Today, I woke up with a very bad headache, which I've been unable to shake. I had agreed to get up with the kids this morning, and I'd been unable to go back to sleep after about 7:00, so by 8:00 I figured I might as well grab my headache and drag it out to the kitchen for breakfast. And then, since I had stuff that had to be done, I went out to the post office and the Chaos Which is Walmart. With both kids. Why not? I already had a headache, might as well have it in public as at home.

Today, I found myself constantly and easily irritated by the short people who share my home. Emily had another inexplicable mooing tantrum, preceded by about 437 instances of flatly not listening when she was told to, or not to, do something. Anything. Jacob was less oppositional, but he stayed in that race until the end.

Today, every time I said something to Willem, I managed to offend or irritate or otherwise off-put him. I made a sharp and concerted effort to not allow my headache to become the family's problem, but that effort was not successful.

It's not that the day was a total failure. I finally got around to writing and mailing thank-you notes from Christmas. I packaged and sent something to my transcription job, and something else to a friend for her birthday. I bought three yards of white flannel, tore it into 1/2" strips, and am knitting it into a new bathmat to go in my new bathroom.

But yet, underlying it all, there was this creeping crawling crud, as though I had accidentally worn my underpants with the ruffles on the inside or something. (I've checked. I didn't.)