Metro

Rather than using Metro Access, I took the regular Metro train to the Newseum yesterday, There are several reasons why I did this. First and foremost was flexibility. On Metro Access, travel times have to be arranged by 4:00 p.m. the day before the trip. On the subway, of course, passengers come and go at will. I preferred the freedom from timetables that the train gave me.

The train is quite convenient. I live immediately next door to the Virginia Square Station.

And, for people with Metro Access cards, the train is free! This creates problems of its own, though. It's easy to get in the station - you just show the Metro Access ID card to the Station Manager, who then lets you in. The problem is that, once you get in, there are gates scattered throughout the pathways of the station. The gates require insertion of a fare card before they will open, and a non-paying Metro Access customer has not got a fare card.

At first, this stymied me. When I arrved at a closed gate, I sat at the gate and looked worried for a while. Then I attempted to remedy the situationn by frantically travelling up and down the length of the station. When this solved nothing, I'd stare at the "emergecy" buttons and wonder if this was an emergency. I'd also yell "HELLO!? HELLO!?" up to the balcony above the platform.

Finally, though, I figured it out. Now I just force the gates open by prying them apart. A loud alarm goes off, and a Metro guard rushes over, but who cares? I get through the gate!

Once in, its time to ride the train. In a wheelchair, this is presents many challenges. For example, in my experience (and I believe I'll spare you the details of my exact experience!), a wheelchair must enter the train while moving absolutely straight forward. Any angle causes the tires of the wheelchair to get caught in the gap between the platform and the car. It's pretty hard to get exactally straight in front of a moving door.

Once the door opens, getting through it and into the car is the next problem. This is es[ecially true if the car is crowded. A crowd of riders is easy to handle. They are generally curteous and make space. What is frightening is manuvering into a car filled with contraptions.

On my trip to the Newseum, directly inside the door of the car I was riding was another person in a wheelchair, 2 men with large rolling carts of luggage, 1 man with a big double baby carrage, and 2 bicycles!

I think that probably it is always a wise decision to take Metro Access!!

Stupid, but....

I am SO SORRY! I hope someone out there still checks this blog every once n a while. What happened is something totally dumb and avoidable that has made my life a living hell. This lazy, not too bright, negligent, self absorbed, useless care manager named Rahella was pissed at me one evening (now that's hard to imagine, isn't it??) because I insisted that she take the cover off my fancy wheelchair pillow and wash it. I also had the nerve to demand that she dry it and put it back on that same evening... Imagine! She only had a 4 hours in which to do this.

Well, from that point on, my wheelchair cushion just did no good at all. I was in constant pain because my butt hurt bad all the time. No amount of shifting position helped. I was in constant misery, and therefore didn't care about anything at all. The Metro Access ride home from church today was particularly bumpy and, by the time I'd arrived home I'd decided just to buy a new cushion.

But, thing is, this one is top of the line and cost $160.00.

So I got my current care manager, Experience, (yes, that is her real name) to check the current pad. Turns out Rahella had put it upside-down in the cover, and I had been sitting, not on a cushion, but on a hard piece of wood.

Anyway, I now feel fine. The experience (experience, not Experience) sure did make me appreciate the bravery of all those folks who are in constant pain.

I knew I was at the point of no return when I watched a movie about cute little animals in the jungle yesterday and I found myself rooting for the predators.

But pythons gotta live too, you know?!

Happy Thanksgiving! We (Mom, Dad, Sue, Ron, Ed, Dayna, Charlotte, Lulu, Martha) all ate at the Hermitage for Thanksgiving dinner. The food was very good and the service was excellent.

Afterward, some of us went up to the penthouse, which was unoccupied, and let Charlotte and Lu run just as hard and fast as they could up and down the room. That was probably an excellent idea!

Then, (I guess just for everyone's general entertainment), Susan took it upon herself to repeat the story of my disastrous entrance into a Thai restaurant last New Year's Eve. Last New Years Eve I met Sue and Ron and a friend of Ron's at a local Thai restaurant for dinner. It was cold out. I was dressed in many more layers than I was accustomed to. I wet in the restaurant to find may group already seated at a table already neatly made with plates, silver, linens, filled water glasses, and various other beverages.

Immediately after greeting everyone, my glove got caught on the "GO" lever of the scooter.

Much to mine and everyone else's amazement, I came sailing into the room at breakneck speed and completely out of control. I plowed into the table where all were waiting, pushing the table into the opposite wall. Glasses, beverages, silverware, linens, etc., flew everywhere. Thai waiters ran madly about the room.

So now, why, pray tell, would that seem to anyone like a proper story to tell after Thanksgiving dinner?

Liebowiitz

There was an excellent Scorsese documentary about Fran Lebowitz on HBO the other night. Lebowitz, if you aren't familiar, is a very witty, sardonic, intellegent essayist, reminiscent of Dorothy Parker. She's got a new book out titled "Public Speaking".

