Tuesday, August 4, 2009

This morning did not get off to a good start. To begin with, Philip got me up about an earlier than expected. Thus I was up before Grandma. She was still in bed when I called Syd to ask if she was coming. She wasn't, having work today, so I went back and had breakfast. We seem to have gotten an extra paper, too, but that's only weird. It was later, after Grandma had gotten up, that there were real problems: she went into the bathroom and started having a spurting nosebleed. Philip got her back to bed with a roll of toilet paper to blot her nose, and I cleaned up the bathroom and started making phone calls. Summit Home Health Care told me to call the doctor, as he had to tell them before they could do anything. So, as instructed, I left a message. Then Grandma had me call Syd, and she and Ralph came over while I was getting dressed. They kicked me out to walk to the dog, and when I got back at nine-fifteen Philip had taken Grandma to the emergency room.

There followed a quiet afternoon of taking phone calls, and reading (or computing) in between. There was a call from Carole, Uncle Chuck, and Linda from the home nurse supply place, which last came just as I heard them getting into the garage. Grandma was very unsteady, so we got her to her room, and then fed her, and then she went to bed. Later in the afternoon she called a conference; its conclusion was that we'll continue here until next week. I had wondered if this would happen, back when I was beginning to get into going-home mode. Oh well. At least now I have a chance at going to the barbecue tomorrow night.

It was nice and cool when we larked; down on the road I even wondered if I would want a sweater, but I knew I'd warm up. I did, but not much--it was comfortably cool the entire time. The trail was pretty busy. We ran into the Serious Conversation couple at the beginning of the trail, then went without meeting anyone until the turn under the trees just before the pond. There we ran into about five young men/older teens. One was carrying a guitar case. The happily conversing knot reformed into a polite single file to let me pass; come to think of it, it was rather as if the teacher had come in. Hm. I got clear of them and stopped to whistle for Lark; her arrival was signaled by a startled shout behind me before she came tearing down the path. I wish very much I'd seen it when she erupted from the underbrush right next to someone. I can imagine it, but I wish I'd seen it. With our company reunited we advanced to deal with the couple ahead of us, (presumably dating) teenagers. The boy was bent over something, a cellphone, perhaps, as he walked along; the girl accompanied him silently. I don't think they noticed us once: we never passed them, as they passed our turnoff before I had to modify my pace to stay behind, and they never looked back. Probably they attributed my whistle to the boys. After those two we saw no one, but we could hear the boys' rowdy conversation all the way to the Heller Center, where it sounded as though they were in the summer house-thingy-building. I did not stay to investigate, as it was very nearly full dark.

After we got home I wrestled with the computer for a bit, then gave up on the agonizingly slow internet and went to make a float. Philip caught me on my way to the kitchen and dragged me down to the sitting room to, he said, exercise. There was a four-minute song, and we were to exercise until the end of the song. We started with pushups, standing up and raising our arms after each one. I think we made it to fifteen, with Philip waiting as I lagged. After that was crunches, touching elbows to opposite knees until my abs were jelly. Finally, to fill the time until the song ended, we did bridges. This is Philip's name for getting into the pushup stance and going down on elbows, with forearms planted on the floor. I think he interlaced his fingers, but I just made fists. I gritted my teeth and held it until the song ended, when I collapsed. Lark was so worried that the traditional post-torment snuggle ended with her on my stomach. She can just about deal with pushups and situps, those being more or less familiar, but anything else is most worrisome.

After that we made floats and watched Castle episode 3, which had for its theme teenagers in (or making) trouble. The downfall of our high-school mastermind was pretty lame. I'm still trying to determine whether it was so on purpose--he was a pretty obnoxious kid.

I finished Candide after that; the ending was pretty good--rather better than anything I'd expected. Started Waverley, then went to bed.

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