Some of It Is Stopping, Kinda...

 Super-fast update...

First & foremost: The Pipsqueak's rapid COVID test came back negative. There was some anxiety because no matter what she or AJ did, they could not access the results through the online portal and had to wait until Sunday morning to try to get hold of someone via phone. The standard (slower) test results won't be back until Tuesday or Wednesday, but we're all breathing a heck of a lot easier now.  On the downside, another one of the girls tested positive but is asymptomatic.

The aides/agency: I'm still working up a single document listing all the invoices by date and things just keep getting weirder.  To add insult to injury, we've had Dad under the auspices of a hospice program since early this year -- not because he's on his way out, but because they have a longer-term program specifically for families in our situation (where the time period can be up to 2 or 3 years, rather than hospice's usual 2-3 months). Well, he gave us a bit of a medical scare last week and we're still arguing with them about getting a basic wide-spectrum blood test done. Worst case scenario, we find out what's going on and know we can't do anything about it; best case scenario, we find out what's going on and are able to do something about it. In either case, we at least know what the blazes is going on... and the lead doctor for the program is refusing to do anything but the most bare-bones basic test "...because you're not going to be able to do anything anyway."  Dealing with dementia is a soul-sucking horror straight out of an H.P. Lovecraft story, so thankyouverymuch to all the "helpers" and "providers" who keep making things worse instead of providing actual help and/or comfort.

My stupid camera: I've downloaded the user manuals for the two cameras in the running as replacements and will probably lay out far more money than I really should in a few days. <sigh>

Anyway, that first point was what I wanted to make sure I got out there, the rest kinda just slipped out because I really needed to vent... Sorry for hijacking your blog-reading time, gang.

Oh, we had a (very) small family celebration dinner Sunday night to recognize Miriam's scholastic achievements, and she's really looking forward to getting back into her classes once the winter break is over (she's still in school this week, but pretty much everyone's slacking off for the holidays).

Also, since I'm not entirely sure I'll be making another post before 2022 rolls around, I just want to wish all my readers a very happy holiday season and a happy, prosperous, and HEALTHY new year!

Y'all be careful out there, okay?

Would Someone Please Just Make It Stop?

 O-kay... The dance studio's big holiday recital/show was this past weekend, and Miri was in 11 of the 30 numbers.  Yeah, almost half the show -- how crazy is that?  In one of the numbers, she and one of the other older girls were sort of guiding/helping/herding some of the youngest through a ballet number (very cute!), and in another she was the swing and had to take the place of one of her friends whose family had apparently forgotten about the show, made other plans, and gone out of town.   It sounds horrible, but the Pipsqueak had conscientiously attended every. single. rehearsal.  even though she was just a swing, so the number came off without a hitch.  In fact, all her numbers (all groups of 4 or larger) turned out really well.  Some friends of ours from our adoption group came -- they haven't had a chance to see Miriam dance since the whole pandemic mess started -- and said they were really, really impressed with how much she's developed as a dancer in the interim and how good she looked onstage.  We were also joined by one of Mom & Dad's neighbors -- one of very few remaining in the neighborhood who moved in around the same time back in 1970 -- and after repeating how good Miriam looked, she added, "She dances well above her age."  (I've said that my niece has been "punching up" in many ways since birth, and this isn't the first time someone who's not heard me say that has made some kind of statement to the same effect.)

For the past two weeks, Miri has been going to physical therapy twice a week to help heal & strengthen the ankle that gave way in gym class a little while back.  Not only is she doing really well physically, she's actually having fun during the PT sessions and is making sure she does all the assigned exercises at home.

The real icing on the cupcake came tonight... I had taken Mom shopping and just moments before we got back to the house Miriam called to tell us she's been accepted into the National Junior Honor Society!  She was so happy that she kept giggling through the call... she's worked really hard in school and there've been a few grumbles about no one really recognizing how much time & effort she puts in, so this is A Big Thing for her.

So what is it that I want to make stop?

My "trusty" camera's been acting up most of the year, and I had so much trouble with it at the recital that I've decided I have to bite the bullet & replace it. At first it wouldn't turn on at all until I'd done two battery swaps; the zoom refused to work at all until it suddenly did after about 20 minutes of my trying to use it; several times the camera would stop recording video and switch to photo mode if I touched the zoom switch; lines of the in-camera leveling display were not only not parallel to each other, it turned out that none of them was parallel to the floor, either; the automatic exposure sometimes worked and sometimes didn't; and plenty more.  Now all I have to do is come up with money I don't have to replace the camera...

 But wait, there's more...

One of the  girls in the small group dance where Miriam filled in for a friend who was out of town was annoyed with her for "taking away" the original girl's position (this number happens to be one of several in the show that the team will be presenting in competition in the coming months). This despite Miri being the official "swing" for the group, despite both the team coach & studio owner placing her in the group to fill the blank spot, and despite Miri repeatedly saying it was only for this one performance, she has no desire or intention to take the slot away from her friend, and that as the official swing it was actually her job to dance in that performance so no one had to worry about changing the placement, choreograpy, etc. at literally the last second.

But wait, there's more...

Even better, the friend whose spot Miri danced -- you know, the one who was out of town -- has apparently been annoyed as well, despite not having been available for this one performance.

But wait, there's more...

While all this other "outside" good stuff was going on, the company we've been using to provide in-home aides to give Mom at least a few hours of breathing space each week has suddenly "gone corporate" -- new answering system on the phones that makes reaching a human impossible, no one returning calls or providing promised feedback, the one person in management that Mom had become friendly with changed to a new position in management and no longer answers her cell phone outside specific hours on specific days, and the latest invoice has some really weird stuff going on that we need an explanation for pronto to avoid problems with the insurance company.

But wait. there's MORE...

Late this evening (technically last night, since it's well past midnight now), AJ got notice that one of the girls in one of Miri's dance classes just got back positive results on a COVID test so she & Miri are going to have to scramble to get a rapid test done. On a Saturday morning. During a surge in local cases.

Would someone please just make it stop...?

Just A Super-Quickie...

 Hi, all... just a few words (and a silly pic) at 4:28am since I woke up & can't seem to fall back asleep...

The overall family situation remains unchanged; lots of stress, lots of worry, lots of love, lots of care. We're all dealing with the progression of dementia as best we can, and the Pipsqueak is showing us just how amazingly strong a young woman she's becoming.  Oh, it's affecting her, for sure -- but I'm constantly amazed at how she's able to stand up straight under the load (on top of the usual "stuff" that one deals with in middle school, hormones, and an ongoing pandemic <sigh>).

