Text from my sister-in-law:

According to your Mom she’s going to be 20 on her bday this year. When I asked her if she thought she looked 20 and could pass for 20 years old she said yes. I think she might be a little too optimistic this year. 🙂

On this official first day of summer, here is a video of my outing with mom on Sunday. We had a great day! I taught her to open the convertible top and we drove around in the singing. Visited one of my favorite overlooks near her place and got some sunshine and fresh air…

One of the things I find myself doing when I am out in public is teaching people how to talk to my mom now. I don’t mean that because I think she comprehends less. I mean because depending on what you need her to do, you have to change the way you talk to her. For the most part, just asking closed ended questions works and you get a yes or no answer, usually followed by a part of the question you asked. It’s like when you were in elementary school and you had to form your answers to questions in complete sentences.

Q: Do you want a banana?
A: Yes, I want a banana.

Now this works fine most of the time. Until sometimes it doesn’t. Take for example at the dentist’s office. Despite my telling the dental hygienist you need to just tell her to open her mouth or to turn to the right or left. Instead the hygienist kept asking, “Can you open your mouth wider?” Which logically prompted the response, “Yes I can open my mouth wider.” Guess what you don’t want? Someone talking while you have a large metal hooked scraper in their mouth. Or even worse, a mechanical drill toothbrush. After about seven or eight screw ups, the hygienist finally realized asking wasn’t as good as telling and from there the rest of the dentist visit went great.

Except when mom discovered I was sitting in the dentist’s chair and she wanted me to get up:

I was all excited to spend the afternoon with mom today, but no go. When I showed up at 2pm, this is how I found her…

Evidently it’s the curse of the full moon. It was true when I worked in a hospital and it’s apparently true in the nursing home, a full moon messes with everyone’s schedule. So middle of the afternoon mom was unwakeable. I guess if I’d have shown up at full moon 2am I’d have had a chance. I was able to wrestle her sunglasses off of her and put them in her junk drawer. Other than that, I guessed it best to leave her undisturbed.