Rambling Rachel
Jun. 11th, 2009 03:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
windinthemaples* Did I ever mention my mom was in Wyoming? Well, she lost her job as a hospital administrator months ago. In all that time, with the help of headhunters and many far-flung interviews, she was offered the job in the middle of nowhere, Wyoming. (Quite a move from south Florida.) Her boyfriend hooked her unreliable car up to a car trailer and drove her up there, with her clothes, a television, and a microwave, a couple weeks ago. The place she'd planned to stay, fully furnished, was more of a druggie crash pad complete with guys hanging out on the stairs all hours of the day and night. So she called some people who had townhouses for sale in the area and found one willing to rent to her month-to-month. No furniture, no money, so she's been kinda making do. On top of that, she's not entirely sure she'll get the job (she has congestive heart failure) or how long she'll keep it for (90 day probation), plus she can't sell her condo in Florida because of the crap economy. I'm rambling and I'm not even getting anywhere! I should have been telling this story little by little. :D Anyways, she's got no money and currently only the hope of a job while she's paying to maintain two homes. She showed up for work on Monday and because her Wyoming R.N. license hasn't arrived in the mail yet, they told her she had to go home. (Um. Yes, she's an R.N. but she's been hired as an administrator. She could just as easily have a business degree but because she's a nurse and her nursing license hasn't been transferred from Florida yet, they're sending her home unpaid. And the Wyoming nursing board is backed up with paperwork because of all the recent graduates flooding their desks. So holy crap. Does she have a job or not? When will that license show up? And when it does, then what?? She's been forced to move across the country, leave her home and most her possessions behind on the hope of getting this job and making enough money to stave off foreclosure and homelessness. She found a cheap, several day flight that will zigzag her back to Florida for a few days. I don't know what her plan is now. But my care package that I'd been piecing together for her has been abandoned for now.
* My father, during this same week, was in the hospital. He drove all the way to the V.A. hospital in Iowa for some migraine-fighting botox shots he's been getting. He didn't feel well during his visit. They took his blood pressure and it was 70/30. It took them four days to diagnose and fix the underlying issues. Basically, he was on a diuretic for some ankle swelling which dehydrated his body, super-concentrated all his heart medications in his system, and stressed his kidneys. So on day four, we still hadn't been told he was in the hospital, as per usual, but the doctors are telling him that they've done what they could to fix him up and the rest would take time. He protested but they kicked him out of the hospital. He was 65 miles from home and feeling faint and lightheaded. So, being my dad, he doesn't call anybody. He gets into his Corvette and proceeds to drive home as quickly as he could so he'd get there before passing out. (Yeah. Think about that one. Then think about what my husband does for a living and you can imagine all the *headdesking* that was going on here.) At home, he called us so we'd know what happened if he was found dead (his words) and then laid in bed for another four days. Luckily, his cleaning lady bought him some groceries and gatorade and he's feeling well enough to be upright now. Still. I don't know how he is surviving all these near-death encounters and I really don't understand why he still tells me that he's just waiting to feel better from 30 years of assorted illness before he does anything with his life.
* Daniel's new employee starts work here in Chicago on Monday. It is weird because Daniel has, until now, been the sole man in his firm's "Chicago Office" and the benefit to that is that we rented an apartment near our (too small, not selling) condo for his office space and to effectively double our square footage. It is a two-bedroom place. One bedroom is Daniel's office. The other is mine (and Graeme's playroom). Tom, the newbie, gets to take over the living room. I'm not sure what to expect. Will Graeme and I be kinda run out as it becomes a professional office? Or will Tom become part of the family and get used to Graeme spreading pretzel crumbs everywhere and coloring on all his important documents? :)
* We ordered a big desk for Tom from an office furniture company. The delivery window was 48 hours! And by "delivery" they mean the time when the truck pulls up, opens its doors, and you and your burly office staff go and get the furniture, carry it up to the third floor via staircases, and put it together yourself. So Daniel had to go on an inspection in Minneapolis today and, as luck would have it, the truck arrived. Only they didn't show up at the office, they showed up at our house first and then had to find their way to the office after a bunch of phone calls. (My bad, totally my bad! I put the billing address and not the delivery.) So there I am with Graeme in a front carrier, out in the rain, with a pissed-off delivery driver and no way to get these six ginormous boxes up the stairs. Would they deliver it the next day when my husband was around? (No.) How about he just help me get it off the truck and onto the adjacent sidewalk from where I could hope to recruit help? (No. The boxes would get rained on, he said.) Could I pay him to help me carry stuff up? (Maybe, despite the fact that he isn't supposed to.) So Angelo, my housekeeper/decorator/personal assistant, ran over from the condo to help carry stuff, despite his hernia. (The guilt! The guilt is piling up!!) The driver helped, a lot, and cursed me up and down each flight of stairs with all six boxes. Short of falling upon some cutlery, I could not have apologized more. I gave him $100 when he was leaving a few minutes later and he took the money, said he appreciated it in a tone of voice close to "get stuffed", and went on to curse me out some more. Holy crap, it was awful. Luckily, Angelo was there to say nice things to me later and help the guy out the door.
