So am I creating a Deuce Coupe here?

 I've just been listening to the old Beach Boys songs "Little Deuce Coupe" and "409"   because it's summer and they're fun summer songs. I'm playing them on my 5.1 stereo system through my iPod, neither of which were even thought of when these songs were recorded - and I wasn't born yet either - but the Beach Boys have fun songs. 

The odd thing was, when actually listening to the lyrics of these songs I thought of how complicated configuring a motorized wheel chair is turning out to be.

The song lyrics go into details of car mechanics that frankly no one knows anything about anymore: "four speed dual quad posi-traction"?  "flat head mill"??

The wheelchairs apparently have a huge variety of parts and options. I've sat in 5 chairs so far now, and have gone through the sales / occupational therapist person describing about 10,000 variations of foot rests, seat cushions, back cushions, head rests, control sticks, tilt sticks.... and we haven't even gotten to colour yet. What the ?

The process of getting a motorized wheelchair is supposed to take about 3 months, Yep, I understand that now. But will I be composing a song about it? 

Little Deuce Wheelchair, I don't know what I've got...

Did anyone feel the ground move?

OK, so the ground - the earth - the planet - is constantly moving. But typically, we ape-descendants don't feel it moving.

In California, and all the way up the West Coast of North America, earthquakes are not uncommon. Earthquakes that we can all feel as they move the ground below us. Indeed, we are all waiting for "The Big One" to hit. Perhaps we are getting a bit impatient. Perhaps the Californians have found a new way to bring excitement into their lives. 

There is a place named "The Geysers" near Anderson Springs, California where people pump waste water into the ground to have it heated by magma, turning it into steam, and then they use the steam for energy. There are evidently thousands of little earthquakes in the area, and there is some evidence that pumping water into the earth's crust is what is causing these little earthquakes. (Who? Us? We're just pumping pressurized water into volcanic magma, what could go wrong?)

So to "up the ante" there are now plans to drill deeper, push more water deeper into the earth, and get more steam for more power so more ape-descendants can use more electricity. See this article in the New York Times for details. This article also has an Interactive Graphic which is worth playing for the enjoyment of watching the details of this plan.

The New York Times article also includes some interesting facts about what happened when people tried this in Basel, Switzerland. Yes, there was an earthquake. A big earthquake. But no, that's not going to happen in California because they're using better technology. And just because there are major fault lines in California is no need for concern, they won't be digging close enough to them for any problems. (No, those aren't linked to each other, we can't see underground, but we know there are no connections. Really.)

So maybe the California people have not watched enough science fiction movies to really scare themselves about this idea. Maybe they've watched too many. Maybe we've all watched too many and are getting really nervous about this for no reason at all.... yeah, that's it.

But how do they practice conversation?

Hair stylists are always fun because they have such interesting ways of looking at the world, and they share their ideas constantly with their customers as part of their business. 

So when I was in the hair dressers yesterday I was wondering why the hair stylist and client a couple of seats down from me were so quiet. As I subtly looked over to see what was up, I realized the client was only a head! It was a dummy head propped up on a stick at the height a client would be in the chair. The stylist was applying highlights to the hair with colour and foils.

I am trying out a new place to get my hair done (got bored of the same old style, grew hair out, needs some definite help on the style aspect now) and I decided to try the Aveda Academy Salon since it's about a block from where I live. I've never had my hair done in a school before. It's interesting, in a desperately ordinary way. 

I'm used to flagrantly individualistic people as hair stylists, and I don't think anyone was relaxed enough to be an oddball there. I do wonder if they've missed the point of hair stylists. Doing hair quietly without some really off-the-wall conversations just seems a bit dull. Shouldn't they be practicing conversation as well as cutting and colouring?

The good news is, I do like the style I had done yesterday, so I will likely go back, I just won't expect to be entertained.

Are they really gone?

For the past 3 years we've had construction workers going up and down the outside of our apartment building doing "repairs" to the windows and walls, and painting the building the same colour it was before, just to make it look cleaner.

Yesterday they took the construction fence and other dirty, dusty building debris away from our front door. Today they took the freight-train car box of tools away. (And spent most of the afternoon cleaning the outdoor parking spaces they had occupied with the box with the loudest power washer they could find.)

So could it be? Is it possible? Could construction really be over? Could they really be gone?

