You can't see me

Apologies to John Cena...

Last night I had an unpleasant encounter with something that happens to me once or twice a year - I've never figured out why.

It was about 11, and I'd been catching up on the current season of Monk (which ends tonight, by the way). Suddenly, I noticed an itch in the corner of my left eye, which I rubbed.

Well, what happens sometimes is that it's not an itch - something I'm allergic to on contact drifts in and lands on the eyeball, and within a short time the eye itself gets all swollen up and uncomfortable. Looking at it in the mirror you can actually see the surface all distended, discolored, and watery. Yecch. It doesn't hurt, but it does make my eyelid kinda scratchy while it lasts, and that's uncomfortable.

So I hustled upstairs as soon as I realized what was going on, and immediately took two Benadryls - the antihistamine makes it fade away pretty quickly. By morning, the eye was normal again. Close call. If I wait too long to take antihistamines, it'll stay puffed up for a day or more.

One the one hand, it'd be nice to know exactly what contact agent causes that to happen, but on the other hand it's so rare I don't care much. I'm sure it's not cat-related, otherwise it'd be happening regularly.

Speaking of cats, Gracie earned all sorts of bonus points yesterday. David woke up mid-nap with a load in his diaper, and was out of sorts all the rest of the day. When I came home, he was sobbing on the sofa downstairs and neither Jane or I could stop him. Gracie hopped up onto his lap, and he quieted down immediately, put one hand on her, and stuck his other thumb in his mouth.

Then last night around midnight he woke up briefly, upset. I went in to check on him, and he was sitting up all startled on the bed. I settled him down, then Gracie came in and curled up with him - which made him fall back asleep immediately. I waited about ten minutes before removing her and letting him sleep.

She's a darn good cat.