Last Night

So I went to the disappointing hockey game last night featuring the Lightning vs the panthers and it was exciting when they tied it up and just before the game went into the shootout I glanced over and saw the cutest blonde out of the corner of my eye. I then stared at her for a moment and suddenly realized that I was looking at none other than Chelsea Hightower!

Now those of you that watched SYTYCD (So You Think You Can Dance) know EXACTLY who I am talking about the hot leggy blonde on this last season shows but for those of you in the dark. Look here: http://www.chelsiehightowerdance.com/

She was attending with fellow dancer Chelsea Traille. They both seemd to be having a good time rooting for the bolts, unfortunately it was the first time I have EVER been to a loosing game by any of my Tampa Bay Team since the Buc were in orange and quite frankly, I don't like it... but hey that's my own issue at least I drank good beer while there but I digress. I managed to geta pen from one of the concession people and get them to autograph my ticket. I did this for two reasons one. I admire them, and two I can remember how cool it was for people to ask me for my autograph back during my "15 minutes". I found it to be really neat and I wanted them to experience it as well. Anyway just wanted to share...

David

Monday Monday

OKay so I headed into work today and beat the supervisors in. I sat down at the counter space next to my Manager Ernie's fridge and worked on the spreadsheet containing the morning numbers. I sent that to Brian (my supervisor) when they got in at 9. I was basically given the directive that I needed to be in the field QCing jobs by the vendor. OK. So not being very prepared I headed out. I loathe disorganization. The only cool thing is I am back in the field. I have to get the latest version of Microsoft's Streets and Trips (2009). I have found a place online throuh Pricegrabber with a great price on the software. I already on the GPS from a previous version. The company did finally get us 2008 but it came just a month ago and 2009 is out. Well, at least it's better than nothing. The place I am getting the software from is called Software Media ( http://www.softwaremedia.com/ ) Check it out sometime.



I also got a chance to use my free Chick-fil-a coupon for strips. I love the place. I am sitting in the parking lot typing this too you on my "Lunch break" listening to my Zune.



Nice weather today taht's for sure. I prefer the 70's that we get in Florida. Probably my favorite weather. I like visiting cold places with snow and stuff but I am glad I don't have to live there. Fireplaces are also cool. But constantly wishing my feet were warm... not so much.



Well, back to work.

settling

okay well I am settling into my world again. I went this morning and had a new doctor take a look at what is wrong with my left foot. For the past few months I have been enduring a sharp pain in the upper metatarsal portion of my foot. I asked my primary care doctor about it and he refereed me to the podiatrist next door to him she game me a curt diagnosis or arthritis. I felt in my gut that she was full of shit but wanted to get a second opinion. Thankfully, this doctor was wonderful and thorough and he even let me watch as he shoved a 4" long needle into my foot. Seems I have Morton's Neuroma which is common in dancers after we stop dancing and is due to changing footwear and stress on my foot. Basically the toe bones are rolling and crushing into the nerve on my foot which is why I get a "toothache" sharp pain. He even gave me a cut sheet with diagrams and such so I could best explain it at work and to my Friends. Gotta love people who love their job! I have to go back for a follow-up next week so I keep you posted.

This weekend I had Miranda and we spent the weekend like most family's do, basically doing our own thing. I must say sleeping in and playing on the computer is EXACTLY what I needed. *Sigh* A few more weeks and I will be good I think. I am playing a game called "Mount & Blade" made by a couple in Poland. You can google it but basically it is a really cool open ended game which is why I dig it. I was turned on to it by my Brother-in-law and now I am hooked.

I tried to watch the World Series last night after the Bucs screwed up their game and the Rays fared no better, I turned it off in like the 3rd inning when it was 4-1. I understand now that Tampa Bay sucked all around thsi weekend with losses by The Rays, Buc, Lightning, and Bulls.

Tonight is Card night and I can't wait I hope to have a full house tonight!

I need to mow the grass so bad but I didn't feel like spoiling the weekend with yard work. It needs it bad. As I left for the doctor's this morning I noticed that Verizon was once again destroying my yard. Last week when putting in Fios in my neighborhood they systematically took out my electrical, cable, water and sprinkler lines. Gotta love. I even made them pay for a plumber to come and check out my system there was 2 cups of sand in my hot water heater which I drained personally as the plumber would not do it. He did however replace all the aerators on my faucets. what a huge difference! if you live in an area with hard water then I would suggest just unscrewing the aerators off and doing it yourself at home depot or lowes. It was an easy thing to do and you can begin to imagine what a difference it makes in water pressure. It seemed like a miracle. coupled with the lime and deposits the sand virtually rendered my faucets useless. Now they work great!

That's it for now, back to work

Back

Okay so I am back from St Louis and I feel like my world is in shambles. I know I have to get back to work and hunker down with my bucket of grit and get to it, but I have like a bazillion things to do around the house and fortunately after speaking in email with my Manager I have until Monday to get settled which is GREAT! I will post up some photos and decorate this blog when I am feeling creative again I promise...

bedtime

okay i am getting ready to crash. I spent almost the entire day calling all my mom's accounts (credit cards, organizations, outsatnding medical bills etc.) to explain that she was now deceased. Most of them were cool. One was idiot and actually asked to speak to the card holder. Don't worry I blasted her. A few want a faxed copy of the death certificate when I get it. So that will all be completed shortly. I sill have to write the poem for my mom. I have a title. It will be called "Bucket of Grit". but that is about as far as I have... I played the new game today on my desktop PC and it was VERY cool. The graphics are quite nice and the game, being open ended is fun. Work called and they are going to provide some food for mom's memorial service. That is really nice of them. I love where I work. Bright House is a great company. Lastly, this blog will get fancy soon as it has now been relocated by AOL to blogger.com as you can see and I have more bells and whistles here, so stay tuned.