I saw the documnentary and it was fantastic. She validates the truth of something the Sunday School leader mentioned last week, which was that, in this society, we are visually oriented, and receive information through images, and not through the written word. Her writing is very humerous and witty, but it seems to me that people these days haven't developed the patience to enjoy what could be a very pleasurable experidnce if they took the time required to read it.

And now for my personal confession......

My friend Susan Craft called to tell me the show exsisted and when it would be on TV. I said, "Gee, but that's when "Hawaii Five O is o." she said, "Hmmm... Fran Liebowitz or Hawaii Five O... What was it that Rudolfo used to say..? (Rudolfo is her brillant deceased husbansd.) Oh yes! 'Nobody ever lost money underestimating the intlellegence of the American public."

Area Access

Area Access came today to replace the batteries on the scooter - if you'll remember, at the zoo, I rode it all the way from Connecticut Avenue down to the bottom Rock Creek Parkway exit, and then tried to drive it back, and the Guest Services guy from the zoo has to push me all the way back up the hill because the battery ran out of power. So the guy check ed tha battery out and said that there is nothing wrong with it! That is what I've alwways liked about Area Accesss - they've always been real honest and don't sell me stuff I don't need. I can just call them up and say, "The power won't turn on!", and they'll fix it for just a couple bucks, when they could probably have sold me a whole new new engine, for all I know about it.

Those workers at Jiffy Lube be an example of the opposite of this good policy. They'd come in the customer waiting area holding an unidentified piece of my car and say. "I just wanted you to see how dirty this is!". Overcome by guilt at having allowed something in my car engine to get so dirty, I would pull out my credit card. Good way to make sales, I guess, but bad way to build customer loyaliy.

Another cool story about Area Access. I was at a doctor's office in a building I'd never been in, in the Lady's on the 6th floor, and my scooter wouldn't start. So I called Area Access and they sent a guy over who fixed it right there in the Lady's room!

Disabiliy Blog

I've been reading articles about "How to get blog hits" and "How to make money off a blog", and the secret seems to be to develop a specific audience and to gear ads toward that audience. They then click on the ads and I earn money. It is not allowed for me just to put a big section in my blog that says, "Click on my ads and I earn money." The content of the ads they send me depends on the content of the articles I write. (As is evidenced by the fact that I once said I was a fountain of knowledge and my blog carried ads for decorative fountains for weeks. Now I've said it again, so you can expect more fountain ads!

Anyway, the idea is to focus on a specific audience and to write articles of interest to that audience, thus attracting ads geared to that audience, which they then click on, thereby earning me money. Groovy. But it does not sound like anywhere near as much fun as writing about whatever happens to pass through my mind at any given moment.

So, I guess on the rare occasions when I'm feeling like I should be productive, I'll gear articles toward my natural audience. And I guess my natural audience is people who have disabilities.

Maybe I can even attract ads for things I want myself and don't know where to get. Some of them are:
1. a wheelchair that fully reclines. It would be great to take naps right in the chair.
2. a wheelchair that climbs stairs. I saw them on TV once, and they were outrageously expensive, but I've not seen them since. Do they exist? Do they really work?
3. a scooter that beeps when it backs up.
4. a scooter or wheelchair with a radio. Yes, one can wear an MP3 device, but that scares me. I find it is good to be able to hear approaching vehicles or pedestrians!

Do you suppose it might be possible to make a scooter or wheelchair with a built-in umbrella or roof?

Which reminds me of a joke. A brunette, a redhead, and a blond are going into the Sahara desert on a trip. A TV reporter interviews them as they leave. He says to the brunette "I see you are taking an umbrella. Why?" The brunette says. "If the sun gets hot, we can stand under the umbrella in the shade."

"OK" the reporter says. Turning to the redhead, he says, "I see you brought bottles of water. Why?"

The redhead answers, "If it gets hot, we can drink the water to refresh ourselves,"

"OK" the reporter says.

Then he turns to the blond. He sees that she has removed the door from a junked car and is holding it. "Goodness" he says. "What do you plan to do with that door?"

"Well," the blond replies. "if it gets real hot, I can roll down the windows!"

Stranger and stranger

I have a toothache - bummer, but no big deal... right? Except that I got to wondering, "How do I get from the wheelchair into the dentists chair?" So I call 1-800-DENTIST, and they give me a name and phone # (which I will call tomorrow, because today is Sunday). But the name is "Dr. Bito", and, when you put "Bito, dentist" in a search engine, you come up with this link to a movie called "The Dentist II", about which they say "Murderous dentist Dr Caine escapes from his secure hospital and flees to a small town in the Midwest where he tries to start a new life. He sets himself up as the town's dentist and even meets a new love - but when he finds her with another man, his old murderous urges come back with a vengeance..." This does not inspire confidence. But, on the other hand, 1-800-DENTIST says he has patients in wheelchairs!