Government Could Shut Down in Just Over Four Hours

Here is the latest on this Friday afternoon January 19, 2018.   The Republicans don’t even have the votes to pass their proposed bill even if the Democrats in the senate don’t filibuster.  John Mc Cain is in the hospital with complications on his brain cancer and is unable to vote.  This makes the count fifty and fifty.  But Lindsey Graham and Rand Paul aren’t going to vote for this bill either.  This bill was one to extend the government one month and is nothing to hoot about to begin with.  It contains the CHIPS bill, or children’s health insurance policy or whatever, which affects either eight or sixteen million children.  I’ve heard both figures.  But there is no DACA provision to help out the dreamers, the children of illegal aliens.  And the President wants approval of “The Wall” before he’ll sign anything related to DACA, which is delayed action on children- - something.  Hence it looks as though the government will shot down at nine o clock tonight regardless of what Gary of KFI thinks.  I don’t think a government shut-down is a good idea even if it’s my party sponsoring it.  It means people can’t get passports approved and government monuments and national parks won’t be open.  Some government workers will stay on the job but they won’t get paid till later.

Median approval of U.S. leadership across the 134 countries surveyed in 2017 reached 30%, the lowest point since Gallup began tracking this measure annually in 2007. Disapproval of U.S. leadership increased almost as much as approval declined. The 43% median disapproval, up 15 points from the previous year, was a new record as well, not only for the U.S. but for any other major global power[there were three others — Germany, Russia, and China — that] Gallup asked [this question] about in the past decade.  The map showing country-by-country results indicates declining approval of U.S. leadership in all countries in the Western Hemisphere, except no change in Jamaica and Trinidad-&-Tobago. There were 9% decline of approval of America’s leadership in Venezuela, and declines ranging from 14% to 40% in all other countries throughout the Western Hemisphere. The biggest decline in the Hemisphere, 40%, occurred in Canada.  In Europe, there were declines in all countries except improvements (increased approval) in Macedonia 15%, Belarus 11%, Poland 8%, Slovakia and Montenegro 7%, Russia 6%, and Ukraine 4%. The biggest change was the 42% decline in approval of U.S. leadership in Norway, but close behind that was the 38% decline in Netherlands. Norway, Canada and Netherlands exhibited the biggest of all the declines in approval of U.S. leadership, among all the 134 nations surveyed.  We just thought you’d like to know. 

Last night Paul called me at twenty after five to go to the hospital.  He picked me up out front in ten minutes.  He asked me if I knew where we were going.  I knew it was Roundtree in another unit.  As it happens we had passed by this building many times going up the south walk to Mom’s place.  I think she was in room thirteen.  They had just eaten dinner.  Tim and Marie were there and Marie gave me a bear hug both at the beginning of the session and also when we were leaving.  I got a change to see Mom with her hair combed and dressed and in a more lucid frame of mind.  She said very few things that were off the wall.  We had a nice conversation.  She was watching TV from her wheel chair.  I sat on the bed and there were folding chairs Tim and Marie brought out.  We met the assistant Laurie.  But then Mom had to go to the bathroom and me and Tim and Marie went out to the hall and talked.  We were right by the nurses’ station and they had Shawn Hannity and Larry Elder and another guy on FOX TV and Tim remarked that everyone who watches FOX news is brainwashed.  Who is going to tell them?   Tim had been planning to get Mom some exercise.  Once before Tim had Mom standing up and pushing her wheel chair down the hall.  That’s more progress than I knew she’d made.  But the never got around to doing that this evening at least while I was there.  It was now a little past 6:35 and Paul was tired and hadn’t eaten dinner.  Paul told me about this one good place for Mom “just across Brookhurst” that would be perfect for Mom and her room would be a short walk from the dining area.  He mentioned other places they had visited.  Mom claimed she had never seen my aqua jacket before when I got it Christmas 2013.  Paul and I left and Paul wanted to show me this other house in a tract area that was a board and care place.  But then his memory failed him and he couldn’t remember where it was down Dale.  Paul mentioned that there is too much stuff about Trump personally in the news, and I would have to agree with that. 

