It Was a Dark and (Clear, Cold) Night

It was a perfect total-eclipse-of-the Moon-viewing night last night. Temps in the mid-40s, no clouds. Orion hanging up there along with Canis Major and Taurus. Jupiter off in the distance. I went out about 1:30 as the eclipse was just starting and watched the crescent shadow slide slowly across the lunar face. After about 20 minutes I went back inside and came out again with my brother at 3:00 for the totality. I could hear some neighbors down the street talking quietly on their front lawn. The Moon was almost black with deep ocher undertones and a lighter golden tinge only around the edges. In the shading I got the sense of the Moon as a three dimensional world and not merely a disk. The deep darkness of totality brought out a slew of lesser stars that had been hidden by the full moon light: Pleiades and such as.

The silence, the darkness, the slow inexorability of the event itself put me in one of those states where I can feel and sense the Universe. I can see the relative positions of the Sun, Moon and Earth. I can feel the orbital motions and trace their paths. I can feel the curves of space-time holding me to the planet, the planet within the solar system and that within the galaxy. And I know, within me, inexpressibly, the grand laws and structures that underlie the whole beautiful assemblage.

And everything is right, for a while.

Lucidity!! I'm Ho-o-ome!!

One of the more depressing things about Mom's Alzheimer's is realizing just how aware she can be about what she is missing/losing. Yesterday she opened her date book to look for her sister's address and realized she had written her sister's name but our address.

"Why did I do that?" she asked. "I must be losing my mind."

Well, yes Mom, you are.

She knows she can't find the words she intends. She knows she has to be told things over and over--and they still won't stick. I am, quite frankly, amazed she does not get more frustrated than she does, but then one of the advantages of a shortening attention span is that this, too, shall pass. Fairly quickly.

Last night she tried looking up my middle brother's phone number in her calculator and then attempted to dial him on the TV remote. She was very accepting when I pointed out to her why she was having problems getting through.

She sighed and said, "I wish I still had a brain."

So do I, Mom. So do I.

Mom-Sequiturs

MOM (While reading a National Geographic article on Alaska): "Can you imagine all the natural wealth up there? If you had a million dollars you could become rich in Alaska."

Rime Time

In the 30s at walk time this morning. I noticed, all along the way, in the north facing, shadowed, low-lying patches of grass a light white dusting, like confectioner's sugar on spinach*. All the birds were sensibly hidden away as well, except for a few mourning doves huddled hopefully high above the empty cracked corn container.

*Yes, it's supposed to be a disgusting, inappropriate image. Just like frost in south Florida.

Hawks and Doves

Out walking in the 43 degree pale dawn sunlight and realized the local hawk was standing not more than ten feet away from me in the burrowing owl "enclosure." (The staked out area that tells the city maintenance crews were not to mow.) We stared at each other for a couple of moments before it came to me:

"You're not. . .hunting . . . OWLS!? Are you?"

He looked at me, then one of the burrows, then back at me and slowly took off to land on a telephone pole across the street. So, that was my answer, I guess.

I backtracked a little from my walk, later, to see if he had gone back to the owl site but there was no sign of him.

I mean, for crying out loud, there are two to three dozen mourning doves just down the street hanging out on the telephone lines overlooking the bin of cracked corn the elderly couple put out for the Muscovy ducks every morning. Go have some pigeon for breakfast!

A Chilling Dose of Reality

The weather has turned cold--for here. About 20 degrees below normal for this time of year: mid 40s at night high 60s during the day. My brother has this thing about not turning on the heat--reasonably enough as it never gets this cold in southern Florida and the house is not properly insulated for these temperatures, and it's (extremely expensive) electric heat, and (since the heat was never intended to be used) the house was designed with the heating/cooling vents high up on the walls. Because cool air descends the air conditioning in the summer works just fine. But since hot air rises everything goes right up to the peak of the cathedral ceiling and then seeps out of the house. Last year he got a bill for one month for $300.

Mom, of course, put on a sweater when the temps dropped below 80 back in October. Now she wears multiple layers, uses an electric blanket at night (when I remind her she has one and point it out to her) and sits in front of a quartz heater during the day. She claims to be comfortable and by afternoon the house has warmed up to the point where she discards most of layers.

This particular "cold" spell should last another week or so.

The trade-off is crystal clear cloudless deep skies, soft dry breezes and sunlight in the trees. Yeah, worth it.

Where the Rotting Things Are

So, this morning a vulture landed in the neighbor's back yard gliding in on its four/four-and-a-half foot wingspan exactly as if it was still a thousand feet up right until it was its own height above the ground and then dropping as gentle as could be and walking over behind some bushes so I couldn't see what had attracted it in the first place. It immediately took off again, from a standing start, which is impressive for a creature that large, circled, came in again, disappeared behind the bush and took off a second time. It's shadow as passing over the yard was worthy of a Nazgul.

The vultures are back in force all around the neighborhood and are flying quite low as a rule. I can't imagine there are that many dead things just lying around (opossum and cat were the last two I saw and that was weeks ago) but they sure seem attracted to a number of sites.

The Persistence of Telephony

Mom got a call the other day from her grandson, Dan, in Iraq. Although Dan's in the Navy he's on detached duty with the Army in Kurdistan. The Navy apparently taught him Arabic. He's a good and thoughtful grandson.

Anyway, Mom was, as always, thrilled by the call. They talked for a few minutes and when Dan hung up she gave the phone back to me. I checked to make sure he was off the line and placed it back in its cradle. Mom, however, continued talking to me as if she were still on the phone. She's done this a number of times and it's always a bit disconcerting because she's talking to me and the conversation makes sense and is appropriate but she acts like she's still on the phone.

So I said, "Dan's gone for now, Mom. I hung up the phone. There's no one there."

She said, "Oh. Well I guess I'd better hang up, too, then," and picked up the newspaper.

Mom-Sequiturs

Mom: Where are the scissors?

Me: Over there on the coffee table.

Mom: (Searches around on the coffee table and comes up with a magnifying reading glass.) Well, I guess I'll never know.

Me: Know what?

Mom: Whether I'm supposed to be using this or the scissors.

Me: Can't help you. I don't know what you're trying to do.

Mom: Me neither.

Our Version of Winter

Several of the homes in the neighborhood have these large, Mediterranean-looking pines which I have not yet been able to identify. They are up to fifty feet tall, very thin, with short regular branches that are set absolutely evenly up the trunk.

This morning a (small) flock of ibis flew in and perched together at the very top of the tallest one in the area. I know birds are very light for their size but these at least looked too big for the branches they occupied. The dozen or so birds were spaced evenly around the top half dozen branches and the tree swayed only a little.

They looked like snow capping the pine.

One Orbit

Hard to believe it's been a full year since coming to Florida.

Mom is worse off than when I got here but not as bad as she would be without the meds and attention. There is no way my brother could both work and keep an eye on her by himself. The Exelon patches seem to be working for the most part, although they are--at best--a holding action. Her physical strength has also improved somewhat. She definitely wants to do more and sometimes does.

The weather has run its full cycle and we are back in the dry season. Summer was not as bad as I imagined it would be but this time of year is glorious. Cool, dry, clear starry nights in the low sixties/upper fifties and warm, dry sunny days in the low eighties. Mom and I sit in the lanai and watch birds and butterflies and the breeze blowing through palm fronds. This is what it's all about.

The only thing missing is mountains. This place is sooo flat!

Art vs. Meaning

Mom has a long history of letter writing and still tries to compose notes to friends and family. For a while there, around the time she first fell down, she literally did not have the strength to put pen to paper. (She always blamed the pen and accumulated a handful of them, none of which, of course, "worked.")

Unfortunately, although she is now stronger, her cognitive skills are weaker. Now her writings are disjointed, repetitious and frequently illegible. Even she, re-reading her notes, realizes this. She does not let that stop her.

A couple of days ago, she spent the better part of an evening composing some sort of missive. I say "some sort of" because I have not been able to see it and probably never will. She wrote it partially on paper (I think) but mostly on the backs and fronts of several envelopes which she then sealed up and glued together using Elmer's. It's three or four envelopes thick, solidly built, red and white and yellow, with flaps sticking out here and there. As collage, it's beautiful. As communication, not so much. She addressed the outermost envelope with the name of an old friend and the friend's cell phone number. And there is no way to get inside it to see what she wrote without destroying it, which I shall not do.

