musesfool, posts by tag: life - LiveJournal

I feel like my posts lately have either been super depressing or lists, so today we'll go with lists:

♦ Another board meeting successfully managed, even if I did forget the table tents. *wry* I feel like I could sleep for a week though. I think tomorrow is going to be a no bra, no boots Saturday. Not my real boss who is now my actual real boss - so I guess boss3 works as an identifier - was supposed to take me to lunch today to discuss goals and moving forward, but the weather is shitty so we've postponed for Monday.

♦ Joss Whedon may be making a Batgirl movie. First off, I will believe this when I see it, as in when I am buying (or more likely, not buying) a ticket for it.

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So as you can see, I have a lot of feelings and they are very mixed.

♦ In other potential blockbuster franchise movie news, Lucasfilm is rumored to actually have an Obi-Wan movie in the pipeline. With Ewan McGregor. I am SO HERE for that, especially if it's wily desert hermit Obi-Wan fighting bounty hunters and Hutts and keeping young Luke out of trouble on Tatooine. (I honestly thought his cameo on Rebels meant there would be no movie at all, despite all my - and Ewan McGregor's - wishing.) I have a lot feelings about this too, but they are mostly good! *g*

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Why not make an Ahsoka movie? Rosario Dawson is interested and she's already in the Disney/Marvel stable of actors...

♦ In something I have no feelings about either way, except they are going to have to find some extraordinary child actors, apparently HBO is co-adapting the first of Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan novels. I really should read the rest of those, but I found the first book so intense that I couldn't tell if I was enjoying it or not, so I haven't gone back to read the others.

♦ March 2017 recs update:

unfitforsociety has been updated for March 2017 with 16 recs in 4 fandoms:

* 9 Star Wars
* 4 Avengers, 1 Spider-Man/Fantastic Four
* 1 Harry Potter and 1 Life

♦ and lastly, the March 2017 writing roundup:

Everything That Rises Must Converge (@ AO3)
Star Wars; Obi-Wan, Leia, Luke, Vader; g; AU; 5,165 words
In which Leia makes it to Tatooine's surface after the Tantive IV is boarded, and nobody is prepared for this particular family reunion.

I actually did other writing this month, but nothing else got finished. I'm pretty happy with how this one turned out, though.

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Ugh, work. Other people, why are they?

Last night, L met me for a quick drink after work to discuss my review, but of course, I was late because even though the board meeting happening this evening was originally scheduled for two weeks ago, nobody's slide deck was finalized. I don't even know. The meeting was originally scheduled for 3/14. How were the presentations not finalized until 5:20 pm on 3/29?

I mean, I get it. It's like uploading your yuletide story two weeks in advance and then deciding to rewrite the whole thing and suddenly not being finished at the deadline. But still, I find it really frustrating.

On the plus side, I was actually only 7 minutes late in the end, and the chicken fingers were excellent so it all worked out, despite my desperate annoyance with other people's inability to finish their stuff.

Then last night, I dreamt there was a Check, Please! update, but it was only available via Skype, and even though it was still a still comic, it was done as a slideshow with voiceover narration. I don't remember what actually happened, though.

Anyway, here are two links, one fun, one less fun (but still good for a little schadenfreude):
- 70 days in, Donald Trump’s presidency is flailing at Vox

and

- Buffy the Vampire Slayer 20 year cast reunion photos at EW.

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- My long black wool coat, which I wore literally until it fell apart, fell apart this morning. Sigh. At least it is finally warming up? A little? The blue wool coat is too heavy for 40-50 degree days, which is where we are now, so my blue jacket will have to suffice. But I loved that coat. It fit well and was roomy enough to wear a fleecy and a big sweater under and also had inside pockets like men's coats do. I wonder if they still sell it. I mean, it's a long black wool single-breasted coat. It shouldn't ever not be available right?

- So. My review went well, as these things go. They said a bunch of really nice things about me, so there's that. There are of course improvements to be made and also I at least now know who my direct supervisor is going to be going forward, and hopefully there will be some more transparent communication forthcoming in terms of stuff they want me to know about so I can do all the stuff they want me to do.

- I can't even discuss last night's Flash without an inappropriate amount of anger, which I know has more to do with timing and personal stuff than the show (though the choices made would have still made me angry prior to now, I probably would have shrugged it off a little bit more). ( Collapse )

- reading meme! It's been a few weeks, huh?