* My father, during this same week, was in the hospital. He drove all the way to the V.A. hospital in Iowa for some migraine-fighting botox shots he's been getting. He didn't feel well during his visit. They took his blood pressure and it was 70/30. It took them four days to diagnose and fix the underlying issues. Basically, he was on a diuretic for some ankle swelling which dehydrated his body, super-concentrated all his heart medications in his system, and stressed his kidneys. So on day four, we still hadn't been told he was in the hospital, as per usual, but the doctors are telling him that they've done what they could to fix him up and the rest would take time. He protested but they kicked him out of the hospital. He was 65 miles from home and feeling faint and lightheaded. So, being my dad, he doesn't call anybody. He gets into his Corvette and proceeds to drive home as quickly as he could so he'd get there before passing out. (Yeah. Think about that one. Then think about what my husband does for a living and you can imagine all the *headdesking* that was going on here.) At home, he called us so we'd know what happened if he was found dead (his words) and then laid in bed for another four days. Luckily, his cleaning lady bought him some groceries and gatorade and he's feeling well enough to be upright now. Still. I don't know how he is surviving all these near-death encounters and I really don't understand why he still tells me that he's just waiting to feel better from 30 years of assorted illness before he does anything with his life.
* Daniel's new employee starts work here in Chicago on Monday. It is weird because Daniel has, until now, been the sole man in his firm's "Chicago Office" and the benefit to that is that we rented an apartment near our (too small, not selling) condo for his office space and to effectively double our square footage. It is a two-bedroom place. One bedroom is Daniel's office. The other is mine (and Graeme's playroom). Tom, the newbie, gets to take over the living room. I'm not sure what to expect. Will Graeme and I be kinda run out as it becomes a professional office? Or will Tom become part of the family and get used to Graeme spreading pretzel crumbs everywhere and coloring on all his important documents? :)
* We ordered a big desk for Tom from an office furniture company. The delivery window was 48 hours! And by "delivery" they mean the time when the truck pulls up, opens its doors, and you and your burly office staff go and get the furniture, carry it up to the third floor via staircases, and put it together yourself. So Daniel had to go on an inspection in Minneapolis today and, as luck would have it, the truck arrived. Only they didn't show up at the office, they showed up at our house first and then had to find their way to the office after a bunch of phone calls. (My bad, totally my bad! I put the billing address and not the delivery.) So there I am with Graeme in a front carrier, out in the rain, with a pissed-off delivery driver and no way to get these six ginormous boxes up the stairs. Would they deliver it the next day when my husband was around? (No.) How about he just help me get it off the truck and onto the adjacent sidewalk from where I could hope to recruit help? (No. The boxes would get rained on, he said.) Could I pay him to help me carry stuff up? (Maybe, despite the fact that he isn't supposed to.) So Angelo, my housekeeper/decorator/personal assistant, ran over from the condo to help carry stuff, despite his hernia. (The guilt! The guilt is piling up!!) The driver helped, a lot, and cursed me up and down each flight of stairs with all six boxes. Short of falling upon some cutlery, I could not have apologized more. I gave him $100 when he was leaving a few minutes later and he took the money, said he appreciated it in a tone of voice close to "get stuffed", and went on to curse me out some more. Holy crap, it was awful. Luckily, Angelo was there to say nice things to me later and help the guy out the door.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-06-11 10:49 pm (UTC)I swear. You're probably only banned from four or five places. But then again, you aren't writing a math text over there, so you could be right. ;)