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Dog ‘n’ Human Walk, Redux…Update

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So here we are, once again, back from a twilight circumambulation of the ‘Hood.

WHAT a pretty neighborhood! If you have to live in Phoenix — or anywhere in the suburban reaches of the “Valley of the Sun,” you really can’t do better than this one.

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Well, I started to write this a day ago…then roamed off into the twilight of my life.

Oh, my. I’m SO sick. 

Surely it can’t be much longer before I’m dispatched to the next world. Surely hope not, anyway!

Speaking of that horrifying dispatch, my son just called to inform me that he’s dragging me to the old-folkerie of our choice: the place he plans to store me until I finally pass over into the Next World.

That would be kind and thoughtful and all…except…..

Very few things do I revile more than institutional living. I just HATE being crammed in with a bunch of other people. I hate listening to some dimwit’s TV blabbering on down the hall. I hate bad food dumped out of cans and boxes into steam tables.

Honestly: if I’m approaching the end of my life, then forgodsake it’s time. Time for me to go.

And that exit is not something I want to have drawn out.

Yes, I will say: I’m not especially well just now. And indeed, it won’t be long before I won’t be able to stay here in my home safely.

Already, my son has purloined my car (he believes I shouldn’t be driving), which means I have to hike some unholy distance just to go to the grocery store. And no, hiring the Uber driver across the street has proved not to be a very practical strategy.

The awful place where he plans to consign me is less awful than most of them.

My father put himself in a place now called The Terraces. He would have done fine there if he had not stupidly imagined he could replace my mother (the love of his life) with a dimwitted woman he met there.

So… Lesson number one: no love affairs!!!

😀

Seriously, though…you would not believe the horror show that devolved from that episode.

Because he had stupidly married the woman, he was afraid to break it up. He convinced himself (rightly or wrongly, I do not know) that she would get all his assets if he divorced her.

Personally, I doubt that would have happened: at the time, his daughter was married to a partner in one of the most powerful law firms in the Southwest. But he was just simply too scared to take any chances.

So he stayed married to her, in profound misery, until the last day of his life.

As for me, I hate institutional living. Hated every moment that I had to spend in the dorms in college. (Back in the day, unmarried women students were required to live in the dorms, unless they could prove they were living at home). And I just. don’t. want. to. go. through. that. again!!!!

I fail to understand, given what it costs to live in one of those hell-holes, why we can’t use the same amount of money to hire someone to come in and babysit me in my home.

So this morning my son is dragging me to the Terraces, for an introductory tour.

Goodie gumdrops. I can hardly wait. 

Another Beautiful Day in Arizona…

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As a long-ago radio announcer — still fondly remembered — used to intone each morning: “It’s another beautiful day in Arizona…leave us all enjoy it!”

😀  Nothing like a little illiteracy to give your talk show some zing, eh?

Seriously, it was a much-loved maxim that he invented and used for years.

Ruby and the Human have marched around the ‘Hood, at least to some degree. The Human is feeling sick, and so not at all in the mood to gallop from pillar to post.

Back in the house, fed,  and ensconced on the bed, I hope to sleep off whatever this is.

Missing a dear friend from long ago. She and her husband lived in a later-built tract to the north of the Central Avenue area. Ticky-tacky little house, cheaply built in the mode of later architecture. He fell ill — very ill, indeed — and died after a long haul in that house. She moved to Scottsdale briefly; then decamped to the Midwest, whence she came and where her family was still living. Forthwith, we lost track of each other.

I seem to have  lost track of most of my friends.

Maybe I should try to get another adjunct position at the Great Desert University. That, at least, would give me something to do and bring me into contact with new people,

But…without a car — my son purloined mine and sold it — there’s no way I can get out to the campus. I’m trapped here in the Funny Farm, really.

I probably could get down to the church. It would require a hike through the North Central district and then a bus ride — often an annoying experience in these parts, what with the stoners and the panhandlers. More hassle than I’m up for.

And so…what will I do? Sit here and rot away?

Very possibly, as we don’t appear to have many alternatives. Make that “any” alternatives.

