![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
One Hell of a three-hour tour
Dec. 31st, 2007 06:04 pm(Not cut because I'm lazy.)
I've just come back from what should have been a Thursday-Saturday trip to visit my mother's family in Windsor. However, it didn't quite turn out that way.
It started the day we got there. My grandfather, who has an ostomy bag and is slightly diabetic, was very tired and wasn't moving much because he couldn't walk well. He hadn't eaten much and kept drooping his head. My mother knew right away that this weekend would see him go to the hospital again. She was right.
The next morning, they got ready to take him to the hospital. My mother suggested calling an ambulance because you get priority access to a room over someone who drives in. So we did, and the ambulance pulled up with the lights off so as not to disturb the neighbours. The paramedics were given misleading information as to why they had been called out, and the woman driving had a particularly frosty bedside manner.
Because my grandfather is rather large (over six feet and 280 pounds) they had to call backup to get him out of the house because there are a couple steps down to the door. There was a shortage of ambulances, so the fire department showed up. And who should one of the firemen be but my mother's cousin on her mother's (my grandmother's) side. So he walked in all sociable, asking how they were doing, and really confusing the paramedics. They loaded him up and drove off to the nearest hospital.
Even with a bit of packing and cleaning up, we still managed to ride their tail almost the whole way to the hospital. My grandfather was shunted into a corridor because there was a bed shortage (the Harris Conservatives strike again) and we sat out in the main emergency room waiting. And waiting. And waiting. It took about eight hours for him to get a bed, and another hour to actually get into the bed. Up until the end, they were almost ready to send him home, but they were wise enough to realize that he needed to sleep over when they were reminded that he couldn't walk ("When did this begin?"). He ended up being roomed with a guy who had blood coming out of every opening in his body and someone with a heart condition who remembered him from his union days (and who happened to be the Windsor-Essex distributor of bull crap). We only spent a couple hours at the hospital, then left my grandmother there to keep him company (if you're ever in the cafeteria at Hotel Dieu-Grace, they do a great grilled chicken breast; their fries need a bit of salt).
We spent the next three days (Friday to Sunday) going back and forth ferrying my grandmother to and from the hospital. We also fit in a couple mall visits because I needed more clothes, having only packed for two days. On one of the visits, we also got a new chest for a new old set of cutlery. My mother was in an antique store a couple days before we left for Windsor and we saw a eight-place set of silver plate that matched my grandmother's pattern. We've been adding to her collection over the past few years (from six places to twelve) and got this for the heck of it. Officially it's my silver, and it's coming home with us, but we told her that when our next trip comes up, it will be put on permanent loan to the 'Hansen Institution' (our motto: We've Been Committed").
We also took the opportunity to visit my aunt, who was kind enough to loan the use of her computer to me so I wouldn't go into internet withdrawal. I had to peel her away from the computer and her chats with her online boyfriend in Washington state (they've met twice, btw). It was slow and shaky, but it worked. We also bonded with one of my cousins, who stayed the night with us while the other was out palling around with her friend and their boyfriends.
Another day saw us drop my grandmother off at one of her sister's house because my mother's cousin was going to show off a bunch of material she researched about my grandmother's relatives, who were in WWI and WWII. My grandmother's other three sisters said on Friday that they were going to be there, but decided not to show up or call to say they weren't going to show up. Nice. They have been on unfriendly and childish terms with each other since their mother's will, and even before when she was still alive and using her stuff. So the show was put on hold until we got back from one of our mall visits.
We also spent the days feeding my grandmother's cat and deer. My grandmother's house backs onto a wooded piece of land that backs on to a government-owned piece of wooded land, so it's not likely to disappear any time soon. As a result, she gets deer to her back fence (and sometimes even back door) wanting corn and other things to eat. She's had up to twenty-four at once, but the most we saw was eight. One of them on one visit had a ten-inch rack growing on its head, one of which was broken already. One was in the back yard, but left before we got pictures. However, we have loads of pictures of them eating because they come in the day now and tend not to leave when people are there, knowing that's when they get food.
Today we visited the hospital for a couple hours before leaving to get ready to leave. We were waiting for his doctor to show up to give him the OK to leave (he had a urinary infection). We waited and waited and nobody showed up except the nurses to take care of the patients, be abused by the bull crap dealer, and put up with the bleeder, who was also taken for tests. After three hours, we gave up and left to pack the car because a snow storm was predicted. As it turns out, twenty minutes after we left, the doctor showed up and said he could leave. Timing is everything.
So, we're on our way back home. I wrote this all in the car between Windsor and Tilbury on Highway 401, a 56-km trip, and hoping that we'll stay ahead of the snow. Knowing how my mother speeds, we should be okay. She says she gets to fly Santa's sleigh next year (which we think is a Tardis in disguise; think about it: it's got unlimited capacity and can travel the world in one night).
