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by Gretchen age 40- something
We actually got back last night around midnight... which means I warped space-time somehow again since the drive takes 6 hours, plus stops and delays, and we left at 6 pm Memphis time which is 7 pm here. There was only one stop for gas and the only delay was Monteagle Mtn. And no, I never did more than 5 mph over the speed limit anywhere.
I hate that mountain, by the way. It's steep and it's curvy and it tends to be foggy except in the middle of the day. Just at the foot of the mountain, where everyone's speed is the greatest, three lanes converge into two with no warning at all. I've almost been crushed between two semis more than once there. Speaking of semis, the big trucks are all supposed to stay in the right two lanes... which should make the furthest left lane fairly safe... but they don't do it. And way way too many people speed over that hill. It's dangerous.. there are even runaway truck ramps for semis who have lost it. Needless to say, I didn't speed... with the fog like pea soup, I crawled. The only good thing about it was that there isn't much traffic on the road that late at night so I wasn't being a hazard by going so slowly.
On the other hand, the girls were angels, mostly. I told Emily when we started up Monteagle that I needed no distraction until we got over the hill... and I had no distraction at all. Not a peep from the back seat... I thought they were asleep until we hit the straight away afterwards and Emily asked if we were over the hill yet. Neither of them asked to stop for food or drinks (I provided those at the beginning of the trip) and surprisingly we only had to stop once for a bathroom break and that was on the way over. And I only got asked "Are we there yet?" once when I had to slow down (and stop) due to road construction.
The trip itself was good... the apartment in Dad's community was phenomenal. Two bathrooms, a huge kitchen and a living room we didn't mind hanging out in until Dad got up in the mornings or after he went to bed at night. And a dining room that we never used since we were eating lunch and dinner with him in the public dining room so I used the table to lay out quilt pieces and just left them there. So nice to be able to do that! We did use the fridge, coffee maker and microwave in the kitchen though. And three... THREE... walkin closets... plus a washer and dryer in another closet.
The dryer came in handy since we went swimming after lunch on Sunday. I convinced Dad to come down and sit by the pool while we talked and the girls swam. We stayed out too long though, he was tottery by the time we went back in. Most of that could have been avoided if the apartment door keys, which are supposed to open the pool lock, actually worked. They didn't, either one of them, and I had to climb the fence and run in and find someone with a master key to get Dad back out of the pool area. I think Dad enjoyed it, he said he didn't even know there was a pool there.
After dinner at Red Lobster, courtesy of my brother, we went over to see my brother's house. It is lovely and in a very nice neighbourhood and the view going across to the island he lives on is fantastic (it helped that we top the crest of the bridge just at sunset!) but it was smaller than I expected. It's more than enough for him but I would feel cramped by myself, never mind the cats and kids. And his cat is beautiful and friendly and fairly huge and distinctly black :)
Monday, after lunch, the girls and I went to the zoo. I found out that they do rent motorized chairs so next time I will try to get my Dad to go with us. They neither one wanted to go but I think they both liked it a lot when I insisted. I hope so, it was expensive enough!
We went through the cat house first... lions and tigers and cougar cubs with huge paws and my first live look at an ocelot. I always thought I would like one because I had heard that they were the smallest of the wild cats, about twice the size of a house cat. Bosh! They are the same size as my house cats! Very pretty, though. When questioned today, Emily said she "liked the felines and the snake house best".
The snake house was one I would have preferred to skip. It is actually a reptile house with turtles and iguanas as well as snakes but it is mostly snakes. That's the biggest rattlesnake I have ever seen, thank goodness, and it had just moulted and was kind of irritable. The anaconda had just been fed, I don't know what but it was something big. That snake was about as big around as I am and I'm no small person! But the most interesting was the cobra. When I went up, it was just laying there, being bored probably and didn't move. Elizabeth came up behind me and that snake took one look at her and slithered over to the glass and started, I swear!, trying to talk to her through the glass. It kept bumping it's nose against the glass trying to get closer to her and bobbing it's head up and down. When she walked away, I could almost hear it saying 'oh no! Don't go.. come back!' And through all this it never once spread it's hood... it wasn't angry, it was fascinated.