What I've just finished
DC Bombshells volumes 1 and 2, which I highly recommend if you like lady (adult) superheroes kicking Nazi ass up and down the European theater while lady (teenage) superheroes hold down the fort in Gotham (and elsewhere, but we only see the ones in Gotham). And why wouldn't you?! Do I think the Trump metaphor worked? Not all that well. Did I overall enjoy these two volumes a lot? HELL YES I DID. We've got Wonder Woman, Supergirl, Stargirl, Batwoman, a whole roster of Batgirls (and one Robin!), Catwoman, Zatanna, Mera, Huntress, Harley & Ivy (I feel like I might be missing someone? I'm still surprised Canary hasn't shown up yet), plus Amanda Waller. I even like the cheesecakey art, which is loving and fun, rather than gross and off-putting.

Technically I did not finish The Guineveres because it had to go back to the library and I guess I wasn't really feeling it, since it felt like a chore to open it up even on all the long trainrides I had this month.

What I'm reading now
I put aside Hidden Figures, which I own, in favor of library books, so now it's Born a Crime by Trevor Noah, which I am enjoying immensely. I plan to get back to Hidden Figures soon.

I'm also in the middle of volume 3 of DC Bombshells but they are clearly not collecting them fast enough for me.

What I'm reading next
I kind of went on a book-buying spree recently when there was a sale of ebooks for $2.99 and under, so I have even more stuff to choose from. And there's always the library, ready to spring something on me all unawares. So who knows?

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You know, I've lived at my current address for nearly 15 years(!!!) and for the most part, Amazon, via FedEx, UPS, and the USPS, has never had a hard time finding me. Until this week. Suddenly packages are being "rerouted" after being sent to the wrong facility(!?) or they've been delivered "to my mailbox" when in fact they 1. wouldn't fit in the mailbox and 2. have not appeared in the vestibule or hallway of my building, where such things are usually left. I can't imagine someone, upon opening their stolen booty of roller bottles and tiny gift bags, made toddler fists of glee, so I have to think the box wasn't stolen so much as it just...wasn't delivered as promised. (I mean, I suppose someone out there did in fact get gleeful over the contents of the box - stranger things have happened - but it does seem kind of far-fetched. Unlike the times my order from LUSH went missing. At least that was worth stealing.)

Amazon refunded me and told me to reorder and they would pay any shipping costs (hilarious because I have Prime so there are no shipping costs) but it's just inexplicable that this has happened twice within a week. My address has not changed! It's not wrong in my profile! So I don't even know what's going on.

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In other news, boss1 said something interesting to me the other day when she was offering condolences, that now with my father gone, we'd get back the younger version of him in our memories. And I was telling L about it, because I've been thinking a lot about it.

It's true that the declining years are top of mind right now, and that's why people telling older stories is so important - he wasn't just an occasionally querulous old man with no short-term memory - he was an active member of his community for a long time, he was loved by his family members, and thought of warmly by his co-workers and friends. He did a lot of quiet good in his way for the people in his life, even if he sometimes seemed overly-strict or demanding with us. And I guess that's the man I want to think of, the one who used to send cheery good morning texts every day, who always made us feel like he wanted us to be happy above all - even if he didn't understand what we claimed we needed for that, he wanted us to have it.

I want to remember how he was always ready to believe in the best of us, and bail us out even when we didn't live up to that (I don't mean actually bailing us out of jail - we never had that experience! but with teachers and other school authorities etc. I will never forget his firm insistence of "My son wouldn't do that!" when he got a call saying my brother had been found passed out drunk in the hotel hallway on the school ski trip. And he never yelled at my brother for it - he just made him pay back the cost of the trip over time, since he was sent home the morning after he arrived without ever even making it onto the slopes. As he later said, he figured the humiliation of being sent home like that and missing out on his trip was punishment enough).

He made his share of mistakes and left us with some annoying baggage, but overall, I think he did way more good than harm in the end. At least, that's how I'd like to remember him.

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It was hard, Friday and yesterday. I don't have anything profound to say about it - it's just hard. I don't remember crying so much at the wake for my mother, but I think that was partly because we were all trying to support my dad, and also I don't think I fully processed everything until afterwards. This time, with the shock of seeing him last Friday night and also having had the experience with my mother, it was all too real and final without the shocked disconnect of "wait, what? what?" to insulate me from the reality of it. I was like holy shit, we're orphans now! Which is an utterly ridiculous sentiment to have at 46 years old, but nonetheless, it's just us now.