Along with some of our adoption group friends & an interested neighbor, Mom & I were able to attend the annual holiday show put on by Miri's dance studio (AJ was there as well, working backstage).  The studio's been in major flux for several months, since the building that's housed it for years is now being converted by its owner into an assisted living facility and the many businesses that were housed there got (semi-gently) booted out. The problem is that the new studio was supposed to be completed in August... September... December... January... and now the contractor is saying March.  Classes have been held at a local Catholic high school, the Sandy Spring Museum, and even a "pick your own" blueberry farm and yoga/spiritual center.  In any case, the show was a lot of fun, and included a number of the dance team's competitive numbers planned for this season... and they absolutely slayed it.  Our neighbor, who's lived across the street since we moved here in 1970, was absolutely floored by Miriam's skill and said "she dances well above her age" -- which fits right in with my idea that she's been "punching up" almost since birth.  One of our friends who's known Miri since she came home and who's attended a number of previous shows said she was really amazed at how much the Pipsqueak has matured as a dancer.  All this while the Pipsqueak is attending physical therapy twice a week to help heal her injured ankle...

 (Dude, you're kvelling again.) (You bet your sweet bippy I am!)

Anyway, we're all still super-tired, super-stressed, and super-sleep-deprived, but we're all hangin' in and managing to keep things from totally unraveling on even the worst of days.  I'm still planning to get back to blogging a little more regularly (and with more/better family content, plus increased focus on adoption-related issues in general), but right now I'm gonna try to get back to sleep so I'll leave you with this sample of my niece's happily weird sense of humor, drawn almost exactly a year ago, that I found while going through a stack of papers.

Y'all stay healthy out there, and have a great holiday season!

 

 

She Did It Again!

 Just a quick bit of kvelling here...  Someone got straight A's on her report card this quarter. :-)

I've always loved learning, but have at best a so-so relationship with organized schooling.  Lil' sis is about the same, the difference being she's usually got a tighter focus on what she wants to learn while my interest in learning tends toward the omnivorous (as in, "Dude, your head is stuffed full of relatively useless facts, when you gonna make some space for more useful knowledge...?").

Miriam, on the other hand, not only likes to do well in school -- she kinda needs to do well in school. We don't push her; I've lost count of how many conversations have occurred between the Pipsqueak and other family members in various combinations where she's been reassured that as long as she's really tried and actually learned something, the grade she receives really isn't all that important. (Oh, sure, dropping grades or low grades in areas we know that she knows her stuff will be looked into -- gently and diplomatically -- but we all have experience on both sides of the teacher's desk so the letters assigned to her results are just a guide, definitely not a goal.)

My niece's push for excellence comes 100% from within her, and while we occasionally remind her to just sit back & enjoy the ride, we just let her set her own goals and she inevitably aims higher than her mother or uncle ever did during their academic careers.

So... yeah, she did it again.  Straight A's.  Congrats, Pipsqueak!

Trying to Catch Up (A Little)

 Yikes, time flies when you're having fun... or when everything's kinda fuzzy. In either case, there's been a LOT that has happened in our lives that I meant to mention here that I haven't, so here's a bit of a catch-up.  (And I do mean a "bit," as in "just a small piece" because it's gonna take several entries to actually catch up for real.)

One big milestone I didn't mention -- in fact, I just found the unfinished draft of the post a few minutes ago! -- is that this year the Pipsqueak turned 12.  It's her last year of officially being a Tween instead of an actual Teen, but to be perfectly honest I'm not sure she hasn't already vaulted forward into teenhood in all ways save actual numeric age.  Thanks to a certain ongoing global medical problem, her birthday wasn't a big bash but she enjoyed the home-baked brownie cake and the gifts and the time together, and that's really all that counts.

Another big milestone I didn't mention is that she's finally really, actually, truly IN school; AJ usually drops her in the morning but she rides the bus back home in the afternoons. Technically, she's attending the same school where Mom taught for several years, but the entire original building was razed to the ground and rebuilt (much larger) from scratch a number of years ago.  I showed Mom videos from my dashcam of the ridiculously narrow & twisty country-type road that leads to the school and of a slow pass around the building, and it was one "oh my god!" and "where'd that come from?" after another. (All of which her granddaughter found highly entertaining.)

After spending her first year of middle school staring at a Chromebook screen, Miri's taken to lugging her two-ton backpack around the school building like a fish to water.  This being the Pipsqueak, there were a couple of very tense & worried weeks leading up to the first day of school (despite two orientation sessions before the scholastic year began)... but now that she's on familiar territory, all is well and she is actually enjoying herself.  Also not terribly surprising: she's popular and has so many students passing in the hall saying "hi" and/or waving that some of her friends (both old & new) laughingly complain that she knows everybody.

That said... there's definitely a bit of a cloud wrapped around that silver lining. So far it's only happened once (and a lot of kids came to Miriam's defense quickly & loudly), but sure as an anti-vaxxer is gonna scream about mind control microchips in the COVID vaccines, one stupid kid just had to point out that Miriam is ethnically Chinese.  Using impolite words. And rather nastily to boot.  It was the usual BS: "You should go back where you came from," "This isn't your country," and other similarly bigoted crap. The good news is that the twerp not only got talked to by one of the school counselors, but several other kids in the class tore him a new one while others checked to make sure Miri was okay (and made a point of asking her again over the next couple of days).  There hasn't been a repeat, but Mama Bear and Uncle Hungry T-Rex are keeping an eye & ear tuned "just in case."

The only other notable negative at school was just over two weeks back, when Yours Truly was taking Mom & Dad's cat to the vet and fielded an unexpected phone call -- while miles away and heading rapidly in the wrong direction -- from the school nurse explaining that a certain someone "...came down a little hard on one ankle in gym class" and Miriam spent the next week on crutches.  (AJ was having a bad day at work and thus we arrived at the school within literally 2 minutes of each other a good hour-plus after that first phone call.) It was just a bad sprain, and she's pretty much back to what passes for normal... but now we all know with absolutely zero doubt that my niece has a dislike of crutches that borders on absolute loathing & hatred (and has the dramatic capabilities to communicate that dislike with nonstop crystalline clarity).

Aaaand I think I'll end this post right there. Obviously there's a couple of metric tons of other things to catch up on but I'm far too tired to spend the rest of the night typing out doctoral thesis. (The situation with Dad is unchanged and thus I'll only mention it on an as-needed basis, let's just say it sucks.)

I'll be back with more soon... 'til then, y'all stay healthy out there, okay?

Twenty Years Ago

 I know this isn't directly related to the Pipsqueak, or to adoption... but it just looms too large in my life to allow the date to pass without mention.

Two decades has dulled the edge of some memories (although it remains sharp), and blurred others to the point where I'm no longer clear on exactly what happened.  For example, I know I spoke with Mom on the phone a couple of times, but not when, or what we said; I don't remember if I spoke with Dad until later in the evening, or during the day.  I remember driving to the local branch of my bank sometime after both towers had fallen and withdrawing a few hundred dollars in cash from my savings "just in case" while discussing the likelihood of another attack on the DC area with the teller... but I no longer remember how much, nor whether the teller was male or female, nor any part of the conversation other than our mutual wishes to "stay safe" as I left.  I remember efforts to track down the many cousins still living in the NYC metro area, slowly checking off the list of names as being "safe" one by one, but I don't remember who called whom, nor how long it took, nor any of the discussions that took place. All those memories (and more) have been blurred, dulled, mixed, and faded by twenty years of life experiences.