Sunday Morning Hospice

On Friday according to what Beth told me, Mom showed some of the classic signs of dying where a person become really lucid and aware for a brief time then they fade and this coupled with a gut feeling, I thought that Mom would finally get some rest (i.e. die) and I called and had Kim call everyone to the place to say goodbyes. We called the few remaining relatives that could not make it down, namely Scott, Jennifer and Tom my aunt Teeny’s family. I also put in a call to mom’s friend Barbara and Mom’s friend from church Mary also came down with Father John and his wife. We had a bedside communion and prayers that personally seemed to go on for a long time. But t was nice for mom and I am sure it brought peace to Kim, Beth and Dayv. We all cried and talked to Mom one last time and she talked to us. The kids (Miranda and Alyssa) went down to the playroom and played video games. Then they had a Scategories game in the room which was good idle chatter I suppose. Then as the day progressed it mostly turned into us worrying about the pain she was in from her moving her leg, arm, back, tailbone. So I made a decision to eliminate her pain with a constant morphine pump instead of trying to get her to swallow anymore. We tried a few last times to get her to swallow but even with coaxing from Beth and me it was a long arduous battle. She has not had food or any substantial water since about Monday or Perhaps Tuesday. The head nurse of hospice whom I met at the hospital said that people that get into the routine of going without food or water do not typically live longer than two weeks. I am not sure what to think really. We all know Mom is a fighter and I am not sure if she was ready to go or not it seemed like she might be but I couldn’t really tell and now she is just sleeping/snoring so I have no clue. I am alone with her in the room right now and I turned on her easy listening channel on the cable box I brought from my house so she can listen to the music she likes anyway. The people and the environment here at hospice could not be better. The only weird thing I experienced was the check in process which could use some improvement. We wandered in from the hospital beating the ambulance somehow. (I know I drive fast but wow) When we came in I stood at the counter for a good 3 minutes while three women had idle chatter about some jewelry or window ornament one had acquired or something like that. Then after I signed the log and was told where to go we entered the room and seconds later Mom arrived. The next few minutes I spent bewildered at the incompetence of the female ambulance person while Dayv and I once again assisted with getting her moved off the stretcher to her bed. Then we were greeted by a nurse that I later found out had 14 years experience but she was very abrupt. She said without explanation that she had to inventory all the things we were bringing into Mom. I actually lied after about the fifth time of having to slow down so she could write and repeat myself and said we had nothing else. When I met with the very nice social worker Susan I shared both of those stories with her so they can make improvements.

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I guess they call this deathwatch and it is not very entertaining, fun, amusing or anything truly positive other than you knowing it is close of someone’s fight and that in our case I hope she goes with a peaceful sleep.

 

Poem

Sucks ass it does, Mom is in pain and the delivery agent is currently a pill that unfortunately takes a few minutes to work. He leg is swollen in her inner thighs. We had a shift change and I couldn’t locate the new nurse, Ashley. I decided to giver one of the pills we brought and just to tell you what a complete waste the medical system we have is. She took the pill she was going to give mom and threw it in the hazmat disposal box. The pissy part is that the insurance company will then be charged for the medication that she just destroyed. Then we wonder why insurance is so expensive. After it’s all said and done I may just let the insurance company in on all the crap that is out there that the insurance company is unaware of.

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I also flipped Mom over to her right side and in the process we moved her left arm and it was stuck under her side so we took it out of the brace that is used to secure it to her chest because during the x-ray of her chest we discovered the pain she had in her shoulder was due to the fact that it was dislocated! Long story short her wrist and fingers still get swollen and they hurt so she cried and grabbed her hand and bent it and then it hurt worse of course because it hasn’t been moved. So I had to calmly convince her that it was best to keep it in the brace even if her fingers are under her side. That seemed to immediately clam her down and she then nestled in under the covers for her snooze.

 

Mom tasked me with writing a poem in honor for her and to recite it at her funeral. I haven’t written anything in at least two or three years and I started off with a rhyming poem which I hate and now I am troubled and brooding because this particular poem and its significance and value to those who will be listen. The last time I had this type of task was when I was writing my vows for my wedding. Just so you know typically poems just come to me. I see something or feel something and immediately get inspired to write it down. Most of the time I write, I don’t even have to edit the piece before I publish it.  So being tasked with this type of pressure writing coupled with my lack of sleep (I am pretty sure I am working on like 10 hours over the past 5 days),  the obvious stress. The not so obvious stress, of family workings, my work, my home, my budget, my mom’s budget and who knows what else.  I am sure I will get something but the only thing that comes to mind immediately is Teddy Bears and Strength.

 

Anyway we will be off to hospice tomorrow and however long I have left with my mom I will cherish the moments like today when I escaped her out of the hospital and we went on an “excellent adventure” to <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Roser Park together to explore. She will be transferred by ambulance sometime in the afternoon. I had a good chunk of friends and relatives visit today and that was nice. I hope to have the same and more when we arrive at Woodside. Beth comes in the AM with her family tomorrow and will be staying at my house while they are here. Scott is also due down this weekend. I am sure he will stay with Gram which will be great for her.

 

It’s scary to sleep right now because I don’t want to wake up and find that I slept through my Mom’s demise and I also don’t know if I want to watch it either so I am torn. I want to be by her side and comfort her and hold her and whisper to her that I love her but I know that I need sleep. I am guessing I could gamble tonight and take the sleep and I may just try to do so in a bit… I’ll let you know.

 

David

 

too buzzed and tired

too buzzed and tired to write but the news i will share sucks for me... more tomorrow when i feel like i can type

Sad - Quick Update

So the lady next door sat up and pulled over the curtain and asked me how I got here. She wanted to go home. I gather she lives in a nursing home now. I was a bit concerned she might hurt herself. They put up the rails on her bed and just after the nurse left she asked me for a bedpan. I walked down the hall and alerted one of the nurses. I hope I will not be alone....

We are not in Spokane anymore Toto

Ok so I am very tired now. I am sitting in a chair in a small shared room in <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Bayfront Hospital. It took us 9 hours to get into this room. In the mean time we missed the regular time for taking Mom’s medication. All I can say is thank goodness I brought them. As soon as we got up here I was able to give them to her. Food on the other had came much more difficultly. Of course the cafeteria was closed. They scrounged up a sandwich for mom and some vanilla pudding which I fed her to completion so she would have something in her. Her cough did not subside nor did it get worse. They gave her a transfusion of 1 “unit” as she was down. (I have no idea how they knew that but hey) it did seem to perk her up a bit. She has managed to get a few hours of sleep despite the elderly women in the room with us that talks loudly in her sleep and is delusional when she wakes. She doesn’t know how she got here and she thinks she is leaving soon to play bingo. It’s sad. I can’t stress enough how important it is for someone, anyone to accompany you to a hospital. Someone to watch over you, make sure you are treated correctly, with the right medication and such. It’s downright scary to watch. The accommodations for me the care giver are horrible compared to the hospital in Spokane (Deaconess) this hospital is a bit like a cardboard house under an interstate. The vending machines are lame and some are broken they only have 5 total in the place. Two are off. The cookies I got out of one smelled like the guy that loaded it smoked cigarettes. It was pretty gross, I through them out. The chair I am in has a high back but the angle of it does not lend itself for napping let alone sleeping. The room is so crammed I am literally behind the door. The staff on this floor have been nice and they seem to care which is nice but otherwise forget it. They don’t have blankets or pillows. Thank goodness I brought Mom’s pillow she is using that. The pillow they provided is propping up mom’s legs for the blood clots. The blankets on Mom came from our 9 hour stay in ER as does the sheet. The blanket and sheet that came on this bed are wrapped around my legs lest I end up with frostbite.

