December 10, 2014
Happy birthday to Mama Lee. Seventy-three years old today.
She's an amazing woman. A single Mom when she moved here from New Jersey in 1972 with four children under the age of ten.
She got a job at UBC and earned a degree while raising her family.
Now at her age, dealing with the effects of her Parkinson's she shows such courage. But I'll come back to that.
I was up early this morning made myself a cup of Joe
and finished off yesterdays blog. Another cup of Joe, a shower and I was ready to roll by 9:30. I have an appointment in downtown Vancouver at 10:40.
Man, was the rain coming down! I had Elvis and Nutmeg with me. The rain pounding down on the roof of the truck was freaking Nutmeg out. I was there twenty minutes early and I parked the truck near a grassy Boulevard. Nutmeg wouldn't even get out of the car! Elvis jumped down, peed on the meter and jumped back in.
Fine! I left the rat dogs a bowl of water. Dropped a toonie into the meter and hoped forty-five minutes was going to be enough time.
If you recall I was towed the last time I was downtown. In exactly the same place. They were running twenty minutes late so, what do you do. I spent my time trying to get my tablet to work on their free WiFi. It never did.
I did my thing and headed down to the truck. I still had fifteen minutes left on the meter. The rat dogs still wouldn't get out of the car.
The highway was an absolute mess. Not with traffic but with standing water. They just spent hundreds of millions of dollars on this highway and pools of water form every time it rains. Not that good when people are driving a hundred and ten kilometers per hour.
It was just after 11:00 when I got off the freeway. My brother in law, Peter was supposed to be at our house at noon. I was going to take him and Mama Lee for her birthday lunch. I thought I had some time, so I took Elvis and Nutmeg to Blue Mountain Park.
The rain had let up enough that they actually got out of the truck.
I have this big Eddie Bauer Poncho I wear when I'm out in the rain. I might look like a tent but I'm dry. The Poop Fairy visited the Rat dogs within two minutes of being at the park. Did their business then headed straight back to the truck.
When I pulled into my parking spot in the back of the house
Peter was standing there in the backyard. In the rain. Alright then, let's go get Mama Lee I said. I put the dogs in the house, locked up
and with Peter in tow, went to pick up Mama Lee for her birthday lunch.
Mama Lee asked if she could have her birthday lunch at a Greek restaurant called Sakos in our neighbourhood. No problem that works for me, even though I don't really like Greek food.
We got Mama Lee loaded into the truck and drove over to where Sakos used to be. Seems I'm not the only one who doesn't like Greek food.
We ended up down at the foot of North Road at Yans Seafood Restaurant for dim sum. There was a handicap parking spot available right in front of the restaurant. I was able to get Mama Lee into the restaurant without getting soaked. The host said it would be five or ten minutes for a table. My mind immediately flashed to the Seinfeld episode in the Chinese restaurant. I took a seat and pulled Mama Lees wheelchair close to me so we could talk. Peter sat across from us in front of a giant fish tank.
The resemblance was uncanny!
The resemblance was uncanny!
Peter can eat dim sum! It's mostly steamed dumplings. Some of them are quite large and all of them are steaming hot. Peter somehow managed to fit three of the steaming hot dumplings in his mouth at one time.
While Peter was doing his impression of a chipmunk with it's face on fire. Mama Lee was ignoring her Parkinson's and attempting to use chopsticks to eat her lunch. Even though she had a fork right there. I told her she should always eat with chopsticks, she'd for sure lose a few pounds. She'd also still be sitting there on her next Birthday! I'd like to say it was a miracle and all of a sudden she was wielding chopsticks like Bruce Lee wields his nun chucks, but that's not what happened. At one point I looked over and Mama Lee was using one chopstick and had a piece of steamed rice paper stuck to the side of her face. I'm not the type of person that gets embarrassed easily. I'm like a coach on the sidelines. "Slow down, chew your food, close your mouth when your chewing, use your freaking fork!" It's like my Mantra when we go to lunch.
While Peter was doing his impression of a chipmunk with it's face on fire. Mama Lee was ignoring her Parkinson's and attempting to use chopsticks to eat her lunch. Even though she had a fork right there. I told her she should always eat with chopsticks, she'd for sure lose a few pounds. She'd also still be sitting there on her next Birthday! I'd like to say it was a miracle and all of a sudden she was wielding chopsticks like Bruce Lee wields his nun chucks, but that's not what happened. At one point I looked over and Mama Lee was using one chopstick and had a piece of steamed rice paper stuck to the side of her face. I'm not the type of person that gets embarrassed easily. I'm like a coach on the sidelines. "Slow down, chew your food, close your mouth when your chewing, use your freaking fork!" It's like my Mantra when we go to lunch.
I don't want to sound mean. Humour has always been my way of coping. I know Peter and Mama Lee are doing the best that they can and I'm very proud of them. The courage and perseverance that both of them show in dealing with their everyday lives just blows me away. We/Peter ate $50 worth of dim sum. That's a lot of dim sum! I think Peter might of been putting it in his pockets for later.
I usually drop Mama Lee off before I take Peter home. Today she wanted to come along for the ride. With 650 senile playing Christmas songs on the radio, we drove Peter home first. Then I meandered slowly back towards mama Lee's. Mama Lee was really enjoying the christmas music. She was even singing along to the religious themed songs. She didn't think it was funny when I told her Oh Come All Ye Faithful sounded like a good title for a porno movie. I don't think she got it. Or she would have laughed, cause that's freaking funny.
I took Mama Lee home, wished her a Happy Birthday, told her I loved her and gave her a kiss. The lovely Lisa would be stopping by after work.
I came home and got the dogs. We went down to London Drugs to get the lovely Lisa's Hawaiian shots in to a photo book. I got my HOHOHO warning while I was there. The drive home was unbelievable! Even with the wipers going warp factor five and the heater on stun, I could barely see fifty feet in front of me.
I'm absolutely amazed at the number of people who drive around at night, in the rain, without turning on their lights. Most cars these days the head lights come on as soon as you turn on the ignition. It seems a lot of people don't realize that their tail lights don't come on unless they actually turn on their headlights. I saw two different accidents on Austin Avenue on the way home both involved rear ending .
I took Mama Lee home, wished her a Happy Birthday, told her I loved her and gave her a kiss. The lovely Lisa would be stopping by after work.
I came home and got the dogs. We went down to London Drugs to get the lovely Lisa's Hawaiian shots in to a photo book. I got my HOHOHO warning while I was there. The drive home was unbelievable! Even with the wipers going warp factor five and the heater on stun, I could barely see fifty feet in front of me.
I'm absolutely amazed at the number of people who drive around at night, in the rain, without turning on their lights. Most cars these days the head lights come on as soon as you turn on the ignition. It seems a lot of people don't realize that their tail lights don't come on unless they actually turn on their headlights. I saw two different accidents on Austin Avenue on the way home both involved rear ending .
Lisa didn't get home until about 7:30 she had pork chops and pasta for dinner. I had eaten a hamburger patty with a dill pickle
about an hour before she got home. I would eat a couple of pork chops later. We watched four episodes of Family Feud.
Do you know how I said I don't embarrass easily? I lied. This is such a stupid show and I could watch it all day long. Lisa went to bed about 930 and I've been playing with this blog and watching TV and strumming my guitar. Generally wasting time until I'm tired enough to sleep.
That's all I've got
That's all I've got
Till next time
Peace out y'all
©2014 Dave Squatch Ward
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