Tag: health

Eye Doctor

I have an eye doctor appointment scheduled for about an hour from now. I have my insurance card at the ready, I need to stop for gas on the way, but otherwise I’m all set.

And I am freaking out. This isn’t the first time I am voluntarily letting someone get right up close to me, but in the Covid-19 world (note, I did not say post-Covid-19 world) I am just not comfortable with it yet. I don’t know if I will ever feel comfortable with it again. I hope so. I can’t handle this extra stress piled on top of all of the other extra stress. I’m tired of this. Additionally, if you allow me to quote the great Roger Murtaugh, I’m too old for this shit.

I’m hoping to get a pair of general use glasses and a pair of sitting at the computer all day working glasses. We’ll see.

Welcome to July

Happy July 1st, everyone. Summer in full swing. The forecast calls for a high of 80 degrees today with rain every day for the foreseeable future. Hooray.

Today is the day that my company’s Covid-19 lock down kind of comes to an end. Prior to Covid I worked in the building four days per week and at home one. Now it’s sort of the opposite. It’s not in the office once per week, it’s more like in the office an average of once per week. Flexibility is our friend. It’s actually in the office 20% of the month… so about once per week.

I was hoping to make my first day back July 13th as my last day before lock down was March 13th and it would be funny for it to be exactly 16 months. Nope. My nana sitting schedule will not allow that. I need to sneak in at least once before the 13th.

Change of subject, I went to sleep around midnight last night and woke up a bit before 5:00. I felt okay, even though I failed to get even five hours of sleep, but my SleepWatch app is telling me my heart rate dip was garbage. It says I was in restful sleep for about three quarters of the night though, so I’ve got that going for me. It’s going to be a long day.

The 50/90 challenge starts in four days. Are you ready to be bombarded with posts regarding awful, pointless, idiotic music, guitar playing, song writing, and recording? I strongly suspect this year’s challenge will end in a crash and burn, and it will likely happen quickly. As of this moment though, I am still thinking I am on board. In fact, I was thinking about swapping out my amplifier. I don’t want to go with a two amp setup like last year. I don’t want to take up that much room in the bedroom anymore. I have been using my Vox AC15 for the last few months. This weekend before things kick off I might swap it for my Fender Bassbreaker 15 again. We’ll see.

Did I mention I have an eye doctor appointment on Saturday? Does it make me sound like an old fart when I say I am seriously looking forward to it? Probably. Okay (son of) boomer.

Right, time for my Nana Sitting duties. I need to bring her the 8:00am meds.

Until next time.

Good day, eh?

Nana Sitting Again

Nana sitting once again. Jen and Harry are at home and I’m not. Harry had his first official day at his new job today. He had some remote orientation sessions last week, but he was on the premises today. He said it went well. He said there was air conditioning. Good thing. My Tuesday was stressful when it probably shouldn’t have been. I need to calm down but there is so much piling on right now that I don’t know how.

Tomorrow is July 1st which marks the day we have to start going back into the office. Not full time, we’re still mostly telecommuters, but it needs to be about an average of once per week. I worked out 4-5 days that will fit into my Nana Sitting schedule as well as our planned overnight trip to visit Bellana. We’ll see if I get pulled into anything that requires in-person attendance that will screw with my plans. Fingers crossed, I certainly hope not.

The Red Sox had a rain delay tonight but they should be starting soon. Game two of the Stanley Cup Finals is tonight. May Montreal suffer a humiliating loss at the hands of Tampa Bay. Distract me from my misery, please.

I am so sad that I’m not at home having Marvel Burgers for Dinner Night with Harry and Jen. Watching Loki, eating burgers and fries. Being together.

I hate this.

Lunch Break

It’s the tail end of my lunch break. What’s going on in the world?

What the hell is the deal with Apple’s podcast player? Both on iOS and iPadOS? I’ve been using them both for years but over the last few weeks they’ve become useless. I’ve found myself using Stitcher out of frustration. The app is garbage these days. I’m almost afraid to try it on the MacOS, though it’s pretty much always been garbage there.

At this moment, the third podcast I have queued up is a hockey podcast talking about game one of the Stanley Cup Final from last night. I only watched the first period and I fell asleep before the third period started. The final score was Tampa Bay 5, Montreal 1. That’s what I am talking about, hockey fans! I hate Tampa Bay but anything is better than Montreal. Tampa Bay, keep up the good work. Let’s win this one in four. Pretty please?

Work has been weird today, and I am not talking about my idiotic forgetting of my badge this morning. Not sure if it’s something in the air or what, but lots of weirdness going on. Nothing we can’t handle, just… odd.

I finally made myself an eye appointment. I’ll be visiting my local Lens Crafters this weekend. I think I am 100% on board with a dedicated computer glasses. I think that will make my work day a little less blurry.

I am a bad person. I have to nana sit tomorrow, which means I need to go over there around 6:30 or so. Harry has a new job and he won’t be getting home until after 7:00. That means we can’t watch the new episode of Loki on the day it’s released. At least we can’t watch it together. Maybe we could do one of those… what do they call them… viewing parties? Or we can just wait until Thursday. Or Harry and Jen can watch it without me. I don’t want that, but I would rather the two of them be happy than anything else. I feel like I am breaking my own heart every third day. I just feel awful.

It’s 95 degrees out right now. As bad as that is, it’s better than 110, or whatever it is over in the Northwest. The air conditioner is keeping up here. May it continue it’s good, heroic work.

