palace of winds

Every year my grandma gets pneumonia at least once. Often it’s right before a big holiday — usually Christmas, sometimes New Year’s. We hold our breath every time, hoping this won’t be the one that will send her into a nursing home. I don’t think we could get her back out again. And I’m pretty sure it will kill her.

For all the complaining she has a wonderful home right now. The facility is a pleasant place to be. It’s beautiful, and the grounds are pretty. There are little living room/sitting room areas on every floor full of big comfy furniture. There’s a homey kitchen for entertaining. An ice cream parlor. A beauty shop. They throw parties for the residents’ families a few times a year. They show films and organize bingo. She has a bridge group. She writes restaurant and movie reviews and sometimes stories for the monthly newsletter. She paints. She paints beautifully, better with one hand and half her vision than I could fully-abled.

She went into the hospital yesterday late afternoon. They’re talking colonoscopy on Thursday. I’m not even sure what that means, really. What the colon has to do with pneumonia, or what fresh hell this might be.

* * *

I finished Anansi Boys, and it was truly lovely; no surprises there. It went by utterly too fast. At least maybe now I’ll catch up on sleep at least a little, and not feel quite so much like keeling over at work. Though partly I guess it’s because it’s nearly lunchtime. Still, I hate & am tired of light-headedness.

I’m also tired of House not being on. Stupid — sports. Baseball? I feel like it’s baseball. I don’t even know what season sports are played in, other than hockey. That’s winter, for obvious reasons.

Several months ago, for a period of a few weeks, I got a rash of repeated phone calls from unfamiliar numbers, all at odd hours. While I was at work, in the middle of the night. I never managed to be by my phone when they called, and eventually they finally stopped. Well, they started back up again at the end of last week.

I’m not in the habit of calling up numbers I don’t recognize from my list of missed calls. I find it brazen and irritating when people return missed calls without knowing; it inevitably leads to an imperious demand of ‘Who is this?’ which I think is a rude way to begin a conversation you’ve initiated.

But Monday night I got ten calls between midnight and six, and a ‘page’, and a voicemail with a muttered ‘Fuck!’ before the phone was hung up. And I was fed up. Fed up with whatever drugged-out completely idiotic kid couldn’t put together that a voicemail clearly stating they’d reached *Rachel* would not take them to whoever they were trying to reach.

So yesterday morning I called the number and stressed quite urgently that while I didn’t know who had been calling me from that number I was very sorry but I absolutely could not help them, and was at wit’s end, and didn’t know what to do beyond contacting the police or the phone company to block their number, but that it was entirely inappropriate to call someone repeatedly all night long. And some very nice-sounded suburban mother quite agreed with me and promised that she would talk to her son. I like to imagine that he got in quite a lot of trouble. Possibly for prostitution or drug-dealing. I haven’t gotten another call yet, at least. Hopefully he’ll pass along the message to whoever’s been giving out the wrong number that they ought to learn their own phone number. And get more intelligent friends.

And, because I’ve been told I complain too much, here are a few random good things:

• I’ve brought a peanut butter and banana sandwich for lunch. I’ve also got a package of hot chocolate mix for later.
• I’ve joined a little crochet square-swapping community, which looks like wonderful fun.
• We’re supposed to get one last nice-weather weekend, and Saturday is the Halloween party. Double-good as my costume is sleeveless.
• Today’s A Gorey Year selection is from The Gashlycrumb Tinies.
• My space heater is making my feet pleasantly toasty. I can slip them easily out of my little pink shoes for maximum luxuriance.
• I’ve 74 solid minutes of exercising scheduled after work; I expect to finish feeling slightly wobbly & accomplished.
• Though it’s not a particularly good hair day, it is also not a bad one.