The mother-in-law

Shortly after that last post with the photo of Dorothy’s mother, RAW went down for his regular visit taking that photo with him. A couple days later she asks RAW to call 911 because she didn’t feel very good. I don’t think they ever found out what was wrong with her but she ended up staying in the hospital for 4 nights. I guess a couple of those nights she did have heart trouble but that was most likely caused by being off her regular Rxs being in the hospital.

Because of RAW’s now extended stay down there, I worked a day at home so I can teach Hollace how to get her self off to school on her own in case she had to like she had to the next day.

RAW came home while Dorothy was still in the hospital thinking that she was going to be there for a few more days until he could get back but she got released the next day and sent to the Lutheran Home for convalescence.

While he was down there, while driving her car, he is involved in an accident practically right in front of her house. Some young guy just home from Iraq made a left turn while RAW was going straight. It sounds pretty cut and dry, the other guy’s fault but the police report said it was both’s fault and that RAW was in the turn lane even though he was going straight. That doesn’t sound right to me. RAW knows that intersection so why would he be in the turn lane when he was going straight?

At the accident scene he was given a citation for having expired plates and no proof of insurance. It was becoming apparent that Dorothy was not handling her bills very well. Her license was suspended since she wasn’t able to show proof of insurance after an October accident she was involved in. She also had an overdue handicap parking ticket. She doesn’t get that in order to park in handicap she has to have a handicap placard which I am sure she is eligible to have, heck she already has the mailman delivering her mail right to her door now instead of across the street because of a doctor letter.

She was just going to be running into the store for 5 minutes but it turned out to be 2 hours.

Which brings us to the next bugaboo in her not getting it. The cell phone.

She had a Jitterbug phone and paid month by month, no contract. I guess that phone quit working (I think it was for non-payment of the bill) so she went to Sprint and got a new phone. She claims she didn’t sign no contract but she does now have a 2 year contract.

While RAW was visiting her in the hospital, he put her new phone in a bag with some milk which leaked and fried the phone.

That’s it, we will get her on our phone line for only $10 a month and another new phone. In order to cancel with no $200 early termination fee is to get a simple letter on a doctor’s letterhead stating why. RAW talks to the doctor who says no, Dorothy ok. It probably would of helped if RAW filled him in on all the bill messes. Anyway, Lutheran House faxes something over.

In the meantime we try to retain her old number and get it ported to the Verizon account. No problem, only now Sprint won’t waive the early termination because it is apparent we are still using the account just through another carrier–duh on us.

While RAW comes home while Dorothy is still in the hospital, he gets a call from his cousin Theresa. After her quick, how is your mother, she starts ripping into him about him hurting her mother’s feelings. “How dare you speak to my mother that way after all she has ever done for you.” This went on for 15 minutes. RAW has no idea what he said or done to Aunt Geri. Geri isn’t a wimpy sensitive little old lady. She knows RAW, she knows how abrupt he can sound. He calls Geri and she sounds fine before he could ask if he has offended her somehow Jay gets on the phone and talks cars.

I was pissed! Theresa has always been a royal bitch in the first degree but I couldn’t believe her gaul. Seriously woman, you have the nerve to call like that knowing the stress RAW was already under with his mom in the hospital, seriously?

The next weekend after Dorothy was at Lutheran House, we all go down there for a visit. I present her with her new phone.

A few days after we home RAW makes yet another trip out there to sort through the bills, deal with the car and insurance, citations and such. Originally he was trying to get back before Saturday cause Pam and Cindy and kids were coming out for Hollace’s birthday but we switched it to next weekend so RAW stayed out until tonight. His mom got released from Lutheran House on Friday so it just made sense that he stay there to settle her in.

I guess today has been a challenge to him and her both as she tries to regain her billing system while RAW tries to keep control. Lot of heated battles. She still doesn’t think she signed a cell phone contract or needs to deal with the handicap parking. Nor does she seem to acknowledge that her DL is suspended but at this point, her car is still getting fixed.

Hopefully soon we will have her name on a senior apartment waiting list which is what she has been wanting for a long time.

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Testing out the new WordPress changes.

 

This is a picture of my mother-in-law’s mother. I think she died when Dorothy was 18. Or maybe it was after that, I guess I should go check on that.

This is the only picture Dorothy has of her mother. That photo is less then a inch big and all beat up. She was going to take it in to get refinished and enlarged and framed. I told her I can do that for her.

Because Dorothy is 88, she doesn’t need much in the way of Christmas gifts. She is of the age where she is going in reverse with her stuff, trying to rid herself of it.

While we were there she was trying to give me her mink stole to sell for her. It wasn’t really her stole but was given to her by a friend when she was getting rid of things so there was no personal history with it.

Because of this reversal of stuff, all I got her for Christmas was a stamp thingy that you roll over address on envelopes before you recycle them. She is paranoid about throwing away envelopes with addresses on them, preferring to burn them instead. Hopefully she will use the roller stamp.

