In our last episode...

I was booted out of the hospital and made my way home. 

Well, not exactly. 

There were some issues with going home.  To start with, the driveway has been washed out by various floods in recent years, and is impassable passenger cars.  My truck could make it, but it is not currently running.  Plus, it's a stick, which my wife has only a little experience in driving, and I am not yet medically cleared to drive myself.  Besides, bouncing over the rocks would be extraordinarily painful after my surgery. 

And the house is in the middle of 5 wooded acres.  So, just getting home would involve walking roughly the length of a football field.  A rutted, rock-strewn, tree-choked football field. 

The house is 2 stories, with the bedrooms and full baths upstairs.  Not a climb I was looking forward to.  Even worse, due to certain pressures at the time, we moved into the house as soon as it was marginally habitable, but before it was completely finished.  So, some of the frills are missing, like the front steps.  Due to terrain and cost considerations, the house in on piers, placing the front porch around 5 feet above the ground, with only a ladder allowing access.  That's not something my wife was willing to let me tackle yet. 

So, I moved in with my mom.  As she always sleeps in her recliner, the bedroom was available.  The problem is the bed.  It has the hardest mattress I've ever tried to sleep on.  It brings to mind an old mattress commercial that used the phrase "basic highway material".  I was tired enough the first night to sleep fitfully on it, but not a chance the second night.  I ended up taking the other recliner in living room, and managed some sleep in between bouts of one or both of the cats walking across me. 

So, the next day we got my son-in-law to move that recliner back into the bedroom.  I still had trouble sleeping, mostly due to pain, but for the most part it worked.  I look forward to getting back home, to my own bed with the memory foam mattress topper.