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Kim brought me Wendy’s before she returned to Gram’s to crash which was grand! I really appreciate her support. I scarfed down a double, fries and some chili and went to the vending machine for 2 bags of Fritos BBQ and those shitty cookies. It’s 5:20AM and I am very tired and hungry. I am pretty certain we are going to get out of here as the only thing they are doing for her that I didn’t do or couldn’t do has now been completed. I can certainly give her a couple of pills for her cough just as much as the next guy and then maybe we could all get some sleep. It seems to me her cough is more than just a cough but so far no one has acknowledged anything more than the obvious. (LOL) The lady next to us is having a full conversation one sided out loud now in her sleep. She says things like Oh My, No I can’t stay here longer and such. It’s cute, funny, scary and sad all at once.

 

I wonder when the dang cafeteria opens. I hope the food is at least decent. I was really spoiled in Spokane and I had no idea. All I can say is we better see a doctor today.

 

I logged in to the VPN and sent an email to my bosses to let them know where I was and that I was available by phone if needed. I am pretty sure I should be fine as I didn’t have anything scheduled on the calendar.

 

*Yawn* Okay well I guess I am going to go play some more Fate so that I can stay awake. Talk with you later…

Tags: hospital, bayfront, spokane, deaconess, work, tired, food, wendy's

Ground Hog's Day

Okay so we drove home and on the way I went through a Checkers drive through and got mom and vanilla shake. I got a banana and chocolate shake for myself. Then we drove to the CVS right by the house so I could get her compression socks and her pain medicine what I failed to remember is that Mom uses Walgreens for her prescriptions. In my head I was thinking CVS because of proximity and the fact that the place is 24 hours. Luckily the pharmacist was bored and she said it didn’t matter and so we just had to wait a few minutes and it was filled. I then took Mom home and we crashed. I was able to get in a few hours before the first calls came in. None of the calls last night were for potty breaks which was great but I was still exhausted from the adventure. We got up this morning at 6am and she would not go back to sleep until 9am then se slept till like 2pm. Kim made us a wonderful lunch I had ham and provolone on toasted rye with tomatoes and cheetoes and mom had ham rollups, sliced tomato wedges, cheese and cheetoes. She had like 3 cheetoes and started coughing really bad, that turned into chocking, back to coughing some spitting up then I noticed when sitting her up that she seemed to have crackle in her chest. That was enough of a signal for me. I got dressed and with the help of Teeny and Kim getting Mom ready in sweats to keep warm we headed back here to the ER. They have now taken blood and a chest x-ray all while I watching the dinky TV in the mini waiting room with her seeing the Bucs win. She has been napping in between visits.

A nurse came in and although cute she was the kind of person that can’t look at you while you speak and tries her hand at multitasking but fails miserably asking questions about topics I answered on the question previous. I find that very frustrating. Mom is now asleep and we were told it would be a couple of hours for results. So I called Kim and left a VM and I called Gram and let her know what was up. The ER doctor came in just now, the same one from last night and she said the x-ray showed Mom actually has a dislocated left should which accounts for the pain she has been having on that side. She said it is not a huge deal since she is unable to move it but to me it seems significant. She said she would inform Dr. Morales. She also said most of Mom’s crackle has cleared but she is still coughing which I don’t like. We shall see what they say.

Saturday Night - No Fever

Sleep. It’s so important and most of the time we take it for granted. Mom managed to get about 7 hours straight last night, which is a record. It also made a dramatic improvement in Mom’s condition she went from partial “robot” to her normal talking self. I personally think that our society has been a bit warped in recent years and we work longer hours to make ends meet and our weekends of sleeping in seemed to have ended. Sleeping in is waking up at 8am instead of 6 or 6:30 big whoop. I know I am just as guilty as the next guy but getting sleep in 1 ½ increments, like mom has been doing this last week ain’t gonna cut it.

Now today after her sleep I got to be scared for another reason. Mom’s good leg is swollen and it hurts her. After dinner Kim called Dr Morales office and he called back  and suggested we head into the hospital. Two things you should never forget about the emergency room.

 

1. It will always be cold if you are the patient
2. You need to have all of your personal belongings with you
1. Wheelchair
2. Change of clothes
3. Jackets/Socks/Hat
4. Something to snack on and or drink would be a plus
5. Pillow and blanket
6. Magazine, Laptop, MP3 player or something for the accompanying person to have to do while we wait

Fortunately other than making mom change into warmer clothes which I should have done, and not bringing our wheelchair, I remembered the rest. We arrived at 7:10pm I am guessing it will be close to 9:30pm before we see the Doctor. I’ll let you know of course. I remember one time going to the emergency room with my friend Tim when he broke his arm and we waited for 6 hours. Surprise! We just saw the ER doctor who did a quick overview and Q&A. Basically said they would be doing a sonogram of the leg to check for a blood clot and check her cumamin levels. Her blood pressure is always low which works in her favor and fortunately for me it runs in the family.

 

*Yawn* I realize that I am pretty tired right now. The only cool thing in here is this really large like 40” computer monitor they have hanging from the drop ceiling. I’d like one of those for my PC at home, well maybe anyway it might actually be too big unless I had a wireless keyboard and mouse and could sit on a big comfy couch, not our current one mind you we need a new one. I want to get one that has a recliner built in so that I can watch TV in style.

 

Okay so Jamie the sonogram nurse just came and took us for a sonogram and the news is not great she has a blood clot all the way down her leg. We came back and they had ordered an EKG. Our nurse and Tina and she seems really nice as she does things slowly and she cares about Mom being cold and comfortable which is also very good.

 

So the ER doctor asked if I was caring at home and whether or not I wanted to continue to and we said yes then we learned that because she is already taking blood thinner there isn’t really any other treatment to do except the elevation I was already doing at home. I asked about her pain and they will check with the primary care doctor on the phone and see if we can get some pain meds. That’s about it. I am gonna see if they can get me a compression sock or something or if I even want one. For her condition. Okay so the sock is a go. They are now looking up what to give her for the pain then we are outta here.

