HA HA, did everyone see what I did there?!  Today we were at Hamlet Yard and finished pretty quick so I got to see up close them “humping” the cars.  I was talking to one of the people who control the locomotives remotely, he was so nice, and was able to give me some good info.  It’s good info for me, but I promise you would not be entertained – ha!

I am now in Rocky Mount, North Carolina and sitting on my bed waiting to go to dinner.  There is this little gas freak out going on here and there are several places that don’t have gas.  This is just crazy, people are freaking out for no real reason and the gas stations are being greedy and raising the prices illegally – that burns me up!  One station says that they will only be getting premium for the next 3 days – um, premium is the least used – so how is it you are getting two deliveries of that when you wouldn’t normally??  Maybe you are putting regular in the premium tank (probably already do that crap)…

OK, gotta move on from that cause it just fires me up!

I know that people probably don’t want to hear about this, but to me it is something that I would rather have had some idea about before I had to experience it.

I realized today that I need to turn off my mom’s cell phone.  It doesn’t cost that much and it isn’t even turned on right now, but for some reason I don’t want to.  It doesn’t even have her voice on the greeting.  I just am not wanting someone else to have that number maybe.

I had a good conversation with my coworkers yesterday at dinner and I mentioned that I have my mother’s ring and it makes me think of her even though she didn’t have it very long.  About 6 months in fact.  And I also had this urge to buy something with her birthstone – she never wore her birth stones, but it is what it is.  My coworker had told me that she has her grandmother’s rings, she pulled them out right there.  It was very nice to see someone else had felt the exact same way for someone.

Just got back from dinner, going to play my little game and go to bed

I am sitting in my hotel room after driving to Santee, South Carolina today and I am trying to get my motivation back to blog everyday.  Things have been hard and I feel numb a lot of the time, but I can’t spend this entire year in a haze.

I don’t know when it is really going to hit me that my mother is gone.  Everyone keeps telling me that everyone deals  with this differently and whatever it is that I am doing isn’t “wrong”.  I think that is good for me to hear, but I am still worried that it will all come crashing down and I won’t really be able to handle it.  My doctor said it isn’t going to be as bad as I imagine.  The fear of how hard it is going to be is worse then it is going to be.

When we got here, before we even checked in we had dinner at Cracker Barrel!  We both had pancakes  I rode up here with one of my coworkers if anyone is curious about the “we” – I am not that crazy

There is so much going on right now that I am feeling a bit overwhelmed, but my brothers are really stepping up.  Anyway, enough about that.

I am almost done with my latest book, well it shows 44%, but they count all the reference pages as part of that percentage – which is DUMB Kindle – STOP!  It is another book about a building, The Chelsea Hotel.  Very interesting stuff happens in buildings that people live in…

Alright, I am going to try to get some sleep early tonight so I am gonna stop this now.  Goodnight!

 

Oh my goodness, today Carlos worked on cleaning out the freezer.  My mom had it so full, but most of it was expired.  Last night he did the pantry, I think he finished with it, but I am not 100%.  The boys have been very good about this, so amazingly helpful.  I can’t seem to participate, I don’t know what it is.  I just have no motivation to deal with it.

Tomorrow we are supposed to go to the bank and try to do some re-arranging with that stuff.  Just so much to do.

I swept out my car today and it looks much better.  Nickel had jumped in there after getting home in the rain so really it was muddy.

I was able to sleep a little better last night, but really slept best from like 08:00 to 10:00.

I was thinking about going to look for a truck yesterday, but I am going to try to stick with my original idea of paying stuff off first.

I just finished paying my rides for their mileage last month.  Ugh, just kept putting it off for no reason really.

Well we are trying to get food done so I am going to close this out.

Right now I am sitting in a hotel room in Anderson Indiana.  I have my Panda Express dinner to my right and I am done with work for the day.  This week I have been in Indianapolis giving a training class.  I wasn’t going to go, but I kept thinking to myself what am I going to do at home except be constantly reminded that my mom isn’t there.

