Jodie's wheels, like new!

Jodie has had her power chair for a year now.  When it has been working properly, it has made her life much easier.  When it has stalled continuously and has to be reset over and over...and when she has not been able to reset it herself...well...you know.

The last straw was a couple weeks ago when Jodie stalled out in the rain a couple blocks from work.  I had left early to drive Eric to school for open gym baseball practice.  As I blogged a couple weeks ago we took the power chair into the shop.  They had to order parts.  We kept Jodie's chair at work, since her workspace is all set up for her power chair.  We got a manual chair in the meantime to get Jodie to and from work.

The shop called yesterday to let us know the part for her power chair had come in.  Eric and I took it in this morning, and returned to get the chair at noon.

They replaced both the left and right motors. They updated something...I don't remember what they said.

Eric drove the power chair to our van and he could not believe how smooth it drove...and twice as fast!

Jodie has not tried it yet, but I am anxious to see how she does.  I can see her booking down the sidewalk, getting to work in half the time.

I know it sounds strange, but I kind of look forward to the day when I have my own power chair to book around in...using less energy for my disability so that I have more energy for my abilities.

;)

Messing with a big kid...

I took Eric to the doctor the other.  He had what looked like an infected sliver that would not go away.

His regular doctor was not in, so he had a lady doctor attend him.  She was tall and she seemed surprised to see a kid that matched her height.

She diagnosed it as a wart.

There are two ways to get rid of wart - the slow, no pain, medicine way, and the short, painful, freezing off way.

Dry ice, wart falling of - it was a n brainer to Eric.

The doctor came back with a cup of smoking dry ice.  She had a smile on her face and a "I get to mess with a big kid!" look in her eye.

She dabbed Eric's wart with a swab of dry ice.  It was painful...I could tell.  Eric grimaced.  The doctor said that little kids scream and push her away when she does that to them.

When she was done, she threw the dry ice at the wall...it was gone in a puff of smoke.

Her smile and spirit reminded me of my Aunt Barb who was a great nurse.  Hi cousins Tiana and Travis...nice to have contact with you again.  Your mom is smiling down on us.

To whom does the power chair belong?

Yesterday, Jodie and I took her power chair in to Providence home care services to be looked at.  She stalled out a couple blocks from work yesterday, and she has been stalling out a lot lately.

I unloaded Jodie from the van, we went into the "store front".  The gal behind the counter was very nice.  She called for a tech.  He came out.  Jodie transferred to a regular (non-wheel) seat in the waiting area.

The same tech came back out awhile later.  They had the power chair up on the rack.  From viewing the log from the onboard computer chip he could see that Jodie's chair had indeed been stalling out...a lot!  The diagnosis was that the left motor on the chair needs to be replaced.

It will take five to eight business days to get the part.  They offered Jodie a loaner chair, but with her experience with the loaner earlier this year, we figured dealing with Jodie's chair is a better option.  I will take her to work and to her meetings for now...no busing it or long way ventures for Jodie for awhile.

Another tech brought Jodie's power chair out.  The gal behind the counter was on break.

The look on the tech's face was priceless! Like - "OMG! They are both disabled!  Whose chair is this?"  A deer in the headlights look - totally!

He came towards me with the power chair.  I do look like the more disabled one...no doubt.

Jodie said, "Umm, it's my chair."

"Dang!" - I could see it in the tech's eyes.

Jodie and I had a good laugh...

Bye Shadow

As I wrote before, we are a household of five dogs.

Make that four.

Shadow, one of Ma2's "Boys", was put down earlier today.

Shadow was a big, old, Lhaso Apso with attitude.  A grumpy old man whose growl frightened Vinny, a lab mix four times Shadow's size.

As a pup, Shadow had a near death experience.  A nylon stocking in his intestine was the culprit.

Shadow was a cudly dog, Ma2 says.  Jodie called him "Teddy Bear".   Shadow loved to play, he loved to tip over the small trash can we have by the computer table.  We have a plastic container--our bill box--Shadow would take whatever paper he could get out of there and eat it.  He even tried to eat the lid!

Jodie called Shadow the "Matriarch"  ("patriarch" woman!) because he carried himself in such a kingly manner around all the other dogs in the house.

My favorite memory of Shadow is how he would sit at my feet while I sit at the kitchen table.  He would get as close as he could to my feet and lay down.  I could never resist reaching down to pet the Big Guy.

Yesterday the vet said that diabetes was getting the best of Shadow.  Eleven years old.  Pain.  No guarantee that extreme measures would even help him.

Ma2 brought him home last night so we could say goodbye.  I got choked up this morning as I pet Shadow and said my goodbye.

Shadow is curled up in a much better place now.

Bye Shadow.

Skeeter, Shadow, and me