Those writing scraps which I have seen and deciphered are generally bittersweet, filled with thanks for friends and family, love (especially for her grandchildren), and promises to write better letters when she gets well again.

Its Own Reward

I am sooo virtuous.

Not only did I vote today, I then proceeded over to the hospital for a platelet donation. I've got my sticker and my bandage and a new T-shirt and I am surrounded by clouds of the sweetest smelling self-satisfied smug you could imagine.

I think I shall be insufferable for the rest of the day.

Hallowe'en Treats

Our yard and Neighbor Dan's yard were all done up and lit for the event. Cars have been slowing and stopping all week long to take pictures of the displays, especially my brother's cat.

Normally, kids come up the driveway to the walk and thence to the front door. Mom sits on the couch and doesn't really get to see the costumes. This year was a little different.

Rather than usual, we put up a table at the head of the driveway. Mom came out and sat behind the table where she could see every little ghostie and ghoulie (and Batman and ninja and pirate and three-foot-tall twin Supermen). The sky was cloudless and the air dry. The sun disappeared turning the palms into finely serrated, sharp cretaceous silhouettes against a pink background fading to steel gray-blue.

My brother's girlfriend came over to help. Neighbor Dan had friends over and put on a barbecue in his driveway to which he invited us. The pillaging started slowly and we gave away too much too soon on the assumption we would all be in diabetic comas from the leftovers, otherwise. Two great waves of looters hit the neighborhood after dark (I wouldn't be surprised if they came in buses and campers) and we ran out of goodies by 8:15. The last of the mini Huns and Visigoths finally departed around 9. All told, I think we treated 80+ kids of various ages and species.

Mom sat through most of it and enjoyed herself immensely.

Mom-Sequiturs

Mom: I don't understand how it got dark so early today. (It's going on 10 pm and been dark for almost three hours now.)

Me: The days are getting shorter. It's close to winter.

Mom: Winter?! We haven't even had summer yet!

Me: It's the end of October. (Mind you, she's been admiring all the Hallowe'en decorations and sampling the candy for the past week.)

Mom: Well, I don't know what they do with the weather around here!

Me: . . ..

Things That Go Bump in the Night

Mom has suffered from insomnia on and off over the past two weeks. normally she gets up a couple of times during the night to go to the bathroom but this is different. This weekend she got up both nights around midnight (she normally goes to bed between nine and ten), fully dressed and asking where the daylight was. Saturday night she went back when I convinced her it was still the middle of the night but she was back again an hour later and stayed up on the couch 'til three. Sunday was almost as bad except she knew it was nighttime and she had insomnia. She stayed up until three again and only went to bed because my brother got up and chased her off to her room.

Last night she promised me she would not come out again (except for the normal bathroom breaks) and she kept her word. I don't know if she actually slept (we'd had a busy day, with a doctor's appointment and everything and she was very tired) but she kept her word.

I intend to ask the doctor if the accumulated effects of the Exelon patch might be giving her too much nervous energy and disrupting her sleep cycles.

Random Civic Duties

Mom voted yesterday. She can't get to the polling station so she gets an absentee ballot which she can not read because of her eyesight and can not fill out because she can't put enough pressure on the pen to completely fill in the ovals. I read the ballot to her.

There were seven or eight candidates for US senator, Republican (Tea) (currently under investigation for improper use of party funds), Democrat (payoffs, cushy job for his mom, etc.) and half a dozen independents including the current governor (ex-R (not Tea)). There were four or five candidates for governor including Republican (billion dollar Medicare fraud under investigation again, pleading the fifth 75 times), Democrat (current state CFO with all the baggage from failing state investments, bank shenanigans, etc.), Tea and independents. After that it got messy with a bunch of non-partisan races for county commission, school boards, flood control districts, a bunch of local and county judges, and half a dozen proposed constitutional amendments.

I read the list for each race to Mom, usually several times, and she'd say "That one!" She only managed to pick one major party candidate*. I know she was faking it because she'd make some comment along the lines of "I've heard of him before," or "I like that one," when I know there had never been a single ad or flyer for that candidate. I suspect, in some of the lesser races, she could be the only vote some of these guys might get.

She got tired half way through so she never even voted for any of the judges which is just as well since she finally admitted to not knowing who any of them were.

*So now my vote for that office will be cancelled out by hers. It could've been worse.

False Alarms

Took Mom to the doctor yesterday. She had been complaining over the weekend of a specific physical condition and we agreed I would call first thing Monday and set an appointment. The doctor's office was kind enough (and the condition was concerning enough) to give us 3:15 the same afternoon.

When we got into the examination room, however, she insisted everything was fine, denied any knowledge of the problem and claimed she had complained only of her eyesight (for which we had seen the eye doctor less than a week earlier and received some drops for a dry cornea). They took some vitals and everything was normal. I apologized. They nodded knowingly. We went home.

Mom said nothing on the way home or sitting on the couch until after dinner.

All is well, for now.

Adventures in Fine Dining

So I'm just finishing my dinner and I look across to Mom just in time to see her sticking a forkful of Kleenex into her mouth. There were more bits of Kleenex spread across her plate and covering her food.

Mom got into the habit a while ago of covering her food and drinks to keep them hot and/or cold. She started by covering her coffee cup with a piece of paper and has slowly progressed to using cardboard, washcloths, even tissues. I have pointed out to her that (with the possible exception of cardboard on a coffee cup) none of these procedures will keep her food from going to room temperature, and most will just end up making a mess. She is not deterred.


I yelled, "Mom! Stop that! What're you doing?" She seemed genuinely surprised to realize she was eating Kleenex. I literally pulled the one piece from her mouth and carefully picked the others from her plate and she continued with her dinner. When I asked why she had done it, she couldn't explain. (I know why, I just wanted to know if she did.)

I don't want to take it personally, but I do kind of wonder if it's worth making chicken Alfredo from scratch if everything tastes like tissue paper to her.

The Horror! The Horror!

I suppose I should be thankful that it is, at least, October, not June or July, but the Hallowe'en decorations are starting to go up. Specifically, Neighbor Dan from across the street was out yesterday afternoon installing not one but two giant blow-up haunted castles on his front lawn along with a giant blow-up ghost and a couple of blow-up pumpkins. And this just the start.

This is, of course, my brother's fault. He gets all sappy when it comes to almost every holiday and confessed that Neighbor Dan never put up decorations at all until after he saw my brother's inflatable menagerie. Also, Neighbor Dan is not, technically, the first to install, even this year, since my brother bought two new inflatables and "tested" one to make sure it worked properly.

It's a fifteen foot tall black cat with six inch claws and a painted Cheshire cat grin on a head that swivels from side to side. It's lit from within, the tail sticks straight up and you can walk under the arched belly. He "tested" it in September. Mom came out and down the driveway to get a good look at it. Apparently, he also bought a blow-up hearse. Haven't seen that one, yet.

They're Baaack!, or, The Return of The Birds

Hah! Two movie refs in one title!

During the height of the Hot/Rainy Season most of the birds seemed to disappear. I haven't mentioned vultures or raptor tornadoes because they simply weren't there. No parrots, no mockingbirds. For a while (after a week of torrential downpours that raised the water table to about a foot below surface level) even the owls were nowhere to be found. Now the humidity has dropped, the temperature has dropped and the birds are back!

Including really ugly Muscovy ducks and . . .

. . .some sort of black duck, possibly female Gadwalls or maybe young Mallards and

the local neighborhood Red Shouldered Hawk . . .

. . .which I last saw sitting in a concrete faux-fountain birdbath on somebody's front lawn.

Best of all the owls are back (if they ever really left). Three different sites along my morning walking route have at last four different owls in them (total).

So all is right with (this little corner of) the world!

Mom-Sequiturs

Re: the Tampa Bay/Kansas City game last night as she was getting up to go to bed:

"Well, I hope whoever's playing wins."

