It would seem my grandmother has been watching some Monty Python lately…
The Dead Collector: Bring out yer dead. [a man puts a body on the cart]
Large Man with Dead Body: Here’s one.
The Dead Collector: That’ll be ninepence.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn’t: I’m not dead.
The Dead Collector: What?
Large Man with Dead Body: Nothing. There’s your ninepence.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn’t: I’m not dead.
The Dead Collector: ‘Ere, he says he’s not dead.
Large Man with Dead Body: Yes he is.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn’t: I’m not.
The Dead Collector: He isn’t.
Large Man with Dead Body: Well, he will be soon, he’s very ill.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn’t: I’m getting better.
Large Man with Dead Body: No you’re not, you’ll be stone dead in a moment.
The Dead Collector: Well, I can’t take him like that. It’s against regulations.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn’t: I don’t want to go on the cart.
Large Man with Dead Body: Oh, don’t be such a baby.
The Dead Collector: I can’t take him.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn’t: I feel fine.
Got in last night. Talk to nurse at care center. Grandma is sleeping. Ate like a horse at dinner. Interacting with people. Decidedly not on the “dead in 24 hours” list.
Mind you, she’s tired as all get out (the aneurysm-rupture-that-wasn’t did take her down a few notches) and her meds are all kinds of farked up because the MD discontinued everything but Xanax Thursday night*, assuming she was on her way off this mortal coil, but she’s definitely not dead, or actively dying. It’s undoubtedly shaved a few years off her lifespan, but she is decidedly still among the living.
*This is a good object lesson for the next time I get this call. If she still has a pulse, leave her damn medication regimen intact.