Some of you with a lot of sinus infections in the family wanted more information about how a sinus infection ended up in a Tuesday-Saturday hospitalization, and that is something I am not sure I can answer well: we DON’T get a lot of sinus infections at our house, which makes it hard to compare a typical one to this one. I got a sinus infection a number of years ago, and when my teeth started hurting I went to the doctor, and she gave me an antibiotic and I took it, and the sinus infection went away, the end. So that’s not super helpful. But I can tell you some of the miscellaneous things doctors mentioned as if they were important, and maybe those will make more sense to those of you with more experience.

One key element in Edward’s case is his Crohn’s disease and the immunosuppressant medication he takes to manage it (Remicade). One of the doctors said that this can make him vulnerable to some of the weirder little bugs that the rest of us would fight off easily.

This might be why the first antibiotic didn’t work: the pediatrician was assuming it was a sinus infection from one of the usual culprits, but maybe it was a weird culprit. Many doctors asked about MRSA and other antibiotic-resistant infections, and whether anyone else in the family had dealt with one. (No.)

Is it helpful to know that the ER doctor said the CAT scan showed allllll of the sinuses were infected? I didn’t know there WERE “allllll”; if asked, I would have thought there was one sinus that stretched across the face, or maybe two sinuses, one on each side—something like that. But there are sinuses up all the way around the cheek/eye region, and all of them were involved. I don’t know whether that’s typical.

The ER doctor mentioned that one sinus region (he pointed near his own eyebrow) has a membrane divider, and that there was so much infection in there, the membrane was “bulging,” and there was concern about rupturing. That’s just so gross.

An ENT doctor said that all the little passages up there were very small (that is, Edward’s set of passages were unusually small), and very swollen, so the sinuses couldn’t drain.

There was a lot of concern about the possibility of an abscess—a walled-off area of infection. If I’m understanding everything correctly, they did find one or two of these.

There was a lot of concern about his eye possibly being infected. The area around one eye was swollen and a light reddish-purplish color. (At one point it was swollen almost shut: that was after we arrived at the children’s hospital but before surgery.) Apparently it is not unusual for sinus infections to cause a little puffiness, but this must have been more than typical, because everyone involved was very interested, and we had an ophthalmologist in our room at 8:30 at night; she brought a suitcase of equipment. If there HAD been eye involvement, he would have needed immediate surgery that very night. Two doctors (the ophthalmologist and an ENT doctor) had a rather heated discussion about it right there in the room, when she (the ophthalmologist) had determined there was no eye involvement, and he (the ENT doctor) questioned her judgement and wanted to do another CAT scan “just in case.”

Something they found during surgery was that the flesh of his cheek was disintegrating. I will tell you that freaked me right out. The surgeon acted like that was a normal thing to say. I asked if my child’s face was going to continue to disintegrate and he acted as if that was a funny question to ask, but SERIOUSLY IS HIS FACE GOING TO CONTINUE TO DISINTEGRATE, I DIDN’T REALIZE IT COULD START TO DISINTEGRATE.

Cheek disintegration suggested to the doctors that this could be a fungal infection rather than a bacterial one; fungal infections are apparently another thing that can happen with immunosuppressing medication. They cultured everything, but didn’t get any decisive answers: one doctor mentioned they’d found some bacteria, but later more than one doctor mentioned finding no bacteria and no fungus. At first I thought that was a good thing (LESS bacteria/fungus in my child’s face) but it’s not exactly good: if they don’t find what it is, they don’t KNOW what it is, and that can make it harder to treat.

One of Paul’s co-workers gets a lot of sinus infections, and she was interested in the antibiotics, so I’ll put that here. The first doctor gave him cefuroxime, also called Ceftin; that’s the one that didn’t work. I don’t know what exactly he got by IV: he got a dose of something in the ER, and then they put him on two different IV antibiotics in the hospital; after a day or two, they took him off the one that was for antibiotic-resistant bacteria, because they felt that was not as likely to be the situation. They sent him home with cefpodoxime, which they said was fairly equivalent to the other of the IV antibiotics.

