Collwen- Woman of varied worlds

Mom- she's out of the hospital and back in the nursing home to continue her rehab from the hip surgery, having had her gall bladder removed and no further complications! Thank the ever loving gods!!

Job- First day was today. Listened in on phone calls. Typical Help Desk first day stuff. Hopefully it won't take the usual 4-6 weeks to get my badge because of where the bathroom is I have to borrow a badge or get escorted just to get to the bathroom, much less back into the room we're training in.

Council of Five Nations- This coming weekend. Damn it, but it's the same weekend as Albacon (so I miss seeing people who are coming up for it like purpura, miss seeing Anne McCaffery, but I'll be able to see Eric Flint this Thursday at Flights of Fantasy. At Council I'll be running a bit of Living Forgotten Realms (D&D 4e RPGA campaign), and maybe some Living Greyhawk (D&D 3.5 RPGA campaign), at Council.

Podcasts- I'm in the process of getting together the "Story So Far" for the next The Aurora Hunter chapter set up and recorded. I also submitted myself for a future contest for Horror Addicts. I seem to have left an impression on Emerian, the host for Horror Addicts after emailing her about Forever Knight....

Ok, so Mom's in Samaritan Hospital with a broken hip. She's in pain, but that's to be expected. They're going to operate on her on Friday. I don't have all the details yet, because I've not been home.

Why have I not been home?

I go a call from Marnen Sunday afternoon, with him asking me if I recall seeing his passport.

Long story made short- Marnen couldn't find his passport at home, in his car, or where he had been staying in Illinois. Yesterday we had to run to NYC for Marnen to get a copy of his birth certificate (which resulted in me driving in downtown Manhattan for the first time). Today we're in CT getting a new one done so he can make a new flight to England (since he missed last night's flight because he didn't have his passport). The new flight is Thursday evening.

So, I do get more time with Marnen, who's been in Illinois for a couple of months working at a theater festival, before he goes to England for the rest of the month, but I didn't want all of this... running around, bother, and tsuris.

Sunday through Wednesday morning- a trip to and stay at Samaritan, including a stress test with abnormalities in the results, a heart catherization that found two partial blockages in one artery.
Wednesday- a trip to Albany Med and two textbook stents later...

as long as she did well overnight Mom should be able to go home today.

I'm curious.

To those who are clansmen/women of Celtic families/clans:
What sort of relationship does one need to have to "claim" (for the lack of a better word) a clan heritage?

I've done some digging, and my maternal line great-grandmother appears to be of mixed Scottish and Irish blood and named Elizabeth Lamont. Lamont is one of the Scottish Highland clans (which settled into Conwal from Ireland).

I'm interested in checking this out, but is my blood "too diluted" to consider looking seriously into this?


( Notes to self behind cut )

It'll be a different day. And I'll be heading down to the Stronghold after work to visit for the night and recharge a little before meeting up with my mom and brother for more packing.

Need to remember to get boxes- we ran out while packing the kitchen and haven't gotten the dishes packed yet. Still have the dining room and the living room to do.

And I'm hoping not to get a phone call. Or at least if I do it's not bad news. My Aunt Joyce (my maternal uncle's wife) is on her way to a hospital in NYC (Mt. Sinai I think) and is high on the liver transplant list. Now, while I haven't been nearly as close to her as I was with my Aunt Glady, I still don't want to lose someone else in my family.

Between that and the feeling like I'm fighting that I'm just a fat, ugly, dumb, no-taste trailer-trash nobody makes me very interested in tomorrow getting here.

on one level, having the extra $ and time off would be good... but with Aunt Glady passing away having the day off so I can deal with her house stuff is extremely good.

So I spent most of three days going through my Aunt's place, sorting and packing stuff up.

( The Details )

( Help needed next Saturday )

I do get bereavement days when my aunt passes on. I should play the flex hour game so I can do things like leave early on Friday or for other almost false alarms, but I don't have to panic on being able to do things like pack up the house and such.

This past Tuesday Marnen and I went to Zach & Erica's house to meet up with them, Rosalee, Brooke, and Heather (who I didn't know was going to be there until she arrived) for a Samhain hangout with small ritual.  It was what I needed.

During the hang out Heather was really suggesting the Alien Nation goth night.

Since I've ended up here for the weekend, I was planning on going, thinking that I was needed the... distraction, release... what have you.  But I crashed and fell asleep instead.

I'm planning on going home tonight, unless my aunt passes away today.  She's just lingering enough that I'm not sure what to do, but I don't have the time off from work to just be able to stay.

Yesterday was rough.  When she finally woke up enough to realize we were there... she may have recognized Ed, or confused him for her brother that passed away in 1941.  It took her asking 3 times to remember who I was (she still can't hear), then spent 5 minutes in horror asking why she didn't remember my name at first.

Basic Update: My aunt is still alive. I'm sick... as in the coughing, stuffy head, chest congested, raw throat, voice sounding like sandpaper type of sick. And 4 days away from LJ = a long time to catch up.

Detailed update:
Thursday night I went and was part of the District Staff that installed my own Rebekahs lodge. (I'm the District Chaplain... yes, the pagan woman got asked to be the Chaplain). I had a surprise when four of the ladies from Rensseleaer District, including the NY Assembly Warden, came down for it.

During this meeting is when my throat started to get sore.

Friday morning I wake up and my throat is even sorer, and I'm coughing a little. I helped marnen clear out his car, then headed up to East Greenbush to visit my Aunt. She's not doing good. She's not eating solid food again, and at times was having trouble even swallowing water.

Friday evening Ed met up with me, and we had dinner with Neffi, tetsujinnooni, and chickipu_no_oni at Garcia's. I also started my laundry somewhere before going out and finished it that night.

Saturday morning Ed picked me up and we went apple picking with a whole bunch of people. Well, it seems that we got there first I think. Ed and I each got a bag of apples. Johnagolds are incredible apples, tastey and HUGE. We also picked up some cider and other stuff at the barn store. We then stopped off at the nursing home but Aunt Glady was sound asleep. We left her her reading glasses (Ed had fixed them) and a piece of maple sugar candy, which should disolve enough for her to be able to eat.

Saturday evening Ed went back to the apple party, I ended up with a migraine. So I went back to the Halfway House and slept. Then dranks lots of peppermint tea with lemon and honey while watching some eposides of House. OMG I love this series.

Sunday, we all slept late. I felt even worse. I realize that I'm not going to get going in time to hit the Wool and Sheep Festival in Rhinebeck. At some point we went to Pearl of the Orient over in Loudonville for food. Hot & Sour soup is good for sick people. Right after eating, I felt a wave of heat come over me and I got flushed... oh great. A Fever.

So it was back to the Halfway House for more and more peppermint tea, a couple more episodes of House. I decided to crash there, with the hopes that I would feel better

Monday at about 3am, after having woken up a few times already, I made the decision there was no way I was going to make it into work so I called into the automated system and took the day off.

Today I tried to sleep in, kept feeding myself tea, and watched Logan's Run. Then Tersha and I met Jon for lunch. Ruby Tuesdays now has these mini hamburgers, and a combo of 2 minis, a small amount of fries, and the salad bar. The minis were good, the fries just enough, and the whole package actually reasonable for lunch. Then I got the car inspected at the Adorondack Tire place in Schenectady where Tersha's gone a number of times and has a good rapport with the mechanics. I had to get new windshield wiper blades (not just a refill), and I'll need to get someone to look at the breaks when I get my next check. Then after a quick Sam's Club stop for Tersha, and then I dropped her off at the Halfway House and then headed home.