Part 169 ~ The Adventures of King Ben & Zeus the Big Dumb Dog

If you missed the start of this series, you can find it here. A lot of things will be the same or very similar.

Ben stayed awake yesterday evening, playing with dominoes and scripting Angry Words. Younger arrived around 6:20pm and we left to Drive Miss Daisy about ten minutes later. I took some Scientific Research pictures before we left, and more after I got home.

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Yadda yadda yadda, Night Stuff, pill, sleep.

I woke up a little after 6am to ear sniffing. Ben was sitting on the side of the bed, not saying anything. I told him I’d come to the living room. I grunted and groaned my way out of bed and headed toward the coffee pot.

Ben’s stuff, breakfast for Zeus and Sven…

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I looked at the sky, no clouds… it was gonna heat up fast. I took some sunrise pictures and turned on the AC unit.

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Meds, shoes and picking Daughter up from work. Home by 7:45am. I got settled for Couch Sittin and Daughter kicked me out. Ben had a 9:00 or 9:30 Zoom Group scheduled, we were gonna try, try again. I went back to lay down in my room. My bruised liver still aching.

Ben brought his tablet and hung out with me and Zeus on the bed. At 9am Daughter got Ben to sit in front of the laptop for Zoom School. He wouldn’t put his tablet down, but he was sitting. She did get him to take one earbud out, no participation… still sitting. He sat for the entire twenty-five minutes. He was singing Magic Dance from The Labyrinth, but he was sitting. An improvement. I’ll take it!

Two more Zooms were scheduled at 10am and 11am. Daughter planned to log into both. She was very irritated at the whole situation. She understands the reasons and that everyone is trying, but she worked a twelve hour shift and it was a difficult shift and she didn’t want to fight with Ben.

Ben was pacing and scripting at 10am when it was time for the next Zoom. Daughter got him to sit back down. He wasn’t really engaging. He was still ramping up. It was to be a “Show and Tell” session and he’s been stuck on V For Vendetta. He was going to show gloves and dominoes.

He got up and got a toy gun and was pointing it at the camera. Daughter kept telling him to stop, trying to get him to put it down. He wasn’t listening to her, he was stuck in what he wanted to do. When Daughter had told him several times to stop pointing the gun, she closed the laptop. He beat on the closed laptop with his fists.

Then it was kicking the door. Moving all the stuff from the busted back gate… Meltdown Road. He was able to bring himself down, slowly, in increments. There were still “behaviors” and LOTS Of Angry Words. I gave him his meds ten minutes early to help calm him.

By 11am he was settled enough to give Daughter back her phone and to sit with me on the couch. I sent her to go rest. I was Couch Sittin and Ben was eating Oreos, drinking diet coke and watching blasted Peppa Pig on his tablet. He did switch to Mr Bean for a while. Thank goodness for earbuds!

Around 12:30pm he looked like he was getting sleepy. He actually dozed a little bit and I was going to let him nap. I texted Daughter but she didn’t respond, she must’ve gone to sleep, which was good. His Contrary Senses must’ve tingled though, he woke up and started moving around. It was because I was okay with him napping that he woke up.

I gave him his half Adderall at 1pm cuz the alarm told me to. He was back on the couch, under a blanket with his tablet. Daughter is off work tonight, so I was thinking that whatever Ben wanted to do as far as napping goes, was okay with me.

Around 1:45 Ben decided it was chalk time. He took his bucket of newer chalk to the area by the Bath Room and dumped it, sat down and started doing his thang. I took some morphine, thankful to have it.

I continued my Couch Sittin, getting up to give meds at 2:30, then ibuprofen and Benadryl at 3:00pm. He’s got some bug bites of some kind and I saw him scratching at them, the ibuprofen is just in case. He was scripting while working on his chalk. It wasn’t exactly Angry Words, but it wasn’t Happy Noises either.

Just before 4pm Ben took a break from playing with his chalk and sat on the couch with me. I told him I needed to go lay down, my back and abdomen were both yelling. Daughter was still sleeping. I told Ben he could stay in the living room or he could come to my room with me. He said “It’s fine.” Alrighty then. I went to lay down on my bed.

Daughter got up about ten minutes later. When I went to tell her about the benadryl and ibuprofen, I saw Ben stretched out on the couch next to her, with his eyes closed. I guess he decided to take that nap. Daughter said she was just going to let him sleep until time for his meds. If he was awake in the middle of the night or super early, she would get up with him. She has work tomorrow night anyway. Neither one of us wanted to deal with a grumpy Ben, and there was no reason to.

So, that’s where we’ll leave it for today.

I need to fill prescriptions for me and for Ben. I may just do it this evening and get it overwith. We never know at Casa Cuckoo, do we? Or I might wait until tomorrow morning. Thanks for Zooming with us, and hanging out after. The Zoom was both better and worse. I guess we try again on Monday. We have to get through the next two days of brutal triple digits heat. And Daughter working. Come hang out with us, it’s bound to be interesting. ¡Hasta mañana!

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HUGS!

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