Our medical booboos -- and learning to love Ibuprofen....

Marc is down with something mysterious -- strep and mono have been ruled out, but he still feels awful as this throat has been bothering him considerably the past few days. He has been nursing it with lots of warm drinks, rice porridge (Americans have chicken noodle soup, Singaporeans have fish porridge), and lots of lozenges. The doctor was puzzled by what it could be as well and wasn't able to do anything other than prescribe some Sudafed (even though he doesn't really have any serious nasal congestion issues).... let's hope it's just a bug that will pass in a few days.

Meanwhile, even though I've managed to avoid getting whatever Marc is down with (so far), my SI joints are bothering me again, this time on the left side. I was in immense pain on Sunday and was unable to bend over at all, but the pain mostly dissipated by the next morning after some icing and heating. If you had only seen the two of us this past Sunday... Marc was groaning and hecking/spitting from his sore throat and I was immobile from my back pain --- we were like a couple of 80 year olds, or rather a pair of sissies unable to bear discomfort, and hence whined to each other all Sunday long! Nana, you are doing well compared to us -- or at least you are far more stoic that either of us!

On another note, I think I'll be going to Hawai'i in February for a conference (need to use up my conference travel budget)! Unfortunately, between his teaching commitments and WB meetings, Marc won't be able to join me -- I had thought it would be a nice way to celebrate his 30th birthday. So, we will have to postpone the celebrations until after we both return from our respective trips. Admittedly, I'm not sure if the timing for this conference is all that good given that I will probably be freaking out about defending my dissertation right around then, and it is a really long trip (which means I will likely stay 5 days since I'm out there), but the idea of it is rather tempting.

Today has already been rather busy as I had to get my biometrics redone for a replacement greencard, which took quite a while, and then headed to the airport for my trip to DC to interview for the World Bank's Young Professionals Program. Will meet up with Lara & her mom for dinner in DC tonight. Tomorrow will be somewhat tiring as well, since the interviews will run from from 7:30am - 5:30pm, before I'll have to rush off to DCA to head back to the Triangle that same evening. We will see how all of that pans out, but first, lots of reading to catch up on!

~ Shuwen