Mom, the Anarcho-Libertarian Philosopher

We just recently increased (doubled) the dosage of the Excelon patches Mom uses to slow the Alzheimer's and I think it's working. (The reason the patches start on lower dosages is because one of the side effects is "psychotic episodes"(!!) which we, fortunately, did not experience. Anyway. . .) I don't think any of what follows would have been possible before the patches.

I had the most interesting "conversation" with Mom the other day. She had become thoroughly bored with the game on TV so I turned it off. Her eyesight and attention span don't allow her to follow the games anymore and everything runs together and seems never-ending to her. (See Mom-sequiturs .)

With the TV off, she kept talking. At first it seemed like she was complaining about the no longer visible game. Her complaints usually run along the lines of "Who decides that (X) should go with (Y)?" And I explain that "X" is the game but "Y" is just a commercial and has nothing to do with who's up next or the current score. Or "Y" is a preview/review/instant replay. This time we went in a different direction.

Mom: I don't understand who makes these decisions.

Me: What decisions? (This is usually a bad question and most often I just ignore the opening.)

Mom: The decision about who should make the decision.

Me: (O.K., this is a little meta. Obviously, she's not going to let this go.) Different people make different decisions about different situations.

Mom: Absolutely! But we're not happy with what's going on. I guess life is supposed to be like that. Is one person supposed to be in charge of everything? We should choose our own way or leader and if that makes you happy, good! Be happy!

Me: (Are we still complaining about the composition of the TV program? These conversations seldom have a defined subject.) Are you asking me if I have any ideas, because I'm not sure what you're talking about.

Mom: (Laughs.) Live our own lives and don't pay attention to anyone else. Everyone do as he wishes . . . as long as you don't hurt anyone else. I'd like to see how the program ends.

Me: What program? (Surely, she doesn't want the game back on?)

Mom: What's good for you and what you should do. That plant out there in the yard, taller than anyone else. I don't see why that makes it any better. And you can get awfully tired discussing this because there is no answer.

Me: . . ..

Mom: If there is a particular item in charge, I don't want to know about it.

Me: (Item? I'm not sure I want to get into a theological debate this late in the evening.)

Mom: I like to think we're happier with the more people we know and are in contact with.

I agreed and went to get her another cup of coffee. By the time I got back the topic was closed. We changed her patch, did her eye drops, and she went off to bed. A good place to end it anyway.

Mom-Sequiturs

Sometimes Mom says things for which I have no response. We were watching the Notre Dame football game Saturday:

"For all the years this (current) game has been going on, I don't think I've ever seen anyone win."

And the Tampa Bay game Sunday:

"They're not even playing hard enough to warm me up. I need to put my sweater on. I told them that two years ago."

The Destruction of the Language Is a (Continuous and) Subtle Thing

Since this is Florida, dependent on tourism and therefor acutely aware of rain, hurricanes, and other forms of weather, we watch the reports which local TV obsesses about. The station we watch, the local NBC affiliate brags that Haley Webb, their weather lady, not only "tells you where it's raining," but then goes on to tell you "where it's going to rain!"

Well, duh. I thought that was the whole purpose of weather reports and always had been. They seem inordinately proud of the obvious.

The worst part, though, is that telling you what's going on now is apparently considered the "forecast." Telling you what will happen is now called the "futurecast."

The sad part is, I'm sure these idiots have no idea what's wrong with their choice of words. At all.

Anthony! Anthony!!

Anthony was a little kid living in Boston's North End whose mother would call from the townhouse window, summoning him home to a fine 1950s-'60s style weekly pasta dinner made from Prince spaghetti, because "Wednesday is Prince spaghetti day!" As a kid growing up watching TV in those days, I wondered why Wednesday was so special. I've finally figured it out.

It's not just because a dedicated pasta day would sell more Prince spaghetti.

It's because, now that I've taken up cooking the daily dinner for Mom and myself, I finally realize how difficult it is to come up with something new and interesting to eat every single day! Seriously. There are just so many variations on a theme (and a more limited theme than when I was cooking just for myself). I'm helped partially by Mom's short term memory losses but I really don't want to have to count on that to get me by.

Telephonics

So. . .. One of Mom's docs (the dermatologist) called this morning. I was expecting a call from the neurologist who left a message yesterday wanting her to go back to the hospital to get more tests done, but didn't say which ones or why, so I called back but got voice mail and now it's their turn again, which (along with Mom's deafness and confusability and the fact that telemarketers still manage to call sometimes) is why I tend to intercept her phone calls which she is perfectly happy to let me do. So I did.

The doctor was very nice (I've met him since I've started going in to Mom's appointments with her) but refused to tell me why he called because I'm not officially on her need-to-know HIPAA list.

So I handed off the phone to her. The doctor had to yell so loud that I heard everything from my chair three feet away anyway.

Her biopsy came back clean. She's good for another six months (on that front anyway).

Life in the Real World

This is how you tell you're not in Zion any more: The local supermarket circular has literally a full page spread on Kosher specials for Rosh Hashanah. With multiple competing brands. And little tag lines on other items throughout the six pages of the ad noting "Kosher for the Holidays." No getting uncomprehending looks since there's no need to ask in the first place.

That, and a distinct lack of blondes.

Happy New Year!

Good Days, Bad Days

The Excelon may be working. It's hard to tell. Some days Mom is totally together, coherent, verbal with little or no word loss and others (yesterday, I'm looking at you) . . .. She couldn't figure out where the newspaper article ended or how--or why--to turn the page to continue the story, and couldn't understand that slicing up the paper with nail clipper scissors wouldn't solve the problem. She got very frustrated and kept saying, "I just don't understand how to do this. Where am I supposed to cut this?"

The good side of it is she forgets fairly quickly when she's in this mode and so put the paper down, sat for a few minutes, picked up a magazine and everything was fine.

The bad part is, at least while the behaviors remain harmless, these situations are pretty funny (after the fact). I'm probably not accumulating any Karma by laughing (but never out loud or when she's around).

At least she still appreciates my cooking.

The Diagnosis

So. We went to the doctor a week ago Tuesday to get the results of the CAT scan. Mom was not having one of her better days. The good news: No bleeding in the brain. No stroke. The bad news: Alzheimer's. Officially. And fairly well advanced, too. So there's no going back, now. The doctor said best case, 2-3 years, worst case, one, before she is incapable of taking any care of herself.

He did give us a prescription to try, Excelon, which is a daily patch. She's been very happy to use it. It can not reverse the plaque damage but it can stabilize the situation for a while. Doc said it will take a week or so to see any changes but I think I see minor improvements in her reasoning and verbal abilities already.

Could also be wishful thinking. (A long-range placebo effect? Her medication makes me think she's getting better?)

A Word to the Wise

I've noticed recently that most of the birds that were hanging around the neighborhood seem to be gone. The mottled ducks are still up at the north end of the road by the canal and most of the burrowing owls are still there, but no ibis, vultures or parrots and hardly any doves, crows, mockingbirds, etc. I presume nesting season is over and most of them are just off somewhere but it is weird to walk around at dawn in silence.

The neighborhood falcon is still here, though. This morning he was sitting on the telephone line in a front yard at the end of my street. We stared at each other as I walked directly beneath him. As I went by a squirrel came down the driveway toward me, obviously oblivious to the raptor over his head. He was coming from behind the hawk so the bird didn't see him either. I stopped, pointed and yelled at the squirrel, "You idiot! Look up!!" He froze. I continued on a little way, then turned around. The squirrel was gone.

The falcon saw me coming back and swooped off the wire, diving down to my height before gliding up to the top of the nearest telephone pole. As soon as he did, the squirrel popped out from under some ground cover planted along the driveway and took off.

The falcon is not that big and the squirrel was probably more than he wanted to deal with, but still, it's nice to know the rodent paid attention to my warning.

"If They Want Me To Get Well, Why Do They Want to Make Me Mad?"

That was Mom's question Sunday evening when reminded of her appointments for Monday and Tuesday this week.

My answer: "That's how they tell you're still alive."

Her response: "They should leave me alone and just guess."

