The Neuropathy Group

After much deliberation and procrastination, I finally narrowed my choices for a support group to attend down to a women’s support group for single parents, a neuropathy support group, and, as a last resort, an AA meeting if one of the other two didn’t work out for me. All of the meetings were on Saturday, nearly the only day that would work well for me schedule-wise.

As instructed, on Friday afternoon I got on the phone to confirm that the meetings would indeed take place at their appointed times on Saturday. My first choice was the women’s support group, listed as meeting in Tate Page Hall on campus at Western Kentucky University at 1:00. I looked for a phone number for Tate Page Hall but couldn’t find it, so I called the general information number for WKU. After telling them about the information that I was looking to confirm, I was transferred to some place in Tate Page Hall. The lady that answered had never heard of the group but asked around a bit. No one knew anything so she transferred me to the Psychology Department to see if they knew anything. I received the same answer from the second lady who then transferred me to another person. Again, no one had ever heard of the group so this lady recommended that I call the Daily News, the paper that the listing had come out of, and inquire of them if they had any additional information. I decided that I had inquired far enough and would rather pursue another group.

My second choice was the neuropathy support group. The group was listed as meeting at Barnes & Noble in the meeting room at 10:30. This listing didn’t have any contact information listed so I called Barnes & Noble to see if they had any information. The lady that answered the phone said that she is not allowed to give out any information about the group. I pressed her a bit but, no, she would not give any information. She did confirm that they had booked the room for 10:30 on Saturday morning but, other than that, there was no information that she would give. This time I resorted to calling the Daily News because I really didn’t want to go to the AA meeting. The lady at the Daily News said that what is in the paper is all the information that they have. I decided to take my chances and show up for the neuropathy meeting.

This morning, I arrived at Barnes & Noble around 10:20 and I couldn’t find the meeting room right away so I went to the cash register to find out where it was. I was waiting for my turn in line when an elderly gentleman behind me asked, “Are you a Western student?” I confirmed that, indeed, I was. “I believe that I sat right in front of you at the Western Symphony Orchestra performance the other week when I attended with my granddaughter." How astonishing! He had held a lengthy conversation with Kris the evening she attended the concert with me. He encouraged me to continue on.

I asked the lady behind the counter where the meeting room was and she pointed me in the right direction. Another employee overheard me asking about it and escorted me to the room.

I entered a fairly large room with tables & chairs set around, all but one of the tables being empty. There were five women sitting at the table and the oldest-looking lady, Edna, asked me if I was looking for the neuropathy group. I said that I was and she invited me to pull up a chair and join them. I got my chair and, as I pulled it up to the table, I explained that I am a Western student and that one of my assignments was to attend a support group and write a report on it. I asked if it was okay for me to use their group as my assignment and Edna said that it would be fine and that I had chosen a good day to join them because Judy, a nurse practitioner, was joining them to be their speaker for the day. It turned out that I was sitting next to Judy and she said that she had attended WKU and had obtained a bachelors degree in biology and a bachelors degree in nursing. She then went to the University of Louisville and got a masters degree in adult health.

Two more elderly couples came after I arrived and then Edna called the meeting to order. She introduced Judy and let Judy have the floor. Judy spent approximately 20 to 30 minutes explaining the central nervous system and what causes peripheral neuropathy.

From what I could understand, peripheral neuropathy is when the nerves in the extremities are damaged, usually over a period of time, resulting in symptoms like numbness, tingling sensations, and muscle weakness, just to name a few. There are some medicinal and therapy treatments available but not a cure.

Judy emphasized the necessity of getting plenty of vitamins and minerals. Judy, a relatively young person, takes two of GNC’s Ultra-Mega multivitamins three times a day to combat the future degeneration processes. She said that the amounts of vitamins and minerals that a person receives from One-A-Day brands are not nearly enough. After Judy was finished with her talk, she opened it up for questions and there were various questions regarding treatment options and types of medicines.

