Gooe Deeds? Feh.

Someone once said "no good deed goes unpunished." That's kind of how I'm feeling this afternoon.

I worked my shift at the book store yesterday, Walt picked me up, we came home, I posted yesterday's journal entry, packed up my stuff, got into the car and headed to my mother's. She had called to ask if I could pick up half a gallon of milk and some coffee creamer for her, so my first stop was to the supermarket to buy her stuff.

It was about 9 or so when I got there and when I handed her the stuff she had asked for, she sheepishly admitted that she had forgotten (a) that I was coming (despite three phone calls), and (b) that she had asked me to bring anything, so she had called my cousin and SHE had brought milk and coffee creamer. At least she won't need either of those items for awhile now.

I could see right away that this was not going to be a "good memory" visit. I was very sleepy, for some reason, so I wasn't up for visiting very long, but I answered the questions "what is my doctor's name?" and "why am I seeing him?" over and over again. She also insists she never made this appointment and had not even given the woman on the phone her personal information, though the FIRST thing you do on the phone before you walk to anybody is to give your medical record number.

But we went to the appointment. This was her orthopedist. She has a "trigger finger" which is extremely painful and the pain is eased by a cortisone shot, which lasts about a year. This was her third injection, the last being given in March of 2011, so it was just a routine visit and went without incident, which was a good thing.

I'm still trying to solve the problem of how to get access to my mother's records on line. Kaiser has a web site which I tried to set up for her and--totally my own fault--I screwed up because I forgot which log-in name I had used and which password I had used. I tried to get the password re-set, and it had to be mailed and then that re-mailed password didn't work either. Twice. I gave up, but with my mother's increasing memory problems, I felt it was more important that I stay on top of her appointments, her meds, and access to her doctor.

So this morning I called member services and the person I talked with told me that if I brought my mother to the member services office they could solve the problem for me right there.

Well. Not quite.

First, the member services office had moved. Ironically it is now about three blocks from my mother's house. We met with a rep, who says that no, they can't do anything for me. Nothing. But she did give me the number of their web master (it's an 800 number, so I don't think it's all that special a number!) and told me to call as my mother and see what they could help me with. ("but I never told you that.")

I can't do anything about it until I get my computer back, because all of the information I need to identify me as my mother is on the hard drive. Of course.

So I headed on home before lunch so Walt could have the car to go to San Francisco to meet Mike & Char for the symphony.

There is a road (Hwy 39) that connects Hwy 101 (where San Rafael is) to Hwy 80 (the road to Davis). It takes about 30 minutes to drive across it. Except for today, when there was an accident on 39 and the entire road was shut down, barricaded by Highway Patrol cars. We were all shunted off toward Napa as a detour. It took forever because there was a major accident on that road too. We were stopped long enough for me to send pictures and texts to Walt. When we started moving, it was about 2 mph for a long time.

I didn't really mind because I had my book to listen to and I could see that I would still get home in time for Walt to get the car, so I just relaxed and kept driving and listening.

I got home, gave the dogs their treats and went to turn on the computer. I had left it "shutting down" when I left for my mother's. It never occurred to me that it would not shut down. But it had not.

I finished shutting it down, then fired it up again and it got to the screen that says "Windows is starting..." where it has sat for 3 hours now. I tried starting it in "safe mode," and it starts just fine, but as soon as it gets to that "Windows is starting..." screen it just sits there.

I had been so cavalier about having the desktop with the guru because I had finally gotten my laptop set up so that it behaves like the desktop.

And now it, too, has screwed up on me. I guess when the desktop comes back, I will give the guru the laptop. And will beg and plead with Walt to let me use his laptop in the meantime and continue writing blog entries in HTML code (hoping I have gotten it right here!)

Addicted? Why yes I am addicted, why do you ask?