My patience, over there. Worn thin and boozing.

Mateo is sick. Supposedly.

He woke up with a slightly red eye and a bit of gunk in the corner, and since he goes to daycare, I had a strong feeling if we decided to be "those" kind of parents who still take their kid to daycare even though they sorta, kinda had an inkling that something may be wrong with him, I would be receiving a phone call mid day telling me my child's eye was bright red and his nose was dripping gloops of snot.

So I told my husband I was staying home, and after a bit of thought, decided to call Kaiser to get him an appointment. He has a mild eye infection and a slight cold, but you wouldn't know it based on the day I spent with him yesterday.

His doctor told me that if he doesn't have an appetite, not to worry, just make sure he gets a lot of fluids. Let's see, before the appointment he had a whole banana and a container of yogurt. And his morning milk. After his appointment he had most of my Trader Joe's thin pizza and a cereal bar.

Loss of appetite wasn't an issue.

After a much needed nap, we went outside to play with some chalk and a ball. You can see pictures of that fun over here. We had two incidents of frustration, one when I took the chalk away from him because he was trying to chalk up the fountain and bench, and another when I took the ball away so he'd stop trying to fling himself into the fountain after it. Both times he turned into a limp, wailing rag. Both times people were walking around. Both times I couldn't help but laugh because he's just so ridiculously over the top with his displeasure.

We went back in and I fed him his lunch. Pictures of that fun can be seen over here.

(Side note: Doesn't he seem really sick in the pictures?)

After that he decided it was time to lay in on Zoe, our petite kitty who is slightly on the simple side and doesn't seem to get it when Mateo or Sophia (our other cat) is trying to kill her.

My patience ran out on me and sat in the corner around 4:30 PM. I looked over right when Mateo reached and grabbed Zoe's tail, and started yanking and bending it in ways it's not supposed to bend.

Upon later reflection, I realized I did the one thing you're not supposed to do to a 16-month old who learns a lot from mimicking, and trial and error: I screamed, really really screamed, while my patience was in the corner drinking a tall cold one, "MATEO - STOP IT NOW!"

Yes, he stopped. He stopped and looked at me in shock. Zoe ran off because my screaming completely freaked her out.

While I toned my voice down and told him not to pull her tail, not to hurt her, etc., he began to babble. And babble. And babble even louder. And then really loud. Almost as loud as his mommy did to him a few seconds ago.

So not only did I have no patience anymore because it was in the corner, drinking it up and having a blast while it laughed at the scene unfolding, I now had a toddler screaming at me. And a sick one at that.