If you have any questions, like about things that I might not have thought to compare to regular sinus infections, I can attempt to answer those too.

I wrote a long post about where I was right now (children’s hospital) and why I was there (Edward sinus infection), and when I proofread it later, I noticed it was very boring. So I re-wrote it and made it a lot shorter, hoping that that would reduce the boredom if only by reducing the bulk, and I was also very charming about how much I like being in hospitals. Then I hit post, and that is when WordPress, which is what I used to write this blog, asked for my password, and I gave it, and when I had entered the password, it brought me to the old version of the post. Usually when this happens (why does it ever, EVER happen???), I can get the other post back. This time, nothing worked. I am starting to feel as if the universe is trying to protect you from a long boring post and/or a post in which I brag about my own charm.

I will SUMMARIZE why we are here, as I did in the SECOND version, the version that was lost. Friday night Edward seemed ill and had a fever. Saturday morning I took him to Urgent Care, and the doctor said it was a sinus infection and prescribed an antibiotic. Tuesday I called the pediatrician to say he was no better, and they gave me an appointment that morning, and at that appointment they sent us to the Emergency Room. The Emergency Room did a CAT scan and labwork, and sent Edward by ambulance to the children’s hospital in the nearest big city, and he started IV antibiotics. Wednesday evening Edward had surgery to get stuff out of his sinuses. Today we are seeing how that went and whether he will need a second surgery. We have been here for two nights and will be here for at least a third night.

Boy, that is still pretty long. You will have to take my word for it that the original version gave that same information (plus more detail than anyone would want about which doctors we saw and what his symptoms were and the entire evolution of the treatment plan) in triple the words.

I will now tell you some reasons you might want me as your hospital companion, and I will try not to be as obvious about my own charm. …No, I have tried several drafts, and there is no way to do it. I am just very charming about hospitals. Except: there is a shower in our room, and I don’t know if I’m allowed to use it or if it’s just for the patient, and I’m too shy to ask, and there are no towels so I can’t just sneak one, and also there are people coming into the room continually but unpredictably, so I feel as if the MOMENT I stepped into the shower, an entire team of medical professionals would arrive. And a person might think, “Well, of COURSE you are allowed to use the shower! That is what it is THERE for!”—except that when I stayed in the maternity ward long ago, the nurses were Very Strict about the room’s bathroom being ONLY for the patient, NOT for guests. And it wasn’t just the shower: guests were not allowed to use the toilet, either. Guests were supposed to use the bathroom down the hall. And “guests” included the baby’s other parent. So I think it is VERY POSSIBLE that this shower is only for Edward, and that’s why there are no towels in there, because he cannot shower yet. And you may well sigh with impatience about my reluctance to JUST ASK, WHAT IS THE HARM IN ASKING, but you KNOW staff can get a little snippy about things like that, you KNOW they can. Like, SOME of them will say really nicely, “Oh, I’m sorry, the shower is only for patients!” and seem genuinely understanding and regretful about it, but OTHERS of them will act as if you’ve suggested violating HIPAA in there.

(More about this sinus infection if you’re wondering “Wait, how did a sinus infection lead to hospitalization?”)

I am back from an assortment of short vacations/road-trips (people who chose the postcard subscription in the fundraiser will get this month’s postcard from the road), and so today I am feeling mixed feelings: the fun is over and so is the vacation/road-trip food, but on the other hand I have my familiar shower and my non-travel-size hairbrush and my full assortment of clothing.

I’d ordered some earrings from Etsy before I left (I ordered a duplicate pair to go into one of the fundraiser care packages), and they were waiting for me when I returned. It is challenging to take a picture of one’s own ear, but I persevered until I got at least a mediocre picture:

One of the things I find discouraging on road trips is getting a glimpse into how very many women feel comfortable peeing all over toilet seats. I remember learning in psychology class that the human brain will work very hard to take a person’s behavior and force an explanation for it that lets it align with their concept of themselves as a good person doing the right thing, and I am wondering how anyone’s brain manages that feat in the case of peeing all over a toilet seat and then leaving that pee for someone else to have to clean up. Perhaps we should have a couple of special stalls reserved for people who don’t want to sit down, so that we are not wasting nice clean seats for other people, and to minimize the number of peed-on seats for the people who clean the bathrooms.

