Funeral and now

The funeral was beautiful, as much as one of them can be, anyway.  My cousin A sang at the funeral and at the chapel in Cathedral.  She was great.  My brother, a few cousins and uncles were the pallbearers.  Two of my cousins and I did the offerings and my brother and cousins J and K did readings.  Cousin B gave the eulogy.  They all did great.  My uncle played guitar for A when she sang Danny Boy and Carolina Moon at the chapel.  Then we went to the grave and I, of course, wanted to clean off Grandpa's.  But I had to stop.  I did help clean off my aunt and uncle's when we went to it with their children.  I always do.

Stirna's was, of course, where we held the after-funeral brunch.  It's where everyone holds them in North Scranton!  Mrs. Gavin is really cool.  She made sure the food was all GF (except for the lovely pastries and rolls, which I didn't touch).

Now the fun part is cleaning the house, sorting Grandma's things from ours and letting everybody make off with what they want to keep of hers.  I'm currently making a calendar I intend to follow to get all of the cleaning done by Thanksgiving, which is when all the horse-trading is supposed to take place and still TRY to get NaNo and my required stitching done.

The weirdest thing of all was that last weekend there were FOUR deaths among my co-workers.  One of my closer friends there lost his grandmother, as well.  A cashier and one of the pharmacy ladies also lost relatives.  Weird.

Time is Unimportant

I've come to the conclusion that we should no longer tell Grandma if she's going somewhere until it's literally time to leave. This includes weekend trips to stay with TAFH. She's driving me nuts.

Almost every hour she's asking if it's time to go yet. She keeps putting on her shoes (or only one of them) and takes off her Lifeline pendant. Her pills and apron have been packed a number of times. *sigh* No matter how often we tell her she's not leaving until Thursday, it's just not sinking in that today is NOT the day she leaves. I suggested to Mom once that we mark big X's off the calendar, but she told me she doubted Grandma would even look at it. She's right.

Beyond that, she seems to be really spiteful lately. She's also upset with Mom for working nights so often lately. Mom can't help it. She lost a manager and has to take up the slack. Oy. I need a few days off. We're even having caregiver trouble right now an d have none for the week at all. In all likelihood, I'm going to be calling off work Thursday and making up as much of it as possible by working as late as I can stand it on Friday. It never rains, but it pours.

I hate dementia. I want my Grandma back.

Not too bad a week overall.

Okay, I'm apparently a grandchild again and Grandma now wants to get me a gift. She doesn't remember saying what she did, of course. *sigh* Shoot me if I ever get this bad.

The kids are in and I just want to hug them and never let them go. We're taking them to Corning and the movies while Grandma's away.

Christmas is almost over and I got to avoid working with the co-workers who have been annoying me for the last month on Friday. I may get to do the same on Monday. Yippee!

Not too bad a week, visits from Mrs. Hyde and co-workers getting on the very last shred of the very last nerve I possess aside.

Oh, and I'm going to a party tonight. Of course, I didn't anticipate seeing Kim and the others before Christmas, so their gifts aren't finished yet, but I think they'll understand.

Plus, I'm making go0d progress on the Chameleon and my genealogy work (Re-work?!).

B12 and Caregivers

This newest post was going to be all about how much I love B12. We've been giving Grandma a B12 shot each month for about a year and a half now and she's always a little better right afte the shot. Well, we recently began giving her B12 pills to supplement the shot. Oh, boy! Mrs. Hyde is making a lot fewer appearances lately and those times she does visit are a lot shorter. I might start taking the stuff myself.

Now, to those of you dealing with caregivers that come on while you work, what do you do when this happens? On Mondays, I go into work late, losing my $1.50 shift differential, since Mom has to be at work by 3am and my shift doesn't start until 4am. You know we'll never find someone to start at 4am so we schedule the caregiver to come by 6:30. I call for a cab to get here around the same time the caregiver should be here. Sometimes they (both cab and caregiver) can be a little late, so when the cab gets here, I go, depending on the caregiver to be there a few minutes after I leave. This did not happen today.