Tuesday night when I got in it was really late so I went to the hotel restaurant and got a burger and fries.  The hotel has wonderful steak fries and their burger isn’t bad.  Wednesday was the first day of a two day review session for the more advanced users.  We covered a good amount of material so I was on schedule and things were going pretty smooth.  When it was done I went to the bar to see some of the guys and we decided to go out to eat at a place called the Library.  I ate there in January with Brad and that is where I was playing in the snow

Today was a little less smooth, the program went down and some of the stuff I wanted to do just didn’t work perfect.  Everyone was great though, no one was too bothered by it except me.  After the class was over it was time to drive over to Anderson for tomorrow’s meetings.  My flight is at 17:00 out of Indy so I have to finish up here a little early.  That was like the best flight to get home before midnight.

I have been feeling OK, being at work is a good distraction.  I have been reading a lot and that is also good, although I will find my self almost daydreaming while I read and have to go back a page or two to read again  I am hoping to get into bed early tonight, I won’t go to sleep early, but might get a good bit of reading done.

It was raining the whole way here which bummed me out because there is an amazing building down town – or where ever I was  Let me see if I can find out what it was.  Yep, it was the Indiana War Memorial.  I will attach a pic from the internet, I didn’t take it.

Next week I am going to Atlanta and I am debating on driving or flying.  I kinda want to drive, but I don’t really know why except that I can leave when I am done and will probably get there faster and get home faster.

Alright, I am going to wrap it up so I can finish eating and get to reading

Today we started to clean some of the stuff around the house.  My mother was a bit of a “stuff saver”, so there is a lot of things around.  To be very honest, at this point I just need to move the things that make me think she will be home any second out of sight.

I do find myself just pacing around the house.  Paul and dad went to the store and we had the TV off and it was so quiet in the house.  It is NEVER quiet in the house, mom couldn’t stand it!

I moved Samantha’s car so that I could move my car and somehow I managed to lock her keys in her car and the spare are in the glove box…  I have no idea how I did it, but it happened.  Now we are waiting for someone to come get them out.

The dogs just ate so they are going a little crazy.  We tired them out pretty good earlier.  I try to take it easy for a while after they eat, but Nickel usually doesn’t let me.

Just had to pull some weeds to be able to move my car closer to the house.  Them weeds are horrible!  I think we are going to kill everything and use potted plants in there so that we can easily keep the weeds out.  Like fill it with stone or something.

I have always said that I really messed up on our living room, in that I didn’t give it enough space or plan how it was going to be orientated.  Needless to say that means there isn’t much room for a sofa and we definitely can’t fit a sofa and love-seat.  The problem with this is that there are so many of us and we don’t have the space for people to sit.  Maybe we can come up with something later.  Really this is no big deal right now.

Why is it that late at night is when I start feeling the pain?  Why is it when no one is around is when I want a hug and when people are around I don’t?  This was not the way it was supposed to happen with mom.  She was supposed to give us a warning that she was leaving.  I can’t understand it all.

This situation with my mom still seems unreal.  I feel like it must be a dream.  It doesn’t feel right.

I had decided that I was not going to see her in the hospice room and talking to my friends they all seemed to understand, but then I just kept seeing her the way she was here at I didn’t think that I would have wanted that to be my last memory of her.

I went to see her tonight.  Hospice is such a great organization and I am happy that they are there, but I am starting to think that it was a mistake.  It is just so heartbreaking seeing someone you love so much just lay there waiting to pass.  She didn’t look like herself, but I held her hand and said again that I loved her.

I am having a harder time with this than I thought.  Seeing others in the family having a hard time is painful for me too.

I have been traveling so much lately and was supposed to be gone this week.  I knew I shouldn’t go and I am just so so so thankful that my coworkers understood and I felt like I could stay.  I can’t imagine how it would have been if I was away.