Of course, we also got to see elephants and giraffes and hippos ("Mom! They're so big!") and playful sea lions, otters and, oddly, meercats. Emily commented that they were fatter than she thought they'd be until I pointed out that they didn't have to hunt for their food in the zoo. There was a tour group feeding them and they offered her some mealy-bugs to feed them but she can't stand bugs so she wouldn't.
Elizabeth doesn't mind bugs so she wanted to see the Spider house (sponsored, appropriately, by Terminex) but Emily didn't like it so we waited outside.
The cap of the whole zoo excursion, however, were the Giant Pandas, Ya Ya and Le Le, on loan from China. They were both napping in their day rooms but we could still see how lovely (and huge) they are since the day rooms are glass with dimmed light.
By the time we were ready to leave Memphis, the girls didn't want to leave, which I found amusing and gratifying. We all slept in today... Emily slept until 10:30... and spent the rest of the day cleaning and buying cat food since the cats had eaten it all. I think they must have been bored, they usually don't eat that much in that short a time.
They were also glad to see us! When we got home, I opened the door and left it open to carry a sleeping Emily into the house (Elizabeth beat me to it, however.) and the cats all ran outside. They also all came back in with in 15 minutes... they wanted to go out after having been cooped up in the house for three days but they wanted to be with their people more. Simba has finally stopped telling me about it now.
On the down side, my Dad is slipping. He is not walking well and while he has a physical therapist supposed to start working with him today I am dubious about the amount of good it will actually do. He is not writing, he is sitting in front of the TV and watching movies all day long. He is also smoking 4 times as much as I've ever seen him do before... mostly because, I think, he is not doing anything else. And his memory is not good... okay, it was never good, it's worse. We had the same conversation several times and it was clear he didn't remember that we'd already had it once. But it's only short term memory and he's still very alert and is still aware of people and time and the days of the week. And he is making new friends... both staff and other residents which is great. (Of course, we had to meet them ALL... he was showing off his 'girls' and enjoying every minute of it.)
At least with the kids having had such a good time, it won't be hard to talk them into going back as soon as I can arrange it again.
We actually got back last night around midnight... which means I warped space-time somehow again since the drive takes 6 hours, plus stops and delays, and we left at 6 pm Memphis time which is 7 pm here. There was only one stop for gas and the only delay was Monteagle Mtn. And no, I never did more than 5 mph over the speed limit anywhere.
I hate that mountain, by the way. It's steep and it's curvy and it tends to be foggy except in the middle of the day. Just at the foot of the mountain, where everyone's speed is the greatest, three lanes converge into two with no warning at all. I've almost been crushed between two semis more than once there. Speaking of semis, the big trucks are all supposed to stay in the right two lanes... which should make the furthest left lane fairly safe... but they don't do it. And way way too many people speed over that hill. It's dangerous.. there are even runaway truck ramps for semis who have lost it. Needless to say, I didn't speed... with the fog like pea soup, I crawled. The only good thing about it was that there isn't much traffic on the road that late at night so I wasn't being a hazard by going so slowly.
On the other hand, the girls were angels, mostly. I told Emily when we started up Monteagle that I needed no distraction until we got over the hill... and I had no distraction at all. Not a peep from the back seat... I thought they were asleep until we hit the straight away afterwards and Emily asked if we were over the hill yet. Neither of them asked to stop for food or drinks (I provided those at the beginning of the trip) and surprisingly we only had to stop once for a bathroom break and that was on the way over. And I only got asked "Are we there yet?" once when I had to slow down (and stop) due to road construction.
The trip itself was good... the apartment in Dad's community was phenomenal. Two bathrooms, a huge kitchen and a living room we didn't mind hanging out in until Dad got up in the mornings or after he went to bed at night. And a dining room that we never used since we were eating lunch and dinner with him in the public dining room so I used the table to lay out quilt pieces and just left them there. So nice to be able to do that! We did use the fridge, coffee maker and microwave in the kitchen though. And three... THREE... walkin closets... plus a washer and dryer in another closet.
