maybe in a few days, or a few weeks, click

B's family stayed a couple of days & didn't leave until about noon on saturday. it was a beautiful morning, dark, grey, raining & even 2 rounds of hail - sweet!

when my mom left on thursday we hadn't cut into the pies, so i told her i would bring her some on sunday, sat night i called her to check in. she didn't answer & i figured she was either sleeping or out walking the dogs & didn't really think too much of it.

the next morning we all slept in late, company can be exhausting...
i called my mom again, but didn't answer so i left a message. Z & I spent the morning working on his school project & i told him once he was done we'd go to grammie's, actually i'd been telling him we were going since thursday. when he was just about finished i called my mom & finally she answered & told me:

"i can't talk to you right now, maybe in a few days, maybe in a few weeks" then she hung up on me.

happy thankgiving, merry christmas, it's the most wonderful time of the year...
my family is completely fucked up beyond all belief
how do you tell someone that without even explaining to them what you think they did wrong?

was she mad because dinner was late?
how do you rush a cooking turkey?
does she think this was a conspiracy to make her drive in the dark?
maybe we made her stay too late? [5:15 pm is really late right?]
did she have an anxiety attack because she was more than 5 miles from home?
maybe she got in a car accident & she's blaming me...I DON"T KNOW

so yeah, i cried most of the day over this yesterday. i'm hurt. i'm mad. i don't deserve this. i knew something was up with her before she came over for thanksgiving, i had hoped getting together would smooth whatever was wrong in her head things over, but instead they blew up.

i took something to help me sleep last night, so i dreamt of vampires [not hot edward-like ones] & robots trying to kill me, then another one where all my hs friends stopped talking to me, but at least i didn't dream about my mother [which would have been even worse].

thanksgiving 2009

thankgiving was a quiet one this year, i invited my mom & B invited his cousin & aunt over & that was it. ever since we've been back things have been weird with my mom, before she used to come over every sunday to visit, but she'd only been over once [for my birthday in july when we first got here]. it's not that i want or expect her to come over every week, but something's up & she's not telling me what's going on. i wasn't even sure she was going to accept my invitation for thanksgiving, but she did.

i called her that morning to find out what time she was coming over; she told me she'd prepared all her stuff the night before but she wouldn't be over until noon. a little weird right? it's thanksgiving don't you want to spend the day with us? apparently not.

B's cousin & aunt showed up early that morning. [i had spent the previous day baking all day long so the house was kind of a disaster & i had planned on cleaning before they got here, but oh well...] we sat, had coffee & talked while B & I prepared the stuffing. later in the morning we made some munchies and shortly thereafter my mom arrived with spinach dip & yummy pies.

it was a beautiful day & we sat outside on the back patio & talked or sat around the tv for a bit. i think it was about 3:30 when my mom told me she had a headache because she needed to eat. B checked on the turkey but it wasn't quite hot enough still; so that needed to cook a bit more, brown it & the side dishes also needed to go in the oven. it was probably about 4:30 when we sat down to eat, the turkey was fantastic, very juicy [we think the trick was B cooked it at 325 so it took longer, but it was worth it]. everything was really good & we all had a nice dinner.

my mom complained about it getting dark, so once we finished eating i helped her gather her stuff, gave her some leftovers & Z & I walked her out to her car. she seemed fine, just a little perturbed a bit about having to drive in the dark & being a whopping 13 miles away from home.

trip to ghetto house

tuesday was supposed to be the baking day, but on monday night we got a call from the renter that the heater wasn't working. we had him try a few things, but no dice, so tues am we got up & headed north. when we left in july we knew there were a few things to wrap up, so the heater just made us stop delaying the trip.

the yard had just been mowed [we've been told he lets the grass go, like really GO] but the inside of the house was immaculate. honestly, i would eat off this guy's floor [something i would not do when i lived there! haha, well, it is all new flooring, so that does make some of the difference.] the house is decorated really nicely too [i'm jealous....& thinking of asking him to come decorate this house]. all in all we aren't going to complain about ugly yard when the inside is being kept up so nicely.
example: a soft blue sofa & a brown chair that has matching blue striping, the fabric from the chair is also used for drapery in the dining room.

