Tuesday, September 9

A good day all around. Tommy's physical-therapy schedule is now firmed up--he'll have Shannon on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and Loretta (whose nickname is Red, for her long red hair) on Tuesdays and Thursdays. This morning Red gave Tommy a good workout, and a speech-therapist joined him and Janis for lunch. Tommy is still on a "mechanical soft" diet; i.e., the food is midway between solid and pureed. This weird food category is most noticeable with meat; a "mech-soft" pork chop, for example, looks kind of like a pile of chopped-up rubber bands. But until Tommy can limit the size of his bites, the speech therapist will keep him on this regimen. Today, she also directed that Tommy not be given straws; this is because he continues to sip too much too fast (rather than taking one sip at a time), which leads to coughing fits. Our dinner was quite fine--I brought steamed shrimp and Pat, the wife of Tommy's roommate Mike, brought a big box of Popeye's chicken. After dinner, Tommy had a long phone chat with his son Steve. So things are back on track after yesterday's turmoil.