Gary Chronicles - Event 16 - The Boat Batteries & Coffee Tables

Remember: $14K.......

So there was a boat.  A car, too but this is about batteries.

Remote control drones, remote control cars, remote control boats.  The boat.

The boat was pretty big and designed so it could be out on the water in the lake, obviously.  Guntersville Lake. (GO! It is beautiful.) It was pretty cool, I have to admit.  I am 5'3".  The boat was probably 4' long.  I didn't lay next to it for exact numbers.

NOW, the boat had been ordered and so had the remote control car.  This kid had reviewed the batteries and connections. The batteries I'm talking about are about 8" long x 1.5" thick.  This is an estimate I can't prove, but it's close enough for who it's for.  He decided that some of the batteries wouldn't connect and special batteries needed to be purchased.  Also, connection attachments to connect them.  He was right on a couple, but he was largely wrong about it. They nearly all fit.  Now he had a zillion batteries. I am betting this group of purchases were WAY more expensive than any legos.....

The boat came and the unboxing started.  It was my turn to be on the floor taking orders and putting things together.  Even the directions on how to put the boat together weren't needed. ...Ahem... G started pulling the boat apart.  The outer shell was taken off so he could get to the guts.  He thought THIS gadget was the one that regular batteries wouldn't fit. He works in his order, a combination of engineer and metastatic brain.  I just tried to follow along.

He started working the batteries and couldn't connect them.  See, he need the adapter.  Can I try, says the big sister who isn't mechanically inclined.  He hands it off, I turn the battery to change connection directions and it connects like butter. High five from the boy.  I feel I appear super smart at this point.  He's surprised I knew something, I feel certain.

Later, when we aren't on the floor anymore, the plethora of batteries and connectors needed to charge.  Remember, the boy likes everything around him.  Underfoot, around him.  Kristy comes back to start plugging in all the things.  NOW the boy was bent set on charging all of them and then organizing them somewhere.  What he really meant was to charge them and keep them somewhere they wouldn't loose charge quickly.

G: KRISTY?! Will you go get that little cooler that is in the garage?  The blue and white one.  

K: You mean the one that is Hopie's? 

G: is that your's Hopie? 

H: yes but you can use it.

As batteries charge, he put them all in a stack.  He asks for a couple freezer packs.  He then delicately stacks batteries, freezer packs, rinse repeat, until all the batteries are in the cooler.  The cooler has to be open though because it won't close, says he.  So I went over and closed it.  Big eyes, probably surprised that I am smart enough to judge the space well enough to know it will close. Smart two whole times in a row!

I put the boat in his office.  It took up nearly all of the space that was left to walk in the office.  It should be noted that in every story told, Meg's house is a jumbled mess where no surface is blank.  I am pretty sure she walks through the house looking only straight ahead so as not to start swinging an ax and kill every inanimate object in the living room.  She was ridiculously gracious to have the sisters in her house for 2 months.  Kristy and I were living in the guest room and couch.  Things get cluttered.  They coffee table was a mess.  Kristy and I even discussed that today was the day we needed to clean it off and start fresh again.

G had anxiety issues his whole life.  As you may imagine, his anxiety was slightly heightened with his diagnosis.  A little.  A smidge.

Remember that everything in the world is around his chair.  Tables, metal arms, monitors, drinks OH and dip cups.  How did I forget that?  Ick. Moving on, a cooler full of batteries and all of his blankets.  

If he was in his recliner, he was covered.  There were 3 blankets that had to be on him in a certain order.  The bigger thing about the blankets was he would get out of his chair and just let them fall to the floor and step over them.  They never tripped him.  I have NO idea how he avoided that.  The point of this is to tell you that the mess around him, regularly, in varying states of gross was profound.

I asked him if I could take anything away, put it away.  NO, he wanted all of it around him.  This turned into a mildly spirited conversation about the abundance of shit and blankets around him.  As he is "discussing" and walking through his obstacle course he starts this conversation.  Me not wanting him to trip and all.  I'm probably stupid on this one.

G: Hopie I've been anxious and you know what you could do for me?  

H: Sure. What?

G: The coffee table is really bothering me.  Could you clean it off?

H: (know that my voice will be increasing in volume) The table?!  The coffee table?

