Penaten for my thoughts

It's the end of week 3, and (I hope) the end of my intensive introduction to the aberrant body functions of a sick baby.

She seems to be out of the woods as far as the upchucking is concerned, but the unpleasant effects of her stomach bug linger on. The diaper deposits have brought daily surprises in colour, texture and volume. Especially volume. How the hell can so much poop come out of so little person?

I've noticed that contemplating such matters tends to short-circuit whatever else I happen to be doing at the time, as anyone who's watched me put on my socks in the morning will attest. Mostly I have considered this zone-out tendency an ability rather than a liability—let's just say I don't get bored easily—but that was before I started dealing with the perpetual-motion machine that is a seven-month-old.

Yesterday morning, babygirl evidently decided I needed more data for my poop-to-baby-ratio calculations. The results of this decision blew out one diaper, one sleeper, six wipes and yet another change-pad cover. Toward the end of the change, I bent to grab a new sleeper from the change-table drawer, taking my eyes off the baby for what felt like two seconds.

I'm not saying I zoned out. But when I straightened up again, the first thing I noticed was the metal tin of Penaten cream, which I had left open. The white creamy surface, normally reminiscent of icing on a cake with its gentle undulations and soft peaks, was pitted and gouged. Like someone had reached in and scooped out double handfuls of... aw, hell.

Before I go on, a word about Penaten cream. According to the hype from Johnson & Johnson, it has "helped moms battle diaper rash since 1904. That's over 100 years of happy babies!"

Now, I'm not a mom, but I can believe that. Because for awhile there, I thought that's how long it would take me to get the goddam stuff off the kid's hands.

I managed to intercept her cream-coated fists on their way to her mouth. Then it was time for wipe number seven of this change to do its work. Except it wasn't working; it was just smearing the infernal axle grease all over her hands, creating what the J&J hype calls "a barrier from further wetness."

Off we went on the now-familiar hike to the bathroom, while babygirl decorated my black sweater with Penaten handprints. I slammed the faucet lever upward and held one of her slicked-up hands under the warm stream.

Nothing. It was like the water was bending around her hand.

If there's such a thing as amused panic, that's what I started to feel at this moment. But then I spied the solution: our trusty white bath towel. With some careful finger-by-finger effort, I finally solved the cream conundrum.

The moral of this story? If you have a baby and you're not using Penaten, go out now and get some. It's that good. Oh, and to the Penaten people: you should do an ad campaign with Moses slapping some on his hands to part the Red Sea. "Penaten: it really creates a barrier from wetness!"