See How She Runs...

It was not what I had in mind at all.

Nope.

My day was to begin with carefully planned and executed activity. Ginger, Jared's sitter was to come and keep careful watch over the sleeping prince while I ran the errands that occupy a couple of hours of alternate Fridays in order to manage household affairs and prevent starvation.

I called to make sure Daddy was up so he could go bid his sad farewell to the Cadillac that will no longer be his. The engine blew and it will take more money than the car is worth to replace it and that first estimate of $3,500 samoleons on the repairs they offered was for a USED engine with more miles on it than the current engine has accrued.

Call me stupid, but that did NOT sound like a deal to me and when they "sweetened" the offer by telling me how "little" the price would be to get a brand new one put in, I almost fainted!

There are some really good things you can apply $6,500 bucks to and putting a new engine into an ancient car is not one of them. I think we'll pass. Daddy wasn't so sure, so it took some swift talking and reality checks to make sure he didn't agree to spend the money on something that was like putting a new patch on some old worn out overalls.

So, when the determination was made that the Caddy would NOT be part of the family anymore, we went to Champion Chevrolet's repair bay and gathered up the sad remnants of the items stuffed into the glove box, the pockets, the door side trays and the trunk of the Caddy while hopefully managing to shove into the back the ginormous spare tire that had lain forever in the garage instead of riding around with the car.

Don't ask me to explain THAT logic defying bit of derring-do. The only thing I could get out of Daddy on the issue of why the Cadillac sans spare tire was was that he was "saving gas" by not having it in the trunk.  DO WHAT???

The absence of said spare tire would explain why he had to pay over 50 dollars to get JUST a new rim when he wrecked the Caddy and blew out a tire a couple of years ago before we took the keys away. That said nothing for the amount the tire mounting and balancing costs as well... Had he simply been carrying that full-sized spare in its appointed location, he could have simply changed (or had changed FOR him) the tire and been on his merry way and bought a matching rim at the salvage yard for just a few bucks. *SIGH*

There is no way that any imagined gasoline savings made up for the aggravation of not having a spare tire when he needed it or the attendant expense he accrued by doing things in this odd manner. Of course, it does explain some of the earlier symptoms of dementia that we never noticed. Who knows what other quirks we are likely to discover over time?

One little aside here, when I took this aforementioned absolutely nasty spider web coated spare tire from the corner of Daddy's garage and hauled it up into my van for transport to the Chevy place where the Caddy sits, I was not anticipating getting my daily exercise the hard way. The lifting and moving of the tire I expected. Everything else that happened was just a bonus.

After getting all of the personal items, four million umbrellas (don't ask!) and other sundries from the car, I loped around to the van on  my sore leg to get the spare out and roll it to the car.

It sounded like a good, solid and reasonable idea at the time.

Too bad, so sad - but it didn't work out that way.

The tire was heaved carefully to the ground. Did I mention it was sloped? The GROUND not the tire... troll! Well, it was. Again... the ground was sloped and not the tire.

After the first bounce and a couple of feet of hand rolling, that crappy mind of its own tire got away from me and in full view of every single man working in the repair bay, the tire just bounced along and rolled away, away, away, with a slightly plump woman running for all she was worth behind it trying to catch it to keep it from rolling out into the middle of highway 72. It was like a slow motion thing with my mind screaming "GO! GO! GO! FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, GOOOOOOOOO!" and my legs saying languidly, "HUH? Were YOU talkin' to ME?"

Nice. I'm quite sure they will all be laughing and sharing the hilarious vision of thunder thighs, jiggly belly and the red face of a less than Olympic sprinter in action for years to come.

For the record, I DID indeed manage to catch the cursed tire before it managed to cause an embarrassing and expensive pileup on the highway. It was close, but I did it. MAN ALIVE!! Does my leg hurt now!!

Less than gently, I heaved the now recaptured and evil offending tire up and into the Caddy's trunk. I slammed the trunk lid shut rather violently over the tire's snickering hubcap. Hey, I was there, you weren't and that tire WAS laughing at me. Really!

