Stronger and stronger

I know I just posted this, but I think it bears a repeat. When you read this you will likely agree

I spent today mostly staring at my son Tim. He doesn't live here anymore, but he stayed here last night. I checked on him various times through the morning. He slept - or tried to. (Someone kept checking on him.) Lest you think I've gone 'round the bend,  I did have a good reason. I was thankful that he was alive and here and I needed to confirm that over and over again.

Tim was involved in a very serious car accident on Memorial Day. He was a passenger in a car that flipped over one and a half times on the freeway after an over correction by the driver. Thankfully both Tim and the driver were relatively unhurt. Tim has a mild concussion and cuts and bruises and he is very sore. I'm not positive about his buddy, but I know he too had only minor injuries. I presume the car is totaled. Tim said it was on its side with all the windows shattered and the roof collapsed down about two feet.  It is a miracle that both young men are alive and unbelievable that neither was seriously injured. My sister said Maggie was his guardian angel. I like that thought.

Needless to say I was a bit of a mess. In fact I still am.

And so I stared at him all day.

I'm not sure why he decided to return to his own place.

Dented Door Blues

Vanless. That's my lot this week. After the great mis-merge of 2012, I had to get the van fixed. No van means no way to transport Maggie.  Come to think of it,  it wasn't a "Miss" merge at all. If I had missed her when I merged, I wouldn't have this problem.

I took the car in on Monday morning and, fingers crossed, I will have it back by Friday.  I really hope that happens because going into what promises to be a rainy weekend without any way to get Maggie places will not be fun. We are fortunate to live where there is so much to do withing walking distance, but we cannot take advantage of that if it's raining. I should hear from them today if  they are ready to paint. If they are it will be dry by Friday. Otherwise it will be Monday.

I originally took the van to the place the insurance company recommended, but that shop was crazy busy and wanted to have the van for a minimum of 6-8 working days and THEN paint. When you factor in weekends that meant two weeks without the van. Not workable.

The new place is called International Sports Motors - because my minivan is so sporty. I know Adam, one of the guys who works there, and his nephew is a peer of Maggie's and he "gets" the need to have the van back.  He actually fixed my old van when Eddie had an encounter with a wall several years ago and did a great job, so I am confident this will work out too.

Right now the sliding door won't close unless the front door is open. The damage is mostly where the two doors meet, but there is a nice scrape on the rest of the sliding door. Fortunately, I did not damage the lift in any way.

Vanless during the week is not a problem. Maggie takes the bus to and from school and she is pretty wiped out after school anyway. I can walk to the supermarket, bank and post office or hop a bus to go anywhere else in town. Better yet, I could actually clean the house and clean out drawers etc. Note: I haven't yet (and it's Wednesday) but I could. The problem is the weekend.

Steve is going away this weekend and we won't even have a backup vehicle. Not that his car would help much. But in a pinch we could put the wheelchair in the back of his car and put Maggie in a specialized car seat. I probably wouldn't try that anyway because the 100 lb wheelchair would have to be lifted in and out of the back and laid on its side. But knowing it won't be here makes me a tad nervous. Obviously in a real emergency I could and would call 911, but something less than dire is always possible in Maggie's World.

With any luck at all I will hear today that we are on schedule for Friday and can take Maggie to the mall or any number of other important places this weekend.

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Update - they just called and the car is being prepped for paint now and will be done be Friday, barring any earthquakes, power outages or other catastrophes. Yay!

Back to Reality, in super slo-mo

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We are all still exhausted from all the activity and excitement of the weekend. There is a giant basket of cards and things that we need to go through with Maggie, but she has been so busy or so tired that we haven't had time.  I opened all of them but I need to sit down with her and read them to her.

Life slowly returns to normal after the Big Birthday Bash. It's time now to get back to the day to day realities, like preparing her conservatorship papers for the court. Oh Joy.

Maybe tomorrow.

