Way Behind

GONE MISSING:  There's been a dearth of posts this week. Apologies. I was in the hospital.

No, no - not an admitted patient myself, but was hanging out and helping out as I could while someone else underwent a procedure.

The hospital was Providence, in north Everett. Big place, well appointed. 

Each and every nurse we encountered was terrific. Seriously. They were all so different, age, gender and other- but they had two qualities in common: They were good at their jobs technically, and they had great bedside manners.

What wasn't so good is we arrived at the hospital at 7:20, got the patient admitted by 7:40 a.m. .... and then the procedure, scheduled for 10 a.m. didn't happen until 7:30 p.m.!!! And let me tell you, it felt like even longer than 12 hours. My god. We got our hopes up around 12:30 when the surgeon stopped by and said there had been some emergencies, but he was ready now and he'd see the patient in a few minutes. "Fast" forward SEVEN more hours (and a few more emergencies later), and it finally went down.

After another couple of hours of waiting room "action," we were told it was over and it went well. And the surgeon said he still had two more procedures to do that day. That's downright ridiculous, if you asked me.

I get that emergencies happen, but I don't know why you schedule a surgeon for a full day of surgeries, but you also have that same person be the on call guy for everything coming into the ER. It just makes no sense to me. We finally got home about 11, and I went to bed at 1, only to wake up at 4. Instead of fighting it, I just finally got up at 5 and Day 2 began. We were back to the hospital by 7:20.

Naturally, the second day was more of the same - waiting on the doctor for discharge.

The patient was more than ready to go home in the early a.m., but the surgeon never did show up. At least he had a physician's assistant making his rounds. She showed up about 1, and we finally left the hospital at 2. 

While it was , of course it was worth the wait. The patient is recovering nicely, and we're all glad to have that in the rearview mirror. 

I had to laugh, when Christian sent me a nice photo of Mt. Rainier taken from our place. The accompanying words were "My view right now." 

In return, I sent him this photo, with the same phrase.

Good times. ;)

FULL HOUSE: This weekend was busy, as we had a house full of company again. Christian's dad, stepmother and younger brother stayed with us Saturday evening. Saturday afternoon we all went to Queen Anne to watch Christian's brother's lacrosse game. That was really entertaining, as always.

Afterward, it was back to our place for 9 pounds of corned beef and some Reuben sandwiches. (No, we didn't eat all of that, it's just how much I pressure cooked, using two pots. So good!

We went for a little stroll after dinner, to a park on the south end of Lake Washington.

As you can see, it was a lovely sunset on Saturday night.

Sunday afternoon, we went to another park. This time it was in the Rainier Beach neighborhood of Seattle. The occasion was an afternoon of music, food and fun at Detective Cookie's Chess Park.

Annabelle was a guest of honor, as she designed the logo for the park's official t-shirts.

A couple of people even asked her for her autograph. :)

Here's a photo of Annabelle and the park's namesake, Detective Cookie. She has been encouraging Seattle area kids to play chess for years and years.

And here's the detective in action, playing chess with a youngster.

Below, Annabelle stands as she's recognized for her artistic efforts. You can see CJ was applauding. :)

 Speaking of CJ, this is what he looks like when he's killing you in a chess match.

Did I mention there was free pizza?

All in all, a fun hour in the park.