Complaining about allergies

One of my sons has a peanut and tree nut allergy. It freaks me out on a regular basis...just the idea that something that most other kids enjoy on a regular basis could potentially kill him, well, it's a bit unsettling. Having said that, though, I don't get too down about it. I mean, it's only a nut allergy. Nut allergies are so common nowadays that it's reasonably easy to avoid. We know plenty of other kids with nut allergies. In the grand scheme, a nut allergy is a pretty minor blip.

But once in a while, it just hits me. Recently an ice cream truck has been coming through our neighborhood. B-man will never be able to get ice cream from an ice cream truck. It's just not worth the risk. Yes, maybe he could get a prepackaged ice pop, but he's never going to be able to run up with a couple dollars and just get something without worrying. Or perhaps I mean without ME worrying.

I know, not a big deal. It just hits me whenever I hear that tinkly music coming down the road.

Random unrelated thought: I finished The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao a few days ago, and really enjoyed it. I'm not sure why...it has footnotes, which I LOATHE with a passion**. It has far more Spanish than I understand. And it out-geeked even me. I wonder how all the totally non-geeky members of my book group are fairing. Unless you have a PhD in Lord of the Rings, you're certainly missing some of the references. I'm really looking forward to discussing it, but I'll refrain for now since I know a large portion of my readership is members of my book group :)

**See, it's annoying, isn't it? Okay, fine, I do it myself in blog posts, and it's acceptable when I'm reading nonfiction, but it just pulls me right out of the story when an author chooses to use them in a novel. I mean, work it into the story, can't ya??