I called the house a few times and Mom once before my shift was supposed to start at 7am. J was still not there. So, I told my bosses that I was going to go home, stay with Grandma until J got there, then come back ASAP. I got home in 45 minutes. It's a ten-minute drive by highway, but a 45 minute to an hour walk home. I'm already beat. And J still is not here. I called her cell, but got no answer. I called Mom and she told me to giver her an hour to respond, then call Telespond.

I can't afford this shit. I need to make money ($10 of which I just wasted on a cab ride) and do my job. My income may not be as great as my mother's but a lot of the bills and resources are still paid by me, aside from my own bills like loan payments and medical. Now, my bosses were actually rather cool about it this time. They tend not to like it when I have to call off to take care of Grandma. Not that they're threatening to fire me, but you know that look your boss or another person in authority gives you when they're not happy with you? That's usually the look I get when problems with Grandma-sitting arise.

I called her as soon as I got in the house: 7:45. She still hasn't called back. Twenty-five more minutes and I have to deal with the wonderfully communicative people of Telespond (please note the heavy sarcasm).

I'm going to be working until midnight tonight to make up my time. :(

Week of Wows

Wow, has this been a weird week. We’ve done the high and low and in-between thing.

Last Tuesday: posted rant

Wednesday: Did you know there are some (supposedly) Eco-friendly Bratz dolls? *shudder* According to the packaging, it is recycleable. Of course, you have to tear it apart to recycle the pieces of it. And you get seeds and a Save the Planet badge.

Thursday: Total Grandma Day
It was a perfect day. Grandma was in a wonderful mood. Mom was in a wonderful mood. We bought some patterns and put the last quilt Grandma marked in the parlor to finish. Grandma helped. All three of us were happy and joking and no one was crabby. So cool.

Friday: Grandma breaks her streak
Grandma hasn’t had to really go to the hospital for almost two years now. Friday changed that. I was trying on a pair of shoes when I finally turned on my cell phone, topped it up and listened to my voicemail. Apparently Grandma lost her balance while finishing up using the toilet and fell. She wedged herself between the toilet and tub and managed to get a long cut on her right arm. We had three fire engines, two ambulances and two police cars at our house. The police had to smash the toilet to get her out, she was wedged that tightly. How she fit in there so well, we have absolutely no clue. Oh, supposedly one of the cops was cute, but she didn't get me his number, darnit! When I teased her about it, she said, he was too young. So I brought out the axiom, "Get 'em young, train 'em right." She just laughed.

Saturday and Sunday: typical boring weekend in which I sit home and do nothing of interest.

Monday: Sewing class
I went to my first sewing class. It was so exciting. I picked out the pattern I was thinking of using then went home. It took a total of half an hour. Then Mom convinced me to pick a different pattern. *sigh* I’m going to make a shirt instead of funky froggy sleep pants.
Before I went to the class, my cousins came over. J is pregnant. We saw the little fishy-looking blob on the ultrasound printout. I asked her what she wants the room to be decorated in and she’s talking about jungle animals. I’m not sure what her husband, B, wants. Now, we just have to finish renovating their house before the baby gets here.

Tuesday (today): Narc
I have a cold. I have asthma. The two are not a good combination. I had to take two puffs on my inhaler. Albuterol gives me all the terrible side effects, so I’m not really a happy camper after I use the inhaler. Well, right after I took it one of the gentleman (and I do use the term loosely) in the backroom decided to get pissy with me. He listens to sports radio constantly. That’s all he listens to. He has the radio in the backroom on constantly. Well, this time when I went in there, he wasn’t in it. The radio was still on, though. So I turned it off. He came in and got all hot and bothered about it. He literally told me I didn’t belong in there, even though the back room is not his exclusive property. He also told me I couldn’t touch the radio because it wasn’t mine. Technically, it’s not his either. It belongs to another backroom worker, which I reminded him. He told me not to talk about what I don’t know about. I brought up the fact that the other guy’s name is written on the radio with a nice little tag: Property of. I then proceeded to ignore him and finished my tasks. I then went to the HR person and told her about it.

