The Adirondack Chair

It's by the "Bear Chair" Company, and it's also called a Muskoka chair. I've been asking for one for about twenty years, and wanting one for about twenty years before that. Hubby gave me one for my birthday this year.

My grandparents had two of these chairs at their house in the country. Which burned down about 40 years ago. I loved those chairs. They're comfy, and their arms are wide enough to put a drink on (my favourite part!). I also like that they're made of wood. Natural. A connection to the earth.

Well, earlier this labor-day weekend (oh, you don't scare me - I'm stickin' to the union!) I decided to take it out of the box and see how bad it could be to put the thing together.

See, all these years of whining about wanting an Adirondack/Muskoka/Bear Chair did not prepare me for receiving one in an un-assembled state. I was somewhat dismayed that neither of my Knights-In-Shining-Armour offered to put it together for me, but I put it down to both of them wanting me to show the world how I was a woman who could not only bake a cake, but put together a complex wooden structure, using man-tools, as well!

Unfortunately, I have an annoying habit when I open a box that comes with pieces, screws, and instructions. Yes, I confess - I read instructions.

And much to my horror, the instructions said I had to PREP the wood. Not only apply some kind of stain or waterproofing, but before I could even start doing that, I had to sand every piece first.

I stood there staring at the pile of wood, the bag of screws, and the instructions, for quite some time, contemplating ignoring the instructions altogether and simply putting screws into the holes. That's what I really wanted to do, you see, so I could be sitting in my Muskoka/Adirondack/Bear Chair DURING part of the labour-day weekend.

But alas, years of experience have taught me that unprotected wood rots. And, having waiting forty or so years for my chair, I figured one more weekend wouldn't actually kill me.

So I began the process of sanding on Saturday. Today I applied Thomson's Water Seal. 

But while I was painting, something wonderful happened. I started to remember my dreams.

Not plans for my life. I mean dreams that come in the night during REM sleep. I had entered a meditative state that approached the moments before falling asleep, and my dreams began playing to me while I painted.

No, there were no fumes. I was in the garage, sitting by the wide-open door.

This was real. This was a "Zen and the Art of Archery" moment. It arrived all by itself when my mind was quiet and it was wonderful.

I didn't understand the dreams any better with my waking mind, but it was a very pleasant experience.

The moral of the story is: It's fun to put things together. Wood smells nice, and quiet time is valuable even though you don't know what's going to come out of it.

Lawnmowing for Women and Sissies

If you're a woman who has never had the experience of mowing a lawn, this article is for you.

If you're a first-time home owner, or are simply just starting to mow a lawn for the very first time, this article is for you.

If you have ever run over an extension cord while mowing, this article is for you.

If you have ever pulled on a cord to start a gas mower more than 3 times in succession, this article is for you. It's especially for you if you've ever yanked so much on the starter cord that you thought your teeth would fall out.

If you've ever popped a hernia while using a manual mower, this article is for you.

Why There is No Perfect Mower

There are advantages and disadvantages to every type of mower. There is no one mower that will suit every user or every type of lawn. And make no mistake, the lawn, and the user, figure prominently in the functioning of your mower!

The Flat Lawn: A Manual Mower for Type A

First of all, I've never actually met one. A lawn that is perfectly flat, that is. But say you bought a house with a postage-stamp sized lawn that is actually flat and free of holes. Say also that you are a Type-A, go-getter personality, who enjoys physical labour and wants to cut the grass three times a week. Get yourself a manual mower, and enjoy! Clean it after each use, oil it, and get the blades sharpened, and you'll enjoy a lifetime of crowing it over your gas-guzzling, cord-cutting, deafened neighbours. You can cut the lawn  in the middle of the night if you want - this kind of mower makes only gentle whispers.

But beware - if you skip a mowing and let it go more than three days, expect a hard time. This puppy has no gears - it's push-push-push every agonizing step of the way. If you go away for a week and come home and have to cut more than 1/4 inch off your grass, you may as well save yourself time and go wait in the emergency room, because you'll have a heart attack or bust a gasket doing it!

If there is the slightest chance that you will miss out on mowing every third day from April to November, get a different mower.

Normal Lawns

Most lawns are not flat. They've got gopher holes, swingsets, flower beds and trees that need to be mowed around. They have little hills and valleys that are invisible from the porch or the street, and insignificant until you twist your ankle pushing a mower through them. Now you must decide what kind of personality you are to determine the proper mower for you.

