That little voice in the back of my head that told me not to call in the first place was right.

Laurel will still get eye muscle surgery, only at some point later this year after my grandparents' estate settlement is disbursed so there's money for it instead of health insurance.

You'd think I'd have learned better after three years without health insurance. Sometimes lessons don't stick when they're too easily learned.

It was easy to call and cancel the LASIK screening. I almost cried when the ophthalmologist's scheduler said "I'm sorry" after I answered his question why I was canceling.

The surgery scheduler at Laurel's ophthalmologist found an opening next week, so we have a preoperative appointment after school on Tuesday and she's scheduled for surgery on Friday, the day after the end of the school year. (The eye muscle surgery should be covered by our new insurance. They'll let us know if it's not and we can reschedule for later this year.) Keep your fingers crossed for her to have binocular vision soon!

Vogon also wanted me to make LASIK screening appointments for the two of us (i.e., him and I; Laurel actually has 20/20 vision in each eye), but their first open time is Monday afternoon so I'd have to find someone to pick up Laurel at school and watch her for about an hour afterward if I want to do that. I've left a voicemail for the teacher that supervises the after-school program at Laurel's school in hopes we can pay for her to attend just Monday afternoon, but if that's a no-go I guess I'll just pass on that. No big deal, since I've worn glasses for over half my life anyway.

...

may_lyn asked about some of the things I've used the Magic Eraser to clean. Here's what I've done with the first one from the several I bought yesterday:
- cleaned Laurel's sneakers, sandals and dress shoes
- wiped spots off the major kitchen appliances and the wall behind the trash can
- wiped down the front of the kitchen cabinets
- wiped marks off the flat paint in several rooms
- wiped down the light switch plates in several rooms
- got a lot of grime off our front door, especially around the handles and bottom edge of the door
- cleaned the grime that sticks to the top of the baseboards in the master bathroom
- tried it on a candle wax stain on the toilet seat lid without success, but got the same stain off the floor (we used to have a large candle in a footed holder on top of the toilet tank, but it took a header a few times and left marks where it came in contact with surfaces on its fall)

...

Something about lunch made Vogon sleepy and my repeated verbal attempts to wake him up when it was time to pick up Laurel were unsuccessful, so I put on my lace-up shoes and started walking twenty minutes before school got out. Even with relatively low (20%) humidity, I sweat like the Mexican I am walking at a quick pace in 95 degree (35°C) heat.

Partway down the long stretch between the two-lane divided street bisecting our neighborhood and the six-lane road crossing between us and the school, a mother of a first-grader stopped and offered me a ride the rest of the way, kindly giving me a few minutes to wait in the shade before the end of the school day. While waiting, I tried Vogon's cell phone and the house line to let him know I'd gotten to the school but would really appreciate a ride home. Just after Laurel's class came outside, I saw our neighbor and asked if we could get a ride home with her, so we had some more rest in the shade before going home in an air-conditioned car on a day I could really appreciate it!

...

On Tuesday night as I was tuning in for the start of House, Dad called me and said "We're at the corner of 18th and California, walking toward Welton. How do I get to The Paramount from here?". Instead of replying with something witty about the same way you get to Carnegie Hall, I turned to Google Maps and reassured him he was going in the right direction, but also needed to head south to get to 16th and Glenarm.

Today was our appointment with Dr. Davis, the pediatric ophthalmologist. They gave me a nice discount for self-pay, so it cost much less than what I had budgeted.

The doctor gave us the inevitable news that Laurel has monocular vision -- that is, she only sees with one eye at a time. She is not blind in her right eye like the previous doctor (who didn't even do the vision exam himself) insisted, but will need eye muscle surgery in order to have binocular vision since her amblyopia is not caused by farsightedness.

Dr. Davis said we can reduce the amount of time she's patched down to an hour daily, which is a relief since she's started trying to take her patch off after two hours, and we'll see him again in 4-6 months.

I now plan to enroll Laurel in the state children's health insurance program with my income. (If they audit me for not listing Himself's income, they're welcome to go after him for child support.) Benefits begin 90 days after enrollment, so if I get this squared away now, she'll have coverage by our next visit and we'll see if their practice can perform the procedure for her; otherwise we'll go with the doctor's suggestion to call Children's Medical Center to see if they can offer a lower out-of-pocket price for the procedure.

...

