Today, my mother had a telephone doctor’s appointment to get the final test results from her recent ER visits. The previous results would have already been sent to her doctor, but there was the one culture test that takes 5 days to get results. Today would have been enough time for that test to be completed, and the results sent to her doctor.
Her appointment was for 10:30, but I left early to do things like put gas in the truck and pick up a breakfast/lunch of some sort at the grocery store, since my mom has been complaining about the prices of take out food. I ended up getting a Chef’s salad and a couple of croissant sandwiches. They didn’t have a lot of prepared food to choose from, that early in the day.
When I got to my mom’s, I was about half an hour early. My mother told me that she’d had a phone call at 9am, but she didn’t get to it in time. No message was left, but she thought it might have been me. It wasn’t, so I checked the call display on her phone, which only showed the number, date and time, but nothing else. I tried to do a reverse look up and, sure enough, it came from the town the clinic is in. That was as much as we could find out, but it was likely the doctor, calling 1 1/2 hours early! It was also just after the clinic officially opened.
Still, we figured since she didn’t get through, she’d call at – or close to – the appointment time. We also knew that it might be late, if things got busy with her in-person patients.
After half an hour past the appointment time, I called the clinic, just to make sure. It was confirmed that the doctor did try to call in the morning. I ended up being transferred to someone else and I explained the situation again. She looked up the information, then assured me that she would let the doctor know to call us, and that we were waiting for her call.
So… I guess she wasn’t going to try calling again, after not getting through to my mother earlier? It seems my mother’s name wasn’t on the list anymore.
We waited.
And waited.
My mother was starting to get really tired, so she tried to lie down for a nap, and I waited with her phone.
And waited.
At least I got to watch the latest Tasting History video that went live today. 😁
The clinic doesn’t answer their phones between 12 and 1. It wasn’t even 12:15 when my mother started saying that we should call again. I explained their telephone hours to her, but she had a hard time understanding the concept. She did, at least, understand that there was no point in trying to call until 1pm.
When 1:00 rolled around, I called again, just to see what the status of things was.
It was confirmed that my mother was still on the list of people that would be called – and I was assured, my mother would be called.
The doctor, however, was in the ER.
The clinic is part of the hospital building, and the doctors take turns being the on call for the ER. Today was her turn.
The receptionist was really apologetic, but there was nothing she could do – there was no way to know when the doctor would be able to call. Meanwhile, I still had errands to do for my mother, and I couldn’t stay there all day, waiting.
We ended up rescheduling the appointment, this time in the afternoon. I’ll be coming back to my mother’s for it, the day after tomorrow.
When I asked about the stuff my mother had wanted me to pick up for her, she said to forget it. Just go home! She was more than ready to try for a nap again, feeling very tired and very frustrated.
So I’ll do the errands for her on Thursday. I think I’ll go over in the morning, do the errands first, then wait for the call with her. If I wait until after the call to do the errands, it’ll be dark by the time I’d be heading home, and I’d really prefer to avoid that if I can. Yes, I did get deer screamers for the truck, but there are an awful lot of deer out there this year.
The end result is, we still have no idea what her test results are, and what next steps can be taken to figure out what is going on with my mother.
When I got home, I found my answering machine blinking, but no message. My caller ID, however, gives more information, and I could see that the call was from the clinic. The doctor had tried to call me, immediately after trying to call my mother, but I was already on the road to my mother’s place at that time.
On the one hand, I can appreciate that she tried, but it frustrates me that a telephone appointment is not being treated as an appointment, but a free-for-all. We’ve had some telephone appointments for myself and my husband with similar issues. The call comes in much earlier, much later, or not at all! So it’s not an issue with this doctor in particular.
Ah, well. It is what it is.
I just can’t help but feel my day was completely wasted for it, though.
My daughter and I left really early for my eye exam, just to be on the safe side. The drive is normally about 45 minutes. Road conditions were good, but the farther south we drove, the denser the fog and the worse the visibility. The town my appointment was in was completely enveloped in fog. The city, another 15 minutes drive away, would have been even worse!
Since we got there so early, we had time for lunch, and to check out a couple of stores. I still got to my appointment almost an hour early. I’m glad I did, because they were able to take me in early. There was the pre-test stuff, which included a field of vision test, this time. I haven’t had one of those in well over 20 years. Then I got the eye drops and stayed in the waiting room to give them time to do their work. Even with all that, it was still earlier than my appointment when the doctor came to get me. I have some extremely mild hemorrhaging in my eyes that she wanted to check again. They seem pretty much unchanged. My field of vision test also seemed fine, though she didn’t have any previous tests to compare to, of course.
She wants me back again in 6 months, partly for a regular eye exam, but to do the field of vision and dilation tests again, and be able to compare.
Since I was taken in so early, it was still light out for our entire drive home. Being a passenger for a change, I tried to get some pictures out the window. In town, the visibility had actually gotten worse, but once we were on the highway and heading north, the visibility improved.
One good thing with everything being covered with hoarfrost. Deer are highly visible!
We even got back early enough to pick up a parcel at the post office, before they closed.
So now I sit here wondering if my eyes can handle working on another garden analysis post.
Considering how they feel, just from writing this, I think they’re still way too dilated!
Ah, it feels so good to be using a keyboard again! I really don’t like using my phone to tap out blog posts. 😄
Would you look at this bunch?
There’s always quite the rush of cats in the sun room when I first come out with my little bin and scoop to feed them. They’ve usually tossed things about over night (or the racoons have!), so I now put the bin down in the ground and let them have at it, while I pick things up and put them back where they belong. Then take scoops of kibble from around usually 3 or 4 cats eating out of the bin to fill the feeding areas in the sun room. Even after that’s done, I usually still have one or two I need to bodily remove from the bin so I can take it outside. There is a black cat that now lets me pet it and even move it around while it’s eating. I think it’s the one I posted a picture of recently. I’m not 100% sure, though.
This morning, every time I tried to do a head count, I got a different number. However, my first head count, done while they were all still voraciously eating, rather than running around all over the place, I got 38, and I’m almost positive I did not double count any of them. Once they’ve had at least some food, though, they start running around and then some start disappearing.