just arrived Friday Night

Lovely, that’s how my Mom’s smile is. I arrived tonight and she was asleep. This is a good thing as she hasn’t slept all week. I issued orders today to let her sleep all day if she needed to and apparently she was brought outside for at least a little while by Gram wanting her to go out front. I can tell she needs sleep. She woke up and called for me saying she was cold. I then covered her up and turned the light out. I no sooner walked back into the bedroom and she called again to go potty. I removed the blanket and sheet I just placed on her and the pillows under her foot and arm and proceeded to swing her legs around. We did the customer count of one, two, and three and on three I go nothing from her. I mean nothing. No lift off the bed. No ability to stand. No muscle control to sit up. Nothing. Then I said Mom looks like you have nothing for me, to which she replied yep. SO I wrestled with her pajamas and paper pants and got her on the potty. I sat back on the bed and sat her up straight and told her I loved her. I kissed her and she kissed me back and gave me a hug. Then she asked for a Kleenex. I thought she was going to blow her nose and instead she tried to wipe with it. I explained to her that she had not gone yet and had it drop the Kleenex in the pot then I said so I guess you don’t really have to go do you? And she said no. So I tried to get her off the pot but she was completely dead weight. I have not had any training on getting her clothes on in the bed yet and boy was it awkward. I resolved to call Kim and have her come over and give me a hand. She was going to come over tomorrow with Miranda but I need someone to help with Mom’s clothes while I hold her up. I would love to tell you how strong, and brave I am but the truth is it’s very scary. It has only been 1 week and she seems to have declined so rapidly it feels like hospital déjà vu all over again. In the hospital as you might recall me saying in an email to the group, when she didn’t sleep she went into a weird robot like state. At the hospital it was scary enough seeing her like that but now I am the care giver and its fricken scary! I made the decision after this weekend if I can’t get her to sleep and if she doesn’t improve that we will need to get in touch with hospice and start to make the arrangements to get her moved in over there. Either way I may contact them just so they are aware and prepared.

  I am so very glad that Teeny decided to come down this weekend. Looks like I am going to need her for certain! This week for me flew by pretty quickly as I had some days of actual work. Now I am here on the weekend and BAM it’s like I just drove my truck into a brick wall. I don’t feel like thinking about it anymore so I am gonna go try and check email, facebook, and my alumni website and maybe play a little fate to relax a bit. I’ll check back with you later

sunday night

okay so we ended up having hot dogs for dinner because that's what mom wanted and I went to the store to get buns and stuff. I really don't like the way Publix is laid out as a store it is confusing. Mom barely ate any of her food until I explained that she needed to eat or she would start to decline. She ate a few bites. Kim and I reviewed the new rules with Arlene and I think that went well. When we got home I had turned off the air since I knew we would not be here and I wanted to save some money and it was hot in the house like 90 degrees but it was a weird dry hot like a sauna. It took a couple of hours to cool down and we crashed immediately after that.

Today I got a call from my big boss about a report we have been working on and he asked about mom and I shared with him about the weekend and such. It was nice to unload. Much like it is nice to unload here in this blog. Anyway, I had some stuff to do for mom today in regards to her bills and setting up her continuance on her insurance. I found out that they will not let me pay by credit card so I had to call gram and ask her to loan mom the money until i can get moms social security in to pay the bill as they want it all up front which is $1800. She said she would reluctantly almost and again told me about how she was going to be using up all the money from the equity line. I am kinda tired of that speech. I was going to just use the cash advance feature but mom’s credit is crappy because she doesn't work and the interest is like 17% on cash advances.

*sigh* This whole thing just sucks

the weekend

Well Friday night kinda sucked. I didn’t get to sleep myself until like 1am then Mom woke me up at 2am to say that she was cold. After I get all the covers and blankets on her she then tells me she wet her pants. No big deal to me personally that’s why she wears the paper pants anyway. So I asked her if she wanted me to change her now and she said now. Well that was a big mistake. So then at 4 for another waking she now says she is soaked. Well yeah, she went again and these pants only hold so much, plus she sweats so bad being bald, her body has not adjusted to the no hair thing. I couldn’t tell the difference between what was sweat and what was urine. Seemed like everything was soaked, so, I got her up on the potty and started to remove it all. Fortunately, Kim heard me and got up to help. I decided that the best bet was to get mom onto the shower. I had bought her some of her favorite English lavender soap so I used that and she said it felt delicious after she got over being terrified by me putting into the shower. She was frightened that I would drop her or something. But when it was all said and done she loved it. Kim had striped the sheets and remade the bed and started laundry which was great so that after the shower I was able to get her back into the bed. Also, I learned that Mom talks in her sleep and is constantly calling my name asleep or not so I must have gotten up every hour fire station ready and only once was it a real call. I am so tired this weekend.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 On Saturday we got up and got started late around 1 or so. Kim made us all breakfast and we ate at the dining room table. Then we went to the old Kmart which is now Sear essentials to go shopping. We picked up some hangers, some black sandal/flats, a new  leather purse that I picked out and some other stuff I have now forgotten about. By the time we got back it was time to get ready for dinner. I wanted to take Gram and Mom to Pacific Wave to eat and use my monthly allotment to do it. The owner Dan and I have become good friends and he know the situation with mom and welcomed me with open arms. Only one problem, it was a Saturday night and even though we got there at 6:30pm the place was hopping and the noise in the place became unbearable for Mom and Gram. Gram must have told me at least 3 different ways how miserable she was and how fine dining should be quiet and how the times have changed and such. I get it but it is what it is. Fortunately, Dan was very understanding and he even offered for them to come back in a couple of weeks on a Tuesday night instead when it will be quieter. That will be nice. I will have to plan ahead for that. On a positive note the loved the food although mom’s appetite is diminishing and she hardly touched her food she did say it was nice and I could tell everyone knew we were stressed because the cocktails for me were strong. Gram’s was too strong for her and to be accommodating Gene or server brought out her scotch in a sidecar with some ice and water for her to mix her own. Funny thing was she downed it all and was hammered herself and crashed immediately when we got home. Mom had a glass of Cabernet which she did not like. She complained that it burned her throat so I sent it back for a pinot noir and she that did the same thing. Gram wanted me to get her a burgundy which of course they did not have so she just drank the pinot and said nothing more about it. She was so tired she was despondent anyway. She is becoming more and more tired but unfortunately she only seems to sleep in bursts. The longest of these is now 5 hours and that typically is right after her sleeping pill.

Saturday night was much like Friday as far as my lack of sleep but Mom only had one bathroom trip she called me for a couple of small things but mostly I didn’t sleep because she kept saying my name in her sleep and I kept getting up to see what she wanted to find her snoring. After the cocktails I was dragging ass but at 11:30 today I forced us all up and we headed to breakfast Mom’s treat. She wanted eggs again with grits and bacon and we started off with cracker barrel in mind but with it being Sunday the parking lot was completely full so I suggested waffle house which is on the next block. We got right in and even got a handicapped parking space. I had a couple of eggs, some scattered, smothered, covered hash browns and a waffle. Our waitress and the place seemed really disjointed the cook was slow the server was not kind and forgot my covered (cheese) on my hash browns but everything else was tasty. Mom was out of it wand we still had some shopping to do. Kim had asked mom how she was doing and Mom said she was tired and ready to lay down. SO Kim said as I often do Mom we are eating breakfast now. Mom snapped yelling at Kim telling her not to treat her like a child that she knew were she was, Kim got up from the table crying and I had to sternly talk to Mom again about snapping at people. It was uncalled for. She doesn’t do it to me but I am the only one she doesn’t do it to. I explained again to Mom that her response to everyone always is that she is tired and that she had only been out of bed for an hour, that Kim was not talking to her like she was a child but that Mom gets spacey and either doesn’t respond or says a comment not pertaining to the question to begin with and this is at the least frustrating. When Kim came back to the table Mom apologized we then headed out after I paid up.

