party

I have lots of stuff to tell you today, but limited time. I've wasted a ton of time searching for my cel phone. I call it from my other phone, and I think I have the ring narrowed down to some where either behind or under the bed. How it would get there I don't know. Someone called me a while back. If it was someone whom reads this blog, I'll call you back when I find the phone.

Ron and Sue and Shirley and Martha and I went to the Hermitage for Mom and Dad's "welcome" housewarming party. That place is so much nicer than this place, it is just plain in a different class. Mom has worked like hell, and they are pretty much unpacked and their rooms actually look like "home". She even has her little decorative pieces placed and her "africans" laying on various pieces of furniture. (David always said that, in North Carolina, instead "afgans", they called them "africans". So his dad would come in and say, for insance, "I think I'll curl up on the couch under an african for a while."

Anyway, I think they can be veru happy there.

excitement

They are having a big "virtual dementia" conference here today. I guess they are probably learning to deal with people like me!

That's funny, but it's also indicative of why this place is intolerable - the staff treats every resident as if he/she is incapable of having a rational thought. On a certain level, one starts to believe it must be true. After all, it is what everyone else thinks! So I run just as fast as I can.

Today I folded stuff at church. Tomorrow I'm in Alexandria again, because I got all the way to Alexandria Tuesday, and then they called and cancelled class and rescheduled for tomorrow. This is actually OK by me.

I have a funny story for you. Sunrise has a wee, tiny circular brick drive out at the front entrance that exits onto Broad Street. On Tuesday, the Metro Access bus was waiting for me at the top of the short driveway. A bread delivery truck was there, also. I got on the bus. There was a work crew in the middle of this tiny brick driveway. They were tearing out and replacing bricks. As my van sits there, two more cars pull in from the street. They idle as they try to figure out where to park. Then, lo and behold, two huge firetrucks scream up with sirens blaring. They pull in the driveway entrance. My pal Bill, an older guy in a wheelchair, comes out to see what all the excitement is about. He sits right in the middle of the circular part of the drive. So, to sum up, we have a Metro Access van, a bread delivery truck, two passenger cars trying to park, a crew tearing up the pavement, two fire trucks, a guy in a wheelchair...

...and a woman runs up from the back parking lot screaming, "Its an emergency! I have to get out!! I have to get out!!"

Apparently there was no fire or emergency requiring firemen (imagine if they'd tried to fit in an ambulance!), so the firemen managed to get everyone out! Bill stayed until the last minute! I bet he felt he'd had great morning!

Oops!

Oh dear... You know what? Ron Mussleman is a real nice guy! Here is his picture with my sister.
I had a trip scheduled for today to the National Gallery for no reason (other than self preservation!) But, much to my dismay, Bob Ryan said last night to expect rain all day. I decided that would not be a good day to make a junket, so I tried to all Metro Access to cancel, but they had some sort of phone phone outage. To make a long story short, I ended up taking my phone to bed so that I could call them at 6:00 AM.

Well, I tried, but it is DARK at 6 AM! I pushed the button that I thought would call Metro Access, and the next thing I hear is, "Hi. You've reached Ron. Please leave..."

I hung right up, of course, but he called immediately, and was very nice about it all. He sounded relieved. I guess probably normal people only call their friends at 6AM if there is some sort of emergency! At that point, I decided that the recent turn of events meant that the fates must want me to go, so I went, and I had a wonderful time!

I'm really down on this place today - so lets get out of here! This morning I went to Starbucks (I'd rather pay an arm and a leg for coffee than to drink it here!) Yesterday I went to the National Portrait Gallery. Today I have class in Alexandria in the afternoon. Tomorrow I just called to get a bus to the National Gallery. Thursday I get to volunteer at church. Guess this is my atones for being stuck in a rest home.

She blinded me with science

The weather here in DC was wonderful today (Saturday, 10/23)- cool in the morning, but warm and sunny all afternoon. Luckily, I'd planned something wonderful to do in the nice weather. I went down to the Mall, where they were holding the US Science and Engineering Festival. It was like a HUGE science fair with hundreds (literally) of white tents, each of which held a display demonstrating some different type of scientific work or discovery.