Mom actually had a pretty good weekend. A fair amount of energy and the ability and desire to get up and around the house a bit. She's been going to bed an hour earlier which may be helping. A friend of hers form her old ceramics classes stopped by on Sunday. The woman, Ruthie, had called earlier but neither of them could hear the other on the phone so she just showed up on our front step. They had a nice visit for about twenty minutes or so and Mom was really animated.

Mom's second grandson, Dan, called from Iraq Monday afternoon. He'd called Sunday night but Mom had gone to bed early so he and I talked for awhile and he tried again Monday. He's part of the 50,000 "non-combat" troops still there. He's up in Kurdistan, going on patrol "arresting" bad guys. Technically the Army does the "arresting and he's Navy, but he speaks Arabic ("What's your name?", "What are you doing?", "Lie face down.", "Eat gravel.", the sorts of things that will be totally useless if he ever goes touristing in Egypt or Morocco) so he's the official translator. When he hung up I said, "Wow. A phone call all the way from Iraq! How about that?" Mom said, "Considering what's going on over there, I really don't want phone calls from Iraq." She wants Dan back here in the States.

When the home health nurse asked her questions, she got the date and year wrong, although she knew Obama is president. She also knows she wants her grandson back from Iraq. I'd say her mind is holding the important stuff just fine.

Creative Cuisine

Yesterday I came home to find Mom had tried to make herself some supper. My brother had left out a can of soup for her to heat up (she loves soup almost anytime, so I'm sure it was at her request) but she was too weak to open it. Instead, she went rummaging through the refrigerator and found a leftover bowl of "soup."

She tried heating it up in the microwave but with no luck. So she heated up some water and added that to the "soup." Even that didn't help and it tasted pretty bland according to her. There was still an inch of broth in the bottom of the bowl when I got home. I asked her about it and she explained the problems she'd had. I offered to fix her something else but she wasn't interested in a meal so after some negotiations we settled on a PB&J on toast.

As I brought the bowl back to the kitchen I noticed the veggies floating in the bottom were actually lettuce, cucumbers and carrot slices. She had tried to transmogrify a salad into soup.

When my brother got home and I told him about this we both laughed so I know when a get to Hell, at least I won't be alone.

A Question of Timing

The nice young woman from Home Health Services came by Thursday. Mom was very nervous about her visit.

The nurse was scheduled to come by at noon. The night before, Mom told me she didn't think the nurse would show up because she'd told Mom on the phone that she'd be here "at 12," and then changed the time and told her "noon," and then changed the time again and told her "about 12" so Mom had no idea when she might show up. I tried, but there was no way I could make Mom understand.

Mom went to bed a little early Wednesday night. An hour and a half later she was up and dressed and coming down the hallway asking, "Didn't that girl come by?" I said, "It's not noon. It's 12 midnight. She won't be here for another twelve hours yet." Mom looked out the window but still didn't believe me. I'm afraid I took advantage of her recent, more compliant personality and just said, "You need to turn around, get undressed and go back to bed." She did.

The visit went off fine. The nurse showed up fifteen minutes early and took Mom's history and vitals (Mom couldn't answer what year or season it is although she did get the day and date right and knew Obama is president) and timed her as she got up and walked across the living room and back to the couch. She'll be back Monday and will set up a schedule for the physical therapist.

The CAT scan is scheduled for Tuesday.

Mom, Me and the Doc

So, after our trip to the emergency room on Saturday, we set up an appointment with Mom's doctor for Tuesday morning. I decided I would sit in on this one since I didn't think Mom would be able to explain everything that had happened. I was right. When he asked, "So, what's the problem?" she said "Oh, just the usual," to which I replied, "No, no, no," and explained the situation.

His diagnosis? Parkinson's-like symptoms (weakness, tremor, memory loss, etc.), possible bleeding in the brain. He says the new prescription should have had nothing to do with this. He's ordered a CAT scan, a visit from Home Health Services, and an appointment with a neurologist.

I think we may be making progress. If there is bleeding in the brain, I don't know how they'll stop it. Are there drugs for this? I can't see anyone ordering brain surgery on a 90-year-old woman. If we can stop it, is the damage reversible? All the fight is going out of Mom. She's becoming this very amenable, pliable, almost obsequious personality--which is not my Mom!

My Mom is feisty, argumentative, take-no-guff, opinionated--and I'd like her back, please.

It's a Big Building Full of Doctors...

...but that's not important, now.

What is important is that I took Mom to the ER Saturday. She didn't have the energy to get off the couch in the morning and kept saying, "I want to go to the hospital." So we called her doctor's office and got the on-call physician who said we could go now or wait until Monday but recommended we go now, so we did.

I do have to say that the admitting staff at Cape Coral Hospital Emergency Room are some of the nicest, friendliest, most helpful folk it has been my pleasure to run across in the medical profession. i talked to the screener who thought Mom was just the sweetest thing and offered to adopt her. True, we caught them at a slow point. Mom had to sign some paperwork and they were very understanding when she was too weak to finish her signature. They accepted her scrawl and let me finish the information part. After taking her history, we were told to return to the waiting room until an examination room was ready but before we could move a nurse came up and said, "I just saw the request pop up on my computer. Come this way. We have a room ready for you." It was a long ride on the seat of her walker. We should have taken a real wheelchair.

We were there for most of the afternoon. They ran a battery of tests on her, but mostly she just lay on the examining couch being bored even though staff popped in on a regular basis to see how she was doing. The tests all came back reasonably normal. They gave us a hard copy and we went home. In the parking lot on the way to the car Mom said, "Well whose idea was that, anyway?" I told her it was the doctor's idea. She would've vehemently denied it if I had said it was her own.

I made dinner and we made plans to call her doctor first thing Monday morning.

The Open Road

I am pleasantly surprised to notice the number of cars out on the road with their windows rolled down, almost ten per cent by my rough estimate. Considering it's 78F before sunrise and 95F or more after and 90+ humidity all day. And it's not just older vehicles, either (although even the oldest cars have air-conditioning down here). Several were newer SUVs.

Are there that many Floridians concerned about the mileage differential? Or Freon (sorry, tetrafluoroethane) usage? Or are they just the real natives who don't notice the heat/humidity and enjoy the wind in their faces?

Fun With Pills, the Final Chapter

Mom and I have agreed for her to stop taking this latest prescription, the one that took her legs out from under her. She's supposed to be taking two pills a day, one in the morning and one in the evening, but she's been cheating and only taking one a day, either a.m. or p.m. Even so, they've been knocking her out. since she started on them I've noticed a definite physical weakening, loss of energy and diminished reasoning. It's scary watching her deteriorate like this.

Last night she took a pill and confessed it was the first time she'd taken the prescribed dosage, one in the morning and one at night. She could barely stand. It took several attempts with both hands and me helping to get her off the couch. I had to help her into the bathroom (she managed to get back out on her own, which surprised me since I had pushed her walker in there and didn't think she could reach the door with it in the way). She went directly to bed from there without watching the end of the ballgame and I had to help her with her pajamas. She told me to leave her door open until I went to bed. I told her we weren't going to take any more of those pills.

This morning, she got up on her own, and could carry on a coherent conversation. Her voice is much stronger and she seems to have more energy (this is obviously a relative concept). She is very relieved not to be taking this prescription any longer. I will be calling the doctor to explain the situation. We have an appointment next week.

Ice Cream, Mangoes & Mom

Mom's getting weaker. She hardly walks anywhere now without the walker. Today she changed her mind about going down to the end of the driveway to get the mail. She's also forgetting more words and having more trouble putting sentences together. (When she originally said she wanted to get the mail, I said "If you're up for it," and she was unable to parse that.)

She asked if she could have some of "my" ice cream (a "big favor") and I reminded her that it is "our" ice cream and she can have as much as she wants whenever she wants. She had tired herself out peeling and chopping mangoes. We're getting a nice crop this year and every morning, especially after a titanic thunderstorm like last night, there are a few more on the ground. I fixed her a dish of the chocolate chip cookie dough because she doesn't like plain chocolate.

This weakness and confusion has accelerated/become more noticeable since she started the new medication. I'm going to ask the doctor if that might be contributing. I really hate to see her deteriorating so quickly.

