My interesting couple of weeks...

[jazzypaul]

Damn.

So, Wednesday before last, my grandmother passed away at the age of 95. She had one helluva great run, doing everything from teaching ballet to fighting germans in Algeria. When she came here, she busted her tail to help provide for her four kids, her ten grandkids and six great-grandkids. She was also a fantastic painter and a lover and supporter of the arts. Everything I know about warbling French bistro singers, I know because of her, and while my trio's in the studio, we're cutting a version of Edith Piaf's La Vie En Rose in her honor.

On Thursday before last, the turbo on my car decided to stop working. Now my car that could do 140 is struggling to do 80 downhill. Uggh.

Then on Saturday, my dad broke his ankle in two different places. They put him in a cast, and after looking at it, the doctor decided to operate. So they operated on Monday, and he freaked out coming out of anesthesia. So they decided to keep him an extra day. While they were keeping him, his blood sugar skyrocketed to 550 (he's a type I diabetic, btw), so they had to keep him an extra day. Wednesday morning, all of the sugar and all of the stress to the body causes a heart attack. Once they get that handled, on Thursday, his kidneys "fell asleep." All of the chemicals that they had to pump into his body in order to see everything on the cat scans had shut down his kidneys. Just as they were about to put him on dialysis, they finally started working, although just enough to not worry about dialysis yet. Then on Saturday, he stopped breathing momentarily. So, on came the oxygen mask and some gargantuan air pump which forces you to breathe (but it's not the same as a respirator), and finally yesterday, he FINALLY had a good day. It looks like they're keeping him for another week to keep an eye on him and make sure that nothing else bizarre happens.

But, amongst all of this, there is a bit of good news...my beautiful wife is expecting. We go in for our first doctor's appointment later in the day.

All in all, an interesting couple of weeks to be sure...

[Chuck Nessa]

Best of luck on all fronts.

[Joe G]

When it rains, it pours! Best wishes in everything, Paul.

[Jim Alfredson]

Sorry to hear about your troubles, Paul. But congrats on the little one! That's awesome!

Here's hoping things start to look up for you and the family.

[Dan Gould]

What Jim said.

[brownie]

Quite a lot of bad news but the good news offset this mightily!

Don't want to quibble but this does not sound right...

She had one helluva great run, doing everything from teaching ballet to fighting germans in Algeria.

The German troops never invaded Algeria during WWII. Algeria was run by the infamous Vichy government of France until the November 1942 allied invasion of North Africa. General de Gaulle moved his headquarters to Algiers a bit later.

[jazzypaul]

Quite a lot of bad news but the good news offset this mightily!

Don't want to quibble but this does not sound right...

She had one helluva great run, doing everything from teaching ballet to fighting germans in Algeria.

The German troops never invaded Algeria during WWII. Algeria was run by the infamous Vichy government of France until the November 1942 allied invasion of North Africa. General de Gaulle moved his headquarters to Algiers a bit later.

Brownie,

I'm still figuring out the history here. I do know that she was part of the French resistance against the Vichy government. It's very confusing to figure everything out, because grandma wouldn't talk about this stuff, and so all of the accounts we got of what happened all came from her younger sister, who doesn't speak a word of english outside of "you speak francais!" So, everything came in translation from my aunt and uncle (my french isn't nearly good enough to keep up with her), and stuff was sure to get lost. What I do hear was absolutely fascinating stuff, however.

[brownie]

jazzypaul, wherever it happened your grandmother seems to have had a fascinating life. She obviously was a grand old Lady!