I, of course, know nothing of science. I had Mrs. Mahoney for chemistry in the 11th grade, and that was as advanced as my scientific education ever got. I have never even used a Bunsen burner. Mrs. Mahoney was quite elderly, and dyed her hair bright red. We kids swore that she must have mixed up the dye herself in the chemistry lab. I once saw her (really!)in the grocery store saying "wheeee!" as she ran down the store aisle pushing her grocery cart. She then jumped up on the rack that was on the bottom of the cart and rode the cart as it whizzed down the aisle.

So I don't know a whole lot of science.

Lloyd would have loved this, though. He is a pharmacist and thinks scientifically. He can also do Texas Line Dancing. My Aunt Patricia would have loved this, also. She is a college level science professor. She also makes beautiful Appalachian ceramics. (Which she sells, if you are interested!)

I generally just tooled around in my wheelchair and enjoyed being out on the Mall on such a pretty day, There was only one fairly minor disaster. I went over a metal thing that covered electrical wires across the road and got stuck in the street, but two passerbys saved me.

There were some really cool looking displays. NASA had a lunar rover and a spacesuit.

The another display that interested me was the one from the people that make the Rubik's cube. I got Lloyd a brochure about how to solve it, although I bet he can do it without a brochure! I looked at the brochure, but got no further than step 1, which was "get to know your cube"!

Class

I went ahead and signed up for the Nov./Dec. session of my Spanish class. In a way, that's too bad, because the class isn't particularly good. If I continue to be the only student in the class, though, I guess two hours of one on one instruction for 16 hours, which is worth $239.00.

I had found and signed up for a class that looked more serious - more like a real class - with Fairfax County Adult and Community Education (ACE). It was about the same price, and met twice a week in a real class room. I was all signed up for it, but then it was cancelled due to lack of interest. (Not lack of interest on my part, but lack of interest by the population as a whole.) Now I know that they exist, though, and can be on the lookout for new classes starting in December or January.

I'm also kind of unexcited also because I've sort of "done" the highlights of Old Town... although, even as I say that, I realize that it probably isn't true. I've seen just a few things, and those I've seen only very superficially. I''ve never even been in Christ Church... And one could spend days in the Torpedo Factory and it would be different all the time, because the artists are always creating new stuff.

The George Washington Masonic Memorial is something Ive never been inside, and it created an amusing moment a while back. My Metro Access driver was overwhelmed by the beauty of Alexandria at night. As we came up King Street and saw the Masonic Memorial at the end, he was beside himself. "Oh my God. It is beautiful. What is it?"

Try to imagine yourself explaining to a man from Sudan what a Mason is. I don't think I really even know what a Mason is. If it ever hapens again, I'll say it is a Church!

Jean

I think I'll tell you about one of the caretakers here, a good one.

The ones that get me up in the morning most weekdays are really good at their jobs and are usually in a good humor. The first one I'll tell you about is Jean. She is the lead. She is a tall, thin (but healthy!) woman from Jamaica of about 40 years old. She always seems to be in an "up" mood, and is usually singing and laughing and dancing. She is very proficient at her job, and acts professionally.

I try to learn jokes to tell her because Broken English is her first language, and therefore she understands them. She tells lots of stories from her childhood in Jamaica. It seems to have been a place where the kids really had to toe the line and listen to teachers and parents. The school principal, she tells me, was a bad man who said all the teachers were "caca".

The other day, I asked her to tell me a joke, and she she told me about a time when she was a girl. She was at the top of a hill, and the latrine was at the bottom of the hill. She wanted to use the latrine, but she looked down and there was a man in a big hat, sitting in there, nodding up and down. She waited and waited and waited. Finally she went running, yelling, "Pa! Pa! There is a man a big hat who is just sitting and nodding in the latrine." So her Pa came running, and he went down to the latrine and found that what she was seeing was the shadow of a banana leaf.