A long weekend. Monday is a day off for Remembrance Day. I went a step further and took some vacation time on Friday and Tuesday to give me a five day weekend. The plan was simple: finish patching the holes in the floor upstairs. Certainly I could do that in five days. Well, here I am, past the half way point of this time off, and I am yet to so much as set a foot on the stairs, never mind get any work done. Hope isn’t lost yet, but it’s fading fast.
Friday
My daughter was in school. My wife had the day off from her job for Remembrance Day, but she was going to be running errands. I had the house to myself with no distractions in the morning. The plan for the day was to bring in the patio furniture to store it in the basement for the winter and set things up in the basement for cutting the plywood. I prefer to cut outside to minimize the sawdust in the house, but at this time of year, the weather rarely cooperates and we lose daylight early.
I start the day off hopping on the computer to do some banking and update Quicken. I am obsessed with our finances as we try to climb out of the hole we’ve dug for ourselves, especially since we had the plumbing done in the summer. After checking my email, it is coming up on 10:30. I track down my old sweats and t-shirt and start changing when the phone rings.
It’s my wife. She has the brilliant idea of going out for lunch– just the two of us– since we both have time off and the kid is in school. At first, I want to say “no.” I really want to get some work done. But it is rare that we have a chance to spend some time together without the kid. So my wife came back to the house to pick me up and we went out for lunch. Afterwards, we wandered around some of the shops and even sat in the park for a while.
When we got home, I took care of the patio furniture until the school bus rolled up. I still haven’t taken everything downstairs.
Saturday
Hockey day. My daughter plays hockey. It’s only one day a week for one hour. It may not seem like much, but you have to tack on at least half an hour before and half an hour after for changing in and out of her equipment. By the time we get home, it’s usually close to 1:00. This week, we stop on the way home to get our groceries.
Saturday afternoons, my wife and kid go to my Dad’s house (a minimum 20 minute drive) to do housekeeping and laundry. Sometimes I go with them and do my Dad’s grocery shopping while they clean. It had been couple of weeks since I’d gone, so I *should* go this week. At this point, I know that I will not be working on our house at all.
As it turns out, my Dad had a minor medical condition requiring attention. He had seen his family doctor who was unable to refer him to a specialist until next week (I’m not the only one who likes five day weekends) and suggested he go to emergency. Dad spent about seven hours there into the wee hours of Friday morning. He had the necessary treatment and was instructed to return Saturday.
I take him back to emergency and we spend about 4 hours there. We leave with instructions to return Sunday morning. It is after 7:00 when my wife and I leave Dad’s house and after 8:00 by the time we have our dinner.
Sunday
I take Dad back to emergency as he was instructed. We are only there for a couple of hours this time. The paperwork has been submitted for a home care nurse, so he will not have to return to emergency. The medical issue should be completely resolved in a few more days. I take Dad home and then go out to get his groceries. I return to our house around 1:30.
Partly as a means of saying thank-you, partly as a means of wishing my wife a Happy Birthday (she is celebrating her 8th anniversary of turning 29 later this week), and partly because it’s been a while since we’ve all gone out together, my Dad invites us out for dinner. We meet him at the restaurant at 5.
Maybe Monday?
With the wife at work and the kid at school and my dad not requiring any further medical attention until Tuesday, it appears at this point that I have Monday to myself. Unless I get distracted by the stack of dirty dishes in the kitchen or the piles of leaves outside, I might actually get something done. It could happen….