Then there are the ones that don’t disappear. They instead settle down in the sun room, with full little bellies, and settle in for a nap!
I’ve managed to touch the back of that fluffy grey tabby in the top right a few times while eating. He (she?) would run off, but not as quickly as usual. When not eating, I can’t get close enough to touch.
I think my daughter and I will need to head out earlier for my eye appointment today. I can see on the security camera live feed that the fog is getting thicker. We had fog alerts starting last night. After my mother was done at the hospital, we were hitting fog on the drive to her place. In one stretch, I turned off the main highway to cross over to her town and immediately drove into a wall of fog. We kept driving in and out of fog banks the whole way, but it did seem to clear up as we reached her town.
When I was driving home, I started driving through fog banks again. In some places, the ground was clear, but the fog hung like a ceiling, above.
When I came out to do my rounds this morning, there was a light fog. The trees are covered in light hoarfrost. I expected it to get lighter as the day went on, but nope. It’s getting denser!
So glad we’ll be taking the truck, and not my mother’s car!
My mother and I ended up in the ER for just under 6 hours.
She got her scan done – it turned out to be another ultrasound – and we were sent back to the ER waiting room until the results came in.
The problem is, for people waiting for scan results (we weren’t the only ones), they get squeezed in between patients with more urgent needs. Plus, only a doctor can discuss the results, not the nurses, and they were really busy. All 14 ER beds were full.
So what I thought might take a couple of hours, ended up much longer!
On the plus side, the cafeteria was open, so my mother did actually get a chance to eat. It was closed when she was there with my brother, yesterday. It was a real demonstration about just how hungry she was when she agreed to have a quesadilla, the only hot food option available. She had to ask what it was and agreed to have one. My mother will normally flat out refuse to try anything new, so this was a big deal!
I also almost drained the battery on my phone, distracting her with things on Pinterest. We tried watching a few short videos, but that was pushing her attention span to the limit, so I went back to Pinterest.
End result, when they finally called her in?
Nothing.
They found nothing wrong in their scan.
Now, with her symptoms, there is obviously something wrong, but they have no idea what. They took a sample for a culture test, which takes 5 days, so see if there’s a bacterial cause. They will phone my mother only if they find something wrong. Meanwhile, all the data will be sent to her doctor, and I will be booking an appointment for her in the near future – but not too near. We’ll see how it works out, with the Christmas holidays.
As for my mother, it seems she’s ridiculously healthy. Not bad for someone who is 92, very round, with busted up knees, and constantly complaining to us about various health problems, and is convinced the doctors are hiding things from her, like that she has cancer or something (she doesn’t). At one point, as my mother was being taken to an examination room, even the nurse that was supposed to be leading the way, only to have my mother race off ahead of her, commented on just how fast she is!
Anyhow.
Once she sees her regular doctor, she might get referred to a specialist to try and figure out what the heck is going on.
Funny how my mother complains about her health so much, but she’s had these symptoms for months and ever thought much of them. She figured they’d go away on their own.
*sigh*
Meanwhile, tomorrow we have to go to yet another town for my eye appointment, which means I won’t have the time I need to finish any of my 2023 garden analysis drafts. It might be a couple of days before I can get back to those.
This has got to be the busiest December for outings we’ve had since moving out here!
I woke up in pain. Every joint. Even my finger joints where hurting and didn’t want to bend.
I’m about a 6 on the above chart. My husband fluctuates from 7 or 8 on a good day, to 10 on a bad day, so I really don’t have much to complain about.
At least I remembered to take pain killers this morning.. I was intending to take pain killers after finishing yesterday’s blog post, got distracted and completely forgot until I was taking my evening prescription and supplements before bed.
I’m not sure why I’m in so much pain this morning. It’s not related to my fall. My knee feels good enough that I forget it’s still injured and start to kneel onto a chair or my bed with it. In fact, right now, it’s my other knee that hurts more, just with ambient pain. It could be the change in temperatures and barometric pressure. We’ve reached our expected high of -3C/27F already, and tomorrow is supposed to reach a high of -8C/18C. My desktop weather app includes the pressure, but without knowing what it was yesterday to see how much it has changed, I can’t say one way or the other.
On a more pleasant note, I also woke up covered in kittens. At least four of them at one point, snuggling against me. Well, three against me. Snorri in particular much prefers sleeping on me over sleeping with the other kittens. Usually on my hip, but one time I had my feet out from under the covers, and he decided my bare ankle was the place to be!
He’s so small, he could actually do that, and I could barely feel his weight! Even The Beast (aka: Tiny) is significantly heavier than Snorri, and she’s still too tiny to let out of the room! We are letting Soot Sprite out regularly now, though.
So it looks like I’m not going to get a lot done today. My daughter took care of the outside cats for me this morning. Thankfully, we’ve got our prescription refills getting delivered today, so I don’t have to drive into town for them. I’m glad my husband called his refills in earlier. Yesterday, we got a call from the pharmacist about his pain meds. He gets it in both slow release and “take as needed” versions. The pharmacy not only needed an updated prescription for it, but they needed the triplicate paper prescription, as it’s an opioid. The problem is, they sent a fax for the refill, and got no response. They even tried our old doctor at his new clinic, and we’re not patients of his anymore. My husband called his new doctor’s office and, according to their records, they sent the refill information just a few days after the pharmacy requested it. How they could fax in a triplicate prescription, I don’t know, but I guess they’ve got something worked out. With his new doctor in the same town as the pharmacy again, they’re just blocks apart, and I recall the clinic would simply walk the paper prescriptions over. He called the pharmacy and they double checked, but never received the fax. So the clinic sent it again, and it’s all straightened out. He’ll get his pain meds with his bubble packs today, as usual.
Well, I guess this makes today a good day to work on my 2023 garden analysis drafts. It should be interesting to go through my early planning posts and see just how different our garden turned out to be, from how it was intended this year!
Yesterday, I got out the Montana Morado corn cobs that had been set aside to continue drying in a cardboard box before trying to remove the kernels. Unfortunately, a few small cobs were still to unripe and started to get fuzzy instead, but we still got this out of it.