Still, things are getting accomplished, albeit slowly. I did manage to finish up the Social Security with minimal effort. Now we wait to see if the US Government thinks Maggie is disabled or not.

There is one other matter to deal with. I mentioned the small accident with the car last week after leaving the social security office. I did get the repair estimate, which is $3200 (eek!), The insurance will take care of most of it, but you know we will pay that back over the next few years.

The biggest problem is that the car will take like 9-10 days to fix. I have no idea what we are going to do without the van for that long. Maggie will be in school during the week, but there'as at least one weekend in there.  I could rent a car, but it doesn't really help me unless I can transport Maggie. If she stays healthy it's fine. We do have Golden Gate Park in our backyard and there are lots of things to do within walking distance. But is she gets sick, we are in trouble.

The car is definitely damaged but  it's completely operational and drives fine.   I could wait to have it fixed, but I will still have this problem at some point. What to do, what to do?

 I'll decide when I have more energy.

In like a lion indeed

March is not starting well.

We went to Social Security and after 90minutes they decided we need to do a phone application on Monday - for another 90 minutes. Sigh. Ok. There were definitely high/hilarious parts of that visit which I will put in a separate post

We left there and I took Maggie to school. As I left the school, I got in a slight fender bender with another car. No one was hurt but both cars are damaged. We were completely blocking traffic so once we disentangled, we pulled over to trade information. I was right in front of Maggie's high school and pulled onto the only available open spot, a bus zone. The other driver was right behind me. She was a very nice woman and because it is pouring rain, she invited me to sit in her car and we traded information.

As I sat there I saw the ticket guy and jumped out of the car to explain why we were stopped there. He didn't care he had already written the tickets for both of us. $255 for stopping in a bus zone in addition to whatever the damage to the car is and the deductible and and and.....  Now the other driver and I are united in our fight against these tickets. 

Waiting for the "out like a lamb part"

I'll take the blahs, thank you.

This getting up and ready in the middle of the night is for the birds. (Owls, I guess). It is so dark in the morning that I feel out of sync all day.

Once I get Maggie all prepped and ready to go in the morning, we roll the chair out onto the deck and get in the elevator in the dark of night. I have to grope for the light in the basement to find my way to the front of the house and it is still dark when we're outside waiting for the bus. It gets light pretty quickly once we're out there. The whole process will definitely be easier after the time changes. (Of course then I'll be complaining that it's dark too early in the evening.)

The dark mornings make it hard for me to start my day and the mid afternoon blahs are quite present. Yesterday was no exception. The afternoon nurse arrived just ahead of the scheduled time for the bus. I was working and trying to stay awake. That's when the phone rang. I saw it was the school nurse and thought, oh, the bus is going to be late, maybe I can sneak in a 15 minute nap. I was half right. The bus was going to be late, all right, but I was snapped out of the blahs by the rest of her news. The bus was in an accident.

WHAT!?!?! She assured me that everyone was fine and that the accident was minor. They were only a block away from the school. The bus was stopped at a light and was rear ended by the vehicle behind them. There was a very loud crash that scared all the kids (and the adults) on board, but there was no damage to the bus and no injuries. The car behind them didn't fare as well there was front end damage to his car.

Suddenly I went from "I need a cup of coffee to stay awake" to "I need a cup of tea to calm down." My initial plan was to head down there and get Maggie home as quickly as possible. But there are protocols and procedures to follow. They wouldn't let anyone off the bus until the supervisor arrived and the reports were done.  I understand that completely, but it was difficult to just sit here and wait. I didn't think I could add anything positive to the scene and would only complicate things by bringing my van to the congested area. So I waited. Maggie arrived 45 minutes later not any worse for the wear.

I asked her about it and she gave me a sad face, so it clearly scared her, but she's fine. It scared me too. I know how precarious Maggie's well being is, but I feel like she should be immune from the regular dangers and perils of life.

If you are suffering from the mid afternoon blahs, enjoy them. They definitely beat the alternative.