bed

I got my new bed today! Doesn't it look comfortable?


I'd been sleeping on an old hospital bed. It was not a good hospital bed, either. It was just a 3" thick foam mattress covered with plastic that lay on a hard metal frame.
I got the junk man to haul the old bed away. They took the old bed away before the new one came. It felt really strange to send my only bed out the door!

Mom initiated this and purchased the bed. That was really nice of her.

Although I'd "fall asleep" on that old bed, I never got a deep. restfull night's sleep. In fact, I think I've been going through life exhausted, because I fall asleep every time I sit in one place for long. Now if I'm in church or at the movies, that's fine. At least I guess it is. I don't think I snore when I just snooxe. But when I'm on Metro Access? It certainly proves how tired I've been, that I can fall asleep in the bumping and jostle and noise of metro acces.

dinner

I usually don't eat here, except for breakfast. Breakfast is fine. One can always get eggs or cereal, and toast, and danish, etc.

Lunch is supposed to be the big meal of the day. Since lunch comes in the middle of the day, I find that I am usually out doing something else at noon, and therefore do not eat here.

By the end of the day, at dinner, I am just so fed up (ha, ha - get it? "Dinner" and "fed-up"?) with this place that I'd rather go anyplace else in the world to eat. There is a great place that serves "choose your own" ingredients salads called Sweet Green that I love. There is also a pizza place right down the street.

But tonight, alas, it was rainy and cold. I spent the day getting to, seeing, and returning from the doctor. So I decided just to eat here. Alas. The main course was a fish paddy (like a square fish stick), 0n a dry bun, with a piece of American cheese and a small handfull of limp French fries. I asked for catsup to go with the fries, and was told they don't have any.
Here are some places to eat that might be better:

Verna

Personality Profile -
Verna
Verna is one of my aides. She works the 11PM-7AM shift. I work with her alot, because she is among the crew that puts me to bed at night and is also amember of the crew that gets me up in the AM.

An older, thin woman, Verna is good-hearted and honest and tries her hardest - which is sort of what makes her so gently funny. Because, in a way, Verna is sort of really out of it. Her conciousness is usually out looping around the universe somewhere. She's has a laid-back, cool personality, but cares adamently about the well-being of her charges. It's just that, a lot of the time, she has no idea what it is that they actually need.

One of the unique things about her is the way she communicates. She is from Jamaica, and speaks an "island" English which is difficult to understand. As a matter of fact, though she may talk and talk, no one ever has the slightest idea what she is saying. Which she seems to just take calmly in stride...!

Once she gets a correct phrase in her head, though, she uses it over and over, with appropriate variations. For instance, the crew uses a lift machine to lift me out of the wheelchair and put me in bed. Once they lower me to the bed, Verna always says, "good landing!" One day they let me loose too early, though, and I fell to the bed from about two feet up. As I lay there, shocked and suprised, Verna looked down at me, and "crash landing", she calmly said.

Although Verna doesn't look or act old, Joey, a fellow on her shift tells me that she is in her 60's. She has an afro wig with long rings of black curls. Joey says he has seen her without her wig, and she has short, gray hair.

Rip-off

Emeritis is screwing me over. They have raised my "care level" rating to "6", which is the highest level and which is absurd. Level 6 also costs tons of money.

I do not get, or need. Level 6 quality care. I receive help from their care managers basically only when I get up, shower, dress, and go to bed. There are people here who need help to eat, and need help all day throughout the day. That is the type attention that deserves Level 6.

In addition, Emeritis is requiring that I hire a private aide to get me up, shower, and get dressed. Emeritis is not pleased that I get 5 showers a week. The standard here is only 1(or 2?)showers a week, but the salesman who got me to move here from Sunrise promised 5 showers. That is what convinced me to move. Now the Director says, "That was before my time, so I'm not responsible for that."

I feel that Emeritis really gets a free ride from me. It is quite rare that I'm even here during the daytime. I try to stay awway as much as possible. The Care Manager Supervisor even admitted as much, saying, "We would have required a private duty aide during the daytime, too, but we realized that you usually aren't here in the daytime, and we couldn't have the aide just sitting around."