 [Thursday] on Days of our Lives we understand how Andre could be murdered.  Anna has a motive because she is obsessed with vengeance for Tony’s death and carries around his ashes everywhere and has broken off her relation with Roman over it.  That’s sad.  Gabriel is a suspect because Andre just called her in and fired her and intends to steal all of her business profits.  I suspect that’s breaking several criminal laws.  Vivian has a self professed motive.  And Chad has the clearest motive because he just deduced from talking to John Black that Andre had to be the one to organize that phony warehouse break-in thing to take them off the trail.  Also Kate is a possible suspect, though a more distant one.   But he hasn’t been murdered yet.  Otherwise, I would say that Abigail has been both uppity and shrill in her objection to Stephen asking Gabriel for a date.  She seems to equate it in her mind to Bill Cosby drugging women or something.  She was almost threatening.  But I thought her “role” was to play the nice submissive, cooperative employee.  I thought that’s what she and Chad decided on to get Stephen to hire them both back. 

Democrats Pushing Us To Another Government Shutdown

The big news of this week is that there is going to be another government shut-down.  This one is sponsored by the democrats rather than by the republicans.  The democrats say they are going to force a government shut-down by not approving a budget unless it contains DACA provisions for the dreamers.  Chicanos used to call President Obama the “deporter and chief”.  President Obama did deport a lot of illeagels.  I guess you say the democrats are doing it just because they have the power and they intend to use it.  The Republicans need nine more votes in the Senate to pass a budget and the democrats aim to not let them get them.  Of course it’s partially President Trump’s fault by blowing up the DACA deal last Thursday with all of that African “shit hole” stuff the media was hopelessly sidetracked by.  The media and the American people missed the main picture that President Trump appears to make deals and then backs out of them turning around on a dime.  We’ve seen this behavior on his part a lot lately.

At nine thirty I turned on the Bill Handel show after Nora was through.  The “house whisperer” guy was on with the same basic presentation he’d given to Gary and Shannon.  He talked about the no touch toilets where the toilet senses your presence and warms the toilet seat and the floor beneath your feet.  I guess it’s a “bide” thing that automatically sprays and blows your butt dry.  Bill Handel has one of these modern toilets in his house.  There are a lot of household items at the Consumer Electronics show last week.  But they’re mixed in with everything else.  There are also no touch bathtubs and no touch showers.  All you need to do is tell the shower how hot to make the water.  I wouldn’t know because I don’t take a thermometer with me when I shower.  There are also these pop up floor projectors.  They are 8K projectors or something that are powerful enough to produce a 150 inch image.  The other time they said you didn’t even need a screen with these things but just project them on the wall.  I don’t know about that.  At ten o clock I went out for a snack in the courtyard.  I got two Oreos and a lemonade. 

Jeff Flake is a flake according to Norman Goldman.  He gives all of these moralizing speeches before the Senate.  And he wrote that book of his.  But in the end he votes the straight line republican agenda.  The media is trying to start a rumor that Jeff is going to “Primary” President Trump in 2020.  He’s not running for reelection as you know.  The other political news of the day is that Steve Bannon is not going to testify before congress because he’s only going to testify before the grand jury of former director Muller.  Some people have these rose colored visions that somehow Muller is a genious for manipulating the thing so that Bannon rats out all of the higher ups including Trump himself.  I don’t see that happening.  Then we have the second annual “Pink pussy cat” mass women’s protests on January 20^th or the first anniversary of Donald Trump’s inauguration.  With any luck this one might even get more media notice, though last year’s got plenty.  But I hold some vague hope that a blue tide is rising in America. 