While I’m complaining (I am drinking black coffee after a week of adding, for example, Hershey’s syrup and heavy cream, so my mood is iffy), I would like to complain about how frustrating it can be to share the road with other people. I’ve noticed that if the speed limit is 55mph, I can usually cruise along contentedly in the same lane without needing to pass—but when the limit is 65mph, I have to keep passing people in order to go the speed I’d like to go. And it happens again and again that I am stuck behind someone going about 60mph, and then as I attempt to pass, their speed climbs and climbs until we are twinning it along the road at 75mph and I still can’t pass them. I am familiar with the right-lane phenomenon of “Oops, someone is passing me and that makes me notice I am going slower than I want to be going, better pick up the pace!” so I try to be understanding, but it happens SO OFTEN! How can SO MANY people just be noticing their speed as I pass them? And could they perhaps let me pass them and THEN pick up the pace? That’s what I do when it is me in the right lane, because I am ALSO familiar with the left-lane phenomenon of trying to pass someone who is going faster and faster. EMPATHY, everyone; EMPATHY.

Another complaint: people who are UP IN MY TRUNK as I am in the passing lane, when I am going Nice and Fast but also can’t go any faster than the person in front of me in the same lane, and/or can’t get over to the right because there are cars there. If I could say ONE THING to The Car Behind Me, it would be something like: Look WIDER than just the back of my car. This is not a case of my one single car unfairly blocking someone’s way by going deliberately slow in the fast lane. I CANNOT go faster than the person in front of me. I CANNOT get over to the right if there is a car to my right. I am JUST AS STUCK as the person behind me, so could I have A LITTLE SPACE. We are going VERY VERY FAST and it seems like the safety distance should be more than three feet.

The last time I was on a road trip, there was a scary situation where someone switched into my lane without looking, and luckily I had noticed that it looked like they were about to do that, and luckily I had time and space to scooch over to the lane to my left and avoid the crash. It was a lot closer than I would usually like to cut it, but it was an emergency. The guy I cut in front of LEANED on his horn, pulled so close behind me I was sure he was going to hit me, swerved his truck back and forth, was visibly flailing his arm and shouting. He did this for several minutes. Like, was he attempting to communicate that he felt my driving had been unsafe? In that case, why was he communicating it by being WAY WAY WAY MORE UNSAFE? It is a mystery. When I was finally able to get back into my own lane, he drove beside me for another minute or so, continuing to honk and shout and gesture. My good sir, you are teaching me nothing about road safety/manners.

I wrote about this bee shirt on Twitter but wanted to write about it here, too. I love it so much. I might buy it in more colors.

(image from Amazon.com)

I was nervous about what size to order. I am long-torsoed, narrow-shouldered, medium-to-medium-small chested. Men’s/unisex shirts are typically terrible on me: huge/boxy in the shoulders, tight in the hips, shapeless/baggy in the waist. But women’s sizes (especially in graphic/fundraiser tees) tend to run small/fitted/short. I wear an XL Tall in Old Navy / Gap women’s shirts. Sometimes I wear an XL in other brands; sometimes I wear a 2XL (my Notorious RBG shirt is 2XL); sometimes nothing works because all the options are too small or too fitted or too short, or else too big or too baggy or too boxy.

I ordered a women’s 2XL in the bee shirt. I didn’t try it on before I washed it so I don’t know if it shrank; but after washing, it fit the way I like a cute comfy weekend t-shirt to fit: soft and casual and a little loose. And it was nicely long. If I were ordering a second shirt in another color, and I may very well do that, I’d risk the XL.

