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Oh I get it...like humor...but different.

Wednesday, October 27, 2004

Conversations with CrankyMom

Me: (Opening her mail, which she is now unable to open herself since she has me around to do it.) This is from your insurance company. It’s the insurance cards for your cars.

CM: Oh? What’s that other trash in the envelop?

Me: The agents here give you a nice folder to put everything in – your insurance card, a summary of your policy, and an accident-report form to fill out if you are in an accident so you can remember to get all the details. You put it all together in the glove box of your car.

CM: (Firmly) I don’t put insurance cards in the glove box. I put one in my wallet and the other one in HIS (gesturing toward my long-suffering dad).

Me: Oh. OK. Well, then, I guess the rest of this is just to throw away. You can put the cards in your wallets. (Throwing away the other parts and leaving the cards on the desk).

CM: Where is the stuff that goes in the glove box?

Me: (in my usual state of confusion) What stuff? You said you don’t put it in the glove box.

CM: Well, I’m going to put it in the glove box. What did you do with it? I need it to put in the glove box.

Me: (under my breath as I dig through the trash) one….two….three….four….five…..

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CM: I will need an ashtray to put on the patio table. There are some up there (indicating the top of the kitchen cabinet).

Me: OK. (Getting a step stool and getting into the cabinet—seeing three ashtrays, two white, one blue. The table is green. I am smart enough to know that CrankyMom will never allow a blue ashtray on a green table. I get a white one. Put up ladder. Put ashtray on table.

CM: (spying ashtray) Oh. (you know that “oh”? The one that says “Substandard! Unacceptable!”)

Me: What, Mom?

CM: Oh, nothing (You know that “oh nothing” that says “Substandard! Unacceptable! Read my mind and fix it NOW!”)

Me: Is it the ashtray?

CM: Well, it’s just…..well, that ashtray is awfully fragile. I wanted one of the GREEN ones.

Me: There weren’t any green ones up there, mom. Just blue and white.

CM: There should be three green ones too, two triangular and one round.

Me: No, mom. Not up there. (opening the cabinet so she can see for herself.) Maybe they are over there above the refrigerator.

CM: No, I didn’t put anything over there.

Me: (thinking, “No you didn’t put anything ANYwhere, cause I am the one who unpacked you, remember?) I think I put some up there. (Step stool, cabinet, ash tray found. Ashtray put on the green patio table.)

CM: Oh.

Me: *sigh* What, Mom?

CM: It’s just that you need to put the white ash tray back up.

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You know what, never mind. I am tired of this. You get the picture. But, as they say, I made my bed….now I will waller it all to pieces and leave the sheets in a pile on the floor.
Charming sentiments posted by: Nanntz / 2:17 PM

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So here’s the 411 on the big move.

I drove the parental units in their Escort. My daughter (PU2) followed in her new (to her) truck. My son (PU1) brought up in the rear in a 17-foot U-Haul pulling a vehicle trailer. And off we went, from Arkansas to California, like some scrap-iron Conestoga caravan.

Since the parental units couldn’t ride for extended lengths of time (Mom has arthritis, Dad has had a hip replacement), we stopped often for bathroom breaks and such, and we made fairly short days of it. It is a 24-hour drive, and we took four days to do it. We stayed in Sayre, Oklahoma; Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Kingman, Arizona. We came to love Love’s truck stops and Flying J’s Travel Plazas. And in Sayre there is an AmericInn that is the love of my life.

Mom and Dad both smoke like a ’55 DeSoto, and I am a non-smoker, so driving with them was a challenge. At bedtime each day, my eyes looked like something that should be hanging on a Christmas tree. A bigger challenge, though, was the fact that my mom is a compulsive, non-stop talker. It helped somewhat that she was in the back seat….there were times when I couldn’t quite hear her. Thank God. But she basically talked non-stop for 1600 miles, and she still hasn’t stopped. Oh, well. So it goes. I knew the risks when I signed up for this gig.

The good news was that the parental units go to bed early, and I shared a motel room with PU2, so after 8:00, I was “free.” Whew. PU2 was a great help with all things parental and has a gift for “reading” when I have reached my limit and stepping in for tag-team grandma management. PU1 did a great job as a UHaul wrangler, though his small-town Arkansas heart did go pitty pat in trepidation at the sight of Cali traffic. He hung in there, though, until he was able to park the UHaul and say, “I will NEVER do THAT again!” Oh, and by the way --- motels with indoor pools ROCK.

We saw the largest cross in the western hemisphere…and drove along the route of historic Route 66 nearly the entire way. My dad said, “This is plumb uninspiring country, isn’t it?” about 95 times. He also asked “what mountains are those?” so often that I started making shit up. Did you know that you drive through the Alleghenies and the Alps between Arkansas and California? Hell, yeah! :-) We laughed until my sides hurt.