The roller stamp is all I could find her this year for a gift and it didn’t cost that much so I was thrilled when she mentioned the photo of her mother. Tomorrow I will go out and get a nice frame, then wrap everything up as a gift.

I think it is those kind of things that make the best gifts for seniors.

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her first formal

Tonight Hollace went to her first formal dance at school. Acquiring a dress proved to be a bit of a challenge. Before I even knew there was a dance and she wanted to go, she already found a dress at kohls.com that she liked. It was pretty so we went to Kohls to look at it. I think they only had one dress and this wasn’t it. I soon realized it was an online exclusive so I go to order it. Because regular shipping would mean the dress would get here until after the dance I was ready to spring $20 for priority shipping. Only for some reason the site wouldn’t let me do it. I call them and they try, no luck. I go ahead and order it with standard shipping and go look for plan B.

I found a dress sort of similar at Sears.com and order it. Then we hit the stores to try and find a dress there as well as a shaw and shoes. We were successful with the extras but there wasn’t even a close contender for dress at all.

On Tuesday the Sears.com dress comes. Hollace tries it on over her clothes and freaks out when she gets stuck. She keeps declaring she hates dresses, she hates dresses.

The next night she tries again with out the extra clothes. She keeps the dress on for most of the night liking the feeling of fancy.

The next night I buy some black tights and she tries it all on again and wears it most of the night.

Tonight is the dance and guess what comes? Yes the Kohls dress, the original one gets here. Hollace puts it on and it is a hit.

We go and pick up her friend Marabell who needs a ride and I drop them off. All in and all she had fun even though her feet hurt from the heels.

 

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It is that time of the year again

I guess it is, that is. Not really any snow so to speak and the fact I haven’t gotten the Christmas tree up yet is contributing to the illusion that it Christmas isn’t really only 9 days away.

At this moment I am taking a break from Christmas card production while listening to She & Him’s Xmas album and most of my shopping is done and all of that, I still don’t realize Xmas is here.

I originally had next week off for the holidays but I realized that Hollace didn’t so I changed it to the week between Xmas and New Years. I hope the weather is drivable since we will be spending the week visiting folks.

Last weekend was my 48th birthday. That number is starting to sound old. I am already starting to freak out about turning 50. Oh dang, how can that be? Seriously. My hair isn’t grey yet, just under the bangs on the right side. I still don’t need reading glasses but I am sure that will be changing soon. I don’t think I will handle that well. Also this year my periods are starting to get slightly irregular. As soon as those three things really hit, I will feel old.

Until them I am not. Do you know I have never gone in a liquor store by myself and maybe in one with someone else maybe 3 times. I am totally delusional to think I’m not yet 21! Maybe I should do that now that I am 48. Go in and buy a bottle of wine and be a wine drinker. That sounds older then I feel. Maybe get my hair cut short, I still wear it the same way as I have my whole life, younger then a 48 year old.

One of the mom’s that wait while our kids are in Japanese class assumed she was older then me and I assume she was younger then me. We are the same age.

For my birthday, Sherry came up for the day. She had homework to do so for the most part she sat on the couch to do it. She isn’t old either, she is doing homework for God’s sake!

When Sherry was done with her homework, we all went to Tsukasa for dinner and a little shopping while we were out.

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2012 might be an interesting year. I hope nice even numbers are insignifcant as I will be celebrating 20 years at Abbott next November right around the time the company separates into two companies. I hope I fare well here, but at this time no one has any clue what is going to happen to shared services like the art department.

 

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cake2011



cake2011, originally uploaded by swardraws.

RAW’s cake for the year. It is tradition.

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it’s the holidays now

Thanksgiving was 2 days ago. As usual, we went to mom and dad’s for turkey.

We don’t really have a pushy family, we are all pretty laid back. I am sure if we weren’t something would of probably been done by now about helping mom figure out how to deal with grama or get her some help some how. None of us kids live all that close. i am the closest at 100 miles away.

Grama is 92 and is starting to look to be 100. She is all skinny and shriveled up. She doesn’t bother with her wig anymore. Her mind is slipping. She kept wondering who was going to take her back to her apartment and wanting to get a new rug for her apartment door because it is too slippery. She doesn’t walk anymore. Mom wheels her around. Because we were there she wanted to sit in the family room but the couch is too low and it is an ordeal getting her in and out of it. She keeps forgetting that she can’t get around too good.

Normally she sits in the old living room where my dad lives. He sits in his elevated easy chair watching his little TV being driven crazy by his old mother-in-law. He can’t get around too good either. He shuffles along with his walker. On occasion, my mom has to call 911 to pick either one of them up from the ground. My dad is in purgatory. It is sad for all.

