no one likes the pink ones

I had to take the N boy to the doctor today. The child went and ruptured his ear drum (at least all evidence points to that, but too much ooze was present in the ear canal for complete confirmation). He was in that stage of slight betterness today that leads to greater whining and complaining. The youngest three, in my opinion, either got too little sleep or are in the day-before-getting-sick stage of greater whining and complaining (and tantrum throwing ad nauseum). As a result, the brief and unexpected trip with N boy to the doctor’s office today was almost as refreshing as a long weekend away in the mountains.

I asked the boy whether he felt well enough to go with me to the grocery store to get his prescription immediately following the appointment. Had he responded in the negative, I would have gladly taken him home before trekking out alone. He didn't, so we dropped off the prescription, and I began the very slow acquisition of a few small items. Having become accustomed to picking up a few prescriptions on a monthly basis, I have the timing aspect of this venture down to a science. The boy followed along like my hugging velcro monkey twin for the first half of the adventure then slowly oozed into a seat near the prescription counter when exhaustion got the better of him. Being a somewhat resourceful momma (who tends to procrastinate), I figured this was the perfect time to gather up a few Easter goodies for the little people. Purchases made, I hurried the packages out to the car and returned just as my number came up on the big Your Drugs are Ready Board of Doom.



This is all a very long prelude to simply ask one question. Whatever happened to plain old regular jelly beans? I know for a fact that I found them last year, though they WERE surrounded by sister beans of every possible gimmick. But alas, this year, there were specialty jelly bean-like creations of the ‘kissables’, lifesaver, bubble gum, and skittles varieties, but not even an empty space to suggest the one time presence of the more generic sugary goo. Have we become a society of so many specialties that we have lost the basic form?

…which reminds me of my mother. She has at least four doctors all dealing with different aspects of the same medical condition. When she has a question about something, it takes her ages to figure out which one she is supposed to call for that specific thing. It makes me worry that something will fall through the cracks (like the time she had pneumonia and her GP sent her to a specialty ER that is divided into departments. Because some of her symptoms were presenting like those she had with a heart attack, they sent her to the coronary care unit. No one ever checked her lungs. They sent her home, and we were back the next day because she was much worse).

And to think, I was merely trying to write about jelly beans. If you need any jelly beans in late April, I am sure we will be able to spare you a candy dish full of stale pink ones – if I can ever find the darn things, that is.