I recently read an article on Babycentre about extended breastfeeding and it calmed down my increasing feelings of guilt at my lackadaisical approach to weaning.  Most of the time I am letting Robert drive the process, and I have no intention of covering my nipples with chili sauce to put him off – which is a remedy I vaguely remember from the less worldly mothers of my native country. Robert is actually very mature about the whole thing, he rarely requests to be nursed during the day and I have managed two nights in a row to put him to sleep without resorting to the comfort of breastfeeding.  I feel comfortable that weaning will take place sooner or later, perhaps even before the end of the year.  A month ago I managed to reduce breastfeeding to nightly sessions only, but then his prolonged sickness was a setback; breast milk was the only food he wanted, and it was the only thing he was able to keep down when he had the stomach bug.  Today I am having another setback because I am suffering with an incapacitating flu (yet again), and breast milk is an easy meal to offer when mom is bedridden.

I believe my frequent bouts of flu are intimately linked to my emotional and mental state. The flu hits when I experience an emotional setback, a conflict at work or a disappointment, this weekend has witnessed two such incidents.

I guess I am not so lucky after all, the black cloud that my ex husband purported to float around my head is still very much there. Never mind my near miss with the cell phone; On Friday I lost my wallet for the second time in two months. Since this follows so closely on the heels of similar incidents, I can hardly make any excuses except for perhaps stupidity, confusion and absentmindedness.  I mean this is now the third time that I have something fall out of my pockets (from the same shallow-pocketed pants I may add) but I never really took notice of the problem until now. Well, not many people are this dense.  In the aftermath of the event I made a quick google search with the sentence “I always lose my wallet” and all I got was writings from party animals and people who generally get themselves too intoxicated to remember what they did on nightly revelry, let alone where they lose their wallets in the process.  Ah well, shit happens I guess.

My bad wallet jumped out of my pocket early Friday evening somewhere en route on Sea Point Main Road, and I only noticed its absence early on Saturday morning when I was getting ready to go to work.  I was too frustrated to go to work and I actually phoned to get out of it but a very nice Duty Manager was on the floor in the morning and she asked me to try my best to get there and I couldn’t say no. Lucy did not have any small change to lend me for the taxi and I do not have a change box at my little flat, so in the end I picked up a two-Euro coin and used it for my transport. At work my friend the Duty Manager gave me some money to tide me over until Monday when I will be finally able to go to the bank and get a new bank card.

The day progressed like a normal day at work usually does, no disasters, no major happenings. As I was ready to leave my Team Leader indicated that he wanted to speak to me for ten minutes about my quarterly review.  The review was encouraging, despite the fact that I made one serious mistake involving the transport of Dangerous Goods, and another less serious one which resulted in a complaint from a customer airline. I also had two incidents of late comings recorded during the time; it is hard to punctual when I depend on public transport and the early arrival of my nanny, and things easily spiral out of control when anything else goes wrong.

As I was leaving the little man from productivity planning, the star of my previous woes with the work schedule showed up. He had apparently been putting in extra time on this Saturday to prepare the shift roster for January. I went to get my copy and was unable to believe what I was seeing there. After all the trouble and the degradation I went through trying to explain to my situation to management, they put me again on flexible shifts, working afternoons as well as mornings.  I think I went straight to the little man and showed him my schedule, and he gave me a puzzled and uncomprehending look : “this is what I had” he muttered, and the only thing I could do was retort : “You guys are really funny, you know that?”. I just walked away, trembling with my pent up rage, and the desire to strangle and trample the blond cretin.  At the water cooler I bumped into a colleague, who pointed out to me the futility of getting mad and letting my mouth run away with me, whinging only as I usually do. He put into my head the idea of filing a formal grievance, which I definitely intend to do.  I cannot even begin to describe my feelings of utter rage at the incompetence and inefficiency of the people who plan our working schedules.

My worries about this recurring problem made me forget momentarily the problem with my wallet, and in any case my cards were safely canceled by then and there was nothing left for me to do other than casually ask at some of the places I passed yesterday, if anyone had handed in a wallet. At the first Supermarket I asked, there was strangely enough a wallet but it wasn’t mine. The fact that people seem to find things and hand them in, encourages me to ask further. I do not like it because it makes me relive my stupidity again and again (every time I ask) but I hope that the exercise will be humbling enough for me to learn a useful lesson.

Robert’s dad brought him home at three, and he was burning up with fever, presumably the side effect of his MMR vaccination, so I was caught up with this problem for the rest of the night.  Sponge baths and suppositories absorbed me with wallet and work forgotten for while. However I still managed to email my incompetent management to ask about the scheduling; my tone in the email was not as poisonous as I felt. I am saving all my wrath though for the grievance letter which I have started to work on.  Another battle for the walking wounded… life can get too interesting sometimes.