So the ‘rents are living in a 55+ apartment about 15 miles from me now. They are all unpacked, and the wind chimes are hung from the patio with care, so they should be good to go. Dad is a bit confused about where he is (his sight is very poor and he has some periods of mental confusion). I think he thinks he is still in a motel and will be going “home” soon. But they seem to like the apartment and the view and the weather (though it has rained twice since they have been there, the weatherman apparently not realizing that I promised my parents that it never rains in southern California).
Charming sentiments posted by: Nanntz / 8:39 AM

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Wednesday, October 06, 2004

Yawn

I should post something. It has been days.
I am gearing up for the CrankyMom move. Today my to-do list is get the OP's utilities turned on. Such excitement.
So I called CrankyMom a while ago to get the information I needed for the utility companies.
She's not feeling well. No great surprise there. I can't remember the last time she DID feel well. This is not lack of sympathy on my part exactly...just pragmatism. If I jumped and ran every time my mom was "sick," I'd be a marathoner by now instead of a fat old lady sitting in a computer chair.
I make appropriately sympathetic noises.
She remembers that that doesn't much work anymore, so she plays the trump card.
"Your dad isn't feeling well either."
Aha. She has figured out that she has WAY worn out the word "wolf" but that everyone in the family is always worried about dad (who is the world's greatest dad and a truly wonderful man, and I adore him), so now it is "dad's not feeling well."
Now if Dad himself told me he wasn't feeling well, I would be on it like a possum on a pile of shit. But the fact that MOM tells me this means nothing. It's just "wolf, etc." Sheesh.
Well, soon they will be out here, and I will be able to check it all out myself. You would think that that would be great for mom. She will get much more attention and have people dropping in and out regularly, as opposed to the isolation they are in now (she having run off everyone she knows). But watch this space. I bet within two months I am reporting that nothing out here suits her. I am not visiting enough, she is feeling abandoned, she is sorry she ever let me "force" her into moving to begin with.
Boy. Am I ever feeling sorry for myself today! My apologies.
Charming sentiments posted by: Nanntz / 11:16 AM

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Friday, October 01, 2004

J.H. Kohley Candy Company

Back in the days of my youth, back before small-town America even dreamed of Wal-Mart Supercenters, the countryside was dotted with Ma and Pa grocery stores. They were in garages or in outbuildings, in a curve of the highway, or down the street from where we lived. Near where I lived at 601 NW B Street, there were two of these little stores within walking distance. I don't remember the name of one of them, but the other one was The Busy Bee Grocery Store, and I used to love to ride there on my bicycle and buy a popsicle or Hostess cupcakes.

But before I was old enough to ride that bicycle on the mean streets of Bentonville, when I was very small, my great-grandfather (whom I called PaPa) had a candy business. He received shipments from the candy makers via JTL trucks, and he drove all over Benton County delivering candy to the hundreds of little stores. These were the days when Hershey Bars were huge...and nothing was better under the sun.

PaPa kept the candy in a very large enclosed section of his garage, and he delivered it in a black panel van with "JH Kohley Company" on the side. My MaMa would be at the house, waiting on deliveries from JTL and unlocking the warehouse for the boxes to be stacked in.

Spending any time with my great-grandparents (and I spent a lot--I lived only one block away) involved two exciting events. One was the arrival of the delivery truck. But the greater one was when PaPa came home and took me out to the storage room to get me a treat.

Oh, the smell. I can't begin to describe the smell of that warehouse. Heaven smells like that. Chocolate blending with coconut blending with wood blending with cardboard. I can still smell it now. And his idea of "getting me a treat" was to give me an entire BOX of Hershey bars or a Pez dispenser and a double handful of refills for it. It was kid heaven....

I have no idea what kept the candy from melting out there. I guess nothing kept it from melting. Nothing was air conditioned in those days, and it got very hot in the summer. It may be that all the Hershey bars I ever got as treats were the ones that had "blushed" from melting. I sure didn't care. They were heavenly.
Charming sentiments posted by: Nanntz / 3:46 PM

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Miscellaneous

1. PU2 passed her drive test yesterday and is now a full-fledged driver! Woo hoo! Alert the CHPs!

2. My volcano blew off some steam this afternoon. Bet that felt good.

3. I shouldn't post this. I really should have more self control that this. But I gotta. It's bigger than I am.

Mom and Dad are getting ready to move out here to be closer to me, as I have mentioned here before. Moving day is Oct. 12. All they really need to do is just sit in their recliners till I get there and the movers need to load the chairs. But that is not my mom's personality. She is a ditherer and a worrier....

I got a call from the woman who works for them three days a week, taking care of them and running errands. The woman, Pam, had taken them to buy groceries, and mom had a very long list, with multiples of many items, such as cans of tuna and light bulbs.
Pam: Why are you buying so many things? You are just going to have to pack and move them.
Mom: I know. But I am not sure that they have things like this in California.

Lord help me. What am I getting myself into.
Charming sentiments posted by: Nanntz / 1:22 PM

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