The Caravan Petri Dish

One of the many challenges of living in a caravan is to try and keep everybody healthy and illness free.  The last thing you need as a family is to be playing cold and flu tennis where a simple sickness volley can go on for weeks.  The petri dish that is our caravan life has proved to debunk and prove theories about contagens and how they spread.  The usual scenario would be that if one 'gets it' then 'all get it'  given that we live in a space about the size of an average lounge.  However this has proven to not be the case.  Both the girls have picked up their share of 'lurgies' from school and supermarket trolleys etc etc but neither Steve or myself have managed to be affected.
Then out of the blue two weeks ago Steve came down with this most horrendous flu bug which 'knocked him for six' for a full week.  I was dreading the obvious outcome for myself and the girls as Steve went from having just some cold symptoms to two days in bed and several days after that being unable to do much at all.  Becca had a temperature at one stage during that time but was otherwise her usual self with a little help from panadol.  Erin just continued going to school as did I carry on with my usual stuff, my only hinderance being the bloody weather.
One could therefore speculate that once Steve was over the worst of his bug and if it hadn't been caught by one of us already, that all would be ok.  Wrong!!  It had been two weeks since he got sick and I didn't have a sore throat per se, but just an irritable throat and cough.  Apart from feeling a bit flat, all seemed ok and I soldiered on.
By Monday morning, I was barely functioning but not in a 'flu' way but I just wanted to go back to bed.  Steve's 'Mrs Doubtfire' kicked in and he had to take a couple of days out of his flying schedule (perfect flying days I might add) to look after me and take on the girls.
It's always a bit of a fumble to start with as Steve isn't quite sure of the routine and I'm not really in a place to be overly concerned.  It's a bit like starting a car in the morning.  A few coughs and splutters before the engine starts purring.  Steve was walking Erin to school in the morning and picking her up in the afternoon, usually at a run because he'd misjudged the time.  Becca was showing Steve what she has for snack time by going to the cupboard and pulling out her favourite food of the day so she had him organised.  Then he started doing some household chores.
I was laying in bed where I could hear everything going on around me.  I heard the washing machine door open and close several times followed by the customary beeps of washing selections.  One, two, three, four, five........oh no that's too many beeps...., what is he doing out there!  I said nothing as he came inside but then he said "I've thrown your whites in with my blues so that should encourage you to get better in a hurry".  Ha Ha!!  Normally I would have been freaking out but just went with the joke instead.
Homework time with Erin after school was fun to listen to and the girls thought it was a novelty as Steve is usually at training so Erin does her homework with me.  As I heard them coming back towards the caravan after school, I could hear a discussion about dinner.  Erin was busy telling Steve what her favourite meals were from worst to best.  I managed to come into hearing range when spaghetti bolognaise was mentioned......no surprise there.  They must have been trying to work out what to cook that night.  After reading and sight words, Erin was super keen to help dad with dinner.  I laid there watching as they crowded around our tiny freezer pulling every frozen pack of meat out and asking me what it was.
After a while, Steve had made a decision but left Erin guessing what he was going to make.  She stood on a stool at the sink in her Masterchef apron and hat peeling carrots and continuing to guess.  Steve never makes the same sort of meals as I do.  It's usually a mixture of whatever he finds around the place so anything was possible.
He started cutting up some frozen pork fillet and Erin shouted out " I know what we're having......frozen meat".  Steve and I just burst out laughing and Erin just smiled and carried on peeling.
A while later, Erin came into me and said 'mummy, daddy said we are having sweet meat for tea".  Nearly everything was being cooked on the outside bbq in a frypan but I had an inkling as to what it was.  When dinner was served, it was a very tasty homemade sweet and sour pork stirfry.  It had a bit of everything in it and was really yummy.  I'm not surprised by this.  When we first moved in together, Steve did most of the cooking for the first three months and that's how I know his cooking style.
This morning, after taking Erin to school, Steve and Becca went food shopping.  I had written out a list over the last week but had to rewrite it in long hand, not my abbreviated style.  Steve also asked that I include brand names so he knew what to pick up.  Upon their return, the tension was evident.......Becca had not been a good girl for daddy in the supermarket.  He said she squealed her high pitched squeal from one end of Woolies to the other.  He had left her vegemite sandwich in the car and so had to leave the trolley to go and get it but it didn't seem to work today.  He needed to ask where stuff was several times particularly when Becca was distracting him with her naughty behaviour.  I have had days like that with Becca but I must admit she hasn't been like that with me for quite a while.  Unfortunately the father, daughter shopping experience was not good this day.
I have started to feel better by this evening apart from that blasted, tickly cough and Steve cooked dinner again tonight.  I was able to get both the girls bathed while Steve did the dishes and should be able to take Erin to school in the morning.  It's her pet talk tomorrow so I have to take the lizards into class in the afternoon while Erin does her talk.  At least she didn't pick the snake.....not that it would have bothered me one way or the other.  Whatever bug I picked up didn't seem, in any way, the same thing as what Steve had and without the same severity.   It just demonstrates that we all have our own immunity working in different ways when it comes to bugs.  Anyway, lets hope the dreaded lurgy stays away from us, at least for the next couple of weeks while school holidays are on and Steve can get his teeth into flying again.