G: yes

H: The coffee table is the thing stressing you out?  You have every half done thing taking up space, sure to make you trip?  The coffee table is what's got you worked up?  The coffee table!?

I think I blacked out for a minute because I can remember the face he was making but I don't remember what else was said or whether or not smacked him.  I think the coffee table was cleaned off by Kristy and me and I think this is where I moved some things from around him.  I also figured out I hadn't smacked him.

I wanted to kill him but I didn't want him die from a fall.  That makes perfect sense.

And so go the stories of the lunatic on the floor with legos, can't put batteries in straight, tangled blanket having, running through the woods with cancer, $14K spending, smart ass. 

That's it.  The batteries and the coffee table.

Gary Chronicles - Event 15 - He broke my car (Related to Event 2 - the Fob)

Did your mother ever say you have busy hands?  Mine didn't.  She just smacked the shit out of them.

The Louk men have busy hands.  If there is a gadget, FOB, dial, shifter, computer, chair, do-da, thingambob,...blah blah blah, they have to touch and play with it and figure it out.

Remember the Fob?  Here is the back story of Gary breaking my car.  Which is why the car didn't start in Florida and it still wasn't the fob.

A perfect sibling car ride.  I, the oldest was driving.  Gary, the next was shotgun.  Kristy, little sister in the back.  Keep that picture in your mind, you'll need it later.

Maybe a 1/4 mile from Gary's house is a gas station and convenience store.  This isn't a convenience store story, this time.  Alabama sits on the surface of the sun so when I pull up to get gas and turn off the car.  I make sure the windows are down.  Gary is moving around a lot.  I peek in the driver's side and ask him if he needs anything.  No, Hopie, I am just looking at everything.  Busy hands.

I get in the car all filled up.  Foot on brake, push button to start. Nothing.  Not one thing.  No flash from the computer, completely dead.  I turn immediately and say LOUK, what did you do?  Nothing Hopie I was just looking at stuff.  (Here is where you need remember where we are all located in the car.) Just as you would expect the little sister from the back seat says HOPIE he pressed the start button like 25 times.  My teeth were gritted, for a visual.

We argue back in forth some, voice(s) raised, at lease mine.  Well, we obvious need to jump start the car.  Of course, we had to do the required, engineer girlsplain and the nurse mansplain. Little sister staying out of it.  She's a smart girl.  It comes to the flash point.

G says he has a little do-da that you charge up and it holds charge and you keep it in the car.  It's awesome.  I said, clearly I don't have that do-da. G says he does, back at the house.  I said, go get it.  Big eyes first.  G says there is a short cut through the woods,  I say, get going, we will be right here.

So 90 lbs soaking wet with a brick in his pock trounces through the woods.  You're probably thinking, she made her dying of cancer wisp of a brother go through the woods to walk home?!  Umm...yeah!  I sure did!  Just because he's dying he isn't any less a busy hands breaking shit.  You broke it.  You fix it.  Also, there was exactly ZERO guilt on my part. 

He rode back on one of his 4-wheelers and the do-dah jump starts the car.  Kristy and I go to Advanced Auto and whatever the other one that is popular. They read codes to see what's up.  I know what's up.  Busy GD hands!  That's what up!  Of course, by the time we got to either of these places the battery had a chance to charge back up a bit.  No codes thrown.  I knew he had shorted out the battery with his busy hands.  We were to leave for Florida the next day.  We would be driving all day and that would keep the battery charged up.  It did.

Anyway, Kristy and I get home from the places and G starts.  This back and forth with comments and questions. It wasn't a calm ask a question, give an answer....nope.

G: what did they say?  What codes came up?  I guarantee some code should come up.  There is a guy I know down the road and that sumbitch will put it on his computer and the right codes will come up.

Me: the battery had time to charge back up some.  No codes came up because of that.  They have the same machine as your guy, I feel certain it is the battery.....then I start to lose a millimeter of control and come undone....

I'm yelling in an escalating fashion: Is it so difficult to believe that perhaps, MAYBE, on an off chance, that you fucking around with it created this problem????  

I need for all of you to know...I was holding so much back.  I really was trying.  I wanted to slap him and shake him cartoon style.

