— पांच हजार अस्सी-पांच —

And here I thought working from home this morning with just my laptop would be fairly easy, since I don't have to do it all week or even all day. Ha! Shows what I know.

I've had too many emails necessitating complicated calculations or communications or multiple replies already. I am discovering I really should have, at the vey least, brought my wireless keyboard home. I do a lot of ten-key typing with numbers, which is not an option on the laptop keyboard. I am not used to having to stick to typing the numbers across the top of the keyboard. Also, just so that I am not raising my arms up at an awkward angle, I have set my entire laptop down on the keyboard tray of my home work desk. It's easier for my arms but more awkward for where I have to look at the screen, for my neck.

These other things would be the same either way, but I have had several interruptions both from Shobhit and from a particularly whiny Guru the cat, who is making me want to toss him through the fucking window. This morning has been a long reminder of why I was so glad to get back to working at the office in the first place.

I mean, I will admit it was nice being able to sleep half an hour later again, and "commute" just from the bathroom to my work desk in my bedroom. Still, I live far closer to the office than most people, 2.4 miles away, so it's not like I have anything real to complain about even when it comes to that. Not having to commute is just a minor silver lining that really does not make up for all these other frustrations.

— पांच हजार अस्सी-पांच —

And I still need to update you on my weekend! It was fairly eventful, much more than I had initially anticipated.

It started with dinner at Saffron Grill on Friday, plans made again with Alexia, our condo neighbor, along with Shobhit, and when I invited Ivan again a few days earlier in the week he was happy to plan on joining us. So, the four of us went out to dinner at Saffron Grill Friday evening, just as we had done on Friday July 30—I didn't realize it had been that long—only this time we planned for 7:00 instead of 6:00; I did not make any reservation via OpenTable since their website makes no mention of reservations and they seemed unaware of any reservation last time anyway; and Alexia offered to drive us all in her SUV and gave Ivan a ride to work after. Ivan was actually by his workplace around an hour earlier than he needed to be even this time, which means we got him there really early when we gave him a ride to work after dinner last time. This time, he asked Alexia to drop him off across the street and said he was just going to go for a walk.

Also, Shobhit kind of just ordered for the table, after some discussion with Alexia and while Ivan looked at the menu but did not seem to make any real decision. He seemed fine with just sharing the four vegetarian dishes Shobhit ordered—two of them Shahi Paneer; one two stars and one three, although they clearly told us which was which backwards because after I ate what I thought was the two-star one and found it surprisingly spicy and was thus afraid to partake of the other one, once I did, it was not the least bit spicy. Shobhit wanted me to try something new but I love Shahi Paneer! He did order a lentil dish which was okay and a bell pepper and paneer dish I had never had before which was spectacular.

Last time we came, we had all had chai; this time only Shobhit and I did. Alexia remembered how much it kept her awake last time and so chose to avoid it; Ivan opted for a mango cocktail, the only thing on the menu that he ordered independently. They top off your chai like other places do with coffee, so God knows how much chai I drank that night—I just know I was awake until about 1:30 that night; I was unable to sleep in past around 7 a.m.; and I slept so poorly that night that I was zonking out by 9:30 Saturday night and was out like a light when I went to bed that night. I then proceeded to sleep for nearly nine and a half hours Saturday night, unheard of for me, and probably would have slept longer but Shobhit woke me up because I needed to get ready in time to drive him to work yesterday morning. I'll get to that later.

— पांच हजार अस्सी-पांच —

Saturday was the day that was much more eventful than anticipated, even though I didn't really socialize with anyone. Because Shobhit and I are in Southern California tomorrow through Saturday, he has been working shifts all weekend. He did have Friday off but he worked a full shift both Saturday and Sunday, during which on Saturday I took myself to the 1:05 p.m. showing of King Richard at the AMC at Pacific Place downtown, which I really liked a lot.

It's also long though, 138 minutes, which when combined with the far too many trailers they show beforehand, let out quite close to 4:00. I then decided I would walk down to the Central Library to pick up a couple of things I had on hold and waiting for me.