It feels strange to realize that since that day, I have changed careers (not just jobs) at least twice, with almost every previous employer now either out of business entirely, bought up by & absorbed into another company, or staffed entirely by strangers; a surprising number of former colleagues and managers have died in that twenty-year period as well. I have owned four different vehicles (only one at a time), and have gone from renting out two rooms in my house to living alone; the long-ago-expected move to a different house, possibly a different region of the country, evaporated somewhere along the way.  Halfway through that twenty-year stretch, the most important person in my life joined the family, many of our cousins married or divorced or became parents or grandparents (some several times over), members of the extended family have spread across the globe or died, and more recently we've had to helplessly do what (very little) we can while watching Dad slowly melt away.

Despite that, there are flashes of memory of 11 September 2001 and its aftermath that remain shockingly clear in my mind...

I still remember the "click" my stereo made when the timer turned it on (even then, a loud stereo was almost the only thing that would wake me up).  The radio faded on to something like, "...approximately 18 minutes apart" and it took about a minute, maybe two, for me to figure out the DJ was talking about airliners crashing into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York.

I still remember yelling, "TURN AROUND!" at the screen as a reporter talked to the camera, oblivious to the tower behind him beginning that slow, obscene drop almost straight down, leaving a ghost of itself in the smoke for a few moments before the winds blew it away.

I remember seeing one of the first up-close shots of Ground Zero on TV with some segments of the outer cladding of the towers sticking up from the rubble and thinking, "Oh, good, there are still a few floors left." I also remember the feeling in my stomach just moments later when the camera angle changed and  I realized how far from the truth that thought had been.

 I still remember posting an essay about my feelings on my personal web page (anybody remember those?), constantly updating the list of emergency services, locator services, shelter services, and information numbers as they became available over the next few weeks.  (The HTML file is still on a dead backup drive I hope to someday send to a data recovery company; all I clearly remember of that essay is the paragraph where I mention the commandment, "Thou shalt not kill" and said that under the circumstances it was going to be necessary to diminish ourselves somewhat in an effort to find the perpetrators' support and eliminate it.)

I remember a conversation with one of my cousins sometime in October, when his answer to the usual "so what have you been up to?" was to tell me he'd attended the funeral of a friend of his who'd been on one of the planes.

I remember having to sit down and close my eyes for a few minutes when, early the next year, I was walking through Union Station in DC and came across an installation featuring part of the 9/11 wreckage.  In retrospect, I'd never heard that part of the station so quiet before. 

And I remember telling myself, year after year, every year, "Don't watch the replay. Don't watch the specials. Don't watch the memorial service." And how year after year, every year, I do anyway. Sometimes I even catch myself yelling at some group of long-gone firemen or police to go the other way when they go up the stairs. Sometimes I still catch myself telling someone to park their truck somewhere else. 

And I still cry.

For Miriam, 9/11 is as much a part of history as the American Revolution.  It's something that she hears about and people speak about, but twenty years in the past is as good as it happening on another planet. Her life, as are all our lives, is shaped by the events of that day in ways she may not be able to understand simply because she has no first-hand experience of just how different the "before" and "after" worlds are. She knows it's a day on which something really terrible and frightening and sad happened, and she's glad that none of the family were hurt... but her concerns are lie in the realm of which of her more drama-loving friends are involved in a love triangle (as if you can really have a love triangle in 7th grade), when the next lockdown drill will be held at school, who's going to get her to her next dance class or rehearsal, whether or not she has a fresh mask to wear in school, if her smartphone is fully charged and the "Find My" app is linked properly to Mommy's and Uncle Brian's and Grandma's, if the kid at the next table during lunch is coughing for real or on purpose, and how are Grandma & Grandpa doing today.

But as alien and distant and "historical" as 9/11 is for my niece... it still hurts.  And I still remember.

Stay safe out there, and never forget to tell the people you love that you love them. 

Believe It Or Not, I'm Still Here...

Hi, everybody (assuming anyone is still out there)...

NOTE: This isn't going to be a terribly happy post, and it's only adoption-related in terms of us being an adoptive family.

First and foremost, the Pipsqueak's okay, doing well (she finished 6th grade with straight A's, a feat hitherto unknown to my immediate family), and the subject of several updates I'll post over the next few weeks (at least two of which already exist as long-dormant Blogger drafts).

For a long time, I've been referring to problems or issues or complications or other euphemisms when trying to explain why my posting has slowed to a new level of crawl, and have repeatedly promised to explain more fully at some point in the future.  I even have a half-complete draft of that particular post in my account in which I try (with little actual success) to wax poetic and describe things eloquently...

...but the truth is that I just don't have the energy (or all the time) to write that way right now, so I'll keep it short.

Life around here for Miriam -- yes, that's the Pipsqueak's full first name -- and the rest of us has been complicated beyond the bounds of our imaginations by the fact that Dad is suffering from dementia.  He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease almost three years ago, although we'd begun to see signs as much as two years prior to that.  Since then, AJ and I have come to suspect we're dealing with a different form of the disease, but the bottom line is that Dad is suffering from advanced dementia.

I've seen a lot of diseases, especially with my starting out originally as a pre-med student in college and then working in a nursing home for more than a decade, and I have many impolite, colorful, and/or negative adjectives for them... but there's only one I refer to as an actual obscenity: dementia. (Alzheimer's is the most widely known, but is just one of many varieties that differ in detail but follow extremely similar paths.)  It slowly, inexorably and unavoidably destroys an individual while their body remains mostly intact and functional, all while that individual's friends & loved ones watch, absolutely helpless to do anything but maybe -- just maybe -- slow its progress in the earliest stages until Death steps in to end the torture.

I still have online privacy concerns so I'm not going to go into much detail right now other than to say that the situation sucks. It is emotionally, mentally, physically, and financially debilitating in ways I only thought I knew back in my nursing home days.

You may have heard the term "my better half" when someone a little older was referring to their spouse, but in my parents' case it's a literal description of their relationship; they've known each other as friends for over 70 years, and this past April was their 67th wedding anniversary. There are no words that can convey the pain the situation is causing for Mom, who has taken on the role of primary caregiver. We have some help for a few hours each day but the exorbitant cost of certified help more than a few hours on weekdays (and a family friend who happens to be a certified GNA willing to cover nights an extremely reduced rate) means Mom has to shoulder the vast majority of the associated work herself.  (For reference, the weekly base salary of a member of Congress is roughly $1,200 less than the weekly cost of three full standard shifts of in-home care... and anywhere from $500 to $2,000 less than a full week in most memory care facilities.)

