The Comings and Goings and the Good, The Bad and The Ugly

 I tried to do a meme dump earlier, but Blogger is being fussy. So, you get a kitchen sink update. Here’s all the news fit to print from my Swiss cheese brain. In no particular order, here’s the tea (for you younger kids). 

We lost our youngest menagerie member recently. May 25TH dawned reasonably normally. I was busy outside taking care of some chore or other, and I had taken a break to look up some information related to that chore. I honestly don’t recall what it was at this point. The Queen opened the door to let the cats get out and explore the outdoors for a bit. Our youngest kitten, Hershey Cocoa Nut, barely recovered from her spay surgery a month prior came out with the crowd. The Queen asked if I saw her, and I glanced up from my Google Fu and spotted Cocoa. She was over by some trees eating grass. I told The Queen as much and went back to Google Fu. 

A minute or so later, I was pulled out of my focus by The Queen having a hysterical meltdown. Apparently, Cocoa had become lethargic and then collapsed. I started trying to help, and it was apparent that breathing was compromised. I tried to clear her mouth, but I couldn’t see any obstruction. I tried a baby style Heimlich Maneuver hoping to dislodge anything blocking the airway. No luck. We are out in the sticks, and the closest vets office is 20 minutes away minimum. There was no time and no chance to save her. In less than five minutes, it was clear she was gone. We have no clue what caused her to stop breathing. We don’t know exactly how old she was. We found her last September, and she was super tiny and sickly then. She has been buried near the tree where the Fat Dog, Sasha, is buried. 

Late May saw yet another sign post in Opa’s declining state rear its ugly head. He was supposed to go with us for a weekend in east Texas for a church event  I got a text from him on the Thursday morning before we were supposed to leave asking me to tell my wife/his daughter that he would not be able to go. Having seen this movie more than once before, I knew to ask questions as to WHY he could not go at which time it was revealed that he had tripped and fallen over a gas hose at a gas station causing him to fall down and go boom. Once The Queen was informed, it was all hands on deck, and we loaded up to head to Opa’s secret hovel whereupon we discovered that the fall was a bit harder than he had let on. 

After a brief examination and assessment, I declared that he had broken something at which time the argument about what to do about it began. We finally convinced him to go to urgent care and at least get an X-ray. Sure enough, fractured elbow was the result. Of course, he ignored all suggestions as to what to do about it.

M&M just completed her first teen camp. There no reports of major issues though we did have one brief scare with her having a brief medical issue. Nothing permanent or traumatic. A similar incident to one we have dealt with before that unfortunately doesn’t diagnose if the medical establishment is to be believed. The Queen enjoyed herself this year serving on the First Aid staff. She and the nurse are on friendly terms and work well together. 

I was taking a break from KP this year, and I really wanted to work on the Archery staff since the Archery Director and I are friends. Unfortunately, despite promises to the contrary, the staff assignments came out and showed me assigned to Campus Improvement. What is Campus Improvement you ask? Its primary task is janitorial staff cleaning the public restrooms and removing trash to the dumpsters from wherever needed it. It also handled “other duties as assigned” including mowing, dropping trees, minor construction and moving bleachers among other tasks. 

I don’t know how i survived. I’m here to tell you post middle aged old farts acclimated to sedentary office work should not attempt to do that job in Texas summer heat. Even drinking copious amounts of water and electrolytes, trying to take advantage of every rest opportunity, regular usage of the TENS unit and medicinal bourbon, I thought I was going to die. My lower back locked up after the first day. After a few days of gritting through that at a slower pace, my left Achilles tendon decides to make walking nearly impossible. My right knee wasn’t to be outdone either. The only thing that kept me going was telling myself that the other guy on staff my age was doing it so I could too. 

We had a few young people on staff as well. I wanted to strangle them though as they were more interested in sitting on their phones on the shade instead of doing the work, and it’s not like it was always harsh and difficult work. We usually had air conditioning when cleaning the public bathrooms. It only got over 100 one day, and we even got a brief bit of rain. That said, I focused on setting the example by doing instead of arguing with them. I wasn’t their boss or parent, and it wasn’t my place to correct them. The CI Director took care of that for me during one incident he witnessed where one of the young guys refused to move to let me into a seat on the Ranger to go from one place to another. I was content to take another ride rather than make an issue of it, but he dressed the kid down and told him not to disrespect his elders again. We shall see if the lesson sticks. 

Even though I wasn’t assigned to the kitchen this year, I still got goat roped into cooking omelets and burgers on a couple of occasions. Not that I’m complaining. By comparison, slinging omelets and burgers is a lot more palatable than scrubbing crappers or mopping floors. 

Camp ended and we returned home uneventfully.

The week after was a blur of getting caught up on work. Despite working emails any chance I had during camp, the backlog was eye watering. Still is. 