The Trump administration released the President’s results from the physical he had last Friday.  His temperature was 98.4.  His height is 75 inches and his weight is 239.  His blood pressure was in the normal range and he's not taking any BP medication.  His cholesterol was 221 or just a little high and he’s taking Crestor for it and that amount will be increased.  All of his systems are normal except he’s just a little heavy.  His heart and lungs and brain and nervous system and genital-urilogical tract is all normal.  He’s recently had a colonoscopy and is not due for another one yet.  In short the President is as healthy as a horse.  He’s in great shape for someone 71.  His fasting blood sugar was 89.  My last one was 82.  Of course one topic not touch was the president’s psychological health.  That’s another story.

This is Wednesday January 17, 2018 and it’s the eighth day Bill has been gone.  They aren’t giving out information.  One song that slipped through the cracks in May of 2006 or our rock compilation is “The Cradle Will Rock” by Van Halen.  I don’t know how that song slipped through but we don’t have it.  Just before eleven I was drowsy and roused myself and went out for a cigarette.  I was in the dining room early with waiting.  Jerry thinks that Susan is actually a hypochondriac because every day she complains of some new ailment.  We were supposed to have beef stroganoff.  That’s what it said on the menu.  Actually they had macaroni and cheese.  I guess they didn’t have any beef- - - and didn’t have any stroganoff either.  We had mixed vegetables and also a dinner roll, but no butter.  We got seconds on the amberosia which today featured both the cream and the marshmellows.  I had to go back to the counter for coffee because the coffee cart passed us by.

The Minisota Vikings defeated the New Orleans Saints in one of the wildest finishes ever.  The Vikings scored the first seventeen points.  The Saints scored toward the end of the third quarter just before dinner making it 17 to 7.  After dinner the score was 20 to 14 with over eight minutes left to play.  The lead changed four times in the last three or so minutes of the game.  First the Saints scored making it 21 to 20.  Then the Vikings scored a field goal we were all on pins and needles about making it 23 to 21.  But there was still a minute left to play and the Saints marched down the field with seeming ease and scored a field goal making it 24 to 23.  But there were still about fifteen seconds left.  Things looked pretty hopeless as the clock wound down even further.  But then the Vikings scored a flookish touchdown.  There was a Saint there ready to tackle him as soon as he caught the ball but he didn’t but had a puzzled look on his face as the Viking scooted right by him.  And I’m sure he was thinking “I can’t believe it” as he scored.  The final score was thus 30 to 24 and the game went on till after five.  

Proposition - "You Can't Be What You Can't See"

But first here's the news.  President Trump in some public setting talked about how we need no more people from shit hole nations in Africa or Central America and more immigrants from Norway.  This is the clearest racial sentiment we’ve heard from Trump.  If he had used the term "hell hole" rather than shit hole I think we could understand.  Their is a veil of spiritual darkness that pervaids so much of the condinent of Africa from highly corrupt government leaders to savage religious practices.  You may be destined to live your short life with a half a dozen diseases with flies buzzing around your head.  Just getting a visa to the United States may be a lagistical impossibility.  But then when Trump says he wants people from Scandenavia where they are among the most well adjusted and happiest people in the world, at that point he is being racist.  Norman Goldman says it’s a Brooklyn term and Trump picked up the lingo of the working class ghetto so he could learn to relate to them and negotiate better, and also mount a successful campaign.  History books will say "This phenominon reflects poorly on the character of the American people.  The other key fact I'd like to discuss was that Donald Trump has no mind.  He's mentally a blank slate and does whatever the hard core republicans and the Koch brothers tell him to do and even think.  If he hasn't read the script for the day, he's lost and he says things that embarrass himself. It's a national embarrassment to have a president who's dumb as a post on so many issues.  Apparently President Trump was for the dream act before he was against it.  On last night’s news he spoke of working out a “clean bill” with just the dream act.  But then when someone told him what a “clean” bill was he reversed his position and said “Anything that reaches my desk needs to have provisions for a wall”.  But now they are saying that the “wall” could be as little as chain link fences or electronic surveillance.  So who knows?  Also the President reversed his position on the FISA court bill.  This is all the secret and pervasive spying done by the government in accordance with the Patriot Act.  But he thought it was some Obama conspiracy against him.  Then someone told him that the FISA provision or “Foreign Surveillance Information Act” was something Republicans wanted.  Of course another propensity of the president is to do whatever Putin wants and make Putin happy.  What if Putin personally told Trump to get ride of the FISA law?  He even changed the Republican platform because Putin wanted something different.  We can't have a puppet President.  This is dangerous not only to national security but also to the constitutional welfare of the country in general.  