we worked on a few things on the house & Rob came over to help. it was so great to see him, he seems to be doing pretty well there although he complained about how boring the job was. they took the motor out of the heater & determined that was the problem so we went to a couple of places to find a replacement. although it's a track home, so all of the nearby houses initially had the same heater, it's not a part they keep in stock so it had to be special ordered. we went back to the house & did a little more work then headed over to R's for a little bit.

we stayed there about 2 hours then got on the road, i hate driving that stretch at night so i was anxious to get going. there's about a 20 mile section where there's no passing, which is fantastic when you're stuck behind a car that is going between 40-50 mph that brakes whenever a car comes in the opposite direction. or there's a little hill. or a dip. or a curve in the road. or fornoreasonwhatsoever!!!! it was insane, but to make it all the more enjoyable i had a semi in the backseat with Z. awesome....

i don't know what the deal was with the car in front of me & i certainly didn't get wtf the semi was doing riding my tail. i was surprised B wasn't telling me to just pass the car; i guess he's learned that i have this uncanny ability to make cops manifest out of thin air when i do stuff like that so it's just better that i don't do it. we made it home safely though.

almost impossible

one day last week B's biology study group came over; when they meet they bring donuts & beer. [i don't remember study group being like that...]

anyways, so yeah, there were donuts in the house, right & one day last week Z managed to be good ALL day long at school & ALL 2 1/2 hours at his after school place [that's a lot of behaving for this kid, seriously.] so i told him he could have a donut after ALL that exasperating being good stuff.

he ate the donut. licked his fingers. then checked his cheeks to see if any sugar granules were stuck there & then took an actual bite out of the paper napkin for a few pieces of sugar. you would think we'd never let him have any treats what so ever...

then he asked if he was good ALL day tomorrow, could he have another donut?

wow, well, let's see here:
1 - Z has to be good 2 days in a row
2 - at school & at after school place
3 - there's only 2 donuts left & that means B can only eat 1 donut tomorrow am

so, you may not know this, but i am not a betting person...however, this is something i would feel pretty safe about putting my money on....self control around here is, well, um, needs some work.

surprisingly, the stars aligned & all worked out. good thing i didn't call the local bookie.

tues visit & a story about chicken soup & my dad

after making this post, i called the hospital & spoke with nana, she told me they took her to the hospital because her tummy hurt. to say she's a little in the dark about her health would be an understatement, but it's probably for the best...
when i visited her last week, she told me they "they'd cut her open", suddenly aware that she'd had a surgery & to a certain extent seemed like she felt violated by the act. i told her if she didn't remember any of it, it was probably best & that comforted her some.

anyways, she told me they were discharging her from the hospital that day (monday).

so on tues mom & i went down to check on her. she was sitting in the living room; her color looked good & she was talkative. then my mom went into one of the rooms to look for some old books & when she came back she had an old hs annual. really old, 1963. i actually found a few people that i knew, well, i knew them as so&so's parents, but still funny to see these people in hs.

nana talked quite a bit more with my mom & for some reason they brought up an old story. a long, long time ago my mom had extreme oral surgery to have her wisdom teeth removed. the reason i say extreme is because i think the doctor used an old, rusty butterknife to work on her because after the surgery she got lock-jaw, i think she said it lasted for like 2 weeks...

can you imagine the lawsuit if that happened today?

so, beings my dad was....well...you know.....like not worth his weight in salt....nana told my mom to come stay with her while she healed. nana was sick too, but my dad knew sick nana could take better care of my mom than he could so he gladly dropped her off & took my sweet lil baby ass over to his mom's house because he couldn't take care of me either. when he dropped off my mom in the morning, he did ask if they needed anything from the grocery store [alright, there's a bit of good in there] & nana told him to pick up a few things to make some chicken soup for the both of them.

and here is where my dad is my dad.

they waited all fricken day for him to return with the groceries. yup, both sick & stuck waiting for him. he didn't show up until sometime in the evening & he was all proud of himself that he remember to get everything. yeah. nice. stupid actually. just a tad inconsiderate. i don't know what the 2 of them did all day long. i know nana has never been one to keep a full pantry, so when she gave him a list of things she needed for soup, she [like any normal person] would expect the person to go get the stuff & return immediately. right? i mean what kind of person goes & f's off all day long when you have 2 sick people waiting for soup fixings?

and here is where my nana is my nana.

nana took the bag with the chicken in it & hit my dad with it.

