Apples and Oranges

Thank the Gods for TAFH (and my brother, too, I guess). Grandma will be going down to her house one weekend a month every month (hopefully). Someone will bring her down and my brother will bring her home after his monthly weekend for the Reserves. She went down this last weekend and Mom and I really got out.

After work on Friday I got to the library to do some genealogy research. Saturday I went downtown to look for benchmarks and take some pictures. Afterward, Mom and I went to both Miller's and Roba's corn mazes! We went to Miller's first but were less than impressed. the maze was too easy. However, they had apple trees to pick. That was fun. Then we went to Roba's (successful guilt trip on Mom for once!) and got lost in the maze for about an hour and a half. Loved it!

We had to replace the thermostat last night.

Today I left work early because we had no one to watch Grandma after 9am. I left at 10:30 and got a ride halfway so I only had about fifteen minutes to walk. I just couldn't afford to leave any earlier, by money and workload standards. I feel guilty about leaving her alone for two hours, but I need to make money so I can afford to buy her food and pay the heating bill and all that fun stuff.

I realized as I was walking that I actually feel guilty about eating at home. Unless I specifially buy something for my particular consumption, I don't like eating here. I feel like I'm eating something she might have wanted. Does this make sense? As it is, Mom and I have totally given up on eating Gluten-free. It's impossible to buy enough variety of foods that Grandma will actually be willing to eat and still buy the much more expensive foods that Mom and I can eat. If the choice is to make sure Grandma eats and buy something safe for us, we choose to feed Grandma. We basically have to buy two to three times what she actually eats for her because we have to go through such a list before we finally hit something she'll eat. The woman refuses to eat GF for us. She'll eat whatever TAFH serves, but she gives us problems every time.

For lunch today, I made her a microwaveable turkey and dressing meal. She refused to eat it. Instead, she was willing (after many suggestions) to eat half a cheese sandwich. I took one piece of bread, folded it and stuck cheese in between, then I got griped at that it wasn't half a sandwich. Probably because it wasn't cut diagonally. *sigh* Adventures in Grandma-sitting, indeed.