Checking In…

It’s been a rough so far week here. I’m in Michigan at Grandma’s to help out. Sunday we met with a home nurse who got all the paperwork done to have a nurse stop by three times a week to check her general medical stuff. Dad and I went to the grocery store and dropped a decent sum stocking her fridge with meat, veggies and a few key comfort foods. She’s just plain not eating enough. Sunday, I made us the same breakfast, one egg with an ounce of cheese and one slice of toast That’s 235 calories, served with coffee and hers with juice too, it makes a good start for a day that plans to include a couple of cookies on wife 1500. Unfortunately, it was still like pulling teeth to get her to eat it and she putzed around it ALL DAY! She did promise that “Monday, I’ll eat all of breakfast and whatever you cook.” I didn’t get to put that promise to the test.

Sunday night after Dad had left, she stated having disjointed speech, she was trying to talk, but the words couldn’t form correctly. I called the nurse, who told me to call 911. Grandma got her first ride ever in an ambulance! I locked up and followed in my car. She’s had an episode like this before. I recalled the same symptoms a few years ago at the orchard in Erie when we were peach-picking. At that time paramedics said it might have been a TIA, mini stroke, but she got over the episode and refused to be taken to the hospital. This time, three paramedics and I didn’t give her a choice!

They let me in to be with her in the emergency room. They did some preliminary tests and confirmed that this time, officially it was a TIA. Thank God I was there, but it really confirmed that she needs to NOT be living alone anymore. She was in the hospital a couple of days and released around 7PM last night. We stopped at McDonald’s, mostly because I hadn’t eaten since noon and was starving. I got a hamburger Happy Meal with apples instead of fries. She said that a hamburger sounded good, YAY, and I got her a hamburger Happy Meal too. Unfortunately, after being convinced all she got was fries and a “big guy” (mini beanie baby panda) until I found the burger under the toy, she ate one bite of the burger and about a half dozen fries.

On Saturday night, she’d told Dad and me that she knew she shouldn’t be alone and was ready to explore her options. Last night she moved up to telling her best friend that she would be moving to a senior apartment. Okay, she also included that David and I would move in with her here, but she didn’t want us to have to move. Her hearing aid isn’t working and she was getting “Dad, Dave and David” confused. What I said was that either Dad or I would stay with her until she had an apartment. I still gotta love the fact that she didn’t want to make us move!

The best thing that happened last night was Grandma proclaiming she was hungry! I served a bowl of melon to us both and she ate every piece, after I’d just watched her wolf down a bowl of watermelon in the hospital, then she said he was hungry for cold cereal. She poured about a serving and a half of Honey Nut Cheerios. I was worried I’d be throwing most of it out as she poured the milk, but she ate every bite of it. Vitamin-fortified and all, we might be eating Cheerios for three meals today!


So, now I’m caching up on other things in my world. As it turned out, I never did get my birthday ice creams before I left home. I gave my coupons to David. He’s not a big Cold Stone fan, so I asked him to get me the fat free cake batter with chocolate chips and cherries and put it in the freezer for when I get home if he gets a chance to stop. I told him to use my free Baskin Robbins scoop as the base of a sundae for him. I don’t think wasted coupons or free ice cream count as big on the penance list in the afterlife as spilled ice cream does, but just in case… Okay, I’d heard an old Irish saying that the difference between Heaven and hell was determined by being put head first in a barrel of all the alcohol you'd wasted in your lifetime. If thre is so little that you don’t drown, you go to Heaven. I modified that when Tori and Rina were little and we said you'd be put head first in a barrel of all the ice cream you wasted in your lifetime. Hey, that almost automatically starts with at least one cone from childhood for everyone!

Now, I don’t know if there will be ice cream waiting for me when I get home or not. David got a new car! We’d been talking about him retiring the old gas-guzzling Explorer in the Cash for Clunkers deal and I spent a few phone calls coaching him on Monday when he was test driving a Ford…I think it was a Ford Fusion. He commented on wanting to think about the Escape, a small SUV, too. I encouraged him to really consider the Escape because what he uses his car for, railfanning and such, lots of dirt roads, fields, etcetera, he’d really be happier with an SUV. He did some more calling, found the deal that was right for him and signed the paperwork on a 2009 Escape! It’s his first brand new car! I think he said it had 34 miles on it. That has me beat! The Camaro had 54 when I drove it off the lot. Our driveway finally has a car whose model year starts with a 2!! Next is me finishing school, starting a job and maybe a 2011 Spectra?


I needed to catch up on baseball stuff, I’ve really only been able to see the scores, weep at the Reds scores and move on. Now I found out why I’m weeping. Right at the deadline Scott Rolen became a Red. Okay, I remember that last year I was ready to trade Edwin Encarnacion, but that was in a deal that would move Joey Votto over to third and put Lance Berkman in a Reds uniform. The only thing positive I have to say about Rolen is he might be more tempting to Houston. The man is almost as overrated as Gary Sheffield. (That’s my opinion and this is m blog, so everyone is entitled to my opinion!) I’ve been thoroughly unimpressed with him since 1997, when he beat a much better qualified ROY candidate in Kevin Orie. Rolen had the home runs, Orie had everything else. This chick doesn’t dig the long-ball. Home runs are just PART of the game. This chick digs BASEBALL and I loathe how many players that can hit the ball far, just don’t hit it to them in the field, get built up so big. Give me a Mark Grace or Barry Larkin any day!

Okay, time for a coffee refill and to get ready for Grandma to wake up. Dad will be back later this morning, so I’ll get a little bit of break later. Maybe I’ll blog again; maybe I'll go out to the ice cream shop in Hale!