The question of the day is...

Every day as a part of my mom's 'agenda', we ask her questions to keep her mind active and alert. It kind of evolved from the day that I asked her, " Are you okay?"

And she said, "I'm file!! [instead of 'I'm fine!"]

Then when I asked her, "What's 7+4?"

She answered eleven, but slurred the 'L' sound.

That was April of 07 [with a stroke ocurring within minutes],

and now [in 09] she'll look right at me and say, "I'm file!!"

And a couple of exchanges follow:

What's 7+4? Eleven

Do you know what day it is? I think it's Tuesday.

How about what month? May?

We have expanded our conversational thinking. Nic has been encouraging her to recognize those yellow birds as 'finches'. Sometimes Flo would say "Cinches."

To give a clue...I said " Those fooking ------. " We had her saying finches.

Then a couple of days ago, when she was in the bathroom getting dressed, I heard Nic ask her, "Flo, what do you call those yellow birds outside the living room window?"

And I heard Flo proudly say, " Yellow birds!!"

When we ask what are the tiny, tiny, birds called and I have begun 'humming' as a clue, ...

She'll say 'tiny birds"...I'll say 'Mom, I'm humming to give you a clue..."Oh, is that what you call that??

Last new question has been, " Okay Flo, who is the president of the United States, and it is not Bush."

She would answer, "Taft." No, not Taft.

So in a Password kind of help, I said, Mom, it's not O' Mama....it's....

Her reply: "O'Papa!"

Always an adventure.