I mean, two Sundays ago I was visiting him in his room at the rehab facility, watching Star Wars! And now he's gone. (At least he got one more year of St. Joseph's pastries - my sister-in-law brought him one while he was in the rehab place. I think I'd have to go down to Ferrara's to find one today. I don't know that Agata and Valentina has them. I might have to go look.)

My niece wrote and read a really sweet and heartfelt poem at the wake and there wasn't a dry eye in the house. We told stories about him, and it's always so nice to hear from other people's perspectives how liked (even loved) he was - I think because the past couple of years saw his decline cognitively, it's hard to remember that most people hadn't seen that, that they were still used to the man who didn't talk a lot but who usually had good advice or an unexpected flash of humor in conversation.

One of my cousins had a picture of him holding her when she was a year old (and he was ~17) - she said for some reason she'd always carried the picture and just transferred it from wallet to wallet over the years, and she showed it to us and it was a really lovely photograph not just for the memories, but also because it was in brilliant color and hadn't faded at all - it looked like it could have been taken ten years ago instead of 60+.

Considering that neither of them knew him, I thought the priest at the funeral mass and then the priest at the cemetery both did a really good job of talking about him - the three of us have somewhat conflicted or even contentious relationships with the church, but my dad in his day was a lector (he used to love doing the Easter vigil mass with the seven readings? And I have very vivid memories of him practicing the reading from Exodus about pharaoh's chariots and charioteers) and a Eucharistic minister and he was at one time an active member of both the K of C and the Holy Name Society, and he still said his prayers every night - when we were picking the text for the memorial prayer cards my brother was like, "The prayer of St. Francis. He said it every night." and my sister was like, "How do you know that?" and my brother was like, "his bedroom was next to mine. I could hear him!" So that was an easy choice. (I mean, I think we would have chosen it anyway? I think we also chose it for my mother? Because it's a great prayer. Just like we were in basic agreement about the songs for the mass. though I must complain about them changing the wording on certain prayers and responses. My niece was like, they do that to catch out people who haven't been to mass in a while and I don't appreciate being called out like that, but I was like, why would you change a beautifully composed response like "Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and I shall be healed" to "I am not worthy to have you under my roof etc." I mean. It's more literal, sure, and more colloquial, but it's mass! It should retain some grandeur of language! Otoh, the cues are the cues, and though I haven't regularly attended mass in fifteen years, I still knew when to sit/stand/kneel because you don't erase all those years of Catholic school and mass attendance. It's just drilled into you. We were talking about how when we were in grammar school, we went to mass every morning during Lent, and my nieces and nephews were like, EVERY MORNING!!! and we were like, yeah, and you just prayed you got Father Gordon, who could bang out a mass in fifteen minutes on a good day, and not Father Vogel, who liked to drone on and on - though I'll be honest, it's Father Vogel's voice that comes back to me when I mouth along with the Eucharistic prayer during the consecration. And also his homilies were always the same 'I do always what is pleasing to the will of my Father.' gosh, it must be thirty years since I heard the man say mass and yet.)

And both the meal between viewings on Friday and the lunch after the funeral yesterday were good celebrations of him, and of our connections with each other, both family and friends. I mean, that's what all this is for, right? The person is gone, all of the other stuff is to help us process our grief and trade stories about them.

We had asked to have the prayers at the grave site, but the cemetery made us do it in the chapel, and my sister and niece were both extremely upset about this (I mean, I was also upset, but it was cold so I was okay with being inside for it) but then, in an example of what my brother-in-law insists is divine providence (not that he used those words), the limo driver couldn't figure out how to exit the cemetery so we were driving around, knowing we had to head north and east, and as we finally pulled up to the exit near the railroad tracks, my sister looked over and was like, "There it is! That's our plot!" and you could see the workmen lowering the casket off a truck and onto whatever they use to put it in the grave. So that was unexpected but good - my b-i-l was like, "that had to be your father. you know he would have been like, 'watch and make sure they put me in the right spot!'" So. Whether you believe in that stuff or not (and I am skeptical but open to the possibility), it makes for a good story.

Anyway, please don't feel obligated to comment. I appreciate the comments I've received already more than I can possibly express, especially since I don't think I'm going to be up for responding yet. Hopefully we'll return shortly to our regular programming of complaining about work and talking about TV shows.

