Taking our locks

She had an unequalled gift... of squeezing big mistakes into small opportunities.
-- Henry James

And so we come to the end of the weekend, when what goes around has come around ... and doesn't seem to want to leave.

Meggie is up and at 'em, and Alan is down for the count. Whatever stomach bug she had has moved on to him, but as said, kids are incredibly resilient -- elastic even. Meggie reacted violently to the bug but rebounded with equal force. For Alan, the stomach ailment has been a slow but inexorable opponent, not delivering a knockout punch but wearing him down over the course of two days.

Miss Meggie, having recovered her full strength, is up to her usual mischief. She locked me out of her room today. I left her for a minute to check on the laundry (my mistake), and she turned the knob on her door handle. This particular door doesn't unlock with a straightened hanger (I tried).

I had to wake the convalescing Alan to assess the situation, and we determined that the only way to get in was to remove the door knob entirely. Meggie was distressed by the sight of the door knob lurching out of the door and started to scream frantically while pushing against it. When we finally got in, she was extremely glad to see us. She ran to me and, clinging and panting, berated the door, "Broken, broken, broken!" Alan went back upstairs (another jab from the stomach bug), and I started reattaching the door knob.

Meggie was very helpful. She handed me screwdrivers and wagged her finger at the offending knob: "Fix it! Fix it!"