Jakub has been in the hospital for the last 8 days. He went in with a fever and sore ribs, which were diagnosed as a Staph Aureus infection. Staph is a tough bacteria to kill when it's inside the body, but it is all around the outside, apparently especially in the nose. One of our doctors said that Jakub could have got it from another kid who had picked his nose and then touched a scrape that Jakub had on his knee. Or maybe Jakub picked his own nose. Anyway, he was sick on Thursday afternoon and we took him to the hospital on Friday morning. The initial advice was that he was just constipated, causing the pain in his stomach area, and had an unrelated infection causing the fever.

I was very impressed that the doctor took blood and x-rays. She sensed that the initial explanation was maybe not 100% right. Turns out, after a day of culturing the blood, that he had Staph and the hospital called us back.

Now the tests and treatment really started at the Montreal Children's Hospital. He went on intraveinous antibiotics and rounds of x-rays, ultrasounds and gallium-bone-scans to find out what was causing the pain in Jakub's chest. Staph enters the blood and then can cause infections usually in the lungs, heart or a bone. Since the pain seemed to be in a rib the doctors suspected a bone infection at first but they also had to eliminate the heart. The bone is a bad place for the staph to hide because the treatment is very long, perhaps six weeks. While the investigation continued he was kept on antibiotics assuming the bone, and his blood cleared of the staph infection. Unfortunately, he still had the fever and pain so the search continued for the hiding place of the bacteria.

After the tests the doctors believed that the staph was isolated in the lung causing a pneumonia in the left lung. Additional, the pneumonia caused an accumulation of fluid around the lung, which would explain the fever and the pain. Since the fliud was not easing on his own, Jakub was scheduled for an emergency surgery to drain the fluid. He had this surgery on Friday morning and is currently attached to many wires. He is in good spirits, eating well and generally seems to at least be no worse off than before the surgery. Hopefully the fever will break after a day or two and he can be released in a week. The doctor gave me only a 20% chance of this optimistic outcome.

I must also say that the Montreal Children`s Hospital is fantastic. He has a team of doctors looking after him as well as specialists from infectious diseases, respiratory illness, and now surgeons. Each day they answer all our questions with endless patience, tell us what puzzles them and their strategies, and teach us whatever we need to know. Nothing is held back. He gets whichever tests and procedures might help his recovery but not more. We don't take ourselves or the kids to the hospital for colds or bumps so we don't experience the 12 hour waits that we always hear about. Every experience we've had: childbirth, ear infection, a scary high fever in Newfoundland, and now this, has left me very satisfied with our care.

The Montreal Children's is very children oriented. They have playrooms, videos, games, and an outdoor terrace with a playground on the 8th floor. The only thing they don't have is good food, but I hear that no hospital has good food.

Special thanks to all Jakub's friends who visited him in the hospital or sent get-well-wishes. He appreciated those visits so much and says THANK YOU to everyone. And thanks from Bogusia and I for the many offers of help. Thank you also to CN and my VP and director for not hesitating to give me the flexibility to care for Jakub.

Here are some pictures of Jakub from this week.

Last week, Jakub invited us to his school to show off his "portfolio". Wow, what an event. He had to dress up in his official clothes (tie and blazer and all) and show us all the work he's done all year. We sat at tiny tables in tiny chairs and listened to Kuba telling us what each thing was in his portfolio.

Since I talk to my son and come to get him everyday from pre-school, I know what he does, so none of it was news to me. But it was very important to him. In fact, we had to play "Portfolio Day" just yesterday where we pretended we were kids showing our portfolios to our parents (Jakub chose a few books to represent the portfolios). Very cute.

Sunday March 15th: "You better get all your work done Alex, he's coming. I can feel it!"
Seven days later the prophecy remains unfullfilled.
Sunday March 22nd, the due date: If he doesn't come today then we have to see the doctor to schedule an induction.
Monday March 23rd: At the doctor`s. Everything is as fine as it could be so no induction needed. The doctor schedules one for a week later just in case.
Tuesday: Nothing
Wednesday: Nada
Thursday: Boring. Until about 8pm, when Bogusia starts to get some really good contractions. It`s not nearly enough to go to the hospital yet, but he`s coming for sure. Bogusia tries to put it off until morning so the kids can go to school, but by midnight it is apparent that we have to drop them with the neighbours. 2am and we`re at the hospital. At 4:30am Konrad is born without much difficulty at all.

