901.

 Hi y'all.

I hope everyone is happy, healthy, and safe.

For the most part, we are.

But sometimes, I'm sad.

Grandma transitioned in December. 

Life goes on but all is tilted sideways. 

I'm waiting for the world to right itself.  💔

376:

hey y'all.

i need to get to bed cuz it's 4 a.m. and i know it will be another busy day in the land of bliss.

yesterday was unexpectedly busy. i knew i had some things to do but it just got out of hand once i walked out the door.

it started with a call from grandma. she wanted to come over to help baby bliss clean her room. baby bliss said yes because she hates cleaning her room more than getting her hair combed. and she wanted to swim but knew she couldn't go unless her room was neat and tidy.

i'll take the blame for everything that followed.

we got grandma from her house and i dropped them both here around 3. grandma said she had a pressing engagement around 5:30 so needed to gone and back by 5:15, latest.

my first stop was the library to return 20 pounds of borrowed materials. (i'm not joking.) a few items i'd reserved online were waiting for me so i got those. then i popped over to walmart (a 3-5 minute drive) for water and fertilizer spikes for my peace lilies.

my walmart allergy didn't kick in at all (thanks for the joke nurse so-and-so!) and i was in there longer than i wanted. i picked up an extra pair of shorts for me and one for baby bliss, 4-5-6 gallons of water, and two boxes of capri sun for baby bliss and i.

the bank (my next stop) is another 3-5 minutes up the road. i parked and sashayed across the parking lot and before i could reach the sidewalk, my phone rang. it was baby bliss calling to tattle on grandma: grandma was washing our dishes; grandma was doing our laundry; grandma was putting stuff away in the wrong place(s).

yeah, i knew it was coming. it happens every time grandma comes over to help. she knows no limits on what she's here to do.

not that i don't appreciate her help because i absolutely do. it's just that we have to do additional work after she leaves, to put things in the places we're used to seeing them and/or finding things that we missed and having to find them days and weeks later.

everyone in the bank probably heard me yelling at baby bliss (who had put the phone down) to give grandma the phone. i could hear them in the background, baby bliss talking to grandma like grandma was a 2 year old, trying to get her to sit down and watch t.v.

grandma wasn't having any of it. she fussed and fussed and would not come to the phone. i knew i needed to get home before grandma put baby bliss in the oven.

but i wasn't done running my errands. so i went to the post office to mail my sister's birthday gift (we share the same birthday) and check my p.o. box.

on the way home i passed my cousin who was headed to her house. we waved and i turned around and went back to her house, where we gossiped and talked to neighbors for about 30 minutes.

it turned out that grandma's pressing date was cancelled and she stayed here with us for another few hours.

baby bliss talked grandma into taking her to the pool and i had some peace and quiet while my arms regained their blood flow (after i carried several gallons of water up umpteen steps).

i was doing good until #2 auntie called to ask what i was gonna fix grandma for dinner.

say what?

good that she called tho because grandma had been here all day without eating. (she does that all the time. she eats well but not a lot. i have never seen her eat more than one plate of food ever in my life.)

now y'all know y'all have never seen a blog post about me cooking. but while #2 auntie was on the phone, i checked the freezer. thank God mr. bliss buys so much food. we had chicken breasts, corn on the cob, and green beans in the freezer.

i put the chicken in a bowl of water to thaw out, tossed the corn and green beans in the steamer, and heated up the counter grill. i thought i could just grease the grill with olive oil and things would progress naturally.

ha!

i didn't have enough oil and what little bit i did have rolled into the gutter because unbeknownst to me, our building and/or kitchen counters are not level. i put the chicken on the grill any way and it stuck to the grill in an unappetizing manner.

impromptu thinker that i am, i grabbed the butter and began greasing the griddle. it worked well enough and by the time i was done cooking the chicken, all the evidence was gone so i didn't tell anyone.

when i went out on the balcony to flag down baby bliss and grandma at the pool, i saw mr. bliss rounding the corner into the parking lot. there was enough for us all and i knew he would be totally surprised that his wife cooked a real meal.

the pool people couldn't hear me so i went down to retrieve them. baby bliss the water nymph was pissed. she didn't want to leave her wet habitat and refused to eat after her shower and shampoo.

grandma and mr. bliss munched happily on their vittles. i was too busy to get a real plate so i chomped on a chicken sandwich while cleaning and trying to coerce baby bliss into eating. then i remembered that the food i fixed wasn't exactly to her liking: she's not a big meat eater, green beans usually upset her stomach (for years and years), and eating corn usually makes her itchy around bed time.

she decided to make bean burritos for herself.

grandma and i snuck off to baby bliss's room for additional cleaning. we bagged all her winter clothes and extra blankets to be moved to storage later. i also pruned her clothes, toys, and jewelry stashes and filled a small bag for goodwill. i added it to the big bag of stuff we should be taking up there towards the end of the week.

by the time we took grandma back home, it was after 9 p.m. baby bliss teased her about it because grandma does not play being out in the street at night unless it's church-related.

i think we're leaving thursday (baby bliss and i) and neither of us is packed. i did find time to pull out 20 outfits though. now i need to weed through to see what i'm really taking to wear. i want to take the small suitcase and one other medium-sized bag.