I jumped on the interstate and was at Sears in like 8 minutes. We parked right up front and headed in. I wanted to get some more hangers for mom’s clothes which I spent time this morning organizing and a couple of aprons for when she eats. She wanted some khaki pants. We needed a new toothbrush as she threw hers in the garbage last night after she threw the wipe she wiped her but on the toilet in there. Sometimes when she is spacey she does very illogical things; that being one example. The toothbrush was too big for her anyway as she always says she likes kids toothbrushes. We were looking at clothes and she became fixated on getting Gram another housecoat. They were all like $16 and Mom didn’t like the price but kept looking anyway I finally said we needed to go and we headed out. On the way we stopped at CVS so I could get her a gift card for Miranda to stick in the mail for her birthday on Tuesday.  King, Mom’s nail tech friend works in Clearwater but brings her son over to St. Pete to visit with old friends on Sunday and she volunteered to come by every other week to see Mom and do Gram’s and Mom’s nails. Since Mom wanted a nap Gram went first, then Kim and I just got Mom up. That gave her a 2 hour nap. The first thing she said was that she was cold. And when I explained that I got her up for King and put her in the wheelchair and rolled her out to the dining room where King had set up shop Mom said David, can I lie down. I said no, mom your going to get your nails done, I’m cold to which I just grabbed her knit cap for her head and threw a blanket over her and promptly came back here in the bedroom to write this note…

Gram for dinner offered to buy the $5 little Caesar’s pizzas again. They suck so bad I just believe it. So I said let’s just wait and have Mom decide what she wants for dinner. But it looks like I might be sunk since Mom is still tired. Kim used the bananas that were going bad while gram was getting her nails done and baked a banana bread. I love it when she is domestic!

I am going to go over the rules sheet I posted earlier with Arlene tonight before we leave and show her how mom’s clothing is organized and such.

promised the care giver rules....

Rules in no particular order

 

 

 

q     Check at least once an hour on her even if she does not call and carry light remote and monitor with you if walking around the house.

q     Potty Duties

o       Clean portable potty bucket after each use, fill with 1 inch of water and dust the seat with powder

o       Make certain that you wash Mom’s hand with a handy wipe after she uses potty

o       If she has soiled he pants immediately remove and place in a plastic bag. Seal up bag and dispose in kitchen garbage at night and large garbage outside during the day

o       Place wet clothing in wash and start wash leaving lid up until washer is full

o       Make certain she wipes and uses wipes on hands afterwards

q     Have spare trash bags in clear garbage can and fresh bag in wicker (white) can at all times

q     In evening ensure that Mom’s cell phone is plugged into charger

q     Place Mom’s drinking glass on washcloth on bedside table and change wash cloth every two days

q     Change drinking glass at end of every shift

o       Make certain she gets fresh water to take her pills

o       Add ice to her glass on occasion

q     Change sheets and pillow cases:

o       Monday Morning

o       Wednesday Morning

o       Friday Morning

o       Or as needed for accidents or bathing

q     Vacuum the house

o       Monday Morning

o       Wednesday Morning

o       Friday Morning

q     Trash is to be emptied every day to large can outside

o       Garbage pickup on Monday and Friday make sure large can is by road

o       Small garbage is used for soiled pants is to be dumped immediately

o       All ashtrays around house and out on patio are to be dumped everyday

o       Check for garbage in all rooms to be emptied

q     Dishes are to be washed and put away after each meal

q     Mom’s teeth need to be brushed and flossed after each meal

o       Currently she is able to do this with assistance

§         Hand her a flossing stick and throw out when used

<SPANSTYLE="FONT-FAMILY: Wingdings? mso-bidi-font-family: Wingdings; mso-fareast-font-family:>§         Place some toothpaste on the brush and hand her the brush have a glass of water and the bowl for her to spit in after rinsing

o       When she is no longer able to do this by herself we will come up with a different plan

q     Bathing

o       A bed bath should be given every evening

o       A shower should be given On Monday during the day

q     Lotion

q     Turn Mom in bed on occasion to prevent bed sores

q     For sleeping make sure she has a knit cap on her head, either the white heavy one or the red Buccaneer’s one unless of course she is hot to begin with

q     DO NOT TOUCH the air conditioners

o       Make certain the fans are positioned to circulate the air into Mom’s room

o       Ask Mom whether she is hot or cold

q     Get Mom up for Meals in wheelchair to dining room table unless she is miserable

q     During the day if she has no visitors please take her for a walk around the neighborhood in her wheelchair to get some fresh air. There is a park on 14th street 2 blocks up as well.

q     Help grandmother with food preparation

o       Breakfast

o       Lunch

o       Dinner

q     Laundry to be done P.M. shift

o       If soiled clothing is involved immediately turn on washer and fill up tank leaving lid up to stop cycle until washer is full with clothes

o       FOLLOW DIRECTIONS on laundry detergent as it is concentrated!

o       Ask Gram if she has any dirty laundry to go in the wash, to ensure full load.

o       Laundry needs to be dried, hung up/folded before P.M. shift leaves at 8:00 a.m.

o       A.M. shift will put all cleaned laundry in its proper place. If you are unsure where something goes, ask Gram

q     Kitchen Floor to be cleaned on Tuesday

q     Bathroom needs to be thoroughly cleaned on Thursday

Tags: rules for care, mom, care giver instructions

here again here again jiggity jig

Well it’s another Friday night and it’s 10:30 as I finally settle in to write to you. I got here tonight at like 7:30 and immediately sent Kim back out to Walgreens to pick up moms prescription, some water, some pads to go under the potty, some bleach and some oxy stain remover as I went to put on a new white t shirt for mom and discovered that almost all of the 8 tees she had were stained in some fashion. They smelled clean so they had been washed mine you, they just had stains and I will be damned if my Mom will be caught dead in stained fricken white tees on my watch! Then I discovered that one of Mom’s happy pills, had made it on the bed pad and not in her and I had run out of the medicine that controls her spasm in her colon/rectum and she was in pain. Luckily the prescriptions were all ready so armed with pills, heating pad, extra pillow and a Tylenol we were able to get her to relax and start her first sleep. I also discovered that the potty dish was in backwards to which I promptly pointed out to Debra, there was not enough water in it, and there was no powder on the seat either which really annoys me as it is not that difficult a task to remember I also handed her a pseudo checklist of things that must be accomplished throughout the week, which I will share in this post below. I also checked the laundry room as I had to place the shirts in the wash and discovered that the place was a disaster. The only good thing was they finally figured out what I was saying about the concentrated detergent and it wasn’t ½ empty like the week before last. The container does 110 loads and they managed to finish it off in a week! There was soap leakage all over the wooden shelf the container sits on so I cleaned that up and placed an old towel under the container. I also located it directly above the wash so any dripping should now make it into the damn washer. I cleared the floor/pathway so you could walk in there as stuff had fallen over and rather than pick it up they just left it on the floor. The bag for trash like old dryer sheets and lint from the screen was missing so I hung a new one up. I started a load of whites with the tees and a bunch of crumpled up towels and stuff.

