Today’s Business: 2009-09-20
Sunday, September 20th, 2009Started a pork roast with carrots, potatoes, and onions in [Emmy's] crock pot for her. It should be done cooking by 6:00 or so this evening.
Riding the train back to Altoona this afternoon. My cab to the train station should arrive here at 12:15 PM, and the Amtrak train departs at 1:20 PM. So far, the weather for the trip looks fabulous; few clouds and lots of sunshine. Another cool, crisp, and dry day is on tap here in Pittsburgh. I love riding the train, although the jaunt to Altoona is just a bit short at two and a half hours. I prefer a four hour ride, which gives plenty of time for a restful nap, a snack of garden burgers from the dining car, and an hour or so for iPod listening or journaling. But hey, I’ll at least get the nap in if not the snack or the entertainment. The only concern about napping during such a short trip is the worry that I’ll miss my stop and wind up in Harrisburg. But this fear is irrational since the conductors are very good at making sure people get off the train when they’re supposed to.
After talking with Mom last night, I worry that she won’t like the faucet I bought yesterday for the bathroom. She’d rather have the kind that has the high arching spout that extends way out into the sink area so that she’s not constantly bumping her hands against the back of the sink when rinsing them. The one I bought has a decidedly short spout and so, may not jut out toward the center of the sink as far as she wants. To be safe before installing it, I’ll take what I have to the nursing home and show it to her. If she hates it, we can exchange the faucet at the Home Depot in Altoona for something she likes better.
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Here at home now after the train trip. The train kept to its schedule and so we arrived at Altoona almost exactly on time. A nice and sunny trip it was, though clouds met us at the horseshoe curve and followed us the rest of the way, and remained throughout the evening. Looks like it might rain overnight. I got the garden burgers I wanted and did some iPod listening. But not enough time for a nap. I suppose I’ll sleep well tonight therefore.
On the way from the station, we stopped to visit Mom at the nursing home. She seemed content. No, in fact, she was quite happy. We met her in the first floor lounge where we had diet pop and about an hour’s worth of pleasant conversation. Then, we visited her room, where she wanted me to look at the TV there to see if it could be made any brighter. Unfortunately, it had electronic menus, to which access was disabled — the menu key did not bring up any menus. Further, this particular television was an LCD unit, and so the quality of its picture quickly degrades as you move off to the sides. Since the TV was aimed at a spot between the two beds in the room, neither patient gets the best, brightest view. The home would have done better to install a plasma TV instead of an LCD one, which offers a much wider range of quality viewing angles. Either that, or each bed could have its own TV so that each patient gets a straight-on view of it. The picture seen at Mom’s bed is rather dim and thus, low contrast and lacking in some of the finer details of the images. Oh well, at least she won’t have to be there for very long; several weeks the doctors are predicting currently. Hopefully, she can make due with the TV such as it is, until she comes home. 
After the visit with Mom, sister JoJo, her daughter, and I drove to Wal Mart and I picked up a few things for the week. Click here for more details on that grocery shopping trip.
Finally, after a pretty full day, we got here to the house. While I was away, sister JoJo and sister Christine did a bang-up job cleaning up Mom’s part of our basement. There’s so much open space down there now that was not there before, that I’m certain I could skate around the washer and dryer without feeling too claustrophobic. I thanked them both profusely.
In the process of cleaning out the DVR of all the TV it recorded last week, that I’ve already seen with [Emmy].
[Emmy] reports that the pork roast turned out pretty good, except for a bit of dryness in a couple pieces of the potatoes. We’ll have to add slightly more water the next time; no doubt owing to the fact that her crock pot is a bit bigger than mine here at home. Perhaps a whole cup of water would be a good amount.
Tom