<333

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Again, thank you so much for your lovely comments and kind words. When a couple of people said they were worried that I was dealing with this alone on Tuesday (because of the snowstorm), I was able to quite truthfully say I was not alone at all. ♥♥♥

Yesterday, we went and made the arrangements, and it was pretty stress-free as these things go. I think it helps that we all get along and don't really disagree on a lot in terms of how this stuff ought to go? My father would not have wanted a lot of fuss and so we're keeping it simple in tune with that.

My brother was telling us that the cardiologist who had seen him on Friday night when he was admitted to the hospital called him on Tuesday to offer sincere condolences. According to my brother, he ended up consoling the doctor, who was like, "When I saw your father on Sunday, I couldn't believe it was the same man I'd examined on Friday. We had a conversation! He was improving in all ways, every indication was we were bringing him back! So to find out on Tuesday that he was gone was a shock." And my brother was like, "To us too!" But as we joked, he died doing what he loved - eating. (I believe I mentioned he was having trouble swallowing? And they did the swallowing test and said he should have soft food and thick liquids, and they believe he aspirated on his breakfast and that's what killed him. Not that he didn't still have all the other problems to come back from.)

Also showing that our minds run along similar tracks for some things, when this all started, I was like, "oh shit, I better replace the money I took from the savings account where the proceeds from the sale of the house were deposited, because if he has to go into a nursing home, they're going to come looking for it!" And my brother was like, "watch him survive for the next ten years in a nursing home! the money was two years from being free and clear!" And when I mentioned to my sister that once all the dust was settled I would start looking for a condo using the house money, she was like, "when Dom told me he coded and came back, I thought, the money is free and clear for vic to use! and then it wasn't!" But now it is. Sigh.

All of which is to say, if you live in the US and your parents are getting up there in age and they own a house or have retirement savings etc., you might want to start thinking about how to manage that so that if something happens and they do require institutional Medicaid, their retirement money doesn't just get funneled into paying for a nursing home. (see Medicaid's Asset Transfer Rules and obviously consult with a lawyer as I am not one nor do I play one on the internet. I'm just speaking from personal experience here.)

My father was usually on top of this sort of thing - he managed it with his own mother etc. - but for some reason, even though he told me all the time that he was going to transfer the house to my name so that it couldn't be touched under these circumstances, he never actually did it. So when we sold the house in July 2014, even though the money was all transferred to an account in my name, if he'd needed a nursing home before July 2019, the govt would have come looking for it and so while I dipped into it from time to time to cover expenditures (mainly my new laptop and iPad), I generally paid it back just in case. Now, once the funeral expenses are covered, I should be able to start looking for a place to live/buy. That's one thing I can say for sure I know both my parents wanted for me (the reason I get the house money instead of it being split three ways is because my brother and sister both own houses - he discussed this with all of us and they've been supportive of the idea because the one think I've said repeatedly is that I don't want to fight about money.)

Anyway! The point is, things happen, especially when people start getting older, so be prepared.

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Unlike last time, as soon as the mayor announced that the NYC schools were going to be closed today for the storm, the bosses announced that we also would be closed. So I was excited to get to sleep in without an alarm/having to check to see if we were open.

I woke up at about 8:45 and about an hour later, my brother called to let me know that dad died this morning. They said it was peaceful. Which. I guess is what you want.

While he had a lot of battles to fight, he seemed pretty lively on Sunday afternoon when I saw him, and my sister reported yesterday that he was pretty feisty, so even though it's not necessarily unexpected, it's still kind of a shock.

I think being stuck here - the weather means that none of us can really go anywhere or do anything re: arrangements yet - is making it weirder. When my mother died, I got the news, packed a bag, and headed straight to Penn Station. Today, I'm just sitting here refreshing tumblr and absorbing the news, wondering what happens next. Maybe it's healthier than rushing around trying to accomplish things. I don't know. I keep stopping what I'm doing to cry.

Anyway, after today, I'll likely be scarce for a few days so thank you in advance for any kind thoughts or condolences. I really appreciate it, and all the comforting words on my previous posts, even if I haven't been able to respond to it all.

<333

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Things I never thought I'd have occasion to learn:
1. it's really difficult to text while wearing non-latex (vinyl?) gloves.

2. if you put on a stupid paper mask as part of a quarantine protocol and you wear glasses, your glasses will frequently steam up when you breathe!

2a. however if you tuck the top edge of the mask beneath the bottom edges of your glasses, you can forestall that problem.