I realized while walking that I had passed the Olympic Fairmont Hotel, where they have re-instated their annual Seattle Festival of Trees, a gallery of Christmas Trees for sale in fundraising support of Seattle Children's Hospital. I thought I might try to plan with Alexia to go check that out, but, not knowing when or if I could make that happen, and since I was right there, I decided to go in and check it out.

I proceeded to spend the next half hour or so taking pictures of countless Christmas Trees that were first put up on Friday and will only be on display until December 1—I think maybe they always take them down at the beginning of December so people who purchase them can set them up in their homes? This is always the timing, where they go up mid-late-November and get taken down in early December, which is a big reason I kept spacing it in the past few years after I first learned of its existence.

Well, now I have my first Flickr photo album of it, containing a whopping 44 shots, and it also serves as the first of what will surely be many albums for my Christmas 2021 collection of albums, even though we haven't even reached Thanksgiving yet. But, such is the nature of this particular event, which I was kind of thrilled to get to see this year since the Gingerbread Village has now been canceled two years in a row, still due to COVID restrictions. (The key difference probably being that the Gingerbread Village typically has a truly huge crowd, every day, and Seattle Festival of Trees a fun annual tradition but nowhere near as wildly popular.) I got a lot of similarly themed photos for an album; it's just Christmas Trees and ornaments rather than gingerbread houses. I can live with that. And perhaps in 2022 I'll finally get both!

Anyway, I walked to the library, picked up my book and DVD, then caught the #2 bus which I rode all the way to the Central District PCC to take advantage of the PCC weekend deal where I could get 30% off three frozen pizzas, two of which I prepared for dinner for Shobhit and me that night. This meant I got home and immediately set to chopping vegetables to add as extra toppings. And not long after that Ivan joined us in the living room to check out the two first episodes of the new Amazon Prime series The Wheel of Time, which was . . . okay.

I was barely keeping myself awake through the second episode. Even Ivan was nodding off. This is why I went to bed instead of finally writing that movie review then, which I wrote up and posted after getting back from driving Shobhit to work yesterday morning.

— पांच हजार अस्सी-पांच —

So, yesterday . . . I spent the afternoon with Danielle. We finally made our plan to get together to watch Contagion, but guess what? We did start it eventually . . . and only ever got as far as 4 minutes in.

I would have driven directly from dropping off Shobhit, but Danielle had a blood donation appointment and would not be back until around noon. So, I aimed for 12:15 arrival and got there at 12:18; Rylee was home as Danielle had told me she would be, and Danielle was not home yet. I just hung out while Rylee continued watching How to Train Your Dragon, her "favorite movie series," she told me.

It was only a few short minutes later when Danielle arrived, saying she had gotten light headed during her blood draw, something that never happened to her before. They kept her there waiting a little longer than they would have otherwise as a result.

She had also stopped by the store for bread and other things, and I had come with cheese and veggie ham and a tomato for sandwiches, which we all had for lunch shortly thereafter. I also made chai for us all, which we decided we would wait to have until after lunch. We all sat at the dining table to eat our sandwiches and it was all perfectly pleasant.

Then, Danielle had moved to the couch in the living room, and she got the phone call that dramatically changed the trajectory of the rest of the day. Valley Medical Center, where she works, was calling her. "Why's the hospital calling me?" she said; "I don't know," I replied. And then she learned, and shortly thereafter I learned, that Patrick—her ex-husband; the father of her daughters; the one Morgan has been living with for some time now because Danielle can no longer handle her at home—had been in a serious car accident and was being transferred to Harborview Medical Center.

This was bad.

What followed, after Danielle got all the information she could, was a lot of phone calls, first to Morgan, who had not long before called Danielle to say Patrick was supposed to drive her to her friends' house at 1:00 but still wasn't back (at first Danielle was like, "This is my problem why?" —which she said to me, not to Morgan); then to Jordan, Patrick's grown daughter from his first marriage; then later she had a call with Patrick's brother's wife. Lots of information being shared around, limited as it was. She also had a couple brief phone calls with Gail, her mom, who was just getting off work at 4:00.

