I don't know why it still surprises me, but sometimes it sure feels like time flies. Just yesterday it seems like it was January and now here we are in March. We've had a break from the snow for a few days, but the forecast continues to call for more storms. At least the roads have had a chance to thaw out in between rounds of snow this time. There were a couple dicey drives to work in the last week. One day I was ten minutes late even though I'd left quite a bit earlier than usual.
For once, this week I was not the one having a bad week, but man did my dad have a doozy of one. First, he got into his car to start it and then when he stepped out to clear the ice and snow from it, the doors locked all by themselves. He had to call a locksmith to come out and open it because he only got one key when he bought the car. Needless to say, he went and ordered a second key for his car to avoid having such a thing happen again. Later that same day at work, he had a huge chunk of snow fall onto him and knock his glasses off and break them.
I helped out trying to repair the glasses for at least the short term. He has a lovely piece of tape around the stem for now, but he has to have them for driving at the very least. He hasn't decided yet whether he just wants to live with the taped up glasses for a while or order another pair. Of course, glasses are not inexpensive, but if they aren't going to hold up, he has to be able to see.
Just in case this was not enough, his monthly car payment was returned to him because the stamp had fallen off in the mail. This was returned to him just one day before it was due, so he had to go drop it off in person. He has had a series of bills returned to him over the years with a missing stamp. For some reason, the envelopes he was getting are too slick for the stamps to stick (or maybe he forgot to put one on once or twice, I don't know, he's not that old, but I could see getting in a hurry and forgetting).
Then last night he was watching TV and stood up to go to the bathroom. He coughed once, so hard that it actually caused him to pass out for a minute. My mom and I were standing in the kitchen and heard a loud crash. We ran to the living room to find him sprawled on the floor and unresponsive for a few seconds. Just before I could run and call 911, he regained consciousness and was very disoriented for a minute. After getting up, he realized that he must've fallen onto the corner of the coffee table because he had a big red mark and very painful spot on his back.
I took him to the ER to get checked out and make sure everything was okay. They tested his heart, did an x-ray of his ribs and an ultrasound to check for internal breathing. Everything came back looking all right, and it seems that he just had a vasovagal attack (which is a fancy way of saying that the vasovagal nerve overreacted to the cough and caused him to lose consciousness). After a few hours of waiting for test results, we were sent home with a prescription for pain pills to help him sleep without a massive pain in his side. Basically all he ended up with though was a big contusion on his side.
All of this reminds me of the week of hell I had back in February that included: emergency surgery for Jonesy, my brakes going out on my car and then my car refusing to start. I'm glad that I'm not the one having an awful time of it this go round. Prior to that week last year, I also had a foot injury that caused me to miss several days of work and a big medical bill of my own. At this point, I'm convinced that my family is just a big magnet for crazy bad luck. I'm not the only one who has had just a string of really awful things happen in a short span of time.