I'm not going to waste much time talking about the effect it's having on my life other than to say I basically visit my own house for a few hours on most days so I can lend a hand to Mom.  AJ's job is already a soul-sucking exercise in exhaustion, but now she has to come home every day to stories of what went wrong this time, or "what did he do now," or the tale of the latest billing/insurance/health coverage SNAFU, all while trying to be a loving, caring single mother and stepping in to help as best she can with her expertise and her list of contacts.

Much worse is watching the effect this is having on Miriam who is -- to use her own words -- watching Grandpa melt away in front of our eyes.  She's a very mature 12-year-old with an old soul, about to start 7th grade (a milestone I have to admit is sort of freaking me out), but when she talks about the situation she can't help but swing back & forth between rage over her powerlessness to help and deep sorrow over the slow, painful fading of the loving grandfather who taught her to love history and to always look up at the moon.  She holds them back well, but tears are a lot more common than any of us like.

So... I'll ask y'all to excuse my long absences and the gaps between posts.  Most of the time I have to scrape minutes from the day just to do laundry, clean the dishes out of the sink, or do the bare minimum I must do in response to nastygrams from my neighborhood HOA; finding time to type something even vaguely coherent here is a rare luxury... and to be totally honest, on most of the too-rare occasions when I do have the time, the physical and emotional exhaustion just makes it too difficult to even bother trying.

So... yeah, I'm still here, and I still have some thoughts & stories to share (all with my niece's permission, for those of you wondering).  They're just gonna come a bit far between for a while.

Thanks for understanding, and please stay healthy out there.

A Little Bit of Catching Up

 Whoa, those months sorta slipped past quietly, didn't they...?

(Dude, you need to work on your definition of "quiet," ya know?!)

Yeah, yeah, I hear you... February, March (and now April!) slipped by quickly but not really quietly -- there's a heckuva lot going on 'round these parts despite the best efforts of an increasingly scary global pandemic. The result is that despite my good intentions, a combination of short time, long to-do list(s), demanding life issues, and near-zero energy made it really hard to keep up with everything here.

Sooooo (as the saying goes)... Here's one more, "Oops, I'd better try to catch up!" blog entry to add to my already extensive collection.   (And yes, I'm working on an entry to explain some of those "life issues" and "difficulties" and "complications" I keep cryptically referring to.  It'll be here soon... or at least when it's ready.)

The Pipsqueak and I had a unique opportunity to share some quality "together time" back in February during a particularly long medical appointment that I had to take my folks to.  AJ was working and Miri didn't feel comfortable being alone in any of the family homes for the required number of hours, so she came along for the ride... and, since the pandemic has played hob with medical offices as much as any other facilities, ONLY my folks were allowed inside so uncle and niece found a nice, sunny parking spot nearby and spent a couple of hours just talking about this and that and such.  I got an earful about the hormone-based drama(s) beginning to shake up Miri's group of friends, which girl liked which boy that liked which girl, who was getting nicer and who was becoming insufferably uptight or overly proud of themselves, and all the other "good stuff" that guarantees there is not enough money on the planet to convince me to relive my years in what these days is middle school.  As you can see in the photo, there was far less sturm und drang in our conversation that it might seem from the preceding sentences; chalk that up to my niece really not being a fan of such drama (but, thankfully, still being a fan of the bad dad jokes I look up online to inflict on her).

Near the end of the month, a long-awaited milestone was reached when the lovely Miss Alison told Miri that she feels she's ready to go up on toe in ballet class -- words that the Pipsqueak has been longing to hear for at least a year, maybe longer.  She's got some oddly fused bones in one foot that kinda got in the way (apparently a genetic gift from her bio family) so it's taken her a bit of extra work, but it wasn't many days post-pronouncement before AJ had made an appointment at a local dance supply store (thanks again, you stupid virus, for making such craziness a necessity) and at the end of the appointed block of time my little niece was practicing ballet moves en pointe at the barre.  I don't think a week has passed without her mentioning how sore she is when she gets home in the evenings after dance -- anywhere from 1 to 3-1/2 hours of class every weeknight due to the dance team requirements -- but she remains happy and proud to finally be up on point.

As has happened early every March since near the middle of the last century, Yours Truly officially got older... again.  AJ & Miri baked me a special cake and then Miri decorated it... and needlessly spent quite a bit of time during the small immediate-family-only (thanks again, you stupid virus) celebration apologizing profusely for the messiness of her penmanship with special frosting in a squeeze tube.  I just thought it was an extra-personal touch, and can vouch for the fact that the tastiness of their work was in absolutely no way diminished.  Also, since that "B" was actually quite a bit larger than it looks and there were only five of us eating it, I still have a couple of good-sized chunks in my freezer at home. (Lil sis' excuse was "that's the only size the cake pans will let me make!" but I wasn't complaining.)

I got a few gifts, ranging from cute to downright silly (including a 24" high hollow milk chocolate Tyrannosaurus Rex that's currently still in its box in my kitchen, since there is no way I can eat it all by myself without getting happily sick)... but I also got a couple with extra-special meaning.  AJ got me a cool shirt (and immediately commented, "Now I don't know what to get you for Father's Day!) that I appreciated...

...but the one that I thought was really special came directly from the Pipsqueak herself:

Call me an old softie, but for me that little key ring was Something Special that I keep with me all the time. :-)

I don't have any photos of the "event" but a few days later we finally -- after far too much research, decision-making, decision-changing, and general pulling of hair -- replaced our rapidly dying iPhones with new models... and transferred one of our folks' phones (with a new number) to Miri.  She's been  lobbying for a phone of her own for a couple of years, fully accepting our reservations & desire to wait until she was a bit older, but with so many communications from both the dance team and her friends now being via email and text message, and with her being alone in one or another house for some period of time already beginning to happen, all her grownups agreed that it was time.  She uses her 2016 vintage iPad Mini on a daily basis (and there's only been one episode where AJ felt a need to intervene & tighten some ground rules in all that time), but it doesn't offer some of the communications & safety of the newer smartphones so now she is the absolutely thrilled "owner" of an iPhone SE (2020 version) all her own.  Of course, nothing went as planned with the process... I spent a total of 5-1/2 hours on the Verizon website (almost two of those hours on the phone with an amazingly helpful customer service rep) just trying to get the order placed properly, then discovered that Amazon would not let me buy more than three of any Apple-branded accessory within a multi-day period (we have FOUR phones, Amazon, I'm not trying to resell anything!), and then the actual transfer of data between AJ's nearly-dead old phone failed repeatedly over TWO DAYS due to its inability to keep working long enough in a single sitting. (Note to self: never ever never buy an iPhone charging cable from a dollar store and never ever never let said cable short out while the iPhone is plugged into it... it wasn't her fault and we were amazed the phone still worked at all.) 

