Dementia dilemas
How many jackets are too many? And the trials of incubating chicken eggs.
December 2023
My husband, Shujin, held up a large white plastic bag. He’d gone shopping for fertilized eggs, and returned with what??
We had three chickens, but there’s six of us living together, so 2-3 eggs a day isn’t enough! We decided to incubate some eggs and increase our chicken number.
Since chickens don’t lay over the winter, I thought now would be a good time to incubate the eggs. By the time the chickens are old enough to lay winter would be over! (I love efficiency!)1
Okasan loves shopping, so when Shujin announced that he was going down to buy some eggs, his mum gladly joined him.
When they returned, Shujin held up a large white plastic bag. Too big for a carton of eggs, I could see something black inside. He proceeded to tell me that he and his mum had bought her Christmas present, from Shujin and me. I was so fine with that. One less present that I had to decide on! I asked what it was.
“A jacket.”
The look on my face did not disappoint his expectations! When Okasan was out of ear shot I shot him the hard question:
“Are you for real?? Is it REALLY a jacket or are you just joking with me?”
No, it really was a jacket.
“Mum picked it out, she really liked it. It’s leather and has real fur and was $450 down to $20!!” blah, blah, blah.....
It’s not that I have anything against jackets. And I do love a bargain (this one was clearly REALLY good!) But Okasan already had HEAPS of jackets. Last winter Shujin bought her two when she already had more than five at home.
And last month we were out and she bought another jacket. She wore that jacket for the first few days and then forgot about it and went back to the old favourite….
And now here Shujin had come home with yet ANOTHER ONE!!
In my opinion, he really needed to be the parent/adult in that situation and tell her, Mum you’ve already got heaps of jackets, let’s get something else instead. But of course that didn’t happen... To ease my angst, I suggested to Shujin he needed to go through her wardrobe and get rid of half the jackets, it was just plain insane!
After the jacket fiasco, Shujin proceeded to show me the carton of fertilized eggs. Yes, in Japan you can buy highly nutritious fertilized eggs at the supermarket. For a higher price of course, since they are apparently more nutritious. I’ll try not to think too much about that.
Anyhow, he placed the carton on the kitchen bench.
Bob was dead keen to put them in the incubator at once but Shujin didn’t want to start incubating at night time. He did that last time and 21 days later the eggs started hatching around midnight and took hours to all be finished! I’m shocked that the timing was that precise! (Not sure if it was coincidence...) So we agreed to start the next morning.
We went about doing our own thing. I read to Missy in the kid’s room, Shujin occupied himself with something, Bob went to take a shower, and there was the carton of eggs, sitting out in plain sight on the kitchen bench.
Okasan saw the carton and in her usual helpful way, proceeded to unpack the eggs from the carton and put them in the fridge where eggs belong...
Later on, Shujin walked into the kitchen, saw the empty carton, opened the fridge door and found all the fertilized eggs had been placed with the ordinary eggs. With no way of knowing which eggs were what!
In situations like this, you want to whine and complain and even scold. But knowing Okasan had dementia, what good would that do?
So it was back to the shop the next morning to buy another carton of eggs!
Okasan wore her classy cream jacket. It was one of the jackets we bought her last winter. It was cream, puffer style, but fitted, 3/4 length down past the knees. It had extra stuffing around the bottom, empasising the “skirt”. It looked very stylish. I’m no fashion expert, but I imagined it would be worn by younger women, probably not for a 70+yr old, but it did look good on her. It had little diamond-type jewels on the zipper and very nice fur around the hood. Missy just loved it and couldn’t wait for her to “grow out of it” so she could inherit it!!!
Missy noticed Okasan in her cream jacket and commented about the jacket looking tight, and it did. But Okasan was quick to open the jacket and show all the layers she had underneath (including another jacket!!) showing the reason for the tightness had nothing to do with her “growing out of it”! Needless to say, Missy was very disappointed!
Off they went to buy eggs.
Shujin returned home with a carton of eggs. And thankfully no new jackets!
We wasted no time in placing the eggs in the incubator!
For the experienced, I can just hear the wise words of advice “Don’t do it! Winter is a bad time to incubate eggs!” Sadly, I learnt the hard way…
Oh nooooo!! !! the eggs!! the jacket!! whyyyy?! I'd keep track of the moon, in this case. maybe something was retrograde? lol good job for not losing it ;)
It's times like this when you wonder what will come first - another jacket or a chicken...New take on the chicken vs egg question/dilemma! ;-)