Of Moose And Men
The Best Laid Plans Of Both Often Go Astray

Going back to where you grew up is not necessarily the easiest thing to do.

I’ve considered myself lucky in that ‘home’ is a short trip away (even if traffic is occasionally harsh), but not so close that my family can drop in unannounced. I’ve enjoyed that slight distance as I work out for myself how I interact with my immediate family, and frankly right at the moment I find it a bit far away.

I’m encouraging my elder (soon to be eldest) niece to take up athletics in a way I never did in school. Her birthday present this year (she turned 10 last month) was a triathlon race entry fee and a good pair of running shoes from Uncle Moose. She’s got my feet, poor dear. Overpronator (like my father, her grandfather, as well as her Uncle), so stability shoes were in order. They were less than I expected to pay (being used to adult, male prices), so a good top and shorts and socks were in order, too. I wish I could be down there to train with her, to encourage her more. Hell, she’s even willing to try tofu now, something her step mother had managed to poison her away from just a couple years ago. She really looks up to me, and it’s hard to leave knowing that.

I don’t have any other children in my life. Her baby sister is just that, a baby (turned 1 this past month), and the other niece isn’t due until June (at which point the elder niece becomes the eldest niece).

My parents are, thankfullly, taking a bit more interest in their health. They were great as race support yesterday, and do talk about the walking they’re doing, and more stuff at the Y down there now. I want them around, selfishly, and am glad they’re looking out a bit more for themselves now. I wish they’d done more earlier, but any little bit helps.

We went to brunch this morning with one of mom’s fellow teachers. She and I went to see Evita together, as well as Cats, while I was still in Jr high and high school. As she put it this morning, “When your mother told me about your lifestyle I said, ‘Duh, we went to musical theather together.'” Too funny. She hadn’t really met my Dad until Mom’s retirement, at which point she introduced herself by saying, “Hi, I used to date your son.” She’s a self-described ‘bobble-head’ now, thanks to a sick new wing of the junior high where Mom used to work. It caused some neurological problems that has her looking like she has parkinson’s, though that’s not the case. It was both hard to see her, as well as good to see her. She was a very good friend, and despite the bobbing, she’s doing well.

Which reminds me, Mom and Dad have adopted Save The Ta-Tas as their motto now. They spotted a shirt while down in Florida this past winter and had to get some of the merchandise (including stickers which are all over their cars now). Mom’s a breast cancer survivor for not quite a decade now, so is an appropriate thing to show (she loves her “My Ta-Tas are Survivors” shirt).

We did chat some about the family history as well. I thought just 2 of her 3 brothers had had prostate cancer, as well as her father, but it seems all three have had it. The third had normal PSA results, but mentioned the family thing to his doctor and sure enough, the digital exam showed cancer as well. So my early screening isn’t such a bad thing. Now if I can continue to stave off the hair loss on Mom’s side I’ll be happy (though if it shows up, the rest is gone – it’s all or nothing; I’m not doing a comb-over).

The younger niece is, unfortunately, too young yet to remember Uncle Moose. Over this next year things will cement, at which point the spoiling will begin, but I have a bit of a reprieve until language starts in earnest. She knows ‘nose’ and ‘ears’ and the difference between her own and someone else’s, but she’s not got language quite down yet. Soon, I’m sure, at which point more spoiling will become part of the order of things. Hopefully she’ll be as athletic as her big sister is (and her parents are not), which will make spoiling easy.

I’m a tad worried about Mom’s memory.

She’s been paranoid for years now about getting alzheimer’s, which I think unlikely, but she has been showing signs of “chemo brain” as she calls it (a diminishment of mental capacities after chemo). The most notable thing is that she repeats anecdotes a couple of times within the same conversation. It’s not every conversation, but it’s enough that I’ve started noticing it. Now, I’m not one to talk but so much about repeating the same story to someone, but I at least separate my tellings by a day or so. Doing it in the same conversation is a bit different, like she’s losing short term memory. Will have to discretely mention it to Dad and see if he’s noticed it as well.

Hated, hated, hated driving. It’s loud, it’s boring, and I do not see how people do it on a regular basis. I am so glad I moved a mile and a quarter from work so I can walk or bike. Multi-hour commutes just blow my mind. That’s inhumane, IMNSHO. Didn’t help that the nimrod who rented the car before me smoked in it, using the center console as the ash tray (which the rental car place missed). The only good thing there was it allowed me to ID the sweet smell that occasionally comes out of my air units – I suspect now that the previous owner might have smoked. Not a biggie, it’s not come out in a while, but it was there when I first moved in and had to run the air units.

