Winter Week 1

Hey!
Truckin' into the first full week of Winter Care on Okaasan and Me.

All going well.
The snow arrived - not a lot at the moment, maybe 5 cm, so the roads are icy and dangerous.
NOT the conditions for Okaasan to go walking. Luckily though, she understands that and doesn't seem to be keen to go out at all. I come home and she has switched on the porch light, closed her room curtains and has settled in for the evening.

A year or two ago I'd often come home about 5 pm and Okaasan would then start stirring to go out - of course it was far too dark/cold/icy - but this year she is less interested, maybe less confident, about going out for walks alone. So she'll be down to the twice a week outings: with day care helper on Wednesdays and me on the weekends.
( And no, I haven't forgotten about the Nishi-guru exercise DVD looping idea - just haven't had the time to set it up...)

It's good that Okaasan isn't wanting to go out alone. Before Dear Son left for ski work last week he and I talked about whether I should be hiding Okaasan's shoes to prevent her from trying to leave the house...but it seems there is no need because she is staying put in front of the TV.

This week?

I had Japanese test on Sunday afternoon. With hundreds of eager young Chinese students. Waaay above my level. Level 3. I knew it, and from the very first page of questions it was clear. So I just relaxed and enjoyed ticking random circles on the answer sheet...picking my way thru the stuff I could do as a language practice.
Listening section no problem. Reading and grammar - whooooaaaa!!!
It's ok. I haven't studied hard at all this autumn. So now I know what Level 3 demands. Maybe I'll try next year.

If there was a test in practical language ability I'd ace it. In the past few weeks I've done the following in Japanese:

* entertained and managed the life of an elderly lady.
* interviewed and arranged classes for a prospective student
* negotiated and booked a movie theater for a documentary screening next year (more on THAT later)
* given the Japanese language test room staff a blasting for being noisy during the first part of the test...

Yes. The test staff. They were tramping up and down the classroom during the first 15 mins of the grammar section - shuffling papers, clattering pens on the table and generally failing to Keep Quiet in the Test Room. So, in the break time - I complained to them. In perfectly ungrammatical, but getting-the-message-across Japanese!!
Cos I am bossy. Sadly, got that trait from my mother...

Anyway.
Okaasan and me.
Doing fine.
She had lunch box deliveries. Dinner with me on Sunday and Monday night. A bath on Sunday.
Dinner chat about Kyoto and wartime food. If students give me some Japanese snacks as souvenirs from a trip, I leave them on the kitchen table because then I can use them as a prop to get Okaasan talking about the place they come from.

Yesterday I had my first year end party with students. A friend came in to feed the cats in the evening. She could access the cats upstairs without disturbing Okaasan downstairs.

I left curry in a pan on the cooker. With a box of pre-cooked rice. As I was leaving the house at 10 am I wasn't sure that the food would keep hot in the food flasks until 6 or 7 pm.
So, somehow Okaasan would have to heat it up herself. Her ability on heating up food is hit and miss: sometimes ok, sometimes half heated, sometimes the food is forgotten in the microwave within a minute or two of her putting it there.

At 6 pm I found a quiet spot near the shoe lockers of the party restaurant to call Okaasan and tell her that I was out - so sorry etc - your dinner - DS's famous home made curry and rice - is on the cooker. Sorry. See you later.

At 7 pm I escaped the party again and by the shoe boxes checked in with Okaasan...
Dinner? No, I didn't eat dinner. I was watching Tv....oh...wait a moment...what's this...oh...curry...yes, I ate curry...here it is...

I got home just after 10 pm and could smell the burned saucepans from the entrance hall. Two burned pans. She'd cooked rice with water in one pan. And next to her sleeping form I spotted the other pan: burned curry and a bowl of half eaten curry.

Oh well. She ate something. For one night it is ok. Six years ago, when DS rescued Okaasan from her chaotic home in the Tokyo suburbs, he found many burned pans in her kitchen. She really can't do cooking or reheating. She knows there is a microwave and sometimes uses it...or pans, and burns the food. That's why we bought a cooker that cuts out when the heat gets too hot, or if the pan is not moved for an hour.

Sigh. Oh well. 
Time to start pan scrubbing.

But today! Day care day!!! Yippeee!!!
Now I only have to worry about leaving my kitchen in clean enough state that the helper lady isn't shocked about my housekeeping level.

Walking 二人で

The Saturday helper did her duty by Okaasan.