Last night during some TV awards, one woman raised the proposition that “You can’t be what you can’t see”.  This is the idea that it’s hard to fantacise being Batman or somebody if you’ve never seen a Batman program or movie.  The idea has to be implanted in your mind somehow to give you some image to strive for.  However this is not the approach Christians take.  When push comes to shove they will quote you the scripture of “Eye hath not seen no ear heard what awaits the Saints in the afterlife”.   When you think about it this really gives little to hang on to.  But there is an even bigger problem.  Most teachers see it as their job to impart the knowledge that they have- - to you the student, so that they serve as a role model to you.  But often this is the last thing Preachers want.  When you think about it, your emotion toward these preachers is not one of admiration or even respect.  Indeed if you were adopt some of their traits they would be secretly disappointed in you.  What they do, their “act”, if you will,  is not that unlike a magician whose role is to mystify rather than instruct.  They want you to be in awe of them and they secretly want you to think “Gee, I could never be like that”.  And if somehow you did adopt all of the “stuff” they teach in terms of theology and legalization and all,  your mind would be so filled with theological junk that would only end up clogging and cluttering up your own thought processes.  Think about it.  You wouldn’t be turning into “them” but rather an image they are projecting of themselves, which may be no more real than a hologram.  One thing you find curiously missing are any “rungs of the ladder” that you can climb up after them.   And often (when push comes to shove) they will explain this in almost Hindu terms of “Well you know the Lord has a path for each of us and you are supposed to pursue your own path (or fate) even if that “fate” is something nobody in their right mind would want.  It’s almost as though certain people are meant to be blessed and certain people are meant to be jinxed.  I’ll return to this thought later.  There is also an element of “impossability” about the whole Christian salvation thing.  Just as a woman having the carrier of a man two hundred years ago seemed a near impossibility because it was such a long reach.  John Calvin was a champion of this “impossability” doctrine- - - (for lack of a better term)  Many people speak of hyper-Calvinism.   I would use the terms of strict Calvinism or hard Calvinism, but not hyper-Calvinism.  Because for something to be hyperbolic it has by necessity to somehow be NOT the thing that’s being called “hyper”.  I suspect Thom Hartman gets hyperbolic when he speaks of “Salvation by being rich”, which in essence is what Hartman believes about Calvinism.  He’s inserting this wealth thing in there that Calvin doesn’t make a big thing of per see.  But the key here is that there is no link, no “bridge” if you will to a brighter day for the average hearer at some evangelical meeting.  I will not comment on whether God answers prayers.  Under Calvinism - - - you’d just have to infer that our destinies are fixed, or preordained.  And if they are preordained then you can’t pray for “God to change his mind”.   I would like to think that we can “Change God’s mind” by our deeds known as “works”.   I believe we should live our lives as though this were True, even if we don’t know whether it is.  I think I can sum up my sentiments on this paragraph in that there is no “Sharing the wealth”.  There is a basic tenant of human nation that when one person comes on good fortune he “shares the blessing”, shares the wealth with those he calls his friends.  But in terms of what I’m saying, these Christian pastors really aren’t your friend.  They don’t stick with you when times are down.  Think about it.  If anything if hard times fall on you you may have a jinx which “They don’t want to catch themselves”.  That’s how they think.  Jinxes are like viruses, diseases, which you have to stay clear of.  (Selah)