It came out to almost exactly a cup of kernels.
I’m waffling between keeping some as seed for next year, or just processing the whole thing. We don’t have a corn mill, but we want to make flour out of it to try. We might have a coffee grinder strong enough, but I think my daughters want to try using our larger mortar and pestle. Which is still pretty small, but we’d be doing it in batches, anyhow.
The other thing that happened yesterday was related to the truck financing.
Yes. We have the truck.
Yes. We have signed the financing documents with the lender, and the finance company representative that’s been helping us all this time.
Yes. The lender had actually said it was done, after we’d sent in a cell phone bill in my husband’s name as yet another proof of ID.
Then yesterday, they told her the cell phone bill wasn’t good enough. They wanted more.
By this point, the entire office was in an uproar about it, I was told. She’d gone to her managers about it, and they were getting involved with the lender to get this mess fixed up. It’s gotten so bad, she was starting to think someone else at the lender’s office had a problem with her, and was messing with the file because of it. We’re not the only file of hers that’s had issues, but none to the point we’re at now. Not only was the entire office getting involved to help out, she herself had stopped working on all other files but ours. The problem is, we already gave them pretty much everything we had. I did eventually sent in an image of my husband’s CPP Disability T4, which only has information they already have on it. They kept wanting something with my husband’s name and address that was sent within the last 30 days (the updated proof of income not being good enough, since they sent it to use digitally, apparently), but most of what we have is all done online, and/or is in my name.
Eventually, a manager had an idea, and suggested we contact the electric company and have my husband’s name added, then have them generate a bill with both our names and our mailing address to send in. This manager had to do that, themselves. They are in a different province, however, and in our province the electric company is run by the government.
I tried it anyhow. I logged in, but the name is one thing that cannot be changed by the client. I found a phone number, though, and after going through the automated system, eventually got to where it would sent me to a customer service rep. All lines were busy, of course, but I had the option to get a representative to call me back, rather than sitting on hold, so I chose that.
Thankfully, I didn’t have to wait too long. After explaining the situation, the rep was able to do it in her software, but when I logged out and logged back in (refreshing the page didn’t work), on my end of it, our names were all mixed up. She tried again, and basically removed my last name entirely, and that finally worked out by showing “[my name] & [my husband’s entire name as it shows on his birth certificate]”.
She could not, however, generate a statement for me. The change would not show up until the next billing cycle, which I wouldn’t get until the middle of next month.
The personal information page, however, had our names and mailing address on the same screen, so I hoped that would be good enough. I did a print screen and save as PDF, and sent that in.
I have not heard anything since, which tells me it may finally have been accepted!
We are all just blown away over how this has been made to be more difficult that it should be. They had more than enough to establish my husband’s identity. It just sounds like someone had a bee in their bonnet and wouldn’t let go.
Then I got a call from my mother.
Now, when I last spoke with her on Tuesday, I made sure she knew that I would not be available on Wednesday or Thursday, because we were getting the truck on Wednesday, and my husband had a medical appointment on Thursday. My sister was planning to visit her on Wednesday, so she would be able to help my mother with groceries, etc.
Well, she helped with the groceries, at least.
When my mother called, she told me she had run out of her prescriptions, which come in bubble packs. She had planned to take her walker and go to the pharmacy, but it’s been raining and unpleasant. She said she also had a letter from the doctor to give to the pharmacist, and what was I doing tomorrow?
So we arranged for me to come over today so we could have lunch together, and then I could help her with the pharmacy.
I headed out earlier to pick up some gas, first, and would normally have picked up some fried chicken for lunch from there as well, but it was too early in the day for that. They wouldn’t have any for quite some time. Instead, I went to the Chinese restaurant by her place and got take out. Yes, even though she told me she didn’t want to eat from there anymore, because she’s decided they use cats for meat. Well, she did enjoy her meal – then told me not to get food for her from there anymore, because she things they are using cat meat. She claims she saw on the news that a restaurant in the city was caught doing this, and now assumes all Chinese restaurants do this, but 1) the first time she told me about the cat thing, she told me it was one of her neighbours that told her they were doing this and 2) when asked, she couldn’t tell me anything about this story she heard, other than it was in the city. No idea where in the city, or even how long ago she heard this.
The thing is, this is a small town, and there are only so many options. The gas station has fried chicken she loves, but she’s decided she’s not supposed to eat it because it’s bad for her (even though she only eats it rarely). There is a restaurant she goes to pretty regularly that specializes in fried chicken, among a wider menu, but she complains because their food is always cold and not as good, so that’s out, too. There’s another restaurant, but it doesn’t do take out, and finally, there’s the Chinese food place. Which has excellent food at prices even she used to make a big deal out of, because they give so much food for the money. That’s it. Those are the only options for take out. The remaining alternative is for her to make lunch and 1) I wouldn’t want to make her do that work and 2) … let’s just say, my mother’s food combinations don’t always work out. My brother always bring food when he visits, because he has gotten physically ill from food she’d slapped together to make a meal. This isn’t even a “make do with what you have” thing. My mother could be a great cook with some thing. With others… frankly, I’d rather eat cat.
Anyhow. I brought lunch, she ate and enjoyed it, but chastised me for it. Knowing she will complain about anything I bring (when my sister brings her food from the Chinese restaurant, my mother speaks glowingly about it), I’ll just bring whatever I want that is available.
For the rest… Well, I’ll make it as short as I can. Overall, it was a good visit, but there were a number of concerns that came up.
First; my mother is really struggling, physically. Her knees are hurting her a lot, but she still refuses to take the T3s, because they are “narcotics”. Even though she took a pain killer before she left, it was clearly not enough.