Trip out in the car to the local shopping mall - walk round the supermarket, walk round the home care center, lunch of noodles and chat, home again. All done in 2 hours 30 mins.

That's Okaasan's outside exercise until next Wednesday.
Unless God throws in a few more hours into my usual available 24 quota.

Wasn't so bad. She enjoyed it. I went with the flow.

Got her ready to go out with advice about suitable clothing and shoes. Gave her money. Put her cell phone in the handbag, in case I lost her.
Supermarket was huge and busy. Okaasan clutched onto the big shopping car and pushed it all the way round. I had some shopping to do, and she either advised me on what I should buy or picked up a few random bits. She asked shop staff if she couldn't find stuff....told me that the fermented soy beans I was buying were no good...insisted on buying two slices of pizza in the baker "for snacks".
We also went round the home center - a long walk via the pet center, the curtain department, the electrical department, the Xmas decorations.
Rather bizarrely, Okaasan stopped a man who was deep in thought near light bulbs and asked him "What's the date today?". And she commented several times that we didn't need flowers because guests don't come to the house.

After all of that I took her upstairs to a ramen restaurant. Ordered for her and we sat across from eachother looking at the parking area and mountains view, and then slurped our noodles.

Brought her home, via the gasoline stand.
She spent the rest of the afternoon asleep under the heated table carpet.

I watched a  movie on TV and went out to dinner with a friend. Left food in a heated pot on the table for Okaasan. She only a little.

All well.

Today??????????????????????????????

Got a snow storm.

And a Japanese test.......

Planning for two

Me and Okaasan.
What will WE be doing this weekend?

Under our new regime: take Okaasan out for a walk/don't let her go out alone.
This is what DS really wants because he is worried about her ability to walk safely alone. Worried, but not worried enough to be here...
Wednesdays the day care helper comes to take Okaasan out. Weekends are my duty time.

Makes planning a weekend a bit harder.

I used to be able to plan my own weekend and factor in:

* Bath time for Okaasan 
* Lunch and Dinner for Okaasan
* Send her out to go walking in daylight
* Maybe pick her up from somewhere
* Clean her room while she is out.

Now it is different. I need to GO with her somewhere to take her for a walk safely.

This weekend, in my life I have:

Saturday, 5.30 pm onwards dinner plans with a friend downtown
Sunday, all afternoon - Japanese language test at a local college campus.

Would also like to try and do some Christmas card/present shopping.

So - how will I fit Okaasan into this equation?

Tomorrow will be hard - the Japanese test will take up from midday to late afternoon. I'll be knackered after that.

So, I'd better take her out today - but early enough that I can rest up a little at home myself before going to meet my friend at 5 .30 pm.
Walk outside and then back here for lunch? That means I'll have to dredge up enough bright conversation for about two hours of interaction.
Walk AND lunch in the same place? Could get away with an hour or so of bright chat...

Hmmm..

Walk and lunch seems a good idea.
Sunny now, huge snowfall forecast for later today. Better get her out this morning.

Planning for two.......

Deciphering...

I have a Japanese language test this coming weekend - aiming for 3rd Grade this time.
Won't pass because I haven't opened the kanji book or online flashcards for about 3 months, and I've been doing just enough grammar and diary writing homework to keep my Nihongo teacher sane every week.
Just enough.

So, I should be studying this:

But I REALLY am peering at this, and trying to decipher it!

The day service helper report which was left neatly on the kitchen table yesterday. Big pink folder, with shopping receipts, the door key inside. And short handwritten report about going by taxi to the supermarket with Okaasan.

I wonder if Okaasan opened and read it after the helper had gone? I wonder what she thought about such a report on her?

Think it all looks good. That they went and she chatted about what she usually buys, where she usually goes etc. Receipts for the usual stuff: yogurt and magazines, snacks and dried seaweed.

Kitchen was all clean and tidy when I came home. Dinner stuff washed and put away.

Looks like a successful first day.

This morning I asked Okaasan: "so you went to XX Supermarket yesterday with the helper in a taxi, didn't you? Was it fun?"

"Me. XX Supermarket? I went? I don't know. Did I?"

No memory of that.

I laughed with her about it. She laughed about it. We made light of it.

But, still. Even after 6 years I AM surprised.

Must have been quite a lengthy, unusual experience because the day service people came and talked with DS and Okaasan in the kitchen, signed the contract for service etc and then got ready to go out and went, all the chat, and home again by taxi.

All of that yesterday afternoon -  gone from her memory bank.