Thanks to those of you who have written in response to my earlier posting, where I mentioned that I was taking care of my child who had scarlet fever. Sorry if I scared anyone (especially family members). The kid is fine. I had forgotten that the words "scarlet fever" conjure up an 18th century Hogarthian image of deathly ill children in a slum -- at least they did for me until I heard what the doctor had to say and did a little research. Scarlet fever is no longer one of those deadly childhood diseases. It is a kind of strep infection, and its virulence seems to have waned over the past century. The bacteria that cause it are one of the few type of bacteria that haven't evolved resistance to penicillin, so it is easily treated. If promptly treated, it usually isn't much of a problem -- although it certainly isn't any fun.
Everybody here is fine.
Posted by Geodog at February 5, 2003 09:06 PM | TrackBackMy apologies, but my web hoster has turned off commenting, due to a flood of obscene spam bringing the server to its knees. I hope to have this weblog transitioned over to Wordpress in the near future, so that I can have commenting up and working again. Until then, please feel free to send me your comments via my email contact form.. Please ignore everything below this comment.