I also finally bought a bee mug. I’d been looking for awhile, but nothing seemed just right until this one:

I wish I could include a link, but I found it at a non-chain candy/card/gift shop, and it doesn’t have a brand name on it. They had one each of several similar mugs, and I narrowed it down to two and then asked my sister-in-law and my sister-in-law’s sister which they preferred, and they both preferred the same one, and it was the one I was leaning toward, so that was happy.

One more bee-related shopping story. I had a packet of Mrs. Grossman’s bee stickers, bought who knows where. As with most of the stickers I buy, for a long time they just sat in a cubby on my desk. Then when I started mailing stuff for the fundraiser, I started putting a bee sticker on the mailing label, and/or tearing off a little panel of stickers and putting them in with the book/earrings/whatever.

As I got low on bee stickers, I started nervously wondering where it was that I’d bought them. I suspected I’d found them while shopping with my sister-in-law and my sister-in-law’s sister, but those are stores outside of my usual rounds. I looked online, and that’s when I’d found information that the bee stickers had been discontinued, and that the stock remaining in stores was all that was left. And so I was greatly anticipating an upcoming shopping trip with my sister-in-law and my sister-in-law’s sister: MAYBE we would find the bee stickers!

We found the bee stickers:

They were at a crafts/stationery/gifts store. I bought all they had.

(Each time we talk about bee stuff, there are questions about what’s with the bee stuff. Here is the Erin Keane tweet that started it: Erin Keane tweet that started it. Here is the article she later wrote: Welcome to Bee Season. Bees have become a symbol of pissed-off liberal/progressive women. Here’s a whole post of gift ideas for same.)

Elizabeth is going through her room and she’s been getting rid of tons of stuff: a giant bag of clothes, a giant bag of stuffed animals, two boxes of assorted toys and knick-knacks and miscellany. One thing in the pile was the book The Care and Keeping of You—the version from before they split it into a book for younger girls and a book for older girls.

I was leafing through it to see if I should just discreetly put it back onto a shelf in case she might want it again later, but it really did look much too young for her. She’s 14 now, and will be a freshman in high school this fall. She hangs out with friends in coffee shops. She French-tucks her shirts. She’s growing out her bangs. She needs an older-girl book and I’m wondering if you have any to recommend. We have the Scarleteen book on the bookshelf, but that seems like that’s TOO old: “to get you through your teens and twenties” sounds like a broader range than what I’m looking for. I’m looking for something in between American Girl and Scarleteen. Like, to get her through ages 13-16.

I leafed through one book in a bookstore this weekend, and it looked like the kind of thing I wanted: casual, cool, friendly, a section on tampons, answers to questions people might not want to ask the grown-ups in their lives. The only reason I didn’t buy it right then and there is that as I was skimming through I saw a lot of stuff about how can you tell if you have a crush on a boy, what is it like to go on a date with a boy—and nothing about any other possible situation. I’d like such books to show they know that situations other than “girls get crushes on boys” EXIST.

********

OH! Also! Elizabeth is having her first sleepover. We haven’t had one before for various reasons, including “because I hate sleepovers” and “because we have so many children sleeping here already,” but I am finally at the stage of life where I can imagine managing it, and also there was a reason to have one, and so here we are.

What I would like to know is if there are things that make sleeping on the floor in a sleeping bag more comfortable and that are also worth purchasing/storing to have on hand for sleepovers. Like, what about those rolled-up squishy-foam things? Should I get a few? We have hardwood floors. I personally would not want to sleep in a sleeping bag on them.

Or air mattresses? I associate air mattresses with being gradually lowered from “sleeping on a balloon” to “sleeping on the hardwood floor,” and also with “endlessly trying to find where the leak is this time,” but perhaps that is not always accurate.

Or do we just let the kids put their sleeping bags on hardwood floors? I don’t remember caring much about the floor when I was a kid. Though thinking back, I’m pretty sure my friends’ floors had carpeting.

What I want to ask is if you’d feel comfortable letting your daughter sleep over at a house when only the dad was home and not the mom, but I feel like that could devolve into an exhausting “not all men,” “but women also,” “what if it’s a family with two dads,” “here’s a horrifying story you will never get out of your head, as an example supporting why I have the opinion I have” kind of discussion that I am not up for this morning.

