The Day After the Day After

By Sunday Evening, Sadie was Exhausted!

It's over. 

Everyone has gone home, intact.  Rachel's SUV made it back to Memphis in one piece.  Laura's apartment and her cat were not harmed when Irene hit NYC.  My cucumber sandwiches were a disaster.  Other than that, and a few shattered nerves, things went quite well (sort of). 

My mother is exhausted.  She's still in her jammies after two days of rest (we hope). Our real fear was that APR would have this tremendous let-down once the 60th Anniversary celebrations were over.  On the contrary, he is doing great (thus far).  He's quite with it.  There were some shaky moments late Sunday, but not bad at all.  Cathy feared major fuzzies.  He did great! 

60 Years! 

Yesterday he called several times while my mother was napping.  He called today, while she was napping, looking for the car keys.  It was obvious he wanted me to come down to the house after I picked up the mail.  I did.  Sadie was a little down, bouncing off the wall, bored after her admirers left the building, but other than that, things were fine. 

We made a major discovery this weekend.  So far, with this phase of the disease, the more going on around him, the more the intellectual stimulation, the better APR does.  I suspect this may run contrary to popular opinion, which calls for calm.  He does great with a group of people and things going on, the more things, the better.   He did not eat as  well as he should have, but we suspect he may have been grazing a little.  I know on Friday, he and Dustin, according to Dust, were tossing back Ensure shooters!  APR had chocolate and Dustin had strawberry, if anyone is interested in the gory details.

Sadie Slept Through the Photo Opt

On Saturday, Dustin pulled the old Buick, my old powder blue 67 Rivera convertible, out of the shed.  They spent the afternoon tinkering with it.  I have this feeling, as the years progress, Dustin is going to be the one to be able to reach him, through their mutual love of cars.  When I told him, this afternoon, that Dust wants to get the Buick running, and take his grandfather cruising down Route 66, he was so excited.  A light went on in his eyes!  Now he has someone to share his car books with. 

Dustin is going to try to get back in a month or so, to work on the car.  I think it will give APR something to look forward to.  I have a feeling things like that are going to be increasingly important.

APR's Perkins cousins, Jean, Kerry, and Jean's husband Lee, arrived on Friday evening.  They had dinner with us on Saturday, and were in and out Sunday and Monday.  Late Monday evening, APR got a few things mixed up with some stories, but that's okay.  By that time, I don't think any of us were quite with it.