I just am unable to describe or comprehend how I feel.  I just don’t know.

First, let me get out there that she is going to be fine in a couple days.

Saturday she started acting very strange.  She was being sluggish and was not really remembering the name of things or would forget what she was doing in the middle of doing it.  I thought the worst, I thought the mom I have known was going to be lost forever.

What a terrifying thing.  I was very upset last night.  And please don’t think for a second I was worried about what it would be like to take care of her, I was worried because I can’t imagine her being here but not being her.  Dementia, to me, is almost the worst thing that can happen to a person.  I am not sure how they feel, but I have seen people with it get very frustrated not being able to remember.  That would upset me the most.  She was having a hard time doing her normal things and that is why I was so upset.

Turns out she had a very bad UTI.  She is getting shots and oral antibiotics to cure the infection.  I instantly felt better when the doctor thought it was that.

There is a lesson I got to learn the “easy” way.  Most people don’t get the freebie their experience is permanent.  If you are a caretaker or if you are your family members closest link you MUST be engaged in their life in such a way that you don’t add so much to the stress of the medical situation with all the other things in life that are going on.

Do you have a power of attorney for them?  Do you know their wishes when it comes to final care.  It’s a lot of little things and trust me I know no one wants to do it, not them and not you – but someone has to know these things.

I love my parents more than anything or anyone else – even if I am not a huggy kissy kinda person!

I went with Carlos to get a pedicure today and it was very nice  We walked right in and were out of there in no time.  It started to pour while we were in there but was done when we got out of the grocery store.

I am about to wrap up my invoice for this month and I am very happy!

I made some good dinner, pigs in a blanket  I know, but I do love it

Nickel has been harassing me for a while, I took him out and it started raining and he does not seem to care one bit!

My phone was going dead very quickly and I got me a replacement, so happy to be back to normal.

I did all my laundry today and will be heading out again tomorrow.  I am almost done with this traveling portion and I think that is a good thing because I think things at home are getting a little bit hard.  We had to get the dryer fixed this week, that was kinda crappy, but it wasn’t too expensive to fix.

I have been needing to give up soda again, and I haven’t had a soda for a couple days now.  I am not sure if I can keep it up, but I will try!

Alright, I am going to grab some ice cream and go to bed

I am officially sick again  I felt a little bad before I left, but now it is in full swing!

I have been in bed all day so far.  It is 16:30 y’all.

I am sitting at my desk because I needed to look at my bank accounts and do some quick work and my desk is such a mess.  How can it be so bad when I am here so little lately

I slept most all of the day.  I am thinking that did good because I am a feeling a little better.  We had some pizza for dinner.  It was pretty good I guess.  Alright, I am going to bed now!

First, I must say how warm I feel with all the comments on yesterday’s blog!  I wasn’t sad writing it, just getting it out at that point, but still to know that many friends are engaged is amazing

Today we have an early flight but right now we are at Avon Yard.  This is a very loud office being near the retarders.  If you know what I mean you know how screeching it is.  I am gonna try to get a video to show it.

I am going to be getting home around 19:00 tonight and I can’t wait.  I have a busy working weekend, but all this work is gonna pay off very soon  I will have check boxes next to a task instead of the ongoing tasks you never check off.

Right when I decided I was going to grab a video to get that sound, the trains stop coming   Oh well, maybe next time.

I am now sitting at the gate in Indianapolis waiting on our flight to board.  Not too much time left, can’t wait to get home.  My phone is about dead, my replacement is waiting for me at home.  This stinks, I don’t know how people put up with phones dying during the day!

Next week we will be starting in Ohio I think.  Tomorrow I am going to take dad and go look at sheds!  I want to get figured out what one I want and get that next month.  I need BUSINESS space

Alright, I might add to this later, but the layover in Atlanta is short and I know when I get home I am going to have prime time puppy bonding time