And finally home

 Sort of a difficult trip. 

Oh, it was good seeing my mom, and I had some good meals and did a little knitting and some crochet, and my mom bought me a couple of dresses ("the rest of your birthday present") when we went out one day, but difficult things happened.

Friday evening (the 14th) there were bad storms in Arkansas and Missouri when I was on the train. I know I looked out the window a couple times after going to bed and seeing lightning everywhere. And then we sat for several hours outside, I think, Little Rock, because of tornado warnings up ahead.

Then, when we finally got to Poplar Bluff, we stopped. And then went *backwards*. They finally announced that there were trees down on the track, and the track needed to be cleared and inspected.

So we sat for like six hours. And then we had to wait even longer on a new crew.

They did feed us lunch. But unfortunately - womp womp - I realized I now have the third triad of the "celery-carrot-spice" sensitivity that some people with birch and mugwort pollen allergies get - I can no longer eat cumin, or at least not in the quantities in the butter chicken the night before and the enchiladas that day and had some gastric distress as a result. (At least now I know, and looking back - several 'stomach viruses' I had over the past year were probably THAT, and the "oh no, is my gall bladder starting to go bad" was probably THAT).

 Makes cooking and restaurant food harder, but oh well. At least now I know.

Anyway, we were super late. (They fed us pizza for dinner, which didn't help with my stomach). 

We finally got in to Bloomington around midnight (a bit before, but it was after midnight when I finally got home because...) My mom went out about 11:30 and it was a very dark night (cloudy) and some of the roads in town are not well lit, and she is in her 80s.....and she caught a damaged curb with her tire and tore the tire. She was close enough to the station that she decided to sacrifice the tire and get there. Someone called the cops and they showed up

(She later told me they gave her a field sobriety test, which of course she passed!)

They called the local towing company (for those who did graduate work at ISU: it is the one that shall not be named; they had a very bad reputation for rudeness and requiring payment IN CASH one the spot for services rendered). They changed her tire for her; I was afraid the axle might have been damaged but apparently she didn't hit as hard as I feared, and it just punctured the tire

I wound up paying; they wanted a cell phone to send the link to and she doesn't have one that accepts texts. 

Then she had to arrange for a new tire but her good mechanic was able to take care of that, and they concluded the other three tires were still new enough (months rather than years) that replacing one would be OK.. 

(Also, the "spare" was actually an in-good-shape leftover from the older set, so she wasn't driving on a donut)

But that ate up time in a too-short break. 

And coming back, I had to take a "bus bridge" for part of the way - trackwork - but that wasn't so bad. Drove home, ran to the Albertson's (which is now going to be my "big shopping" store - it's closer and nicer and has some more of the familiar-to-me brands). 

Got home, was about to eat lunch, but decided to call my mom first to assure her I had gotten in.

No answer.

Okay, fine, maybe she stepped out to get the mail, it was about that time. 

Called again in a few minutes, left a message, hoping maybe she was out talking to a neighbor (that often happens). 

Then my brother called. He NEVER calls me except in emergencies. "Have you been able to reach mom? I've been trying since last night"

Oh.

Oh, no. 

I still remember that Friday night in January 2016 when my brother made a similar call about our dad, and it turned out he had had a surprise hospital admission (bad medication interaction) and I didn't find out he was OK for some 20 minutes and it was *awful*

After that, I got all the neighbors' numbers.  Well, one set is out of town right now but I called Barb and trepidatiously asked "do you know if my mom is okay? I can't reach her on the phone and my brother just called...." 

and she said "your mom is fine" and I was about to yell HOW DO YOU KNOW but she followed it up with "something went wrong with her phone and internet service, she's been over here trying to talk to someone from Frontier to get it sorted, she said she'd come back at about 2 and call you so you wouldn't worry."

She also said her housemate texted me but I didn't get it, I suspect she texted my landline, which can't accept texts.
 

So I called my brother back to tell HIM, and then shortly after that, yeah, my mom did call. I reminded her she had a cell phone (which normally lives in her car) but I knew she didn't have it and I don't know the number anyway.

So she went and got it and I now have the number, and at least she has a phone she can call out on if there's any emergency. 

But yeah, now i'm TIRED. I did go over and set up Monday's lab, and grabbed the stuff I need to write Friday's exam, but I'm not sure I have the energy to. And I'm not sure what to do for dinner given that it was nearly 3 pm here when I finished lunch.