The Jock Who Loves Engines and Is a Lazy Bugger

This character wants a gas mower. To find out if this is you, answer the following questions:

1. Do I enjoy taking engines apart and cleaning them at least four times a season?

Because if you think that once a year will do, you'll end up yanking on that cord a lot more than you bargained for!

2. Am I responsible enough to actually take my used oil to a proper facility for disposal?

Because if you're likely to dump it down the drain, you're a shmuck - get an electric mower! 

Ok, you say, I'll save it up in a container and take it to a facility once in a while. Fine - but be be honest with yourself about just how "once-in-a-while" you really are. Do you really want all this toxic stuff in your home for forty years? It's not like you can sue anyone when you get cancer, if it's your own bloody fault for never disposing of it properly. Have you got toddlers running around who might decide that the coffee can would be great to catch bugs in and who might pour the stuff you've been saving for years down the drain, then put bugs in the tin and lick their fingers? Face it - people do stupid things, especially when dealing with dangerous or toxic substances. It's better to haul the stuff away as you finish with it than to leave it lying around in an unlabelled container, waiting for trouble.

3. Am I actually going to put the mower somewhere out of the rain and snow?

Because if you leave it out to get rained on, sooner or later it ain't gonna start. And if you don't empty and clean the thing properly before winter, you're going to need a major engine rebuild in the spring. And after a few rounds of this kind of mistreatment, you end up buying a new mower every couple of years, which is darned expensive.

If you only like the idea of a gas mower, because you think that electric mowers are for sissies, but you're not actually going to maintain your mower properly, man up and be a sissy and get an electric mower!

The reason people like the idea of gas mowers, by the way, is that they're powerful - they can cut the really long grass with no particular difficulty.

Of course, it's better for your lawn if you cut it regularly - twice a week in the spring, once a week in the summer. You cut off less of the plant each time, you don't have to bag the clippings, they just fall invisibly down and nourish the lawn as they decay.

But if you like to leave your grass till it's waist-high, you'll need a gas mower. Either keep it tuned yourself, pay to have it tuned, or pay someone to cut your grass more often, and preferably use their own mower while they're at it.

The Careful Planner

This kind of person suits an electric mower that has a cord.

The beauty of electric mowers is that they're light, easily maneuverable. Easily turned. Actually a great mower for a woman or un-athletic guys.

The problem is the cord. Most everybody will run over a cord at least once in their lawnmowing career. But it doesn't have to be that way.

Locate your plug in relation to the grass you have to cut. Find out which side of the mower the cord will fall on. Plan your mow. Plan to move away from the plug, with the cord falling on the side you have already mowed.

It's that simple. As you mow back and forth, if you're moving away from the plug, the wire will always be lying on the freshly-cut grass, never in your way on the bit you want to cut.

But you have to spend at least five minutes of your life actually thinking about this, or you'll end up having to flip the cord over the mower, or run over it. Mind you, once you've figured this out, you should be able to remember it for the next time!

If you're a klutz who can never remember which side the cord is on, which side of the car your gas tank is on, or how to vote in a Quebec election, get a cordless. It may cost more initially, but you'll save money on extension cords over the long haul.

Everybody Else

A cordless electric mower can have many advantages over both gas and corded mowers. First, it's easy to start. There's no cord to run over, so you can twist and turn to your heart's content.

It can be a little heavy, but that's easily solved by getting a self-propelled model. Squeeze the little handle, and the thing drives itself. This can be especially handy on those hills I mentioned earlier. And on bigger hills, like the sides of descending driveways for example, should you be unfortunate to own one of those, it's a godsend.

There's a little trick with any self-propelled mower though, because once the wheels have been engaged, they lock into that direction. If you let go of the handle at the same moment as you stop moving forward, those wheels are still locked to go forward only. The trick is to mow a little bit forward - 4 or 5 inches only - after disengaging the drive. That returns the wheels to normal functioning, and you can yank it backwards easily.

The Actual Mow

Preparation

A good mow starts with preparation. The day before, check the fridge. There must be at least one beer, and it's got to be cold. Mowing is work!

Planning

Try to mow in the morning, when it's cool. If you sleep till noon, you have no shade to mow in. It's hot. Really not much fun.

A Word About Rain

Grass can be cut after a rain, it's just not pleasant. A gas mower doesn't care, it'll tear through anything. If your grass is too long and you're bagging it, well, I told you to get someone else to cut it for you!

