9/28/09

It's Wal-Mart day! Whoo hoo!

Saturday, September 26, 2009

I hate Wal-Mart, but we have discovered that the cheapest place to get Mom's nails done is the Wal-Mart in Hillsborough.

When I call her that morning, she asked me where I'd been, (I saw her last Friday), all motherly concern.
"Right here", I said, "Where've you been?"
"I'm here too", she said.
A small sweetly sad exchange. Ok, we're all here now.

While she's getting her nails done I do her shopping (diet Pepsi/diet Dr. Pepper, sugar free candy, low salt cashews, sugar-free jello/pudding, and those tiny white powered sugar donuts), and still have plenty of people watching time, since I didn't bring a book. People watching in Wal-Mart depresses me however. Is it because it's Wal-Mart...well no actually, people watching in malls also will cause a mental nose dive.

Which leads me to wonder - if people were people watching me, would they be depressed?

Most of us see don't ourselves as others do, (both good and bad). For instance, in my head, I'm around 30 and still weigh 130 lbs, then I'm SHOCKED when I see my reflection in a mirror or window (hey, who's that FAT OLD woman in front of me?! - oh wait...crap). Apparently this phenomena happens to people in Wal-Mart - a lot (this way too small yellow sparkly t-shirt with the pink camouflage pants and puce stilettos looks GREAT!).

Anyhoo, then we went to lunch at Ming Garden (something different for a change). On the way there she tells me how she picked out the nail polish all by herself (it was actually my pick, with her approval).
"I went back there all by myself and picked it out. It's pretty isn't it?"
It sure is Mom.

9/22/09

Mookie's Doing Great


Several weeks ago, we went to Kay's (the vet) house to visit Mookie. He came right up to Mom, twitching his little corkscrew tail, which made her SO happy - "He remembered me!" He also did his "take me for a walk!" dance to me (consists of picking up his front feet one at time, whipping his head around, and saying "wrue, wrue, wrue").

Mookie seemed quite content, even though it was noisy: there are ten dogs (three are hers, rest are fosters), several cats, an iguana, two macaws, numerous sleeping ferrets and about five to six rabbits. This woman (and her husband!) is a SAINT. Seriously.
He was fine with the other dogs. He had his belly band on and didn't seem to mind it at all.

That seemed to satisfy Mom, she hasn't mentioned Mookie since then. She didn't get emotional at all, going, during or after. But if she does want to, we can go any time.

Here's a link to Kay's "other" job.

A Day in the Life

Friday, September 18, 2009

This is what it's like having a meal with Mom:

Setting: K&W Cafeteria, where we have become regulars.
Time: Lunch

After several minutes of silence interspersed with comments about how much she likes it here, how good the potato salad is (just like hers), and offering me various items, (I usually just have a glass of tea.), the conversation goes like this:

Mom - "Did you get your...[insert some sort of vague gesture here]?"
Me - "My what?"
Mom - "You're not that smart anymore, are you?" Laughs.
"You know. Just wait, I'll tell you."
Plays with a chicken finger, making it walk around the plate because it has a funny shape.
Me - "My what? Car? Kitten? Elephant?"
Mom - Laughing.
"No. You know, your...just a minute. I'll think of it. Mmm, this is good [potato salad/banana-strawberry compote/chicken fingers], you can have some."
Me - more guessing of ridiculous things.
Mom - Laughing (this is good. Compared to last year at this time, when she and everyone else was so miserable.)
"No. You can't have one, because of when you were a baby."
Me - "Ohhhhhhh - a flu shot!" (I was allergic to eggs and chicken when I was younger and the flu culture (?) was incubated in eggs back in the day. Not sure if that's still true.)
Mom - "Yes!"
This has taken approximately 20 minutes.

After lunch, it's off to University mall; Rose's for Kleenex, then to Bath and Body Works, where she smells everything about 6 times because she can't remember she just smelled it. We walk down towards Dillards, but her back (or legs, depends on which time you ask) is hurting today, so we head off to Trader's Joe's for cashews, watermelon, and whatever else strikes her fancy while she's still mobile. She's worn out; it's been about 2 hours since I picked her up.