1st trimester report card

let's just start with "WOOOOHOOO"

ok, settle down......geez!

so for life skills & work habits he got S (satisfactory) for everything except observing school/playground rules & demonstrating self-control, which ya know, considering some of the stuff he's pulled, is perfectly true. he got an N (needs improvement) but i wouldn't have been surprised if they'd given him a U (unsatisfactory).

now for the nitty gritty:
[because really, social skills...who needs them? look how well i function without them.]
writing - S & all 2's "partial mastery of grade level standards" for sentence structure, punctuation, spelling, content, yada....yada....yada.
reading - S & almost all 2+'s [yup, on the cusp of 3's, which is consistently demonstrates...] for word recognition, fluency & vocabulary!!!!!!!!!!!!
math - E (EXCELLENT!!!!) all 2+'s & one 3...in money [duh, we know what's important].

did you know in 2nd grade math they cover alegbra? because i took a pre-algebra class in jr high & that was considered kinda advanced.....
they also cover statistics, data analysis & probability, which i didn't take until....college....2nd year...

and the big overall standardized assessments:
reading 41/52 = 78.8%
math 27/30 = 90%
hold on to your seats....75% is considered proficient!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

teach said she was really worried about Z in the beginning, because when he came into class he told her he didn't know how to do anything, not even add. i know that he could add & spell, but his reading was way, way behind. his progress in one trimester has been so significant she's going to nominate him for an award for most improved.

back to the hospital

i found out last night that nana is back in the hospital. she was taken on sat & admitted on sun for dehydration & some sort of infection (details are sketchy at best). the biggest concern though is that her veins aren't strong enough to hold an iv.

last time they'd used her arms & hands, she still has large bruises on her arms from them. this time they had to use a vein in her groin.

aunt A & cousin C are supposed to go visit her today & give us an update. my mom is going to try to get the day off tomorrow & we hope to head down to visit her.

UA is still causing crazy drama with the family; practically everyone doesn't want to visit nana (at the hospital or at her home) because the don't want to see him. i don't think i wrote about it earlier, but before my last visit nana had told my aunt A that she (nana) was worried about me coming to visit because my mother & i had "attacked" UA in the hospital.

no doubt a repeat of his words. no doubt he wouldn't explain that it's because he didn't want tell us his plans for nana. i would not put it past the man to put her in away & not let us know where she was at. he runs off everyone & then tries to convince nana he's the only one that cares about her. the man needs therapy....lots of it!

calculating.....& possible pocket-protectors in our future

the other day Z was given a little positive reinforcement slip for doing well in PE. he told me they'd given out the slips before, but for some reason this time, a slip was given to 1 boy & 1 girl & they each got to pick out a prize. Z picked out a calculator.

are you off the floor yet?

yeah, i know...what?

if it helps explain things, it's blue & at the top has a locking mechanism...er...um...latch-like-connector-thingie & he got it so he can learn times. he's anxious to learn his times tables because all those smart girls from 1st grade last year that knew a couple of factors & that really got to Z. he must learn them. [finally my competitive nature is appearing! & as long as he's not punching or kissing them, i'm not complaining....]

today, Z walked around all day long sporting his calculator, finding different spots on his clothing to attach it. i'm kinda surprised he didn't hang it on his ear, maybe tomorrow. at one point B started to explain how cool pocket protectors were....hello, the award was for PE, honey....

monday we have our 1st parent/teacher conference. yeah, i'm a bit nervous. the reading lab has helped Z tremendously & the other day he moved up another [yeah, that makes 2] level in math! but that doesn't change some of the behavior issues he's shown, although significantly better than last year, still working on it.