Wish me luck.

I know I didn't promise a post this week, but I have a few minutes, so here we go, highlights from my week.

On Tuesday on my way home I peered out the window into the median at a major intersection and saw panties. And I wished I had my camera with me. Because who loses their panties like that?

Landon tried to re-enact that scene from Poltergeist on Tuesday afternoon. So I stayed home with him yesterday. He seems ok now, and there is something going around. I wouldn't normally have panicked, but he's never been this sick (vomiting, I mean clearly the pneumonia was worse than this) and he was listless, which was the scariest part. We called the after-hours doctor number and ended up talking to a nurse at Texas Children's Hospital. She said they were getting a LOT of vomiting calls. So I followed her directions and he seems to be recovering nicely. He managed to get either puke or poop on every sheet in the house and we each went through 4 outfits yesterday (granted my outfits were pretty much pajamas, but that's neither here nor there). After washing everything, I layered his sheets, so I can change his sheets by removing 1 sheet and 1 absorbent pad without having to remake the whole thing again. Unfortunately I can't do that with our beds, since I only have one mattress cover for each matress. Anyway, He's better.

Oh and I realized this morning that he somehow figured out how to unlatch the crib rail. Which means he's one short "safely getting out of the crib" lesson away from us waking up to someone staring at us from the edge of the bed (or yelling at us from the top of the gated stairs.)

I am loaded up on vitamins and Zicam as a pre-emptive strike, because the last thing I need for a test is to feel bad during it.

It occurs to me that those of you who don't know me and don't know what I do for a living are all "Why is she so worried about a PE exam? And what's this studying stuff? I took PE in elementary and I did fine." The PE exam is Professional Engineer exam. After working for 4 years minimum and gathering up info from at least 3 supervisors who are PEs who will corroborate your experience, you can apply to take the PE exam. I am a structural EIT (Engineer In Training). I work in offshore at the moment and it's not as highly a coveted achievement within that market, primarily because offshore work hardly ever requires a stamp of any kind. Drawings are still stamped 99% of the time because the lead engineer is usually a PE, but I have been on projects where nothing was stamped. Anyway, if the market dies (a la mid 1980s) or if a person wants to take a different path in life and try something new (a la inspector and self employedness), having a professional engineer's license is a big advantage. To build anything on land, you have to have a PE stamp the drawings. Signifying that they checked them, blah-blah-blah. So it's a big deal. It won't end my career if I don't get it, but it will certainly help if I do.

At my new project I ran into someone I met at the first PE exam I took. Since I didn't get the congratulatory email about her that I got for the others who passed, I asked if she was taking it again and she is. She also missed a passing mark by only a few points. She has decided that if she doesn't pass this time that she's not meant to be an engineer. Which I find sad, not that she can't change her career path, but that she's letting a test dictate to her that she's not worthy of her original choice. Plus she'd still have 2 more chances on the same application. I say, you get 4 chances to take it without having to re-round up your references, and I'm going to take all 4 if I have to. I may reevaluate at that point, but not before then.

I have a new approach to the exam this time, and I think it will serve me well. I feel better prepared this time, and I feel like I know what I did "wrong" last time around.

My birthday is Friday, and I'm turning 29. I don't like it - but everybody's doing it.

If ever I needed comments, it's now. Good lucks, and happy birthdays and the like. I know I told everyone I wasn't going to post this week, and I can tell from my stats that almost all of you took that to heart. So I don't expect much.