Easy to say from where I'm standing, but DO IT. I mean, seriously--you're here on hand for all of this drama and trauma, and I'd totally get if my sister just threw her hands up in the air and went incommunicado for a while.

Yeah, I know. Life is rarely practical that way. But it would be nice.

What ita said. Good luck, Suela. If nothing else, Monday will come.

You can leave the house, right, Juliebird? Go to the movies. Or whatever.

Drat, the one today-only special from Lands End I was going to get is already sold out.

ION, I'm going to hang out with my mom! My dad is going to his day program, and she has the day off work, so I'm sure she feels like she's playing hooky, but I don't know when we last spent time just the two of us. It will be nice! I continue to be thankful that I like my family.

We are just getting ready to go do Thanksgiving.

I'll be off to PA for combination cleaning-Mom's-out AND bonus salvaging-destroyed-Shore-house -- if I am allowed to come out to the island (they're very finicky about who and how many are allowed in at a time). Otherwise I stay back in PA and manage on my own....

Cereal: 'Suela, when my Mom was being obstreperous, it was AMAZING how much better she responded to my brothers than me. With Women Of A Certain Era, there's more of a habit of compliance when a Guy Says It.

Seriously, my brothers kept wondering why I was complaining that I couldn't get Mom to take her meds, et cetera, because THEY never had a problem, at least until they were hanging out and saw how she was responding....

If you have to pretend you have a headache and go sit out in a coffee shop for a couple hours, it may save a life or two, or at least give a possibility that your mom won't get wound up and diffuse a potential explosion.

Timelies all!

Later today we head to DarkoverCon. Nice relaxing weekend...

And also why most African Americans today have some Native American blood.

I don't think this is actually true. On that PBS show with Henry Louis Gates looking at African American genealogy, practically everyone he talked to claimed, "My grandmother said that her grandmother was Cherokee" or something like that, but the DNA tests didn't bear it out at all.

mac is a happy happy boy. Fed Ex just brought by his Christmas present. Even though Fed Ex tracking said it wouldn't be here until Monday. Another Thanksgiving miracle.

msbelle, may my fedex carrier learn from yours: Mom's anti-anxiety drugs are supposed to arrive either today or Monday.

Thanks, everyone. I got to bed at a reasonable hour, and then woke up at 2 and spent an hour or so listening to an audiobook before getting back to sleep. (I find Bujold's The Curse of Chalion really good comfort reading, for some reason.)

This morning I'm going to walk the dog, stop by my sister's house and make a couple of turkey-berry sandwiches, pick up some jeans at the tailor's, and then go out to my folks' place to pack things. At some point I have to run back in with the Big Box O Meds to hand it off to the folks at the facility. And then home, feed the dog, and then go to the airport at 8 to pick up my brothers.

C'mon, meds!

I wish you lots of fortitude, Suela. Even if the craziness continues after this, it really is the big push right now. And you never know, once she's in and settled and stable on meds, she really may calm down. And if she doesn't, you are no longer looking at the possibility of you having to live in her house and be primary caregiver. So you can let the people you're paying to deal with her, deal with her. You can have lots of mixed feelings about it, but you're really doing the absolute best you can for her.

Think about how far you've come; how impossible it seemed that you would get to this point. And now here you are.