Tuesday I had nothing planned, I was going to take it easy and recover. The main order of business was to get enough liquids back into my body that I would start to feel better. I continued to read and work on that blanket. And I waited for my BrailleNote Apex to be delievered. it finally came around 3pm. the UPS driver person, could have used some sensitivity training on persons with disabilities. Usually the UPS driver that has come to the house, has been the same person, is very nice and accommendating. This driver was not the same, he wasn’t necessarily rude, but he wasn’t necessarily nice either. When I asked where I needed to sign, He did the typical thing, right there. Okay? Where is right there? Oh I love that term…Right there! Saying that to a blind person means nothing. Anyways I got my box and he went on his way. I also never know what I should do about encounters like that. Should I call UPS and complain, should I not. What to do? Luckly we don’t have alot of items that are delievered, and if they are, they do not rquire a signature like this package did.
On this night hubby had an elder meeting. And if you go to our church, you know that an elder meeting will not be over in just a few hours, but be like a 4 or 5, or maybe even a 6 hour meeting. Yes I know that sounds crazy, but they do talk the whole time. About what I don’t have a clue, nor do I ask. I say all of this in a teasing manner. I love that my hubby can serve our church and God. I promise it really does not bother me that every once in a while they have a meeting that lasts six hours, its all good. So while hubby was off to his elder meeting, I went to have dinner with a neighbor, who also goes to our church. Her son is about 18months old so I got some good playing time in with him. the conversation between me and her was hard to hear over the baby playing, but I did hear some. After he was done eating dinner, and playing, she put him down for the night at 7pm. She had made a very good Italian dish for dinner, chicken, mushroom, and noodles. I don’t remember the name of it. We sat down for dinner at a little after 7. Very shortly after we sat down to eat, her husband came in from work. We talked a while, and then I came home.
I didn’t stay long because they were both tired from a day of work, and I had to get ready for the next day. I came home and groomed the pup on the back deck. The weather was nice, cool and a little humid. The moon was out, and not sure if full but very close to it. It was bright in the sky. It was late enough that most people were all bundle up into their homes by this time.
Pup’s grooming went quickly as she is putting on her fall coat. When she wants to be, like on this night, she wanted to cuddle. I was sitting on the deck with her in front of me. Its usually harder to get her to stand while I get her bum area brushed out. It wasn’t that hard on this night. Then when I went down her body to her front legs and head, she wanted to curl up into my lap. Her body heat was nice as the temperature was cool. But I had a task to get done. She needed to be all pretty for the next days adventure.
Shortly after I completed the pup’s grooming, I fed and took her out for her last relieving of the night. I then got in the shower to clean up from that mess. At 10, hubby’s elder meeting ended. OhMyWord…its been like NEVER that an elder meeting has ended at 10pm. I was happy to have my husband home. Again teasing, only teasing. 🙂
Before going to bed we both had a snack as both our dinners were quick and small. Unfortunately we weren’t in bed until midnight or so. this was espically bad as we had to get up early the next morning, so the little sleep would not help us get through our day any.
Wednesday, as I mentioned started bright and early. Well not exactly bright, as most mornings we are waking before the sun comes up. but it began early. there was the typical rushing around for us both to get ready. I packed my back pack, with things I might need while out. On this day I was going down into Philadelphia to the Blindness and Visual Services office through OVR. My FIL picked us up at 7:40am. We dropped off hubby and then FIL took me over to Warrington PA for my Septa CCT pick up.
Septa CCT is a paratransit for disabled persons, its door to door service. Because hubby could not go down to Philly with me, I knew I could not successfully travel the route to my meeting independently. So to save on stress, and my safety, I took paratransit.
Because of where we live, we live outside of the service area for septa CCT to pick me up from my home. So I must get a ride to Warrington, or some other place in the service area to get the ride. I meet the CCT at a Walgreens. When I and my FIL arrived, they were already there. Early in fact..seriously shocking!
Even though this service is for the disabled, and yes its door to door. Its a shared ride service, with multiple pick up and or drop offs. So in other words they have their own time and schedule. Its not the type of service you should use if you want to get some place in a hurry.
For me some stress came with knowing that I would have to communicate with the driver, and I most likely would not hear them or not understand what they were saying. The nice thing though was that the driver on this day knew that I could not hear. So he responded to my questions in a yes or no, and no rambling answers. this particualr day, I rode on a bus that had a wheelchair lift. When I boarded the bus, there was one other person on the bus. Once I was settled, had paid my fare, we were off.
