Fair Swap

I'm doing a fairly good of of shoulder #2  healing, despite  certain uses still making it ache. I'm way down on tylenol most days, or even off if it's been an easy day. Of course with ferrying things for Steve back and forth it has become a useful part of my pill regimen again. Tomorrow is supposed to be my final appointment with my surgeon, where he puts in orders for my PT to start. But well as it's doing, there are still things I can't/won't accomplish.

I realized with the driving all around I've been doing lately that I likely needed oil in the car, or at least to get it checked. I keep one spare bottle in the back just for top-ups. The problem is that these days I can't  open the hood. Besides, somehow every time I buy another vice grip needed to open the cap after the mechanics have finished with the oil, the next time I go to find one, it's managed to "walk away".  

Mind you, I'm not pointing any fingers. I don't have any suspects like we did in Arizona when beads I know I dropped got lost forever, I could blame the cockroaches there for coming out to play soccer with them while we were sleeping. Not only do we never see cockroaches here the way we did there, but I simply cannot imagine them even as a troupe towing away a vice grip. Not claiming here I know everything about them, but just saying they're unlikely to be responsible.

The point is I still can no longer do some things I'd do regularly a couple years back.

It occurred to me this morning, in the middle of errands with several more coming up in the next few days  before the holiday that I likely needed to top up the oil before putting a bunch of miles on the car. With no time for an oil change and no likely openings for what requires an appointment these days to even get one in the shortened week, I'd better go for plan B,

I drove the few miles to my son's house after supper, asked him to please open the hood, check the levels, and put the last full can in before letting me know how low I might still be. I still needed a bit more, so there was a drive to pick up more than I needed just then to top it, in order to have some for next time. 

In exchange, I did one of the things I still can do with a single shoulder in good shape, pull weeds out of his garden. It's a job he'd prefer to ignore, but he happens to have a large section of already tall ones which I know from years of experience are easily persuaded to release their grip on the soil... most of the time. Parts of his garden are now emerging into view.  I left him a couple nice piles of them before I drove off the final time for both of us to do whatever for ourselves in what remained of the evening in our own homes. 

Steve as expected is still in the rehab facility, recovering from the day's strenuous PT and OT, perhaps with energy left to read a few pages in one of the several books he asked me to bring, or possibly to look for any watchable TV leading up to a holiday weekend. He was really tired and in pain as I'd left earlier, working as hard as he is to get himself out of there and home again. Yesterday was easier on him, leaving him time to join the blackjack table, where all play for fun, not money. I don't think he's played more than a couple times since he retired as a dealer. 

At least today when he wasn't up for much of anything, one of the staff handed him an alternate menu where he can order ala carte foods instead of the same three meals every day. He was saying something about a BLT when I left after dropping off his laptop earlier. He was happy for the change, but we both knew he'd really have preferred BATs, where instead of lettuce there is fresh mashed avocado, not just tastier but providing the occasional shocked reaction to the uninitiated along with a chance to let them know what they've been missing in their sandwiches all their lives. Hey, some days fun is where you can make it.