In any case, Miri took to her new phone like a duckling to water -- no surprise there! -- and it got to the point where her grownups had to remind her the main reason she was complaining about her thumbs being sore was because she spent perhaps several orders of magnitude too much time messaging back and forth with her friends.  (In my day, we just talked to each other on the phone for hours... now it's PING! PING! PING! as text messages fly through the ether.)

Later in the month we were happy to host the Florida contingent of the family during one of their too-rare visits to the area.  We weren't sure of how to deal with the necessary distancing -- not all the adults had been vaccinated yet, and there were three younger humans who could not be vaccinated at all -- but the weather cooperated with a beautiful sunny day and we all enjoyed a meal of Pho (delivered, of course) and several hours of catching up and interesting discussion.  (Their son, not in the photo due to my bad timing, is the kind of "kid" who discussed things like, "Do the transporters in Star Trek actually move you from place to place, or do they just dissolve you and create a copy at the other end, and if they do that then did you die and is the 'you' that beamed down actually the same person, and do the laws of physics even allow for any of that to happen?" back when he was in elementary school -- he's about to finish high school now, so he and I have conversations that are truly enjoyable but leave my head spinning for days afterwards.)

By the end of March/early April, Old Man Winter seemed to finally get the message and temperatures during the day began to move farther north on the thermometer.  Both Mom and Dad finally got their COVID-19 vaccines (despite our county's byzantine, fractured system), the deer visiting my backyard began to replace their shaggy grey coats for a sleeker brown look, and we finally began to see real signs of spring.

Another sign of Spring for us is the beginning of the dance competition season, which has been extra-special for Miri this time around because she has her own solo number this year.  Her piece is very difficult technically (her teachers know how hard she works and are helping her level up) and she's been busting her tuchus working to tweak and refine and improve it every chance she gets.  She's gotten a couple of honorable mentions so far, but no official "placement" -- but the season's not over so (despite some angry tears) we still have our fingers crossed.  She's also part of a quad number that's taken 2nd place overall at a couple of competitions, and the overall team number (danced to "¡Que Calor!") has placed first as well.  I don't have any performance pictures due to strongly-enforced photography restrictions at the events, but see if you can spot her (in her "¡Que Calor!" costume) in this group photo sent around by the studio owner... 

Hint: Miri is front row, far right.

Oh... and another sign of spring was a visitor I noticed nervously watching me work on my computer late one night...

She spent the night in there eating the peanut butter I used as bait, and the next day I released her into the woods... almost a mile away from my house, over on the far side of the 8-lane Intercounty Connector highway. (I may be a softie, but I ain't entirely dumb, LOL.)

And that just about catches us up to the present day.  It's funny how the little girl so worried about what middle school was going to be like is now an occasionally blasé Tween who complains (often rightly) that school is boring -- and who is able to share a laugh at her own expense when reminded of how scary it seemed back in September.  Miri keeps telling us that she's very glad Mommy decided to keep her in "virtual" school instead of the recently re-opened "in person" school (which literally has the kids sitting at socially-distanced desks attending class via Zoom on their Chromebooks while the teachers broadcast the lesson from the front of the room, since the kids may be in almost any classroom in the building due to space constraints... wearing masks 100% of the time... and not being able to socialize... <sigh>) but has also been adamant about wanting to return to school "for real" in September if it's in any way closer to a regular school experience because she's tired of feeling isolated from her friends.  Meanwhile, she's still carrying all A's on her report cards, still knocks me out with how diligent she is about getting her homework done ASAP and as well as she can every day... and still admits to having it really, really good when she "attends" school here on my living room sofa with free run of the fridge and a personal servant & onsite tutor. (Which, to her credit, she does not abuse... but I sure seem to be washing a LOT of dishes on the days she's here with me!)

AJ is already trying to get the Pipsqueak scheduled into summer programs -- an already anxiety-fraught process made all the more interesting by changing ideas of how to deal with the pandemic -- and all the adults in the family have finally gotten both doses of COVID-19 vaccine so we have high hopes for the coming months.  Of course, not everything is coming up roses, and there have been some pretty tough times (thus the long gap between my last blog post and this one), but all in all we're about as okay as we're gonna be and these days that's good enough.

I'll address some of the craziness more directly soon, as well as (try to) get back to more frequent postings... until then, stay healthy and wear your masks!

Happy New Year(?)

Xin nian kuai le - "Happy new year!"

Okay, I know I'm a few days behind (mainly because I discovered that I'd forgotten to post the last installment of our latest IKEA adventures!) but...

 Happy (Chinese) (Lunar) New Year!

This is the Year of the Ox, and it's the Pipsqueak's year -- the last time we were in the astrological realm of the horned bovine, she was busy being born and found.

 The Ox is the second of the twelve animals in the Chinse zodiac, a position it occupies because (according to legend) in the great race between animals decreed by the Jade Emperor to see what order they would be placed in, the large and powerful Ox was in the lead but agreed to help the smaller Rat across a river at the end. (Some versions of the legend say it simply agreed to carry Rat if he wold sing to keep the Ox from being bored during the long journey.)  Just before the finish line, the Rat jumped off Ox's back and scooted ahead to grab the winning spot.

The Chinese zodiac is quite a bit more complex than just the dozen animals we're all familiar with from restaurant place mats, so a more detailed description would be that this is the Year of the Metal Ox, associated with Yin (of Yin/Yang), with the "Xin" Celestial Branch and "Chou" Earthly Branch.  (This differs from Miri's birth year in that she was born under the Earth Ox with the "Ji" Celestial Branch.)

Gong xi fa cai - "Wishing you happiness and prosperity"

Individuals born under the sign of the Ox are said to be honest, diligent, earnest, and hard workers; they are usually skilled & talented but rarely seek out praise and prefer to not be the center of attention, thus earning recognition for their accomplishments through hard work rather than by drawing attention to themselves.  They are generally kind & helpful, even-tempered, and believe that each person should fulfill their responsibilities.  In particular, women born under the sign of the Ox are calm and gentle but rarely surrender to fate, working hard to achieve the goals they have chosen for themselves. This can lead to their being considered stubborn, but they are really just dedicated to following their own path as best they can -- and they are usually well-equipped to do so with sharp, logical minds.  Some sources say that Ox women lack a sense of humor, are prone to haggle, and may appear unapproachable.

Several of the sources I checked say that individuals born under the Ox in 2009 are likely to follow a path that requires hard work but no unusual hardships, and will likely earn a great deal of money through their efforts.  In the early years they will have trouble holding onto their money, but as time goes on they will be able to settle into a comfortable life thanks to earning proper rewards for their ongoing diligence, talent, and hard work.   (Dude, maybe that means your niece will be able to support you in your dotage...?!?)

Da ji da li - "Good luck and [have] a profitable year!"

