Small Civil War Sampler and Mood recovery via Martini

This is a small-ish quilt - beautifully pieced. I know that most patchwork instructions tell you to press seams to one side. And that is the only way to get a ditch for Stitch-In-The-Ditch quilting.  I find that quilts like this which have the seams pressed OPEN lie really really flat.

This was treated with feathers, curls, line dancing, and stitch-in-the-ditch (which, lemme tell you, is challenging when there is no ditch).

Friday was Mom's first two appointments for the pacemaker replacement.  She needed an EKG and bloodwork, then to see the resident surgeon, then to preop to see the anesthetist and the surgery nurse.  I picked her up at the nursing home and say "She has had her breakfast, right?"  Um, no, she's been fasting because she needs bloodwork.  "No, she does not need to fast" I explain to the nurse (?).  Crap.  Now I have to take her out HUNGRY.  So we get a couple of cookies Mom can eat in the car.  Not a good start to our day.

We get to appointment #1 and discover the nursing home has given me the wrong health card.  It belongs to someone else.  Pfft.  (that is steam coming out of my ears)

The EKG and bloodwork went fine.  The appointment was on time, and outside of Mom having her normal OUCH OUCH OUCH over bloodwork and the blood pressure cuff everything was good.  The two nice nurses tell us to go sit in the waiting room until the resident sees us.  We wait half an hour and I begin to think I have mixed up the instructions.  We are getting close to being late for the second appointment with the anesthetist and the nurse.  I check with the receptionist and I heard correctly - we ARE still waiting for the resident.  At the one hour mark Mom is getting really antsy so we go for a nice long walk down the hall and check out all the offices.  Come back and wait some more.  Mom, by now, has had enough and wants to go home.  Now.  She's 90 and has Alzheimers - she gets agitated.  She also gets tired.  And she hasn't eaten. I go see the receptionist and explain the situation, AND remind here that now we're half an hour late for our other appointment downstairs.  I ask her to rebook with the resident (since we have to come back on the 20th) and we will go finish up so I can take Mom home.  Well, she's totally flustered and won't/can't make us another appointment.  The resident has had an emergency and will be done in 10 minutes.  Me?  I'm not buying that.  After 10 minutes of the receptionist calling someone to see how to rebook our appointment and making us wait for that gal to come see us, the resident (who has been standing at the photocopier this whole time) decides he can see us now.  Pfft (that is steam coming out of my ears.  Again.).  The instant we sit down in his office, his cell phone rings.  He spends 10 minutes talking to someone in Spanish (?), hangs up and apologizes to us that his daughter is sick and he may have to go pick her up.  Then he calls someone (his wife??) and talks to HER in Spanish for 10 minutes.  Mom turns to me and gets up and says "we'll come back another time".  Doc hangs up the phone and starts going through the paperwork.  I think it's his first day because he is READING every single item on every single page.  He took my list of Mom's meds, wrote them all down, then gave me back the printout.  But he kept the old printout from February.  (yes I cleared that up before we left).  Then he takes her blood pressure again, more OUCH OUCH OUCH.  He calls another doc in to check about a scratch on her skin near where the incision will go.  Finally sends us on our way to our next appointment.  They wondered where we'd been all this time.  Obviously Miss Receptionist did not call them to explain that we'd be late.  Pfft (more steam coming out of my ears - there was actually quite a lot of that going on).  The folks at appointment #2 were very sympathetic that it was now going on 2 pm and Mom hadn't eaten and did their best to rush us through.  I finally made it home at 4 pm.
It took two double martinis and four episodes of GLEE to untwist me.  Poor DH had worked all day and ended up having to make supper because I was not moving until 6 pm.  He is so understanding sometimes.