Lord Love A Duck - 6

For anyone that hasn't been following along, Lord love a duck is one of my mother's expressions. I have no idea what it means other than that she is exasperated. So these posts always involve Mom but I'm the one that is exasperated.

I visit Mom twice a week and I have about three hours each visit to get things done for her. On Monday I struggled to get one load of laundry done and the kitchen floor washed. I sent John to the grocery store so I could get it done. Not much to show for three hours!

I had big plans for today but so did Mom. As soon as I walked through the door she had her to-do list in hand and was reading it off.

Top of the list was to have John go out and read the number on the telephone pole out front. The street light has been flickering and driving her crazy so she called the power company to complain. They wouldn't send anyone out unless she knew the number on the pole. Simply giving her address and saying the pole closest to the house was not specific enough for them. She seemed to have forgotten that John retired from the power company and she went into a long winded explanation of where to find the number on the pole. She was all concerned about his boots because she didn't want him to get snow in them when he climbed the snow bank to get the number?! We could see the metal tag on the pole from the house and he did not have to climb the snowbank to get the number but she was concerned about his safety until he returned.

Mom can no longer go shopping so she gets catalogs. Lots and lots of catalogs and she is always finding things she has to have. Her latest order came in a box that just fit in the mailbox. Mom cannot get out to the street so my sister brought in the mail when she visited yesterday. The box was wedged in there so tightly that she had to go back in the house and find tools to help her get it out. Heaven forbid the mailman should walk an extra 50 feet to deliver a package to the door for an old lady! One of the items in the box was a sleep mask to block out the flickering street light.

Apparently the extension cord for her nebulizer has been getting tangled in the chair legs. Rather than mention that to us she saw a neat little plastic gizmo that will coil the extra cord and keep it out of the way. Of course you can't buy just one, you have to buy a six pack. I finally figured out the directions (my Greek is improving!) and after breaking two nails and enlisting John to help I was able to show her that there was no way that much cord was going to fit into that little plastic thing. I went out to the kitchen and found a wire tie and shortened her cord. And as long as I was sitting under the desk anyway I dusted too! She was very dissapointed that her little gizmos didn't work so I guess we'll have to shorten her phone cord or something next week.

It seems like once a week some light bulb needs changing so John took care of that while I ran downstairs to bring up the laundry I hung on Monday. Holy cow! It was almost 11:30 already so I sent John off to the store by himself again. Mom gets Meals-on-wheels but yet she still needs things from the store at least twice a week. Sometimes she has a list for my sister too!

While John was gone I decided to try and clean the table or at least straighten it up a bit. Mom never throws out anything. Still on the center of the table were the papers that came with her chair. _ The chair that we got her last summer. The manual was sitting on the desk (you never know, she might have to look something up!) so I stuck the delivery papers in it and tossed the two paper tags in the recycling bag. My mistake - letting her see me do it. She went right over to the bag, took out both tags and placed them neatly in the manual. What were the tags you ask? One was a square that said, "Made in America" - certianly something bad would happen if we got rid of that! The other was a - gasp - YELLOW CAUTION tag. It had to do with how to put the chair together and is covered in the manual. Um, Mom, the chair is already put together and working fine! I should just shrug it off as a quirk of old age but I so wanted to run into the bedroom and rip the tag off the end of the bed, the one that says, "DO NOT REMOVE UNDER PENALTY OF LAW." I restained myself figuring that that would just give her a heart attack.

Then she took five full minutes to ask if I would get mad if she asked my advice but didn't take it. No, Mom - you'd be in the majority if you didn't take my advice. She went on to say that my sister had told her to get more information first. Finalllly she got to it. The company that services her furnace had sent a flyer offering prepaid services and she didn't know what to do. So I took  my sister's advice and called them. They want to charge her and extra $150 for what is essentially an insurance policy that will cover any needed repairs up to $750. I pointed out that she has annual service and has never had a problem so I thought she should just set the $150 aside and in five years she'd have her $750 saved up but would have parted with it if she didn't need to. Will she take my advice? Probably not!

I finally gave up any idea of getting anything done and we had a nice chat about her grandmother and other memories of long ago.

So the dust bunnies won this round but I will beat them back next week!

Happy Birthday Princess!

Five already! I hope you have a wonderful party at school.

Happy Birthday PJ!

Have a great day!

Winter Blues

I'm still here. Thank you to all of you who have asked if everything is OK. I suffer from SAD - Seasonal Affective Disorder - and 2010 has gotten of to a rocky start. I have started to write several times but they were all whiny posts that I decided not to publish. So another edition of Apple Whine and hopefully I'll find something pleasant to write about.

