Ah Yes. Out Of The Relaxing Pan and Into The Hospital

The ringer on my phone was still off, because my sister was here with mom for the weekend and would be taken care of. Of course that's not how it panned out. Mom got up in the middle of the night and fell, and she was in a lot of pain. It could have happened to anyone, I guess, but my sister didn't have to come out for Thanksgiving at all. It was a choice. When she and other sister caught up with me, there was fun to be had. We decided she had to be taken to the hospital. My sister has some pretty severe anxiety about this because my mom turns into The Beast lately when confronted with authority. But I (who was with her through the situation -- only one person allowed) had a comparatively good time:

• They gave mom fentanyl before moving her onto the gurney, and she was sweet as pie
• I got to ride in an ambulance with her (my first time)
• It was quiet at the ER
• Mom kept telling me that it was such a nice hospital and that she was only the 2nd person to be a patient
• She thanked me for being with her
• She had no additional injuries since her last ER visit a month ago
• We were out of there in three hours. When has that ever happened? 

The paramedics, by the way, were so great with my mom and everybody. They exchanged short hellos with people at my mom's building that they'd met before, and were telling the lady in charge of showing them around stories that she didn't even know about residents -- "Bob was an engineer during World War II..."

Anyhoo, the mom was much better when she got home. We felt more reassured that any pains were going to be not serious, and after buying them some McDonalds (traditional post-medical mom treat), I slipped out, feeling like I could go home without guilt.

Countdown to Vacay

Sunday was mama day. The night before she'd been restless, but in the morning she was up and attem. Until I got there, of course. She was sweetly sleeping again, and could barely keep her eyes open for more than a few seconds. "Lovely to see you," she'd say. And then zzzzzzz. She asked "How's mrguy?" about a dozen times. And at one point she gently cupped my face with both hands, and looked so lovingly into my eyes that I felt like I, myself, could die of love. It's hard to reconcile the fact that the night before those same sweet hands were slapping someone (who she had already bitten twice).

It is countdown to vacay. We leave tomorrow. On Saturday we had mrguy south over for dinner, which was delightful. I miss cooking for friends, so this was great. He's off on an adventure in Japan.

And yesterday I dropped keys and a Christmas cactus off at #1 nephew's house. He's taking care of the babies tomorrow. Then I got gas, and sold some gold. A horrible elephant charm that came with a necklace that I bought last year. The charm brought me $394! 

Made an appointment for a haircut, dropped stuff off at Mom's (gotta make sure she's got paper products for the week!), made clam dip for a certain sumo loving friend -- wooooooo!!!

Now it's starting to look like vacation. Clam dip and I watched some sumo last night. And before that mrguy and I took in a pretty stupendous sunset. See that hump down there? The mama now lives a few blocks away from it.

Boy kitten enjoyed watching the sumo recap when we went to bed.

Tomorrow we fly. We had enough miles for first class round trip flights, so I hope to make the most of it from the moment we board. I *will* turn off my work email. I *will* turn off Slack. I have a friend who is on notice to text me if anything momentous goes down at the factory that I shouldn't miss.

Early Birthday

In 2006, we went to Hawaii. Right before we left, the factory's stock price became unstable. People started talking about Hammerslag and John Deere in the news. I was in paradise, but glued to my computer as the news of our acquisition materialized over the next few days. Every time I think of the state house in Honolulu I remember the sunny day when I sat on the capitol steps, facing out to the Archives, and received the blow-by-blow of the announcement on my Nokia 6310. My colleague at work relayed the whole thing, and my not being there on one of the most important days in the company's history still bugs me.

Over the last few years, our department has been hit hard but has done so well. We had layoffs after Covid hit. Hammerslag made a small number preemptive staff cuts, but one third of them were in our department, which is now really small for the amount of work we do. One of those cuts made my life much better. I was in a years-long slow motion battle with someone who was laid off. I have not cried at work since she left, and I am in love with the team I work in now. They are amazing.

So here I am, going to Hawaii next week. Things are looking up. We've been working so hard, have taken so many special assignments (tributes to fallen co-workers, extra publishing projects, exhibitions), and really done a great job with them. We've gotten a req. for head count and...a Friday afternoon announcement that JD is having targeted layoffs. I am going to do my best to ignore the news while I am away, but SHOOT! I'm feeling nervous, and worried for my factory, and worried for myself.