Someone replied to a comment Karak made in a mutual friend's entry that they believe Landmark Education is a cult after they did some online research after reading his initial comment. Based on the rest of the comment thread, the majority of their research was reading pages within a single anti-est/anti-Landmark site that they quote elsewhere in the thread. I'd like to direct them toward the Skeptic's Dictionary article and comments, which is much more balanced than the sole site they cited, and The Scoop About The Landmark Forum, but if they want to believe it's a cult, that's their choice.

Good news on two fronts:
- A copy of Laurel's medical records from the pediatrician she saw for her 15m-3y checkups arrived in the mail at no cost to me. Now I have my own copies of everything except for her first 8 weeks.
- Apparently my pharmaceutical order had already shipped when I was playing e-mail tag with one of their CSRs, but it looks like they split my order since the package only contained ephedrine. I should find out whether they'll be shipping the ephedrine/guaifenesin next month since my interpretation of the initial e-mail I received from the CSR was that they can only ship one item every 30 days containing ephedrine.

I went to the first PTA meeting of the school year last night and boggled at how many people brought their kids to the meeting. I knew beforehand from the school PTA's website that the meeting was followed by a meet-the-teacher program, but I didn't find out until later that students were encouraged to show their parents around their classrooms. I marveled at how small all the furniture was in her classroom, looked through her writing workshop folder and talked with her teacher, who's sending home a business card in the next few days for a pediatric ophthalmologist. (Laurel's due for another evaluation of her amblyopia and this will save me the time I would have spent cold-calling doctors from WebMD's doctor finder.)

While I was there, I picked up copies of the required forms for school volunteers and talked with the school's Cub Scout pack Cubmaster. He was thrilled by the interested adult volunteers that he'd talked to that night and chuckled when I asked if they have a separate adult division for their Pinewood Derby. (I don't mind if you laugh at that. I was really envious as a kid when my brother got his derby/regatta kit and my Girl Scout troop did "girl" things that I felt uncomfortable doing when I wanted to go do the fun stuff the boys were doing.)

I am ridiculously excited about the volunteering opportunities here -- it will fill a niche in my life that I'd had automagically filled through my community connections in Evergreen.

After yesterday's poopfest, I do have good news about Laurel. Her eyes are noticeably less crossed, so now she rarely looks cross-eyed in photos and is coloring in the lines _without_ wearing an eyepatch. She's doing fine detail coloring, too -- today at lunch she very carefully colored a boat oar with a handle barely the width of a pencil and proudly showed it to us.

A colorful incentive has helped her sit on the potty -- a sand/water wheel from my family. It's sitting on the counter facing the living room so she can see it from anywhere in the kitchen, living room or dining room. I'll report later on how well it helps her.

I'm making headway on tidying the nerdsprout's bathroom and bedroom so the former will be presentable and the latter will be tidy enough to tuck Laurel into bed in while nerdsprout's away. Fear my leet organization skills.

In other news, I am in search of empty mint tins, preferably about the size of those used for Altoids, Penguins, Zingos and the like, but larger, smaller or round are fine too. If you've got empty tins sitting around you'd like to send to a good home instead of throwing away, drop me an e-mail and I'll give you a mailing address to send them to. Danke.

edit 1900: Dad e-mailed me to remind me KBCO's annual Studio C cover contest is open. I'm still angry that Clear Channel bought them, but... *sigh* It's BCO and I have nothing to lose except the cost of shipping an entry to Boulder. Must convince myself again that I can draw.

I finished Laurel's flannel pajama pants today but am too lazy to photograph them now. You'll laugh your butt off when you see the waist detail. I could stand much more practice with narrow hems; the stitching at the top of the waist casing is less than 1/4" from the top of the garment and I could not keep it evenly spaced from the top to save my life so it varies up to 1/16" as it goes around. Must get used to straight stitching faster than I treadle. (:

Laurel is playing naked on the patio today in an effort to both use fewer pull-ups and make it easier for her to sit on the potty (outside with her) when she feels like she has to go. In the hour hour she's been outside so far, she's pooped on the patio (scooping it up with toilet paper a little hot soapy water took care of it) ans sat on her potty twice afterward. I'm glad she's finally sitting on her own, although it hasn't been fruitful yet. When it is, she has her choice of shiny adjustable rings, press-on nails or candy as a reward. Here's hoping.