Second; my mother’s cognition is failing. The “letter” for the pharmacist turned out to be the new prescription from the doctor for her bladder concerns. A prescription my mother declared she would not fill, when we got into the car after her appointment. She doesn’t trust the doctor because she’s female and not white. When the pharmacist brought out her bubble packs, my mother was shocked, because she though she wouldn’t be getting them, because of this “letter”. When she found out it was to have a new prescription on top of the unchanged regular prescriptions (for all that she complains she’s taking soooo many pills, she really isn’t), she was upset. She completely forgot that she had a new prescription and what it was for, but filled in the blanks by deciding it was a letter – a letter she thought the pharmacist somehow already knew about, even though she had the only copy – that said what she wanted it to say.
Third; she’s having trouble keeping her medications straight. We went over them after I got her home, and she had a couple of them mixed up. Which wouldn’t matter too much, if she were simply taking them when she was supposed to, but she keeps trying to drop this one or that one. She had tried to tell me on the phone that she was feeling better without them, but today, she was telling me how bad she was feeling without them. It also turned out she had changed when she was taking one of them that was supposed to be taken before bed, which basically negated the whole point of that particular medication helping her while she’s lying down. She was taking it with her evening pills, but she takes those so early in the evening, it wouldn’t be useful by the time she got to bed.
Oh, when I had the chance, I asked her why she didn’t get her refills while my sister was there to help. She said she still had a day left, so she didn’t bother. We’ve all been trying to tell her, she needs to get her refills before she runs out, but she seems downright offended by that idea. As if there were some sort of law against it.
In the end, was I was looking up her medications to tell her what each specific pill was for, she got me to write it out. which leads me to one last concern. Her anger issues. It’s not even a new thing. It’s just more hair trigger. As I was writing things out, she was at first happy to see how I was printing it out so clearly and easy for her to read – but then got angry that it too me two lines to write out the description and information, then what the pill was for. Then she wanted little drawings of the pills and was furious because I didn’t make the doodle where she though it should be, etc.
I was able to de-intensify things well enough but, my goodness, that gets exhausting.
Still, it got done. She has her medications, including the new one. I told her (as did the pharmacist), to try it for the 30 days. He only gave her half the prescription, since it’s basically a test. If, after 30 days, she finds it helps, she can let the pharmacy know and they’ll add the next 30 days into her bubble packs. If they don’t help, she can just stop using them. I added that it could take about a week to for them to start working, so to go keep taking them for the 30 days.
I won’t even get into the other stuff that came up. The medications thing was enough to suck the energy out of me on its own, but of course, it wans’t the only thing.
I had left early enough that I could have done some work outside (something else she gave me a hard time about), but by the time I got home, I just didn’t have the spoons anymore. After updating the family – and writing an email to my siblings about the medication things and the concerns I was seeing – I’d pretty much reached my limits.
The problem is, next week, the cold weather is supposed to finally hit us. Which means things need to be prioritized differently. Getting that second trellis bed started has just dropped down the list over things like mulching the garlic more, as well as covering the orange carrots we plan to store in ground for the winter, etc. We’ve been leaving that last bed of onions as long as possible, but we’re going to have to take the whole thing in and process them for freezing right away.
As glad as I am to have the truck and to be able to bring my husband to a medical appointment in it, it looks like those two days were the last really pleasant ones we’re going to have for the year. Since then, it’s been overcast and rainy. Tomorrow is supposed to be a bit better, and then that’s it.
Ah, well. There’s only so much we can do. The world won’t end if it doesn’t all get done.
Right now, I need to decompress and get some solid sleep!
My husband had his medical appointment this morning, so we got to give the truck its first real test.
I did end up having to fold up both bench seats in the back to fit his walker. With just the seat behind the passenger seat folded up, the walker fits at a angle, which makes one wheel just an inch or two too far for the door to close. The part of the bench seat behind the driver’s seat that folds is 2/3rds of the seat, so it would fit just fine, there, but that’s not where my husband is, when it comes time to load and unload it. If we are ever driving with all 4 of us, the walker would just have to be laid down in the box and secured. With the cover on the box, that would work out just fine, too.
As for getting in and out, he has an easier time of it than I do, being considerably taller than I am! Not having to fold himself down into a tiny seat in a tiny car, all on its own, makes a world of difference!
The appointment went as well as such things go with him. He’s going to be tried on a new medication to try and get his blood sugars down and, hopefully, allow him to reduce his insulin. Part of the problem with insulin is that it causes weight gain, and that’s sure as heck not helping his injured back any. He hasn’t had his Ozempic for a while, now. Because of how high his dose is, he gets it in special ordered pens with a lot more in them; with the “regular” dose versions, he’d be going through a pen a day, and it’s a lot more expensive, even with coverage. The pens he needs, though, are not available. He opted to skip it for now, rather than go for the more expensive smaller dose pens he’d have to buy twice as much of.
So he’ll be taking this new medication for 3 months, then get some bloodwork done to see if it helped any, or if the dose needs to be changed, etc. This medication is supposed to also be good for his heart, though he hasn’t had his heart tested in a very long time, what with the heart clinic in the city being unwilling to accommodate his disability.
Armed with a new prescription, our next stop was at the pharmacy. The new medication needs special “permission” for coverage, though, and that involves some paperwork between the doctor and the insurance company. It was expensive enough that I couldn’t just get it without coverage, unfortunately. Since he’s going to have to really keep on on monitoring his sugars while on this medication, I got more test strips and lancets and, since it’s been more than a year, he qualified for a free glucometer with the purchase of test strips. I don’t think we’ve every had to pay for an actual glucometer with that particular deal.
After his stuff was done, I had my own prescription to refill, which is extremely simple compared to my husband’s convoluted medications. While I was waiting, I remember to ask about the Ozempic. Still nothing, and no estimate as to when they will be able to provide more. The problem, of course, is that Ozempic is being used by people who are not diabetic as a weight loss gimmick. Which is disturbing enough on its own, but that enough people are getting this super high dose for it to run out completely is quite alarming. This stuff has some pretty terrible side effects, and you can’t just take it, loose weight, then stop taking it. It’s basically Ozempic for life. She said she expected the fad to fade away in about 5 years, like previous weight loss drug fads. I sure hope it takes less than 5 years! I just can’t imagine deliberately taking something that can cause such incredible problems with the digestive system, including losing control of the bowels, just to lose a few pounds. For some diabetics, it can work very well. It doesn’t seem to be doing much for my husband, other then add to the long list of side effects he’s already dealing with. It certainly isn’t resulting in weight loss, but he’s also been on at least two medications that cause weight gain for much longer than he’s been on the Ozempic.