I went with Danielle to Patrick's house two different times, first to pick up Morgan because Danielle did not want her to be alone. Morgan didn't want to come to Danielle's and so Danielle went ahead now and drove her to her friend's house. This was the only time I saw Morgan, who was surprisingly calm about it all. I later went back to that same house again, this time with Rylee in tow and this time also going inside (there's a lot I could say about the state of the house, but I suppose I won't), so Danielle could get photos of all the prescription medication in his cabinet.

Danielle had to tell Rylee the news in person at home, and she was also kind of shockingly calm and all-business about it, asking if she should text a particular person, I don't know who, but Danielle was like, "No, this is not a texting conversation." Danielle was the one intermittently really freaking out about it, occasionally saying "Oh my god" almost under her breath and almost involuntarily. She said more times than I could count, "I hope he doesn’t die," and "I can't raise Morgan by myself." Morgan will be 18 next summer, but that's still a year away, and I can't remember if maybe she still has her senior year of high school after that. In any case, having Patrick's house for her to live at has been a godsend for Danielle, and she doesn't know what she'll do if that no longer becomes an option.

That seemed to be the primary driver of Danielle's anxiousness, but she was definitely also concerned about Patrick, and about the father of her girls. At one point I said, "I know you have a lot of contempt for him, but you definitely still care about him." She didn't disagree.

She later took some time to research where the car was, calling the Renton Police Department, the King County Sherriff's Office, then Renton PD again. The Renton PD lady said she could only look up the car by license plate number, not by name, but Rylee, a godsend, could only remember the first three digits—which turned out to be enough. Danielle got the number for the withholding facility the car was in, and found out the car will stay there, accruing daily fees, until the owner of the car came to get it. Danielle could do nothing, which feels like a really shitty thing to do to someone possibly holding on by a thread in a hospital.

As for Patrick's condition, I'm assuming Danielle knows more now as I write this, but I haven't been in contact with her since I drove back home yesterday, picking up Shobhit at Total Wine when he got off work at 5:30. I just know that, as of yesterday, he had had at least two seizures, one of them at the hospital; he was with it enough when he first arrived to say he had been on his way to the golf course (which he was going to do until coming back to take Morgan to her friend's house); and the latest was that he was awake but not responding to commands. Danielle is clinging to hope but she's also a nurse with a very realistic and pragmatic look at things, knowing he could die, or even if he doesn't, he could come out of the hospital significantly compromised, physically or mentally or even both. As of yesterday afternoon no one knew what any kind of outlook was, except that he had a "small brain bleed," and Danielle thought he was likely to need brain surgery.

Also, there was some discussion about visitation, but still due to COVID, visitation is severely restricted, and they only allow one visitor per day—not just at a time; there's no switching out on the same day. Danielle wasn't going to take that opportunity from someone else yesterday, and I think maybe it was Jordan who went. Danielle might be taking Morgan up here to see him today, and they also restrict it to people 16 or older, so Rylee can't visit at all.

I do hope he's all right. I think it may be days before anyone really knows for sure, or even better than is known now. Danielle was kind of an emotional wreck yesterday. At one point, with no calls to make in the moment, she suggested starting the movie after all, but as I said, we only got four minutes in. She got another phone call, and then she was texting or calling people for the rest of the afternoon.

I wasn't quite sure what I should do, but Danielle seemed to appreciate having me there so I stayed. What insane odds, the incredibly rare time I happen to visit, this happens. I don't think I had actually been to her house since Shobhit and I went for the Fourth of July. She told me I was also with her in the late nineties in her apartment in Spokane when she got the news her grandma had died, which I had completely forgotten, and still only vaguely remembered when I got the reminder. In any case, I stayed there giving her company until 4:40ish rolled around and I needed to leave to go pick up Shobhit. Danielle was on the phone again with someone else, and I waved goodbye and gave her a big hug while she was still talking to them, and then I was on my way.

I'll have to connect with her again later this evening to get any updates if I can. In the meantime, I need to finish up my morning work before doing my "Holiday Helper" shift at the Central District PCC; then finish up packing for our flight to LAX tomorrow morning. We'll spend a few hours in L.A. before driving on to Palm Springs, so tomorrow is going to be a long day. I think it will also be fun though.

— पांच हजार अस्सी-पांच —

[posted 11:36 am]