Coupled with that was the need to get Opa to a doctor’s appointment to establish care. At 82, his warranty has long expired, and his personal hygiene habits and long existing health issues are combining to make his care challenging at best. Through a series of unfortunate circumstances, it fell to me to take him to his appointment as both The Queen and BIL were otherwise occupied. 

To say that I didn’t want to be the one handling this task is an understatement. Opa, for his part, didn’t understand why someone had to take him to the appointment when he was perfectly capable of driving himself. I don’t think he liked me telling him because we could not trust him to tell the doctor his full condition and history or tell us anything about what the doctor said. He tried to decline getting a full physical exam and downplayed just about everything, but I wasn’t having any of it. I told him that actions have consequences, and the choices he makes now limit the choices we can make in the future. I also told him that he needs to choose the argument he wants to have and that I would be a lot calmer about it now than The Queen would be the next time he called her at midnight with a health issue. He got the exam. 

He also did not like the comments the doctor made. She told him she point blank he hadn’t been taking care of himself and made several recommendations for things that need to be done. I’m not hopeful that any of them will happen. Part of it is monetary. He never enrolled in Medicare Part B, and now the penalty for late enrollment (18 years too late) is astronomical to the point he can’t afford it even if he wanted it (and neither I nor my BIL have enough disposable income to supplement it for him). So, that leaves us with bad and ugly for choices. 

For my sanity, I dropped it back in The Queen’s lap and headed back to work. I’m sure that’s not the end of it, but there is (bleep) all I can do about it. At least, that’s what competent legal counsel tells me to say to avoid labels like “premeditation”.

Someone or other had asked about the RV’s condition post tree limb. The repairs are now “complete” for certain meanings of that word. The RV went into the shop on Monday, March 24 about 2.5 weeks at the tree torpedoed the roof. The hunk of wood they pulled out of the roof was about 13” long and 4” wide at its thickest. The rest of the tree section that fell was over 20’ long and over a foot in diameter. 

So, thank you Lord for thinking about us. No complaints here.

The repair was supposed to take 8 days. Stop giggling. I’m being serious here. The first hint of a problem was the awning fabric. Apparently, it arrived from the manufacturer in damaged condition. ETA on a replacement was early May at that point. The shop was nice about that and offered to send a mobile tech out when it arrived and install it at our location. The next delay was the ceiling panel that was damaged. They ran out. Initially they tried to say they would have to order one and had no idea when it would come in. I suggested they call around to other shops to see if they had one that could be begged, borrowed or stolen rather than wait. That was a novel concept to them, but it turned out to be the best option and a panel was located locally. 

We were finally able to pickup the RV on May 1 and get it back home though it took waiting out several more days of bad weather before we were able to get it set back up again.

The awning didn’t show up until end of May, and it was finally installed June 11. So, over two months start to finish on the repair for those keeping score. We also found a thing or two which was damaged during the repair process which the shop also fixed for “free”. Now, we just have to keep up with all the normal maintenance headaches that come with RV ownership.

Like replacing the cheap plastic pantry shelf support bracket that are held in with tiny little staples. That was an all day project with multiple trips to the store because someone was brain dead.

During that RV repair drama, we were staying at Mimi’s house. One night, The Queen and I were sitting at the dining room table after dinner when we heard an unexpected noise. I recognized right off what it was and started getting my shoes on to investigate. The Queen asked what it was, and I said car wreck. Bad.

We opened the door to find a car crashed catty wampus in Mimi’s driveway and a person on the ground next to the car, another car in the road and a woman having a hysteria moment. Turns out the crashed car was being driven at a high rate of speed by a man in his mid 20s, drunk as a skunk, who was running from his wife who was chasing him in their other vehicle. The genesis of the chase remains unclear to me, but Speed Racer was attempting to push a Nissan Sentra way passed its design handling specs on a bumpy country road, started to get sideways after the car got a little air from a dip or heave in the pavement, over corrected to avoid the right ditch, drifted straight into the left culvert (in front of our property), spun and tumbled a time or two, hit the driveway culvert and speed limit sign nose first, launched straight up and landed sideways in the driveway.

We don’t know if Speedy extracted himself or was ejected from the vehicle, but he was on the ground bleeding from the mouth. The Queen waded in an started helping with first aid while I got on the phone with 911 and gave them the necessary information they needed, related instructions to the people handling first aid and surveyed the scene to make sure we weren’t about to have a carbeque on our hands. About 10 minutes after the accident, EMS and the Sheriff’s office were on scene. Speed was stabilized and transported to the hospital via ambulance . the Queen took the wife to the hospital in her vehicle while I followed in ours to bring The Queen back home. 

Last we heard, Speed had come through with a broken nose and no other major injuries. I have no clue if he caught a DWI out of this, but I hope he learned not to drink and drive.

That’s the news fit to print from Lake Theywentthataway. Check back soon for memes when I figure out why blogger is flogging me about images.