Two Key Court Rulings Out Today

A three judge panel overturned the gerrymandering of congressional districts in the entire state of North Carolina.  They said the bias and the racism were carried out with surgical precession.  North Carolina is a purple state but the results are red.  It would be nice if every court in the land decided to make the same ruling about gerrymandering in their state.  Then a district judge overturned down the suspension of the Trump ruling saying that the dreamers only hat six months to get their act together and leave the country.  Apparently Attorney General Jeff Sessions spoke of the illegality of the Obama decree back in 2015.  He also placed an inter-locqatory provision on this ruling saying he can be fast tracked by one Court before the ruling of another court is played out.  So this ruling will go first to the ninth circuit court of San Francisco and then to the Supreme Court as fast as possible.  Norman Goldman is on now.  He believes the republicans are in disarray this year.  But we’ve heard sentaments like that before and somehow they all manage to rally around and protect President Trump.  Two Republican congressmen have thrown in the towel here in California.  One of them is Ed Royce, who used to be our congressman but his district was redrawn.  The other congressman is Daryl Eisa or however you spell it.  He’s an ultra-conservative and I thought I heard he had a criminal record of some sort.  Lots of Republicans are choosing not to run in 2018.  They don’t want to be associated with the Donald Trump ship of state when it goes off the rails.  Think about it.  

 The Christmas decorations are still up around here. 

This will be a nonpartisan commentary about U.S. politics, as viewed by an American historian who is disgusted with the profoundly corrupt U.S. Government — not merely the political Parties, but the billionaires who effectively control them. Not everyone who finds Trump and the Republican Party to be beneath contempt is a Democrat. All that this commentator is is a democrat — a person who is opposed toall forms of dictatorship, including America’s own.

Key factors are now coming together to indicate that Donald Trump’s Presidency is already doomed, even if he survives to the end of his term as President. His remaining chances of being elected to any public office are near zero; even his success with the Republican Party has doomed — tainted for years, if not ended — that Party, made it not just repulsive, but increasingly repulsive, both inside and outside the United States; and, here is how, and why, this extraordinary phenomenon is happening:

Everyone knows, by now, that Steve Bannon, who was reliably reported (both before the election, and, in even deeper retrospect, after the election) to have been absolutely crucial to Trump’s election, has recently become instead the total opposite, Trump’s enemy — out to destroy both Trump and his family. A book will soon be published from him, that’s sure to spill lots of disgustingly putrid beans, beyond anything previously wafted by the public, from these now rotting but powerful targets.

The well-connected political reporter Michael Wolff has also recently come out with a new book (excerpts here), in which many of Trump’s aides already anonymously leak damning testimony of Trump’s personal stupidity and psychopathy.

Life Sure Can Be Depressing

In a late news flash they are thinking of reconsidering their vote on net neutrality.  I guess they've been flooded with mail disagreeing with their decision.  Congress is voting on a whole lot of things including the dream act.  Trump almost acts as if he's open to keeping the dream act for the children of illegals.  But Trump can turn around on a dime just like Steve Bannon did about that book out last week.  Now he's praising Jered Kushner and Donald Trump Jr.  Politics is turning into one big soap opera where the authors of the thing can't decide what plot-line they want to go with.  Do the good guys win?  In good news it's over fifty degrees in Chicago these days after a nearly two week deep freeze.  

Last Thursday the room was cleaned for bugs and they were alone in here for hours.  I have discovered another item missing.  It’s that ceramic square picture thing I got as a gift one Christmas.  You add this to the TV manual and the fire exit map, and also the two calendars, and my missing confirmation number and Chase bank statement and two store receipts with my balance on it, plus a Christmas card or two.  