The doctors keep Bogusia in the hospital for the requisite 24 hrs and we`re home just after lunch on Saturday. The existing kids, the dogs, the grandparents, and the uncles get their introductions and are natually impressed by the handsome new baby.

By the way, Konrad means `Brave Counsel`, but we chose the name mainly by sound and suggestion from our friends and family. One of my superiors, named after the god of wine, was shocked that we hadn't researched the meaning of the name just in case it meant "fig tree" or something more ridiculous. Luckily it turned out well but thanks for the good advice!

The middle name, Mariusz, simple means "Male". It was chosen as the closest thing to Bogusia's recently-passed grandmother's name Maria.

Have a look at some pictures of Konrad:

Guapa stole some vermicelli from the table, and she doesn't feel that guilty about it.

Finally the weather is nice. Spring is here. We decide to go to the library by walking, about 4K round trip. Jakub wants to take his bike. If he succeeds, this will be by far the furthest distance he will have crossed by bike.

We start off with Robert on the bike, because he insisted. His feet scarcely touch the pedals and he doesn't quite get the steering, but he has a good time being pull by his balloon string.

Then comes Jakub. He still remembers how to ride, but not at 100% efficiency. He especially doesn't remember how to stop and there was one scare when he kept on rolling almost into the street. Luckily he bailed into someone's lawn.

Jakub proved that he had the stamina, if not pride enough to keep a short spell of whining inside.

Have a look at Uncle Mark impressing the kids with his skills of disgusting behaviour.

Once again, the Hexa-Trex puzzles got published in the Games Magazine - the the February 2009 issue (out now in your local magazine store). They're on page 40 of the magazine in the pencil-wise section. Have fun!

If you want to try some online, I post a Hexa-Trex puzzle everyday. Also you can purchase a book full of these puzzles from the Nucleus Learning Store or on Amazon.com.

This year, Robert got the cool Ratatouille costume (Jakub's from last year.) He was actually Ratatouille's brother, the fat rat, but very cute none-the less. And Jakub got lucky and was a Dinosaur. The costume we borrowed from our neighbour friends was actually of an alligator, but for Jakub, it was definitely a dinosaur.

Robert initially hated to dress up, but that's probably because he didn't know what was about to happen. When we finally got on the road and asked for candy, he was content, especially when he realized all the candy and chips and goodies was for him and only him, and all he had to do for all these treats was wear a silly costume, say trick or treat and then thank-you.

Jakub, remembering from last year and probably from talking about it at school, wanted to go to bed early the night before, saying that he just can't wait for Hallowe'en... he was so so so happy; he's so funny. In the morning he dressed up in his costume and went to school.

Here are some pictures of the two of them... such cute little babies we have!

I would suggest that everyone do the Niagara Fall Marathon!

Two weeks ago I tried another marathon to get to Boston, and the lucky one was Niagara Falls. It starts in Buffalo, we cross the bridge into Canada, run up to Lake Erie and then run down the Niagara river finishing right at the Falls. It was spectacular.

The run itself was quite good. I had some Mitch Hedberg comedy on my MP3 player and ran well for the first 10k or so, then running up to the mouth of Niagara river very near the turnaround I felt a sharp pain in my achilles. During my last long run before this race I had injured it, but I had taken good care of it for the week prior and hoped it would last.

I immediately changed my gait to more of a Terry-Fox style to avoid using my calf and heel. The pain went away after just a couple of minutes and I was running well again.

Everything was great for another 12 or so k when the heel came back. This time it stayed for about an hour. My pace went down to around 5:30 or 5:45 or a minute + slower than I needed it to be. It is a good thing Bogusia didn't come watch me during that time because I would have gone off with her.

An hour later and the heel was numb, which allowed me to go faster again and I hit under 5:00 for the last almost 10k. I had enough energy to rocket through the last 500M at a flat out sprint which I paid for.

Final time: 3:27 Personal best, under 3:30, improvement of almost 8 minutes from a month ago and only 17 minutes off my goal. The race was a pleasure with great weather and scenery. I'm happy with my time and I think I ran close to the best I could have.