After a quick pause to collect my lungs, which had apparently fallen out in my race to glory, it was time to finish the fond farewell and go away without looking back. Daddy's weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth was over where the Caddy was concerned and he'd finally made his peace with letting the old girl go to that great junkyard in the sky, so we handed the last sets of car keys over and started to leave. Daddy then informed me that he wanted to go buy a new car and insisted that we drive the lot and let him look.

WHAT? You are gonna get a CAR...??? HELL NO!!!

Uh uh! NO. NO. NO. There will be NO new car. There will be no used car. There will be riding with us girls in OUR cars no matter how mad it makes you, Daddy. Regardless of what the commercials on television say, there is no codicil for dealing with someone who still THINKS he can handle the car, but in reality is a danger to himself and everyone else on the road. I can only imagine how hard it would be to get the keys from Daddy a second time. Likely, there would be violence. I'm sure one of us wouldn't survive, but at this juncture, I'm not allowed to say who would have to die.

After that little adventure, I dropped Daddy and all of his containers of car stuff off at his house. He seems to be okay with everything now. I hope that being okay with this lasts. It truly grieves me to have to keep explaining everything. But I will keep doing it as many times as needed and hope that I am being patient with him while doing so. He patiently explained life to me when I had a need to know, now the situation is simply reversed.

When Daddy got settled into his "trundle chair", I locked up and left him, then went to get groceries and run my OWN errands. Why is it so dang tiring to do what I HAVE to do much less what I'd LIKE or NEED to do?? Totally not fair! I'd like to keep the brains I have now and go back and pick up the body I had in my 20's. Why can't someone figure out how to do that sweet little maneuver? I'd love to have legs that still worked, a body that wasn't wrinkled lined and flabby and the brains my experiences have carved out for me.

Oh well... a girl can dream.

While I was at the Dollar General tooling around the store picking up dog food, v-neck t-shirts, skivvies and some peanut butter, I realized just how much useless stuff is out there that is for sell. Who in the heck needs a glow in the dark cat poop scoop?

Really? Glow in the dark??? Why? Just why...?

I can imagine that people "find" a need for this stuff using all kinds of reasons. You could go broke discovering "needs" that aren't really needs at all. One of those quality finds today was also in the pet section. I was astounded beyond measure. Truly. And that doesn't happen a lot at the Dollar General. They are usually so reasonable...

I never realized my dog needed a purse.

To be sure she IS female and I'm certain it would be quite fetching with her fashionable ensemble of scarves, but how in the name of all that is holy is a dog expected to CARRY a purse??? Her paws are unsuited to carry a clutch and still be able to walk without irritating her arthritis. She lacks the shoulder shape to put a shoulder strap on without leaving her purse dragging the ground and she would frankly look totally ridiculous with a fanny pack on as it would give her "holster hips". And just how is she supposed to work the little zipper to open it up? She doesn't have opposable thumbs. Assuming some dogs NEED purses, isn't this some sort of design flaw?

While I am almost certain that this is a novelty item meant for her collar, why does she actually need a purse? She isn't well known for her shopping skills. I would also imagine that it would bang into her chest when she runs or bounce up and down flopping all around her head, back and neck. So that might be a trifle distracting when she is trying to run the fence line and gobble up the utility company representatives. And what would happen to all of her precious purse items when she wound up biting a hole into the purse when it annoyed her as she ran?

She lacks any sort of actual identification cards, government ID, debit or credit cards or, frankly, even a wallet in which to carry either them or her wads of cash in and, truthfully, if she HAS wads of cash she has been hoarding and holding back from us, I'm gonna be a might peeved. We are family and she should share... but I guess even a fur covered woman has needs and simply can't spare a dime to the family who has raised her up from a pup and given her the run of the house.

Anyway, upon returning home, I discovered all well and Ginger even helped me haul in the groceries. I'm so tired and sore now, I need a three week nap. I won't get one, but it's a nice thought.

As you are out and about the next time and should you happen to glance around and see a tire abandoned alongside the roadway, think of me and my sprinting efforts. Also, should you happen to be out and about and see my dog Gypsy out unattended doing any shopping, check discretely to see just where she keeps all of her cash. I'm thinking she may have some sort of marsupial pouch in which she's hiding her treasure.