A zoo.

My grandmother is in a nursing home, and I think everyone who works there is impressed with the amount of visitors she has. My mom is there every day, and one of my sisters is there almost every day. The rest of us are there every other day or so, so on any given day my grandmother usually has three or four people in to see her.

Her roommate, Ms. Mearl (totally not her real name), is apparently unimpressed with all this. Ms. Mearl is a nice lady, but she can't see very well and she's a little (and by "little" I mean "a lot") out of it some of the time.

So yesterday I was there, and John was with me, and my brother and sister were there, and my neice came in with her little girl. So we're talking and kids are doing the kid thing and my brother is in and out going to smoke. Eventually, John and I got ready to leave. We'd said our goodbyes to the family already.

"Bye, Ms. Mearl," I said.

She shook her head. "It's like a zoo in here," she said, "just like a zoo."