Guilty as Charged

It's always something. - Gilda Radner

Guilty, guilty, guilty.  Yes, I admit it - I'm guilty!

I feel guilty just logging on and writing this post!  I'm overwhelmed with GUILT.

Forgive me, friends, for I have sinned.  It has been 5 1/2 months since my last blog post.

What can I say?  Life happens.

Just a couple of weeks after my last post, my dad had a car accident and shattered his right femur.  The Sister and I spent a week at the hospital, hunted down the wrecker service that towed his big ol' Caddy away from the scene, emptied the car of its contents (please consider the fact that the parental unit is a terrible pack rat, and the Coupe DeVille is a boat of a car, and it was FULL of STUFF), took care of medical and auto insurance issues, and arranged for his transfer to the physical rehab facility where he lives.

That was just the first week.

Needless to say, my training for the Monumental Half Marathon, which had been going GREAT, fell completely to pieces.  I'd decided to try anyway, but the morning of the race, it rained, and I decided it was A Sign From God to stay home, so I did.

While he was in rehab, I visited often, checked his mail, wrote checks for his bills, deposited his checks, brought his whatever he wanted from his apartment, and attended his doctor appointments and care conferences with him.

When the rehab people started making noises that it was time he move back into his apartment, The Sister and I went into overdrive.  We tackled the piles of mail and magazines Dad had stacked on every flat surface.  We moved Mom's old bed out of the second bedroom in the apartment and had The Husbands take it back to Dad's house.  We moved some of the remaining furniture around to give him room to maneuver with a wheelchair, and made the second bedroom into an office/music room.  It's amazing how much room we gained by just getting the bed out of there.

Two days before Christmas, we moved him back into his apartment.  We had to tweak the furniture arrangement a bit to suit him, but thankfully, he mostly approved of what we had done.  After the surgeon approved his transition to a power chair, he was a much happier camper, since he was more mobile.  But he wanted to GO places, DO things, and SEE people!  So I researched public transportation options for him so he could attend church and his Masonic stuff.

We had sort of achieved a "new normal," so I started training for the 500 Festival Mini Marathon.  So, of course, I got good and sick for nearly a month.

I'm finally back to training, and doing okay with it, but I've been staying inside on the treadmill.  Can you say "BORING?"  I knew you could.  The TV and DVD player are my new bestest running buds.

Dad's actually doing VERY well, and he's doing a lot of the things he like to do, but he's getting antsy, and wants to DRIVE.  He wanted us to bring the other car down to the apartment "just in case" the surgeon says he can drive after his next appointment in a couple of weeks.  There has been significant bone growth since the accident and surgery, but he's still not allowed to put any weight on that leg.  I doubt the surgeon will allow him to drive before he can do weight bearing exercises, but I guess we'll see what we see when we see it!