Rose's Cantina

On Friday, Scott finished up moving Jennette from her perch at the Hunt Club Manor. That move took us roughly 10 hours, and was a lot easier than the last two times we moved her. The first move was the most challenging. You see, she might have been all of 4 foot 9, but she lived like four people: her mother, who was a keen collector of jewelry and Royal Doulton; her father who was a spirited collector of paper and coins; Roger who was a curator of all things Blue and Jay; and Jennette herself who liked to keep bills, photos and newspapers until they literally disintegrated. The first move came in 2014, after Roger died. Don't get me wrong, the place was well organized, with small paths that took the couple to the kitchen, bathroom and bedroom. Everything was covered by a inch of ash, including the birdcage which had sat in the middle of the living room over the two years since the Cockatiel Digger died. The aftermath of Digger's death by second hand smoke at th...

On the eve of 2017, Jennette was looking forward to a new life, unencumbered by caregiving, armed with a new set of choppers the doctors said she would never have. Sure, she missed her dad terribly, as she did her husband who had been her wingman and drinking buddy for over 30 years. But now, she was set. Dad had left her a tidy sum in his will, and she had inherited all of his sunny Florida-themed white furniture. She had bought a new car, and had set herself up in a tidy little apartment on Kilborn Avenue, her little dream palace. Jennette had survived her own personal war. In her late middle age, she worked two jobs because Roger was too sick to work anymore (largely due to a rum and Camels habit that would have put Hemingway to shame). Soon after she retired from her job as an executive assistant for Canada's electronic spy agency, she found herself out of both jobs -- her other job in a clothing store had been stolen away when retail went bust -- and so she became...