Veterans’ Day Parade and G’ma

We decided not to put Stephanie through torture even though she volunteered to take g’ma to her doctor’s apptmt.  As a result we stayed in town for my rare day off.  Bruce wanted to go to the Veterans Day parade downtown San Jose, a tradition of sorts for all of us when the kids were little.  So we went and I brought my knitting and watched most of the parade.  We waved at the dignitaries and the military brass.  It was fun.  Not a very big crowd, but we got to see the giant flag put into place by the firemen.  Around 1:15 ish we left and went to get Grandma for her doctor’s apptmt.

Her apptmt was for 2:15 ish and we sat around and then left her apt.  It was with her primary care doctor, Bo Lee, Korean of course.  G’ma had been in pain for a few days and finally, have relented to see the doctor, but not emergency, even planned the apptmt for the pm so Stephanie could sleep in.  OMG – Dr. Lee couldn’t figure out what was the problem and they chatted (argued/yelled) with each other in Korean.  I interjected here and there with comments like, “is it her kidneys?” “she said that it hurt so bad, that she thought she was going to die…” “is it her gall bladder?”…”did she have a stroke?”…”is it her heart?” …”is it her arthritis?” “no there is no diarrhea or vomitting” “yes, she can move her bowel” 

Dr. Lee said that she looked fine and is in some discomfort but doesn’t look like she’s in a lot of pain and mom agreed.  So he ordered tests which means running around from building to building in the 2 square block vicinity.  First stop, xrays – oh, they moved to another building..get into the car and drive another block and a half; xrays are done – where do we get the EKG done?  No one knew but they suggested Outpatient at O’Connor and so off we went to O’Connor – registration was moved from the OP to the main lobby.  We park and went in to see a room full of people just waiting to register for OP – OMG!!  G’ma was fit to be tied.  She complained to the old lady volunteer in her pink smock and she moved the sticker that had her in the cue to the front and got called in front of 7 other people.

We went into the office to register and according to Bruce, the whole waiting room was in an uproar.  G’ma had pushed her way to the front.  Bruce was livid, I was in shock and G’ma was still muttering.

We went to the Outpatient and got her EKG done.  Then we went to the drug store to get her prescription refills.  Then to another building for her bloodwork.  There was an ambulance and fire engine in front of that building and lo and behold, they were at the bloodwork lab – someone fainted while getting their blood drawn, but regained consciousness.  So after a lot of hemming and hawing they finally got to Mom.  G’ma was on her last thread of patience and was pounding on the walls of the counter to get a worker to take her blood, etc.

Our last stop was with Dr. Lee who wanted to talk to us after the xrays, etc.  He told us that we had gone to the wrong place for the EKG and should’ve gone to the folks where the blood was drawn.  Who the hell would’ve known?  Not G’ma, not me…anyway, xrays shows bm issues, but g’ma protested.  Anyway, so far, no news and no real reason for all her aches and pains. I’m suppose to call Dr. Lee tomorrow around 11:00.  Who the hell knows.

We finally finished everything by 5:30 – OMG what a way to spend my day off!  We ate dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen and went to get gma’s lancome face cream at Nordstroms and went home.  I was unconscious most of the way home.

Bruce is ready to ship her off to Arcadia.  One bright spot – I got a lot of knitting done – a scarf for Miss Cynthia, my TA for Christmas.

100 Million Miracles

We saw the Flower Drum Song on stage (Doreen, Lind, Pauline and I).  A few weeks ago, I got this random phone call from someone calling for the American music theater blah blah group telling me that there was going to to be stage production of the Flower Drum Song and that maybe I’d be interested in purchasing tickets for this show at the San Jose Perf Art Center. 

The paranoia sets in – who are you?  how did you get my number? (from the time I bought Lion King tickets from them) how do I know you are who you say you are? (my superv is sitting next to me, m’am and I can have him talk to you; this is a ph # I can give you for me and you can call me back…) and after some hemming and hawing, I backed down.

I bought 4 tickets thinking that Bruce and I and Pauline and Ron can go, or Me, and Lisa, Nee and someone can go, or pauline and me and whoever we damn well please can go but then, AHA!  Who  would love this FOB story more than Doreen?  So I thought Doreen, pauline, me and Linda would be a great combo.

I then called Doreen to see if she was available and she was in China at the time.  I called Linda and she never called me back.  I called Pauline and she started singing 100 million miracles and I joined in with I enjoy being a girl.  Standby for tickets #3, #4 were Ron, Bruce, Nee, Kay Kay, Jason, Sweetie, David, Brandon, Tara, and whoever else we could think of.

The performance night draweth nigh and finally Linda answers my email and Doreen gets back from Canton and we plan to meet at the Perf Arts Center at 7:30 – Linda’s late as usual, Doreen is trying to feed everyone at Linda’s and Pauline’s cell phone is on silent – I’m waiting for those 3 in front of the perf Art center listening to the scalper next to me, thinking I’m going to be doing that very soon.  Then I decide to call Linda (remember she’s the one who doesn’t answer cell calls) and she answers and says they’re on the way.

We did meet and sat down – great seats very close to the center and 23 rows back – not too far.  It was cheesey in a very planned cheesey way, it was great music, Linda Low character shined, the agent shined, the Nathan Filipino look alike shined; stage set was very SF and made me feel I was at home; the FOB accents weren’t as good as I have heard (“my Fodder said…”), but then I grew up with the best of them; love the Chinese take out boxes for “Chop Suey” and all the costumes!  Very fun, very well done, very sweet and subtle in message.

Doreen loved the film when it first came out; Pauline remembered a lot of the songs and I remembered it all very vaguely.  Linda has never seen it. 

Conversations for the evening:  “He looks like Nathan because he’s Filipino.”  “All the cheap Chinese are here for Cupertino night.”  “She must be Filipino, she’s so good.”  “Yayyy, San Francisco locals.”  “Dad worked at Trader’s Vic.”  “Here are my pictures from my Canton trip.”  “Now we know what to wear for the wedding.”

100 million miracles – one of them getting us all together finally; 2nd miracles – we had such a good time!