A less than great day

I had to get up early this morning to make muffins for brunch at my small group leader's home.  When the alarm on my cell phone went off, I adjusted it for another 30 minutes of much-needed sleep.  Amazingly, I did get out of bed when the alarm went off the second time.

The muffin recipe came together easily and in no time at all, I popped them in the oven to bake.  My "oven" sometimes takes longer to bake than a normal oven would, so I wasn't in a hurry to take the muffins out when the 20 minute bake time was up.  However, when I did look at them, I was unpleasantly surprised.

The muffins were really flat.  In fact, they didn't look like they had risen much at all.  Arrrgh.  They also were still doughy in the center, so I left them in to bake for 5 more minutes -- knowing that the extra baking time wasn't going to make any real difference.  I checked the expiration date on my baking powder and confirmed that it was expired.  : /

So besides wasting my time and baking ingredients, now I had to find time to run to the bakery and get a coffee cake to take to brunch . . . and I still needed to take a shower.

Fast forward: brunch was nice -- good food and great conversation.  I learned some very interesting information about my fellow group members. 

After brunch I had planned to run errands; I had a few coupons I wanted to take advantage of and HELLO, I needed to buy baking powder.  I was about a quarter of the way to my first stop when I realized that I needed to go to the bathroom.  Not wanting to turn around and go home, I tried to convince myself that the mild discomfort I was experiencing was no big deal, and I could find a restroom at the store.  It only took a few moments for me to realize that my optimistic plan was not going to work.  I reluctantly turned the car around and headed home.

Soon my annoyance at having to alter my plans turned into absolute panic as I began to be afraid that I wouldn't make it home before I had a very unfortunate accident.  I had serious stomach cramps and I hate, hate, hate stomach cramps.  Ever since the birth of my first child, I have said that I would go through labor and delivery many times over rather than have to deal with stomach cramps.  Ugh.

Fortunately I made it home okay, but the relief I had hoped for didn't materialize.  Even after I used the bathroom (several times) I still was extremely uncomfortable and didn't feel as if I could venture too far away from la toilette.  Setting my plans for the rest of the day aside, I turned on my electric blanket and climbed into bed.  Three hours and a few bathroom breaks later, I got up and decided to see if I could still salvage some of my plans.  Sadly, the answer was "no."

I'm hoping tomorrow will be a better day.