Iowa to Illinois

Wow. How time flies. Well, there's good news and there's bad news. The good news is that at least one person in this household still has a job. The bad news is, the other person has issues.

Alan went through two weeks of training at Covenant and HATED it. He hates the job, he hates being away from me and he hates the lifestyle. For one thing, he got a horrible trainer who basically sat in the right seat for probably all of an hour and then said, "OK you got it," and went back to the bunk to sleep. Alan was brand new in the truck and it was baptism by fire. He drove to Kansas City and then to Houston and was doing OK. But his next trip was from Texas to California and they were doing a lot of construction work on I-40. It was dark, he was going down a hill on a curve, and he was in a construction lane with jersey barriers on both sides of him (single lane), and he was in the wrong gear. You can't downshift a truck when going down a hill because if you miss a gear you're in the shit with nothing but your brakes to hopefully slow you down. The experience was terrifying for him and after that he was a nervous wreck. He was freaking out every time he got behind the wheel and it was so bad that we made up a story about me getting injured just to get him off the truck.

He joined me in Iowa and took a couple days to get his wits about him. Then he had a go at doing my job and it sucked for him. He worked a week and only sold two pictures. After that, he resigned himself to the fact that he was going to have to get back into the truck or else we're going bankrupt.

So now we're in Edwardsville, IL which is just up I-55 from East St. Louis. He's waiting to hear from his student coordinator to get himself matched up with another trainer. Hopefully it will be someone who will actually take the time to TRAIN him rather than just use him for a log book to get extra miles.

Other from that, there is not much news except that my mom is getting some pretty bad cancers on her skin plus she's been diagnosed with lymphoma. I'll be in Illinois for a month and after that I'll be in the Huntsville/Birmingham, Alabama area which will put me closer to her so that I can help her around the house and help take her to her doctor's appointments. The past year or so she has depended on her sister, Elsie, to be her support for morale but Elsie was diagnosed last month with pancreatic cancer and is not doing well at all. So my mom has lost that last bit of support and she's getting tired. I'm glad that I'll at least be nearby within an hour's drive if she needs anything and I'll be able to spend more time with her and help get things done around the house so she doesn't have to worry about stuff like that.

It has always bothered me that I couldn't be there for her when she needed help and although so many people in the neighborhood always say to just call them if she needs anything, I know how it feels to not want to have to ask. You hate to be a bother to folks. I'm the same way. Like mother, like daughter. It's not that we are too proud to ask, it's that we don't want to impose on people.

Tomorrow Alan and I are going to splurge and spend some money to go see the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. We really can't afford it but opportunities to see historical sights don't come along every day and so we are going to take advantage of it before Alan has to go back to work.

The "boys" are doing fine. I had to shell out over $200 for Gizmo because he got another eye ulcer on the scar that he had from the last one. While he was at the vet I went ahead and got him some more meds for his allergies as he'd run out months ago and his legs were completely bald from his licking, chewing and scratching. He's been on his meds (antibiotics and steriods plus coal tar shampoo) for a little over a week now and the hair on his legs has started to grow back. I have enough steriod meds to last him for a couple months now so maybe I can keep his itchies away long enough for his coat and skin to recover. Poor baby! But now he feels lots better and so do I.