimzie and Hershey). Dayden asked for that Thanksgiving favorite, a cheese taco.

"You put it in the microwave," he explained after asking anxiously if we had any Velveeta cheese in the house. We did, which was very good, but what he doesn't know is that I love him so much, I would have gone out to buy some if we hadn't had any, but there's no need for him to know that. He would only use that information to wheedle huge amounts of candy out of me. "You take a long square piece of Velveeta and put it on a tortilla and fold the tortilla and melt the cheese. And then I eat it."

"A 'long square'?" I teased. "Don't you mean a rectangle?"

He eyed me beadily. "No. I mean a long square."

"Sorry," I said, chastened.

We took Kieren (who was wearing the Aeropostale thermal shirt we got him for Christmas) and Dayden home late that evening and I slipped in to say hello to Angie: She was on the sofa covered with a crocheted blanket, looking wan and pale, but said with something of her old spirit, "I didn't know you were coming in! I look awful!"

It was the first time in a week I'd actually seen her with her eyes open and without a look of acute suffering on her face, so I think she's making excellent progress. Although unfortunately perhaps using up all her sick days at work for the entire year, which, of course, has only just begun.

I've heard of people speak of "surviving the holidays" before, but this seems a bit much.