Simplify

As mentioned previously, very few of us have flat, unobstructed lawns. Most of us are dealing with obstacles. In a perfect world, there would be no grass right up to the side of the house - there would be a foot or two of mulch or gravel around the house, around each garden, around the poles for the swings, around the composter, etc. If that were the case, you wouldn't need a whipper-snipper.

Now, personally, I hate whipper-snippers. I just know that at some point that thing is going to go after me - and I'm just not into lacerations. I'd rather get rid of all the grass along the edges of the house, driveway, gardens, trees, composter, and everything else that obstructs the smooth mowing of the lawn. This takes time, money and effort. So my rule of thumb is, I mow what I can. You want to whipper-snipper it, knock yourself out. To date, in the year Boyfriend and I have lived together, he's mowed the lawn three or four times and whipper-snippered it twice. I've done the rest of the mowing. The tall tufts of grass at the edges of the fences and the foundations bother me, but not enough to get out the whipper-snipper. One day I'll have dug all that stuff out from around the fences and the foundations and there will be stone or mulch there, and I'll mow right to these new edges proudly. Till then, the tufts of tall grass will wave accusingly at Boyfriend, saying "When you gonna whipper-snipper us?" It's his problem, not mine.

Okay, so you have all these obstructions. All of them are arranged in such a fashion as to make lawnmowing more difficult. A series of twisty-turny, uneven passages where you have to turn in tight spaces and go back over areas you're just mowed to get to the next impossible area.

The rule for backing up is, it's okay if it's fewer than eight steps. Longer than that, it'll probably save you effort if you can figure out how to turn around. If your lawn has such an obstacle course on it that there's nowhere to turn and you have to walk backwards more than eight steps, dig up more of it and put down crushed stone. Your knees, back, ankles and wrists will thank you.

Make Rectangles

Go over your problem areas in little back and forth sections to make them into squares or rectangles. Take six or more turns to get around trees, angling the mower a little each time. Every lawn has nooks and crannies that have to be dealt with before you can get into smooth, straight line mowing. The goal is to get these nooks mowed with a minimum of fuss so they end up with straight edges which can be incorporated into straight-line mowing.

Après-Mow

Clean the underside of the mower. (Ick.) If you do this regularly, you can do it with a stick in a few seconds. Leave the stuff to dry and harden, your mower and blades will rust sooner.

Wind up the cord. Plug the battery in. Sit with a well-deserved beer and relax for at least a half hour.

You Missed a Spot

Invariably, someone will point out a spot you missed. Do not get angry. Smile warmly and say calmly, "You're very welcome to do it yourself, Dear."

The Six-Million Dollar Cat

Well, Maggie is home. She's been examined, poked, shaved, x-rayed, ultrasounded, blood-tested, fed intravenously, and boarded for 5 days.

She had an inflammation of the upper intestine.

In a way, it was an answer to prayer, because the initial exams indicated a "mass," meaning cancer. But the ultrasound cleared that up, it was a simple inflammation. Whew!

We don't know for sure why her intestine became inflamed. All we know is that right now, she appears to be doing better.

So she's been given back to us, with special food and instructions to keep her inside at least a few days to limit her feeding and pooping options. (We need to get a sample.)

Bijou is seriously pissed that Maggie has returned. And Maggie, though glad to be here and not in a cage, is seriously pissed that she's not allowed out.

They go for each other's food, of course. Maggie, released from hospital, was looking forward to my homemade food, and stared at me, incredulous, when I only gave her the same c**p she'd been eating all week. And Bijou went after Maggie's food, because it was Maggie's.

Well, it's not cancer. There is a chance we'll have her for some years now. And that she heals up properly and goes on to live a full, fun-filled life.

Remember how I didn't go to Louisiana to visit my dad for 10 years because I couldn't afford to? Well, what I paid today for Maggie's treatment this week added up to more than the trip Daughter and I took three weeks ago. So, am I an idiot, or what? Stupid cat! Or stupid me?

Putting my money where my mouth is

Cats. Dogs. Expenses.

Examinations. Innoculations. Blood tests. X-rays. Surgeries. Flea protection.

And that doesn't include food, litter, toys.

Having a pet, properly, is an expensive business.

Now let's talk about this "properly" bit.

