Karen, with a side of chips and a pickle

All of my children have colds. This is not surprising, since both of thier parents have colds. My ILs arrived this morning expecting to watch Lil Joe, and instead ended up with all three kids (MIL said she didn't need me to take a day off to stay home with them, so I'm not just dumping them.) Hoss' cold is resulting in him having watery, slightly gunky eyes. I don't think it's conjunctivitis, nor is he having any problems with his ears (the last time he had the eye goop, it was in early indicator of an ear infection.) But, I didn't want to get a call from the school telling me to bring him home because they feared pink-eye. The Princess was complaining this morning of a stomachache, and did not want to eat her breakfast. She has a nasty case of post-nasal drip, which I think is causing the tummy issues, and she is running a low grade fever. So, she crawled back into bed and was fast asleep when I left for work. Lil Joe is just snotty and a bit cranky. But mostly he's just the same as always. While I was getting ready for work, Lil Joe popped a tape into the VCR. It was the opening ceremonies of the Olympics; he and Princess were watching the Parade of Nations. FIL sat down on the couch and began to watch as well. He continued watching as I gave Lil Joe his breakfast and tucked the Princess back into bed and called the preschool to report that Hoss would be out sick. "Come in and watch this," FIL said to MIL, "You're missing the good program." "I saw it already," she replied. "What do you mean?" "It's the opening ceremonies of the Olympics," she said. "Yes," he said, "we always like to watch the Olympics!" He continued to encourage her to watch the program. Finally she said "It's a repeat. I saw it the first time." He looked confused, but stopped the conversation. I worry about the generation behind mine because I am supposed to take care of them and keep them from getting infections and tummy bugs, and I am on my own this weekend if emergencies come up. I worry about the generation ahead of mine because I'm seeing a man who doesn't realize that he's watching something that happened two weeks ago. Yeah, I think that's the very definition of "sandwich generation".