Johnny is my third personal 4-year-old—Ella came to me at age 5—and as different as they all are now and were at the same age, they all have a few things in common. They tend to follow a pattern, and as such, I have a loose pattern on my approach to them.

It was not the week I'd planned on having.

The Plan looked like this: make prompt recovery from The Plague, get back to work, go to horse show with awesome clients, win everything, party down.

Every year or so, usually after a few months of running myself ragged, I go through a two-week period of serious enthusiasm. I mean, I am JONESED. I'm getting stuff done. I'm up late, sans caffeine, and then up early again the next morning with a big smile on my face. I tell myself that I must be doing something right; I must be eating right or doing really well with whatever exercise regime I'm on, or that maybe I've just biologically hit my stride, because, clearly, all this energy is so great.

Then I get the Plague.

A while back I scheduled a two-day clinic, which then had to be cut to one day. And somewhere between then and now I forgot to add lesson times back to my nifty e-scheduling system, which meant my students didn't know I was going to be around. And on Friday night, I went to make my schedule for the following day… and found I had nothing to do, other than ride a few horses. It was too late to call anyone to ask if they wanted a lesson for Saturday. 

Friday, 4/12, 9 p.m.: My schedule for tomorrow is made, my bag is packed, and I'm checking the big email the triathlon director sent us to figure out exactly where we're supposed to meet tomorrow afternoon for the Mandatory First-Timer Meeting.

Which is when I see that I'm supposed to pick up my packet before 3 p.m. Before 3. No exceptions. 

I work on Saturdays. I've already cancelled two lessons to get to Richmond by 3:30 for the mandatory meeting, something I only learned was mandatory a few days before.

Oh booger.