 My niece is indeed honest, diligent, earnest, and a hard worker; there's a reason she's carrying straight A's in school while also taking various dance classes six days per week while also being a member of her studio's competitive dance team while also learning how to play the flute.  She loves it when her hard work is recognized and rewarded, but never goes out of her way to call attention to it (and gets annoyed when others around her begin grandstanding in an effort to be noticed).  She is amazingly caring, kind-hearted, and empathic, and her love is given unconditionally.  She has already decided that she wants to be a veterinarian and is taking steps to achieve that goal (even going so far as to discuss opening a joint practice with a friend who also wants to enter that profession).

Although she can indeed negotiate, haggle, and debate when she feels the need (when she was younger, we used to joke that she was practicing to become a trial lawyer), she differs from the standard lore in that she definitely does NOT lack a sense of humor, and usually has no trouble making friends when she meets new people.  (In fact, her sense of humor is undeniable, unavoidable, and sometimes rather loud!)

So why the question mark in the title?

Well, as I mentioned earlier, the Chinese zodiac comprises a full dozen animals -- and they each have a full year, as opposed to the Western zodiac's (roughly) 30-day period per astrological sign.  The last year of the Ox was 2009, and it won't come around again until 2034... when Miri will be an adult, attaining the ripe old age of 24.  Every year she's been home, we've attended at least some kind of special celebration & event to celebrate the turning of the year, and even in those years when major events have been cancelled or we could not attend we managed to have get-togethers with fellow adoptive families and attend at least one lion dance performance. So of course this year, which is her year for the first time since birth, there are no dance performances, no big celebrations, no lion dances, no big noisy luncheons with our friends... nada, bupkis, nuthin', zero.  (Thanks fer nuthin', SARS-nCOV-2, in all your damned variants, strains, and mutations.  And thanks fer nuthin', an administration that didn't give a damn.)

Miri has sad that she was disappointed in that of all the years she's experienced, the first go-round of her year was the one during which there really wasn't any way to celebrate.  Over the past 12 months, the special Patrol picnic at her school was cancelled, the year-end school picnic was cancelled, all her remaining elementary school classes suddenly became poorly presented online shadows of themselves, all the events celebrating the "graduation" from elementary school to middle school were cancelled, all her summer get-togethers with friends were cancelled, all the tours of her new middle school were morphed into videos on a laptop, our week-long beach vacation was cancelled, her middle school classes were morphed into semi-interactive videos on a laptop, many of her dance classes were (at least temporarily) changed into online sessions, the competitive dance season was essentially cancelled, multiple dance performances were cancelled or morphed into online videos in an almost deserted studio, and even the possibility of a couple of months of actual in-person schooling at the end of the academic year are looking like a total washout.

On top of that, several of the stricter lockdowns brought residual feelings of abandonment to the forefront of her memory, options for getting a leg up on various personal goals were eliminated or pushed back by at least a year... and we are all very much aware that there will be no Grandma & Grandpa to celebrate the New Year of the Ox the next time it comes around.  Add to that the stresses of dealing with some ongoing family medical issues and... yeah, it's a pretty sucky way to "celebrate" Miri's year the first (and only) time her entire family can be together for it.

We're doing what we can... funny shirts, some special gifts, hong bao (the kid's got more pocket cash than I do these days!), some decorations at home... but it's obviously far short of what we've been able to do every year up until this one.  It came to a head the other night when we had a celebratory dinner with our folks that featured several soups & dishes from our favorite Chinese restaurant.  Miri had her usual egg drop soup, white rice mixed with duck sauce, and some of the crunchy outer layers of an egg roll -- the kid just doesn't like Chinese food even though we had it at her request.  As we were finishing our meal, Miri just got quiet... and after a few more minutes had passed she was quietly crying in AJ's arms just because out of sheer frustration over the whole situation.

It wasn't too long before the Pipsqueak was back to her usual self, singing quietly to herself while dancing in the kitchen, then laughing at a silly video on her iPad after venting her frustrations over all that was not going right, but the message was clear: After years of waiting for "her" year, and after  what I sincerely hope is the toughest year of her life ever, nothing was going to plan and everything was at best "just okay" when she'd wanted (and earned) so much more.  (And I'm sure that the other Ox kids in our MIT group have been sharing the same letdown & disappointment.... I'm just writing this from a very personal perspective, I don't want to minimize their feelings in any way.)

So yeah, there's a question mark in my title... but we all remain hopeful while pushing through whatever it is we're trying to push through on a daily basis.  Miri is proudly maintaining straight A's in school and is willingly putting in whatever effort is required to do so.  She appeared in several dances in her studio's (delayed) annual recital, including her first-ever solo -- which she absolutely slayed -- all of which was watched online by family & friends scattered around the country.  The return to in-person schooling is pretty much dead for this academic year, but she's satisfied that she had a major role in that decision and spends time actually laughing at how blasé she is about it all now after months of steadily increasing anxiety about whether or not she'd be able to cope with middle school last summer & fall.  The vet who runs the clinic where all the family cats are patients has told her that once she's past her 12th birthday (due to insurance restrictions), there is an open invitation for her to spend time helping & observing behind the scenes so she can get a real taste of what it's like to be a vet while earning required credits for the school system.  We even managed to (finally!) have a zoom session with one of the families who traveled in China with us, and Miri and their daughter have connected via text & social media.

Yeah, some of what we're all dealing with absolutely sucks (on a good day), and she's beginning to experience (sometimes bemusedly, sometimes angrily, sometimes just quietly shaking her head) all the drama and craziness and sturm und drang that occurs naturally within a group of friends who are encountering hormones for the first time, but Miri knows we have her back when it matters, her best friends are still (mostly) truly her friends, and that she is doing what she needs to do in order to achieve the goals she has chosen for herself.  (And yes, AJ & I both independently talked with her about both the importance of working diligently to achieve her chosen professional goal and the fact that she will still have our support and plenty of other alternatives if she comes to the realization that it's not right for her  at some point.)

Things could certainly be better... but they could also be a lot worse.  We're all working together as a family to get through the rough stuff while still finding ways to have fun & celebrate the good things in life. The Pipsqueak knows she can (mostly) make her own choices and that someone's got her back when she does so, and absolutely any and all issues that come up are fair game for discussion, sharing, and brainstorming.

So, yes... Gong xi fa cai!  Happy New Year!

Another IKEA Adventure, Enfin le Fin (Ouch!)

[NOTE: This is a big oops -- I thought I had clicked on "Publish" back when I finished this entry, and only realized it was still an unpublished draft when I went into the system to write my next post!  So... on that note, here is the closing episode of our latest IKEA misadventures, just 3-1/2 weeks after I saved it as a draft "to publish in a couple of days"... <sigh>]

 

Okay, Smastad, it's me or you... and I'm the only me I've got, so it's gonna be you.

