Day Four of My Vacation from Parkinson's Disease (The Final Day)

Thursday, March 1, 2012, Day Four of my vacation from Parkinson's Disease started way, way too early.  It was after midnight before I got to sleep and I woke up at 4 am. We didn't need to pick Lynn up until later, so I let my Wonderful Husband sleep in.  I played on the computer and started writing this series of humor stories.  
Lost? Read Day One and Day Two and Day Three

We picked Lynn up at her hotel at 10 am and she and her Dad posed for some pictures, then we headed through the desert towards Phoenix, 200 miles away.  We stopped at In-N-Out Burger and grabbed a bite and then fought our way through the traffic and dropped Lynn off at the airport.  It was a tearful goodbye for all of us.  Lynn is his only daughter.

I  always drive in the big cities because I was born with MapQuest pre-installed in my brain's hard drive.  On the way out of the airport, my brain's hard drive froze and I took the wrong exit.  I didn't have a map with me, so I had to keep taking exit after exit until I got headed towards home. Needless to say, getting out of Phoenix was a huge nightmare and totally stressed me out.  By the time we got to Gila Bend (a town in the middle of nowhere), I had enough.  I pulled over and my Wonderful Husband drove the rest of the way home through 100 miles of desert and cactus.  


We got home about 5:30 pm and I crashed, I just had to lay down.  An hour later, we ate the rest of the subs we'd bought the night before and I put on my jammies and flopped on the sofa.  Lynn called when she got home, which was 9:00 pm our time and I went to bed soon after.  


My Wonderful Husband asked me if I missed being around people my own age (Lynn is a few years younger than me) and doing his Daughter's kind of fun.  Hell no! was my answer.  I may look like I'm in my 30's, but I'm actually 51 and most days I feel like I'm 80 or 90.  

So, after my 4 day vacation from Parkinson's, I still haven't caught up and it's a week later. 

Maybe I need a vacation?
  
PS  I've still got the tan!







Thank you for reading this story, I hope you enjoyed it. This is just one of a hundred stories in my book, Parkinson's Humor - Funny Stories about My Life with Parkinson's Disease. Please consider purchasing a copy from Amazon.com or your favorite online book seller. Thank you and have a Happy Parkie Day!

Day Three of My Vacation from Parkinson's Diesease

Wednesday, February 29th, 2012, Day Three of my vacation from Parkinson's disease started early, at 5 am with terrible leg cramps again.  IF you are lost read Day One and Day Two

Before the spray

Lynn wanted to get some tan while she was here, but the weather wasn't cooperating, so I called and made appointments for both of us at Sprayed Rayz, to get spray tanned. It would be a "girls" thing (her Dad stayed home). I picked her up at the hotel at 11 am. Neither one of us had ever done this before, so I went first. Jonna was patient with me and managed to follow along with my wiggling body (the dyskinesia didn't get the NO PD memo either) and then it was Lynn's turn. The instructions were to wait six to eight hours before rinsing off and we looked like we had rolled in mud. 


What the heck, Lynn said. I don't know anyone in this town, let's go pick up my Dad and go eat, so we did. He said he'd never had lunch with two pretty mud wrestlers before (ha ha, his attempt at humor). We ate at our favorite local Italian restaurant, Da Boyz and then we went over to a casino nearby.

all tanned up

Since Lynn was a new casino visitor, they gave her $10 to play with.  I'm not sure, but I think she won enough with their money to pay for most of her Mexico treasures. After awhile, it was approaching "rinse the mud off" time so we headed back to the house, stopping to pick up some Subway sandwiches on the way. I rinsed off first and was pleasantly surprised at how natural my new tan looked (not to mention the lack of tan lines, hee hee). Lynn rinsed off next and she was just as pleased.  


We spent our last evening together just sitting around and talking and once again, we took her to her hotel at 11 pm.


I had survived another vacation day from Parkinson's and I was tan, can't get much better than that.

Thank you for reading this story, I hope you enjoyed it. This is just one of a hundred stories in my book, Parkinson's Humor - Funny Stories about My Life with Parkinson's Disease. Please consider purchasing a copy from Amazon.com or your favorite online book seller. Thank you and have a Happy Parkie Day!

Day One of my vacation from Parkinson's Disease

On Monday, February 27th, 2012 at 4:30 am, I decided to take a vacation.  My step-daughter, Lynn, who is nearly my age was coming for a visit and I decided that I would NOT have Parkinson's Disease for the four days she would be here.  

Montelucia Resort

We left the house at 7 am and drove 182 miles to the 4-star Resort in Scottsdale AZ where she had spent the weekend on business (she had flown in on Friday from Orlando FL). The first 165 miles were easy (nothing but desert and cactus), the last 17 miles weren't. She showed us around the resort and treated us to a late breakfast.  The service was excellent as was the food, but they had trouble locating a straw for me (I guess most people don't use straws at breakfast). My shaky hands apparently didn't get the NO PD memo.  We left right after eating and headed back home, the first 20 miles were terrifying and stopping for gas was just your average nightmare.  

An hour or so later, we stopped in Gila Bend, AZ, and had an ice cream cone, took a bathroom break and snapped a picture of the town's humorous Welcome sign.  Lynn was beginning to realize that she was in the middle of nowhere and Yuma was only 100 miles farther into nowhere.

Freida's yummy cake

We arrived at our house at 3:30 pm and I wanted a nap, but instead, I washed some clothes for Lynn and showed her around our home. At 5:30 pm, we went over to our neighbors for dinner.  Sharon made Cornish Hens, broccoli and rice pilaf and Freida made Caesar salad and Lemon creme cake. I don't know what their Husbands did, probably set the table and dug up the extra chairs.  Lynn was seated next to me and instantly cut up my Hen so that I could eat it (she remembered my troubles with knives).  

 We sat around gabbing and telling stories and then we played a game where we each drew a picture of a pig and learned all about ourselves from our drawings.  My piggy looked like he was doing a wiggle dance.  Then I taught everyone how to draw a swan by making a number 2 and Freida showed us how to draw a 3-dimensional box. 

How to make a swan from a number 2

Pretty soon it was late (for us) and we drove Lynn to a nice hotel nearby (not a 4-star resort, but nice).  We decided she'd be more comfortable there, especially with me wandering around the house in the middle of the night.  


By the time we got back home, it was 11:30 pm and I was ready for bed.  I had been up for 19 hours.  I had survived Day One of my Parkinson's vacation.

Thank you for reading this story, I hope you enjoyed it. This is just one of a hundred stories in my book, Parkinson's Humor - Funny Stories about My Life with Parkinson's Disease. Please consider purchasing a copy from Amazon.com or your favorite online book seller. Thank you and have a Happy Parkie Day!