It’s on my mind because Elizabeth is going to have a sleepover, and the plans are for a specific date for a reason (that is, the sleepover can’t be moved to a different date), but that’s a specific date I’ll be out of town. Paul is totally up to the task and is in fact better at this kind of thing than I am (he’s already planning to do make-your-own-pizzas for dinner and make cinnamon rolls for breakfast), but I was wondering if other parents would mind if they knew I wouldn’t be home. I’d mind a little. I’d almost certainly still let Elizabeth go, but I’d mind a little.

I am stressed this morning because Elizabeth has a dentist appointment to fix one of two cavities, and they’re going to give her Novocaine, and she hasn’t had that before (except when she had two extractions, but they didn’t give her the Novocaine until she was very very high on nitrous oxide, so she doesn’t even remember it), and I don’t know how much to prep her about it. And I’m so sad for her that she has to get this done, and also that now she has two molars with breached hulls. Also, I’m agitated that they’re having us do this in two appointments. They said it’s that they don’t want her to have to have work done in two quadrants at once, but I personally would HUGELY rather just get this kind of thing over with, and Elizabeth is the same, but I didn’t want to argue, and they didn’t really give me SPACE to argue: they just said, “Okay, so for the first appointment, any particular times/days that are better?” And then they spaced the second appointment a week later, so she’ll have a week to stress about it. And I’m mad because when we were there the last time for a dentist appointment, the dentist WASN’T THERE and they just shrugged it off as if sometimes the dentist just isn’t there when you have an appointment to see him and it’s no big deal and you can just see him next time, and reassuring me that I wouldn’t have to pay for that part of the appointment (WELL CLEARLY I WOULD NOT HAVE TO PAY TO NOT-SEE THE DENTIST), while I was like “WHY DID YOU NOT CALL ME SO I COULD RESCHEDULE??” (but did that part entirely internally), and now Elizabeth has two cavities that are big enough to need Novocaine, so I’m guessing they were present last time and would have been caught if the dentist had BEEN there. And I’m retroactively mad at myself for not being someone who would say “Wait, you’re saying the dentist isn’t here? Let me reschedule, then. We had appointments to see the dentist.” I just have to be such an Easy Patient all the time, even when it makes NO SENSE, and I am no good at dealing with sudden/unexpected things.

And Rob emailed to say oh, by the way, he accidentally shipped shampoo and body wash to our old address, and could I contact the new homeowners and see what can be done about getting those? Which: no, I can’t/won’t. We will take the loss in whatever form it happens (return shipping, the entire cost of the items, whatever). And also: WHY IS HE HAVING SHAMPOO AND BODY WASH SHIPPED INSTEAD OF GOING TO THE STORE??? And he doesn’t have Prime; does this mean he PAID FOR SHIPPING in addition to paying whatever jacked-up price he paid?? And I am seeing him in ONE WEEK: this was SUCH a last-minute shampoo emergency he had to SHIP things? And even if he had deleted our old address and put in our new address, he meant to ship things to his SCHOOL address, so why wasn’t he checking to make sure of THAT?

This is driving me crazy. It feels like there are so many levels of COULD YOU BE MORE ALERT that I need to discuss with him, I don’t even know where to start or how many of them to do. And it’s reminding me intensely of Paul, which is making me much more upset because it makes it harder for me to roll my eyes and say this is just a Kids Are Kind of Dumb But This Is How They Learn thing. Paul is STILL this unalert. He will run out of the little flossers he likes, and instead of putting them on the shopping list he will just get a packet shipped from Amazon. When I say, “Wait, were they cheaper that way or something?,” he shrugs: who knows? who cares? So then I’ll look it up and they’ll be TWICE the price of buying them at Target, AND I was going to Target before the package will arrive, so he could have had them cheaper AND sooner. It is maddening. MADDENING. I AM MADDENED. I AM SO MADDENED THIS MORNING.