Speaking of the air units, I’ve asked the building operations guy if there would be issues with installing some programmable thermostats in my apartment. Tired of trying to remember to adjust the heat (which means it usually stays just a trifle cool).

Picked up oodles of veggies this evening to make soup tomorrow. And oatmeal. And other stuff. This after I was too lazy to change out of the shirt I biked home in this evening (I did switch out of the tights in favor of jeans). In this weather I don’t even break a sweat biking home (it’s <10 minutes to home – downhill), and this shirt’s comfortable, so what the heck. Did sit down and pay bills, which was needed, as well as arranging for some other errands I needed to get done. Productive evening, if not the most exciting.

Too much to write about right now, and no time to do it. Will attempt to get more thoughts to ‘paper’ here in the next couple of days.

Good lunch today with RNJTM at his place of employment. This after getting rid of the rental car and somehow managing to get into my BGA, deposit a check in the ATM (I bank at the BGA’s credit union), replace my lost badge, drop off two bags of candy in my office, go to the bathroom and leave, all without seeing any of my co-workers.

Came home, napped, got in a run (first exercise in two weeks – damned cold). Found out the internet was down, watched them release a squirrel who’d gotten into our lobby (yay for the exterminator [who regularly comes in on Mondays] having a live-capture trap), cleaned some, then off to dinner with MG, who is now trying to fix his ailing laptop in the other room since the internet is now back up. Oh, and managed to register for the Cherry Blossom 10 miler (third time’s the charm?). Next step, planning how to approach the race this year.

Lots of thoughts about the family, Mom’s memory, driving, etc., but for now I really, really just want to get to sleep.

It is, sometimes, good to be the sibling with no kids and who’s the responsible one.

Case in point: At Xmas, I get cooking equipment and jewelry. He and my sister-in-law get baby stuff and food things.

Drove down to Tidewater for the annual between-the-holidays visit (easier than dealing with holiday traffic), and we exchanged presents this evening. I made out like a bandit, though I think my fave is a silver ring with a dark green tourmaline in it that fits exactly on my right ring finger, and that does not clash with my favorite steel-n-ceramic ring (which is the only ring I wear daily these days). The moose cutting board has to be a close second, though. The relatives all seemed to like my choices of gifts as well, which is always good news.

I’ve also managed not to down a single drop of water since somewhere around 10 this morning. Coffee all the way down in the car, and nothing but wine since. I still marvel that despite not really drinking a lot around us kids when we were growing up my parents have somehow turned into total wine people. Or maybe they just pretend when I come down, but in any case, most visits are tests of my liver because of the amount of wine consumed.

I’ll be drinking a good chunk of water before bed, I suspect, just to stave off a possible hangover. The blow-up mattress is ready to go, just need to dump sheets on it. The parental units have retired, and the brother, sister-in-law and nieces have retreated to their own desmesne.

The younger niece (9 months old now) is not quite a terror – she’s crawling, and standing, but not yet walking. Cuter than should be possible, and was (thankfully) not all that fussy when strange ole Uncle Moose picked her up and held her. But very, very wiggly. You had to be very careful or next thing you knew she was dangling by a single toe and straining hard to get that dislodged so she could go on to the next conquest. Wrapping paper was her favorite play toy of the evening (aside from my necklace and general person), and we had a minor crisis when the older niece popped open a tin of mints and scattered them all over the floor. Watching five adults scrounging for white mints on a slightly off-white carpet is a funny sight, but when compared with dealing with a choking toddler, we went with the mint hunt.

Shopping tomorrow. I’m looking at going to BJs to get huge amounts of necessities like adult Tang and the like, and a trip to Homo Depot to check out programmable thermostats (gotta love being a home owner). Then on to a late lunch with one of my two surviving great-Aunts, and general visit time with the ‘rents. So far so good, and glad I came down.

Gradually returning to the land of the living. This cold has sucked ass. Not so much with the breathing, that’s actually been mostly okay, but this one has just left me incredibly drained of energy. I’ve been able to sleep, eschewing sudafed in the evenings in favor of sleep and depending on the humidifier, which has worked well. But that has meant that each evening around dinner time the sudafed has worn off, and without pumping another stimulant into my system I’ve not had the energy to do squat. Yay for funky dreams.

Am definitely feeling better this evening, and am hopeful that a run might be attemptable tomorrow.

Pretty much done with shopping for the immediate family, just waiting for the last bits to arrive early this upcoming week before I head down to see them next weekend. Can’t wait to see how the 2nd niece has grown (she’s 9 months old now), and to play with the older niece. But first, gotta kill off the last of this cold.