At least that was my attitude when the time came to finish the stupid desk and finally be DONE with it.  After all, we were all planning to get together for a family dinner that night...

Yeah, like that happened. <sigh>

As I stood in Miri's room and tried to visualize how we'd fit all the pieces into the available space, I realized that since we were building the entire thing as a mirror image of our original plan, the desk would now be directly in front of the electrical outlet we planned to use for lighting on both the desk and the bed above it... leaving no way to actually plug anything in.  AJ & I sort of stood there just looking at each other for a minute, and then I drove back up to where I had come from (literally passing my own house on the way) and visited the "Electrical" aisle at the local Home Depot.  My plan was to buy a sideways multi-tap to replace the regular outlets, along with a new surge suppressor to replace the one AJ used to charge her laptop which had begun to spark every time something was plugged into it.

Well, I guess a lot of folks got electronics for Christmas this year, because that aisle was thoroughly picked through.  After resorting to Plan B, then Plan C, I finally settled on Plan D and grabbed a couple of extension cord/surge suppressors that had flat, sideways-facing wall plugs. (I got two different models because there was literally just one of every such item left below the $50 mark.)  Mission accomplished, I re-retraced my steps (in the car) and returned to AJ & Miri's to dive back into the IKEA construction project, which I had sworn to myself would be finished today, come hell or high water.

First, there was the usual hauling of boxes from the garage to the living room, the fight to open the boxes up, and then the hauling of furniture parts up another flight of stairs into Miri's room.  Then came the usual counting of pegs and cams and bolt and other bits of hardware, followed by the usual round of, "What the heck is that... oh... maybe...?" while leafing through the instructions before actually trying to join pieces together. (Note: ALWAYS a good idea, since there are occasional surprises hidden in there... and not always pleasant surprises at that.)

After figuring out what comprised "left" and "right" (there were multiple ways to assemble the entire piece of furniture, each requiring we start on a different page of the instructions and each changing the location of certain boards and/or fasteners), then hunting down the Phillips head screwdriver that seemed to walk out of the room on its own (eventually located under several other tools), we got to work and soon had... a large white box.

(In retrospect, we had actually assembled something that looked like it belonged in an etching by M.C. Escher, but... yeah, it was a box.)

Now it was once again time for a game of, "Is this the left, or is this...?" until we got what would be the actual top surface of the desk attached to our Escher-ish construct. The momentary feeling of victory was tempered by the realization that we had to now shoehorn the whole thing into the bottom of the bed completed bed frame... with zero clearance because it bolted directly to the bed frame on each side... but that we also had to line up bolt holes on the back of the desk and bed frame, so the entire construct had to be pulled away from the wall to give us enough room to work behind it as well as inside it.  (Did I mention that Miri's bedroom is actually rather small and already has other furniture occupying space against the opposite wall...?) It didn't take too much thinking to figure out that because of the space (not) available in the room, AJ was going to have to squeeze in behind the frame because her larger brother with his creakier joints was unlikely to fit... or to be able to get back out from behind the frame if he somehow managed to get behind it in the first place...  (Obviously, I did manage to squeeze in far enough around one end to photograph my sister's contortions as she tried to get back out from the space she'd gotten into!)

With all the major components finally bolted together (including a couple of bolts driven in "blind" through the closet at one end which miraculously lined up perfectly with their holes), it was time to put together the drawers for the desk.  AJ showed me the page in the instructions that showed where the drawer slides had to be installed in the desk and set about putting the drawers themselves together while I tried (with minimal success) to contort myself into a position that wold simultaneously allow me to screw the drawer slides into place while also still breathing.

About those drawer slides... The Smastad desk could be built with two, three, or four drawers; we were going for the three-drawer version, and the instruction book very clearly laid out exactly where the slides were supposed to go; the inner surface of both side of the "box" of the desk had long rows of pre-drilled holes and the instructions showed not only a line drawing of the proper locations, but also gave the number (counting up from the bottom) of which holes should be used for attaching the rails for each version of the desk.  AJ even commented that I needed to put the slides into such-and-such a hole for each drawer.

Guess what I did? 

I'll give you a hint. On the left is my original install; on the right, the final install.  <sigh>

Despite my sister's smirk -- and the requirement for me to periodically crawl back out from under the desk and give parts of each drawer she was working on a good smack! to lock them in place -- we soon had the desk completed and stepped back to admire the fruits of our labors.

(We're still not sure if we picked up the correct drawer front for the big one, but we ain't changing' nuthin' else if we don't have to!). Throughout the construction process, Miri had been hovering nearby but due to lack of space she finally retreated to the living room sofa (with her iPad, of course) and would come running up when we called her to help find things, or move things, figure out how she wanted things, etc. etc. etc.  Now we called her up and after a little victory dance, the Pipsqueak began to experiment with placing various items and soon had her new desk set up the way she wanted it.

The next step was to put the doors on the small closet located at one end of the bed frame, which went swimmingly once we shifted the entire eleventy-seven ton piece a few inches farther from the wall so I could fit into the space.  The almost infinitely adjustable hinges actually lined up nicely with very little tweaking, and I felt pretty good about the whole thing until I stood up and forgot about the shelf over my head.  Luckily, the furniture was undamaged and my head stopped hurting a couple of hours later.

Miri excitedly began hanging clothing in the new closet, and hanging clothing in the new closet, and hanging clothing in the new closet... until there was a loud crash as one end of the bar across the closet gave way under the weight.  After advising the Pipsqueak that maybe putting all her clothes there wasn't a great idea (and figuring out how to put the parts back together in a slightly different arrangement), we took a few minutes to gather up all the assorted pieces of cardboard on the floor and generally try to put the room back together.

One last task was to get the most loved (and possibly most fragile) picture back up safely on the wall. Of course, lil' sis had no idea where her stepladder had gotten to, and the little folding step stool she had was too short for me to reach high enough... so after double-checking the bed's weight limits one more time  she got up into the elevated bed while I used a tape measure & pencil on the wall to show her where to hammer in a nail (while I carefully made sure I was not standing under the hammer) and our uncle's Pooh painting was soon once again hanging in a safe spot.

With a collective sigh, we all went downstairs, Calle Mom to let her know we'd have to do a family dinner some other night because it was getting late & we could barely move, and plopped down on the couch to take a breather.

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!

Y'see, AJ had had to buy several sets of scrubs for work because (even though not a nurse) she was in direct contact with residents & patients -- and given the current virus situation, the more separation between what she wore at work and everything else she wore, the better.  While at IKEA, she had found a small chest of drawers that would let her store all her scrubs separate from her regular clothes... and her foolish brother had said sure, he'd help her put it together.

First we hauled up one of the two remaining boxes from the garage, laid all the pieces out, compared them to the drawings in the instruction booklet, and realized we needed to open both boxes (of course there was more than one box of furniture parts for this small chest!) in order to have all the parts needed for Step 1 of the instructions.  After a few more minutes of prying, sorting, and shuffling around on the floor, we had everything laid out and ready to go...

