Back to School

Here's HH's newest m/c. Isn't it cute? I have been wanting to take classes at LBCC for several years, and I finally successfully signed up for one. Two, actually, one for me, and one for DD. They are not at the same time. Anyway, I've had my first week of class, and am amazed at how hard it is. There is little time, so the instructor talks fast, and I don't catch all she says, though I listen as hard as I can. Also, we barely have enough time to get the week's work done, if we put in extra time in the lab. I may have been in pretty good shape, except I missed an important part of one of her lectures, with the result that all the work I did one day was gone, and I had to start over. I wonder if the second time was better than the first time, or worse? I can't wait to check and see next week on how I did, if I have time. I have to go tonight for extra lab time, because there's two days missed because of 4th of July, and the weekly schedule makes no allowance, we still have to get a week's work done next week, with only one day of class instead of three. And me so slow! I am worried.

We're going to Klamath Falls this weekend for Dad's funeral. My mother-in-law needs us here then, but we'll do what we can for her today before we go. She's coming home Saturday from the rehab center after her knee replacement surgery. Her doctors are trying to get hold of her, and even though they should know how to reach her, they don't. They know she had knee surgery and went to the rehab place, but they call her at home. I think the expenses involved in being a doctor are so high, they are having to work too much to pay the bills. It's a wonder anyone is willing to be a doctor these days. Her regular doctor has escaped with his family for a vacation in Alaska. I hope they're having fun, because they deserve a good time. His partners are trying to look after Mom.

Home for a Week

Back home from Bend. Dad is still critical, but he has a chance. I want to go back to Bend, but my family needs me for a while. I am hoping maybe I can go again next Sunday. I guess I'd better pop in on my MIL, who's at Corvallis Manor while she gets used to her new knee. I've got some clean laundry to take her. Has anyone tried microfiber dusting-cleaning cloths? Are they as great as they say? My cousin in Bend puts one in the drier and it attracts all the loose threads and animal hair to keep it off the clothes. She's a quilter, in fact she's going to have a quilt for sale at that famous Sister's Quilt Fair, and there are lots of threads, plus she has a dog and two cats, so I suppose she has animal hair, though I didn't notice any. What should I make for dinner? I'm here, so I suppose I should cook. This is HH's newest motorcycle. He says it's very fun to ride. He's having a ball. Isn't it cute?

HH is Mowing the Lawn

I can't sit here and talk to you while HH is mowing the lawn. I've got to get busy. Things were too slow this morning. I'm thinking, since my MIL has to go from the hospital to a nursing home for rehab on Sunday, that I should stick around for that and go to Bend on Monday.

St. Charles and Good Sam

Dad is now in Bend in St. Charles hospital, and HH's Mom is in Corvallis in Good Sam hospital with her new knee. That operation went well. I am planning on going to Bend on Sunday. Don't know when Mom will get out of Good Sam. DD is playing at the high school graduation on Monday, but I am hoping to be in Bend then, so am looking for transportation for her from school, since she has two large instruments to carry home. I think HH will be able to take her to OSU for the graduation ceremony, but will not be able to pick her up from school. I forgot to make a payment on the motorycle purchasing loan, which we never spent since HH didn't get his dream bike, so I will have to go do that right away. I suppose there are other things I'm forgetting. Thank you Lisa for your encouraging words.

Dad Didn't Go

Friday Dad was supposed to take off for McCloud. Saturday I got a call that Dad was in the hospital in Intensive Care. He fell getting the last load, the "just one more thing" load, into the motor home, and hit his head and got a subdural hematoma. He may pull out of it and he may not, as heart, lungs, kidney's are all not what they once were. I'm back home for a while from visiting him. My brothers are both there, but one of them has to go to work and run the county. He pops in to the hospital whenever he can, and between meetings. The other one's able to get out of his usual duties, at least for the time being. I will be able to go back after 4 or 5 days here at home. DD took her bike to school while I was gone because she had to go to a luncheon with the orchestra, but she fell down and banged herself up a little. She's OK, and got everything done she wanted to do, and got back home, too.