375: "...follow up with your personal physician..."

hey y'all.

i didn't need to. thank you God.

but maybe i should have. that tetanus shot did a weird-y on me and i got my days and nights all mixed up.

the incident actually happened late night on june 18. by the time we left the hospital, it was early morning, june 19.

by june 20th, i was in the midst of some sort of delusional scenario that i know was brought on by that tetanus shot.

nausea and a bad headache kept me awake for a lot of the hours between then and saturday evening. when i did sleep, it was restless and full of strange dreams that seemed more like day dreams.


*** DO NOT READ PAST THIS POINT IF YOU'RE EATING OR JUST HATE GROSS-OUT KINDA STUFF ***


i also spent quite a bit of bit of time in the bathroom, flipping a coin for toilet or trash can. (the toilet won.)

we are our own primary care physicians in most instances, especially those of us who don't have health insurance. we do (have health insurance) but in a family of 3, the co-pays can add up to a mortgage payment before you know it.

my follow-up care consisted of mega doses of vitamin C, spirulina, lots of water, very little food (the nausea, the nausea...), and lots of sleep.

my hand feels fine as long as i don't press my palm within a few inches of the teeny weeny incision. i was already having some problems with my right hand any way which i suspect is related to nerve damage.

it's been several months since i've been able to use my index finger to twist caps off water or juice bottles. there's just no strength there and the finger hurts sometimes too.

any way, i am thanking God for the lesson (which i'm still waiting to understand) and the subsequent healing. even though i don't know why, we were supposed to be in the E.R. that night.

grandma said it's good that it happened last week and not this one (because i have to drive this week, a topic for another post).

you're absolutely right grandma.

.

137: saturday fun

the remainder of today was interesting.

ya gotta love my granny. she tried to trick me into doing doggie duty at my auntie's tonight.

earlier in the day she said she wanted to go home to press her hair and get ready for church in the morning. she said she didn't want to go to church from her daughter's house because that might make mr. bliss late. (he's picking her up for church.)

ummm, hello? i didn't sign up to house- or pup sit. i have guests coming in tomorrow and i needed to get home (after staying with her at auntie's from early yesterday afternoon) to make sure my quarters are presentable for their arrival. in addition, puppy sitting would require me to be responsible for auntie's house (keys, alarm, personal effects, the car her co-vacationers left in her driveway) and the dog (making sure he was fed, watered, and walked).

i've done it before and i didn't mind then. this time tho, granny put her honor on the line and i think she should keep her word.

needless to say, she had a 'tude when i took her home to get her church clothes (and probably her strayt-nen comb). i dropped her back at auntie's and she acted like she didn't wanna wave g'bye.

i sho hope she prays about her attitude when she gets to church tomorrow as well as why she thinks it's always okay to inconvenience me but never the rest of her kin.

most of them hit her up for money, food, etc. i've never done that. because i'm the one "with no job", i've usually been the one to take her to appointments and to run errands. not that i don't love my grandma. i do. but i get tired of being the go-to girl when it suits her and the outcast when that works better.

on a more pleasant note, our neighbors (who hail from a hometown near our own) had a weekend shindig at their house. their family is still visiting from the holiday and they all invited us in like we were part of the clan. my daughter played with our neighbor's niece, i watched the ladies play spades, then my hubby joined a bunch of them to play blackjack while i talked to a new friend. later we all threw down on some grub dished up by mrs. neighbor.

ribs, steak, hot dogs, bratwurst, corn on the cob, greens, baked beans, tater salad, homemade crab cakes, and all kinds of drinks... mr. neighbor manned the grill so i gotta give him his props too.

the downside was that my daughter got a bit sick and i had to leave too early to bring her home. i wanted to give my food time to digest and get to plate number two so i told mr. bliss we could take shifts with baby bliss. of course he said no but as soon as i got settled in to stay home, here he comes in the front door. by then it was too close to 10 p.m. and i decided to stay home.

mr. and mrs. neighbor are cool people but we haven't known them that long and i think it's rude for me to be knockin' at people's door after a certain hour.

maybe they'll have some food left over tomorrow evening. i bet i've got somethings in the freezer i can take over to add to the grill. :-)

it's nice to have good neighbors. i'm thankful.

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