The dryer came in handy since we went swimming after lunch on Sunday. I convinced Dad to come down and sit by the pool while we talked and the girls swam. We stayed out too long though, he was tottery by the time we went back in. Most of that could have been avoided if the apartment door keys, which are supposed to open the pool lock, actually worked. They didn't, either one of them, and I had to climb the fence and run in and find someone with a master key to get Dad back out of the pool area. I think Dad enjoyed it, he said he didn't even know there was a pool there.
After dinner at Red Lobster, courtesy of my brother, we went over to see my brother's house. It is lovely and in a very nice neighbourhood and the view going across to the island he lives on is fantastic (it helped that we top the crest of the bridge just at sunset!) but it was smaller than I expected. It's more than enough for him but I would feel cramped by myself, never mind the cats and kids. And his cat is beautiful and friendly and fairly huge and distinctly black :)
Monday, after lunch, the girls and I went to the zoo. I found out that they do rent motorized chairs so next time I will try to get my Dad to go with us. They neither one wanted to go but I think they both liked it a lot when I insisted. I hope so, it was expensive enough!
We went through the cat house first... lions and tigers and cougar cubs with huge paws and my first live look at an ocelot. I always thought I would like one because I had heard that they were the smallest of the wild cats, about twice the size of a house cat. Bosh! They are the same size as my house cats! Very pretty, though. When questioned today, Emily said she "liked the felines and the snake house best".
The snake house was one I would have preferred to skip. It is actually a reptile house with turtles and iguanas as well as snakes but it is mostly snakes. That's the biggest rattlesnake I have ever seen, thank goodness, and it had just moulted and was kind of irritable. The anaconda had just been fed, I don't know what but it was something big. That snake was about as big around as I am and I'm no small person! But the most interesting was the cobra. When I went up, it was just laying there, being bored probably and didn't move. Elizabeth came up behind me and that snake took one look at her and slithered over to the glass and started, I swear!, trying to talk to her through the glass. It kept bumping it's nose against the glass trying to get closer to her and bobbing it's head up and down. When she walked away, I could almost hear it saying 'oh no! Don't go.. come back!' And through all this it never once spread it's hood... it wasn't angry, it was fascinated.
Of course, we also got to see elephants and giraffes and hippos ("Mom! They're so big!") and playful sea lions, otters and, oddly, meercats. Emily commented that they were fatter than she thought they'd be until I pointed out that they didn't have to hunt for their food in the zoo. There was a tour group feeding them and they offered her some mealy-bugs to feed them but she can't stand bugs so she wouldn't.
Elizabeth doesn't mind bugs so she wanted to see the Spider house (sponsored, appropriately, by Terminex) but Emily didn't like it so we waited outside.
The cap of the whole zoo excursion, however, were the Giant Pandas, Ya Ya and Le Le, on loan from China. They were both napping in their day rooms but we could still see how lovely (and huge) they are since the day rooms are glass with dimmed light.
By the time we were ready to leave Memphis, the girls didn't want to leave, which I found amusing and gratifying. We all slept in today... Emily slept until 10:30... and spent the rest of the day cleaning and buying cat food since the cats had eaten it all. I think they must have been bored, they usually don't eat that much in that short a time.
They were also glad to see us! When we got home, I opened the door and left it open to carry a sleeping Emily into the house (Elizabeth beat me to it, however.) and the cats all ran outside. They also all came back in with in 15 minutes... they wanted to go out after having been cooped up in the house for three days but they wanted to be with their people more. Simba has finally stopped telling me about it now.
On the down side, my Dad is slipping. He is not walking well and while he has a physical therapist supposed to start working with him today I am dubious about the amount of good it will actually do. He is not writing, he is sitting in front of the TV and watching movies all day long. He is also smoking 4 times as much as I've ever seen him do before... mostly because, I think, he is not doing anything else. And his memory is not good... okay, it was never good, it's worse. We had the same conversation several times and it was clear he didn't remember that we'd already had it once. But it's only short term memory and he's still very alert and is still aware of people and time and the days of the week. And he is making new friends... both staff and other residents which is great. (Of course, we had to meet them ALL... he was showing off his 'girls' and enjoying every minute of it.)
At least with the kids having had such a good time, it won't be hard to talk them into going back as soon as I can arrange it again.
