...you might want to back up, now...I'm going to vent...and then explode...and then, spontaneously combust...the lingo may get  a little salty...you've been warned.... Sunday was a total bust.  Dad took G.M. to church & the sermon was about inspirational weight loss...should've been a good lesson in patience and tolerance, but--instead--G.M. arrived at our house, afterwards, and blasted on and on and on about fat and fat people FOR FOUR EFFING HOURS!!!!  That's easy to do--of course--if you're a 94 year-old prune, 5'1" AND 93 lbs.  That doesn't describe anyone else in our family, at all, though...I don't know about anyone else, but I haven't been 94 lbs. since before the third grade! The worst was that my mom was feeling like crap and in great arthitic pain, hadn't slept at all the night before and was getting madder and madder listening to this old witch prattle on...no mention that my mom was nice enough to make her a "healthy" lunch, fix up the holes in her slacks 'cause G.M. can't see w/her eyesight problems, etc....In fact, in between, G.M. complained vociferously about:  how she's freezing to death "up here" (it's sitting at 98 and we're surrounded by goddamned brushfires, for Christ's sake!) and wishing to hell she was back in FLA; how she can't stand her apartment anymore and that she's just going to "move out and go elsewhere" (move out using what?  She splurged all of her $ years ago, flying back & forth, all over the globe & besides the Feds & the state, my dad's footing the bill for the rest...and  except for an anniversary trip to Hawaii--where my dad refused to go out w/my mom anywhere because he'd been there "four times, already" and didn't want to "be there" and was "tired of the place"--my mom's never even been off the N.A. continent!); how my mom should "make" my dad eat healthier because it's her "family duty" to do so (...my mom hasn't had a break from this goddamned family for going on 45+ years & now w/her poor health, she's stuck w/all of us, no $ to call her own, & no place else to go!); how everyone should be healthier, like G.M., herself, because she "never buys" sugary products...just dried figs, dates, plums, apricots, apples, peaches, honey, mints, angel food cake...blah, blah, blah (...as she asks my mom for a piece of cake, cause she's "starving"...) and--finally--how my mom needs to make my dad a cake for his upcoming birthday 'cause "she never makes any for him" (???!!!!????)  WHAT?I can't blame my dad, this time, for "stranding" G.M. w/us all day long, because the drain was clogged at G.M.'s place & after our last "maintenance" fiascos at her apt., my dad just decided to take the bull by the horns and fix it, himself...which he did, very well.  And, I did feel for him...that's no way to spend a Sunday, when it's not your responsibility...but, then, later when he was grousing over his lost day, he tried taking it out on my mom w/some goddamned snippy remarks...hell, it's his mother--why can't he control her?  Why take it out on your spouse, who is already seriously ill and tired?!?I got my mom alone, later, and told her I'd make her a deal:  I won't offer to take G.M., shopping anymore, if my mom will promise to excuse herself and walk out of the room the next time G.M. acts out, like that.  She promised that she would, and I promised to hold up my end of the bargain, 'cause I feel for my dad and I want to help out his mom, but she doesn't behave like any grandma I'd ever want to have, when she pisses off the people I love...and, besides, it really is dad's problem.  I remember when my mom's mom came to live w/us...she had true emotional problems and she, too, wasn't very kind to my mom, but she was always very dignified and kind to us kids, God rest her...what a switch this is, now!Yesterday, my mom had a verbal altercation w/my dad & he hardly spoke to any of us for the rest of the day...I have an idea what that may have been about...Today, mom got an update on her tests from last week & the news wasn't good:  they discovered a kidney stone (incredible, to me, 'cause my mom's the best water drinker, ever!); they think there "may" be a problem w/her ovaries (I'm worried because my mom had emergency breast cancer surgery in 2003 & I'm afraid that--in spite of her cancer prev. meds--it may have returned and spread) and they didn't get as clear a picture of everything as they were hoping for in the ultrasound...so, more agonizing scans, while she's lying on her back, may be in order in the future...sadly, my dad overheard everything while walking in the room, but just kept walking...it was clear that he didn't want to get involved...not even w/his own ill spouse...Plus, my dad was hounding my mom, this A.M., about her prescrip. meds that they have to order through Caremark; he kept trying to reorder this one ahead of when the insurance co. will allow & my mom kept trying to explain that he couldn't do it that way...instead of taking her word for it, he challenged her, took her meds away, himself, and tried to call it in, just to prove a point.  Of course, it didn't work w/Caremark, or the insurance co. & that ticked him, off, too.  Let me tell you, my mom was pulling her hair out, and it wasn't even eleven in the morning, yet...I'd have said a hell of a lot, out loud, to tell him off, but having never been married, my mom pleaded w/me to just stay out of it and be glad that I was single...Then, when we were alone at the table, she said very clearly to me, "You know, it doesn't really matter.  None of it does.  It's just this life, and it really does need to be over with.  I'm tired...I'm really, really tired, and no can do anything.  So, to hell with it."  She cheered up a little, later on, but I think we both felt it at the table, this morning.  Her life is turning yet another corner...I need to be prepared...I went out into the yard this evening, like I always do...and even though my mom is at peace being agnostic, I prayed like crazy that she receive the gift of heaven and peace, when she does have to go...I'd rather honestly go to hell, or grind through another lifetime than have her be denied that...after her dedication to all of us, she deserves better at her age...well, at any age.And, now, I'm signing off, to chew this over, spiritually, some more...thx for putting up w/me...I, at least, will be better tomorrow....I wish w/all of my love, that it could truly be so, for my mom..