The windows are absolutely disgustingly dirty, some of the windows they "fixed" are now collecting water between the panes, and the front sidewalk is cracked and beaten up, so the place looks like hell. But maybe it will be quieter now that they've gone... 

Would anyone like me to weed while I'm down here?

On Sunday I was on the Stanley Park Seawall for the first time in years.

My husband and I took my newly-loaned manual wheelchair with us in the trunk of the car and went to the park for a bit of a roll. We do live in the West End, very close to Stanley Park, and my husband can walk to it easily, but we live up a hill. We actually live in the middle of a hill. To get out of our home you either need to go up, or you need to go down. Neither of us have the strength to roll me up the hill, and my husband has to struggle to hold on to the wheelchair going down the hill so I don't end up in a spectacular crash. So we drove to the park. We really have to find a better place to live.

The seawall is a wonderful thing. I managed to actually get some real-live exercise outside in the fresh air! It's been so long since I've been able to say I've gotten some good exercise outside. And it was a lot of fun too! I haven't smiled that much in ages.

My husband helped with course corrections, and occasionally took over pushing the chair for me. I will need to get some gloves to help with braking. It's a good thing that neither of us are control freaks, but we did break out in laughter many times as the dips in the pavement had me learning about physics - so that's gravity, huh. You can escape the gravity of a dip if you are going fast enough... that's fun. 

"Thistle!" Was something I called out once while my husband was pushing me around the lighthouse at Brockton Point. This thistle was just at the right height for me to get a whole whack of thistles stuck to me. A quick course correction, and more laughter followed. It's tough to steer while your laughing. 

While I was in the chair I noticed a lot of weeds at the side of the pavement. It made me wonder if anyone wanted me to do some weeding while I was down there. It's low to the ground, that chair.

Are all sidewalks sloped?

I have MS, so my world has been shrinking to a point where I now have problems walking to the bus stop 1 block away from my home, and can name several species of turtles that can walk faster than me. So I'm looking into wheelchairs. Since this is a brand new experience for me I am going to be including updates on the progress in my blog.

I now have a manual wheelchair on loan from the Red Cross. My first trial run on the sidewalk outside the Red Cross centre was hopeful, it took a couple of minutes, but I got the hang of steering and figured I could do this. The next day my husband and I went to see the movie Star Trek a few blocks from where we live. (It was the 20th anniversary of the day we met, and our first date - about a week later - was going to see Star Trek 5, so we did another Star Trek movie for the anniversary... awww) He walked behind me to give me help where needed, and boy did I need help!

Why was I drifting to the left? Course corrections were needed often on the flat bits, and my husband took over for the off-roading on the uneven pavement and when we were in crowded areas. But I was definitely drifting to the left - towards the road - on the way there.

When we got into the theatre, it was clear sailing for me. No problems at all, and since we were seeing the matinee and the place was fairly empty, I took the opportunity to use the washroom. Some fine corner maneuvering, and I steered through that just fine.

On the way home... I was drifting to the right. Hmmm.

The manual wheelchair is incredibly sensitive to changes in slope! I had never noticed the slope when walking down those streets. It is amazing how much difference a slight slope made to the steering.

So is the slope just on the streets downtown? Or are all sidewalks sloped towards the road? Wow, what an odd question I never even considered before.

Has the world gotten louder?

The arrival of summer means sun, glorious sun, and long days, fresh local food, tourists, picnics, and all sorts of activities to stimulate your senses. 

It also means keeping the windows open to get some wonderfully fresh air. And with the fresh air comes more noise. It's something you don't notice during the winter, but winter is very quiet and summer is very noisy.

Stimulating the senses is a wonderful thing, but it's a shock at first.

Ever had to sneeze while brushing your teeth?

Some sneezes just instantly burst forth.

Some sneezes give you warning, and then never happen. And you just know that sometime in the near future you have one of the instant ones coming.

Some sneezes give you just enough warning to grab a tissue. But if you are brushing your teeth at the time...

Jackson Pollock (1912 - 1956) was an abstract painter who created paintings by throwing paint onto canvas. His name is sometimes used as more of a verb than a noun: "He Jackson Pollocked on your couch" means a mess is awaiting your artistic critique in the living room. 

The hysterical laughing fit that you try to overcome after viewing your Jackson Pollock on the bathroom mirror can be loads of fun, but you tend to swallow a lot of toothpaste while trying to keep your balance.

Luckily, some of us never grow up.