Tuesday 19 December 2017

Egg Nog On The Carpet

I'm resting my left arm heavily on the pad of my laptop while I type, my right arm too, although not as much. This happenstance is due to my continuing loss of strength in my arms, my left more affected than my right. It is one of the oddities of this illness that I continue to have excellent fine motor control within my fingers while my arms collapse, their strength falling off a cliff.

This kind of loss leads to lots of unusual kinds of problems, situations where one would not expect to need a call for help. Today I wanted to get over to Safeway before writing, to pick up a few things I could not get at Costco or won't buy in supersize. Getting their early in the day was important. The snow is on its way; it began falling at around noon, about the same time as my day began.

I braved the elements, made my way across the street, purchased all my groceries, then came home, all rather uneventfully except for that final slide down the ramp to my garage. Even that was done at low speed, more fun than fear. It was when I got inside my apartment that the true fun began. I came in, moved the big basket with major items sideways off my lap and onto the counter. A break was in order after that effort, so I took a rest as well as taking a moment to check on something in the spare bedroom.

That was when disaster struck.

As I backed out of the bedroom door, I misjudged the door frame, crunching into it, not with my wheelchair but with the bag of groceries still hanging from the left handle of my power wheelchair, the bag of groceries containing my two 2L cartons of egg nog. In fact one of those cartons was the origin of the crunching sound I mentioned a moment ago.

As I repositioned to go into the kitchen where I planned to retrieve the contents out of my shopping bag one at a time, something I can almost still do with my left arm, I noticed a large spill of egg nog all round my wheelchair, on both the bedroom carpet at the doorway as well as in the entryway and hall. I reached round and grabbed the offending carton, removing it from the bag, then driving into the kitchen where I could put it on the counter. Of course the roll into the kitchen meant egg nog all along the floor as I travelled.

Once I get into the kitchen I attempted to remove the shopping bag extant. It was still too heavy for my left arm. So I went with my original place, to remove the articles contained therein one at a time. Except now they were covered with slick, slippery egg nog. I was unable to pick up the other egg nog, nor was I able to retrieve them jug of milk or whatever else was in that bag.

It was at this point I realised I was stumped. I had choice; it's just that none of my choices were good ones. I could just leave the bag and its contents in place until 6:15 PM when my dinner company is expected, asking them to help me clean up the mess. I could attempt some sort of contortion in my wheelchair to get a better grip on things, perhaps leaning backwards to let the bag rest on the floor, releasing the pull weight holding it to the chair, allowing me to clean up from there. Or I could call my elderly neighbours down the hall, the ones struggling with arthritis and Alzheimer's.

I went with calling the neighbours. Pat and Paul showed up a moment later. Pat, ever the organiser, took over the scene, handing Paul a mop with which he began cleanup. Alas Paul's Alzheimer's took over at this point, leaving him to forget water in the mop bucket. The mop itself was damp enough, and the egg fluid enough, that he did managed to soak up the mess. Pat, in the mean time, had taken the bag with the damaged goods and transferred it to the counter, including pouring what remained in the egg nog carton into a jug.

Now all I am left with is the ask of re-wiping the floor, putting away the groceries, and wiping down the counters. While this is still a substantial bit of work for me, I can only imagine with some degree of dread how much it would have taken out of me to tackle this current disaster without the help of my 75 and 87 year old neighbours. It's not the blind leading the blind. It's the frail helping the frail.

For those of you who think I should ask Home Care to help, recall that the HCA for these tasks won't be here until tomorrow morning, meaning sticky floors all night. On top of this, Home Care doesn't wash carpets, nor do I have a carpet cleaner of my own. The remnants tasks are mine to do; I will do them. It's just going to take a while.

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