I need a new purpose.

Ugh…I had the most horrible meeting yesterday. It was with the same family that beat me up last year. Without going into details, I basically said, “Your kid is fine at school. She doesn’t need my services anymore.” Boy oh boy did I get it after that. The mom started to cry and grandfather threatened to go to Due Process and bring in an attorney. This was all so that I would hang out with their kid 30 mins per week because it makes them feel better. Anyway, after that, it made me re-evaluate my purpose as a therapist. I thought I went to school to learn how to help people. Instead, I’ve paid an absurd amount of money (tuition and books) to end up with a sucky-paying job that causes me angst and doubt in my judgement. I’m not a babysitter and I’m certainly not a miracle worker who can “fix” their broken kids. Americans are so spoiled. I don’t know if this is making any sense but this just makes me want to move far away to somewhere that really needs me and start a non-profit therapy center. Who’s with me?!

SO not ready…

Last night I decided to treat Marie to a little evening at the Nail Spa by my house. In order to do that, I needed a babysitter for Cole first. Well, when the thought occurred to me, Jes was standing next to me and I had a mini-“aha moment”. I took a chance and asked him if he would be willing to hang out with Cole for an hour and he surprisingly said “sure” without hesitation. I paused for a moment due to the confusion that had come over me and he said, “hurry up and call her before I change my mind!”. Anyway, it was a go and we were off to get our nails done! Marie was so excited and I was a little worried for Jes.

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For the first fifteen minutes, I had to order Thai food so I called Jes twice to ask him what he wanted and it sounded like he had everything under control. Well, 15 minutes turned into 45 and then by the time we picked up dinner and got back to the house it was an hour and a half later and Cole was on the couch with Jes’ leg blocking the drop-zone crying his poor little heart out.

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According to Jesse, Cole was cool for the first 20 minutes or so just hanging out and goin’ with the flow. Then, as if a switch turned on, he realized that his mommy wasn’t around and started to cry. It sounded like he cried for a good hour. Jes laughed at first…haha…15 minutes of crying is still kinda funny. Then the next 30 minutes was spent walking him around, checking for a poopy diaper, and trying to calm him down. Then he tried putting Cole back on the couch and and turned up the TV. It worked at first but 5 minutes later he started to cry again. There was a periodic pause in his crying as if he was tuckered out but then he caught his breath and it was back to the tears! All I know is that when I walked into the livingroom, Cole was trying to catch his breath in Marie’s arms, there were little wet spots all over the couch, and Jes sat on the couch with a funny grin and couldn’t say anything but, “uh, he pretty much cried for the last hour…little wanker”.

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Oh well, so much for Jes’ first try at babysitting. It sounded kind of like my first time with Cole back in September. The only difference was that Cole fell asleep for me after 30 minutes. Nice try, Jes.

and then there were 215

I managed to weed through my photos and uploaded 215 photos from Thailand. They simply don’t do the trip justice but this will have to do for now. My brother and dad took a grip more and some of them can be viewed on my brother’s site: www.chimmytime.com.
I also think I’m over the jetlag. I actually got over it very quickly. I suppose going to work right away wasn’t a terrible idea. It forced me to sleep normal hours and prevented the 8-hour daytime naps. However, I am very happy that today is Friday already. I need a weekend badly.

a little perspective

OK. I just got back from lunch with Jes at Wahoo’s. We ordered the usual fish taco combo and a side salad, which came out to about 8 bucks for the two of us. I’d say this was a pretty cheap meal – that was until I went to Thailand.
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I couldn’t get over how cheap the food was there. I had breakfast that consisted of rice porridge with Chinese doughnuts and a cup of coffee for 12 bahts…uh, that’s about 30 cents. For lunch, I could have a bowl of noodles and a Coke for about 30 bahts…that would be about 75 cents. Dinner? Let’s go a little crazy…I’ll have a family-style meal consisting of fried fish, tom yum goong (spicy shrimp soup), papaya salad, rice, fried fish cakes, and a Singha beer for about 100 bahts/person…that’s $2.50. Can someone explain this to me?!

home sweet home

Our last days in Thailand were in Bangkok where the weather was really mild and much drier than usual. We spent much of our time shopping and eating before we had to leave the land of Tuk Tuks and Singha beer. Our flight home was really short, only 13 hours!
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I will post photos of the trip as soon as I find some time to sit down and sort through all 1400 photos (not counting my brother’s and dad’s). I can’t believe I’m at work already…luckily I was able to get some sleep on the plane and last night when we got back.

bumpity bump

After the 7-degree weather and modest accommodations in Chiang Rai, getting to Phuket was a nice change. We flew straight down to Phuket from Chiang Rai on Wednesday afternoon and checked into a 5-star golf resort (got a discount from a family friend). First of all, the weather was super hot and sticky. Secondly, the hotel shower was awesome. The temperature was nice a hot and there was a rain shower above in addition to the regular shower head. I finally feel clean again.
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On Thursday, we all got Thai massages in our hotel rooms. That was very relaxing and long overdue with all the car riding and cramped quarters from the past week. We also went to Patong Beach where all the European tourists hang out.
On Friday, Jes and I took a day trip to Similan Islands in the Andaman Sea. We travelled about 75 km by speed boat, which is quite an experience. We sat in the front of the boat and got bumped and jostled quite a bit. The ride was over an hour long and it was pretty tiring trying to keep myself from falling out. I just gotta say that Dramamine works wonders though. I’m super prone to motion sickness and I managed to ride a small boat all the way to the islands, snorkel all day, and hang out on a rocking boat for most of the day without getting sick. The island that we had lunch on was so beautiful. I had never seen such sparkling blue water (not even in Hawaii) and such powdery white sand. The fish and corral were a bit dissappointing but it was fun just being out on a boat and in the water.