As you can see, everyone has pretty much given up on any treatment for his back injury. There really isn’t a fix for that, and pain control has never been very successful on any of the different medications they’ve maxed him out on. With his current medication (two versions of the same drug; one fast acting and one slow release), it seems he’s actually been a sort of test case on just how high they can safely increase the dosages to. And he’s already been told, right from the first diabetic nurse he saw after he became officially disabled from it, he won’t be able to control the blood sugars until he can control the pain.
Not much quality of life in his situation.
Having said that, while we were driving around and talking about the truck, he actually brought up wanting to make a trip into the city to visit family. !!! Which is really amazing because, even with the van, he always balked at taking longer trips.
By the time we were done with everything, it was past lunch time, and neither of us had had breakfast, so we decided to go to the new DQ for a sit down lunch. That sure hit the spot! He also got more to bring home as a surprise for our daughters.
It was late enough when we were finally heading home that the post office was open after its mid day break, so we stopped by. I was hoping our lysine for the cats had come in, but apparently it’s backordered right now. There were, however, other packages waiting, including two surprises!
M, you are amazing!
That hose will be for the garden tap we will be installing. As we are able, we will get pipes that hose can be run through and buried, and a few other fittings. The plan is to have everything ready for next spring, when we can dig up the rest of the existing pipe and set up a nice tap and vegetable washing station at the garden. I had been looking at heavy duty hoses at Walmart and Canadian Tire. It never occurred to me to look for metal contractor grade hoses online.
As for the other box…
Just look at those beautiful clear eyes!
… Tiny: The Beast, got to be the first to test it out! This is for the outside cats, in the winter. It works by “reflecting” body heat back. No electricity required. I’m sure the outside cats will love it!
In other things, this was a highly interrupted post. I got a call from the roofing company that did our roof last year. My brother had gone up this year and noticed some shingles lifting, which will be fixed under warranty. However, we had that one driving rain that resulted in rain dripping around the chimney to the old cook stove in the kitchen, which has never leaked before. My brother talked to the roofing guy about it, and he said that chimney doesn’t have a proper collar on it. Which apparently it never has, but it also has never leaked before. Either way, my brother made arrangements, and the guy went searching for a collar that would work. the problem is, the roof over the old kitchen is a lot steeper than anywhere else on the house, which, I’m told, is why there was never a collar on the chimney. The angle is wrong.
Well, it seems the guy found something that will work, and he’s now on his way over to fix it, and fix the loose shingles my brother spotted. It’s awfully late in the day for this – it gets dark so fast, this time of year! – but we’re glad that he’s going to get it done.
Aside from all this, there is also more delays in regards to the financing for the truck, if you can believe it!
Oh… time to pause. The roofing guy is almost here.
Well, that’s done.
The collar he found was clearly too small for the chimney, but he went up and did the other warranty covered work, which included sealing around the chimney. He found a gap where he could see water would have gotten in, in a driving rain. He even sealed around the top of the chimney, under the cap, and around a join near the bottom, which had been sealed long ago and was starting to crumble. He even added sealant under some shingles that were over lapping the sort of collar at the base, and the base itself. It will not leak again! He even went around the roof and tacked down anything that looked loose, and sealed around openings above the bathroom, just in case.
In the end, he figures it will not leak anymore, and a collar would not be necessary. It will be up to my brother if he still wants it done, as it is not covered by warranty. Having watched him thorough he was, I don’t see a need!
One more think off the list…
So… where was I?
Oh, yes.
The financing thing.
Before we left this morning, I got an email from the finance lady. The lender had a whole bunch of stuff they needed, now that the vehicle has been insured and sold. Most of that, our mechanic already had copies of that he could sent. In fact, the list was really meant for him, since it included how he wanted to be paid!
Yeah. He still hasn’t been paid, other than our down payment!
One thing they wanted was a copy of the registration in the borrower’s name.
That would be my husband. Who no longer drives and no longer has a driver’s license. I clarified that part but let her know I could get some of the rest for her, if our mechanic couldn’t provide it, since we now have the truck, but it would have to wait until after we got back from the doctor’s.
I took the truck out of the garage so it would be easier for my husband to access and started taking the photos the lender wanted, but couldn’t get a photo of the dash with the mileage. The littler computer display screen it would be on had a warning for a low tire in the rear. Which isn’t low. I saw them top all the tires up, and double checked. It’s fine. I hooked up our OBDII scanner and cleared the codes, but that one kept coming back.
I texted our mechanic about it. When we got to the clinic, the display changed to “service tire monitoring system”. He figures the module needs a new battery, because he knows it’s all fine. I have no doubt; now that I have all the paperwork for the safety, I have a list of all the things he took care of before putting it up for sale! Yeah. I’m even more sure he took a loss on this one.
After we got home, I was going to email the financing lady to see if there were still things she needed that our mechanic couldn’t provide – only to have her phone me before I started! One of the things was a photo of the VIN sticker on the door, which I already got a photo of. The other was more involving my husband’s ID confirmation. They wanted something mailed to him within the last 30 days that has his name and address on it.
His birth certificate name, not the name he uses, which is his second name, as traditional among his Acadian family.
We already sent all sorts of things to them, but they were either with the “wrong” name, or they didn’t have his address. Even his proof of income had his given name, not his first name. Most of the things she suggested either don’t get mailed to us, as we have gone completely electronic, or are under my name. Then she mentioned a cell phone bill.
That was one of the things he updated to include his full name, so that he would have something to show when he finally was able to come in to get a photo ID.
I logged in and checked, and sure enough, it had his full name, just like on his birth certificate, plus both our postal and our physical addresses. Yay!!! Finally!!! I was able to download the pdf and sent that along with the VIN sticker photo.
I just can’t get an odometer reading photo, because we can’t find any way to cycle through the computer display readings. The user manual shows us where the controls should be, but our model doesn’t have it.