I bought mom a cool atomic clock that is 14” and hung it on the wall tonight so she can tell the time now. She seemed to like it. She must have told me three times before she crashed how much she missed me. It was nice. She seemed in good spirits now and I can honestly say that I have slipped into a kind of groove with this care giving thing on the weekends I am glad I don’t try and kill myself and see her everyday the advice I got about the from a guy at work, (Paul Boberg – thanks) and Father John (Moms priest) was right on the money. They said that if I developed a routine of when I would see her that it would be a lot easier on me and my family and even my mom. It turns out that the only rough part is the fact that my house and chores get neglected and that Monday morning for work comes really early when you haven’t had much sleep on the weekend. Both of those things however are relatively small compared to my sanity and stability on that front. The president of my company asked me how I was doing today as did his assistant and it felt good to unload a bit on them. I shared with Dawn the assistant the difficulty when the money situation regarding the care we have for mom, the insurance I looked into to cover me in the event that it happens to me and how worthless that is. I explained that the insurance is $214 a month and it covers only $4000 if I was to need to care today. With me doing weekends with mom the total cost right now that we pay all out of pocket of course, is $7000 a month. As you can see even with insurance you would have deficit of $3000 which renders the policy worthless in my opinion. Even as a man in my prime working age I currently bring in less than that a month as is. I also during my investigation happened to have discovered that John McCain’s health policy forces you to pay out of pocket for any home health care so when December rolls around and Medicare and Disability kicks in for mom they would normally pick up the tab for the home health care. If he gets elected and mom makes it that long we will tap out all the equity of Gram’s house in order to pay for Mom’s care. That thought is VERY scary if you ask me. This in turn lead to another politics related discussion with her admitting that she did not know whom she would vote for. She said she had reservations about Obama because of his religious views so I posed this question to her. “Do you know what religion I am?”, to which she replied, “no.”

I then asked, “Do you know what religion John McCain is? or how about your boss Alan?”

“No and No” came the replies.

So then I said, “So you don’t know what religion or belief we have but you are concerned with what religion he is in order for him to be your leader correct?” I continued, “In addition you and I are friends and we discuss personal details of our lives with each other, and sometimes I offer advice which you follow and you never question my beliefs correct? But for some reason you think that Obama’s religious beliefs matter to you when choosing a person to be the president. Tell me then, can you tell me the religion of the last say, 5 presidents? No? SO how much does it really matter?” Then on top of that if you are still not convinced what about the people you work for? Or with? DO you listen to them and let them make decisions for you that affect you and your family’s livelihood and yet you never ask what religion are they.

At the very least I accomplished my goal of having her think about it. Personally I don’t give a rats ass what religion the person is I care about their morality and their integrity and their honesty mush more. I also want to respect their intelligence and their wisdom in decision making processes and quite frankly I base ALL my relationships on these principles form the people I choose as friends to the people I follow at work. If they don’t fit that criterion from me, they can bugger off.

So that leads me to the nice discussion I had with my leader and friend Alan. He is the president of our organization and he is a family man, a caring man, and a good listener and I admire him.

After some analysis of some work orders and invoices I ended up going to lunch with a supervisor Tony who unfortunately I will never trust as he lied to me and betrayed me in an earlier time at work and my personal relationship with him ended. I am always cordial as my Gram taught me to be and Ernie left the building instructing him to take, Mike, Kurt Laing, and myself out to lunch and I never pass up free lunch or free anything for the most part, (lol) so I went. We choose winghouse which was cool as a couple of old bartender friends of mine manage the place and I really like their naked, blackened hot wings. They have no breading and are all drummies. Perfect. I can also make conversation with Tony and he generally seems interested in the topics we pick to discuss so it passes the time nicely. I also have difficulty with Mike as my gut tells me he would stab me in the back if given the opportunity so I make certain he does not have such. The other member in our party Kurt Laing is an interesting chap from <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />South Africa I thin or something like that. And he always has some good input when I have been around him, which isn’t much but it has been pleasant every time. I have even added him to my friends list on Facebook or MySpace or both I can’t remember which. I killed my, MySpace account as you know and I am pretty sure I won’t renew it although it sucks that none of the SYTYCD kids are on Facebook. Oh well.

The food was decent as always and my friend Steve came by a few times and said hi and such and checked on me, which was cool. I have always been fond of networking and I have learned over the years that it is a small world and if you choose your friends wisely it will reap you and them rewards throughout your life.

<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> 

After lunch when we returned I gathered up my backpack and headed out. I got home and did some email. I also burned a few more DVD’s on my cool new toy, a Panasonic DMR-EZ47V Up-Converting 1080p DVD-Recorder/VCR Combo with Built in Tuner. I got it on Amazon for $147. According to Consumer Reports it retails for $400 and is the top of the line. IT KICKS ASS! Basically you stick in a VHS tape and a blank DVD hit a couple of buttons and come back in an hour and a half (or however long the movie is) and Viola, instant DVD! They even have chapters built in every 5 minutes. There are advanced features to create the chapters yourself but I could give a rats ass. It is mostly for copying all moms old VHS chick flicks so she can watch them here. It makes a pretty good copy. I even had a movie from 1982 Sophie’s Choice and it made a great copy. There are a ton of features this thing can do and when I have more time and a brain to concentrate I will explore it all. I managed to make like 6 DVDs for Mom in the last two days. I brought them over tonight and she seemed somewhat interested. This is the weird thing she directs me to do stuff then she kinda blows it off. It makes it tough to gauge what she really wants but hey at least I’m trying.

