"Anything" on the table...

Oh.

She ate it. The soil...and seeds...for the cat grass kit.....!!!

Oh.

My fault because I left it on the kitchen table in the morning. I'd just found it in a little-used cupboard and thought: "ahh, good for winter, I should start growing cat grass for the cats again...."

But I'd left it on the table and in the rush to work forgotten it.

Also on the kitchen table - on the usual place mat where Okaasan sits - were a box of rice, another of simmered Japanese veggies, some salad on a plate, a pack of soup and a fish sausage. The usual lunch pickings for Okaasan to heat in the microwave and eat.

But the cat grass seeds and soil packs were 10 cm to the left.....

What did she think they were? I know Japanese food can look pretty odd. All the seaweed, fish and dried vegetable products. But they look odd to a non-Japanese person. To an old Japanese lady who has spent her life dealing with the stuff not so much.

I'm not sure WHAT she thought it was!

But food, for sure.

I got home between classes to prep dinner and as I chirped a greeting into Okaasan's room I noticed the two packets of brown-something on her kotatsu table. And then the bowls...

Bowls in two places - kitchen table and kotatsu. So she'd tried it in the kitchen, and found it strange, and then....forgetting that experience...a few minutes later - taken the package of stuff in another bowl into her room to taste as a Tv-watching snack!

Oh my God.

Well. She is still alive. I guess the seeds are just a kind of seed. If actually poisonous her body would be reacting by now...

So. Lesson learned. Must be very careful in future about what I leave on the kitchen table! I already know that if I want any chance of eating fruit or cookies myself, I should take some upstairs for later. Okaasan will often eat all of something over a day - all the oranges, all the cookies....far more than a non-dementia sufferer would eat.

But, until now I've never thought about the dangers of leaving a non-food item on the kitchen table.

And yes, there IS other food in the kitchen that she didn't eat. The fruit bowl was on a side counter and in the fridge were more fish sausages and some yogurts.

But Okaasan sampled the soil and seeds...

* Dear Son has left the building. Gone ski working. It was for 10 days, until Xmas. Then came the phone call last night....till December 30....sigh. Ski widow. 

Plus sides: TV remote 100% control! Computer wordgame time without guilt, even LESS housework....reading time.