I made a couple of tweaks to the fundraiser options. The size 5 skirts are gone. I made the six-postcard subscription into a twelve-postcard subscription (I’d sent out the first installment of postcards and was already itching to send out the next batch, which cued me that every-other-monthly was too skimpy) and moved the six-postcard subscription to the international options. Also, I investigated and found that my top favorite bee earrings (the ones I have been wearing almost every day, bordering on obsessively) are sold by an Etsy seller who will ship internationally for a reasonable price, so I added those as another international option. Also, I found a bee ornament (I’m going to use mine as a Christmas tree ornament, but it was sold with wind chimes and decorative gardening supplies and those rear-view-mirror crystal danglers, so it could be a suncatcher or a very wee wall-hanging or a rear-view-mirror decoration or whatever), and put that in as an alternate option for the Bee Twins: you can do ornament/sticker instead of earrings/sticker (if you signed up for earrings/sticker but want to switch to ornament/sticker, it’s not too late).

If you signed up for the bee earrings/sticker, I have ordered the stickers and they have arrived, and I have ordered the earrings but they have not yet arrived, so don’t worry that you haven’t received yours yet. Napkins, skirts, pottery, and baby name books ordered so far have been shipped out, except for one set of napkins on my kitchen counter that will likely go out tomorrow. There were more napkin requests than I expected (SO PLEASING), and we are starting to run low (SO PLEASING), but we still have at least three sets left. (One of the sets pictured below has been claimed.) William and Elizabeth and I were working on combinations last night, and they think that any further sets would be TOO hodgepodge—but, while appreciating their artistic sensibilities, I disagree that “too hodgepodge” is a thing, and I think I can get at least two more sets out of what’s left—though I admit I’d be tempted to go buy some more napkins to freshen the selection up a bit. Which I would love to have the excuse to do.

I have an extremely pleasing spreadsheet of future greeting cards / care packages / treat packages / Christmas books / wall calendars to send out. I can’t tell you how heart-in-throat sentimental/exhilarating/fun I am finding this. It gives me purpose and hope and things to look forward to.

We are now at $4903.41. It would be so exciting to hit $5000, but even if we DON’T, I feel as if we BASICALLY did. Like, if we stopped at $4903.41, and I were telling someone else about it, I would feel comfortable rounding to $5000. And LOTS of you were able to get matching funds from an employer, and I did not count those in the total but I TOTALLY COUNT THEM IN MY HEART.

I have started shopping for the care packages, which is so fun. I just love it. When I placed my latest Penzey’s order (THE UNEXPECTED SPICES OF THE RESISTANCE) I bought some extras. I am also keeping the care packages in mind every time I buy any indulgence for myself: what’s good for a Swistle is good for a Swistle care package! An interesting care package request concept I hadn’t thought of: someone asked me to send a care package to their college-freshman nephew this fall. I plan to make packages for college-junior Rob and college-freshman William at the same time, so I can get good deals on larger quantities of Kraft Easy Mac and Clif Z-bars and mug cakes and microwave popcorn and Altoids and string lights and temporary tattoos and novelty socks.

Several people donated and said they did not need prizes. I said so already in the individual emailed replies, but I want to say publicly too that if you change your mind and want the prize, I stand ready and eager to add you to the list. Like if you have A Day and you feel as if having treats coming to you at some later date would be bolstering, PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE TO TELL ME. I would love to add you to the spreadsheet of hope and purpose.

I needed a dress for a summer-evening office-casual indoor/outdoor Paul work event later this month, and I went out shopping one evening with my friend Morgan (we are both feeling a little oppressed by our daytime summer schedule of Children at Home), and we FOUND A DRESS and then we had a Food Court dinner and then split a dessert crepe (strawberry/cheesecake flavor with chocolate drizzle and whipped cream). It was a good evening, though I was sweaty and tired and my hair was wrecked by the end of it. Here is the dress, if you are interested:

(image from Torrid.com)

(It looks quite a bit different on me than it looks on the taller/bustier model: longer, less babydollish, more fit-and-flare. The photo of the dress on its own is more how it looks on me.)