Usually when he pulls his shit I can just ignore him. We all do. He’s a miserable little bastard who needs to get laid more than I do. He’s almost never cheerful and treats everyone as if they’re inconveniencing him if they so much as breathe in “his” stockroom. Everyone just says, “Oh, well, that’s just J. Ignore him.” Well, today I felt miserable enough that I wasn’t about to ignore the little shit. I’m really sick of him getting away with being mean to everybody, dammit. The funniest thing is that at times he can be really nice. Maybe he's bipolar. Whatever, he's getting in trouble today.

So, what else will happen this week?

Thursday: Grandma goes to TAFH for a few days.
Friday: Mom and I pick out fabric for my project and possibly go to Roba’s.
Saturday: Mom and I go to the RenFaire in Lancaster and pick up Grandma on the way home.

I just hope nothing else goes wrong. Knock on wood.

Week in review, long...

This has been an interesting week - neither good nor bad, just interesting.

I managed to read quite a few books at Borders, including Transformers: Ghosts of Yesterday, by Alan Dean Foster. I bought the Transformers novelization by him to read at home. I also read the Prequel graphic novel at work, when I should have been putting it on the shelf. I couldn't help myself! It was like something else had taken over my hands and eyes and just wouldn't stop reading it. (Do you believe that? If so, there's a bridge I know of up for sale. Great price, truly.) Anyway, reading them is just making me want to see this movie even more. This is going to be a really good move summer. Between Transformers, HP, Fantastic Four and the new Die Hard movie, I'm going to have loads of fun.

I bought one of my Brit-stitch mags at Borders. There was a free Passione Ricamo pattern. She's gorgeous. I think I might show it to my niece and see if she wants me to make it for her in purple. The pattern is actually in mauve and pink. It's the full version of this one: Summer Lady. I also found an ad for a series of patterns that I really want to try "someday": Spirit Angels

Total aside: I just spoke to my cousin for over an hour. We ranged from the Supreme Court and Equal Pay to Darfur to Celiac to various relations to Guatemala to college and jobs and I absolutely adore this girl. I think she is my favorite cousin. She is passionate about causes and books. She can be petty at times (who isn't?) and is sometimes very silly (as opposed to my constant silliness...), but she is the one out of her sisters that I can trust to treat me like a normal person and not the cousin that no-one wants to deal with because dealing with me means dealing with Grandma.

What else happened? Let's see, I only worked 30 hours again, just like for the next two weeks. Target is keeping me at just over what I can claim on a partial. They did, however, give me more for the overnight differential. All of us who start work at 4am get it. It still doesn't make up for the time lost this last month or the fact that I have to get up at three in the frickin' morning. As a positive, I've had more time to myself the last few weeks. We've not changed the time I get home, even though I've been getting out earlier. The extra time has been nice. I could get used to it. I just can't get used to the lower wages.

I stashed a bit and went to Hancock Fabrics. I still want some of that linen on sale. *sigh* I might go there on Monday, since it's 60% off. Or Friday.

I wanted to get my permit, so I could say I'd gotten one of my goals for the year accomplished, but when I called I found out I couldn't yet. Apparently, I absolutely need my birth certificate (and a lot of other things!). Since Uncle Sam currently has it so he can issue me a passport, that plan is on indefinite hold.

Grandma has been decent. Her sugar has dropped mid-day lately, but it's so damned hot. Mom and I got the air conditioner in downstairs yesterday, so that should help. I'm camped out in front of mine. I like it. A lot. Aunt L came over to do the bills and I was able to make a quick run to the store for Grandma's soda while she was here.

There was probably more I wanted to note, but this is long enough. Enjoy the heat if you like it and the air conditioner if you have it. If you don't like the heat and don't have an air conditioner, I hope you're in the Antarctic!

Oh wait, one more thing! I saw that the Superman Ultimate Collector's Edition is back on the shelves. Now I just have to get the money for it quickly before they're all gone.

