We had my family over for Christmas Eve dinner. I made a turkey and all the fixin's, including home-made cheese buns, and the food turned out well, if I say so myself.
During dinner, it was obvious that my dad was not feeling well. He had been to the doctor's a couple of times in the previous week, once for severe back pain, and then a few days later with heavy fluid retention in his legs. My sister and I agreed that he was going to the hospital for a quick check, and she drove him over there. The ER doctor at San Gabriel Community wanted his prescription chart, so I picked it up at his house and drove it over.
The next morning, we had a nice family Christmas morning. I went to visit my dad and give my sister a chance to sleep - he had spent all night on the crummy ER gurney waiting for a bed in the ICU to open up. My sister came back to the hospital about 3:00, and Carole and the kids came by then to visit my dad.
We all left for Big Bear around 3:45pm. It was raining hard - I had hoped to get started much earlier to beat the weather up the hill, but it wasn't meant to be. Jason drove his car to Upland; Rob and Yvette were bringing him back that night, and this saved them the trip to Temple City and back home. He and I drove up in Carole's rental truck, and Carole took Jeremy and Justin in my car.
It rained hard all the way up the 330 and 18, but never quite turned to snow. The whole way up was strewn with rocks from the mountain sides - some small, many quite large. We made it through unscathed, and pulled in at Pat and Harvey's house around 6:30. Pat had planned to server dinner at 5:00, but it's really a big operation to make a holiday dinner for 25, so we didn't actually sit down until 7:15.
Dinner was nice. Gifts were according to plan - watching the little kids open is always fun, and the adult gift exchange went very well. I wound up sleeping on the floor; my back is still killing me.
We left about 11:00 the next morning, with my nephew William in tow. It had snowed overnight, and the plows had left a couple of inches of snow from the house to the dam, but I took slow and managed to make it to the dam without a problem. The bigger plows and heavier traffic kept the rest of way mostly free of snow, except for a few areas that are shaded throughout the day, which were not a problem.
The CHP and sheriff had setup a chain control point just south of Running Springs for the northbound traffic, causing a 6 mile backup. We smugly shook our heads at their bad luck, but karma took her revenge. About 5 miles from the base of the hill, just north of the ranger station, a three-car accident closed the road in both directions. We parked in the middle of the road (one lane in each direction, with no shoulder) for an hour and forty-five minutes while the ambulances and tow trucks did their thing.
The rest of the way home was uneventful. After dropping William off at home in Glendora, we got home about 3:30, just in time for Jeremy to get to work.
I checked in with my sister, and she updating me on Dad's situation. The doctor's had decided his main problem was a low heart rate - without sufficient beats, his blood pressure dropped, and he wasn't able to clear out fluids from collecting in his legs. He had a pacemaker installed late in the afternoon on Friday. He had hoped to check out on Saturday, but some post-op checks showed a touch of pneumonia and some severe anemia so he's stuck until Monday or Tuesday. We made plans to break him out on Wednesday night regardless of doctor's advice, so he can watch USC in the Rose Bowl on Thursday afternoon.