It’s a nice thick slippery fabric, and we’ll have to see if it ends up being comfortable when I’m wearing it on what might be a very warm July evening—but what appealed to me during try-on is that it does not seem as if it needs any kind of shapewear/slip underneath; it’s high-waisted, and it coasts over the details rather than clinging to them. And it’s stretchy: I pulled it over my head and it felt good to put it on, like pulling on a stretchy comfy t-shirt, but thicker fabric than that. The style is partly casual/cute, but the seams/pleats/pattern give it a structured/tailored look as well. And if you are pear-shaped like me with narrow rounded shoulders, and if in a sleeveless and/or v-neck item you look like your grandmother going to church, the existent sleeves and non-V neckline of this dress are a total relief/delight. And Morgan had a $25 coupon she wasn’t going to use, so she gave it to me, and that was even better, though I would have gladly paid the full $68.90 for it after trying on three dozen other dresses that were thin/short/casual/formal/babydoll/v-neck/sleeveless/needed-a-cardigan-or-slip-or-shapewear-to-work. It was an utter triumph. AND IT HAS POCKETS.

I don’t want to argue on Facebook so I’m bringing it here. A guy I went to high school with (and had a very brief and dramatic almost-dated-but-missed-it with) did a kids-these-days post about how he was outside a bar and saw some early-20s guys refusing to walk an early-20s girl to her car, so he stayed outside a little longer to make sure she got there safely. Which is nice. Except. Back in my late teens, I went to a party this same guy was at. And when I left, he asked one of his friends to see me to my car. Which shows a very nice consistent principle over the decades, and he definitely can’t be accused of judging young people for attitudes he only formed in middle age. But. The friend who walked me to my car then started kissing me and was difficult to get away from, and it was a scary and stressful situation to extricate myself from, alone in the dark with some guy. I can’t know for sure there wasn’t something worse along that path, but I’m pretty sure I would have been both safer and happier if I’d walked to my car on my own.

But you can see why I don’t want to argue that men SHOULD NOT walk women safely to their cars—particularly since the conversation is already devolving into “it’s not about gender: men AND women should be looking out for each other!!” plus the traditional middle-aged bitching about how this young generation is the worst and no one has respect or manners anymore.

I asked on Twitter the other day if anyone knew the scoop about putting return addresses on packages: this week I’m mailing out a bunch of skirts and baby name books and cloth napkins for the fundraiser (up to $4578.41 so far!), and long ago a couple of post office clerks tried to tell me that a return address was required—but then they let me leave it off when I explained that it was a blog giveaway, which made me wonder if it’s really a rule. Surely saying “It’s for a blog giveaway” is not enough to override an actual rule, especially if that rule is for safety/security. And especially if, when I DO put a return address on the package, they don’t even check to make sure it’s real/mine.

Twitter dug up the evidence that it was in fact a rule (only for priority mail, oddly), but suggested clerks might have varying degrees of interest in enforcing it, which is proving to be the case. The first batch of packages I brought, the clerk made no remark other than “I’m trying not to cover up your heart” as he put the label very close to where I’d written “Swistle” and drawn a little heart in the return address field. (I didn’t at first catch his meaning, so it first struck my ear as a surprisingly poetic thing to say.) So he definitely noticed the return address situation, but chose not to do anything about it. The second batch of packages I brought, a different clerk said, “You know, you’re supposed to have a full return address,” and I started in with what I’d prepared to say (“Is there any work-around for that? It’s a blog giveaway, and…”) and she cut me off with a shrug and an “Eh” and an it-doesn’t-matter wave of the hand, before making sure I knew that if the package was undeliverable, I wouldn’t get it back. That made me think again of the suggestion made on Twitter that I use the post office as my return address: if I were tracking the package and saw it heading back to the post office, I could stop by and let them know to expect it. I don’t know how cheerful they’d be about that, but at least there would be hope. But I don’t remember ever getting back an undeliverable package, even when I do put my return address on there, so I am not very worried, just the usual low-grade anxiety which is literally unavoidable.