With Miri kibitzing, we figured out which side was which, figured out which end was which, counted out all the pieces of hardware, and began assembly. I mean, c'mon, it's jus a small  chest with three drawers, how hard could it be?

First, the drawer rails are attached to the sides... No, that one has to flip around... No, use these holes for the screws, not those... Why doesn't this peg fit into the ho-... oohh... 

Seriously, this darn thing just refused to go together despite us carefully distributing the work between us and coordinating with each other on each step.  After the massive project that was the bed frame, we were finding this little thing a lot harder to assemble!  Eventually, all the different parts that formed the outside of the chest were together and... Oops, no, we put that piece on backwards, can these be pulled back apart without undoing the whole thing....?  Finally, after a ridiculously long time (due in part to us being tired and sore), something vaguely resembling the picture on the instruction booklet was occupying the space formerly occupied by a whole bunch of different parts.

Now it was time for the drawers. Again, no problem, right...?  <sigh>

Despite us having successfully assembled four almost identical drawers already (3 for the desk, 1 in the bottom of the closet), these were just plain uncooperative. Snap-in parts had to go just so or they wouldn't snap in, pegs and holes kept slipping out of alignment... Add in our increasing exhaustion (and crankiness), and the whole process soon devolved into the two of us quietly cussing at no one in particular as part after part exerted its independence while Miri kept a safe distance from it all (my niece ain't no dummy).  Finally, after realizing we'd reversed the position of one key component on each of all three drawers, all the parts fit together as intended and we were ready to place the chest in its new home.

Now, let's get one thing straight: my sister is an intelligent, educated, and capable woman... but she has a somewhat rocky relationship with numbers and measures. The result was that after carrying all the parts of the little chest up to her room, we had to again play a game of, "What If That Was Moved There?" and "Can You Push That Over Another Inch?" and a few other closely-related games until finally, with a sense of accomplishment that no measure of exhaustion or soreness of body joints could diminish, the last of the IKEA pieces was complete and planted firmly in place.

It may appear innocent, but looks can be deceiving!

After helping gather one last crop of assorted cardboard, bits of plastic bag, et al., I bid my sister & niece goodnight, drove home, downed a couple of Aleve capsules, and gently creaked & groaned my way into bed.

It had taken half a year of waiting and many painful hours of work, but the Pipsqueak had her new loft bed (with desk and closet) and AJ had her scrubs storage. Yay, us!

Another IKEA Adventure, Part Trois...

Hey, there -- and happy new year!

To be perfectly honest, I hoped I would feel a lot better about the dumpster fire that was 2020 receding into the past, but so far it's looking like 2021's statement was "hold my beer" so I'll just wish everyone good health and prosperity for the newly begun circumsolar journey and leave it at that.  (I'm also going to strongly suggest to myself that I need to cut back on how much time I spend watching/reading the news because my head has already exploded at least a dozen times this month. <sigh>)

Anyway, let's pick up where I left off with my last post...

 I woke up the morning after getting the storage section of the loft bed put together feeling a lot more sore than I had in a long time -- these hips & knees have been aging faster than the rest of me! -- but determined to get the Pipsqueak's "birthday" bed done once and for all.  I got toe AJ & Miri's house earlier than the previous day and, with less "hang on, I gotta finish this first" issues than the previous day we got a (relatively) early start.  

There were several more large, heavy boxes left to bring up from the garage (Darn you, townhouse stairs!) so we once again struggled up into the living room with them one at a time, tore them open, and lugged the various pieces of white-coated wood & pressboard upstairs to the Pipsqueak's room.

It was while we were struggling to open one of the boxes -- apparently, IKEA uses military-grade glues to keep the stupid things closed, despite them being made from biodegradable cardboard -- that AJ noticed a bit of inadvertent humor.  She read something to me and it didn't click, so she read it out loud a second time and then just stood pointing with a smile until I realized what she was pointing at:

Yes, that is permanently printed on the box... In fact, it turned out to be permanently printed on almost all the boxes. I guess maybe they were worried about people cutting holes in the boxes during shipping...?

Of course, all the noise and commotion and moving of large items through the house did not go unnoticed by its feline inhabitants, each of whom reacted in her own way.  Xuan, as usual, disappeared (we later found her attempting to hide from the commotion in Miri's room which worked out about as well as one might expect under the circumstances) -- but Licorice, being the slightly weird busybody that she is, just sat and stared at the funny hoomins.  Of course, this made her look extra-cute (Gee, I wonder why such a difficult cat is still living there?) so it was immediately necessary to stop work and make sure that face was recorded for posterity....

After getting a little creative with furniture positioning so that we had enough room to work, AJ and I laid out the longest pieces of the bed and began to attach the metal rails that ultimately would hold the mattress up in midair, each of us taking care of a rail to get them done faster. That was followed by attaching several of the individual boards that the mattress would rest on... which was followed by joining everything together into a single unit by lining up about a dozen different holes at either end of the pieces we'd each put together while simultaneously balancing one heavy unit on top of another in mid-air.

Somehow we managed to get all the fershlugginer holes to line up... attached the various sub-assemblies together into one big unit... and then we had to pick the whole thing up (while it flexed, since most of the cross beams still hadn't been screwed into place), rotate it on two axes, and place it on top of the assembly we'd finished the previous day.  Oh, and let's not forget how many different holes had to line up for pins and cams and screws and dowels to all go into place...!

Perhaps a slight miscalculation...?

Somehow nothing got dropped... nothing broke... cams and pegs all lined up and fit together properly... and we (eventually) got all the crossbeams in place.  There was another round of "IKEA Dares You To Line Up All The Pegs And Holes Simultaneously" as we assembled the ladder -- complete with stick-on nonskid strips that Miri thought were the Coolest Thing Ever -- and then attached it to the frame.  I went back and forth with one of those infamous L-shaped hex wrenches, tightening first a cam here, then a bolt there, then another cam over there... and suddenly all the major pieces were where they belonged and we had an actual loft bed frame done!

I dragged/carried the mattress from where we'd stashed it earlier, and AJ & I manhandled it up & over the side of the frame into place -- and it fit with another half-inch of "extra" space before exceeding the maximum mattress height recommended for safety.  With a big smile, Miri clambered up and gave her new bed its first test.

Now it was time to put together the desk... and it was nearly 10:00pm... and despite thinking that I was going to go home with the entire project done (it's not like I didn't have some projects of my own to 

worry about!) we all realized that if the Pipsqueak could wait this long for the bed to be completed, another 24 hours wouldn't make much difference...

...so I said goodnight, headed home, swallowed a couple of painkillers (along with a quick sandwich), and grunted & groaned my way into bed.

Next post: Mission Accomplished!