While I was riding hubby was able to follow my progress with an Iphone app called FindFriends. Once I remember that the app had a feature so that I could see the same thing, I started watching my progress too. Before being on a service like this, you never knew where in the city you were, but this app would give the block I was on of a street. Or it would say, I was close to such and such. very cool.
We dropped off two persons, one that we had picked up after I boarded the bus, and then went on our way. I can also say that none of these buses are efficient, as in like heat or AC. Because this morning was cool, damp and cloudy, I wore a sweater, but that did not help any on the bus. It took about an hour to get to my drop off with traffic.
Wehn we arrived, the driver parked the bus and then assisted me up to the building. He was unsure of where I needed to go, so he asked a security guard. He helped me get up to the floor and then I was assisted by another security guard. the elevator I came up was the back one, the normal elevator was broke. So when I came up and was assisted by the second guard, we went through all of these long hallways, around corners, through cubicals and through door ways. I was so lost. Once I was in the right area, I checked in with the receptionists. Of course the receptionist was behind a window. Again one of those situations, how do I handle this, what do I do, how do I communicate with someone I can’t hear. I finally just said, I was hear to meet with my O&M instructor. This meeting was so that my O&M instructor and I could look at the Humanware DeafBlind communicator.
A DBC is a device that is very similar to my BrailleNote Apex, but this has a cell phone connected to it. So if a deafblind persons was in public they could use this to communicate with a person. A person, the person helping would text like on the cell phone just as they were sending a text, but instead the writen message goes to the DBC. Then the DB person would type back a message. The same sort of device can be put together with an Idevice and a braille display, which I am hoping to do.
So once the people I was meeting with came out to get me, we went back into a meeting room. I thought that the meeting was going to be with my O&M instructor, myself and the person who knew most about the DBC. That particular person who knows about the DBC the best, also the BVS special programs director, thus she works with persons who are deafblind. but instead of the meeting being with jsut those few people, it was with 6 to 8 people, and several came in and out, that I did not get their names.
I have generally not had a hard time communicating with people inside, well not on this time. The building that the BVS is in, was once a big factory, so the ceilings are high, its very open, with little in the way of things to absorb the sound. I didn’t hear every thing that was said, but I guess I never will. They were nice in only one person speaking at once. Having a meeting with that many people was fine, it didn’t bother me, and I got to be a test subject in the process.
In the meeting were several O&M instructors, several RT’s, and then a few others, including myself. We started off by explaining about myself, and how or why I was there. Then we moved on to the DBC demonstration. There was alot of talk through out, about the device, about who would benefit, who would not, what skills were needed to use the device and so on. At one point through the meeting I slipped into Social worker mode. There was some talk about other deafblind consumers, no names were mentioned, so I don’t know who they were speaking of. But I really wanted to make a point that deafblind persons look to these professionals for guidance, but unless they have peer support, they are isolated and alone. That for anyone to be successful they need that connection to others. I volunteered to let anyones consumers contact me, and help them get connected into the deafblind community in SE PA. Through several points in the meeting, several persons were curious if one day I would come and work with them. Maybe, difantely an option I am keeping open.
The meeting lasted about 2 hours. Once we were done, I was then taken out to a waiting room area near the first elevator, the back up elevator I came up. I had jsut gotten settle down, said that I was going to eat some lunch and then go to the bathroom, when the driver of CCT came to get me. It was at 12:30pm. So off I went.
The driver took me right back to the Walgreens. Again I followed my progress, we first were traveling on I95, then in Ben salem, then in Treevose, then in South Hampton, then in Warminster, and then in Warrington. All the while staying on Street road. It was funny to see the street numbers go up and down, to see street be a West and then an East and then a South Street road. We did hit some of the lunch traffic, which delayed our progress a bit. We arrived at the Walgreens at 1:15pm. My FIL was there waiting when we drove up. And then we were off for home.
Because when I got home I had not had lunch, I snacked on almonds and banana chips. I did some relaxing with the intention that I woud then get up to do some computer work and or check emails. I continued to read, the book I am reading is 32 hours long, so it will take me still some time to get through it. And still more work on that blanket.
Around 4, I got very drowsy. I texted hubby to let him know that I was going to lay down. I was laying down knowing that once I got all settled that I most likely would not be able to fall asleep. But that is not what happened. I was reading and had used the sleep feature on the digital reader, and fell fast asleep.
