Monday, March 18

Decided against going to water aerobics this morning. I felt I needed at least another day or two to get over this cold. So we slept until after 8 a.m. After breakfast, I did do a modified session of stair stepping, resistance bands, and weights exrcises, though.

Hubbie accompanied Mother to our house around 10 a.m., and she worked on her jigsaw puzzle while I got ready for the day. She is nursing a cold, so she's feeling blah, of course.

Hubbie ran errands before lunch, but I didn't accomplish anything for the rest of the morning. After lunch, I reviewed today's ESL lesson. The student called around 1 p.m., thinking that we would not have a session, because this is spring break week at the college. But as it happens, even though students are on break, the library is open all week, as is the administation office.

So we agreed to meet at our usual 2:30 hour. The first thing the student did was inform me that she and her husband will be moving to Florida in three weeks. I hate to lose her as a student, but I fully understand why she must leave. Both she and her husband have jobs awaiting them in Florida.

The purpose for their being here was to take care of her husband's elderly parents. But now the parents will be moving to a nursing home, and their home will be put on the market. So there is no longer any reason for the student and her husband to remain in this area, where there are no professional opportunities them.

I asked if the student wished to continue our sessions, or just head home today, and she preferred to continue as long as possible. She is also interested in finding a tutor in Florida, so I called the literacy council director, and left a message asking her to contact the student.

Our lesson today involved the student reading a story to herself, rather than aloud, as we've done in the past, and then relating the main points aloud. This was an exercise to check her reading comprehension. She did very well, and completely understood the story, which she was able to relate it to me.

She also completed workbook lessons. Even though she's able to comprehend the written word, she has diffuculty with writing practice sentences: for instance, a lesson asked the student to turn statements into questions..."People can steal money from the bank by computer." "Can people steal money from a bank by computer?" "People will use computers at home." "Will people use computers at home?"

She needed to understand that words like "can," "will," "do," and "did," clues the reader that the sentence is a question, rather than a statement. She needs more practice with this.

Future perfect tense sort of stumps her too: "Computers will be used in businesses and at home." She sees "used" as past tense, and it seems odd to her that "will be used" refers to the future.

We finished the session around 4:15, since the library was to close early, at 4:30. At home, Hubbie informed me that the father of a woman we worked with before retirement died last Thursday, and there was to be visitation tonight from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

So I hurried to complete supper preparations. Hubbie had put leftover meatloaf and mashed potatoes into the oven at 4:15, and in my hurry to get supper on the table, I took it out around 4:45. I'd already made gravy to go with it, and sliced bread and fixed coleslaw. So everything was ready early...it also wasn't hot. But we poured hot gravy over it and ate it anyway.

Hubbie accompanied Mother home afterward, and then he and I went to the visitation. This was a well-respected man, so the line was very long to the viewing. We stood there quite a while, mainly for a chance to offer our condolences to the woman with whom we'd worked. The line moved very slowly, though, as the widow spent a lot of time talking with each visitor.

Finally, our friend began moving down the line, talking briefly to each person. When she got to us, she told us that her father, 85, had suffered with Parkinson's Disease, and that recently, it was also discovered that he had four 98% blocked arteries. He also suffered from dementia. The family felt he was in no condition to undergo bypass surgery, so his doctor just put him on medications. Within days, though, he suffered a heart attack and died.

Back home, we watched TV, including this week's episodes of "Vikings," and "The Bible."