When you try your very best but nothing changes at all.

I'm not altogether sure why the above gif appealed to me but it did so I put it in. I had a message via my Facebook page today asking if I was OK as I hadn't put a blog out there for a while. I am doing OK I guess, all things considered. Thank you for asking :) it's nice to be missed. So an update - Dad is clearly becomming more frail. Having been diagnosed with oesophagal cancer in June, he has lost a lot of weight and has asked me to get him a smaller belt and to take his trousers up about 3 inches - he has either shrunk as well as lost weight or the weight loss is causing his trousers to fall down. This is concerning as is the fact that Ant reports he is sleeping a lot more than usual. He has had a stent fitted to hold the tumour back and it's stent fights cancer at the moment. If the cancer grows through the stent, they simply fit a new one. Unfortunately everything is too far gone to operate and chemo is not an option as at age (almost) 95 the chemo would likely do him more harm than good. The mutual decision was to let him carry on as normal until - well until he can't. He eats very slowly due to the stent and having to have everything necessarily very wet or with sauce and cut into tiny pieces. So - he's been digging in the garden. This is his norm and will be until it can't be any more. He said the fruit harvest was tosh this year because of the hot dry spell we've had. The Hydrangeas have failed to impress as well. So he is busy making sure everything is pruned and prepared so all will be good in the garden for next year... The doctors have told him he needs to clear (or have cleared) a room in his house so that when the time comes he will be able to have a hospital bed in his house with room around it for any necessary machinery and a nurse or two. The doctor told him she was aware his house 'is a little bit busy'. Interestingly worded. Maybe. She told him if this doesn't happen then he will have to go into the hospital. He wants to be at home. This is never going to happen. That it won't happen is a good thing as it takes away the issue that poor Ant may be the one to find him should anything happen at home. We therefore don't push this point. That I am aware he may not be with us long (we have no realistic time frame so we are taking things day by day) is making things difficult. Ever aware I should be playing the loving distraught daughter at this point and then seeing the realism that although this is the clearly expected ideal, this is not the case. I'm running around like a blue arsed fly currently, taking dad to appointments and Ant to meet social workers (who would usually meet at the house but, well, you know the deal with that). Three people would never be able to fit in one room together at the same time due to the hoarding. Heck sometimes we have difficulty fitting three people in the house. If I go to visit, we all usually gravitate to the garden, where I am taken to see his rhubarb, his compast heap, his runner beans, redcurrants and the new pear tree. Yippity doo. Dad's driving licence is due to run out in early September, which he knew about and told me about in May. His car, an elderly 52 plate silver Ford Focus, which is green due to, in his words, being kept in the shade (or never being washed - take your pick), had it's own agenda and refused to go into gear sometime in late July. A neighbour managed to put it on his drive where I fear it will remain for a looong time. So this means I get to take him to get his weekly shopping. Now I am aware I should be doing daughterly duties and am OK with this. However... He asked me to take him on my day off this week. He wanted to go to Lidl and then to Farm Foods. I waited in the car and let dad and Ant go inside. After 45 minutes I went inside to see how they were getting on and why he was taking so long, to see him walking around with his farm foods vouchers,a pen and an old envelope to write things down to ensure he was getting his vouchers' worth. An hour later, I had, to my shame, fallen asleep at the wheel of my parked car in the Farm Foods car park. Dad and Ant came out with a trolley of stuff including 48 eggs, a sack of potatoes and a sack of onions. There are 2 of them living together. That was Tuesday. Dad also mentioned he needed to SORN the car (Statutory Off Road Notification for those out of the UK) and wanted to know if I could do this for him online. (He's not allowed online, firstly as I don't think it's safe and secondly because I won't let him - I refuse to drive 14 miles from my house and back at 11pm to show him how to press 'ENTER' on his laptop again). I checked and he needed the reference number from his V5 logbook to SORN the vehicle online. Of course he does. But he's lost the V5 form. Of course he has. Can I do anything? Not without the number which is on the logbook or a tax renewal form. He doesn't know where either form is. He can have a look but he has so much else to do and he can never find anything anywhere and everyone keeps asking him for stuff and he's still looking for other stuff and ... cue long and often-repeated rant. I said he could apply for another V5 but this would cost and take a week or so. Or he can fill in another form but this will only apply once the DVLA receive the form, and it has to go by post. If they get it on the 1st of a month, it says, you will not be refunded for that month so you pay for another whole month and the refund for car tax in from the following month. I said the best thing was for him to find the form. Another rant ensued and I gave up, telling him to look again. Last night he rang to say he hadn't found the log book and can I do it online. Not without the log book/V5 - he says he can't find it... you see a pattern emerging here? So I found the form online to fill in to say he wants to SORN without the log book number, printed it off, filled it in, wrote an envelope and took it to him after work. Do I get any thanks? No. I get shouted out for it being too late as it won't get to the DVLA in time and he 'has to find a bloody stamp and it's all a bloody nuisance and bloody ridiculous... and he can't find anything and everyone wants him to do everything and it'll all work him into an early grave at this rate.' All his anger directed at me. Again! I guess, at this point perhaps he expected me to fling myself on the floor in tears and say 'Oh darling father, please no, please let me do everything for you. Let me magic the document for you. Please don't worry. The stress isn't worth it'. Did I say that? Did I fuckery buggery! I will not put in writing what I said under my breath. The form was finally signed - after him scrutinising it as if looking for the wording 'I give all my worldly goods to my daughter..' (and not finding it) despite it clearly being labelled DVLA and me having filled out HIS details on it. After him yelling that it would have to be posted in a specific post box a mile away and shouting at me when I queried whether the one around the corner may suffice, the form was duly signed and posted and is hopefully winding its way to the DVLA right about now.