I helped her write letters home yesterday -- one to the family and one to Abby and Gracie, the neighbor's golden retrievers. Included are a couple of drawings, one of which is her nearly legible attempt at writing Abby's name. I am v. impressed although it nags me that she might be doing better if we'd had corrective surgery on her eye muscles. *sigh* I know I can't change that now, but in a few years she'll be old enough for visual therapy and that should help her overcome whatever's left of her eye-crossing after a few years or regular patching.

Madrigal writeup coming later this week. It's only partial as it felt much more crowded than the last time I went to one so we left during the theater portion of the show. Highlights included getting a picture of Mom with Damon (in partial plate armor, he's going to be a heartbreaker) and talking to Brittany Skewes (she co-directed this year's show).

The same cold front that brought us snow Sunday/Monday laid me out. One of these days I'm going to install a self-cleaning hydrocephaly drain in my right maxillary sinus and not give a damn how it looks because it will improve my quality of life so much I might stop using The Doctor Who Caused My Chronic Sinusitis' name as a curse word. Or not. I hope she dies of brainrot.

Laurel's been a pain and a half lately but I hope she's saving it for the overpriced eye doctor, who we pay another $150+ to in two weeks so he can guess (the techs do all the measuring and last time they didn't even bother finding out what the vision in her right eye was) whether eyepatching has helped her lazy eye. If he pushes surgery again well save our money and tell her pediatrician we felt he was more interested in money than Laurel's vision. I'm perfectly content to take the same approach Tea's mother did with his younger brothers as years of eyepatching is much more affordable than some $10k+ eye surgery that's the most common procedure said children's eye practice does.

Slight update to the appearance of the main page at castle.geek.net to reflect the pruning of dead content (and contributors that are long out of touch) and get things ready for a D'Evelyn alumni project I've had incubating all year; also uploaded the November 2003 photos to odd harmonic.

Haven't been on much this week between sinuses and Halloween and Dia de los Muertos projects, so you, dear reader, get the digest format.

Laurel's opthalmologic exam on Tuesday was hardly worth the time or cost. The technician that tested her vision didn't test the vision in her right eye (after asking her to identify the same picture/glyph out of a set of six they use for pre-readers several times, Laurel got bored and quit answering), the few minutes we saw a doctor was spent by him pushing $10,000 surgery that's the most common procedure the practice does. After I pushed back, she has instructions to wear an eyepatch for 3-4 hours daily and a followup appointment in late December.

[EDIT: Around 18 months, her right eye spontaneously started not focusing when her left one was. It's improved tremendously since, but her pediatrician was adamant at her 3-year checkup that an ophthalmology evaluation was necessary to rule out any serious underlying cause for it. I wasn't worried since one of my aunts had lazy eye at the same age and it was remedied by patching.]

We went to the early-evening Halloween event at the high school since Petunia was booked there to twist balloons and we wanted the staff member running the entry to see Laurel in her JoJo costume. She made it an hour and a half before excitement and tiredness got the better of her, which was enough time for some cute candid shots (Halloween 2003 photos).

If you just want to see this year's pumpkins -- Barkley, a sleeping Elmo buoyed aloft by balloons, Sulley and Boo from Monsters Inc. and Teeny Little Superguy -- feel free to skip the sprog cuteness and go directly to those photos.

My first attempts at sugar skulls for Dia de Los Muertos are currently in a display case at the high school and once I finish cutting the 10x20" papel picado banner I got a wild hair to do for the same teacher that asked about the skulls, photos of both will be added to the main Halloween album.

We've been sitting Laurel on her potty first thing after waking up for a few weeks to get her used to sitting on it, but the doctor just seemed to ignore that that was progress for us at Laurel's checkup a few days ago. This morning she peed in it, so we are celebrating.

For the interested, she was 39" tall and 33 pounds at her checkup, which was at 3yrs 2.5mos. I wish I'd asked for one of the other doctors in the practice as the two that had done her previous checkups there actually sat down and were more thorough than our assigned PCM there, who did the Thursday checkup. She seemed more concerned with her bowel movements and the much-improved "lazy eye" in her left eye. (The base clinic didn't think it was an issue, so she's never had it evaluated by an eye doctor. It's barely noticable now compared to when she was 18-24 months old.) Se insists on referring her out for the latter, but our medical coverage ends in two weeks and the only pediatric eye specialist Tricare covers here is at Children's Hospital, which is usually booking five months out. *shrugs* Once she's covered by CHP+ I'll see what they cover for eye exams.