Here's crossing our fingers that none of the cuts hit terribly close to home. It would be a shame if I had to go, cause I really do love the place. Example: I love reading obituaries and we put up our annual ofrenda for departed employees a few weeks ago, and today on my first day of vacation, I found myself looking up Hammerslag on Legacy.com to see if there are any people I've missed adding to the ofrenda. And it's all that I can do to stop myself from logging in to my work computer and adding to my spreadsheet. I'm such a dork.

Anyhoo, I got a beautiful early birthday present for myself this week -- I bought an Akebono tegata on ebay. Can't wait to frame it and put it in the half bath. What you really don't get from looking at photos of them online is the depth of the pigment. I always thought that the handprints were inky, but on this one it seems more like tempera paint -- and it's a little messy. I like that lack of perfection. I showed it to mrguy and of course he had to see if his hand was bigger. Surprising that a guy who is 6'7" doesn't have a bigger hand.

No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

Friday was great. Thursday kicked my butt, and it was really great to be able to work from home. Plus we got beauty mail -- some Bautz'ner senf (mittelscharf).

My office mate was such a good boy in the afternoon, sleeping sweetly on a favorite pillow.

Yesterday was a banner day. I was allowed to visit my mom in her apartment for the first time since she gave us both Covid. It was pretty nice, all in all. No biting or throwing or cursing or wanting people dead.

She was on Norco for pain, because of her fractured pelvis (but she is apparently walking a bit). I could barely get her to raise her head, but she was really cozy because I was there. I mostly just held her hand. Her caregiver that day was super nice, and when her back was turned my mom woke up enough to stick out her tongue to diss her. Oy, mama!! Also she woke up just enough to hate on Novak Djokovic, the tennis player she dislikes. I swear that the only full sentence she uttered was "He's been better recently". Other than that I could just interpret. When she rubbed the ring on my right hand, I knew that that was her way of saying that the rubies in it were from my grandmother, for example. Her caregiver brought her lunch, and I slipped away.

I was super happy to see free candy by the front door!! I missed Tootsie Rolls this Halloween, so I selected one and walked toward the parking lot. I looked down to see that it had been stickered with a Bible verse -- payment for my sin of eating sugar.

I am used to verses on my paper placemat on Alaska Airlines lunches, and on stuff you get at In and Out (which I've only been to once, that I can recall). This was a first.

Mulch'oween 2022

Our neighbors down the street are celebrating their 3 year mulch-aversary. The mound was dropped off in their driveway years ago, and they've never done anything with it. After the first year a local realtor asked them to at least clear the sidewalk. It's insane. Over time they've added to it, topping it with old strollers and broken office furniture. It is an eyesore.

Anyhoo, I drove past their house the other day and saw that they'd decorated it for Halloween, even adding a shovel. I want to say "PICK UP THE SHOVEL AND DISTRIBUTE THE MULCH ON YOUR PROPERTY!!"

But I don't.

Happy Belated Halloween. Or make that Mulch'oween.

Fernandez Kun

I have had a breakthrough in the mystery of Fernandez-kun.

Many years ago I brought together some archival items in order to give some interviews about them to visiting members of the Japanese press. The PR team had me all dolled up, and it was all cool, but right before things all started they dropped the news that some of the interviews would be on camera. Oh! I had things all set up in a conference room, but if this was going to be on camera I would want to move the 12 chairs around the conference table into another room.

Just as things kicked off I realized that I had worked up a deep sweat. After simply rolling a few chairs into the next room! By the time the tv guy showed up I was in trouble. 

To set the scene, one of our Japanese press guests arrives with a translator. With one hand he is balancing the video camera on his shoulder, and the other hand is deep inside a big pink puppet, who is apparently his on camera talent. I am going to be interviewed by a puppet.

This may have been my first ever on camera interview, and at least *one* of the first, and I had questions. Should I interact with the man, the translator or the puppet? Is the show for adults or children? Puppet man was unsmiling and stiff and did not want to answer my questions. Not what I expected when I rolled into work that day, or even when I eyed his cute pink puppet. I had to just do my best.