There has to be something, somewhere, but we just can’t find it!
Anyhow…
Hopefully, this is the last thing they need, and our mechanic can finally get paid! We’re all getting pretty frustrated, because they keep coming up with all these little things that are delaying it. Everything else is done. We have the truck. He needs to be paid!
Talking to my daughter about all this, later on, she suggested we bake him a cake or something as a thank you! I agree!
On a different note, I had planned to top up the gas tank before going home, but we were out so long, I skipped it, so my husband could get home and recover from the outing. The nice thing?
The needle barely moved, the entire time.
With my mother’s car, we would have seen a substantial drop. Even taking into account the different sizes of gas tanks, the difference is notable. Now, given the specs on this truck, it’s not going to be fantastic on gas, so this is more a reflection on how bad on gas my mother’s car has gotten – and we can’t find the reason why! At least it doesn’t seem to be getting worse anymore.
So that’s were we’re at now.
Tomorrow, I have no errands to run, so hopefully, I’ll be able to get back to work outside. We’ve had some absolutely gorgeous weather, lately, and it’s supposed to stick around for a while.
I’m back from getting my mother’s car checked and partially worked on.
My first stop was the clinic to drop off the thumb drive with my husband’s medical files, only to find everything but the emergency was closed (the clinic is in the same building as the hospital). Saturday was “Truth and Reconciliation Day”, so they were treating today, Monday, like a statutory holiday.
Thankfully, the pharmacy was not closed. I went there to update my husband’s file with his new doctor’s name and mentioned it was closed. The pharmacist said they thought it might be, because it had been so quiet for them today! The new doctor still can’t refill my husband’s painkillers, though. They are opioids, which means he’s going to need to get a new, hand written prescription in triplicate to bring in. Which his new doctor can’t give him until she gets his medical records.
When I mentioned the doctor’s name, the pharmacist knew exactly who it was, since this person is now her own doctor, too!
After I was done at the pharmacy, I took the car through a car wash, then dropped it off at the garage. I was more than an hour early, which was fine.
I was just getting out of the car when my phone started ringing. Which always surprised me, because I almost never use my phone as a phone! It came up as “suspected spam”, but I tried answering anyway. I think I got hung up on or disconnected somehow. Our mechanic was outside and started walking over to talk to me. He had just talked with the lady and the financing company, and the call would have been from her!
She had called him about that truck we tried for. While my husband has no current photo ID, we did sent two older ones; his old driver’s license and his Metis card for this province (when we moved away, the Metis Federation in our new province wouldn’t recognise him as Metis unless he paid them to do another genealogy, so we didn’t bother). The finance lady suddenly realized what that second ID was and thought she’d be able to take the taxes off the purchase. That would have made the monthly payments at the maximum we could afford, but we could have done it!
Alas, it was not to be. My husband not Status Indian. He doesn’t have the number needed to be tax free. I just double checked. Metis and Inuit are not eligible for tax exemptions. Which is ridiculous, since there are people with no First Nations blood in them at all that are Status, through marriage or adoption.
Ah, well. It would have been nice. I really appreciate that they are trying so hard to get us a vehicle in our budget!!!
After dropping off the keys, I went for lunch at the nearby Chinese restaurant. We don’t normally go there, as it’s inside a hotel, and we tend to forget it exists. They have an awesome dim sum menu, though. This time, I had a combo that included steamed pork buns. They were the lightest, fluffiest, pillow-iest pork buns I’ve ever had!
When I was done, it was still early, but I saw the car was in one of the bays and no one was around, so I went inside. They were all eating lunch, and were going to look at it next, so I popped over to the grocery store for a bit, then just sat outside at one of their picnic tables with a drink. By the time I got to the garage, the car was done.
The air filter has been changed. My brother and I had no idea when it had been changed last, so I had to ask how it looked. He said that it looked really clean – until he knocked against it and clouds of gravel dust came off of it! The final bill on that was just under $65, which isn’t too bad.
The spark plugs, however, need to be replaced and those had to be ordered in. They’ll arrive tomorrow, but I won’t bring the car in again until Thursday. That will be just under $175
Apparently, Canadian money doesn’t exist in Word Press’ free image library.
Which is a bit over the budget I’d allotted for this, but not by much. It could have been much worse, to be sure! Things were quiet at the time, so we even had a chance to chat a bit.
As I was leaving, though, I turned around and came back. The brakes were screaming! Or, more accurately, the rear end started screaming when I hit the brakes. I noticed this as I was pulling out of the car wash. I told him this and he said to just drive it; it was probably just moisture had gotten into the brake pads. Intellectually, I did know that was likely it, but I am so paranoid about tires in particular! By the time I got home, though, the noise was gone, so that was a relief.
Well now! As I was writing the above, the phone rang. It was the financing lady. We talked about how there is no tax exemption for Metis. She was so disappointed to hear that! As we talked, she even looked through some of the other inventory our mechanic has right now, but that truck was the only one that could have worked out in our budget. I told her our mechanic is still looking; he knows our specific needs, and if anyone can find something, he can. It did give her a chance to ask for a couple of things. She’s got pre-approval for us from a couple of banks, but they have different requirements. One of them is to get our bank records/income statements with his name on it. I sent in pdfs of bill payments/deposits from the last 90 days, but because I logged in to do it, it only shows my name on it, and doesn’t even show that it’s a joint account. It’s messing them up! 😄
Oh, another call from her. There’s a way around having to send another pdf without our banking activity for the past 90 days. We can send a digital void check with his name on it, instead.
The other thing the bank needs is a letter of income from Sun Life. We get those once a year; my husband gets the form at the end of the year to say “yes, I’m still disabled and under the care of a doctor” and around February, we get a letter saying “yup, you’re still disabled; this is how much you’ll be getting every month this year”. The amount changes slightly every year, just as the CPP Disability does.
She is trying so hard to get us a vehicle in our budget! I really appreciate it. Our limitations do not make it easy, that’s for sure. While we were on the phone, she kept trying different things, but in the end, it just didn’t work out with current inventory options.