Work errata

Okay, there's a lady at work that I actually like most of the time. She's nice. She's also forty years old (looks like she's about twenty-five, tops), lives with her parents (pays nothing toward bills or rent) and consistently does the exact opposite of what she's supposed to do at work. She has tendonitis, so she doesn't want to pull or backstock anything because it hurts her elbow. She has sinus problems and calls off if they're bothering her. The newest ailment is bursitis in her hip and now she can't do the comp shopping because walking around Wally-world is too much for her. Nor can she climb ladders. Today, she was doing something that required nothing more than standing and reaching up or down. She left early.

As I said, I like her. She's a nice girl (if I can call a forty-year-old a girl). However, if she can't do the work (she came to my team from customer service because she doesn't like the customers) either fire her or put her on disability and give us someone who will do the work required, dammit! One of my other team-mates has had both hips replaced and walks with a hitched step. He's also damned efficient and hard-working. One of the older ladies needs her knees replaced, but she can't afford it. She's also terrified of heights and isn't very high herself *coughshortshitcough*. She makes herself go up the ladders. Another has arm problems and tires easily and makes herself do the work needed. The lady next oldest to me has blinding migraines and cysts on her ovaries that keep her in constant pain. Yes, we're a very healthy bunch. *snort* But we do the damned work!
I know, I've called off due to illness before. I won't deny it. I've left early when I was sick. However, constantly leaving or making others do tasks you just don't like is plain wrong. She needs a wake-up call. I wish my supervisor would actually do something about it, rather than just shake her head and look the other way out of fear we won't get anyone to replace her. Frankly, she's useless to us at the moment. This has gone on long enough.

you are very sleeeeeeepy

I am tired. The keyboard is actually a little blurry if I don't concentrate on it.

So, why am I up? Why not sleep a little, especially since Mom is off work today? Because she and my brother went out and I had to wake up after two and a half hours of sleep to sit downstairs with Grandma. My brother had to go to the VA hospital for a follow-up on his leg and Mom needed to file her passport information and do something else that I can't locate in my muzzy brain right now.

*sigh* Why couldn't they at least have waited two more hours? Four hours of sleep after a hellish week of overnights and various other drama would have been sooooooo nice.

Well, at last the laptop is fixed again. If I worked on cross-stitch, I'd end up frogging everything the minute I could actually open my eyes for real.

Holiday Wishes

Christmas Eve. NO snow.

Happy Yule (belated) to the Pagans, Merry Christmas to those of you who celebrate it, Happy Hannukah to the Jewish persuasion, Happy Kwanzaa to the African-Americans who celebrate it. I'm sure I'm forgetting someone's seasonal celebration, so just have a happy holiday - whatever it may be. If you don't celebrate anything then have a happy un-holiday.

On a coolness note: Grandma is going to TAFH's house for a few days after the holiday. Can we say "Vacation"?! I am going to be getting the Superman Boxed Set with my holiday haul, so after work, which will be a major pain in the Christmas-Clearance ass (Please people, buy clearance toys at Target. Stock up for next year's gifts. Buy for next year's Toys for Tots and angel trees.) I'm definitely going to need to unwind. Hey, maybe I'll actually be able to pull some overtime finally.

The current plan is that we'll have New Year's Day off, unless we want to make sure we get 40 hours, in which case we can scrounge hours as cashiers. Yeah, right - and I like getting my eyeballs plucked from my head, too. I'll live with my meager 32 hours for that week. I might even go out New Year's Eve. Anyone know anything about that whole First Night deal? I'll have two, count them, two three-day weekends in a row. How often does that happy occasion occur in a retail-lifetime?

Wait a minute. I was searching for the Superman boxed set to link to and it looks like I may not be able to get it. Apparently, Warner Bros. screwed up and Borders may not be able to order it for me. I have to call them bright and early on Tuesday morning and see what's going on. I have pinned my entire Christmas gift hopes on this one item. Stupid stupid stupid idiot - you know your luck. Well, I will report back on Tuesday night about whether or not I got it.