Seems to me that, if I'm off on my own all day every day, I obviously don't require level 6 assistance!

In my opinion, they are ripping me off big time. My advice to anyone with assisted living needs is to STAY AWAY FROM EMERITIS!!!

Because or this, I complained to Sue that I have a limited amount of money and that this will make me run out sooner. "What will I do when I run out of money?!", I lamented.

"We'll just shoot you," she said.

Trick Or Treat?

It's Halloween. As a child, Halloween meant candy and excitement. I remember selecting a costume with care, and putting it together with appropriate wings or wand or whatever, donning a mask, and feeling enormously proud of myself. Then I would grab my bag, eager to get outside, and WHAM!! Mom caught me and made me put a sweater on over my charming or spooky outfit.

Trick or treating used to be lots of fun for kids. Considering the danger nowadays, I bet nobody lets kids go out alone anymore.

They had a costume contest here at the old folks home. The lady I eat breakfast with won. She wore all yellow, with a Peanuts characters print on her pants. My favorite care manager is dressed as a Raggety Ann doll. This isn't really her.

WOW!

WILD! This is a totally awesome story that's kind of paranormal!! About a year ago, while living at Sunrise, I woke up one morning and looked at the wall beside my head and was startled to see a centipede crawling along. It was just inches from my face. As I watched, the centipede crawled higher and higher, eventually ensconcing itself in a corner.
I lay in bed and watched it diligently until a care manager, Melita, arrived, on time to get me up.

"Melita!", I said, pointing at the long bug, "Kill it! Kill it!!"

Melita is one of the nicest care managers I've ever known. She comes from the Philippines.

"Oh,no," Melita said. "That's a centipede. Back home, everyone knows a centipede brings money and is good luck."

"Money?!" I asked.

"Yes," she said. "If you see a centipede, maybe you will get rich." If she had been telling me that cockroaches were good luck, I probably wouldn't have bought it, but centipedes were negotiable.

"OK," I said, diverting my attention from the insect. I paid no more attention to it, and assumed it went on to enjoy a long life with it's many legged family (who, I hope, were not also residing somewhere in my room.

When the mail came that afternoon, I had a check from my long term care insurance for a significant amount of money.

Along time went past. No more centipedes appeared.

Until yesterday morning, that is. I woke yesterday morning to see a centipede scurrying, it's many tiny little legs carrying it rapidly up my wall.

When the mail arrived, I had a check from my long term care insurance for a significant amount of money.

WOW,

Virtual rain

I just got an email from a friend saying "Do you plan to start your blog again?". My answer was, "yes, I plan to start again, if I still have readers. I've had real problems here - serious even to the extent that I called in Adult Protective Services and the Assisted Living Licensing Board, and I haven't felt very comical. But that's over, so I'll give it another go!

Or, rather, I will in a minute... Now I have to drink beer and watch the "Prohibition" documentary on BBS.
Deb

Dinner

I sat at dinner with 2 women I didn't know. Basically, I sat there because one of then women is named Mildred (like my mother). A young male kitchen employee stood nearby, occasionally smiling at us indulgently. The the other woman at the table Is named Mary. Following is the conversation which ensued:
ME: Can I join you?
MILDRED and MARY: Yes! please! Join us!
MARY: The man who was sitting there left already.
MILDRED: He sure did leave in hurry. He didn't even have any ice cream.
MARY: He was probably jealous.
MILDRED: He said he didn't feel well...
MARY: He had no reason to get upset...
MILDRED:...I hope he's O.K....
MARY:...there was absolutely nothing I could do about it...
MILDRED: He always loves his ice cream.
MARY: It's not my fault that cook kissed the top of my head.
MILDRED: Well, no. He just leaned over and smooched you right on the head.
MARY: I know it was a great big kiss, but that's no reason to get mad.
MILDRED: Well, no! You didn't ask him to kiss you.
MARY: He had no reason to get mad, anyway. We eat together every day, but we have no understanding. It's not exclusive.
MILDRED: You couldn't do a thing about it!
Etc

duck weather

I HATE RAIN!!!!

