The hunger strike of the feverish firefly

I am supposed to be at a sheva brachot dinner right now but, after a funky week, Yelena is back on a reasonable sleep schedule (easy to bed and 7+ uninterrupted hours) and I just didn't want to mess with a good thing by dragging her to a social event that began at 7:30. We sent off Eli with kisses and my couscous salad to represent for the Lifcos. Poor guy, I had to remind him of the married couple's names a few times. Social butterfly he may not be, but Firefly fan he has become and, hopefully, he will be back early enough to watch an episode. Yup, the lovely Marsha has led us back on the path of television addiction by lending us the DVD of the one-season show Firefly. If Eli didn't have to go to work and I didn't have to get up to take care of Yelena, we'd probably watch them all within a day or so. Damn, that Joss is a genius.

Yelena was under the weather last week. The contributing factors, per my hypothesis: 1. shots; 2. picking up a bug from some contagious little bugger either at a. Suzuki class, b. tot Shabbat, c. at the doctor's office, d. yoga; 3. teething. Friday she felt warm and her rectal temperature was 102.7. (I am a little disturbed by the fact that Yelena did not appear to mind me putting a thermometer in her bum, but that's neither here nor there.) It went down right away with some Tylenol and by the end of the day it was normal. She perked up and stopped spitting up (more than the usual dribbling) a couple days ago, but her pooping is on the verge of the diarrheatical and she is drooling a river, the latter two classical teething symptoms. That, and the sudden chomping of my nipples.

What disturbs me most about her malaise (or malaises), is her sudden refusal to eat solids. Thursday she ate a full serving of oatmeal in the morning, with some peas and carrots, and in the evening she had 2 T of oatmeal and a 1/2 jar of sweet potatoes. Friday she clenched her mouth shut and, except for a spoonful here or there at the coaxing of Daddy, has kept up her hunger strike. I decided to give her a day of rest from the spoon today, hoping that the novelty tomorrow will rekindle her interest. It worked before when I was introducing the rice cereal, so it's worth a shot now. The sources say not to worry and I don't want to force the issue, but I am having nightmares of her breast feeding in high school. She hasn't seemed to lost her appetitie for that any.