While this is happening Kristy is backing out of the room, Meg takes the dogs and goes into her room and shuts the door.  I'm the only mama left and no one else can talk to him that way.  Poor Meg.  She has been the girl taking the brunt of his labile moods for 2 years. 

So we yell and then don't and then are fine.  Later he is talking to a friend on the phone and I am out of the room.  Kristy hears him say I guess I broke Hopie's car.  YOU SURE DID YOU LITTLE SHIT!

Busy. Hands.

Gary Chronicles - Event 14 - Lego's

Remember last event I mentioned $14K spent in a month?  30 days to be exact.  $14K

So, 6 sets of Lego's.  Apparently the boy loved lego's (this is the first Meg has ever heard of this in25 years) and had always wanted to build things with them.  Who even knows how much these sets contributed to the $14K.  Relatively little in the great scheme, probably.  Know how lego building kits come as a specific thing to build?  A dump truck, plane, tank, something or another Star Wars?  Anyway, 6 sets.

Next were doweled shelving and plastic bins for the lego's to be stored in.  I couldn't understand it.  I don't think the sisters (in-laws and out-laws this time) understood what he was doing either.  So to review we have so far:

    6 builder sets of lego's

    2 tall dowel shelving sets

    Multiple plastic bins

Keep up here.  There will be twists and turns, I promise.  We awoke one morning to find that he had ordered one of those standing tool shelving units.  You know the Craftsman ones with a smaller one on the top and a large one with casters on the bottom?  Those. They are only ancillary to the story, just know they were there.  There was a contentious moment between one of his friends, our sister Kristy and anyone else who was in the room where he wanted the upper tool shelf placed on one of his desks WIDTH length. 

He said long ways on the depth, people who were reasonable said it would hang partly over the edge because the desk wasn't that deep.  Anyway, it ended up the way he wanted.  Now back to our story.

Lego's.  Right.  Boxes were coming in every day.  The three women in the house were irritated on the regular about things coming in from Amazon, but there we were!  The lego sets started coming in.  We would start unboxing these for a few days and there would be these 6 boxes of lego sets.  He wanted everything around him.  Around the recliner that already had two tables with various arms and implements to bring a monitor directly in front of him, drinks in varying stages of waste, a small stand for his phone.  He was surrounded. He wanted the kits around him.  And so it was.

He decided one day that he would start unpacking them.  The outlaw and inlaw and I were having nightmares of little lego's everywhere and one of the dogs eating one and surgery and calamity!  He was still going to unpack them.  He told KRISTY?! to go and get the plastic bins.  She did.  He proceeded to sit on the floor with Kristy and start unpacking all of them.  Envision yourself with each bag of separated parts for you to pull from "a" bag for this part and "b" bag for that part.  You know, separated.  To build it more easily.  Separated.

He began to pull bags apart and start loading lego's into plastic bins.  The women in the room scratching their heads as he just opened each bag and cavalierly tossed them in this bin or that.  When he had done that for an entire building set, he pushed the box aside and opened the next.  THEN he started with the bags again and started pouring them into the plastic bins!  OK, WAIT.  None of the parts were being labeled and he was arranging them in the bins by like pieces.  Kristy had that "WTF are you doing" look on her face.  We asked, why in the world was he removing the organization of these kits and mixing everything up?  There was a good answer, he didn't want to make any of the things in the boxes.  He wanted to build his own things out of the lego's.  WHAT?  It should be said here that he was brilliant and a mechanical engineer.  In another time every woman in the room would have rolled her eyes, lamented his intelligence and walked away.  Right now, though...not so much.

While he and KRISTY!? kept unpacking parts, Meg would hide an unopened box and Kristy did the same when she could get away from the lunatic on the floor with lego's. He managed to get 4 of the 6 boxes open and taken apart before the hiding had concluded.

Those bins needed to be up in his office so the dogs couldn't get into them.  They took up residence next to the big read Craftsman tool box that was hanging off the edge of the desk because he got his way.  They couldn't be around his chair.  Thank the stars.  

Fast forward to me coming home after he died.  I was doing some straightening up.  I got the dust buster out for one reason or another and went to empty the collection chamber.  As it poured into the trash can a yellow lego came rushing out with the dust. The picture was taken and Meg and Kristy got their smile for the day.  That guy.....