I've been in this iccky room all day. I has poured all day, and it is supposed to rain all day tomorrow, and maybe Friday, so you can visit me at the looney bin, room 1.

Adios!

Sort of a bummer of a day today because I had to say "goodbye" to 2 people from here that I like. Which is about 99.95% of the people here that I like. Oh, wait - I just thought of 2 more people that I like. So lower that percentage a bit, will you?

One of the people that left today, was Joey, my favorite care manager. He works the overnight shift, so he's the main caregiver who gets me to bed at night and who gets me up in the morning. He's a young black man, American, who works hard and who really cares about the well being of the residents and of the other employees. He's medium build and height with a complex tattoo on his lower arm and with long, braided "Rastafarian" hair. This is picture of the type hair he has, but not of him. Joey has a very affiable attitude, and is quite easy to talk to. He's married and has a daughter and son he adores.

Anyway, he'll be back in two weeks - he just went on vacation.

The other person was a fellow that lived here named Wayne. All he ever did was bitch and whine about how much he hated being here, so maybe I'm actually glad he's gone.

emergency

All I've done all day is watch the hurricane on TV. A hurricane is raging. Right now, 8/26/2011. I believe I've become closer emotionally to Al Roker than I am to my actual familly.

---------------------------
NEXT DAY
We all lived through the weather emergency. Mom called and said they were OK. It happened when everyone was asleep, so, unless you had continuing power loss, you wouldn't have noticed it even happeneed. I bought a deecorative scented candle and a LifeGear Glow Mini LED Spotlight - the closest one could find to candles and a flashlght on the night before the storm. So, since I was prepared, the power stayed on.

Alas!

Oh, good lord!

The evening care manager helped me get from my wheelchair into my easy chair. That is fine, right? I wanted to be in my easy chair to watch. TV. It's 7:10, and Jeopardy comes on at 7:30. So she comes in and I get in my recliner. I like this woman, so we josh about a bit.

Pleasant, right?

I SHOULD NEVER LET MY GUARD DOWN

(this is a picture of people not letting their guard down)





















My call button ended up being left on my desk. This is across the room from the upholstered chair in which I was sitting. I therefore could not call for assistance, and might have been left sitting there until someone noticed I was missing... perhaps when the rent was due? So I thought about it for a bit, and realized I could reach across the table with my my grabbing device and snag my purse, which was on the other side of the end table, and use the cel phone inside to call the front desk and get them to get my care manager to come back and give me the button. So I did so. A few seconds later I hear the woman at the desk announce, "Will the care manager for room 101 please go to the room?"

Yikes! The problem NOW was that I shouldn't have been hearing this announcement, because it was coming in over the care manager's radio... which meant she had left the radio in my room... which meant that she had no radio with which to hear the announcement... which meant she was never coming.

I called and explained. Once the lady at the front desk had finished laughing, she found someone else to send.

food

I think we are going to focus on "food" in this blog post, because I saw a TV show last night that featureds marvelous cakes, and that got me in a "food" frame of mind.

The food here sucks. The only really good meal they serve is breakfast. You can get anything you want for breakfast.

The old lady who eats with me always gets some of EVERYTHING f0r breakfast. The help doesn't even ask anymore, they just bring it! She has oatmeal, French Toast, 4 slices of regular toast, sausage, bacon, scrambled eggs, sliced fruit. She eats maybe 2 bites of egg, total. The rest she has them wrap in a napkin and she carrries it to her room.

Maybe she thinks she'll starvee before noon!

Anyway, the bill of fare here is nothing to brag abouut. It is, of course, nutritious and bland, and it is certainly nothing to get hungry about. BUT (and this is a bad thing!) THEY SERVE ICE CREAM WITH EVERY MEAL! That keeps families from complaininhg about grandma wasting away to nothing, I guess, but sure isn't healthy.

But, actually, upon further consideration, I'm not being fair. If you don't want what is on the menu, there are a variety of other selections that can be ordered - hamburger, omlette, pb&j, etc.

I've found a fantastic restaurant down the street. It is Sweet Green, and for about $10.00, you can construct yourself a great big entree salad with any veeggies you want.