Last night it was the ABC network news and Jeopardy and a dash of “Wheel of Fortune”.  The medication line was long and lasted well past seven thirty.   Earlier Bill wanted me to go to the bakery and buy a pack of four cinnamon rolls for a dollar, and Bill gave me the dollar.  Bill ended up giving me two of the rolls.  But Bill got sick from the other two rolls, or maybe it was the two packaged burritos he ate.  Bill says he felt really sick.  Later after seven thirty he wanted me to go to the store and get him a can of Sprite for 75 cents and he let me keep the quarter.  It didn’t help.  Bill got into an argument with Kathy out in the front lobby.  Bill told me that he doesn’t want to lie down and go to sleep because “I feel so sick now I’m afraid if I sleep I won’t wake up”.   Apparently he wanted to go to the hospital but the ambulance was really late in arriving.  We watched NCIS and then that “Bull” show”.   After nine Bill left the room and I went to bed at twenty after nine, not knowing whether Bill would be right back.  I heard Denise come in soon after this to get the laundry.  I hope Bill gets the treatment he needs. 

[material deleted here] I lay in bed and got up at five o clock and showered and made myself instant coffee.  It must have rained again last night because the benches were still wet.  I turned on the Bill Press show since Bill wasn’t here to talk about the TV news.  Leah did the morning medication again.  Normally Ricardo does the medication Tuesday and Wednesday mornings.  Today I got cough medicine.  The Stephanie Miller show came on.  Denise returned the laundry at a quarter to seven.  Everything was there, but I had to figure with last Thursday in mind and which clothes I wore longer and which ones I didn’t.  I wanted to get coffee at the store but Ben wasn’t ready yet.  It was kind of a lousy breakfast.  The oatmeal was late and mine already had milk on it and it was cold and really lumpy.  It tasted strange.  The sausage patty was cold.  We had a crescent with butter pats.  Jerry let me have her sausage.  At least the coffee was hot.  I went back out to the store and got a large cup of coffee for a dollar and a quarter and took it too my room.  I opened the shades.  One thing is Bill always likes it so gloomy with the shades closed so he can sleep or something.  I was in better spirits after drinking the coffee but I woke depressed about the way my whole life is now.

Last night’s program got me to thinking about what a joy it is to have kids and see them grow up right and say “I accomplished something”.  I think to some degree most every Born Again Christian by necessity has to live a double life and compartmentalize things.  But if they grow up wrong or have severe mental problems it’s a different story.  Of course like with Princess Charolette it’s amazing to see a child come into their own developmental personality and how it exciting it is to see them learn things.  The next program was about a guy who had gotten psychotherapy and went out and wasted two people with a gun.   And the people picking the jury wanted people who were analytical able to detach objective “reality” from emotion.  Of course what they are really looking for is a bunch of cold hearted robots who vote the way they are brainwashed to do. 

Now you not only have sloppy Steve but sneaky Dianne.  Dianne Feinstein on her own released some controversial material on President Trump.  I’m not sure whether it has to do with the Russian prostitutes.   Bill Press talked about this on his show.  Stephanie also talked about Trump’s activities.  In the old days like say 2012 I’d be doing long paragraphs about President Trump right now but I just don’t have the energy to do that these days.   We all need to just scan the news ourself and form our own oppinions.  There is a lot of talk about invoking the 25^th amendment, which is more of a pipe dream than anything else. 

I actually made morning snacks for the first time in a while.   Jennifer brought Gabby today and she was wandering around the courtyard searching for food.  I got a lemonade and a graham cracker from Valerie.  I called Judy just now and she was a little puzzling.  She said the reason why Mom was restless before in the hospital was because of the drugs she had been given.  I asked her whether Mom was mobile in a wheel chair going outdoors or anything and Judy said no.  I asked when Mom would get back to her apartment and Judy didn’t see that happening.  I asked what would happen to all her stuff.   The whole issue about Mom possibly having stage four metastatic cancer of the spine was left unresolved.  Either she does or she doesn’t and someone needs to find out because it has profound implications.  It’s almost as if they know she does have cancer but nobody wants to think about it.  

