A wonderful feast of deep fried turkey followed by a horrible night’s sleep. That was Thanksgiving 2010.
T.J. purchased a deep fat turkey fryer, did the water test on it to see how much oil it would take to fry the turkey, then noticed a crack in the seal just below the spigot. A quick trip to Bass Pro Shop (which was open for the holiday) and an exchange solved that problem, and later that afternoon we were feasting on delicious deep fried turkey and watching the Cowboys lose to the Saints.
At around 8:30 I started to notice the piles of sand building up at Gail’s feet from where the Sandman was beating her and beating her and beating her, so I took the doggies outside for their final sprinkle and we went to bed.
Raven beat me to my bed, laid down at the foot of it and looked at me as if to say, “So, where YOU gonna sleep tonight, Jug Butt?” I told her to get down, she blatantly ignored me. I got in under the covers and tried to shove her off. She… would… not… move. If anyone ever tries to downplay the stubbornness of border collies, don’t listen to them. She finally jumped off my bed and onto Gail’s — she was still getting herself ready. She wouldn’t move for Gail, either, but Gail is more compact than I and they were able to co-exist.
And then, I laid there. And laid there. And laid there. With snippets of songs running through my mind. Not even whole songs. Just snippets.
“Now this is the tale of our castaways, they’re here for a long, long time… Now this is the tale of our castaways, they’re here for a long, long time… Now this is the tale of our castaways, they’re here for a long, long time… Now this is the tale of our castaways, they’re here for a long, long time… Now this is the tale of our castaways, they’re here for a long, long time… Now this is the tale of our castaways, they’re here for a long, long time… Now this is the tale of our castaways, they’re here for a long, long time…”
YOU do that for several hours and try to retain a shred of sanity. Go on! I dare you!
The thing is, I took my sleeping pill. I took my clonazepam. But my tummy was so full of turkey and stuffing and taters that I think the food just kinda covered up the pills and kept them from being absorbed into my bloodstream. It’s almost 10am the following day. I’m still full. (Delayed gastric emptying is a classic condition of Parkinson’s.)
Got up, had coffee, took a shower, brushed my teeth, gargled, almost drowned in Listerine. And a worse death I cannot imagine. If you can think of a way to get a good gargle going with your chin tucked, submit your ideas to me, we’ll develop them and submit for the Nobel Prize in Medicine. But as soon as I started gargling, my epiglottis said, “Well, enough of this crap,” opened up and let the Listerine into my windpipe. It was less of a gargle than it was a gaggle. I’m still hacking up Listerine-flavored phlegm.
So… how’s YOUR day going?
(For More of This Kind of Story, Check Out my New Book, “Put On Your Parky Face.” See the Chapter Excerpts, then buy the book. 100 percent of profits donated to the National Parkinson Foundation and the Charles DBS Research Fund at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.)
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