Not doing much this week, but last week was interesting.
My Mom, who turned 89 on Thursday, is in a rehab facility for a broken hip. She’s doing OK with the rehab, but her mind is (seemingly) rapidly losing focus, and she’s starting to lash out at caregivers and loved ones. We’ve all put a lot of time in with her in the past week or so, trying to show the love. But, her dementia is progressing. It’s so sad to experience, right there before your eyes. The only good thing is that she always brightens up with a smile when she sees me, and she always tells me, “I love you, Craig!”. I need to savor that while it lasts.
Speaking of health, I went down for the count on Saturday in the early a.m. with a bout of vertigo. I’d never experienced it before, so it scared the crap out of me. I awoke not feeling well, opened my eyes, and the entire room was spinning around, like a carousel. It would not go away, a cold sweat came over me, I became nauseous and barely made it to the porcelain throne before commencing the dry heaves. That’s where Charlie found me. I was a mess. So, we headed over to the hospital emergency room, where they checked me out, did a cat scan, and proclaimed the malady to be “benign” positional vertigo. Yeah, benign my ass…it sucked! Anyway, now that I think of it, I had experienced a slight earache and pressure in my inner ear area for a few days prior, so I’m guessing that I contracted some kind of virus that messed with my semi-circular canals. All I know is that I don’t want to experience that again, ever.
We bought a new car the other day. It is a 2017 Jeep Cherokee Trailhawk 4×4, which will replace my wife’s Hyundai Sonata sedan. This will allow us to tow a car behind our motor home that my wife can drive (i.e. my Hyundai Veloster tow car is a stick-shift, and Charlie can’t, or won’t, abide it). Anyway, I doubt that we will ever use the 4×4 features, but the Jeep is extremely easy to place into the “flat tow” mode, which I like a lot. It cost a bit, but, hey, in for a dime, in for a dollar…right?
Our power went out again, as did our Internet service. This is becoming a regular occurrence. The Frontier Communications guy who came out was nice, and he fixed the problem in short order. But, Charlie was extremely annoyed, again, that the electronic infrastructure failed us again during tax season, which we affectionately refer to as “heart attack season”. One more good reason to give up the tax work, I reminded my wife. She’s getting the message, and is beginning to siphon off some of her load to Jonathan, our son, in Montana. He is capable and can use the money, so we need to continue with this thought.
What else is going on? Well, our trip to Cancun is only a little over three weeks away, so we had to have a BBQ at our house with fellow travelers Jeff and Carol (son and his wife) to salivate over the details. One bit of good news: One of Charlie’s clients is an Uber driver, and she did his taxes for trade. Jeff and Carol leave for Mexico a week earlier than we do (they’re going to spend a pre-Cancun vacation in Tonka Bay, near Tulum with relatives), so they get a free Uber ride to LAX. So do we when we leave a week later. Then, when we both return to LAX on May 6th, our guy will pick us up for the return ride to Murrieta. Pretty cool!
What isn’t cool is President Trump’s on-the-job-training, on our dime, while America’s reputation goes into the shitter. I’m sure he’s trying to do his best, but his business experience and temperament just don’t translate well into the responsibility of running a massive government under a democracy. It’s embarrassing to watch.
P.S. Great News today (Monday): Our granddaughter Jessica dropped by to give us some good news: (1) She’s made the Certified Nursing Associate cut at Cal Baptist University, so she’ll embark immediately upon her three-year Registered Nurse program, rather than waiting another year…kudos to our straight A student!!!; and (2) She’s engaged to be married to her long-time beau, Nathan Torres! They are planning a Summer wedding, and have timed it so that we will be back in town (in August) and can attend. Wonderful! We’ve known Nathan for several years now, and he seems to be a very fine man. He’s agreed to forego continuing his college career at Azusa Pacific so he can support her quest of the Nursing degree. Then, he will resume his studies. What a guy!