The intended family shindig/memorial for my uncle Jim didn't quite go off as planned yesterday, as Jim's best friends couldn't make it and my younger uncle had a diabetic, blind, deaf and partially paralyzed Labrador in tow. Meanwhile my brother's kids were quite overscheduled and a huge storm blew in while we were driving up. But once we got ( Read more... )

My brother and father both went to the same private Catholic high school, and my brother is talking about sending the nephews there. But I'm not so sure about this idea, especially after driving past the school today. They have a giant LED sign out front which today shouted a welcome back to students for the second semester. The problem? They ( Read more... )

It feels like I use all of my (few) holidays and (limited) vacation time to try and get things done for my mother, and half the time it still doesn't get done. See: 2.5 hours at the bank trying to get me on her account with power of attorney. This was the second time we tried to do this, the first time the attorney didn't give us the document in ( Read more... )

I tuned up for the football game by going to the horse expo. I'm diverse like that. Mom managed to lose her ticket in the 12 feet between me giving it to her and approaching the ticket taker. Otherwise she wasn't too bad out there. After a great deal of prodding, I was able to get her to buy a present for my sister-in-law (Mom and I don't wear ( Read more... )

Christmas Eve, Mike didn't snark too much, except for complaining about our artificial tree.  I told him if he was willing to go out, buy a tree, ship it to my house, put it up, decorate it, take it down after Christmas, take it to recycling and do that *every year*, then sure, we’d have a ‘real’ tree. There were no more comments about the tree.
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Or at least two rambunctious nephews are. We just got home and we are pooped. Things went fine, except for my brother changing his mind about half the stuff agreed to in the meeting with the attorney last month. His father-in-law has convinced him the attorney knows nothing about estate law, but the FIL does. Might be time to get my boss involved. ( Read more... )

Things didn't improve after Friday. Turns out Hectic Red played their 25th anniversary gig Saturday. I didn't find out until that day...and I was too worn out and too broke to go. CJ did well in training Saturday, but I can't take her to either of the following classes, and she did more damage to her crate Sunday - in fact, there is a piece of ( Read more... )

Snarl Growl Snarl Growl…my sister-in-law took my mother to a seniors expo yesterday - I didn’t know about it and neither of them saw fit to mention it to me. Anyway, every single suggestion I’ve made to my mother in the last couple years regarding transportation, socialization, senior centers and activities, etc? That she refused to even consider? ( Read more... )

That's been my day. I'm not sure how or when, but my back was killing me this morning, especially my lower back, which isn't what usually bugs me. It got worse and worse at work, so much so that I left early, which is something I just don't do. But I could barely walk or sit up and that point, and driving hurt even worse. So naturally I left my ' ( Read more... )

The meeting with the geriatric care manager went pretty well, phew. The dogs behaved, my brother wasn't a jerk and my mother managed to hang in there. But we seem to have some direction for the future, and I have a laundry list of things to do next week. The one thing I did come away with is that my brother will not make an issue of the house and ( Read more... )