"Dinner For Schmucks", Reviewed By Bev

For some reason, the local theater changed their scheduling, greatly limiting today's choices for my movie date with Bev. It was down to Step Up 3D, Dinner for Schmucks, Toy Story 3, and Charlie St. Cloud. You can imagine why I was on pins and needles waiting to see which one she'd choose. I was pretty sure she'd rule out children's movies, and sad movies (thank God, I don't need to spend 2 hours crying and looking at Zac Efron).

As I described the choices to her, Bev said, "Well, I guess that leaves us with the Dinner Party one. What's a schmuck?"

Don't ask me how a Jewish woman from New York doesn't know what a schmuck is, but she was genuinely stumped.

"It means an idiot, a goofball, a buffoon."

"Oh!" she said, laughing already "What a crazy title! All right, Schmucks it is!"

Bev giggled throughout the movie, leaning over to me several times, saying "There's the schmucks!"

As we walked out of the theater, Bev was still laughing, and exclaimed, "Craziest picture I ever saw! And the wildest title, too! Schmucks! I'm going to call my daughter today and say, 'Jill, do you know what a schmuck is?' and see if she does. Funniest picture I've seen in a long time!"

"Bev, did you ever know anyone like that? Did you ever meet any schmucks?"

"Oh, no dear! Well, there was this one woman. She was an accquaintance, not a friend. She asked me what my name was, and I told her Beverly. She told me I could say Bev-IRE-lee and I said NO I cannot! She was kind of a schmuck."

"Oooh, you could be Bev-IRE-lee and I can be POLE-eyanna, and those can be our schmuck names, Bev!"

"That's a good word for it. Schmuck! Oh, that was the craziest picture! I hope we see another one like it next week."

"Me too, Bev."

Dr. Bill

Dr. Bill is a homecare client that I had way back when. He had been a client of CareCo for a very long time even then, so I assume he still is - I just don't have him on my roster right now. Dr. Bill was a retired doctor who lives in a swanky gated retirement community. He also has Parkinson's. But unlike Bitsy, his Parkinson's seemed to have skipped through the more common symptoms (stiffness, tremors) and gone right into dementia. Don't get me wrong, he had some slight mobility effects, and was very stooped over, so much so that child-sized furnishings would have been no challenge for him. But all of that paled in comparision to the big, bright banner of paranoia that Dr. Bill carries with him at all times.

To begin with, you should know that Dr. Bill believes himself to be an employee, not a client, of CareCo. When caregivers come to his home, he often believes us to be conducting trainings, meetings, or on a break. Dr. Bill drafts endless letters to the CareCo staff, quitting over and over again, and blaming his Parkinson's on the workload he shoulders at CareCo.

Sometimes he writes these out longhand, in his tiny, cramped, Parkinson's "microscript". Sometimes, apparently I am his secretary, and he dictates them to me on his home computer. Sometimes he settles for leaving voicemails at the CareCo office line. But Dr. Bill is always certain he doesn't want to work there anymore, and that they keep trying to stop him from quitting.

Apart from these obsessive resignation letters, Dr. Bill's other main hobby is reading and rereading his bills, and trying to call and argue with any bank, credit card, or utility company foolish enough to send him one. I really don't know why his family doesn't have them sent to a PO Box instead so they don't occupy his mind so much, but perhaps they like him to stay busy in his own way.

Sometimes these two processes mix in Dr. Bill's mind, and sometimes his other preoccupation, the fear that someone is stealing his pills, creeps in there as well. That's when the letters get really exciting. Scrawled on envelopes, legal pads, catalogues, are things like "Last count: 62. Must make a list of HI suspects. Big Boss Betty. Office Assistant Annie. Caregiver Cathy. Bill for VISA $33.86. What is this for? Cost of replacing missing pills? Call police."

Adding to all this is the fact that Dr. Bill has one of those printer/scanners that can function as a copy machine. So if Dr. Bill has, say, two envelopes full of his rantings that he decides should belong on one sheet of paper together, he photocopies them onto one. Over and over. And then rolls up the paper into a long tube, puts a single rubber band around it, and stores it in his closet for further rumination later on. He had a large supply of these crazy collages.

As you can imagine, Dr. Bill goes through a lot of office supplies this way. So one day, he asked me to drive him to the office supply store for more rubber bands and printer paper. We successfully got his supplies and were on our way back to his home for me to prepare him some lunch, when a two-story dental office caught his eye as we drove by.

"Pollyanna! Stop the car! Turn around! That's where I need to go!"

Gamely, I swung the car around, and drove by again, more slowly.

"There! That's the place. I gotta call them and tell them I need to see them. The real office is on the second story, but YOU'RE not supposed to know that."

Always wanting to be polite and humor him, I just replied "All right Dr. Bill, we can look up their phone number when we get home."

I turned the car again, taking a side street to get reoriented in the correct direction.

"Wait, Pollyanna, there was something else there too. Where did it GO? Dammit all anyway."

Luckily, Dr. Bill has a sweet tooth and can always be redirected with promises of pastries. Especially at lunchtime. So we made it back to his place, supplies in hand, for lunch and then more photocopying. Just like always.

Eclipse, reviewed by Bev

I have a new home care client by the name of Bev. Bev is over 90 (not sure how far over 90) and every Sunday, I pick her up, we go to a movie, and then I take her home to the assisted living facility she lives at. To meet her, you wouldn't think Bev is sneaking up on a century of life. She uses a walker, sure, but she carries a cute little purse that I'd bet money she bought in the teenager department, will only wear sandals because she hates real shoes, and has plenty of energy. She hires caregivers to take her out and about because she likes to stay very busy and her kids and grand kids don't keep her quite busy enough for her liking. Bev's a little Bubbe, complete with New York accent and hebrew plaques adorning her walls.

The first movie date we had, I wasn't at all sure what Bev would want to see. Turns out, she wanted to just pop over to the theater and go to the first movie that was starting when we arrived. She'd been hoping to see Salt, she confided, but the timing wasn't going to work out that day, so we saw Ramona and Beezus instead. This last weekend, I printed out the movie times for our local theater in big print, listing only the showings that fell within our 3 hour movie date parameters.

Bev ruled out all children's movies, and had already seen Salt ("it had a terrible ending - she dies!") and Inception ("just marvelous"). This left us with The Twilight Saga: Eclipse. I warned Bev that it was about vampires and werewolves and tragic love, but she said "as long as the good guys win at the end, the rest is all right".

Bev and Eclipse got off to a rocky start, with her saying "I don't want to see this" during the opening vampire attack scene. However, a quick cut to sparkling love in a meadow saved it and we didn't have to leave the theater after all. She greatly enjoyed Bella awkwardly telling her father she is in fact, a virgin. As we left the movie, Bev broke it down for me:

"What was the name of that movie? Eclipse? What does that mean?"
"You know, Bev, like when the moon gets between us and the sun and it gets dark during the day."
"I know what the word means but how did it relate to the movie? Well anyway it was very unusual. Very well done. But very unusual!"
"Bev, did you ever punch anyone for kissing you, like Bella did?"
"Oh, no dear, I said 'more, more, more'!"

Bev's favorite parts of the movie included the Washington scenery, and the love story. She was neutral about all of the fighting, and greatly relieved that it wasn't sad enough to make her cry.

So see, sometimes my job is very easy! If Bev and I see any other standout films, I'll keep you all posted on her thoughts.