The meeting lasted about an hour and after it was over, they again asked me about my reason for being there and were very interested in what I do, etc. One lady asked me what I had learned from being there and I told her that I might need to start taking a multi-vitamin. They found that rather amusing. As I was leaving, I told Edna about the difficulty I had trying to obtain information and she was quite indignant about it.

After I left the meeting, I had been planning to go to the mall anyway, so while I was there, I stopped by the GNC store to see the wonderful Ultra-Mega multivitamin pills. They were just as I expected them to be: horse pills. They cost $29 for 180 day supply and that would be if you take them the way they recommend. The way Judy takes them, she said it costs her $54 a month.

The Axe Has Fallen

On Wednesday, October 13, the axe that I had been waiting on finally fell.

I left my Health class and went to get a bite to eat before going to the library to study. As I was rolling up to the Arby's drive thru, an unfamiliar dash light came on. I was pretty sure it was the temperature light and, to back that theory up, the temperature gauge was hovering around the "just under H" area. I cruised thru the drive thru and pulled into a parking space and shut the car off. I extracted my owners manual from the glove compartment to verify that, indeed, it was the temperature light. I knew there was an Advance Auto just up the road about a half mile and it was only about 8:00 so they should still have been open. I whispered a "God, please help me make it there with no trouble" and headed up the road. Just as I was turning into the Advance parking lot, the needle did a full-fledged jump up to "H", as in, HOT. I pulled up next to the door and shut the car off.

I went inside looking for some kind soul with knowledge of hot cars...and that would be temperature-wise, not stolen. I walked in the open door and out of one of the aisles came a young man that inquired as to whether he could help me. "If you know anything about overheating cars, you can," I said. He said he would start by taking a look at it. I popped the hood and he started peering around. I told him that I had noticed a puddle beginning to form in the garage under my car the past several days. I had tried--unsuccessfully, I might add--to identify the fluid but it had seemed very water-like in texture and smell. He looked for hoses that might be leaking, etc. but couldn't seem to find anything. He checked out the level of the coolant reservoir and it was a little low but not totally empty.

He recommended that we fill the reservoir and that I take it to the fix-it shop as soon as I could. I was already planning to leave early Friday morning for a wedding and was going to take my car to the fix-it shop on Thursday night. He thought that I might be able to make it home the way it was. We went inside to get a gallon of coolant and as he was ringing it up, he asked me, "Do you have a music class?"

"Huh?" I said, brilliantly.

"Do you have a music class?" he asked again. I must have been looking at him very blankly because he went on, "Music Appreciation with Mr. G at 3:30."

"Oh! Yes, I do!" I said, feeling very befuddled. "How do you know?" I knew that he wasn't a student in my class.

"I take his class at 5:00 and I see you sometimes," he said. Oh. Well, since I might possibly stand out from the crowd...I guess that might be understandable.

It was a great connecting point and gave me something to chat about while the wonderful man filled the reservoir and got me ready for the road (much better than standing around silently while he worked). We discussed the concerts that we had attended recently for extra credit and the bad attitudes of the just-out-of-high-school students. He's 26 and had been in the military and is now pursuing a degree in Mechanical Engineering. A very nice young man, made all the nicer by his helping a clueless female in distress far from home and father. (In reality, I could probably have bumbled my way thru what he did, but it would have taken me much longer and I would have had to consult the owners manual frequently.)

We said our good-byes and I got back on the road, with one eye fixed on the temperature gauge. I wasn't even out of sight of Advance and the temperature gauge was hovering just under "H". I stopped at the light just up from Advance and called home. Just my luck, Dad & Martin were both at church. I asked Mom if it would hurt the car if I drove it home the way it was. "If the light is on, it will," she said. "What you do is drive until it gets hot and then stop and let it cool off and then you go again." As I was talking, the light turned green and it just so happened that on the other side of that light was the Bowling Green location of O&S. I pulled into the lot and shut the car off to finish my conversation with mom. I could hear the juices bubbling and the car was steaming. I knew that it would take me all night to get home if I did the "drive 'til it's hot" method.

