What The Hell Is Going On?

Life just turns on a dime, sometimes. Or you think it does. My mom likes to call me up at random times and ask "What the hell is going on?"

I spent the early part of the month dealing with Mom's bronchitis and torn Achilles. Then the boot they prescribed for her Achilles threw her back into spasm. This resulted in more doctors' visits, X-rays, new medication. She's in pain all the time.

New drugs were prescribed for her. The nurses at Mom's community only work part of the day M-F, so I had to jump in the car last Friday, abandon work and pick up the new prescription, which turned out to be in danger of interacting with other drugs. Thanks, Doc! With me standing there waiting, we get the doctor on the phone, and I deliver the drugs to the nurse at home, who has stayed late so that Mom can start the drug before the weekend. I fill in the gaps where professionals should be.

On the caregiving front, I now have only two caregivers, and one of them likes to call in sick on Fridays. And to stir things up.

Mom's mental health is declining rapidly. All of the above was happening along with a backdrop of Mom calling me up three times a day to ask where my father is, and not liking the answer (i.e. super dead). And then badgering me for my not telling her and then badgering me for not telling her the other two times in a way that she would remember. She has other delusions that are more amusing, like the day she called me and started ragging on me by name, thinking I was a different daughter. I laughed and tried to convince her that the person she was talking to was the person she was complaining about. OH. EM. GEE.

Readers of mrsguy, I would like to apologize for the amount of commentary about the sweet mama. If you wonder why you don't hear from me more or why this is all I talk about, here's why. It's my full time job. My next act as daughter is to convince my siblings that Mom needs memory care. And that I need memory care for her so that I can be a human being with my own happiness and purpose in life.

Springin' In 2018

This is my third weekend in a row off from mama duty. Middlesis came in from Minnesota to see the mama's precipitous cognitive decline in person, and to take her to see her primary and get him to put her back on one of her drugs. All of those things happened. Slightly fewer texts needed tending to, and I am very grateful for the respite.

Meanwhile, back on the ranch, there was a break in the rain. Don't get me wrong -- I have been full of joy about rain, and its ability to dissolve rabbit pellets into fertilizer for my plants. But the sun after the rain has left things gorgeous and me a bit giddy. Every year I say I'm going to pull over and take a picture of this house down the street that has a stupendous amount of iceplant in the front yard. Yesterday I did it:

And then I found that the orchid in the front yard has 7 spikes on it so I brought some in for us to enjoy and for mrguy to take to his ailing mama tomorrow:

And the things that I thought were going to be Naked Ladies turned out to be some sort of bluebell, and they're making an impression under the Echium, which is also blooming:

A little less exciting the the casual observer is my cactus collection in the breezeway. I gave Grandpa a haircut two weeks ago, in hopes of plumping him up over time:

Over the past few years I have been able to plump up the half dead cactus I rescued from Max and Bernice's estate sale years ago. Looking juicy!

Continuing the cactus report, my Easter Cactus, above, is starting to put out little buds that will eventually be fluffy magenta flowers. This is the cactus that was most in need of love five years ago when I first got it. And the one that's the most satisfying.

And wrapping it all up is the best news of all -- we have the beginnings of a single lime on our tree. When we moved here in 2013 our lime bush was a very tiny thing, and about a foot and half tall. Every time it started to produce a lime, The Cloven One came to eat it. My decorative Thompson's Gazelles did nothing to dissuade the deer. Finally mrguy surrounded the bush with chicken wire, and it is now seven feet tall. Mr Yuki pruned it into a single trunk, and now it's finally producing flowers  that are higher than deer-level. That's the key around here. The lemon tree has about 100 lemons on it, because it's taller than a deer. I've learned to love using lime leaf in recipes, but this year I'm hoping for a lime we can call our own.