Hawk's Breakfast

Haven't mentioned hawks recently because, since about the last mention, they have all disappeared, gone north I presume, where there is more temperature variation and thus better thermals to ride. So I was surprised to see on one of my walks recently a hawk perched on the shingled roof of a house calmly tearing apart his feathered breakfast. He was surrounded by a disapproving chorus of smaller birds (also on the roof but safely out of range). He did not let their raucous insults disturb his dining experience.

Saw him again this morning, perched on an electric line. Fourteen/eighteen inches head-to-toe, two feet head-to-tail tip. Far too large to look comfortable on a wire. I walked right under him. He was staring intently at a nearby tree and, again, a number of smaller birds had set up a perimeter around him and were sending out warnings. No doubt there's a nest in that tree.

Suburban Zombie Dog-Walking Lady, Part 3

I have discovered the lair of the zombie dog-walking lady. It's at the furthest point of my walk before I begin the loop back. I have varied the timing of my walks (more by accident than design) and--arriving early one morning--discovered it standing by the circular drive, still, unmoving, looking for all the world like a giant, white, overweight, female jockey boy statue holding the reins to the dog. (So, just like one of those obnoxious jockey boy statues except for the giant, white, overweight female part.) It did not move an inch as I went past.

The house is strange but in a very subtle way. It is single story, as so many others in the neighborhood are, but with a roof that rises to the level of a two story structure without gables or skylight. It also has a half turret appendage attached to the back. (The back abuts an empty lot which in turn faces another road that is part of my walk so I can, between the two see the entirety of the place.) It can not be hollow under those huge eaves. No one would be crazy enough to heat or cool all of that empty space.

Since no house in south Florida has a basement, the water table being far too high, the only logical conclusion is that the reanimation lab is tucked up under the roof, invisible to the casual observer.

I have never seen lights on in this place, nor a car in the driveway. Since any closer inspection will involve either deception or trespass, I am not sure where to take the investigation from here.

The Anti-Feng Shui House

There is a house along the route of my morning walk which has, for it's front yard, a planting of trees and shrubs which is almost but not quite perfectly misaligned, misplaced, mis-spaced and mis-selected to produce not just a space that is impossible to appreciate--or use--but impossible even to walk by without an inward shudder for the lack of artistry, design--grace even.

I say "almost but not quite perfectly" because to say otherwise would imply intent, consciousness and awareness to the planter of this monstrosity. And there was a planter. This is not a happenstance of nature. Nature, indifferent though it may be, is natural. There is nothing natural in this layout*. The precise misplacement of each item proclaims its anti-naturalness. Yet there is a sincerity to the place that precludes one from proclaiming "Here be Irony!"

*Besides, when this town was originally laid out, the entire peninsula was scraped down to the limestone. Perhaps one in 10,000 of the original trees was spared.

Chemical Weapons

Mom "discovered" lots of bugs of various kinds in the house today. Mostly flies and palmetto beetles. They call them palmetto beetles because admitting that cockroaches can grow that big is really depressing. Anyway, Mom sprayed and sprayed all over the bathroom and kitchen, attacking each bug individually and effectively drowning them. Then I took her to the eye doctor.

When we returned I noticed the spray can sitting on the kitchen counter and asked her, "Is this the stuff you used to kill the bugs this morning?" She said "Yes, it is. I couldn't find the regular can."

She'd sprayed them all with Pledge.

We have the shiniest cockroaches in the neighborhood.

Fun With Pills Followup

The doctor's office called this morning in response to Mom's call to him regarding her collapse. At first they suggested taking her off the new meds since this is a known side effect, but when I explained she had accidentally double-dosed herself and we had taken her off for one day and then restarted with the proper dosage and everything seemed fine they said "O.K., keep going and just monitor the situation."

Mom says she can tell the new pills are working and is now very happy with them. Her legs are gaining strength (relatively speaking) and she went down to the mailbox this morning.

All is well.

Fun With Pills

My brother came home a couple of evenings ago to find Mom on her knees in front of (and facing) the couch unable to raise herself. He helped her up and got her settled in her usual spot, had a quick bite to eat and then headed out to work. He met me in the driveway just coming home and was obviously still freaked out by the incident.

I had taken Mom to the doctor on Friday. (Same packed overnight bag because "I won't be home for dinner tonight. He'll send me to the hospital for a procedure" which, of course, never happened because all he did was write out a new prescription. I'm learning to just let the drama ride.)

She had double dosed the new prescription. They're small pills and/or she misread the instructions so she took two at once instead of two per day (one every twelve hours). Shortly after that she lost all feeling in her legs and went down for the count. She was probably on the floor for about fifteen minutes before Bob came home.

When I talked to her about it, she at first admitted taking two pills but after "thinking it over" (and not liking to be caught doing something dumb) reconsidered and was "sure" she had only taken one and needed to call the doctor to tell him the prescription wasn't going to work. Since it was the weekend, that would have to wait until Monday. I fixed dinner for both of us and we watched the baseball game. Over the course of the evening, the feeling slowly came back to her legs and she was able eventually to get to the bathroom and bed on her own (with the walker).

Later that evening, I counted the remaining pills. There were 180 in the prescription (a three month supply!). There were 178 in the bottle.

Leftovers

Mom decided to clean out the fridge and make dinner from leftovers. She tore up a couple of slices of bread and mixed it with ground beef to make a kind of meatloaf, except the bread chunks were huge and only stuck to themselves so they ended up the center of a bread ball with a meat shell. She then combined that with some pre-made patties and ended up mounding the "meatloaf" on the patties to make a kind of flat-bottomed dome-shaped meatball.

When these were black (she's recently gotten into the habit of putting things on the stove to cook and then walking away. The house smelled of burnt pizza crust for three days) she covered them in a sauce made entirely of concentrated tomato soup. Seeing as her sense of smell is pretty much gone (she hasn't noticed any of the burning odors) her sense of taste is going too, and since it looked like pasta sauce, she was satisfied.

She made enough for two.

The bottom pre-made patty turned out to be sausage, not beef.

Needed garlic. Otherwise, with plenty of baked beans and applesauce, it wasn't too bad. Not going to add it to my repertoire, though.

Failing Senses and Sharp Objects

Yesterday, Mom decided to cut up all the mangoes that have fallen over the last few days. With the daily thunderstorms and wind there have been a number of them and we've just been putting them in the refridgerator, so it was a good idea. Unfortunately, her eyesight is going so she peeled, mashed and pulped a peach along with the mangoes. With a very sharp knife.

Her eyes aren't the only things that are going. She's already lost most of her hearing and her sense of smell is pretty well shot (which means taste is dwindling, too). she can't hear the microwave dinging to let her know her coffee is ready. She can't smell the oil (or anything else) burning in the pan she put on the stove and then walked away from. I make it a point, when I fix dinner, to create a colorful presentation with tomatoes, carrots, various colored peppers, etc. and interesting shapes and sizes. I can't tell if she really tastes all the good stuff but she comments on how pretty the dishes look. That works at close range with big contrasts, anyway. I was surprised when we watched Fourth of July fireworks on TV and she remarked what a shame it was that they were broadcast in black and white!

Suburban Zombie Dog-Walkng Lady, Part 2

Encountered the SZD-WL again this morning. It was being led around by the aging shephard. I noticed the bandages are off its leg, which can mean only one thing...

Regeneration/reanimation is going on here! Which can mean only one thing...

There is a secret zombie regeneration/reanimation lab somewhere in the neighborhood!! Which can mean only one thing...

I have a mission! I must/will find that lab.

A Trip to the Doctor

Mom has a way of announcing things--just the headline, none of the details--that assumes we have discussed the subject before when, in fact, it is a completely new topic. Such as her 2:30 doctor's appointment which I found out about at 10:00 that morning when I was informed that if it was inconvenient for me, she would ask my brother to take her.

"Take you where?"

The appointment was not on her calendar. She had just made it that morning and had already packed an overnight bag with a change of clothes, a book and her pills (she takes surprisingly few pills for a woman her age) because the doctor would send her directly to the hospital from her* office for the procedure. The doctor was a substitute--her regular was on vacation. Mom informed me the doctor was a woman and her name was "Sue something, or maybe Dee. They don't speak clearly, there."