I've just come back from what should have been a Thursday-Saturday trip to visit my mother's family in Windsor. However, it didn't quite turn out that way.
It started the day we got there. My grandfather, who has an ostomy bag and is slightly diabetic, was very tired and wasn't moving much because he couldn't walk well. He hadn't eaten much and kept drooping his head. My mother knew right away that this weekend would see him go to the hospital again. She was right.
The next morning, they got ready to take him to the hospital. My mother suggested calling an ambulance because you get priority access to a room over someone who drives in. So we did, and the ambulance pulled up with the lights off so as not to disturb the neighbours. The paramedics were given misleading information as to why they had been called out, and the woman driving had a particularly frosty bedside manner.
Because my grandfather is rather large (over six feet and 280 pounds) they had to call backup to get him out of the house because there are a couple steps down to the door. There was a shortage of ambulances, so the fire department showed up. And who should one of the firemen be but my mother's cousin on her mother's (my grandmother's) side. So he walked in all sociable, asking how they were doing, and really confusing the paramedics. They loaded him up and drove off to the nearest hospital.
Even with a bit of packing and cleaning up, we still managed to ride their tail almost the whole way to the hospital. My grandfather was shunted into a corridor because there was a bed shortage (the Harris Conservatives strike again) and we sat out in the main emergency room waiting. And waiting. And waiting. It took about eight hours for him to get a bed, and another hour to actually get into the bed. Up until the end, they were almost ready to send him home, but they were wise enough to realize that he needed to sleep over when they were reminded that he couldn't walk ("When did this begin?"). He ended up being roomed with a guy who had blood coming out of every opening in his body and someone with a heart condition who remembered him from his union days (and who happened to be the Windsor-Essex distributor of bull crap). We only spent a couple hours at the hospital, then left my grandmother there to keep him company (if you're ever in the cafeteria at Hotel Dieu-Grace, they do a great grilled chicken breast; their fries need a bit of salt).
We spent the next three days (Friday to Sunday) going back and forth ferrying my grandmother to and from the hospital. We also fit in a couple mall visits because I needed more clothes, having only packed for two days. On one of the visits, we also got a new chest for a new old set of cutlery. My mother was in an antique store a couple days before we left for Windsor and we saw a eight-place set of silver plate that matched my grandmother's pattern. We've been adding to her collection over the past few years (from six places to twelve) and got this for the heck of it. Officially it's my silver, and it's coming home with us, but we told her that when our next trip comes up, it will be put on permanent loan to the 'Hansen Institution' (our motto: We've Been Committed").
We also took the opportunity to visit my aunt, who was kind enough to loan the use of her computer to me so I wouldn't go into internet withdrawal. I had to peel her away from the computer and her chats with her online boyfriend in Washington state (they've met twice, btw). It was slow and shaky, but it worked. We also bonded with one of my cousins, who stayed the night with us while the other was out palling around with her friend and their boyfriends.
Another day saw us drop my grandmother off at one of her sister's house because my mother's cousin was going to show off a bunch of material she researched about my grandmother's relatives, who were in WWI and WWII. My grandmother's other three sisters said on Friday that they were going to be there, but decided not to show up or call to say they weren't going to show up. Nice. They have been on unfriendly and childish terms with each other since their mother's will, and even before when she was still alive and using her stuff. So the show was put on hold until we got back from one of our mall visits.
We also spent the days feeding my grandmother's cat and deer. My grandmother's house backs onto a wooded piece of land that backs on to a government-owned piece of wooded land, so it's not likely to disappear any time soon. As a result, she gets deer to her back fence (and sometimes even back door) wanting corn and other things to eat. She's had up to twenty-four at once, but the most we saw was eight. One of them on one visit had a ten-inch rack growing on its head, one of which was broken already. One was in the back yard, but left before we got pictures. However, we have loads of pictures of them eating because they come in the day now and tend not to leave when people are there, knowing that's when they get food.
Today we visited the hospital for a couple hours before leaving to get ready to leave. We were waiting for his doctor to show up to give him the OK to leave (he had a urinary infection). We waited and waited and nobody showed up except the nurses to take care of the patients, be abused by the bull crap dealer, and put up with the bleeder, who was also taken for tests. After three hours, we gave up and left to pack the car because a snow storm was predicted. As it turns out, twenty minutes after we left, the doctor showed up and said he could leave. Timing is everything.
So, we're on our way back home. I wrote this all in the car between Windsor and Tilbury on Highway 401, a 56-km trip, and hoping that we'll stay ahead of the snow. Knowing how my mother speeds, we should be okay. She says she gets to fly Santa's sleigh next year (which we think is a Tardis in disguise; think about it: it's got unlimited capacity and can travel the world in one night).