Off to McCloud

No, I AM NOT EITHER going off to McCloud, but Dad is, and that's pretty good when you're 86 years old and can still go off having adventures. He's always telling me he doesn't have a feed of oats for a small nightmare. Ha ha. So I told him I didn't have two nickels to rub together. Now he tells me he doesn't either.

I noticed the other day that my windows could use a little ammonia applied with vigor. I was at the Peter Ellefson demonstration, and it was upstairs in Benton Hall at OSU, with beautiful tree canopies in the background, except the trees were only visible through the open windows, as the closed windows were a bit too hard to see through. The trouble with windows is, every time it rains, they get all dirty again. Around here it rains rather a lot.

Now we're all going to strive toward perfection, and practice until we can play a piece 10 times in a row without errors. But not without remembering that we're not going to sound like a CD, at least not without editing.

This Is Not Monday

Here's a shot of DD's cat yawning taken by DD. Some of kitty's toys are in the background. That string, for instance, used to be much much longer, but it's been worried to pieces, and there's only a few feet left. It's crocheted of cotton yarn by DD when HH's Mom was teaching DD how many years ago. That's the last thing she finished. There's a bit of an unfinished tea towel somewhere. Both cats love this string, I think because of the changing colors. The blue thing is a tunnel that they like to sleep in and peer through. They don't like rolling it around the room, but we people do.

This morning HH took the New Zealand bike to work. I don't know for sure, but I think it's from 1953. I have been trying to add things to my sidebar, which looks like it's at the bottom, but it should be at the side. I once tried to do something that failed, and ever since, the sidebar stuff has been at the bottom. Anyway, HH sure looked cute going off to work on the cute old bike. I guess I don't know how to put one picture here and one picture there, so both the darn pictures are there, and none are here.

Memorial Day

Beth took this photo of an iris blooming at Mom's. HH's Mom. I wanted to show you the beautiful azalea from my own mom's funeral that one of her old friends from her childhood sent, but I don't have one, and it's through blooming now. I'm so glad it seems to be thriving, and it's 7 years old already. Yesterday Mom and I went up to the Memory Care place in Salem where her Sweetie is staying. He's not very well, but he's happy. She took him an old hat he wore in the service I think before WWII. It was very cute. He said he'd wear it today.

I wanted to go to Klamath Falls this weekend, but DD had her quartet performance at a recital Saturday, so we had lots to do around here. I like to go to the cemetary in Klamath Falls where many of my relatives are, and use real flowers, since my Dad is all silk flowers, and probably has the graves all decorated with them. None of the relatives would appreciate the silk flowers, but Dad is happy, and he's still around.

Oh-oh! Time Flies

This is the new dream bike. One of the days here, I may be able to show you the New Zealand bike.

Friday Lists

Not paying much attention to which list....phone call interupted thoughts. Now there are no thoughts. Whole new set of thoughts. Like,
1.DD wants us to host a French student this summer? Oh. Well,
2. I guess we could switch bedrooms around and
3. maybe it would be an incentive to get rid of all the junk lying around here.
4. I wonder if DD intended to mention this idea if there hadn't been so many rehearsals and concerts and goings-on that no one here saw much her.
5. Or maybe she forgot.
6. I wonder if a French student would be interested in staying in a house with half or 3/4 of the wallpaper stripped off the bathroom walls? (I get a little bit off each day, sometimes a VERY little bit.)
7. Mostly I think it sounds a little nuts.
8. I wonder if the student would have trouble saying "milk".
9. It also could be fun.
10. A cat is sitting between me and the computer screen.

Questions and Answers

What three books am I reading right now? The World Is Flat by Thomas Friedman, this is a new book and I only get it for two weeks, and I've already had it for one, so I've got to finish soon, but I don't spend much time reading each day. The Price of an Orphan by Patrician Carlon, which is a scarey story that starts with a murder near an Australian outback cattle station. Mean Woman Blues by Julie Smith is set in New Orleans. I'm about halfway through all of them, and they're all due back to the library soon.

