oh, how I love my job

Occasionally I get called in to go on outings with the Alzheimers Association. If there is anything funnier than my husband, it is spending the day with old people.

I walked into work today feeling pretty good. An old lady looked at me, leaned over to her neighbor and using her "outside voice" said, "oh look at her. She looks TIRED." Rather than being offended, her blunt comment made me laugh. Really hard.

Later, we were talking about what kind of food you live off when you are poor. If you were a college student, it might have been ramen noodles. For me, it was anything microwavable. For her, it was carrots. She looked at me and said without a hint of joking or sarcasm in her voice, "When I was young, we were so poor all we could eat were carrots. I'll tell you what. I ate so many carrots, it turned my hair red."

She honestly believes eating carrots as a little girl turned her hair red.

Another woman has a hard time accepting the world today. We were driving down town, and I was sitting next to her. We saw a woman sleeping in a park. She looked at me and said, "Look at that man!" I informed her it was actually a woman. "I can't believe she would lay down on the grass!! Who in the world would go out in public that tired? You know, I think she might be homeless. Maybe the only homeless woman in Salt Lake. But to be honest, I'm not sure."

My day finished off with:
"Oh, look at how cute that couple is. They're both Japanese."

Because Japanese people are so cute.

Oh, how I love my job.