Anna is four. To anyone who has had a four-year-old of their own, I need not say that she is fussy and temperamental on occasion. On this weekend, she was especially fussy and temperamental, and on Saturday afternoon her fussiness crested and gave way to a mix of drama and trauma, so that it seemed she was coming down with something. At the point when Jennifer got out the thermometer and checked, Anna’s temperature was 106.6 degrees¹. We would not be surprised if the thermometer is broken, although it does read correctly for Jennifer and I. A couple hours (and some Motrin) later, Anna was still over 104 degrees and complained that everything hurt, particularly her head and neck; Jennifer took her in to urgent care. Our local urgent care has adopted a restaurant-style pager system that allowed Jennifer and Anna to wait in the car; Anna napped for the hour wait to get in to see someone. Finally, she was seen by a physician’s assistant who asserted that she did not have meningitis, and after a chest x-ray, she probably didn’t have pneumonia either. Upon coming home, Anna had some more Motrin, some dinner, and went off to bed.

This morning, Anna’s temperature was down to normal, and her mood was much improved (that is, back to normal four-year-old standards). The day has gone by without any new aches, pains, or fever. Hopefully that will be the end of mystery illness #732. Tara continues to be healthy; we’ve gone almost two months without a serious cold or ear infection, so we’re still waiting for the other shoe to drop.

¹ Note to U.K. readers: in centigrade, 106.6 degrees fahrenheit is.. er.. bloody hot.