Dad continues to improve marvelously, though he did sleep poorly last night, as one does in the hospital. But he is on track for checkout tomorrow, and they’ve upgraded him to “solid” food today. You can see how excited he is about that (and what hospitals mean by solid food):
I was able to take the shuttle over to the other branch of this hospital, where I worked for several years before I moved to Oregon; had lunch with a beloved old co-worker and a good long visit with the old boss. That was awesome. I hadn’t seen them in nearly three years.
We’re all a little, er, more padded these days. 🙂 I’m glad it wasn’t just me.
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So it’s been a bit of a logistical challenge, dealing with family staying in Marin County (here at BrotherOne’s house) and surgery in San Francisco (in the Land of No Parking), and people with lives and schedules and all that. Mark and I (and BrotherTwo, till today) are staying at BrotherOne’s house; BrotherOne has been staying at his Delightful Girlfriend’s place here in the same small Marin County town; Dad and Stepmom (and Little Dog) have secured an Air B&B place just a few blocks from the hospital (Best! Idea! Evar!).
Yesterday, the day of the surgery, Mark and I and BrotherTwo drove to the city in our car; BrotherOne had a work conference call and came in an hour or so later, in his own car (and his Delightful Girlfriend was putting the finishing touches on her PhD dissertation which she turned in today!!). We sorted these cars out into various thirty-dollar-a-day garages.
By the end of the day, when all was well and we were all exhausted and spent, and figuring out what to do next, about eating and stuff, it was discovered that BrotherOne had (unwisely, accidentally) chosen a lot which closed at 5pm. As in, locked up, sorry, your car is ours till tomorrow.
Well, that was fine; we had many cars in the city, and furthermore, Stepmom was happy to have us bring her car out here to (free parking in) Marin rather than (thirty or even more dollar) parking in the city. So we did that, with the small snafu that Mark and I stopped for gas on the way home, leaving BrotherOne and BrotherTwo to arrive here (in Stepmom’s car) with no keys to the house, because they were of course on the key ring, that of course BrotherOne had to leave with the garage, and his car, held hostage. But that was a momentary snafu, rendered only amusing by the fact that my cell phone has decided it doesn’t need to ring, but only when BrotherOne calls, wondering where the heck we are with his spare key, that he gave me, because we’re staying here, and he’s staying at Delightful Girlfriend’s.
So today. (Feel free to get a piece of scratch paper out to diagram this; I almost needed to.) Mark, BrotherTwo, and I drove to the city in our car. After some visiting with Dad, Mark took off in our car to the south bay to work on his website with his dear friend and webmaster Joe; I took the shuttle to Parnassus to see my old work folks. BrotherOne and Delightful Girlfriend drove into town in the afternoon to drop off her dissertation (yay!), visit at the hospital, and go out for a celebratory dinner. BrotherTwo and I were to return to Marin in BrotherOne’s car (after retrieving it from Closes at 5pm Garage); then BrotherTwo was to take his car (which is here) back up to Points Partway North, where he has already missed some work and a college class, but, you know, dad and cancer and all.
All is going swimmingly until BrotherTwo and I try to find the garage where BrotherOne left his car. He showed me on the map. Well, there’s no garage there.
I call him; miraculously, he answers. (They are mid-dissertation-dropoff.) He explains again where the garage is, which is about as orthogonal to where I understood as can be, and makes me wonder which one of us was insane last night, when this was communicated.
Anyway: fine. It’s only a few minutes past four at this time. BrotherTwo and I walk to the garage: indeed, it is there! And we see what is most probably BrotherOne’s car. Success!
We walk in, find the sort of weirdly enthusiastic attendant, and hand him the claim ticket. The weirdly enthusiastic attendant chortles and marvels at the fact that the car was not claimed last night, even though there are BIG AND OBVIOUS signs pointing to the fact that the garage closes at 5pm. “Well, rough day yesterday,” I explain, and pay the exorbitant two-day fee, and sign the receipt, and then say, “So, are the keys in the car, or…?”
“Oh, no, we don’t have the keys,” the weirdly enthusiastic attendant says. “It’s self-parking! We don’t take the keys.”
BrotherTwo and I stare at each other, aghast. “Let’s at least look in the car,” he says, wise boy that he is, as I am busy imagining the call to BrotherOne, as we discuss where on god’s green earth these keys might be, and how we are to get them to this car in time to retrieve it and avoid another thirty dollars and countless more logistics…
And lo! The keys are in the ignition. JUST LIKE THE GIGANTIC SIGN SAYS: LEAVE YOUR KEYS IN THE IGNITION.
BrotherTwo is sputtering by this point; I am only grateful, and trying to figure out how to work this danged clutch, which is just about as opposite in behavior to the Miata’s clutch as can be and still be called a clutch; and of course my first act of driving is to take the thing over Divisadero, which, well, if you’ve ever driven in San Francisco, you know what I’m talking about.
Anyway I think BrotherOne needs a new clutch.
Anyway further, it all worked out, eventually! I got us safely here; BrotherTwo jumped into his car and headed northward; I have a few minutes (alone!) to raid BrotherOne’s wine cellar and play with the internet; and wow I’m tired.