Next on the list of discussion is my daughter. Miranda’s birthday is on Tuesday and I had asked her repeatedly what she wanted and never really got an answer so I checked with my friend Drew that I do the website for Winton Music (http://www.wintonmusic.com) and told mom and we agreed to split the cost of getting her a new flute that should take her into the beginnings of High School. We got a flute from the Wisemann company the same manufacturer that makes Yamaha flutes and when I told Lisa this on the phone we got into an argument well how it started was she informed me that Miranda’s flute that I bought her was broken and she went to a shop to repair it and they told her it was junk and that she could buy the flute at “Tuesday Morning” and some other store she said implying that it was crap. I didn’t spend a boatload of money on her first flute because, quite frankly it was her first flute! And, as most parents will attest kids change their minds about what they are into quite frequently and purchasing an expensive throw away instrument is not what this father is all about. Well the backstory is that when I got this flute apparently Miranda’s teacher gave her shit because it wasn’t a big name instrument and then afterwards at least according to Miranda she relinquished that after hearing it played. I guess this may have been a lie according to Lisa and then she also proceeds to tell me that she took the flute to two people and they both said it was junk and since I bought another named instrument Lisa didn’t know…. Blah, blah, blah. SO I said fine I will take it back and you can handle getting Miranda her instrument. If you want her to have a Yamaha so bad you can get it for her. End of story. Coincidentally if you eBay Yamaha flutes and really pay attention to the details most people do not sell real Yamaha instruments for under $750 used. Most are knock offs and they use the word Yamaha in the main description then in small print under manufacturer it says some shit brand you’ve never heard of because mostly all of them are made in China now like everything else in our great country. Anyway, as I said I’m done. Miranda wanted a pair of Apple headphones for her IPod and when I told her Apple sells like six different ones and I didn’t want it to be the wrong ones she then agreed then came up with some sort of thing she needs for an upcoming marching band event she has and it is something that hold sheet music on her wrist so I said no problem I will get whatever that is just call me back with the model number and do it soon and I will get that for your birthday. After the call I called back Drew and asked him if he could return the flute I bought. Fortunately it wont be a problem and at worse he will just sell it to someone else.

 

So did I mention Kim is here with me tonight? It’s nice to have her here. She is asleep next to me right now but I enjoy her company. She is playing a great supporting role with my new adventure and I appreciate that she has stepped up to the plate and is understanding of the situation. Well, its now 11:55pm and I am about due to be called for a potty run with mom so I am going to sign off for now. We are going to try to take mom to the beach tomorrow and perhaps to home depot to buy a ceiling fan for her room and maybe a pair of black sandals at Kmart that she has been bugging me for. We will see how she feels. Talk to you later….

Tags: politics, health care, obama, mccain, boss, work, lunch, wings, relationships, mom, dvds, vhs tapes, chores, beach adventure

sigh

So I did sleep in a bit today, guilty as charged. But I was stewing a bit on a personal matter that I can’t share with you. In addition, it gets hot quick and hot is not how I want to sleep. Plus, I have things I want to accomplish today. I have errands to run, prescriptions for mom to pick up,  I have to get to Lowes to find out what the colors are for the new look of Pacific Wave, one of my clients for websites. I also need to get some cleaning supplies and work a bit on the bathtubs. Pick up some milk, and soap. A strange combination I know, but I have free coupons. I also got my free Progresso chicken broth today so I have to figure out what dish to make to use that. I need to find and book an appointment for myself to see a foot doctor. My left foot is still bugging me.

I spoke to  Gram this morning as the nurse changed up Moms blood thinner to only have her take like one every other day or something and she wanted to know what it was called. Then my mom called and asked the same thing or rather handed the phone to Debra so that I could tell her. She also inquired again as to where her straw hat was that we just bought for her. I told her again it was next to her on top of the PC monitor in her room. She had Debra show her that it was there. This reminded me to call my cousin. I spoke with him and asked him to give mom a call as she now associates the hat with him since we got it when we took our trip to Tarpon. He said he will during his lunch break. That will be nice for her.

It’s really strange although I have freedom associated with my work it “feels” like I have no time in my world or money for that matter to complete anything. Mom’s big other goal beside Cirque du Soliel was for her to see Mount Rushmore. I would love to take her but preliminary cost analysis puts at around $550 a person for a 3 day trip. Frommers says the best time to go is now in September/October. Sometimes it sucks to be middle class. I have already rung up my credit on my equity line and some credit cards. It’s Frustrating.

On a good financial note I had the foresight to move my entire 401k into a bond so when the market tanked 500 points the other day I was unscathed. In fact I made back $5k of my $23k loss I took this year.  I like the fact that I am pretty good at this I wish I had money to invest on the side I know I could turn a profit.

Well I am off, I just finished uploading the album of our adventure:

Taking Mom to Tarpon Springs for dinner

Tags: Mom, tarpon springs, rusty bellies, florida, sunset dinner, sponge docks, straw hat, scott, david, kim, tasha, 401k, errands, lowes

ratatouille

Well we just finished watching the movie and surprisingly gram watched it in mom's room with us. We all managed to sit in there and watch it. With about a few dozen breaks for cigarettes and lunch and potty breaks and such but hey we did it and mom managed to stay awake for most of it. I am pretty proud of her for that. I went this morning and got a sonogram and the good news according to the tech is that my major vitals all look good. my kidneys, gallbladder, pancreas and esophagus all look good with no abnormalities. i picked up a bunch of soda for grams house and I bought some resolve for potty accidents and an air freshener that runs on batteries that squirts every few seconds and I bought lavender moms favorite. I have her on her side and when we move the extremities that are paralyzed she cries and complains of the pain because she doesn’t normally move them and her muscles then hurt. It pains me to watch but it is a necessary evil. She asked for a Tylenol and I gave her one and during it she started to rant about how one of her caregivers says she doesn’t take her pills and when I corrected her, reminding her that just earlier during lunch she spit out and fought with me taking her pills she didn’t remember. That is one of the most frustrating things and if I didn’t have the strength it would be quite a challenge to overcome, forcing her to take her pills. Without her pills we would have seizures and she would also have rectal spasms that cause her a great amount of pain so not taking them is not an option.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

Gram quickly made her way back into her easy chair in the family room to watch the news on the hurricane hitting <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Texas right now. She, like Kim get really obsessed with such things, which seems so very impractical to me.

Scott and I took mom and the dogs for a walk before the movie up to the park and around the block basically it was, of course, nice and hot which was good as Mom is always complaining that she is cold like her mother and we were able to get her in some sun which I always think is a good idea for almost everyone now and again.

We have about an hour to go until we will pack everyone up and head up to Babalu for dinner. I’m not hungry at the moment but we shall see. I brought my new love with me from the house for tonight’s drinking pleasure. It’s called Bulleit and it is a Kentucky bourbon. It is fairly inexpensive at $20 and the taste is wonderful on the rocks or with Coke.

Well back to my game I hope Kim is feeling better I’m going to check with her later to see if she is up to meeting us for dinner….