My Picks for This Weekend's Wild Card Games

They did their four football predictions on the Gary and Shannon show today.  My fear is that the Rams and Atlanta game might not even be shown.  They just keep talking about the Chiefs and the Titans.  I pick the Tennessee Titans over the KC Chiefs for the afternoon game.   I am picking the Rams to easily handle Atlanta in the evening game.  I am picking the NO Saints over the Carolina Panthers, and I'm picking Jacksonville to beat the Buffalo Bills.   We'll see who's right in these picks beginning tomorrow.  

The following was typed yesterday

Steve Bannon has a new book on President Trump called “Fire and Fury” after his North Korea speech.   It’s a real hatchet job in the Kitty Kelly tradition.  It’s a “tell all” book.   The author of the book was given free rein to ask anybody any question he wanted to at the White House with no questions about security clearance.  I don’t see why he did it.  I thought they were friends.  He said dealing with President Trump was like dealing with a child in that it was a chore to figure out what he wanted.  Trump liked to watch TV at night while eating fast food.  He was afraid of being poisoned and the only way around that was for people to not know he was coming.    He called everybody names and thought Trump’s daughter, was dumb as a brick.   He openly admits to all of the meetings with Russia and says “This will only be a problem if we win”.  Trump fully expected to lose and his wife, Melonia was upset at the notion of having to live in the White House.

Now on the east coast there is a new bomb cyclone storm that starts in the south Atlantic and is working its way north.  It’s fully as cold as the general weather but now the wind chill factor will be driven into the stratosphere.  It was 44 in Anchorage yesterday but there were highs in the thirties in Florida.   Also there is all sorts of snow in places they aren’t at all used to it like Savannah, Georgia and northern Florida. 

Attorney Jeff Sessions wants to crack down on all of these states that have passed legalization of marijuana laws.  But the retailers don’t seem too worried.  They are planning to sell pot in the city of Los Angeles on Monday.   Sessions says “Good people don’t use marijuana”.   We know.  They just get drunk and kill people with a car and sexually assault women and lie about it like Roy Moore.  

Yesterday the room was cleaned because there were bed bugs in the mattress and all of the clothes had to be washed, they claim.  - -This is Thursday January 4, 2018 and it hasn’t been much of a new year so far.   This morning after breakfast I began putting away items before the big room cleaning.  No bug spray was used.   I turned off Frangela and turned on KTLA news so when the moment came there wouldn’t be any delays.  Augustine came in here about twenty after nine and began removing the linens.  Then I saw him carrying a lot of mattresses out while out back.  It seemed like there were more than four.  He had Rene helping him.  I was nervous.  I didn’t go out for morning snacks.  It was after ten thirty I asked to use the restroom from someone in the med room.    On two different occasions I sat in the front room and one was around ten to eleven.  We had chicken soup for lunch and a hamburger and macaroni salad.  I didn’t finish the salad.  We had coffee and peaches.   I sat out back a while and then went up and saw Rene and he asked if I wanted to lie down for a while.  I just wanted to use the bathroom - - again.   Finally we got linens on our new mattresses.  Bill’s has a wooden base in front of it.   Both of my towels were taken and we still don’t have any.  Reme remarked about the magazines I’d taken from the closet floor and put them in the laundry basket.   The upper shelf of the closet hadn’t been touched and the contents below the sink were undisturbed.   However there are some things missing.  Both 2018 calendars are missing including the one I just took off the wall.  My latest bank statement is missing and also a few recent “The Week” magazines.   Another thing oddly missing are the TV instruction manual and also the fire exit diagram.   I went down about two twenty to the laundry room to ask when our clothes would be ready and John said they hadn’t been started yet but he’s here till ten o clock tonight.   All of the electronic stuff was working normally.  I had Gary and Shannon on the radio till one.  On “Days of our Lives” now they want to ship Theo off to Johanesburg, South Africa for some experimental stem cell research that should take a year to find the success of.  Theo doesn’t want to go and I don’t blame him.  Now the new Stephen says he owns the Di Mira mansion and wants to pick out his favorite bedroom.  I’ve been smoking a lot being under a lot of stress.  I got two Oreos and a lemonade from Rico for a snack.    I’ve been gradually been putting items back.  This desk chair was swapped out with Bill’s chair and the desk chair was over by the wall.  