I decided that since I was at O&S and I did have a key for the office, I would just call AAA and then wait in the office if they took off with the car before Jolene came to get me. (With the previous nightmarish experience I had had riding with AAA when Kris's car was towed from Daviess County, IN, I was not about to take another ride with them if I could help it.) So I made the arrangements with AAA to come get the car and I proceeded to unload all of my books and other paraphernalia into the office so they could take the car when they got there. I called and Jolene (bless her) headed my way. I went into the office and sat down to do homework until they arrived.

The tow truck came and they loaded my car up and left with instructions to take it to the dealer in Franklin. I then got a call from an annoyed Jolene who couldn't find where I was. I gave her directions and figured out that she had gone too far. She turned around and, after another call or two, we figured out that she had gotten an impression from Mom that I was stranded by the road somewhere and she was looking for my car.

After she arrived, we went to the dealership so I could fill out the night paperwork and get any remaining items from the car. We then went to Mom's and she (bless her, too) allowed me to borrow the van for the following day.

The diagnosis: leaking water pump. And since they had to remove the timing belt to fix that, we decided that it would be a good idea to change it too. I'm a firm believer in changing timing belts. And while they were at it, I had them change the oil too. I also asked them to check out the transmission again, since it had just given me fits the other week. They could find nothing on that again. Total cost: $460.78. *sigh*

It could have been worse. I was grateful that they had it done in time for me to take the car to class that afternoon.

Freshman English

I have come to enjoy this class time and really dislike the actual work. Mr. C assigns different model essays to read, usually a controversial topic. We then discuss these topics in class and Mr. C loves to play devils advocate. If you come down on one side of an issue, he will come down on the other, ask provoking questions, and require you to defend your position. When he asks a general question on how people feel about an issue, I’ve learned that, unless I want to be the target of the questions, I need to keep my hand down! Mr. C will randomly pick on people so I get my share of talking done without raising my hand. I really enjoy the discussions but “to be seen and not heard,” that’s my motto.

The goal of this class is to teach me how to write essays. So far, I’ve only had to write a paragraph on corporal punishment but, as we get farther into the semester, the writing portion of the class will increase and the grammar portion will decrease. It is definitely a challenge to have to put down in writing reasons for your beliefs. For instance, I know that spanking, when warranted, is a good thing, but then I have to come up with three reasons along with evidence to support those reasons. And “’cause the Bible says” isn’t good enough.

A frustration of this class is that Mr. C is entirely too busy. He only teaches one night a week and so the greater portion of his time is spent on his real job. To complicate matters, he has to pick his daughter up from dance class immediately after class so there is no sticking around to discuss anything that needs to be discussed. He has good intentions of responding to emails but it doesn’t happen, at least it hasn’t so far. The quizzes that we have taken so far in this class have not been returned so I have no idea how I’m doing in the class, grade-wise.

I guess time will be the great revealer.

A Husband?

On Wednesday evening, the door to the classroom was locked when I arrived at my Health class. I joined the other students in holding up the walls and waited for Mrs. W to arrive.

She arrived in what has become usual fashion, a minute or two late. She rushed down the hall toward us and came to an abrupt stop in front of me. "Is your husband a professor in the engineering department?" she asked me.

I looked at her in a bewildered sort of fashion and stammered out a "Uh, no. I'm not married."

"Oh," she said and continued down the hall to the classroom. Nothing quite like leaving a person hanging...

I was going to hang around after class and ask her about it but she had her hands full with other students so I just left. I did e-mail her to ask her about it but she hasn't replied. I did a search on Western's website and there is a Doug with my last name that is a professor...down in the engineering department.

Putting Out Fires

I’m feeling deliciously lighthearted at the present moment.

WKU is currently on fall break and my homework load is somewhat lighter than normal, but fall break isn’t necessarily responsible for my current tendency to break out into full hysterical laughter…no, it’s life itself…with Kris as a sister/roommate/near arsonist.