We were so close…
Ah, well. What will be, will be!
Until then, we have to baby my mother’s car as much as possible, because there is no back up vehicle anymore!
Well, three hours outside yesterday, stripping bark and moving logs around, left me in quite a bit of pain today. I decided I needed a day of recovery before continuing. I know by now that if I push it too far, I’ll be out of commission for days. So it was going to be a day of painkillers, and non-labour intensive activity.
Which turned out for the best, as we ended up being 26C/79F with a humidex of 30C/86F.
While feeding the cats this morning, and refilling the smaller bins for the inside cats, I could see we were going to run out, or almost out, before I would be able to do our first big shop at the end of the month. There were a few other things we needed to pick up that made it worth a trip to the nearer, smaller city. I really should have done a dump run, but was in too much pain for that. I left late enough that I could pick up some fried chicken and wedges for “breakfast” at the gas station along the way. I did have an energy drink, too, but still felt ready for a nap by the time I was heading home!
While I was out, my husband kept the phone handy, in case the lady from the financing company called. She didn’t, but my mother did, saying she needed to go to a dentist. I’ve been trying to get her to go to a dentist for months. This past winter (making it at least 6 months!), one of her teeth broke. It wasn’t hurting her, but her dentures were no longer sitting right, making it hard for her to chew.
When I got home, I actually tried lying down for a bit on the couch – the cat free zone – an nap a bit. It didn’t work, but then I remembered that my mother had called. So I called her back and she told me she had a tooth ache, but couldn’t find the number for the dental clinic in the phone book. I have no idea how old this phone book must be! So I looked it up for her and passed it on, and we talked about when would work for an appointment. I have a telephone medical appointment tomorrow, but my sister doesn’t work on Wednesdays, so she could possibly drive my mother. Anything other than tomorrow, I could drive her. I told her to call me back as soon as she had an appointment and we could figure things out from there.
She called me back soon after, saying they could take her in today, for 4:00! She wasn’t sure if I was available, though, so she said she would call them back after finding out if I could drive her. Looking at the time, I saw it was 3:50. !!! Then she told me they said they could take her at 4:30. I told her I could leave immediately.
Then she started getting talkative. I told her we were wasting time! I needed to get going!
It worked out. She called them back and I got her there in time. They were ready and waiting for her, and the receptionist even came to hold the door open for her when she saw us!
This was a first time visit for my mother, so I helped fill out the paperwork for her. My mother had the list of her medications from her bubble packs, which was handy. They just took a photo copy for her file. I went over everything again with my mother to make sure I didn’t miss anything before she signed it.
In the end, she ended up having a tooth pulled. Not one her dentures are attached to. She won’t even need new dentures; they can add a tooth to her current ones. When the receptionist heard us talking about it, she went ahead and printed out an estimate of how much it would cost to do the denture.
While there, my mother asked about the other tooth that was crumbling. That one did turn out to be a tooth holding her denture in place, and they said they could take the remaining roots out another time. After everything was healed up, they’d be able to take impressions and have a new tooth put into both dentures. That was good to know.
It took some doing to get my mother’s tooth out. Now I know were I got my bone structure from! I’ve always had problems with dentists because my bones are so strong. Even at 92, my mother’s jaw did not want to let that tooth go! Of course, the dentist was trying to be as careful and gentle as possible. Once it was out, she showed it to my mother – who said she wanted to keep it!
Yeah, I’ve done that, too! 😄
Unfortunately, my mother also started to complain about how it took so much longer than when she’d had teeth pulled before (we’re talking well over 10 years ago!), and there wasn’t any of the cracking sounds the dentist made sure to warn her she might hear.
There were signs of infection, so my mother got a prescription for antibiotics, on top of an anti inflammatory pain killer. Unfortunately, the pharmacy was about to close. There was no way we’d get there in time. So I started talking to my mother about coming back tomorrow. That’s when the receptionist offered to drop it off tomorrow morning, and I could come in later to pick it up once they had a chance to fill it. That was so awesome of her!
Then my mother got the bill.
She was expecting it to cost a lot less. More like what she remembered paying so long ago. She hasn’t been to a dentist since before she moved away from the farm, so probably about 15 years or so. I helped her write a check and made sure to have all the paperwork in order, including the receipt for her taxes and the instruction sheet with extra gauze. She was already trying to get rid of the gauze she had.
She wasn’t happy about having prescriptions, either.
They were all really fantastic and bent over backwards for her, though. I was very impressed.
As she needed to eat soft foods only for a couple of days, she asked me to stop at the grocery store and pick up a couple of things for her that she could eat, and then it was home. I stayed with her until it was time for her to change the gauze. The instructions including taking a pain killer before the freezing wore off, and she had her evening prescriptions to take, so it made sense to just do it all at once.
I have a strong suspicion my mother did not take all of her evening pills. She took them out of the bubble packs and first tried hiding some pills under her placemat, with others on top. The top ones turned out to be her morning pills, which she says she likes to keep “handy” and had me get a pill box from her room to put them in.
The pill box already had a bunch of pilled in the other half.
When I asked what she was hiding under the place mat, she pulled them out, then covered them with paper to protect them from the light. ??? I stepped away a moment to put back her Tylenol while she was taking her pills, and when I came back, I saw as she hurried to put the paper back, like she was hiding them again, or maybe just some of them.
I also am thinking she might refuse to take the new prescriptions, too. I hope I’m wrong.
Even as we were leaving the dental clinic, she was telling me she wasn’t going to come back because it wasn’t hurting. She meant getting that top tooth taken care of. I expect she will not bother getting a new tooth put into the bottom denture as well. They want her back in two weeks to take an impression for the bottom denture, but when I told her the price (which she can afford just fine), she wasn’t happy. She really seems to believe prices should be what she remembers them to be, no matter how much time has passed!
We shall see how things go.
Meanwhile, I made sure she got the fresh gauze in, though she had already lost the first one and hadn’t felt it. Nor did she notice it was gone while taking her pills!
I told her how much longer she needed to keep the fresh gauze, but I suspect she took it out shortly after I left.