My mom is the one who has to keep the peace and keep them all upright. She has always been anxiety ridden but I like to think she is coping the best as possible. Probably wishful thinking on my part.

I tried to bring it up this weekend but nothing came of it. If we were a more a pushy people, we could come up with something to help their sad situation.

Maybe I should at least make more an effort to go down there to help out on weekends. I first need to get over my fierce protection of free time. I am so damn selfish. I guess that goes on top of my New Resolution list to fix that.

The turkey dinner was typical, traditional. It was just the 6 of us, RAW, Hollace and me; mom, dad and grama.

After dinner dad went back to his chair for some football games, we put on a marathon of Roseann on our TV. Then RAW put on some Pumpkin Chunkers after dad yelled from the other room that it was on.

RAW for some reason thought he would sleep in the elevated and unstable easy chair in the family room for the night. I don’t know what was wrong with the bed upstairs. Anyway I was afraid it would tip over and he would land on his head.The real problem was every time he would get out of it, it would lurch forward ejecting him to the floor the other way. He was being passive aggressive trying to sleep in that chair with the noise of the TV and ejections, like he had no choice. Whatever dude, don’t add to the issues. He crabbily went up stairs to sleep eventually.

Friday he left early to go to Fort Wayne. Hollace, mom and me were scheduled to have lunch with Sherry. After lunch we stopped home to check on grama before we went to visit Aunt Bobbie. She was sleeping so we slipped out.

It has been awhile since I visited Aunt Bobbie. She seems the same even though she was 80+. Her biggest medical issue seemed to be the carpel tunnel surgeries she had earlier in the year. Her real issues and stress has been her son Tom who is medically a mess as well as worthless.

We rushed back home because grama is going to wonder where mom is and start wandering around. Sure enough we walked in as she was rounding the corner in the kitchen looking for us.

Around 7pm, Hollace and I headed back home to enjoy our typical hermit-like weekend.

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Day off

Here i sit with a day off. One where no one is home except the cat. Time especially precious today but I am of course not discipline enough to embrace it.

I decided taking Mondays off were better then taking Fridays because it makes my Sunday nicer knowing I don’t have to go to work the next day. I know it just postpones thing to Monday night but Monday is already Monday so it isn’t a big deal.

All this dread of work isn’t really dread. I love my job and sometimes think having time off is more trouble then it is worth making coming back harder.

I think next on my list is to sit quiet and mediate or think or come up with ideas for my day. Hollace comes home at 2:30 so I have 4.5 hours to savour this time. That means, no Words for Friends and no Facebook. No other things I can do when others are around like reading that Steve Job book which I already did for an hour this morning anyway.

I originally made a car repair appointment for this afternoon after I couldn’t get a good time for Tuesday after work but after talking to RAW, I changed it to Tuesday morning and take the train in. He didn’t want me to mess up my day off. He understood the point of my day.

Well there you go. It is time for that quiet reflection or meditation or doodling or taking a picture of a cupcake. I am done with the writing portion of my day.

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Darkness

My 12 year old is getting too dark. I must pull her back before i can’t. I will tell more when I feel it more in control of it.

Speaking of darkness, we change our clocks back this weekend so it will be really dark too early. Hopefully we will regain some light in the morning.

The brake light on my car are all screwy. Last week some woman motioned to roll our window. She said our brake light is stuck on. By Monday it seemed ok again. Today i noticed that it was stuck again. If I keep the headlights off, the brake lights would work ok. But it was getting dark so it was obvious that the dashboard were dark. Until I hit the brakes and the dashboard lights would go on! It is all screwy. I made an appointment on Monday to get it fixed but it is my day off and I don’t want to waste my precious day at the Hyundai.

still not all that use to this new iPad keyboard.

I got another Apple product, it is still getting pathetic. I now have an iPod nano for a watch.

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Blogging from the new keyboard

I got a new keyboard for the iPad that I am trying to get use to. I am also seeing if I can at least at to drafts, an entry with out a network connection.
First off, I need a lighter touch since I keep making multiple characters. I wonder if there is a keyboard setting.
I need to sell my other keyboard.
I got an iPhone and sold my iPod to a friend.

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Too much minutia to do

and not enough focus to do it. I just decided that opening statement is really a tweet so I just posted it there.

At the same time as I opened up this web page I opened Lynda.com to see if there was any new tutorials I could fall asleep to. I am not saying Lynda.com is boring, it is only going on 1 a.m. and I know that is what is going to happen.

Like I aluded to in the post before this, I am finally with the world of iPhones. Now its time to sell the iPod. I don’t know what to do with it. A couple people on FB feigned interest until I reiterated that is a 64Gig and will more then likely charge more they they were hoping. Yeah, they could of gotten a deal if it was a 16 Gig but it wasn’t. Probably won’t be able to sell it. I suppose I am a fool if I don’t try. I will try to sell the flip video cam as well.

Well that is all I wrote tonight.

 

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