Gary Chronicles - Event 13 - The Morning He Decided - Hospice House

My sweet sister just finally read through these.  She said she was back in the room.  We both go back to the room from time to time.

Kristy and I were gone from our homes for 2 months.  2!  That's a long time to not sleep in your own bed. Meg, Kristy and I danced around the question....Jesus Christ how much longer!?

No one wants to have someone die faster, usually.  This is the hospice lesson, questioning how much longer you can keep pace is a very reasonable question.  The whole village, it took all of us to take care of him.  He spent $14K in the last 30 days of his life.  He had brain metastasis meaning the cancer spread to his brain.  He lost sight in one eye.  His hearing was fine one day, for shit the next day, complete with turning the TV up so loud the dust wanted to leave the house!

Getting him to accept hospice was an uphill push.  He kept asking why I was so gung-ho about it.  So, I dropped it until he was ready.  Everyone who came by from hospice was very nice.  He wasn't a huge fan of the social worker.  I think, she thought that social working was social time.  She answered her phone for clearly non-work related calls and he was all done with her.  His consistent nurse case manager was excellent.  She had a great way of making things his idea and presented with options always.  (Married men, you should know that this is a woman skill that has been used on you, repeatedly, and will continue to be, because it works.  This or hearing it out of another man's mouth.) We talked about the in-patient unit for when he was ready.  He stayed resistant to the in-patient unit until he didn't.

On a Sunday, he was having increased pain.  We weren't able to keep up with it and he was frustrated.  We called the hospice and the nurse called us back to triage over the phone.  Luckily, it was his case manager who was on call that weekend so she called us back.  I stayed out of the way and the conversation. The nurse spoke to my sister (the go-between as assigned by Gary) about his pain and getting it getting worse and all the things.  Somehow I got the phone in my hands.  I asked the nurse if she would talk to him directly about the need for the in-patient unit.  She did and she convinced him.  I took the phone back and we scheduled the time we would arrive at the in-patient unit.

So I mentioned to everyone that our scheduled time in would be in about 4-ish hours.  You see, the boy couldn't do anything quickly.  He had to ease into the idea.  Then he had to ease into the idea of the idea happening.  Then he needed to ease into it happening.  Then he had to ease into it being done in a certain time.  Then he had to ease into the idea of getting ready.  You get what I am saying.... this was an amplification of him usually, it wasn't just after cancer came along, that just made it worse.  Ask anyone who knew him...Did Gary need amplification?.... go ahead, take your time, you'll come up with the answer.

Meg asked him if he would like her to pack his backpack for him and he said yes.  She knew what he would want, knew what to pack and did it.  In true Louk form, he then questioned every damned thing she could possibly put in it.  Headphones, pjs, phone charger, on and on.  I won't tell you about the computer equipment he thought he would need.  It's too much.

On the way there he wanted to stop at a convenience store.  Apparently, when he was traveling for work he would stop at these gas station convenience stores and buy an egg salad or tuna salad sandwich.  You know the ones that come in a little triangle package?  So those.  When I look at one of those all I can think about is the misery of a mayo induced case of food poisoning.  **shiver**. So he opted for 2 sandwiches, egg and tuna. I'm still shivering and almost gagging.

Once we arrived at the in-patient unit, Shepherd's Cove, he proceeded to eat BOTH sandwiches in the car before we could go in.  He was riding with Meg so I don't know the conversation around all that, BUT I bet Meg was just doing a lot of nodding.  Just nod and smile and get to the place.  Rinse...repeat.  2 sandwiches.  2.  This is the kid who couldn't drink a whole boost.  2 sandwiches.  Gross ones.  With mayo.  From the convenience store.  Down the hatch like a pelican with its beak strait up and swallowing furiously.  I don't know if he thought no one would ever feed him again or what but, 2.

Louk men are all the same.  They are fun, funny, infuriating, fun loving, infuriating, clever, infuriating, witty.  He walks into the Cove and struts up to the end of the hallway where the nurses station is.  Along the way folks have been telling him that is room is BACK that way.  We passed it. His reply was that he needed to get the lay of the land and find the exits.  **3 sets of eyes rolling**

Once we were in his room, he got settled, the staff came in to introduce themselves and HE told them all the rules.

He knew when he walked through the door he wasn't coming out.  The three of us knew it, too.