Well, I’ll follow up with her tomorrow and see if I need to pick up her prescriptions for her. Sometimes, she gets them delivered, instead.
I am getting a big concerned about my mother and her medications. There’s not much we can do about it, though.
After I left her place, I had to get myself some food before heading home. I hadn’t eaten since I’d left in the morning. I was starting to get the shakes before we even got to the dental clinic! I also had to tank up again. It really feels like the mileage on my mother’s car is getting worse. I really ought to start recording the gas and mileage and calculate it out. I got spoiled by our van. It didn’t have much of a dashboard computer, but it did keep track of fuel consumption! My mother’s care is a couple of years newer, but has nothing like that.
I really hope we get the financing straightened out and a new vehicle soon. It won’t be a new one, that’s for sure, but it should at least be newer than what we had!
When I came out to feed the outside cats this morning, I spotted these three. The tabby was curled up and asleep when I came over. I reached in to pet them, and the other two started purring before I even touched them! I got to pet the tabby while it was asleep, but once it woke up, it would not tolerate pets and ran off – though I did manage to pet him more while he was trying to get out of the bin and onto the shelf above!
As I was finishing my morning rounds, I decided to pick the potato berries from the large volunteer potato plant from last year’s potato patch. The frost has killed the plant off completely, which is interesting, because the potato plants in the grow bags are still undamaged by frost and barely dying off for the end of their growing season.
Potato berries are toxic, but these all should be full of potato seeds. I will do a bit more research on what to do with them, but during one brief search, I read that the seeds need to be fermented, much like tomato seeds. Which makes sense, since they are related.
For now, though, they are tucked away in the cat proof living room.
This morning, my husband had his meet and greet medical appointment with a new doctor. That went better than he expected, and he now officially has a new primary care doctor. The paperwork to transfer his medical files have been signed, and he’ll need to update the pharmacy and disability insurance company.
Some of the medications my husband is on are not at all familiar to her, so she’s going to be doing some research. We will probably do a follow up appointment with her in the near future, if only because some of the blood test results from yesterday are not in yet.
My husband was happy with her. More so than the interim doctor, that’s for sure. I had my issues. The first being, she was the only person I saw all day wearing one of those useless masks. After years of being surrounded by mask nazis, being treated like trash, and having an ever shortening list of places I could go without risk of being physically or verbally assaulted, either by customers or staff, spending so much time around a faceless person is still something that triggers anxiety. That we still have medical professionals, who should know about the mountains of data and research showing how wearing them are more harmful than beneficial, also immediately lowers my opinion of their competency. There were a few other things that came up when I asked questions about medication that are red flags for me, such as her response on my husband being on statins (he should not be on statins) or Ozempic (the side effects can be very… messy), neither of which have actually done anything to improve his health. But, this is a first time visit, and beggars can’t be choosers.
After the appointment, I did ask at the desk about any other doctors taking patients, which my mother in mind. It turns out that no, even this doctor we just saw is already closed to new patients. My husband is basically the last one. Not that I would ever make an appointment with her for my mother. She has a hard enough time with a doctor that is black (and has an accent strong enough to make it difficult for my mother to understand what she’s saying). This doctor may be the “right” colour but, in a passing comment, she mentioned her wife, and that would just be too much for my mother to handle!
The receptionist suggested I ask again in a few months about doctors taking new patients. Which is much the same situation in the other clinic. As much as I’d like to have the same doctor as my husband, since I go to all his appointments, anyhow, I’ll see if I can have the same doctor as my mother for the same reason. It’s just convenient to have the same doctor.
After the appointment, we were going to try and get my husband’s photo ID, since he has no up to date photo ID right now. Unfortunately, there’s a public sector union strike going on right now, so he decided against it. Even if we got the ball rolling locally, who knows when the processing will actually happen. So he decided to skip that – though I think the state of the streets might have had something to do with his decision. They are rougher to drive on than our gravel roads, and his back feels every bump!
Our daughter was a sweetheart and send money for take out. We were going to get Chinese food, but the place was closed today, so we ended up getting a whole lot of fried chicken, instead. It’s good, but we got less food for her money with that. Ah, well. It was still delicoius food that someone else cooked for us!
After we got home, I found a couple of messages from the financing company. I called her back and she told me everything is proceeding well. We have a conditional approval, and there are two banks vying for our file. She will choose the one that gives us the best deal, then negotiate the best contract for us. Meanwhile, we’re at the stage where we have to send in our ID, income confirmation, etc. She had tried to email us already, but the emails bounced back. Turns out she misheard part of mine, and had the wrong language spelling on my husband’s – pretty common problems with our emails, to be honest! 😄
One thing I’ve never heard of before is that they want an “ID selfie”. Basically, a photo of ourselves holding our photo ID next to our face. Which does make sense, with everything being done electronically, but it’s the first time I’ve heard of that being requested.
I mentioned that my husband does not have current photo ID, which may be a problem. He does have his old driver’s license, which is expired, but still a government approved photo ID. He also has his Metis card from when we lived in this province before. That has no expiry date, but I don’t think it counts as government approved. So for him, we got pictures of the fronts and backs of 4 different IDs, when only 2 are needed, plus a picture of him holding both his old photo IDs next to his face. I had to get one of those for myself, too. Then there’s the proof of income, which was his annual letter from the insurance company saying “yes, you’re still disabled, yes, we’re still paying you!” , etc.
So that’s all sent in. Hopefully, it’ll be enough. One bit of info I did include was that the vehicle will be in my name only; with all his medications and pain levels, my husband simply doesn’t drive. Even when he still had his license, he voluntarily stopped driving, long ago. That might also make a difference. It did with a previous company, and my husband’s name was removed from the application completely.
Either way, we’re one step closer to approval, and getting a replacement van.
Which we really, really need. The check engine light on my mother’s car has turned on again, plus I had to pull over at a gas station to top up the air in one tire. It might have a slow leak, and will need to be checked. I did a cursory check, myself, but could see nothing. I’m so paranoid about tires. We’ve had way too many problems with tires, on three different vehicles, over the years!
The Re-Farmer 