A trip to the hospital and a "procedure" were also news to me but I took her down to the doctor's office at the proper time where one of the names on the door was "Dr. D'Souza." Mr. Dr. D'Souza.

She was with Dr. D'Souza for the better part of an hour and I was mentally preparing myself for a trip to the hospital when she finally emerged with one new prescription, one old prescription cancelled and a note which she did not understand and did not show me until we got home.

So. Drama also cancelled.

When we got in the car she looked at the overnight bag, "It's a good thing I brought all those pills so the doctor knows what I'm taking." Of course, she had left the bag in the car. She also never mentioned the book or the change of clothes or any intention of staying at the hospital. So we went straight home where she showed me the note--which directed her to go to the hospital--where they would take and analyse a sample, a fifteen minute operation.

We go back to the doctor in three weeks.

Suburban Zombie Dog-Walking Lady

As the days have become longer and hotter (and humider(?), humidier(?), more humidous(?)) I have moved my morning walk earlier and earlier to stay just ahead of sunrise. I see occasional neighbors up and about, usually a kid or two waiting for a school bus (that's over for now) or adults leaving for work or walking their dogs. I've gotten to know a couple of the dogs (Hey, Gina, hi, Harry!). But there's one I have not been able to introduce myself to.

He's an elderly but still magnificent shepherd who walks the same route almost every morning trailing a short, rotund zombie lady behind him. I can tell she's a zombie because her eyes are beady and unfocused, staring straight ahead into the middle distance. Her head never turns; she acknowledges nothing in their path. She does not deviate from the established route. She does not speak when spoken to. Lately she's appeared with bandages wrapped around one leg. I suspect she might be deteriorating.

At first I thought she might be a normal human but all stuck up and snotty in that stereotypical suburban way but that would've meant she was annoying and obnoxious. Dealing with which is not how I want to start the day. Then I thought maybe she was terrified of everything or pathologically shy which was not merely depressing but pathetic and also an early morning downer to be avoided.

I have therefor concluded she is a zombie attached to the shepherd every morning by its owner and set loose to act as a counterweight to any ambitions the old dog might still entertain. The dog, of course, knows just how far he can go before he has to turn around in order to be home before the sun is fully risen and his zombie can no longer walk. He's too old (and she's too heavy) for him to be dragging her any distance.

This conclusion also has the benefit of allowing me a little entertainment during my walks.

Solstice Shadows

This being the longest day of the year is a perfect time to mention a phenomenon which is painfully obvious once observed yet something I had never encountered before living in the northern US and Europe:

Shadows below the Tropic of Cancer face south (at least from Spring to Fall).

Up north, boy scouts without compasses know they kind find their direction because moss grows on the north sides of trees--because sunlight never shines directly there. Up north, artists' garrets have north facing windows for the indirect light because the sun never shines on that side of the building. And just as the north sides of things are always shaded, shadows never face south. Except down here, they do.

Which is just subtle enough that it doesn't feel weird until you become consciously aware of it.

(And, yes, I know I'm not quite at the latitude of the Tropic, but the Sun is big and the effect kind of spills over.)

More Owls

We've had a successful burrowing owl season. The closest habitat to me had one owl all winter long. Another came around in the spring (Can't tell the males from the females so I don't know who moved in with whom.) and now there are three little ones as well. The youngsters are almost fully fledged except for white fluffy chests. The parents sit on their poles and the kids stay right by the burrows as I walk by except for one who always scuttles into the hole.

Lately, one of the adults has taken to perching on a mailbox across the street from the burrows in the morning as I walk by. An owly finial on the postal newel post, if you will. For the last two days it has perched there as I've walked past, just beyond arm's length but less than ten feet. Close enough to clearly see the yellow iris of its eyes. There is no fear in those eyes. A little disdain, maybe, but no fear.

There are three other occupied sites within a half mile of home, one of which--in the median of the road no less--also has young. So, as of now, the population I know of has basically doubled since last fall.

Act of God v. Graven Image

So...,

Is this evidence of God's non-existance, that lightning can strike, with impunity, His devotees' object of veneration, or

evidence that He's real and pissed at the violation of His Second Commandment?

Mom = 90

Today Mom is officially 90 years old. She has now lived longer than any other member of the family (so far). All in all, she's doing pretty well. I have noticed an increased deafness, and increased frailty. She will use her walker in the house now where before it was reserved for trips to the mailbox or excursions to one of her various doctors. She has more trouble keeping track of the details of our baseball games and yet will insist up and down that she is right even while admitting the whole rest of the world isn't wrong. She wins most of those arguments because she is 90 after all and, hey--why not?

My younger nephew, Dan, is here for the (extended) weekend before going back to Ft. Bliss and shipping out to Iraq. My brother and his girlfriend have planned the dinner--barbecue ribs and cake. I presume there will be other items on the menu. She's received congratulatory phone calls and presents from relatives and friends who can't be here and admitted to her kid sister (87) that it was astonishing to be 90.

I agree. Astonishing and wonderful.

Happy Birthday, Mom!!

Not Even Remotely Kosher

Good News!

The black blobby things washing up on our beaches here in South Florida are not BP tar balls. They're....

SEA PORK!!!

WTF!?!?

How the hell did this stuff ever get the name "Sea Pork"? Does it resemble the results of somebody's barbecuing attempt? Did somebody taste it? (Hint: go to page 6.) How have I lived this long without ever seeing or hearing of this?

(I'm also kind of curious to find out if there is anything anywhere that somebody won't eat.)

A Land of Choice

By my calculations Florida has over 180 different official license plates. That does not count things like state government plates, commercial plates, etc. The "standard" plate consists of an orange in the center with the tag line myflorida.com across the top and the name of the resident's county on the bottom. There are 67 counties in this state. All well and good, but....

There are currently 114 (soon to be 115) different vanity plates available. Everything from the expected "Won't Somebody Please Think of the Children" series ("Family Values," "Kids Deserve Justice," "Choose Life," and "Keep Kids Drug Free" among others) to the rather surprising "Imagine" with a Picasso-esque semi-abstract portrait of John Lennon in the middle. Some are environmental...and beautiful.

Thirty-six of them are just for the various universities and colleges in the state. Another 9 are for the pro sports teams. "University of Florida" is, by far, the Number 1 plate followed by "Helping Sea Turtles Survive." I am somewhat surprised that dolphins, panthers, manatees and reefs all beat out "Choose Life." I'm also surprised "Imagine" made the top half at number 45.

If you ever see a license plate you can not immediately identify...it's probably Florida.

The Mom Is a Harsh Manager

Mom likes baseball. A lot. Her favorite team used to be the Atlanta Braves. She knew all the players and their stories (not so much the stats) until they sold off some of her favorites and TBS stopped carrying the games. Now we watch the Tampa Bay Rays (formerly the Devil Rays but you know how dangerous it is to mention Ol' Scratch's name down here in the South. Think of the children.).

Actually, Mom likes a specific kind of baseball. Less than two hours with a score of 8-5 plus or minus 3. She was bored to tears by Dallas Braden's recent perfect game. She yells at the batters if they take to many pitches (regardless of where they might be in the strike zone) and yells at the pitchers for taking too long between pitches. She goes to bed at ten and the game had better be in the bag, if not over, by then. She has limited tolerance for failure. If you throw to first you'd better catch the runner. If you try to steal you'd better make it. Hit the ball. Catch the ball. There is no try, young Jedi. Only do or do not.

Mom On the Loose

Sometimes I feel bad about letting Mom go out to get the mail. She has to use the walker to get to the end of the driveway and back and she fumbles with the inner front door and the screen door coming and going. (They're just far enough apart for the walker to fit between on the "porch" but close enough that they each block her from opening the other.) On the other hand, she wants to do it and apart from puttering around in the kitchen it's about the only exercise she gets nowadays. Still, it's 90+ out there most days by the time the postal person shows up so I time her excursions (surreptitiously, of course) and check out the window (discreetly, of course) until she returns. Perhaps I am overly concerned. Yesterday she came back dragging a 40 gallon trash can behind her. I think it was a hint to my brother to finish weeding the walkway.