I recently acquired an add-on cat, Maggie, through a set of unfortunate circumstances happening to Maggie's previous owner. Oh, and my particularly soft heart. (I'm a sucker for a furry face.) Because when I see a loose dog loping happily down the street, I figure it's somehow my responsibility to find its owner or give it a new home. Because when I see an un-spayed female dog, I spay her. Because when I see a doggie with a "cherry-eye" I get the vet to operate on it.

They can see me coming a mile away. The animals. And the vets.

"There's one born every minute."

I have been part of the SPCA. I have walked with them in the St. Patrick's Day parade. I have volunteered there, looked into their building schematics, figuring out their heating and ventilation problems. Walking their dogs. Cleaning cat cages. Fostering a cat - who, unbeknownst to anyone, had hepatitis, and losing my own cat because she contracted the disease from the cat I fostered, breaking my heart twice for the price of one.

Some people are "called" to the ministry, or the priesthood.

Some people are called to work with children. To teach. To be doctors and nurses. To help the homeless. The elderly.

Animals are my thing. I've picked Ghandi's saying for my email "signature." 

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated”

I knew the name of the cat down the street (Murphy) a full EIGHT YEARS before I learned any of the names of Murphy's family.

When my mom made me watch "Turner and Hooch," I was furious with her, because I asked her before I agreed to watch the movie, whether the dog died or not. She said no. The dog dies. I saw her looking at me sideways a few minutes before the dog dies in the film. She tried to defend herself by saying "I forgot!" To which I replied, how the F***K can you forget the MAIN CHARACTER dies?!!!!!! Because, to me, Hooch was the main character. Tom Hanks was an EXTRA. Are we clear?

This is not something I decide. This is beyond my control. Oh, I can control my actions. I can make decisions whether or not I can afford to spay this cat or that dog. But I cannot control the pull on my heartstrings, any more than I can ignore the sound of a baby crying.

The sound of a baby crying is in our instincts. If we're human at all, we want to stop that sound. We cannot sleep through it. Like an air-raid siren, we are not meant to sleep through it.

And protecting animals is in mine. From disease, from pregnancy, from trauma, from fleas.

If I could, I'd give every single Caribou up north a dose of  "Revolution," the flea protection. And a mosquito net.

If I could, I'd feed every single polar bear. Every deer.

Alas, I cannot spay and neuter and protect from heartworm and fleas every dog and cat in the North America.

But I recently, in my trip to Louisiana, helped one dog and one cat, spaying the dog and having her cherry eye operated on, giving her innoculations and hearworm and flea protection. And giving the cat flea protection.

And I recently said I'd pay for Stepson's dog to have her blood tests and innoculations and spaying.

And tonight I took Maggie in for an examination, overnight stay, stool check, blood test, and x-rays to determine the cause of the liquid we're finding on her nether regions.

And when that's done, I have to pay for her innoculations, and Bijou's, and her flea protection, and Bijou's.

My first Husband, D, said one time that he kept working hard to keep me in furs. And he meant the live ones.

So I realize now why I go to work.

It's to keep myself in furs.

Maggie and Bijou, Day 13

There is an uneasy peace. There is now a bowl of water, which must be shared. Food no longer sits out in its saucer, warming up to room temperature, since Maggie will eat everything in sight. Bijou must learn to eat her meals at mealtimes.

Bijou's habit of lurking in the basement leaves Maggie free to lounge on all the furniture upstairs. Bijou better twig on to this quickly, or she'll become the downstairs cat.

Y'all come back...

Eight days without Star Trek, Words With Friends, Facebook, or email. I don't want to look at my credit card bill, not for at least a couple of months, anyway! I'll just start paying it down and look when I can screw up my courage.

For the first time in somewhere between 10 and 15 years, I went down to Louisiana to see my Father and Stepmother. They both have Alzheimer's, and my Stepsister asked me come down and see them while they both still remembered who I was.

It will take me a while to process through all my experiences, but the short version is, I am glad I went. It tore my heart to pieces to leave them again, and the sense of loss is profound, discouraging. In the face of so much needing to be done, I feel terribly helpless.

I can hardly believe what my Stepsister faces every day, caring for them. They don't realize, or they don't admit to it, that they are unable to care for themselves. They resent every meal - it's never what they want to eat. They don't want you to help them get around, do their laundry, bring them something to drink. They sit on the couch and stare out the window. If you try to talk to them, they bite your head off.

