Sunday, September 20, 2009

A boy and his chicken, a nonagenarian and her Lasix

Bye-bye ugly bananas, hello ugly bird. I mean, hello sweet Caroline! Owen had the name picked out and could not be swayed. I think Caroline is a name for a human child, not an electrocuted turkey vulture, but no one asked me.

She's an extraordinarily unattractive, unfriendly bird. We'll see how this works out.

So, yesterday morning, Owen and I were speeding home from the feed store with Caroline when my mother rerouted us to my grandmother's house. She needed someone to escort her to the urgent care clinic and since we were within thirty miles, tag.

My grandmother: "I always say, look your best when you go to the doctor, even when you feel like you are dying, because if you look good they will want to keep you alive."
 
It turns out, she was not dying, she just needs to be more diligent about taking her pills. Many hours later, we were released into the blazingly hot evening and went straight to a greasy dive much loved by my grandmother. She made me order a beer so she could have a single ounce, which she poured into one of the plastic containers more typically used for catsup.
 
Back at her house, she spent fifteen minutes constructing for Caroline a Rube Goldberg carrying case out of a milk crate, duct tape, newspaper, and the plastic packaging from a jumbo pack of toilet paper.
My husband says that's not a flattering picture of her, but I disagree. Any doctor who saw her building that nest for a scraggly, angry frizzle chicken would want to keep her alive. 

It wasn't how I would have chosen to spend the day, but it had its moments.

5 comments:

  1. Lucky, lucky! What a wonderful looking grandmother! I had to show my beautiful four year old Caroline your ugly, scary Caroline. She was very tickled.

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  2. That's sweet. I love the name Caroline.
    I thought, couldn't he have saved that one for my grandchild?
    The bird is a monster.

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  3. Your grandmother looks wonderful and sounds like quite a character. I wish I felt as chipper as she seems!

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  4. i love the ketchup/catsup container with beer. But i don't believe that's all she drank. Did she really stop at that? And how much salt did she shake into that little cup?

    a great post.

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  5. That really is all she drank. She was too busy putting away the 1/3 lb. steakburger to bother with fluids. Salt was strictly forbidden by the doctor.

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