3. even though every piece of equipment in a hospital room is equipped with its own distinct alarm, nobody ever comes to check on them when they go off unless...something else happens? That has not been clear, but even with the monitors beeping endlessly and blinking with red lights, the nurses maintained that there was nothing out of the ordinary happening. According to one, "If you keep watching the numbers, you'll go crazy." So. Even though there is nothing to do in there but watch the numbers and the various lines on the machines, especially if you're there by yourself as I was yesterday, and the person you're visiting is asleep, you shouldn't try to figure out what the numbers on the monitors mean. You'll inevitably be wrong.

Anyway, the update so far is that the doctor is pleased my dad is off the ventilator - it is a good step in the right direction, though all of the other problems persist. ( Collapse )

It's funny, when my mother was first in the hospital and then after she died, I mostly read and reread all the Tim/Kon fic I could find and also listened to "The Minnow and the Trout" on repeat for some reason (and did a massive comfort reread of Discworld after she died). Right now, I seem to be finding most of American Beauty/American Psycho comfort listening, especially "Uma Thurman" and "Twin Skeletons," and I can't concentrate on anything long enough to read it. I don't even know.

In other news, there's a blizzard bearing down on us and we just had to cancel tomorrow's board meeting in light of that, and are scrambling to find another date that works. I'm also hoping we're closed tomorrow as I could use a pajama day after all of these life-and-death shenanigans.

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Thank you all so much for the kind words and offers of help and pictures of puppies in undignified outfits. I appreciate it more than I can possibly say. <333

My dad looked much better yesterday than he had on Friday night. They'd tapered the sedative down enough so that he was occasionally awake and he responded when we spoke and knew who we were. And seemed awfully annoyed that he had a tube down his throat and couldn't talk. This morning they are supposed to try to wean him off the respirator and see if he can breath on his own now. *crosses fingers* I guess that is the most pressing issue, and then all the other stuff has to be addressed.

The virus he has is called human metapneumovirus (me, typing into my phone to figure out what the doctor was talking about: human meta human virus? google: no. me: human metanomial virus? google: no. human metaPNEUMOvirus. me: OH THAT MAKES SENSE.) which is apparently common but underdiagnosed, and dangerous in elderly people and also highly contagious (according to both the infectious disease doctor and doctor google), which is why we have to wear the masks and gowns etc. Which makes it superhard to have a facial conversation (my sister is deaf in one ear and my hearing is not so good, so we do a lot of making faces at each other across a room to communicate and that is not easy when you're both wearing masks and glasses), but since my immune system never met a respiratory infection it didn't roll over for, I'm hoping I don't end up with this one. (My sister, the one with the autoimmune disease, was like, I never get sick like that! I don't need to do all this! and her husband just stood behind her rolling his eyes.).

They didn't tell us what medication he's on for that, but there are also antibiotics to work on the sepsis and a second, even more special drug than the one he was on Friday night to stabilize his heart rate, which is alarmingly all over the place, and a bunch of other tubes and lines that are quite terrifying honestly.

That's basically all the updates I have. I came home last night instead of sleeping at my brother's - I just wanted my own bed - and I slept in this morning (I grudgingly set my clock an hour ahead when I went to bed so instead of going to bed early at 10 pm, it was regular time at 11 pm) so at least I feel less completely exhausted and more just regular tired. I'll be taking a much later train today than usual, and probably not staying quite as long since I still have to go to work tomorrow barring any unfortunate turn of events.

And now, there are some clementines calling my name, so I shall sign off rather than get the keyboard all sticky.

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So I did not get to see Trevor Noah last night.

That is a really terrible way to start this entry? But the fact is, I did not get to see Trevor Noah last night even though all my work stuff was done. I in fact left work not late but early, in order to get out to Huntington Hospital, because apparently my father coded in the ER and was intubated and sedated and my sister-in-law was like, "get out here now." So I did.

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The nurse said this morning that he's somewhat coherent and can follow prompts - he squeezed her hand, for instance, when directed - but otherwise, no real change.

Let's just say I do not recommend the experience, either as the person undergoing the infection or the people who love that person.

I slept some last night but I still feel exhausted and I doubt that is going away any time soon.

Right now I'm home for a bit and then I'll head back out with a bag packed, in case I need to stay overnight.

Comments are of course appreciated but I doubt I will be in any condition to answer them. <3

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