Daddy gets impatient with Mother. In his mind, she should ditch the walker and start cooking and walking again, get moving. He has convinced himself that everybody is making her into a cripple.

My Dad never had a good grip on reality to begin with. He's always been bull-headed and obstinate, and the Alzheimer's is exacerbating that. He insisted to Daughter and me that all he had to do, should he want to get on a plane, is put on his old Air Force uniform and sign in, that he wouldn't have to go through security. No amount of information or facts is going to ruin his illusion. We ended up just shaking our heads.

And that's what everybody spends a lot of time doing - shaking their heads. Daddy insisted that sometimes the garbage was picked up on Sunday, and sometimes it was picked up on Monday, and sometimes it wasn't picked up at all. I bit my tongue back from inquiring whether the days when it didn't get picked up happened to fall on Sundays...

My Stepsister asked me to try to speak to him about going to the dentist. His teeth are in terrible shape, and of course he doesn't have medical or dental coverage. Because he "doesn't believe" in doctors. He has no backup plan. If he gets sick, his children have to pay the medical bills, or let him die. That is the choice he has left us with. I did my best trying to convince him to go, but I may as well have saved my breath to cool my porridge.The people we all knew and loved are, for the most part, gone already. All that remains are the two shells of people we once knew, who must be cared for and tended as best we can.

Their previous caregiver, a granddaughter of Stepsister, had brought a cat into the house. My Stepmother hates cats. Daddy likes them, but Mother gets so riled up he has taken her side in complaining about it. "Simon Peter" is the cat's name, and he is absolutely precious. He's one of those cats people would love to have, that sits in your lap sleeping and purring as long as you want to sit there. He is delightful. We put an ad up on Craig's list.

Stepsister brought a dog she had rescued, and Mother isn't any better about that. Daddy enjoys the dog, but again, Momma complains and gets mad, so he feels duty bound to ignore it. "Missy" spends her days chained up in the yard. She never comes inside, she never gets walked. She doesn't know to play with toys or chew bones. A local male jumped the fence and she had a litter of puppies.

Well, I just couldn't let that stay that way. I took her to the vet. She's been spayed, her eye has been fixed, she's now been given all her shots, de-wormed, and has a 6 month supply of heartworm meds. Simon Peter has also been given a six month supply of flea protection. And we put an ad on Craig's list for Missy, who has the sweetest temperament in a dog I've ever seen. Hopefully, with all this done for her, she'll stand a chance of having a good home. Even if Stepsister keeps her, at least she won't have any more puppies and she'll be healthy.

It's not just lack of funds that has kept me away from Louisiana all these years, though that has been the primary problem. I don't like the way people treat animals there. I don't like the way they treat black people. I don't like the way they treat their children. I don't like the politics, I don't like the religion. And I don't like the climate.

About the only thing I do like is the people I've met, my Stepbrothers and Stepsisters and their families. But we have to agree to disagree on pretty much everything else. There is no conversation we can have that is not fraught with the danger of turning into an argument, unless I can keep my mouth shut and refrain from expressing any opinions. Some of the things people say make my blood boil, but I know I have to "keep shut" or I'd shock them so much they'd run me out of town, tarred and feathered.  Of course, there are exceptions, but most of these people are so convinced they are right about everything, that they are morally superior to the rest of the world, that their religion is flawless... I just can't deal with the intolerance, and with what I perceive to be ignorance. Here are people who are too poor to buy health insurance, but they're determined to kill any health care reforms, in my opinion out of blind ignorance. They're so "free," they're free to die without health care. They're free to get shot in the head by yahoos out joyriding - as happened to my Stepbrother - but they'd die before they'd give up their guns. They have experienced all the problems stemming from their systems first-hand, but they blame anyone who is trying to improve their lives. I love my Stepsisters, but one of them tried to describe her beliefs to me and I just had to ask her to stop. They can sit there and tell you to your face that god created this earth four times, and the last time was Adam and Eve, six thousand years ago. And that there are exactly one hundred universes, and this is the only universe that has fallen into sin. And this is from the mouth of an intelligent, loving woman who gave up her job to come and care for her Mother and Stepfather. I love her. I cannot understand how she can swallow what I perceive to be B******t. But it brings her comfort, and she needs all the comfort she can get. My Stepbrother and his wife have visited South Africa a number of times. To go hunting. And to build a church. Yeah, because that's what Africans need, more churches. Anybody thought about schools, hospitals, doctors and nurses, teachers, wells?

