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mallorys_cameraSpent four hours yesterday playing with dirt and mucking about with plants:
My first tomato of the year! If it ever stops raining, it might even ripen:
It drizzled the entire time I was out. I didn’t mind. The birds liked it. The insects did not.
###
Then I trotted back to the casa to take L to her physical therapy and do her grocery shopping.
L has been flipping out these past few days.
Like day before yesterday, she called me into her bedroom to look at her leg.
“It’s really swollen, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. Well. You had a knee replacement three weeks ago.”
“But it’s really swollen.”
She wanted me to drive her to Fishkill so she could sit for three hours in the waiting room at Orthopedic Associates, and maybe if one of the PAs had an extra five seconds, he could look at it.
The problem with her plan was that if I drove her, I would have to sit there for three hours, too.
I figured what she was really after was another oxycontin script.
“I can’t tell if it’s more swollen than it was yesterday,” I said. “Why don’t you take some Tylenol and ice it? Then maybe draw a little line in pen around the swelling. That way you can see if the swelling is expanding.”
“I don’t want to draw a line around it,” she snapped.
Yeah? Well. And I don’t want to drive through a violent thunderstorm just so you can hector your doctor for more drugs, I thought.
In the end, Mrs. Neighbor Ed drove her.
But I felt guilty.
###
After I finished the L-related chores, I mosied across the road to welcome Neighbor Ed himself back from Colorado.
“How’s your patient?” Ed asked.
“Not very patient,” I said.
“Pat says she was very grumpy on the trip to the doctor.”
“That’s a euphemism, isn’t it?” I said, and we laughed.
“You know what I don’t understand is why she doesn’t have a physical therapist visiting her at home,” Ed said. “Medicare will pay for that.”
I shrugged. “Doing that presupposes she actually wants to regain mobility. She doesn’t.”
“You don’t think so?”
“Well. I should qualify that. What I think is that it has never even occurred to her that with this operation, her mobility could be better than it was before. I don’t think she’s aiming at anything more than the very limited mobility she had before the operation—but before her leg started flopping out from under her.”
“That’s an interesting perspective,” said Ed. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
“She was actually doing pretty well until Chris began visiting again—”
And I turned the story of drunk Chris and the 24-hour-a-day Turner Classic Movie marathon into a standup comedy riff.
Ed laughed and laughed and laughed.
“She keeps saying, ‘Well, Kurt says it shouldn’t be this swollen—‘” Ed told me.
Kurt is L’s son.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “Well, fucking Kurt. He’s come to visit exactly once. And stayed for exactly five minutes.”
We began talking then about L’s incredibly dysfunctional relationship with her two adult children. At a certain point, though, I cut it off.
“Thing is,” I told Ed, “I am fond of L, but the only reason I know so much about her private life is proximity, you know? Because we live in the same house. I know what I know through osmosis. So, I really shouldn’t know what I know, you know? It’s kinda illicit knowledge because I don’t feel any real connection to her. We’re not really friends.
“Whereas with you—I mean, the reason I know you is because we’re neighbors. But there’s a connection there, a real friendship. I would want to continue knowing you even if we weren’t neighbors.”
“Absolutely,” Ed said. “I appreciate you saying that.”
###
After I talked to Ed, I toddled back to the casa.
I fully intended to do Useful Work!
But for some reason, I was utterly exhausted.
So, I collapsed on my bed, and binged Season 2 of The Bear.
###
Now, I liked Season 1 of The Bear. But I actively disliked Season 2.
Why?
Because while Season 1 is over the top, it’s still grounded in realism. But Season 2 just reeks of PoMo sentimentality.
Case in point: “Yes, Chef.”
In Season 1, “Yes, Chef,” is a refreshing instigation of basic civility in a hostile environment.
In Season 2, it’s like the verbal prompt by which members of some secret cult recognize one another—as best exemplified by that awful episode in which Richie gets sent off to the Finest Restaurant in the World for a week, where he polishes forks, visits with QEII (who knew she moonlighted as a chef, right?) and learns the true meaning of humility and service.
Richie is the most gratuitous character ever. I am totally UNinterested in Richie’s redemption arc. I just want him to crawl out of my Hulu browser and slither far, far away.
And then there was that awful Christmas episode where Jamie Lee Curtis trotted out her best histrionics in a bid to add the next crown to her EGOT press. (I suppose next she’ll star in a musical production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and sing on the original cast recording.)
I guess this is what they would call a “pet peeve”, what with me being Southern Italian and all.
But I’m sick of TV and movie representations of Southern Italian dysfunctionality.
Why is okay to stage an endless parade of screaming Southern Italians any time a movie or TV show wants to seem hip and relevant?
Now, I know there are Southern Italian families that scream at each other.
Just like I know there are Black people who enjoy eating watermelon.
But you can bet you’d never get away with having a Black character eat watermelon on television these days.
My first tomato of the year! If it ever stops raining, it might even ripen:
It drizzled the entire time I was out. I didn’t mind. The birds liked it. The insects did not.