Emergency

The fire alarm went off twice in the middle off the night last night. That is rather frightening, since all that all I can do is lie in bed and wait it out -I can't get out of bed by myself. Well, I thought, at least I'll maybe get to be carried to safety by some yummy hunky firemen ! The alarm makes a aloud alarm noise followed by the recorded voice of a woman announcing loudly and clearly and slowly, "Attention residents. A fire emergency has been reported In the building. Please proceed to the nearest exit stairway and exit the building. Do not take elevator." So I'm just laying there waiting, when, WHAM!!! I hear the front entry door of my unit crash open. Thinking hopefully that it might be one of the one of the Emeritus staff come to usher me to safety, I yell, "Hello? Hello? Is anyone there?"

And a demented (literally), frantic, confused ancient woman barrels into my room and frantically runs to the window!

I huddled deep into my bed and tried to become invisible.

Luckily, one of the staff saw her and followed her in. It was Verna, the one who speaks such broken English that I can't understand hr at all. She said, "'oh, Graf ish beetf, Mrs. Gcdxk. Nfgvs mgr,Miss Debbie. Jeqgdtibkgf ndrtbdx.".

The woman protested, "They said to go to the nearest exit. That was the nearest exit!"

Verna took her away, and all was well.

It was a false alarm, thank God. It revealed total lack of preparation on the part of the staff. I understand that poor, I'll-trained Gretchen was up on the 3rd floor trying to maneuver bed-bound people into wheelchairs by herself.

Back in Business

Ron fixed my computer!!! It took him well over 2 hours, and it is so cold in my room that he very likely got frostbite, but he persevered and now it is fixed!!! I can open two windows at once! I can actually find Google and search on it. I can send an email or make a blog post without getting an error message!!!!! (I had gotten to the point where I was making blog posts from the IPad. This is an incredibly tedious process. It explains why my posts have been few and far between!) I can even write blog posts and play music at the same time!!!! I had SO much crap running on my computer... Ron created a folder as he was sorting stuff out that he titled, "I don't know what that is or how it got on my computer".

But now it works, and it is like a whole new computer!

So I may never be seen in public again.....

Ha, ha! Just kidding. I think. Except that the weather is terribly hot...

Jan, a pal from the CTS choir, came over today. We got lunch at the mall and ate at Chick-fil-e and saw "Water For Elephants". It was a real good movie. My only critcism is that I'd have loved to see the characters of the other circus performers developed more fully, but, had that been done, I'd probably be complaining that the movie was too long.

Maybe I'll read the book, if I ever slow down and stop running from reality for long enough to read anything!

Rainy day

There's not a whole lot to talk about today, because the dreary weather discouraged me and I stayed in almost all day. I ran out only to go to Noodles and Company for lunch. I got the Cheesy Noodles with Meatballs. Extravagant, I know, but I'm eating a $2.00 prepared Caesar salad from CVS for dinner.
So do you think it's an indictment of an establishment's food quality when a patron who has already paid for a meal chooses to eat off the shelf at CVS instead?

The food offered here is bland, unimaginative crap. Except for the times it is actually icky! This, of course, is only my opinion, so you should take it with a grain of salt. As should most of our entrees...! And, to top it off, they print up menus and then don't serve everything on the menu that they, themselves, just printed. For example, the other day they offered chicken fingers and dipping sauce. The waitress brought chicken fingers. I asked for sauce. She said, "No sauce." I said, "But It is in the menu." She said, "No sauce!" and walked away.

The best part about eating in the dining room is that I love the little lady from Puerto Rico that eats with me, Francesca. She has become obsessed with Dancing With the Stars, and stays up late every night to see it, but now falls asleep every time she sits down! She also tells me that she was asleep in bed last night and one of the workers here came in the door, waking her up, and then said, "oh, I'm sorry. I was looking for Mr. Johnson." The worker left then, but Francesca got worried that perhaps Mr. Johnson was missing and perhaps they thought he was heading to her room! Poor lady didn't sleep for the rest of the night!

I guess one has to be careful what one says to the elderly!