I brought down a season of the Red Green show. My dad really enjoyed the couple of episodes he watched. Mother got insulted by the "man's prayer" - "I'm a man...but I can change...if I have to...I guess..." It's hilarious! Daddy smiled. Mom was mad.

And that's the feeling I come away with - disapproval. They disapprove of me, of my lifestyle, of my sense of humor, of my beliefs and my morals. And I disapprove of them. And that's pretty much all we have in common - our mutual disapproval. Oh, and that we love each other.

Will that be business, or pleasure?

So tomorrow, I step on an airplane for the first time since I got married 33 years ago. I've heard things have changed a bit since the last time I went flying...

Thank god for Boyfriend - he's got luggage, and it all fits the legal requirements. Plus, in imitation of how he does things, I started packing last week, with the result that there is no last-minute panicking about anything.

Now all I have to contend with is my own personal panic, which, as most of you know, is an ongoing story...

Let's see... the first scenario I came up with was some pervert wanting to strip-search my Daughter, since she's beautiful. Stepson had told me about the time he and Stepdaughter flew out west to see their aunts. Stepson looks the part of the shifty-eyed ne'er-do-well: wrinkled clothing, two day's growth of beard, a heavy smell of cigarettes permeating his aura. Stepdaughter, on the other hand, is clean, well-dressed, and cute.

Stepdaughter got searched. Going, and coming. Nobody bothered to look at the Lout. But everyone wanted a poke at the cute woman.

I've heard a lot about these newfangled x-ray machines, about people's suspicions it's just another way for men to look at naked women under the guise of protecting the world from terrorists.

So you see, I'm convinced Daughter will get searched, just on principle.

Next panic: what are we going to do?

That was a question my Cousin asked me. See, I grew up with this family, I know exactly what we're going to do. We're going to sit and talk. We're going to make supper, and clean up. And then we're going to sit and talk some more. We're going to repeat ourselves. We're going to go to bed, then get up in the morning and do the same thing all over again.

Eight days! What a thrill!

The latest panic came to me when I pictured the U.S. Customs Official asking me, while looking at my passport, whether I was travelling for business or for pleasure.

Well, let's see. My father and his wife are in their 80s. They both have alzheimer's. My dad's been ornery all his life, which the alzheimer's is exasperating, and my stepmom is now "confused."

We'll be staying in the house with them and my stepsister and her husband, who I don't know very well but have spoken to on the telephone about six times in my life.

My stepsister suggested we come down while Momma and Poppa still know who we are.

I saw on Daughter's FB post that one of her friends said something about the French Quarter. Hah! We're not going anywhere near that! We'll be going to the intersection of nowhere-to-go and nothing-to-do! I even looked up dining establishments on the internet, in the hopes of taking my family out for a change of pace. The list is a who's who of international cuisine: Subway, MacDonalds, IHOP... All of a sudden going to the grocery store looks pretty exciting by comparison.


And don't forget church. We'll get asked to go to church. Oh, I'll drive them there, and I'll pick them up. And I'll go in afterwards and let all their friends hug me. But no, I'm not going to church. It interferes too much with my grip on reality.



And heaven help us if somebody starts to talk politics.


Have I mentioned Daddy's satellite dish - that he's blanked out all the channels with parental restrictions on? Discovery, A&E, TLC - these are all a distant memory. On one channel, some advertisement showed cleavage, and Daddy turned it off. On another channel, whales were seen to be mating. On a third, someone said "Damn." Off, off, off.


So, no tv. Unless you want to watch the religion channel. Benny Hinn. No matter that his scams outnumber the scams in the house of representatives... Mother and Daddy don't have the internet, so they don't know about that...


And no drinking. Nobody drinks alcohol down there. No wine, no beer, no liquour.


Nothing, in other words, to alleviate the stress at all, or lighten the mood one iota.
I'm hoping to be able to give my stepsister a break for a couple of days, and care for my folks with the help of Daughter, and my finger on speed dial to my stepbrother, whose wife is a registered nurse...

So, "pleasure" is a far cry from the truth, but you shouldn't lie to a Customs Official! 


Hopefully we will have a few pleasant moments in all of this. Hopefully we will connect with my folks and be able to enjoy their company for eight days, and help out, and make friends with my stepbrothers and stepsisters. Hopefully it will be a good visit. Because it may very well be the last.