Mike's musings

Ambulance

(backposting) The main part of the day - broadly, daylight - was fantastic today. We finished the cleaning and then I took Jo to church, where she behaved beautifully. On the way back she talked about how she'll be able to marry people when she's a priest, and how she'll be a mummy and a priest. It was really sweet, particularly "I don't think Mummy wants to be a priest". All this while skipping back home to see her godfather Matty.

Matty lives in Shanghai, and we've not seen him since Jo's christening nearly 3 years ago, so it was a real treat to see him and his parents, John and Shan, who drove him up. I met Matty just before my 21st birthday, which we spent in Paris together - it was the middle of the summer vacation, and I had nothing better to do - he happened to turn up (cycled from London to Cambridge!) the night after I asked Moo to marry me, and he was my best man. We get on really well, all of us, and it's sad that the distance means we rarely meet face-to-face these days. His parents are also great, and perfect grandparents, so went down very well with the girls. Having 5 adults around also meant that we all got a chance to chat to each other at different times, which was lots of fun and gave us a chance to catch up. Jo loved Matty, and enjoyed his use of my scooter while she cycled round Clare Country Park.

They left at 1700, we put the girls to bed (took a while), I went up around 2030 to get Miri down again - in our bed - and we were just gathering ourselves to go upstairs when we heard a "thump". Both of us assumed that it was Miri falling out of bed, and raced upstairs, but it was actually Jo. She was in a real state, and making a horrible barking coughing noise. Even when she calmed down, she was wheezing badly, and as it had come on so quickly, we phoned NHS Direct for help. They weren't sure, so called an ambulance to us. They took 20 minutes or so, but Jo was responsive and calm, if wheezy, so there was no immediate emergency. It didn't take them long to decide it was probably croup, and they left us around 2300, to much relief. Jo slept with Moo in the spare room, and I took a long time to get to sleep next to Miri, mainly just listening to her breathing happily to my side.

We're very luckly people.