Insanity and Cake

This past weekend has been crazy! Let me give you a little bit of background. Saturday was the annual cookout for my karate school. I offered to get to the location (I feel like a spy.) and hold the picnic tables for us. That's really all you need to know before we get started. Here's a day by day blow:

Friday:
I'm trying to take a short nap while Best Friend takes a shower. I receive a text saying my parents are taking my older brother to the hospital. Let me explain about William. He's a very low functioning autistic with other disorders mixed in there. He and I are extremely close.  He also has a ridiculously strong immune system. I can count on one hand the number of times he's been sick. I fretted, generally pacing around and freaking out. I kept trying to tell myself nothing was seriously wrong. Best Friend and I went out to eat, while waiting for my parents to tell me they were at the hospital (we were closer to town than they were). I get the text they've arrived, and meet them at the hospital.

I am informed that I'm to bake three cakes that night. A glance at the clock tells me it's only 7:30, plenty of time to go to the store, take Best Friend out to her boyfriend's house, get home, and make three cakes, while still doing what I needed to get done (i.e laundry and a much needed shower.). Best Friend and I stay until he's taken back to a room. We head out to the store, pick out our cakes (all will be revealed) and icing. We check out and leave.

Earlier in the day, Best Friend, who is very mechanically inclined, noticed my car was driving funny. While we were still at the store, she looked at my tires, while I loaded everything into the car. I was thus informed, that the tread on the front wheel of the driver's side was coming off. She said, it should be fine to get us to the pharmacy, her parent's house, her boyfriend's house, and we'd make him change it, cause we're lazy girly like that.

Off to the pharmacy we go, and all is fine and dandy. The main roads are next and about six miles down the road we get and the tread comes off. Luckily, a gas station was only yards ahead of us. Limping down the road we go, and she starts changing the tire. I have no mechanical ability what so ever. Living where I do, everybody is super friendly. We had no less than five women and seven or eight men ask if we needed help. Each time we answered with, "Nope, we got this." Dirty, grimy, and tired we're off again. We were only about five miles from Best Friend's Parent's house, and everything was fine and dandy. We gathered up everything we needed for the weekend.

Now, here's where the night gets real fun. Best Friend says the doughnut looks flat. Groaning and moaning, we limp off to the gas station closes to her home. We dig around for change because neither of us has any money. We go to put air in the tire, and low and behold the doughnut has popped off the rim. No problem I'm told. It'll be fine, I'm told. And it was, until the valve stem broke. For those of you like me, i.e. completely clueless, the valve stem is the thing used to put air in the tire.

During all this, I'm fielding update text from my parents, and texting slash calling those who need to be updated. The updates are: Doctor thinks appendicitis. Having a CT scan done. Getting contrast now. Now I'm stuck at a gas station, pacing up and down trying to stay calm. Have I mentioned that I had barely slept the night before? Yeah, so not only am I worried, but I'm exhausted too, and when I get exhausted I cry rather easily. The only thing I can do with my nervous energy is cook, A LOT! But that's another story.

Best Friend has been on the phone arranging a ride for us, because her parents are partying. It is Friday night after all. Best Friend's boyfriend is on his way to get us, and it's time for me to call my father. He ask me to come out to the hospital, and he'll take me home, switch out cars, and go back to the hospital.

Best Friend's boyfriend arrives, and drives us to the hospital. As soon as we park, the next update comes in: It's appendicitis. He has surgery in the morning. Now another glance at the clock, and it's almost eleven. Lovely. But still plenty of time! Dad insists on stopping for food. 11:45 rolls around and we get home.

Saturday:
Little Brother and Nana chip in to help me with the cakes, and it doesn't take as long as it would. Once the last cake hits the oven, I start laundry. The cake and washer finish about the same time. Everything is now sitting out to dry and cool. Once the cake is cool, I put lids on the pans, and Little Brother carries the icing and knives out to the car. Cake gets a little weird the longer the icing sits on it. I've done enough that I'm no longer as jittery, but still I can't sleep. So I watch TV.

About 6:30, I finally get my long awaited shower. I know I should have taken one earlier, but I couldn't drag myself off the couch. I get out, and make sure everything's loaded up, and then Little Brother and I leave. We stop for ice and then unpack everything at the picnic spot.And then we sit and wait and wait and wait and wait. At 8, Best Friend and boyfriend show up, and I get another update: William's in surgery. Will let you know when he's out.

The nervous energy has come back with a vengeance and I start icing the cake. The double chocolate fudge cake gets chocolate butter-cream icing. The french vanilla cake gets the cream cheese icing. The strawberry cake gets the strawberry icing. Finally, O'Sensei, the man who created our style of karate, gets there, and starts grilling. Best Friend and I are wrangled into hostessing, which we are very good at, by the way. We successfully juggled food, kids, parents, and picnic critters.

And then THE text: William's out of surgery, everything went great! He might get to come home tonight. A sigh of relief from everyone there (we're a big ole family), and I start to enjoy myself. Where we were located has a wildlife education center. All the kids where chopping at the bit to go up there, but we insisted they wait. Nobody goes anywhere alone or without an adult.

We wrangle all 30 of the kids together. There are three adults going, Best Friend, a parent, and myself. Do the math on that one. We march off, and are successful in keeping everybody together. Of course, it helps when you have the weight of a Grandmaster in the martial arts behind you. Everything went well, until we got back to the picnic site.

A text saying William's temperature is going up, and the doctors are considering keeping him overnight. I start handing out slices of cake until the rush is over. Then I start packing up. At this point there are only a handful of people left. Then I went to the hospital, where I promptly fell asleep. Dad ended up driving us home and took a nap. William's temp went back down, and they let him come home.

Then a crazy storm blew up and we lost all power for several hours.

Sunday:
I'm woken up at the butt crack of dawn to go fix my car. A trip to the gas station, Wal-mart, back to the gas station, home, back to Wal-mart and it's all fixed.


The past couple of days have been so busy, I sorta forgot about the Boss Man. I hadn't been doing a very good job of keeping in touch, but I did remember to send him text with updates and changes in my location. We're both doing much better at staying in contact.

Our plans for breakfast keep evolving, and I'm excited for our date. :D I can't wait to be able to see him whenever we want!