All The Things / Brain Dump

Mom's surgery is scheduled for next Wednesday. So there's that. It has taken so long to get to this point and now I'm like, "so soon???". But it's time.

Ollie and Pop

They were down spending the night with Cody and Marquee and Ollie last night in advance of her appointment with the surgeon in Atlanta this morning. How squishy is this sweet boy? Love him so much and wish I could have been with him too! I think he favors Pop quite a bit from this angle.

I wish I was down South squishing our sweet Ollie but I was busy dog sitting. I am not great at dog sitting. I'm used to cats doing their own business without involving me. Oscar is prone to punitive poops when his circumstances change. I've cleaned up three of those in the past 24 hours. Lady is prone to peeing anywhere anytime because she's old and pretty much incontinent. I have halfway cleaned up those accidents but haven't given them a proper scrubbing because I just can't bend that way right now. I took the dogs out before bedtime last night and couldn't coax anyone outside before I had to leave this morning. I returned from my errands to new pee/poop spots around the Whine Cellar. Thank you Helen and Bryan for my Yankee Candle for Christmas!

I then tried to walk both dogs, intending to do one at a time but Lady somehow pushed her way past me and headed straight toward the lake. We aren't really sure how much she sees anymore. I was worried she was going to fall in the lake so I stood at the top of the hill and screamed her name to no avail. I tried inching closer and started to slide down the muddy hill. I braced myself and didn't hit the ground but it was still jarring so I resorted to screaming like a shrew from the top of the hill and eventually she came to me.

I took Austin to work this morning and since I was already at the grocery store I picked up a few things. I haven't been eating well lately, not eating much and not eating hardly anything of much nutritional value. I know from experience that eating junk makes me feel like junk so I bought a few of my healthier eating standards: makings for tabbouleh, makings for my three bean salad/panzanella, makings for a beet and goat cheese salad and a bowl of cut fruit. I was happy to discover that the cost for an already cut tomato to go in the tabbouleh was cheaper than buying my own tomato to cut. I was also happy to discover that I could buy the pre-cut red onion for my 3bean salad as well. Unfortunately the precut onion REALLY stinks! It's so strong that I am still smelling it from inside my fridge. At any rate... hoping this helps me feel stronger in the next few days as I am going to need it for my extended dog-sitting stint next week.

Cosette from yesterday

I only made it through half of the grocery store but I at least made it halfway, right? Then I came home and carried in all the groceries in one trip (my big LL Bean tote bag is perfect for this!) because I figured I would either have the strain from carrying things that were too heavy or the strain from making too many trips up and down the stairs. I chose option A and regret it. It might not be as bad if I hadn't followed that up with the trip to retrieve the geriatric dog before she went for a polar plunge but... it was not a great idea either way. Every muscle is in spasm and I'm awfully sick to my stomach which happens sometimes when I'm in pain. I'm on self-imposed quarantine from Cosy today just in case it's not pain nausea and is something more sinister or contagious.

Despite all of this I'm really not feeling overwhelmed or anything. Sometimes I get kind of claustrophobic/anxious when I'm outside my comfort zone (which is a physical and emotional place for me) and I'm very chill right now.

I'm going to just introvert a bit over the next few days and prepare myself for stepping up to the plate to do even a fraction of the things my mom usually does effortlessly. I would say she has big shoes to fill but I tease her too much about having bigger feet than me so I won't put it that way, this time. I know that I can trust you to keep Mawmaw in your thoughts and prayers over the next week or two... and Pop too as it will be tiring for him - much more than it will be for me and mom will at least have good drugs to help her through. I don't know the times or anything specific about her treatment yet so I will update that when I get completely caught up on things. In the meantime... I'm gonna watch some Youtube and some Netflix and try to be a good better dog-sitter. Love and hugs, y'all!