It’s been an awful day.

First, I woke up at three in the morning because Ben started gagging, coughing and wheezing. Then I woke up again later in the morning to find a nasty virus attacking my throat.

Thanks to the thunderstorm last night, it’s one of those days I wished I could sleep in because the weather was finally *nice and cool* but no, I had to resist the beckoning of the bed because the boy needed the doctor.

To top it off, the neighbors one floor below decided that today shall be the day they will hack all their kitchen and bathroom tiles. Yippee!

So what do you get when a sick child, a zonked-out mother, a father looking forward to enjoying his day off (imagine his disappointment!), another constipated child and a two-month-old infant find themselves in an apartment where they can’t hear one another because the hacking, knocking and drilling downstairs is at least two (bloody) hundred decibels?

Plenty of shouting in the house and a nerve-wrecking helluva morning.

The poor kids were so snappy and cranky and stoned by nap time. But it was still bam bam! bam! bam! bam! – pause (for five minutes) – zvrooooooooooooooom! zvroooooooooooooom! zvroooooooooooooooom! (for the next twenty) – bam! bam! bam! bam! bam! zvrooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom (multiply by infinity).

They drifted off to sleep only to be startled again with the drilling and hacking; and this dozing and waking happened for forever, until we decided we would not lose our sanity this way and that it was too cruel to subject an infant to this that we lugged three crying babies out of the house and headed somewhere where we could find peace. quiet. rest.

We found our haven at IKEA. We never found more comfort in a place that’s not our home and today’s the day. We didn’t even do the pretend-we-are-shopping-for-furniture thing; we just plonked ourselves on the next available bed/ sofa/ couch at IKEA the moment we got there. Talk about respite.

We could have gone to Courts next door too, if not for the super long nap we all took in one of those 55 square meter living space in IKEA. I’m sure the Simmons bed at Courts would be worth-a-plonking.

Note to self: maybe next time when another neighbor decides to renovate.