Mama's going to be mad at us for a while. Mark gets out of the hospital today. Mama called to see if we would let his daughter, Brandy, borrow our van to go get him. We said no. This, of course, makes us assholes. But I suspect that Mama's biggest thing is that she didn't want to have to go to Charlotte. She's feeling bad today and doesn't want to get out. My reasons for saying "no" are kind of complicated. A lot of it has to do with the fact that Brandy is young and, quite frankly, she's not on our insurance; we'd be fucked if something happened while she was driving it. Another is that the Shorts have seemed to expect a lot from us lately, and we've reached the end of our compassion. That sounds bad, I know.