Green Parrots

Green parrots!!!

I looked out my window this morning and there were three green parrots in the not-jacaranda assiduously breaking off dead twigs (some rather large) with their beaks and then flying off to wherever their construction project is set up. They hopped up and down on the branches side-stepping in parrot fashion examining various bare limbs before grabbing a satisfactory one with their beaks and twisting back and forth until it broke off. They are very particular about only taking fresh-cut twigs. One bird cut a branch and dropped it before he could maneuver it into a balanced position for flight. He looked at it on the ground directly below and then went to cut another. I am told they are part of a resident flock living nearby but this is the first I have seen them.

I know it was the not-jacaranda the parrots were in because it was identified to me as such by the same people who originally told me it was a jacaranda and they should know. I will take their word for it. When it comes to plants I am at the mercy of experts. But I know a green parrot when I see one (or three)!

Update: Upon interrogation, the not-jacaranda admits to being a bougainvillea. For now.

Small World

So...I'm driving along minding my own business, pull up to a stop light and a voice behind me yells out, "Whereabouts in Utah you from?" Over my right shoulder (it's a two lane wide left turn lane) is on old guy in a beat up pickup truck, looks like either half his teeth are missing or he left his dentures home.

I smile and say, "Salt Lake." Traffic is packing in behind us.

He yells something about Murray and the 2002 Olympics. The vehicle ahead of me starts to go. I wave at him and we both just make the light. I lost sight of him at another light but three miles further on, as I'm pulling into the library parking lot I see his truck making the same turn. So I intercepted him at the front door.

Turns out Chuck used to have his own business installing telephone equipment here in Fort Myers until a friend made him an offer he couldn't refuse (California union rates to install stuff throughout Utah, Nevada and surrounding areas) and he moved to Brigham City, living with his Presbyterian pastor for a while, before moving to the apartment complex at State and Vine in Murray where he watched the twin chimneys come down and helped out in the Olympics when he wasn't taking off to travel all over the west. He's afraid of heights and doesn't like all the new buildings in Fort Myers, the tallest of which is 30 stories, since he'd never been more than five floors up in an elevator in the old days although he'd been 90 feet up a transmission tower (where his knees buckled and he left white-knuckled grip marks in the handrail by his own account). Right now he's recovering from a heart attack and cancer so he's in unwanted retirement but as soon as he has his strength he wants to move back to Utah. He loved the dry cold and the dry heat and his Mormon friends including the family with five kids three of whom married in the temple and the Jacks in Moab who knew how to party. (He really wants to go back to Moab.)

Some days I just love people.

Ceiling Lizard Is Watching You...

I love living in the sub-tropics.

Last night I turned on the bathroom light and noticed a strange shadow. The light is a three-panel fluorescent fixture built into a drop ceiling over the sink. (Very 80s.) The shadow was about four inches long with a tail and four legs. Somehow, one of the ubiquitous mini lizards that inhabit the place had gotten itself up into the light space. (Actually, it must have come down into the fixture from the attic/crawl space, but I can't figure out how it did that, either.) These lizards are adorable. They live in the lanai room, which is half open to the world, and in the front entryway as well as all through the garden. Their main occupations are puffing out their throat sacs (which are surprisingly large and delicate for the size of the animals--transparent with a visibly red vein system), and doing herky-jerky little lizard push-ups with their front legs.

I didn't want to make a lot of noise at that hour, so I left him there overnight. This morning he was still there so I started poking at the panels covering the lights with stick end of a plunger. I pushed up one panel until it got hung up on the frame and then started bopping the one the lizard was on until he couldn't stand it any longer and jumped. It took several tries but eventually he fell through the crack and landed in a wicker soap basket on the toilet tank. From there he leapt onto a nice big round natural sponge on the side of the tub. I was able to pick up the sponge and walk out of the bathroom before he panicked. Then he ran up my arm.

He froze halfway up. I felt little lizard feet on my skin and immediately regressed to eight years old. "Cool!" I thought. "I wonder if I can keep him?"

Adult me said, "No," so I carried him on my arm very slowly to the front door where he saw daylight and jumped for it. I did notice before he left that his tail was already bobbed from some previous misadventure.

Mom, meanwhile, never noticed the lizard or his shadow, neither did she hear me banging away at the light fixture. I had to tell her about it twice and then she allowed as something like that had happened twenty years ago, too, and Dad took care of it.

I Want To Believe

I "saw" the Space Shuttle launch last week. I didn't go up to Cape Canaveral this time, and just as well since the launch was delayed again, but the launch was still visible--158 miles away (as the crow flies)!!! It took less than five minutes. A tower of thick white smoke, a vertical cylindrical cumulus cloud, shot up into the breaking dawn with a point of intense yellow-white light atop it. The light seemed to come back down again, an optical illusion, as the shuttle curved off to the northeast away from where my brother and I were standing on the front lawn. We "saw" the booster rockets fall away in a flash of light that stayed behind and below the main show.

It was all very depressing.

Why?

Because by the end of this year, the shuttles will be retired and the nation that put men on the moon will no longer have any manned launch capacity at all. We will ride into low earth orbit as passengers on Russian ships. Because we won't be able to do it ourselves. We're too busy holding Tea Parties and celebrating Confederate History months, objecting to evolution, embracing anti-scientific non-rationalism and gutting our own economy while lashing out militarily around the world.

This is what a civilization in decline looks like.

I really want to believe the president when he says we will go to Mars and an asteroid. Maybe we will. Maybe we can do it in spite of not having the cutting edge technology, and the launch capability and the trained teams, both ground and orbital. Just because his predecessors promised the Moon and Mars and the rest while cutting NASA's capabilities doesn't mean his flat NASA budget portends the same.

Maybe private companies will take over the lunar program. Just because the railroad companies required federal land grants before they built transcontinental lines, just because the airlines required federal airmail subsidies before they would fly coast-to-coast, just becasue no one but the federal government would or could build the interstate highways and national air traffic control systems, doesn't mean private companies won't jump to fly to the space station and the moon without any immediate visible payoff for them.

I want to believe. Really, I do. In the long run, private enterprize in space is the way to go. In the long run. I'm just not sure we have that kind of time, anymore.

Snowbird Migration Patterns

Saw an article in the News Press the other day. Yes, the paper here is still pretty good. All the old people around here, set in their ways as they are, keep supporting it. The only bad part is they still support the horrendous legacy comics, especially on Sunday. Anyway...

The article got me to thinking if there were any other places where such a large per centage of the population regularly up and moved away for such long periods. People who vacation for a couple of weeks (at the beach, in the mountains, skiing, wherever) aren't going to accumulate enough stuff to donate. The people who come here come from all over so the places they come from don't experience that same concentration of migrants. Here, this is a big enough deal that the Post Office handles the collection.

If you've heard of anything like this elsewhere, please let me know.

The Return of the GIPS*

Must be a Christian holiday coming up, the *Giant Inflatable Pagan Symbols are back. This time there's a seven foot tall pink inflatable rabbit with faux wicker basket at the head of a neighbor's driveway and a clutch of two foot long pastel eggs further down the street. Not nearly the menagerie from last time around, but then Easter is not nearly as commercialized as Christmas. Still, I don't get the logic of promoting symbols of the Old Religion's spring festival in Christian observances. It makes much more sense to celebrate a real Seder for the Last Supper. If it's "for the kids," I don't think infantilizing religion is a good idea, although it does explain the appalling lack of theological understanding expressed by many adherents (especially the more politically active ones).

I did buy a half dozen Cadbury Creme Eggs to share around.

The Red Pencil of Death

Found Mom's obituary the other day.

She wrote it herself (not too long ago from the handwriting) and stuffed it in the drawer of a small sideboard just outside the kitchen where the hall from the dining room begins. It's in with some old silver, flower arranging doodads, other household odds and ends and a poem (not her own) about not missing her when she's gone.