We had a very relaxing Christmas holiday. My first day back to work found me doing driver training and the weather conditions were awful. I have done skills training in the winter before but never taken a new driver out on my route with me in bad conditions. He did wonderfully but I found the stress exhausting. I have also worked with several drivers his age before, however since he used to play football with my son it made me feel ancient to work with him.

Mom has hit another bump in the road where I feel like I am dealing with a child rather than my mother. She's been forgetful and stubborn. Thankfully my sister deals with her stubbornness better than I do. She doesn't leave her chair unless she has to. She is forgetting to take some of her doses of medication and though she is very unsteady on her feet she only used the walker now and then. After the weeks of physical therapy for her good arm she has stopped doing her exercises. I'm hoping she just has the winter blues too and this will all pass, as it has before.

She has been obsessed with a Meals on Wheels bill that she didn't pay. As soon as a bill comes in she writes a check so she couldn't understand how she missed it. It turns out that she didn't miss it, I did. It came with a meal that was delivered when we were out, probably at physical therapy, and was put in the cooler with her meal since we weren't home yet when they came. I saw only the meal, not the white envelope in the white cooler. We used the cooler again this week when she had a doctor appointment and there it was. She feels much better knowing that it was my screw up and not hers. And I also screwed up in not reading her Medicare Part-D stuff closely at the end of the year. Her plan stopped paying for two of her prescriptions January 1st. Her other plan will cover them but only one month at a time so that will cost her more this year.

Twig started going to a preschool class for three year-olds and is so excited about it! He's only made a few classes so far because he keeps getting sick. His sister has been getting sick too. When Bean called school to say that Sprout wouldn't be there Friday the school secretary said to her, "She's sick AGAIN!?" The latest - Twig has Croup.

It would be nice if other parents would keep their little ones home when they are sick, like Bean does. I had three kindergartner's that coughed all over everyone they could all week, including me. I was constantly disinfecting handrails, seats and windows. They have learned to cough into their elbows but it seems to take three before they get their elbow up.

I've has to endure several meetings at work. Training, scheduling and cut backs. Gov. Paterson is cutting aid to schools and transportation is an obvious place to look to make cuts. I have enough seniority that I will be OK but may have to drive a new route. Others are understandably upset and need to talk about it. I've always had broad shoulders but I'm feeling weighed down.

On a positive note, I started dieting the 1st of the year and have stuck to it reasonably well. I'm down a few pounds and hope to fit into my bathing suit and shorts by winter break ;-)

I also have done fairly well at keeping up my genealogy blog, Apple's Tree. Several of John's family members have joined me in working on his family tree and on another happy note I have been corresponding with one of my cousins. She is connected to the line from which the letters come so it will be fun to swap information and opinions.

Merry Christmas

Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas!

We actually celebrated both Birthdays and Christmas last weekend. We're having a quiet morning and plan to go to the movies this afternoon. Is this a new tradition in the making?

Happy Birthday B!

Dear B,

Where have the years gone? You were (still are!) the best birthday gift I ever received. Back when you were a teenager I was worried that I'd totally blown it as a parent. Who would have thought that the kid who ran away and didn't want to finish school would turn into the man that you've become? A hard working husband and devoted father. A phenomenal author - the agents that have turned you down will be kicking themselves in a year or two! I'm proud of you!

Happy Birthday!

A Red-runner First

So, I'm in town picking up at a house near the main intersection where there are three lanes. I'm in the far right lane, my red lights are flashing and both stop signs are deployed and flashing on the left side of the bus. There are a car and a pickup truck in the far, oncoming lane, stopped and waiting patiently.

I'm greeting the kids and just catch out of the corner of my eye in the mirror, a car flying up the middle, left turn lane. I grabbed the air horn cord and gave a long blast. The car never slowed and flew through the intersection making the left turn. Business as usual.

As soon as I canceled my lights the car in the other lane proceeded on his way. The pickup truck however suddenly made a U-turn or I should say attempted a U-turn in front of me. He had to back up a bit to make it and by the time he got straightened out the light was red so he was stuck. I hung back, not being sure what he was doing. As soon as the light changed again he hauled around the corner and took off in the direction my red runner had gone.

Did he forget something at home or was he chasing my red-runner? I had the impression the he was after the guy that ran my reds. What was his plan if he caught him!?

The kids and I continued on our way and were left wondering just what all that was about!

The view from my window is always interesting.