The Geriatric Set

I've been patient. I've been kind. I've been understanding. In my opinion, I've been angelic.
For example:

Sometimes I am going down the hall in my electric wheelchair and a heedless ancient person chooses to meander into the hallway right in front of me. I just stop until the senior clears the hall.

Sometimes I wait forever for the elevator to arrive, and, when it does, the door opens to reveal a bunch of dazed elders aboard. They then stare at me in total confusion before beginning to shuffle about. Alas, the elevator door shuts and they all are transported to some unintended location. I just sigh and push the button again.

Sometimes I put down something inexpensive and an old coot (whoops -"senior citizen") picks it up and stares at me defiantly while clutching it to his chest, I just leave and let him have the thing.

These things just go with the territory, I guess. Let's all pray that my patience and sanity hold out. Especially patience.

Because sometimes I feel like slapping them.

For example, today a resident scooted up to me on her wheelchair, handed me a brochure, and said, "Here - read this. I think you'll get a lot out of it!", Then she scooted away. Upon looking at the brochure, I saw it was entitled, "Living with Dementia".

It's a good thing she has a fast wheelchair.

By the way, they have a cart here in the entry hallway which has a sign on it that reads "Dementia Library", I wonder if they ever get any of their books back?

patience

Well. I've learned something - if an argumentative old geezer is hostile for absolutely no reason, the thing to do is to completely ignore it. Eventually the geezer gets tired of it and goes away. It took me a good long while to figure this out, but I think I've finally learned. For example, this morning I rolled into the living room and picked up a newspaper. There are 3 of them there for public consumption. An ancient man accross the room hissed in an evil voice, "Don't you touch that paper"

I ignore him and pick up the section I want to see.

He hisses evilly, "Put it back right now."

I acknowledge him not at all, roll to the window, and proceed to read. I hear nothing else from him. He's gone by the time I leave.

This explains why my blood pressure was normal when I got it taken this morning.

I don't guess this would work to control conflict in the real world. I suppose in the real world aggressors are out to get something tangible in order to better themselves. I did see a movie once though where the robber got to the bank teller's window and said, "Gimme all your money!", and the teller said, "No hablo Ingles"" and the robber... well, the robber took all the money anyway, so I guess that was a rotten example. As a matter of fact, other than old people with dementia, I can't think of a single example of a time when ignoting unwarrented aggression is a good idea. So perhaps you should use another website for advice concerning sociologial behavior and interreaction.

Fun stuff

I've got more fun stuff to tell! And, once again, it's directly tied to my decision to move here.

I tell you--not to be big headed
or anything, but I am rather proud of myself for initiating and following through on the move. When one lives in a place like this, the normal (and expected) attitude of residents is to act as if every aspect of their lives is preordained by someone else! (Needless to say, I'm not real popular with the staff. I tend to demand to have my own way! And, whats more, I eventually get it). If not I'd walk! The fact that the administration knows that I did walk from Sunrise does not hurt at all. It would have been a lot easier just to continue slogging along at Sunrise. This place I'm at now isn't perfect, but it has a front door that opens and a mall across the street and a metro station next door.

Anyway, the fun thing I did yesterday is that Hedy Rossmeissel, a friend from church, came over and we went to the mall and we found a big ice rink where the Caps practice every morning, and anyone that wants can come watch free. They also have a big rink where people can just go skating, which might be good for Charlotte and Lu.

Songs

Some of the church choir and the pastor are coming here Sunday night to see the place and I'm supposed to write a funny welcome song or poem to greet them with. Let's use this occasion to get some unsuitable one out of my system, as they seem to be the only ones that sprig to mind when I try to write:

TO: Holy, Holy, Holy

Holey, holey, holey,
My bras are holey.
I have moved them twice now.
They're ancient history.
I should buy some new ones,
Bras that fit me nicely.
I think I'll shop now - Sears and then Penny's.


OK, OK - this song should welcome people to my new home, and not dwell on the worrisome minutia of life.

TO: This is my Father's World

This is my tiny space.
I am glad to have you here.
Outside my room the traffic zooms, play music loudly to hear.
Please make yourself at home.
And find rest in my kind thoughts,
That'll have to do, so I'm warning you, one chair is all that I've got.