Okay, it’s 2:00. Back to work, red head.

What Should We Talk About?

My lunch break is ending and I haven’t thought of anything to talk about.

It’s hot. There’s that. It’s not as hot as it is out Oregon way and the Pacific Northwest, but it’s hot. It’s 94 degrees here in Tewksbury, MA right now. We might get another degree or so, but it’s about as hot as it’s going to get today. The heat index, whatever that is, says it could feel about 10 degrees hotter than it is. The forecast for Portland, OR calls for afternoon temps around 113. It’s still June. Summer isn’t even 10 days old and already Portland is looking at 113 degrees. Nothing to see here. Please disburse. Nothing to see here.

I just took out the trash and the recycling. We have security alarms on the doors because my mother went wandering at the crack of dawn recently and snuck out silently enough that she didn’t wake anyone. So now the doors make noise when we open them. At night they make tremendous noise a la a rock band in a stadium volume level noise. I took four trips to bring everything out and didn’t want to keep setting off the quieter, daytime noise so I just left the door open… and now there’s a fly in here with me. Sonofabitch.

Hold it a second, I have to give mother her 2:00 pills. Be right back………

Okay, I am back. It’s 2:00 so I have to get back to work. I was trying to think of what to write about and didn’t come up with much. Here were the rejected topics, all of which might come up again later. Should I call Mike the Bass Player and ask if he’s going to be around this weekend so that I can pick up my amp and my little pedal board, both of which have been in his cellar waiting for a band practice since the first day of February 2020? Should I finally shut up about it and bring that guitar and that amp over to Guitar Center in Nashua and trade them in? On Saturday, maybe? Should I try again to make an eye doctor’s appointment for this weekend? We tried last weekend and their online appointment scheduler was down. Ugh.

Okay. Back to work, you. You have code to patch!

Sunday Nana Sitting

My mother doesn’t have dementia, but she does have memory issues left over from the brain tumor she had about 10 years ago.

I got here a little after 6:30. I asked her if she had eaten dinner. She had not. I asked her if she wanted anything. She said she didn’t know. Did she want me to order something? No. Did she want me to make her something? No. She said that she had a big lunch and maybe she didn’t want anything at all. Okay. She takes a lot of meds at 8:00 so I suggested maybe she should have a Boost (it’s like an energy drink geared toward seniors) with her pills. She said that was a good idea.

10 minutes later she was in the kitchen making herself a sandwich. It wasn’t that she changed her mind. It wasn’t that she ignored our little discussion. From her point of view our chat never happened.

Every time I come here I have to tell her how old I am, how old Jen is, how old Harry and Bellana are, where I am going to sleep, that I am going to be working, where I work, how long I’ve been working there, which sibling will be relieving me, which sibling was here the night before.

She doesn’t forget everything. A few examples: She knows who I am married to, she knows who my step kids are, she knows they are going to the same college (or they will be shortly), she knows which channel the Game Show Network and NESN are on. She knows Dad is in the hospital and she knows what’s wrong with him.

I don’t know why I am writing all of this out. It’s stressful and it’s sad, but it doesn’t really add to the difficulty of the situation. It’s just part of how things go. I don’t know. I might delete this later. I don’t know.

She’s complaining about pain tonight but it’s not too bad yet. She’s been up and around and she hasn’t seemed tired, but she just turned off her bedroom light. Maybe she’ll get some sleep. I’m pretty tired, but I am planning on staying awake for a while. TBS is showing Marvel movies. Captain Marvel is on right now. Rick and Morty is hovering out there at 11:00. I already looked up what channel Comcast runs the Cartoon Network on.

Well, I spoke too soon. She just got up again. It’s leg pain tonight. Probably arthritis. It might be a tough night.

Get Rid of This

Hopefully the end result of the current hospital stay will include getting rid of this thing.

I mean the hospital bed, not the walker. I think the walker is here to stay, even if it’s just as an insurance option.

Go To Sleep

Around 10:00 tonight I was too tired to keep my eyes open. My wife and I went to bed but sat up with our iPads and did a little reading/surfing.

Next thing I know it’s 1:00am and I’m pretty much wide awake. What the hell, Robert?

There has been a handful of short interviews with Alex Lifeson on YouTube, a couple of blog posts, a little bit of music, an hour long episode of That Pedal Show and a couple of episodes of a couple of TV shows.

My iPad’s battery has dropped 50% since I first opened it up.

Any time you want to feel tired again is fine with me, Robbo.

Rehab

Patches is glad that my father will be moving to another rehab facility today. It should happen around 4:00pm, half an hour from now.

This is the third facility this year. Please please please let him have better results this time.

Blank

It’s early but I’m all bundled up in bed. I’m just exhausted. I need shit around me to calm down so I can stop feeling like I’m failing everyone who needs me and stuff.

I was really tired this afternoon but I was somehow able to stop drinking caffeinated beverages at 3:00. That’s always the goal on work days but I’ve been failing for the last week or so. Here’s hoping it leads to better sleep tonight.

We watched Loki. I haven’t a clue as to what’s going on, but I’m a lot more into it now than I was the other two Disney+ Marvel shows after two episodes. Here’s hoping that’s a good sign for the next four weeks.

Other than that I’m kinda feeling blank and empty tonight. I don’t know what I’m doing or anything. I’m just sitting up in bed mentally flaking. Maybe that’s a good thing right now. Maybe.