What was my Dad grousing about today? His girlfriend is too busy and doesn't have enough time for him. My brother has to make big payments each month. No, not that brother, my other brother. His neighbor goes to work whenever she wants. He was cranky today. Oh! And someone else drank too much. I think it was someone on his baseball team when he was the manager of a Pacific Coast League team in the 40's, but it might have been someone who worked as a groundskeeper at the golf course. Maybe both. Oh, and the restaurant at his country club isn't as good as it should be.

What was my cat was gousing at me about? I couldn't figure that out. Guess she wanted attention, or just felt chatty. She sounded so mad! She's over it now, whatever it was. I talked to her and walked around a bit. Think she thought I should give her a treat. I didn't. Treats are at 9 p.m. or whenever I get home after that.

On Their Way

Our delightful guests Tom and Beth are now on their happy way north, just as far as Portland today. It feels like all the excitement and glitter has left with them, though HH is really really really looking forward to the antique motorcycle show this weekend.

The motorcycle from New Zealand arrived, and he rode it yesterday until the battery fell out. He has ordered a new battery from California, and if it comes in time, he'll be able to put the new bike (built in l953 in England) in the show. He has two other old bikes from England that he plans to show, so everything will still be fun. I thought it was pretty brave sending lots of money off for a bike in New Zealand, and enjoyed laughing at him and teasing him. It came and is very nice, though, so his faith was well placed. When we picked up the bike, we had to go through Customs, which didn't say "Customs" anywhere when we were looking for which door to go in once we got inside. It said "Homeland Security". Glad that all went well. There were men with guns!

DD is at least as excited about her upcoming birthday as HH is about the show. Both of those events are on Sunday. I'm excited about a Saturday night dance the band is playing for. A fund raiser for 2008 presidential hopeful, Michael Charles Smith. (A -gasp!- Republican.) Actually, if there must be republicans, I would like them all to be much more like Mike! Then there is a Corvallis Junior Symphony Concert Sunday at 3 which I'm excited to see. I guess we are busy and will carry on carrying on.

Distracted

Being distracted while pouring self a cup of coffee is not a good idea. I was watching HH and DD pass each other, HH going on a walk, and DD walking to the bus while pouring a cup of coffee. I should have stopped the pouring when I started the watching, but woe is me, I didn't. Now I have bright red knuckles and I've cleaned up a mess. Or at least I hope I got it cleaned up. It went everywhere, so there may be spots I missed. I still wonder if they spoke to each other. Neither one are big morning chatters. DD likes to snarl, "Go 'way!" in the morning. It's her favorite morning discourse.

Yippy, Another Car, I'm so Happy!

What fun it was to buy my nice car. I almost said "new", but it's not new. A lovely girl, probably in her late 20's and very pretty and friendly, who told me she took her young daughter to a Fairy Fair yesterday, was selling her car because she bought another one, and her old one was so nice! It's dark green, and if I couldn't have white, dark green was my second choice. I've been admiring the dark green ones I see about town. I was worried I'd have to get a yucky red one. Oh! Bliss. The wonderful friends that like good coffee are coming next Friday, and I'm so glad we've already got the car thing taken care of, and I can give my sweet mother-in-law her car back, which it was so kind of her to lend us. It is wonderful to have my very own car again, and not have to not put things in the car because it's not mine and I'll just have to take them out again, like the roll of paper towels that DDaughter says we should keep in there and which is nearly used up, HHusband's boxes of tools, the box of chains, my comb and mirror, the garbage bag, the picnic blanket, the music stand I like to keep in there so I'll have one even if I forget, hats and gloves and spare sweatshirts...My, what a lot of junk. I think I've lost my lip gloss in one of the moves. I've used 4 different cars since mine fell into the tree.

I would like to go to a fairy fair. I don't think I went to one with DDaughter, though we have gone to May Fairs.

Not Much

Oh, dear me. I have been so busy, and running around in rental cars trying to get everything done, no time for this on-line journal, which I didn't realise I'd been so neglectful of until I noticed my last post was Tuesday, and the one before that was Friday, and I haven't been reading my wonderful friends' posts, either, until I noticed how behind I was. What do you think? Do you like when I stick up a picture? My friend Mrs. Staggs in Merryville sure has lovely pictures, and lovely links, too. I get kind of sidetracked with all her wonderful links, then way too much time has gone by and nothing has gotten done. I have to go now and write to my dad. He's the greatest. Miss me?

