Monday, January 19, 2009

My Grandma

I love my grandma. Who doesn't, right? But grandma can be a bit of a bully sometimes. It's like she does things sometimes just to see how much of a rile she can get out of somebody. I'd say it annoys me, but I do the same thing. I just now know where I get it. But grandma's hit a rough streak lately.

New Year's Day, she comes over for dinner with the rest of my family. Meekly, she lets out that she got a ticket earlier that day. My mom, cousin and I tried to get out of her what kind of ticket it was:

mom: Mom, what happened?
grandma: I was just driving down the road and I saw the lights behind me.
cousin: Were you speeding, Grandma?
gram: The officer walked up and I said, 'Oh, hello officer. I saw your pretty lights in the mirror. What can I do for you?
me: Seriously?
gram: He asked me for all my papers. I didn't know where to find them. Honey, I don't know these things.
me: Your license and registration?
gram: Yeah. I Showed him these (pulls out a stack of papers). But he said my insurance wasn't in there.
mom: Do you have insurance?
gram: Of course I do! I, well, yeah, I think I do. I paid it last month.
me: Where's your card?
gram: Huh?
me: Your insurance card. Isn't it with your registration?
gram: I don't know. I gave him these.
me: (shuffling through the papers) Gram, these are all old receipts.
gram: Huh?
me: Kohl's receipts. And a Taco Bell receipt, from...2006.

So we finally get out of her that she got a fix-it ticket for no proof of insurance, though he could see that her car was insured. Then this last Thursday, I got a call about 5:45 p.m.

gram: Honey, I've been in an accident.
me: Are you alright?
gram: I'm fine [brief pause] but Ernestine, they're taking her away on a stretcher.

At that point I grabbed the mom and headed down the road. Of course, it had to happen at a busy time of day. And of course, it had to happen at one of the most congested intersections in town. We arrive to quite the scene - two ambulances, four police cars and a fire engine. Luckily, nobody was seriously injured, but we took her to the ER, just in case.

me: [in the ER, waiting for the doc to come back with CAT scan results] What happened gram?
gram: I don't know. We were just going down the road and all of a sudden a big boat of a car stopped right in front of us!
me: Was it moving, or was it already stopped?
gram: I don't know, sweetie. Me and Ernie, we were just so high on Jesus. Singing his praises, then that BOAT appeared. Did you see how large it was? We should have slid underneath it.

I saw the other car. It was a Toyota Prius. Not a big car by any means, and certainly no bigger than grandma's car.

So grandma has been staying with us for the past week. You can have a conversation with her, talking right to her face and she will always reply with, "what?" or "Who?" or, my favorite, "eh?" But when she's 30 feet away, in a different room, and you whisper something about her, she can sure hear that. Silly grandma.

10 comments:

Ronda said...

I liked that one, Josh. :-)

Anonymous said...

Doesn't sound like Silly Grandma should be driving a car. ;) (I'm sorry for the emoticon; it's becoming my signature.) ;) (See?)

Kirsten said...

Grandma's are funny that way! my grandma was hard of hearing, but as soon as you said her name she became Steve Austin.

Vic said...

There is nothing scarier than old women in a car who are high on Jesus!
(But I still think I would like your grandma.)

Anonymous said...

haha! High on Jesus, eh? I can just picture her in that state.

Paul Eilers said...

My grandmother, back when she was only a mother, once backed into a gasoline pump. The experience so unnerved her, she never drove a car again!

My grandfather had to drive her everywhere, and he was a salesman who was gone five days a week.

Mary@Holy Mackerel said...

Yeah, she's a good one!

Anonymous said...

that's a good one! grandma oh grandma..

Caffeinated Weka said...

I don't know what's more frustrating: grandparents who are fine to get around by themselves but always want rides from family, or those who shouldn't be driving but don't agree ... scary! What a hilarious story - your grandma sounds like a real personality.

Walley said...

Lol my gran is just like that, great blog btw!