Wednesday already?
I have been a whirlwind of not getting things done. Amazing - really - entire days have disappeared since last Wednesday with nothing to little accomplished. I am starting this post about 3 hours later than normal - Once a month I have to write and send out the newsletter for my embroidery chapter - and I barely started it before dinner and had to write it after dinner - through my “reading the newspaper” time, my “doing the laundry” time and my “writing my post” time. (The last two items are normally done at the same time.
Worst of the week was our lost Friday. I think I have mentioned my mom has not been doing well - she is 90 and now in an assisted living facility. Since I was not able help to much at going through the family home and husband and I do not work full time (more like hardly at all) I was asked by sister to deal with taking mom to several doctors - she gave me a list of them. Last week mom was unwell and ended up at the hospital overnight. She had a blood clot in her leg. After she was back “home” (in the assisted living) my sister wrote that mom had an appointment to go to the cardiologist on (now - last) Friday at 10 am with a certain doctor - Dr B. We had been planning - again - to take a trip to Pennsylvania, but were not sure due to weather if we would go - decided Thursday not to and I texted my sister that I could take mom. Mom called me before I could call her to make the arrangements to pick her up. The appointment was at 10 am - none of the three of us - mom, husband, me - are normally up and out that early. Thursday night there was a huge storm in the general two county area. (Mom and sister are in the next county.) The storm was so bad that the front was blown off of a warehouse on the county line.
Husband and I woke up at 8 am to take mom (this is about 4-5 hours earlier than usual as wake up late and go to bed late (it is 2 am as I write this and husband has not come down yet for snack before bed and we will get to bed between 3 and 4 am). I had estimated a lot of extra time for rush hour traffic, getting mom into her wheelchair - then our car - and then dealing with her wheelchair for our first time. As we drove to mom there were lots of slow downs as huge trees had fallen along the parkway and the crews were working on them. We got to mom just at the time we needed to be there - so my extra time was a good thing. I went up and got mom, we got her into the car and figured out the chair fairly quickly (I had thought to look up online the night before how to take it apart to fit in the car) and we were off. The doctor’s office was fairly close to mom’s place.
I expected a doctor’s office as I am used to - an outer office with staff, then several exam rooms in the back. If it was in an multiple office building I expected to see doors along the halls with the names of doctors on them. The place had open offices along the hall - no doctor’s names - just the specialty that was in that space. We came to the end of the hall we had been sent down and had not seen a sign for cardiology. I asked an employee and we walked into a nearby office area. I asked someone about signing in (at our doctors one signs a sheet with name & time) there was acomputer tablets - oh boy! It asked if I was the person or signing in for them - I selected the latter - it wanted me to put my hand on the screen - I did, several times. It gave up and asked for mom’s name and date of birth - rejected that. I went to someone at the desk and explained - I should not have been sent there - mom was not registered. I was handed another computer tablet to fill in info on. Mom was confused by this (although she does use a computer since she worked with one at her job). I started trying to fill in the form - I have trouble using my Android phone as I do not always show up on touch screens (if I knew we would be using one I would have brought a toucher thingee to use). Husband had to take over and fill in info. I gave the woman mom’s two insurance cards while we did all this. Mom had to sign the tablet - multiple times - she was very frustrated doing so. Then there was a problem with one of her insurance cards - there was an extra digit in the account number (I have to wonder if it is because she has had it soooo long). The woman called it in and found out how to enter the number. We were told to sit down and wait.
We were called much quicker than I thought we would be. We followed an employee into a room. She was checking and taking information - we were there to see Dr. Z per her - I told her that we were suppose to see Dr. B (my BIL’s doctor). No, Dr. B is at the hospital doing procedures mornings - he only has afternoon appointments. I started texting my sister. All three of us thought mom was there to have her pacemaker checked - employee said mom was there to have her leg tested related to her blood clot, and they don’t do pacemaker testing - that is done at the hospital. (Her old doctor did same in his office.) I called my sister - yes, she was there for her leg (did not say to her - but if she was not there related to heart -why say she is going to the cardiologist?) and yes, she was suppose to see Dr B - sister had a card from the hospital which made the appointment with the doctor’s name and time. Our choice was to see Dr Z instead, come back another day or they had an open appointment for Dr B at 2 pm - we could come back. We chose the last. As we walked out it was corrected to a 2:30 appointment
We now had close over 3 hours to spend. We got in the car and started to drive and figure out where to go - lunch would be part of it, but not long enough. We came to a Barnes and Nobles and parked and went in - I figured we could always sit and look at magazines. We managed to easily spend over 2 hours there. Then we went to a Wendys we knew for lunch. Then back to the doctor’s office.
I had asked if we had to check in again and had been told to speak to the woman who had helped us. Again we were told to take and seat and we would be called. At 3:30 we still had not been called and I went back to the woman - I told her that it was an hour past the appointment and mom had to be back for dinner at 4:30 or she would miss same. She apologized and said it would be “soon”. Mom went in just after 4 pm - us with her. Nurse took vitals and asked for info - her assisted living should have sent info with her, including a list of her meds (next time I will check with the office which handles this, in advance) - we gave the list of meds as we could. We then went to another room where they had the machine that doctor needed to do the test. We waited. The doctor came in - he was extremely nice and took time to explain everything to mom and us very simply and without large medical terms unless he explained them. (Husband and I had already the report on the counter from mom’s hospital visit.) He said that she did not need the test yet - she should come back in 3 weeks. He gave us a list of things to be done in the interim for mom’s facility - I had one of the employees make a copy for us. We left. So basically we had spent, just since picking up mom 8 hours - and nothing had been done. We were concerned about mom not having dinner, but she said they would bring her a tray and when we got to her room, we had to insist that she throw out the tray left for her for lunch as it had been sitting out.
On the way home we stopped at the bank as we had planned to do in the mid afternoon on our way home and the at the post office to pick up mail at our box - ditto. Friday gone and wasted.
Then we found out that our kitchen telephone/answering machine was dead. It is on the wall across from the basement door. We bought a new one - per the online info it should have fit - the door passes close to the wall across from it - but apparently they had not included the handset in the measurements. So we have now bought and returned 4 telephones - the others were too cheaply made and at least one of them hardwired so the wire could not be removed for wall use.
In the meantime I am trying to get a copy of the changes to my reenactment unit’s insurance that we did - back in April. The woman I have worked with for years at the agency retired and I figured the new one was stupid and did not understand what I wanted. Then another thought hit me - perhaps the changes were not properly made - seems like that it the story - and she is checking what went on.
I have a client who files his income taxes on extension as he is away when it is due. I just picked up the info from him a week or so ago. He sent me an email that he needed to talk to me. There is a situation with his income for 2019 and I need to call one of his financial advisors - so that is another call I have to deal with.
We need to have a printout of what we paid for medical insurance last year for a senior tax exemption. We have 3 medical polices between the two of us. One company has now sent us the wrong info - not a listing of what we paid - twice now, and I have to call them AGAIN!
So when the heck am I suppose to get anything done?!!!
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Sometimes the stupidity of ours takes up more time than thinks one can deal with. One just has to deal with it and do one’s best. When others are not organized - they take our from our ability to be organized.
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