Deadlines

Again, I force myself to focus on all those things I'm ignoring in my life:

• The Actuarial Exam is in 6 days. SIX. DAYS. Or, in complete-math-geek terms, 141 hours. The sign of a true procrastinator: I started studying yesterday. And you know what? This stuff is HARD. I don't remember a damn thing. I thought, "I'm a fast learner. I'll just brush up with some practice problems." Yeah. Two hours, nine practice problems, and six pages of paper later, I had one problem right. And that was by ACCIDENT. You know, I used to know how to do this. It used to be easy for me. But that was ten years ago. And you know what I've realized? Ten years is a really, really, really. Really. Long. Time.



• We got back a response from the Catastrophic Illness in Children Fund. We sent the original application in August and hoped that was the end of it. Of course! They'll just send us a check! Hi. Fantasy world, table for one. They replied last week, and they want everything from pay stubs to tax records to pictures proving we even HAVE a child. Oh, and receipts from every grinder we ate while we were in Boston in March. Well, maybe not. But close. I've moved the form listing the 20+ things to send them about 134 times. To get to something more interesting. Like the newest Eddie Bauer catalog. Of stuff I can't afford to buy. Because I'm paying tons of medical bills. THAT I COULD HAVE REIMBURSED IF I STOP IGNORING THE FORM. Anyone see anything wrong with that? Nah. Me either.



• School started on September 13th. Today is September 21st. And Ethan is still at home. This isn't so much a deadline as it is a task. My task for every day for the Rest Of My Life is to be the bitch from hell. I must nag. Constantly. I must call the school, and the administrators, and anyone who will listen to make sure that my son is going to be taken care of. Sad, but true. The nurse situation is "supposedly" straightened out. They asked a nurse in training to stay on full time. Oh, except she isn't exactly working in the room yet. That will probably be moved along by me constantly calling to ask the school if she's there yet. (Of course, it will probably have the opposite effect. Like a vacation peppered with your child asking "Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?", it will drag on and on forever.)



• Also school related: the bus situation is my newest fight. I found out that Ethan will be the first of eight handicapped children picked up every day (and therefore, the last of the eight to be dropped off). This wouldn't be so bad if there was actually a monitor on the bus. Right now, it's just the driver. This one is no contest - I have an IEP that states he will have "door to door service, with a monitor". So boo on you bus company. It's just the minor fact of me calling to lodge my complaint that will make the difference, I suppose. But again, I have to wonder: Am I just a super-nervous, ultra-paranoid parent? Or, do the other parents just not care as much about their kids?



• In the "it's just bothering me, but we can get by anyway" category, CG has not had a professional photograph taken since he was 9 months old. I am a horrible mother! With Ethan, I went every three months (or so) dutifully. And I'm so happy to have them now, you can see how he grew and changed with every picture. CG is going to be 18 months soon, and that is my deadline - to get his picture taken by then. Sure, there will be the gap where I have no framed picture of his 12 month. Or 15 month. But at least I'll have this one! As soon as I make the appointment... Obviously, I have a few other things to take care of first.