How Many Car Repair Guys Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb?

 My elderly mother is in an assisted living facility in Florida. She has a staff of people who do her laundry, clean her room, help her in and out of bed, help her get dressed, help her shower, take her in a wheel-chair to the dining room 3 times a day for meals, bring her any snack she wants any time she wants it, a full time nursing staff and a doctor on call 24/7. Still she calls me daily to ask, when are you moving to Florida?

She wants me to take over all of the duties of her staff. And she will not pay me for my services. Taking care of woman in her nineties would put me in the grave long before her.

I have told her repeatedly that I am NOT moving to Florida. (I live in Virginia where the weather is infinitely better and never as hot for as long as it is in the Sunshine State). I have explained that I will NOT sell my house, after evicting my two roommates. I will NOT evict my roommates. I will not let them live in my house and move to Florida, anyway. I don’t know how to make my stand any clearer. I will visit her in Florida a couple times a year, but I will NOT move there permanently. Stop asking me, when?

So, why my current rant?

I get regular calls and texts from people requesting I sell my house and they would love to represent me in the process (thereby getting a huge commission.) When I answered my phone this morning and John asked me if I wanted to sell my house to him, I asked him if he had talked to my mother. From his stunned reaction and loud “NO!!!!” I can’t tell if he talked to her or not. “No, of course I didn’t talk to her. I don’t even know your mother. Why would I talk to her?” I think the man protests too much (to paraphrase Shakespeare.)

Never mind. My answer is still NO!!!!!!