###
Then I trotted back to the casa to take L to her physical therapy and do her grocery shopping.
L has been flipping out these past few days.
Like day before yesterday, she called me into her bedroom to look at her leg.
“It’s really swollen, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. Well. You had a knee replacement three weeks ago.”
“But it’s really swollen.”
She wanted me to drive her to Fishkill so she could sit for three hours in the waiting room at Orthopedic Associates, and maybe if one of the PAs had an extra five seconds, he could look at it.
The problem with her plan was that if I drove her, I would have to sit there for three hours, too.
I figured what she was really after was another oxycontin script.
“I can’t tell if it’s more swollen than it was yesterday,” I said. “Why don’t you take some Tylenol and ice it? Then maybe draw a little line in pen around the swelling. That way you can see if the swelling is expanding.”
“I don’t want to draw a line around it,” she snapped.
Yeah? Well. And I don’t want to drive through a violent thunderstorm just so you can hector your doctor for more drugs, I thought.
In the end, Mrs. Neighbor Ed drove her.
But I felt guilty.
###
After I finished the L-related chores, I mosied across the road to welcome Neighbor Ed himself back from Colorado.
“How’s your patient?” Ed asked.
“Not very patient,” I said.
“Pat says she was very grumpy on the trip to the doctor.”
“That’s a euphemism, isn’t it?” I said, and we laughed.
“You know what I don’t understand is why she doesn’t have a physical therapist visiting her at home,” Ed said. “Medicare will pay for that.”
I shrugged. “Doing that presupposes she actually wants to regain mobility. She doesn’t.”
“You don’t think so?”
“Well. I should qualify that. What I think is that it has never even occurred to her that with this operation, her mobility could be better than it was before. I don’t think she’s aiming at anything more than the very limited mobility she had before the operation—but before her leg started flopping out from under her.”
“That’s an interesting perspective,” said Ed. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
“She was actually doing pretty well until Chris began visiting again—”
And I turned the story of drunk Chris and the 24-hour-a-day Turner Classic Movie marathon into a standup comedy riff.
Ed laughed and laughed and laughed.
“She keeps saying, ‘Well, Kurt says it shouldn’t be this swollen—‘” Ed told me.
Kurt is L’s son.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “Well, fucking Kurt. He’s come to visit exactly once. And stayed for exactly five minutes.”
We began talking then about L’s incredibly dysfunctional relationship with her two adult children. At a certain point, though, I cut it off.
“Thing is,” I told Ed, “I am fond of L, but the only reason I know so much about her private life is proximity, you know? Because we live in the same house. I know what I know through osmosis. So, I really shouldn’t know what I know, you know? It’s kinda illicit knowledge because I don’t feel any real connection to her. We’re not really friends.
“Whereas with you—I mean, the reason I know you is because we’re neighbors. But there’s a connection there, a real friendship. I would want to continue knowing you even if we weren’t neighbors.”
“Absolutely,” Ed said. “I appreciate you saying that.”
###
After I talked to Ed, I toddled back to the casa.
I fully intended to do Useful Work!
But for some reason, I was utterly exhausted.
So, I collapsed on my bed, and binged Season 2 of The Bear.
###
Now, I liked Season 1 of The Bear. But I actively disliked Season 2.
Why?
Because while Season 1 is over the top, it’s still grounded in realism. But Season 2 just reeks of PoMo sentimentality.
Case in point: “Yes, Chef.”
In Season 1, “Yes, Chef,” is a refreshing instigation of basic civility in a hostile environment.
In Season 2, it’s like the verbal prompt by which members of some secret cult recognize one another—as best exemplified by that awful episode in which Richie gets sent off to the Finest Restaurant in the World for a week, where he polishes forks, visits with QEII (who knew she moonlighted as a chef, right?) and learns the true meaning of humility and service.
Richie is the most gratuitous character ever. I am totally UNinterested in Richie’s redemption arc. I just want him to crawl out of my Hulu browser and slither far, far away.
And then there was that awful Christmas episode where Jamie Lee Curtis trotted out her best histrionics in a bid to add the next crown to her EGOT press. (I suppose next she’ll star in a musical production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and sing on the original cast recording.)
I guess this is what they would call a “pet peeve”, what with me being Southern Italian and all.
But I’m sick of TV and movie representations of Southern Italian dysfunctionality.
Why is okay to stage an endless parade of screaming Southern Italians any time a movie or TV show wants to seem hip and relevant?
Now, I know there are Southern Italian families that scream at each other.
Just like I know there are Black people who enjoy eating watermelon.
But you can bet you’d never get away with having a Black character eat watermelon on television these days.
no subject
Date: 2023-06-28 07:12 pm (UTC)I'm glad you have some boundaries w/L.
(PS, Framed is on Netflix)
no subject
Date: 2023-06-29 12:21 pm (UTC)I'm glad you have some boundaries w/L.
Oh, I definitely do. But you know. The people who should be doing (her kids) are not doing. So, I feel bad for her.
no subject
Date: 2023-06-28 11:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-06-29 12:18 pm (UTC)