Thursday, August 20

Today, we woke up in bad moods. Neither of us want to go and neither of us want to pack and clean the cabin. We started with coffee and then more coffee. Then we had to come up with a plan of attack.

Bob went out to get cleaning supplies and mail the boxes home that we had already packed up. While he was gone, I gathered up all of the non-perishable foods (enough for the next three weeks, every meal). I boxed them up. I made chicken salad and a tomato salad with purple onion and fresh mozzarella cheese, olive oil and oregano. That was lunch. When Bob returned, I went online to see if there was a nearby food bank. When I found it, I called to make sure they were there and to get directions. The person on the phone could not really articulate, so Bob and I map quested it. He then went through all of the non-perishable items I had boxed and chose that and some of the stuff from the refrigerator that we hadn't opened to take to the food bank. The mapquest directions were wrong, so Bob was gone awhile. While he was gone, I packed up most of my stuff (except for my clothes).

When he came back, he cleaned out the car and went through some of his stuff--to throw out and organize. Then he packed a couple more boxes to mail. He walked down to the water and saw some shorebirds, but in the mood and luck of the day, they were gone when he came back with his binoculars. We also did not go out on the boat this morning (that was his choice), so he's annoyed that we spent so much money on the boat and didn't use it that much. If we didn't have it, though, we'd be complaining that we should have bought a boat. We can use this boat when we go to other places with water--including lakes in Arizona.

Looks like we can load some of the boxes (all of our art stuff and the box of books and magazines), some of our camping gear, linens and our food today. That will just leave our clothes to pack tomorrow, bed linens and laundry to do at the laundromat, and cleaning. The place is pretty small and we've been keeping up with our cleaning, so it should be a horrible task. Cleaning out the refrigerator might be difficult because we have a lot and still have that smaller size cooler, so we'll have to wait until Saturday morning to do that when everything else should be cleaned and we can save the refrigerator for last thing.

Mother update: I've talked to her hospital case worker. They cannot find a rehab place that will take her because she has made too much progress on her own in the hospital, walking, washing herself, going to the bathroom on her own. However, her attending physician does not want to release her until she can eat. She can't eat until they are sure the fistula is closed. She sounded down in the dumps today, so we'll probably hurry back to Albany. If her fistula is closed, they'll have her eat and then in a few days discharge her IF her insurance covers a nurse coming to change the wound vac three days a week. They were talking about having a nurse come into the house if she is still on the TPN (intravenous food), but now they seem to not want to send her home if she is still on the TPN. My mother told me last night when I called her that another surgery is a possibility. She said, "No, I won't have another surgery. I'd rather commit suicide. I've already been through a lot." When I told her not to think about that and to take it one day at a time, she said, "Everyone has told me the same thing--easier to say than to do." I told her that I'd stay with her and fly back to Phoenix by Sept 10 so we could leave for the Mexico trip but she said, "Absolutely not! You've given up enough of your time and plans." Now I don't think that way and we could rearrange things so that i stay with her for a week to see how she does on her own and if the insurance covers nurses coming in (the doctors said someone might have to learn how to do the TPN changes--yeah, right!)then it might be okay. So, rehab is out, I guess. On Monday, August 24th, she'll have another CT Scan to see if the fistula is closed and then we go from there. Until then, she is feeling fine (except for a cold she caught in the hospital) and our plans are still up in the air.