SB's Special Sauce

Last night The Band played at the Can Company in Baltimore. This is an outdoor gig where a strip of restaurants have outdoor seating that may or may not exist on other nights and bands set up to entertain the guests as they eat. In the past, SB and I usually dined at one of these restaurants to guarantee ourselves a table. But this year, since SB has been interested in running around and dancing, I got Subway beforehand to save a few bucks and not be chained to the table.

Bad idea. For some reason, this time the band set up closer to the seating area. So unlike in the past, when we could have sat on the curb of the closed-off road between the band and the restaurants, there was nowhere for us to sit if we weren't patrons of the restaurants. Oops.

We ate our sandwiches next to the band as they set up, then I parked myself in front of Ray Lewis' Rib Shack and let SB go to town with a few other girls her age, dancing and running and screaming like little girls tend to do.

The first part of the evening was great. SB got a butterfly painted on her face, the weather was humid but not horrible, and I had a front row seat to all the action. The drama started once the gig ended.

I brought SB to Coldstone Creamery, which was just around the corner, to use the potty and get some ice cream before the ride home. She said she had to go, and she got annoyed when someone beat her to the 1-person restroom, but ended up producing nothing. (Bear with me, there's a reason I'm telling you this) We sat on the bench in front of the store to wait for my husband, who was supposed to meet us there with the truck.

After about 10 minutes of waiting, he shows up looking very pissed off, and informs me that the truck is broken down and AAA is on their way. They had tried to jump start the truck, but the battery wasn't holding the charge. SB and I were to ride home with the Sax Player while TB waits for the tow truck.

So we dump SB (already in her car seat) and myself into the Sax Player's Jetta and start home in the rain. Halfway into the ride, SB informs me that she needs to use her potty. Uh-oh. I ask if she can hold it until we get home and she saying yes. But she keeps telling me she has to use the potty. Then she tells me she has to poop. If we were in our own car I wouldn't have freaked out but we were in someone else's car. The last thing I needed was to thank the guy for going out of his way to drive us home by having my child urinate or defecate in his car.

I spent most of the ride trying to distract her with photos on my cell phone, but about 10 minutes away from home she started writhing around in pain and crying, saying that her tummy hurts and begging for apple juice.

Of course, TB had her cup of apple juice. And he was still in the city, waiting for the tow truck.

I have to give her credit: she didn't have any accidents. Until we got home.

As soon as we pulled into the driveway I rushed her into the house, telling Sax Player that I would help unload TB's equipment as soon as I got SB off the potty. I sat her down on the potty and gave her some apple juice (that Sax Player actually found in the car- turns out we had it the whole time, I just didn't know). She gulped it down like she had been in the Sahara for the past 2 weeks.

Then promptly threw up. All over herself, the bathroom and me.

I'm pretty sensitive to certain smells, and the rancid smell of puke is one that I can't take very well. So I try to clean her up, gagging the entire time myself. I get her mostly clean - keep in mind she's still sitting on the potty, producing nothing - and run out of the room to get another washcloth. As I head back into the bathroom, I hear her vomit again.

This time it was much more. I did my best to clean her up and ended up stripping her and putting her in the tub; something neither of us really wanted to do. By this time it was about 10pm, about an hour after her usual bedtime. I cleaned her off as quickly as possible, put her jammies on and put her to bed.

Meanwhile, Sax Player had completely unloaded the car, said an awkward goodbye to me while I tried to rub vomit off my arms. I felt bad not offering him any gas money for his troubles, but I didn't have any cash and I was covered in puke.

Luckily the tow truck driver was nice enough to drop TB off at home so we didn't need to stress out about that.

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I have noticed that all of my posts so far in September begin with the letter "S" so I am keeping the trend going. Let's see if I'm creative enough to keep it up for the rest of the month.