Five to close

Suzie is a very smart woman.  I mean she picked me as the person to hang out with the last 23.7 years right?  Well a few weeks ago she came up with what might be the single greatest idea in the history of the world.  Ok that's laying the hyperbole on a little thick but it really was fantastic.  So our old way of handling the routine each evening in caring for the fabulous Miss Kinley was that we would alternate each task including who puts her to bed.  For example it might go.....help her eat dinner (John), give her meds (Suzie), dessert (John), bedtime i.e. bathroom, brush teeth, read book (Suzie). and then the next night we would switch the order.  Even though after years of practice we were pretty good at this method it had a fundamental flaw:  It required both of us to be engaged every single night and nobody had a "night off".  So now we have a new schedule thanks to my awesome better half.  Each night one of us handles everything after 5pm so the other person can relax and take a night off from caregiving.  Now if I'm off for the night I can go downstairs to watch a ball game, go to the gym, or make time to write more than one blog annually.  Suzie might want to go shopping, read a book, or catch a few episodes of the Real Housewives of Bachelor Island Paradise. It's been great having that down time to look forward to every other night.  I jokingly called it the 5 to close shift and now its the law of the land.... or at least it is for our little plot here in El Paso county Colorado.