I'm at home today on study leave, trying to finish an assignment (due tomorrow), sticking pencils up my nose out of boredom and sheer frustration. My mam and my nana called over a few hours ago for a cup of tea and to provide me with a welcome distraction, or so I thought. Turns out that I was the welcome distraction, as they were both wired to the fucking moon. Crash Grandadicoot took another spill on Tuesday night and though he didn't need to go to hospital this time it has left the usual dint in his (and my nana's) confidence and it's becoming more apparent that he might before too long need to go into full-time residential care. She couldn't lift him from the floor and had to get a neighbour to help, it took all of three minutes but in that time he'd become even more distressed while trying to right himself.
This has happened before. Last time it was in the wee small hours of the morning, he'd fallen out of bed and she couldn't lift him from the floor. She went to call the neighbour for help and ended up stopping a man on a bicycle who was passing on the street. He came in, helped her to get Granda back to bed, made sure there was nothing else she needed or nobody she wanted him to call and then headed off on his way again. "Like a modern-day St. Martin de Porres, he was" she told me the next day, St. Martin being the only non-white saint in her canon (the cyclist was black). It's tiring and upsetting to see these incidents becoming more frequent for them. It's gratifying that she'll call here when she knows she needs cheering though (she phoned there a little while ago to thank me for the tea - "I feel like I've had a little holiday!") and if that's all I can do for the moment, so be it. I still have good craic with him even though he's talking through his hole a lot these days (imaginary dogs and and excess of toilets are the topics du jour - he reckons his house has 6 bathrooms at the moment... it has two) and we're all learning to cope.
Still, my heart went out to Annie when I read her post this morning, and to Terry Pratchett and his legions of fans when I saw his sad news. His humour, as ever, is good for the soul.
This has happened before. Last time it was in the wee small hours of the morning, he'd fallen out of bed and she couldn't lift him from the floor. She went to call the neighbour for help and ended up stopping a man on a bicycle who was passing on the street. He came in, helped her to get Granda back to bed, made sure there was nothing else she needed or nobody she wanted him to call and then headed off on his way again. "Like a modern-day St. Martin de Porres, he was" she told me the next day, St. Martin being the only non-white saint in her canon (the cyclist was black). It's tiring and upsetting to see these incidents becoming more frequent for them. It's gratifying that she'll call here when she knows she needs cheering though (she phoned there a little while ago to thank me for the tea - "I feel like I've had a little holiday!") and if that's all I can do for the moment, so be it. I still have good craic with him even though he's talking through his hole a lot these days (imaginary dogs and and excess of toilets are the topics du jour - he reckons his house has 6 bathrooms at the moment... it has two) and we're all learning to cope.
Still, my heart went out to Annie when I read her post this morning, and to Terry Pratchett and his legions of fans when I saw his sad news. His humour, as ever, is good for the soul.