  • No job.
  • No freelance opportunities.
  • No volunteer gigs.
  • No friends left.
  • No car in which to venture forth…

Really, when you come down to it, I’m doomed. It really IS time to go, isn’t it?

Yeah. “Sit here and rot away” about defines my future. Hope it comes quickly….

Next Step Along the Way?

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Gawdlmighty, what Looney Toons around this place!  It’s beginning to look more and more like I’m going to have to move into one of those horrible holding pens for old folks. I’m not going to be able to live in this house or take care of the property without having someone HERE, with me, to deal with the unending slew of stupid little crises.

Now the barbecue is on the fritz, apparently as a result of some bird-brained cleaning lady’s ministrations. Naturally, today is Sunday, so I can’t get anyone out here to work on that.

And if that weren’t enough, something on the roof — presumably one of the whirling vents — is going BANG BANG BANG BANG…. 

Don’t want to ask my son about that, because I really don’t want him climbing around the roof.

Ohhhh Gawd!

I’m afraid it’s time.

Time to move into the old-folkerie. 

What a horror. 

Few things do I abominate more than institutional living. Just HATED living in the dorms at the university. And that is NOT how I want to spend the last few months or (God forbid!) years of my life. Frankly, before things reached this point I hoped I would die — of a natural passing; don’t panic, I’m not talking suicide here.

Jeez. I just CANNOT BELIEVE one of those nitwit women wrecked my barbecue. What the f*ck is the MATTER with people?

How to Get Your Revenge on a Nasty Old Bat

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“Nasty Old Bat”: that would be me. I get orneyer and orneyer the older I get. And every now and then, some chucklehead will pull a stunt to get back at me. This one though, is too funny!

My son hired a woman to come to the house and keep an eye on me, here in my dotage. Ostensibly, she’s here as a cleaning lady. But the truth is she’s here as a babysitter. She was showing up at the crack of dawn and hanging around until 4:00 or 5:00 in the afternoon. Watching, watching, ever watching….

As a confirmed lone wolf, this is something I could do without. I do NOT want some stranger underfoot all day.

Although I never said any such thing to her, she must have intuited it. She got increasingly surly as the days passed, and now we have this…

One of her jobs was to make my bed: a double-bed sized number that resides in the master bedroom.

So…a couple evenings ago, I climb under the covers on that bed and…R-R-R-R-I-I-I-I-I-P!!!!

LO! The fitted bottom sheet has been sliced with something sharp, from top to bottom. It has a hole in it that runs from the head to the foot of the bed!

Whaaa????

Well, by now it’s 10:00 at night. And when I tellya I’m SICK, I ain’t kidding. I just do not feel well enough to rip apart a queen-sized bed and remake it. Really: TOO TIRED TO CARE.

Figured I’d have her remake the bed when she came in the next day.

This had the effect of pulling the rip apart even more dramatically.

And SURPRISE! Of course she didn’t come in the next day. Or the next, either.

So now, I’ve got to get off my duff, pull the bedding apart, and remake the bed.

Not that big a deal…unless you’re sick as a dog. And in a lot of pain.

Pisseth me off…big-time.

She hasn’t been back in a couple of days. I figure if she shows up at the door, I’ll send her away. That will pisseth off my son, who went to some trouble find this woman. But I figure what she did was just plain malicious. And I don’t want her around here. 

Whole Afternoon Blown Away!

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Sheee-ut!!!!!  The lovely (no irony!) woman my son hired to babysit me all day, every day, schlepped me out to the Mayo Clinic to chat with the docs about the endlessly nagging peripheral neuropathy. Planned to touch on a few other sources of pain and stress, none of them exactly heavy-duty.

WHAT a waste of time!

We sat there and we sat there and we sat there and we sat there until we finally were ushered into an exam room.

And…whaddaya guess? We sat there and we sat there and we sat there and…  Finally I just announced that I was leaving. And away we went. No one even seemed to notice that we were fleeing the premises.

Before we left the building, I had to search for my clothes, which some accommodating soul had picked up and carried off.

Why d’you suppose the Mayo would do that? Evidently they know their doctors keep the patients waiting until the last rooster crows after sundown. If they have your clothes, you can’t get home.

