Cheese and onion rolls, chips, salad

I was intending to do a nice positive post today, about how much better mum is without the medication that is meant to help her: how she got up by herself, found her own clothes and dressed herself, talked about the garden, and about the gardener who came on Wednesday – by name, and the correct name at that – and generally acting like a functional human being again.

But then, after I had cooked and served dinner, mum went digging through the crowded fridge and, in the process of declaring that there is “no food”, tipped over the full tub of cream.

It was an accident, it happens, and I went to help clear up the mess. Somehow, though, I ended up doing the majority of the actual cleaning – including washing a chocolate bar under the tap – with mum’s dubious help. At one point I asked her to wet a bit of kitchen paper for me, and the resulting conversation went, from my POV, something like: “can you put this under the tap for me, please? … Err… you need to run the water first… now put the paper under the tap… I meant under the water… now give it to me. The bit of paper. Give the paper to me. It’s in your hand. Give the thing in your hand to me. No, to give it to me. Please.”

After lots of bending and twisting and stretching – and, I will acknowledge, mum’s assistance in washing the cream-covered glass shelves I extracted from the fridge – the fridge was mostly clean. My legs and back were screaming at me, and I audibly winced.

Mum asked if I was OK. I said “not really, I’m in quite a lot of pain”. And she laughed. She laughed.

I said that that wasn’t generally considered the appropriate response to a declaration of pain, and she snorted something about me “always saying I’ve got problems”. Sometimes I think that she just doesn’t now know how to be empathetic. Other times I suspect she never really knew and now just doesn’t bother to pretend.

So… yeah. A good day with a lousy ending. (Oh, and I applied for another flat, this one in Newport. I’ll let you know what, if anything, comes of that.)

Now I’m going to go and find something high in calories, low in nutritional value, and entirely lacking in cream. I don’t think I’ll want any of that particular dairy product again for some time.