Like Sand Through the Hourglass

So are the Days of my Life. Life here on the 5A ward is ..........amusing and entertaining. First off, I've joined the March of the Old People. At 11:30 every day I can be found shuffling my way along with all the other shufflers, to the lunchroom. While I started off as one of the slowest shufflers, I'm now one of the faster ones. It goes without saying that I'm one of the youngest whipper snappers of the group. Gary, my roomie from the other hospital, is one of the younger ones too and there is one other guy who is around our age, maybe even younger. But as for the rest, the crowd has to be 20 years my senior.

At times I can't tell whether I'm living in a sitcom or the Twilight Zone. The cast of characters is quite fascinating. There is one older gentleman who dearly loves his ketchup and I'm trying to figure out who he looks more like - Mr. Burns or Apu - both from The Simpsons. Although I think I'll have to go more with Mr. Burns. The first time he shuffled in, I wanted to yell out "Mr. Burns!?!?" but thought better of that idea.

Then there is this rather odd older lady named Penny. Most of the time she seems perfectly fine, but then something will set her off and you can't help but look at her twice to see if she's joking or a few bats flew out of her belfry. A couple of days ago I was doing exercises with a small group of other shufflers (and weren't they interesting - they were designed for people in their 80's and lets just say I didn't work up much of a sweat - but hey - it's not like I'm getting a lot of workouts and every bit helps) and Penny was one of them. She looked at one of the other shufflers - a very sweet old English lady and proceeded to ask the sweet English Lady why she kept following her. She must have asked about 7 or 8 times. Since the sweet old English Lady was in the room first, the following bit confused me.

Of course there is Grumpy Old Guy. They are all old, but this guy is grumpy along with being older. Then there is the cheerful funny lady in the souped up wheelchair. This wheelchair is top of the line - power and it can go up and down with the push of a button. I do believe I have a slight case of wheel chair envy. The one I have is just a plain old everyday one that you have to use your arms to make it move. It is a funky green colour though.

The music they play at lunch is not my cuppa though. Patsy Cline, George Jones, Big Band - I think I could quite happily do without listening to any of that. Yesterday though the nurse put on the radio rather than a DVD and I chuckled to myself when I heard Telephone by Lady Gaga and Beyonce. Lord I've missed that music!!!!!!!! I gave the nurse a thumbs up. I was very tempted to try and lead the shufflers in a group dance, but thought they would probably turn me down. But sometimes it's just so hard not to break out into song - songs I listen to - like Black Eyed Peas, Lady Gaga, Adam Lambert etc. So when I heard the Lady Gaga/Beyonce song I gave the nurse a thumbs up.

Time has lost all meaning here. Someone could tell me it's Tuesday and I'd believe them and the next person could say it's Friday and I'd believe them too. It's an odd feeling this - being so unplugged from the outside world.

They have a hairdresser in the hospital and I had my hair done yesterday. What another bizarre experience that was. I had to be wheeled to it - it's down several floors and so far I haven't walked quite that far yet. The hairdresser was asking me how my hairdresser did my hair and I said she usually washed it, cut it, blow dried it and then used a flat iron to straighten it. The hairdresser said that she didn't have any of those new things (meaning a flat iron) I was rather startled at that as to me it's a tool every hairdresser just - well - has. But considering the average age of her clients is probably around 70 and many of them don't have a full head of hair, I suppose a flat iron isn't called for that often. She said she had brought in a curling iron from home since she uses that once in a while. The whole thing was just so strange. It was like I was in a beauty parlour from the 60's or something. She washed my hair and cut it - just a very, very small token amount - and then got a brush to blow dry

it. And she only had one brush!!!! Any hair dresser I've gone to has tons of them depending on the style. But nope - she only had one - and it wasn't a round brush. Still - considering the tools she had on hand and the fact that she probably hadn't done hair on someone as young as me for ages and ages, she did a pretty good job. And I had one of my kids bring me up my flat iron and make up and I straightened my own hair and made myself purty this morning - why I'm not quite sure - but it does make me feel more myself.

And in other news, they weighed me the other day. It was exactly a week before that when I moved to this hospital and they weighed me then too. So in one weeks time, I managed to lose 20 lbs!!! Mind you, that was 9/10'ths water I think. I'm on water pills and

the amount of time I have to check out that particular room is more than any other combined. I mentioned a while ago that my feet had swollen up like blow fish when I was in Florida. Well, by last week my whole body had. But still it was nice to hear that I dropped that much weight in such a short amount of time. I've been trying very hard to eat healthy while here. I order vegetables (blech) and everything. And I go for physio/exercising every day. The physiotherapist found a follow-up physiotherapist at a gym near where I live so when I get out and go home, I think I'll join the gym so I can continue to exercise.

Well, that's about all I have to report. Oh - my going home day is Sept. 29/10 - next Wednesday. So that's not that far off now. Then my days living in Twilight Zone will be over and you know what? I'll miss them.