In the meantime, she did give me a slight scare last week. She keeps regular hours, going to bed between 10 and 10:30 and waking between 7:30 and 8. Last week she decided to "work in the garden," the flower-planted walk from the house to the driveway, and spent an hour sweeping dirt from the paving stones after my brother had been weed pulling. The next day she was exhausted, sat around all day, and went to bed at 9. The following morning at 8:30 her door was still closed. I listened at it, heard nothing, and decided to go for my walk as usual.

It's interesting how easily we can contemplate, and even accept, our own death, but not those of the ones we love and how we're still surprized by their acceptence of their deaths. I recall my father's mother saying a number of times she was ready to go but she was in a nursing home, had had several severe strokes and was old (to my mind). Then I realize that Mom is already five years past her own mother's lifespan and only two months shy of passing Grandma Rosinus.

Anyway, the obit covers most of the basics but really does not do her justice. I think I shall edit it and, when the time comes, post it here. I'll do a draft and sit with her and go over the details. Obituaries being a major moneymaker for the newspapers, when I'm done it will be too big (expensive) to submit to the News Press.

Oh, and when I got home, she was up getting her coffee and everything has been fine since.

Politics--and Warfare--As Usual

I wanted to write about something other than birds this time. I wanted to write about the amazingly traditional Southern politics of this little planned bedroom community where one of the city councilmen was just removed by the governor (The governor! Where else does a governor have the right to remove a local politician? This must be a legacy of Reconstruction.) because, as a contractor (every third person in town is a contractor) he allegedly cheated several clients out of their deposits and payments to the tune of a half mil or so, although he was upright enough to report it to the police when someone (a local citizen and wannabe contractor of an entirely different sort) offered to whack the plaintiffs on his behalf, and where the son of the chief of police just pled guilty to running a real estate Ponzi scheme along with a couple of friends (although as far as I can tell from the state of the housing market here, second only to Las Vegas for foreclosures, half the town must have been in on it), and where the mayor and a crony of his on the city council stand accused of running for office only so they could get their lawsuit against the city (something to do with contracting) moved along by being in position to move it along themselves (and, of course, they'd never ask the city to take a dive on that one), and where the council is trying to figure out how to bill utility costs to people who are not connected to any services and to vacant lots, and where the police just ran an undercover sting operation at a middle school fair to bust underage smokers.

That's what I wanted to write about.

But then I went out for my morning walk and witnessed a magnificent battle royal between a dozen and a half crows and three hawks. It was visible for a quarter mile and audible for three times that. The hawks hung on steady, like bombers in formation, as the crows swooped, circled and dove, claws out and beaks agape. At one point, a hawk and crow grappled (no idea who grabbed who first) and fell from the sky, a twisting ball of splayed feathers. They disappeared behind a tree before hitting the ground but when I got there I saw no evidence of a crash so I assume they broke before impact. The crows scored a tactical victory and the hawks retreated with as much dignity as they could muster. On my return the crows were settling in on the power line, their equivalent of the officers' club no doubt, where I could hear them discussing strategy, congratulating each other and loudly expounding their personal tales of derring-do which I have no doubt will only continue to expand in the retelling.

Personal note for Andrea: Python* season opened yesterday and runs through the middle of April. $26 for a license, free training is available for novices and there is no bag limit. Two extension agents caught a 15-footer and had it on the news a couple days ago.

*Includes Burmese-, Indian- and African rock pythons, green anacondas and Nile monitor lizards(!).

Things That Move...

Startled a buzzard the other day. I was taking my morning constitutional and had to detour across the street because this suburbanite was getting his pool pumped out at 8 a.m. and the pool pumpers had run a hose (we're talking 5-6 inch diameter flexible accordion hose here) from the backyard out to the street where they were recreating the original pool only 3 inches deep and a lot wider. As I moved along the shoreline, a dark shape jumped from the grass and launched itself in that long, slow, shallow awkward ascent typical of large birds, bombers and jumbo jets. It was a good hundred feet down the road before it was able to clear the roofline of a stucco ranch and disappear on the other side. Ungainly, with a long neck, so not a hawk despite the five foot wingspan. I'd seen vultures feeding on roadkill on previous trips (they'll step aside to let a car pass, but won't abandon their prize). I didn't see anything for it to feed on but I didn't exactly search the grass either.

Speaking of vultures, it's a little unnerving to be walking along, noting the occasional hawk/vulture float overhead and disappear, wonder where they disappear to, turn around and realize you're being followed by two dozen of the things. A couple days ago I looked straight up after losing track of a couple of them and found myself at the bottom of a swirling vortex of raptors/scavengers at least 500 feet high. Must have been thirty of them. Toto at the base of a bird tornado. Now I know how Tippi Hedren felt.

Speaking of big ungainly birds, I drove up to the mythical town of Cocoa Beach (geezer reference) to watch the last night-time launch of the space shuttle. Ever since the moon landings we have been slowly cutting back our goals, dreams and capabilities with regard to manned space flight to the point where we can barely get 200 miles above the surface of the planet with rickety technology we will now retire not having any replacement in hand. Needless to say, NASA did not disappoint: five minutes before blast-off they cancelled the launch leaving tens of thousands of us stranded on the beach out in the cold (literally). It succeeded as metaphor, if nothing else.

It took over five hours for traffic to clear out enough to drive home. I took back roads pretty much the whole way, around the north of Lake Okeechobee, a pleasant, flat drive through subtropical forest, farm fields and cattle pastures with occasional clumps of small identical standardized 1940s-era plastered-cinder-block ranch houses each with a broken front window, kitchen appliance in the front yard, and late model vehicle (SUV or truck) in the dirt driveway. Probably built for migrant labor originally, there'd be a half-dozen of them at one spot and then miles before the next bunch. Nothing that could be called a town for forty miles in any direction.

Speaking of the ragged edge of civilization, my eldest nephew called the other day. He's being sent to Iraq. To guard prisoners. Which is perfect military logic because not only is he in the Navy, he spent the first half of his career in Hawaii as a nuclear tech on a submarine and the second half in Charelston, SC teaching nuke tech. I say we send all of our people with nuclear skills and knowledge to Middle Eastern war zones. What could possibly go wrong? Anyway, he starts 90 days of either Army or Marine combat training next month and then Baghdad for nine months. The younger nephew is probably jealous. He's been to the Gulf a couple of times but never been off his ship (that I know of).

Food for Dreaming

So...what sort of psychotic whacko has dreams about containers full of uranium hexaflouride gas? It was maybe a ten gallon plastic container, poorly wrapped for shipment in brown paper and packing tape. It wasn't mine--don't know who it belonged to--but I knew it would never make it in one piece, so I tore the wrappings off, in the process accidentally pushing a button that released a dose of the radioactive gas which I inhaled although I tried not to. Accepting that I might have taken in enough to cause lung cancer at some future point I, and someone I could not see who was in protective clothing, spent a lot of time and energy without much success trying to construct a container made of wood and plastic, much larger and sturdier than the wrapping paper someone had tried to use before.

Then I woke up.

My clock radio goes off at 6 and runs til 8 but I woke to silence having overslept both the BBC World News and an hour of Morning Edtion, I think because I was tossing and worrying all night long. Mom had another day of zero energy. They don't happen often (this was the third since I've been down here) but when they do it seems like she's ready to just give up. Usually, she not only eats right but insists on doing the cooking. These last couple of days she's only been interested in soup.

Last time this happened, I fixed some home-made sausage & peppers with a side of penne and a salad. I asked if she'd like a glass of wine to go with that and she said "Oh, that would be very nice," so we split a flinty little shiraz. She then asked if she could have seconds (of the entree not the wine) and I said "Of course." She then totally surprized me by accepting an offer of ice cream for dessert ("Well, if I'd known there was mint chocolate chip...").

I am amazed how many calories it takes to keep an old lady functioning.

This morning, before my (late) walk, I asked if she was feeling better and she said "Yes," but without a lot of enthusiasm. After I got home however, she chopped walnuts, mashed a banana and made banana bread, so I'm hoping things are better now for a while.

I'm going to take a nap before I eat my banana bread. In the meantime, if any of you heard a report this morning (Friday 2/5) on NPR (BBC or Morning Edition) about uranium hexaflouride, please let me know. I really hope that was just subliminal suggestion from the radio and not my own brain doing that.