Hubby says he came in from work around 6, but I don’t remember much of that. He layed down with me and we both took a nice nap. It was dark out by 6:30. I guess not getting a whole lot of sleep the night before, had finally caught up to us. We did get up for dinner at 7:30. For the first time in several weeks we had popcorn to accompany our dinner. Of course we ate all the healthy stuff too, like a salad. After dinner it was around 9, and neither of us were tired, so we stayed up and got a few things done. I did more blog writing and hubby worked on creating my domain and website. We finally crashed around midnight.
Thursday, This is the time of the year where we are seriously busy, getting ready for this event, gettign ready for that event. And one this day that is what I was doing. We have a convention coming up, and some how I have had a deafblind meeting fall into my lap of organizing. I have found the co-speaker, including myself, and then have done some other leg work for this meeting. I also spent some time blogging more.
After lunch I cleaned up as hubby and I were having a meeting with the HKNC field rep at 5:30pm. It wasn’t the house was messy but I cleaned the kitchen and the bathroom and just picked up around. After doing all of that, I had just enough time to sit and rest, read and crochet before hubby came home.
At 4:30pm, hubby came home. We finish cleaning up and putting things away. I got dressed from my around the house clothes. And then she arrived a few minutes before hand.
The field rep for HKNC was meeting with us, to answer any questions, to get the final information for my admissions and get to talk about different things in regards to HKNC. Many of our questions were answered. I will arrive at the center on November 11th and start my classes on the 12th. We talked about the holidays and coming home for some time. We talked about my focuses for the training, and what I wanted to get out of it. The field rep left around 6:30pm.
Neither hubby or I was hungry, as we had planned our lunches in the afternoon so we would not be hungry right at dinner time. Hubby worked on my domain and website, and I began more blog posts. At 7:30, I got a call from the Vice President of the organization that we are a part of, the same organization that I am planning the deafblind meeting for. She called as she wanted to talk to me about writing a resolution for the convention. We caught up for a while. while I was on the phone with her, we had a grocery order delievered. So hubby took care of that.
After my phone call and the groceries were all put away, well mostly, we had a lite dinner. And yet again after dinner we were on the computer doing our various tasks. Hubby was working hard to get a batch of data together and I was writing. It seems that I do that alot these days. But writing has become my outlet, my way of remembering, of processing. By no means am I ever going to get a pultzer prize from my writing but atleast I hope I can give someone hope, tell someone about myself and keep people update on whats going on with us.
Yet again we did not get to bed until late, and we more fell into bed, from being tired.
Friday, started out like a normal day. The sun came up around 7:00, bright. It was a bit nippy, with the wind blowing, with a beautiful blue sky over ahead. Lots and lots of leaves are falling from all of the trees, and some have already shed all of their leaves, others are still green. When I took pup out we dodge around falling leaves and other items that had been caught by the wind. I had to wear a sweater but could have used another layer in order to be warm. The high on this day was only suppose to be in the high 60’s. Such a nice and beautiful fall morning in the north east. Granted I won’t be saying its so nice once it starts to snow, and get super cold.
On the agenda for this day was getting that flyer I have been working on for that deafblind meeting out to those who might benefit, Generally check my ever growing email inbox, responding to emails, and more writing.
Around 4 I started cooking dinner. My plan was to have dinner all fixed by the time hubby came in from work. Before I could even begin cooking I had do a fair amount of clean up. This took longer than I had anticipated. I was making a sort of greek Italian dinner dish. chicken, with sun dried tomatoes, olives, mushrooms, noodles with fetta cheese. When hubby walked int he door I was a bit frazzled because it was taking me longer to get everything prepared than I had hoped. Being the wonderful husband he is, he came right in and started helping. Even though I was late, we sat down to eat at 5:15. Hubby thought the meal was good. I don’t know, I don’t have much faith in my ability to cook.
We then had plenty of time to change and get ready for our lifegroup. At 6:30, our good friend from life group picked us up. We stopped at our favorite dounut shop for dessert. Life group was normal, we had dessert, a few of the little ones went down for the night and we did our study.
I can’t say what actually the study was about, as I don’t remember. I know that at the time the study was interesting and I learned a lot. But we received news we were not expecting, news I won’t discuss here at this point.
The awesome news is that another weekend has began, this means that I get the whole weekend to spend with my hubby. Woo Hoo!
More to come…
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