The sweat reappeared and to my horror continued to roll down my face. I mouthed to the young woman who was managing the shoot "Help! I'm sweating!" She patted my face with some tissues. All I had done was move some chairs into the next room and try to survive a puppet interview.

It was at that moment that I realized "Ohhhhhh. This is menopause. It's here."

Puppet man left me a mini version of the puppet, whose name I thought was Fernandez kun. For years I'd quiz my friends about the character because I really wanted to know what his deal was. There's a tag on the little guy I have, but whatever it says is in a crazy font that isn't helpful.

Yesterday I got a wild hair again to figure out Fernandez kun. I did image searches for Fernandez-kun pink Japanese puppet and such. Nothing good (or at least nothing appropriate). And then I looked up Fernandez kun in google translate and put the japanese in the google search box. Hadn't I tried this before?

フェルナンデスくん is his name in Japanese.

This is the show he's from:

https://www.ntv.co.jp/hirunan/

https://www.instagram.com/hirunandesu_ntv_official/?utm_source=ig_embed&ig_rid=791194bb-3abc-4e0b-9239-71703cf26478

And there you have it. The mystery of Fernandez-kun is now solved.

Old Lady Faceoff

I haven't talked to my mom for three weeks, which is probably the longest I've gone in *years*. My sisters are taking the brunt of the mom business, along with our new crew of ladies from Tonga. They are decidedly less distressed by her behavior than our #1 caregiver. This probably stems from her having known and loved the person that my mom was for much of their time together. Now we have the angry bitey, slapping, name-calling lady. Without spending time over there it's hard for me to know when's a good time or whether there ever is one. Should I call? Today I did, but nobody answered.

This week's activities have included last minute shopping for butt cream, heading out to the storage space for more towels because my mom is being bathed in bed and there's a lot of water involved, getting medication for her and rushing it to her (with specific instructions from my sister), finding more bed pads and this and that. I'm not allowed into mom's building because I tested positive for Covid less than 10 days ago. It's a thing.

Speaking of which, Covid is no joke (still). I find myself exhausted after doing just a few tasks in the morning. Today we did a group project, rehousing a few dozen pastel paintings that were handed off by a friend who was retiring. That felt satisfying and chunky, bringing a definable project to a good stopping point. Then I went into the warehouse again to go through the remains of my friend's office belongings and help the Facilities folks make heads and tails of it. His lawyer needs an inventory of his stuff in order to share it with his heir. It's so sad. 

I had already said I was going to work from home for the rest of the day but powered through my warehouse duties, using a two-drawer pedestal file as a seat and using his pens and paper to leave notes for others, indicating what I thought should be done with his flat files, art supplies, drafting table. A lot of the artists I know have a bit of a piggly way about them, but this guy pretty much tied everything up in a bow before he went. Pancreatic cancer gave him some lead time, and over the last few years he gradually divested of his DVDs, CDs and finally his historical photographs, which he organized and put in cloud storage for us. His memorial was last weekend. I miss him.

By the time I got home I was spent. It feels silly to be three weeks out from Covid and be tired, drippy and to feel the need to clear my throat a hundred times a day. That's what I thought until I started talking to people. A person in my caregiver support group had exactly the same throat clearing thing I have. She sounded just like me! And people have opened up to me about their fatigue when I've shared my embarrassment about my own.

In the meantime, I've been listening to Suleika Jaouad's memoir and thinking about her journey with illness. It's given me a lot to think about -- about people's lack of agency in their illnesses. My mom continues to feel it. She tells people she wants to die, but she also wants to see what's outside of her door. She has the people in her neighborhood that she likes or dislikes (never too old to hate, apparently!) and she wants to watch movies with the group.

One last thing. Yesterday when I was dropping off supplies, I saw a favorite old krone in the lobby. We'll call her V. She always sits by the door, and was using a wheelchair yesterday. She's feisty. There was another white haired old lady in a wheelchair, also in the lobby. All of a sudden they had a faceoff, which I've seen happen in memory care. Two old people lock eyes and then they start calling each other out. I can't recall what they were shouting at each other but it was something like "Shut up!" and the other person would yell back "Shut up!" and there were a few back and forths and they had to be given a talking to by the concierge. It was awesome. Absolutely made my day.