Tomorrow

For quite some time now for a variety of reasons I have been putting myself to the back of the queue and treating myself with ignore.

Which is wrong.  And I know it is, and am (slowly) starting to do something about it.

My MS is progressing and, like the unwelcome visitor it is, has made itself right at home.  My pain levels are up, my fatigue levels are up.  Other manifestations include a foggy and forgetful brain.  Muscle spasms.  Spasticity.   My hands and legs are reluctant to obey simple commands and I am never quite sure where they are.

Which has become dangerous.  Our shower is on a hob and I have to step up and over a metal lip to get into it.  I have damaged my toes multiple times and I am always bruised .  And I am well aware that a dramatic fall is a real possibility.  Probability even.

So I have bitten the bullet and we are having extensive bathroom modifications.  Extensive and obscenely expensive modifications.  Which will take three weeks to complete.

The existing shower will be ripped out and replaced with a walk-in one.  Which has to be located (for drainage reasons) on the other side of the room so the bath will have to go.  The floor will be pulled up and non slip tiles laid.  Grab rails.  And, since we are doing this much I have agreed to replace the vanity (which has to be moved anyway) with a wheel-chair accessible one (which with luck I won't need for some time).  As an aside, we cannot buy a wheel-chair accessible vanity here.  It has to be custom made.  A stand alone basin?  No problems.  One with a bench so I can have soap, a toothbrush and other things to hand?  Nope.  Hiss and spit.  Some drawers wouldn't go astray either.

I have been wishing painful haemorrhoids on most of the tradesmen who came to give us quotes.  Two of them gave us quotes which included items we hadn't requested and didn't want or need.  They also ignored things we had requested, and included vague statements such as 'if asbestos is present the quoted price will increase'.  When I asked questions they disappeared faster than speeding bullets. 

There is another bathroom in the house but it is, if anything, less accessible than the one that we are having modified.  The work starts at seven thirty tomorrow morning and the next three weeks look like being chaotic.  Builders, plumbers, electricians, plasterers, tilers and painters.  And the asbestos removal team because there is sheet asbestos in the bathroom.  The tradesman we selected tested for it.  $1400 to have it removed and disposed of.  Sigh.

Jazz loathes and detest visitors, particularly white van men, and will piddle copiously and inappropriately to express his displeasure and reclaim his territory.  Jewel will retire to the wardrobe and moult up a storm. Part of me sympathises with them both. 

I am tired and overwrought even before it starts and expect to be largely absent from the blogosphere.

And on a much more serious note my youngest brother is also having issues with asbestos.  Much more serious issues which make my heart hurt for him and his wife.

Between 1968 and 1979, a private contractor from Canberra known as "Mr Fluffy" (such an innocent sounding business name) insulated residential dwellings by pumping friable loose asbestos fibres into the roof cavities.  And my brother's home is a Mr Fluffy home.   The house was insulated before his wife bought it.  In 1990 when the danger of loose asbestos was better understood it was removed.  And we now learn that residual asbestos remains.  And there is no safe level.  At the moment it appears likely that the house will have to be demolished.  And they will get no choice about it.  A compulsory reacquisition and demolition.  When?  No-one knows.  Who pays for it?  No-one knows.  Has the asbestos contaminated their furniture and clothing?  Perhaps.  Testing will take place.  When?  No-one knows.  So they are in limbo.  And worried for their health, for  the health of his wife's children (who grew up in the house) and for that of the visiting grandchildren.  So I have my fingers, toes and eyes crossed.  Which adds to my mobility issues.

Have fun in my absence.  I will miss you, but will be back in the fullness of time.  And with luck will be able to stop in on the weekends at least.