Busy bee
This is going to be a busy week for lazy Me. In fact, that seems to be the theme of the year so far; at least, the first few months of it. My stepmother is visiting in March; I’m going to Boston to see that exhibit, also in March; my sister Beth and her daughter are visiting in April; and John & I are hoping to finally go and visit his family in Canada in May. What with one family-related emergency or another, I have failed to visit them since 1994, which is why I have yet to win the Daughter-In-Law of the Year award, despite my many winning qualities.
Here is what the next week or so looks like for me:
Monday, January 13: Work until early afternoon, then take bus to airport to pick up Mom when she returns home from her month-long stay with my older sister Beth in England. Take cab home, try to entertain her and not get immediately annoyed (see New Year’s Resolution #1).
Tuesday, January 14: Try to get through morning without Mom driving me crazy. I think I’ll take her out for breakfast and pick up the cleaning on the way home. At noon, hand her over to my aunt/godmother, who will drive Mom home where my sister Megan will meet them and I’m betting take everything out of the car and into the house, and do all the unpacking and any other menial chores that have to be done.
While Meg’s doing that, I’ll be getting my nails done, etc., in the spirit of New Year’s Resolution #2 (“Do Things for Suzy”) and to look as presentable as possible to my colleagues from all over the world who have been forced to assemble in Chicago in the dead of winter. Oh. They might be more concerned with trying not to freeze to death than my grooming standards, but why take the chance?
Wednesday, January 15: Get up early enough to do last minute packing and get to airport by 7 a.m. Repair to Red Carpet Lounge and consume sufficient amounts of drugs and alcohol to get on plane. Drink anything offered once on plane. Find New Yorker article sufficiently distracting to take mind off imminent possible death.
If I survive, I should be at the hotel late afternoon. Hopefully, drunken stoned stupor will have abated sufficiently to enable me to hold up my side of a coherent conversation with Kelly. If not, she’ll have amusing anecdotes for her faithful readers and/or sufficient blackmail funds to enable her to move back to Canada in style.
January 16 & 17: Stultifying boredom of conference, with mandatory dinner on Thursday night. Make an appearance and get out of there before the bar hopping begins. I can’t understand why anyone does that. Everyone sees you acting stupid, and you hear about for years to come, and I mean years. For example, one guy got so drunk six years ago that he mistook the manager’s office in a bar for the men’s room. See? Still talking about it.
January 18 -20: See the sights and hopefully get home in one piece.
January 22: Beth arrives from England to take care of Mom while Mom has thoracic radiation. This is a very intensive process and will be more debilitating than the usual radiation, so Mom will need care 24/7 for at least a week. Since Beth still has 3 weeks vacation left over from last year – I’m not kidding, and am convinced that all that vacation time is the major reason there are so few English serial killers – she volunteered. I am beginning to think she is a candidate for sainthood. She has Mom for a month over the holidays, then a week after Mom leaves, Beth makes the 11 hour flight to come here and take care of her for 2 weeks.
Both of my sisters are so much nicer than I am! But hey – I make them look sooooo good!
January 13th, 2003 at 1:35 pm
I’m tired just reading about all that.
=)
Have fun in Chicago, I’ll be fleeing to Whistler while you are in my neck of the woods. I’m sure you’ve had people tell you this already, but it was BEAUTIFUL and WARM here last week and now it is GODFORSAKEN again. Hopefully it will warm up a bit when you are here!