Well, I was about ready to walk home in my underwear, so PO’d was I. One of their underlings apparently realized that, and she brought my clothes into the waiting room. And then…

OUTTA THERE!

Yeah. I do realize the Mayo has rafts on rafts on rafts of patients. And Sure, I do know they can’t ever be certain of when any one of those patients is gonna soak up hours and hours, more than any doctor could catch up on. But honestly….

Wouldn’t you think that when they see they’re running an hour late, they could announce that to the waiting hordes and offer to reschedule those who would prefer not to spend half a day twiddling their thumbs?

How hard WOULD that be, really?

The peculiarly annoying thing about our (mis)Adventures at the Mayo is that none of the other major local hospitals — Good Samaritan, St. Joseph’s, John C. Lincoln, on and on– seem to be very good. They all receive rafts of negative reviews!  Apparently, the Mayo is the best of a bad lot.

Right now, it’s 4:40 in the afternoon and I’m waiting (waiting…waiting…waiting) for the woman my son has hired to ride herd on me to GO HOME, DAMMIT!

No sign that she’s about to do that.

I don’t have enough in the refrigerator to feed dinner to myself, much less to me and her.

Wait: take that back:  A perfectly gorgeous slab of sirloin steak is in there.

And selfish little me: I would just as soon not have to share it with her. Dammit!

But if she doesn’t make a move to leave within the next half-hour or 45 minutes — it’s 4:20 p.m. right now — I’ll have no choice but to offer her dinner and then, without a doubt, host her in the spare bedroom.

Yes, it would be good to have her (or someone) stay here tonight. I did spavin a hip earlier today, and yeah: tromping around the house just now hurts like the dickens.

Just dropped an ibuprofen. We’ll see if that helps. If not…well, then I’ll have to find my own quack.

My long-time physician, the Beloved Young Dr. Kildare, first moved his practice to the far west side (a horrible drive from here) and now, within the past few weeks, has moved it into Sun City.

NOTHING could be  worse sign for a doctor. 

My mother died hideously under the ministrations of a Sun City quack. The doctors out there, the hospital out there…eeew! 

Yeah: those would be the ones who assume, ipso facto, that if you’re a woman you must be a hypochondriac.

And that, right there, is the Number One reason that you could not pay me to move to Sun City! Add to it…

*Endemic hate as a cultural theme…
* Loathing of young people…
* Constant, ungodly racket from that dam Air Force Base…
* Barrenness as a design element…
* Cheap, flimsy construction…
* Air-conditioning bills hovering in the stratosphere, because the houses were never built to be occupied during the summer…

What a horrible place!

Babysitter Hell

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My dear son has hired this annoying woman to sit here all day and babysit me.

As though I hadn’t been living alone and taking care of myself and my dog and my home and my yard and my pool all by my little idiot self, for year on year. You wanna talk about annoying?  

Holeeee shee-ut.

She sits there on the phone gabbing with her friends and whomever, yakity yakity yakity yakity yakity yakity…. The endless yakathon devolves into an exceptionally annoying noise. Especially to a person who is used to living alone.

This comes on top of the discovery that some workers he sent over got into my office and stole sh!t to the left of them and sh!t to the right of them. They stole my office phone’s handset, among a number of other things.

Fortunately, I had another phone stashed in a cabinet in another room. But…that means that sooner, if not later, I’m gonna have to buy another handset.

If they even still make that brand and variety. Seems to me at one point a guy at the local phone store said these things are no longer available.

In-f*cking-furiating!

So, back to the original infuriating element of today’s post: I need to decide whether to try to stay here, in my nice little house in my nice bourgeois neighborhood, until I drop dead (good luck with that!) or to move, in the very near future, into one of those horrible prisons for old folks….uhm….”life-care communities.”

The very thought makes my skin crawl.

Back in the day, the University of Arizona (my dear alma mater /eyeroll/ ) required all female undergraduates to live in the dormitories. Well. Unless one was married or living with one’s parents.

That experience left me with a lifelong distaste for institutional living.

Ugh!!!!  I started in that way, and I do NOT want to go back out through that door. Bleayach!