Mother's Tumble

Last week my mother fell in her room on something and broke a lot of her ribs and bruised her hip and perhaps punctured her lung.  She went to the hospital.  But I was having digestive problems and could not visit her till Monday morning, so here is the report of that visit.  What a way to start off the new year.  

Paul was waiting right in front of the building.  This hospital was in east Garden Grove on GG Blvd and Palm Street.   We took the elevator up to the seventh floor where Mom was.  What struck me initially was how small the room seemed to be.  There were no chairs to sit on besides the porta-potty.  I had forgotten how narrow hospital beds were.  There was little natural light.  The room didn’t seem that clean.  Mom was dead to the world when first we came across her.  She was sleeping so soundly it seemed ashame to wake her.  Naturally she was groggy.  Mom was mentally confused lapsing from reality to some parrellel world where Dad was still alive and she even made reference to Grandpa and Grandma.  She asked where we were parked and could we go to the car now.   When I was by myself with Mom she asked if I could drive her home and asked if anybody else was in my room and maybe she could stay there.  The nursing staff didn’t seem that attentive.  We had to lift Mom ourselves and reposition her in bed and adjust the bed.  Her hospital gown kept coming undone.  Mom complained continually of pain in her stomach.  She took two things of Malox but that didn’t seem to help.  It wasn’t till after one thirty that she got a pain pill when by now her ribs were hurting.  Some of the nurses were chatty like that blonde who was almost as tall as I was.  But they didn’t appear to be tending to her needs.  At one point I used the bathroom.  One thing I noticed was that the bathroom was spacious unlike the cramped room where you always seemed to be tripping on something.   They announced pizza in the cafeteria just before noon.  At some point they brought in a chair for Mom, which was the only chair in the room.  She was in the chair close to an hour and continually complained of discomfort.  Mom was supposed to get her lunch between twelve and one but it was an hour late and the food was cold and there was nobody else to help feed her and she seemed to have no appetite when Paul helped her.   She complained the food was cold, and I’m sure it was.  She didn’t seem to want to watch TV.  The next door bed has visitors the whole time.  An attendant spilled some coffee meant for Mom even though she doesn’t drink coffee.  I’d like to see her out of that place to somewhere where she can get more attentive service.   I was getting cabin fever as the hours ticked by.  First it’s twelve, and then one and then two.  By the time we left it was ten after two and we had been there for over three hours, which was the last thing I was expecting.   It’s kind of an emotionally draining experience and I don’t know how Tim and Paul do it.  Paul said something about how Marie is a better conversationalist than he is, though Paul did a pretty good job of keeping the conversation humming.  Mom did notice my mustache.  After we left we weaved our way through the streets and came up Katella where there were a lot of restaurants.  I had it in my mind I wanted to eat at a Subway.  I wasn’t in the mood for a sit down place where we would be there over a half hour.  I wanted food quickly.  We went down Gilbert to Cerritos and up to Beach where I thought there was a Subway but it wasn’t there any more so we went to Taco Bell.  We got one of their five dollar specials.  We both had a large taco and a smaller cheese shell taco and a thing of Nachos and a different kind of burrito and a large Pepsi for five dollars.   I ate my food eagerly.  We were ready to return back here just about three.  I told Paul it was an educational experience.  Paul expressed concern what to do next.  I thought we should have her at the “skilled nursing” unit at Roundtree and see what happens after a month.  I guess you have to make a decision then where to continue to hold on to her room.