Puerto Rican Chicken-pox?

Tuesday,

Tonight, I'm sweating in my office (saving some small money with no AC on) listening to baseball, fuzzy AM radio attenuated even more by the thickness and heat, at the end of a very busy cooking, errand-filled, cleaning day. I felt engaged and happy all day, running around figuring out how to get everything done. Ran with the jog-stroller to a farmer's market for more fresh peaches, went to a nearby park for massive, high-swinging session with Teague, ran errands, went to vet to fetch Doggy-Prozac for Mumi the anxiety-prone cur, walked same cur around the barrio, cooked food for the little guy, and made a massive pot of spaghetti sauce from a HUGE bag of tomatoes donated to us by our neighbors. Teague was a little pain in the neck this afternoon- refusing to nap peacefully, screaming like a madman. He has this high, piercing witch-scream that culminates in pitiful coughing and choking. At first, I found this coughing to be so shocking and dramatic that I would run into his room and hold him close to me as if he were near death, but what I've learned is that he stops choking and coughing and moans himself to sleep, eventually. I guess I've been additionally worried since I still have the lingering memory of Mira and I waking up in the middle of the night when Teague was about 6 months old and hearing him hoarsely coughing and choking, which sounded, startlingly, like the barking of a rabid seal. As we ran downstairs to his crib I felt certain that he was choking on a fishhook or some other strange foreign object, but then, after the 1 AM call to the emergency room, it was determined that he probably had CROUP and so as instructed, we sat in a steamy bathroom for a time, and after a while Teague was laughing and looking a little bit like he had pulled one off in that he was somehow up in the middle of the night, just hanging out with the adults.

But anyway, he had his 1 year doctor's appointment last Friday and the good doctor had nothing at all to say about the choking-screaming-coughing phenomenon, which she just said that some kids do that, and left the room and sent in the torture-nurse who jabbed him with three poison needles. Of course he screamed mightily (as I would too), but he recovered quite quickly and was laughing soon after. No side effects, at least not yet from MMR, Chicken pox and Hep-A. Mira and I had the requisite discussion regarding autism and inoculation fears, but just couldn't find enough reason to get all primitive and refuse vaccinations. Everything else is normal with our little guy, though his head size is still off the charts and he could nearly be mistaken for an hydro-cephalic child.

I cooked "Puerto Rican Chicken" tonight, the primary component of which is Sofrito, a nice blended mix of peppers, onion, garlic, tomato, etc, all mixed up and cooked along with chicken (and beer!). Not bad. I told Mira after a month we'd vote on the dishes I'd concocted recently and decide if any needed to be voted off the island. She said that this one could stay!