Give him a hug from me. It's been 15 or so years, he might not remember me, but hugs are hugs :)

I’m glad he’ll be closer to you, Beverley.

Yikes, Bev! It was some universe intervention allowed you to check out the walls and get the hell out of there. So delighted that your grandson is escaping.

My experience and reports of those close to me have led me to believe that I am a very calm, easy-going, optimistic person, with an abundance of patience. These past few days, my patience was depleted. I told my SIL that I felt like I had this beaker full of patience that was spilling over a bit here and there, and then someone knocked it over, and it all emptied out at once.

First, flying down for a week, and flying is always annoying, then son's relationship blowing up, which also blew up the plan for them to house-sit my animals, plus the stress of son being heart-shattered. Then the memorial service was outside in a park for 4 or 5 hours, and my MIL was absolutely impossible to deal with as she was undoubtedly the only one who was warm. Everyone was drenched, of course, July in Florida. But the pavilion was in the shade of oak trees, and there were multiple misting fans. Quite a few of the attendees were much older than her, as Uncle Walt was 88. My SIL had flown from NYC after driving bus all day, getting in at 4:30 AM, to be there and MIL was literally screaming at her that she had to take her home, right now. SIL had even bought her this battery cooling collar dealio. Her older sister, the widow, just shook her head and indicated it was par for the course with her sister. We all told MIL in no uncertain terms that we were staying, and she was more than welcome to sit in one of our cars, in the shade, with the A/C running. But no, she would not be satisfied until DH and his sibs forced her into our car and he had to endure her screaming until he let her know he was going back to be with the family and friends. She stayed in the car. Then the next day a round trip over to the other side of the Everglades to see my siblings. My brother is very frail, but I sat and was a chatterbox giving him news and talking about anything for about 15 minutes until he drifted off again. Then I had to go fix tech issues at my sister's place. Trying to wrap things up and get back home and her laptop doesn't look like it usually does when she goes into one of her programs. She has it full screen instead of windowed so she can't see her desktop toolbar. The woman has worked on computers for over 40 years and she doesn't know how to resize a window. I think this may have been the tipping point, but I managed not to say anything to her and just fixed it.

tl;dr Yes, there were more annoyances too, but I have ended up with all of my patience completely depleted and am grumpy girl. It is a little bit renewed this morning, but I warned DH that I am still not quite myself. He is treading gently.

That is too much, Laura!!! You need to take care of YOU.

(Tbh, I may have reacted like your MIL if someone made me be outside for HOURS in Florida at the end of July, I’m sorry but that’s insane!)

I'm guessing there were maybe 70 people there, many in their 80s, probably some in their 90s. Yes, it was hot, but it was completely shaded with a steady breeze. The misting fans were nice. Plenty of cold beverages. The younger people who were running around playing with kids and such were drenched, but those of us who were just socializing were fine. The big issue was that she screamed like a toddler when she had been repeatedly given options. It would have taken someone two hours to drive her home and return.

I wasn't home, but a bunch of family went to my place to go to the beach, and MIL actually went and ate lunch with them outside at the beachfront restaurant. They were just packing up when I got home, and MIL said several times what a beautiful day it was. Of course, she didn't go to the beach, because it was too hot for that nonsense. I had told the out-of-town visitors that they were welcome to visit my place and use the beach facilities, but even if I got back in time, going to the beach in the summer wasn't my thing.