Friday night buckle down

okay I just got situated at my grandmother's. Mom was asleep when I arrived. I brought my camping king sized mattress and some sheets for my cousin and his gf. They will be arriving to stay the weekend sometime tonight. Kim is at home and not feeling very well. I think she has stomach flu. I dorked and left the laptop in my haste at the house and she had to bring it to me. Thankfully so I have something to do. When she arrived she headed straight to the bathroom. Not a good sign I thanked her and ushered her back home to get rest. she brought the dogs with her and they went crazy running all over the house when they arrived but since gram is already in bed reading/smoking/watching tv there was no one for them to say hello to. Kim asked if I wanted to keep them but I always worry about them here because gram has no dog door and they are pretty used to going when they want. I decided to wash the bedspread for the bed I sleep on tonight because I am tired of the smokey smell on it. The room i sleep in gets pretty cold with the wall unit in it. the room has two twins a desk a bedside table a coffee table with a small 12" tv and a 4 drawer chest of drawers it is only maybe 10x14 with all that so its kinda crowded. i have a box fan in the doorway blowing the cold air from my room into moms room and then in the fireplace room where the other air unit is I have a fan in the dining room next to that pulling that cold air into the hall to go back to her room otherwise it get bloody hot in there. I checked on her when I got in and she was out like a light. I figure she will be up in about an hour or so here and need to potty for the first time this evening. Gram said she went to bed after dinner which was like 7 so I figure around 10 or so she will be up for the first time. We are going to take it easy this weekend with her probably only heading over to my house to watch a couple of movies. She really wants to see ratatouille. so the plan will be for me to go to the doctor for my 9:45am appointment. I have a sonogram to check for ulcers as I have had a couple of weird projectile vomiting session before a few meals in the past few months. the doctor thinks it may be an ulcer so after that I will come back and get her ready then we will pack up the trucks and head over to my house for lunch and the movie or two then we will leave for dinner and headto babalu a local dive eatery where they have okay food but a full liquor menu and smoking on a patio for gram plus its close to gram's house. Then back to grams for the night. Sunday am we will play by ear and see if Mom wants to go to church or not. I spoke with father john today and he asked if we would be going but i explained i couldn’t commit because of the situation with my cousin Scott being here and I didn't know the plan. maybe we will head to the beach or something Mom likes the beach... <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Ill let you know. I am gonna go play some fate talk to you later.

Product Eval

As many of you know I have long been a member of several major survey groups and have often been tasked with product evaluation. I just received an email from Pillsbury and pretty soon I will be evaluating a new product from their Progresso line. It looks like it will be 3 new broths. I will let you know how it goes.... (See the company provided images below)

Tags: product testing, progresso, pillsbury, broth, beef, chicken

aoljurlAdd, aoljurlAdd_3

tired

Okay so I am back and quite tired from the stress of the evening Mom is really fading and it is distresssing then my Gram through not being able to hear and see can make things quite difficult at times. Anyway, I think my great auynt had a good time and the meal was fairly good though I dont really like olive garden. and it was even better when Joe, Nita's B offered to pick up the tab! How cool is that! SO all in all pretty sucessful Im just tired and I have to take mom to the doctor tomorrow at 9:30. Hope you sleep well

quickie

Okay gotta go get ready to pickup my mom and take her to Olive Garden for my Aunt's Birthday Dinner. It should be good I will try to take some photos...

shameless plug

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- david

Tags: article submission, website promotion, google, yahoo, adwords, keywords

weekend friday report

Okay so the weekend is here and once again I am at my grandmother’s with a watchful ear on my sleeping mom. It’s 9pm and my grandmother and mom are in bed already. When I arrived Debra had waited since I called and said I would be 5 minutes late. She played a bit of a game about the fact that I was late several times. It was rather annoying after the first time since I had called and instructed Gram to tell her to have Debra leave at her appointed 8pm time. I arrived at exactly 8:07p. Anyway I smelled something funny and I figured out it was a combination of cigarette smoke and poop. The poop smell was coming from the porta-potty which had tracks on the side, no water in it and no powder on the seat. All of which I verbally instructed her to do. I am not happy. In addition the wipes were not out leading me to believe that Mom’s hands have not been washed after she wiped which is another point of contention. I had an interesting day at work today but it was good to actually do some work it took my mind off the situation somewhat which was good.

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We have a hurricane possibly heading this way, Ike. It looks like it will be off of <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Florida’s lower coastline on Wednesday. So we shall see. Generally hurricanes that follow the path of Ike are not very good ones as they tend to move water into the bay which will be devastating. Basically for me a hurricane would be bad as it would create even more stress on me as we would have My mom and Kim’s Mom and sister come and stay with us and my grandmother would likely go to Nita’s house as she lives right around the corner from me. It’s hard enough staying here on the weekends let alone a jam packed scared house full of women. I’m hoping it gets beat up by Cuba like the rest of the ones…

 

I also killed my Facebook and MySpace pages after I had made a comment to one of my “friends” on a picture she posted that was like 20 years old in which she looked attractive and I made a quick comment saying the photo made my heart race or something to that effect. It had been up there for a week or two but her husband apparently saw it and didn’t like the comment and said so in his “status” one liner which caused Kim to investigate and putting two and two together made a big deal out of it to me. I wrote an apology per Kim’s instructions and killed my accounts to avoid any big deal with Kim. The whole thing to me was a bit ridicules as it was just a picture and if I was him I would have taken it as a compliment much like she did when I made the comment, but alas, Kim was mad at me and I don’t need any more stress in my world so I ended it as quickly as I could. I also reminded Kim in not so soft of a voice that I was the one that picked her to marry me not the other way around and that I was not going anywhere it was just a  comment such as people make to one another, as far as I was concerned. .Kim has now rescinded and said I could reestablish my account but quite frankly I could care less except for the occasional line I was dropping to my REAL friends and such and the occasional cool find of new music from various profiles as well, it doesn’t do much for me anyway. I mean I have a website after all! Anyway, I will continue to weigh the pros and cons and decide some other time…

 

In other news we are going to take Mom to Bok tower tomorrow as she has always wanted to go and it should be a good aventure. I will try to write tomorrow and report on how it went. I am off to play some Fate (a game) …

friday night

at moms, had some ice cream with Gram as Mom was sleeping when I got here at 7pm. She woke at 8:30 and needed to potty. I setup her new potty chair afterwards and will give it a go tonight on the overnight it is a larger chair supplied by my friend Tracy. The other one was donated by My great Aunt's BF Joe. It was nice but mom found it a bit uncomfortable. This one is made for large people so it be just fine. I am going to play a bit on the pc and crash in like an hour. We shall see how many times I get up. I hope its not too many as tomorrow will be a big day.

Got my video in from my reunion and I must say it is definately NOT worth the $20 there are quite a few shots of me ironically but not many introductions and the video is sometimes grainy or bad white balance or even water/rain on the lens. the audio track is off and the music is really loud. All in all not great. for the 30th I would like to hire someone who can do a kick butt one. It is nice to have for posterity. I am thinking like a few of the same questions posed to a bunch of people to hear differnt answers or something I dunno. just a thought.

Today it rained and the lighting was so loud and scary I ducked while lighting my grill. Lighting as you know is one of the only things that scares me and it scares me good!

well, im going to go game catch you later...