May??!!!?!

How can it be May already? That means HerHighness will be 16. That means SCHOOL is almost out. That means NO ONE LEFT ME FLOWERS yesterday. I dumped an old collection of dried leaves from the 2nd birdbath, the one the hose doesn't reach, and found a million bug eggs. I was hoping some bird or other bug would come along and eat them, but instead they've been hatching. It's even NOT WARM outside, though it's sunny. Time to put the wash into the drier now. I'd play the piano, but I'm expecting someone, and don't want to embarrass myself. I need to find a new cheap old car that HHusband approves of. He wants one just like the last one so the snow tires and chains will fit. Dang! And we had just gotten new wheel covers. New tires. New battery. Plus I liked that car and could remember the license plate number.

List of Flowers

I believe I will list the flowers outside. The weather has turned beautiful, and everyday something new opens up.

1. The dogwoods are suddenly begining to look spectacular. Oh, how I love them. There's a lovely one in the grounds of the office building with the leaking roof that was in the Gazette Times, between Jackson and Van Buren on 7th. I'm worried about it because it's building is in trouble.

2. Rhododendron. My red one abruptly burst forth. So bright and gay.

3. Azalea. I have two that are orchid color, one that is pale pink and white that I brought back from my Mom's funeral in 2000, one that is red, and not doing so well, and one that is hot pink. My yard looks great when they bloom.

4. Tulips. Mine are in various stages of develpement. I think my favorite is the pink and green one.

5. Geranium. A tiny one I just planted already is blooming. Yea!

6. I have to go now.

Memory Care

Yesterday after much phone searching by discharge placement specialist Kathy at the hospital, she found this place in Salem, and after a tour and much much much paperwork, (Did I say MUCH?) and Kathy setting up transportation, and Mom writing his name on a lot of clothes, the car is all loaded and we're ready to head off this morning to see her S.O. on his way. Mom's neighbor said her friends all call their life partners S.O.'s, for Significant Other. After we got home from Salem yesterday the neighbor came over and we had a tea and hen party. It helped Mom to talk, and like us, she has good neighbors.

Rental Cars and Good Sam Hospital

Yesterday my mother-in-law's significant other was hospitalized after a prolonged, progressive, incurable illness, and everyone says he can't go home again for his and her good. She and I were there when they moved him from emergency to a room upstairs, and while the doctor visited him, and while he had his dinner. HHusband was busy selling a motorcycle. That makes him down to what? I lose track. The sold motorcycle was the one that wasn't his. The one from New Zealand isn't here yet. This morning I took the tree crashing car to the repair shop, and they dropped me off at John and Phil's Toyota where I rented a Prius until Thursday morning. If I need a car after that, I'll have to get something else. I went back up to the hospital and Mom's Sweetie didn't recognize me. Well, heck. Everyone there was really nice. HHusband is out working on the new motorcycle. Something about the gas tank. Gotta go now. See ya.

An Earth Day Night at the Musical

Last night Darling Daughter and I saw the high school production of Music Man. We had a very good time and lots of laughs. It was surprising how many of the actors and musicians (because they had a real orchestra in the orchestra pit, which was just the floor in front of the stage) I recognised, as well as members of the audience, like Golda from Fiddler on the Roof, and Frank Butler from Annie Get Your Gun, both community theater productions, and several people from the last year's high school production of Oklahoma! That's a sense of community when you recognize people you don't even know. Everyone loved the opening scene of The Music Man, where a bunch of salesmen reading newpapers on the train were talking about cash, and whadayatalk whadayatalk whadayatalk and knowing the territory and Harold Hill. Oh, and speaking of celebrities in the audience, I also spotted Michael Charles Smith, the tuba player who's running for US President in 2008. I saw on a list of things at the Earth Day doings downtown, which I wish I could have memorized, but it was too long for me, that attending local events is a way to build community, and building community is also a good thing to do on Earth Day, so going to The Music Man was good for our Earth.