The evening started out innocently enough. I had gone to Mom’s for some chicken and rice for supper and brought the remaining portion home for Kris. After Kris got home from work, she ate what was there and still feeling somewhat hungry, she decided that some pepperjack quesadillas were in order. I was in the mood for some quesadillas as well, so I fixed one up for myself and took it to my room to munch as I messed with my e-mail. Rather than pack up the small hunk of cheese that was left, Kris just fried up another quesadilla.

A short time later, I was interested in a drink so I headed to the kitchen in search of one. As I neared the kitchen, I heard a snap…and a crackle…and a pop. I saw a haze wafting out of the kitchen…and the smell, well, there isn’t one quite like it. (It immediately brought back flashbacks of last winter when Kris put on a pot of water to boil to make cappuccino and then went to study while waiting for it to come to a boil. She promptly forgot about it until I happened upon the scene after my shower, only to find the pot had boiled dry and was melting to the burner.)

“Kris!! What are you doing?!?” I hollered back down the hall as I dashed into the kitchen expecting to see open flames because of the popping and crackling. Thankfully, the flames were non-existent but the bright red coil and smoking pan were real enough! Kris came bounding down the hall as I grabbed the frying pan from the burner and turned the knob the remaining half-inch from as-High-as-it-would-go to Off.

“Oh, no!” she said. “Not again!! Is it ruined?”

“I don’t know. Will it ruin it if I put water in the pan when it’s that hot?” I asked her, fearing the Teflon would just curl right off the pan at any moment.

“I don’t know…it’ll just spatter you”. Hmm…comforting thought. I just kind of stood there for a bit, holding the smoking pan, not sure what to do with it. And then, “Quick, fan the smoke detectors so they don’t go off!” Kris said, not wanting to disturb our renters on the first floor.

She dashed back down the hall to start fanning smoke detectors and I knew that I couldn’t do any good with a smoking pan in my hand so I headed for the sink to try watering down the pan. It sizzled and boiled mightily but didn’t get too volcanic so I put it on one of the cool burners and headed down the hall to try to help avert the disastrous setting off of alarms that sets off the whole house, not just the basement. Too late.

“Shut our bedroom doors so the smoke can’t get to the detectors in there” one of us said. (It’s hard to remember who said what in a situation like that.) We slammed the doors of both our bedrooms and the sewing room but they continued to wail. “Disconnect them,” one of us said. I opened my bedroom door as Kris headed into her room and I jumped up onto the bed and turned the detector a quarter turn and disconnected the wires from the back. I put it on my bedside table and rushed back out into the hall. Kris’s door was closed and I heard a clatter inside as I tried to gather my wits about me and figure out how we could stop the wailing. I later found out that Kris had been standing on her swivel office chair to reach her smoke alarm…and (*drum roll, please*) it swiveled. She knocked a bunch of stuff to the floor trying to keep her balance.

By this time, I could hear footsteps upstairs from the renters. Kris & I looked at each other, a bit wild-eyed. Then I looked up and saw the smoke detector that we had forgotten about…in the hall with free access to the smoky air. I grabbed a rag and started waving it around…it didn’t help. I grabbed a step stool nearby and Kris climbed up and disconnected the alarm. And blissfully, silence once again reigned.

Kris ran up the back stairs to let our renters know that the house was not on fire. They exchanged a short conversation on kitchen adventures and Kris came back down, somewhat pink and very embarrassed.

About this time is when the hysterical laughter set in but, for some reason, I seemed to find it a bit funnier than Kris did. If we had just disconnected the hall detector first, we could probably have averted all the wailing.

We set about trying to air the place out with frequent bouts of hysterics between mortified discussions of different aspects of the episode. We opened our lone window in the kitchen and I went to the top of the front stairs and opened the door, along with the garage door, in hopes of drawing the foul smelling air up and out. Kris set up her fan in the hall to try to stir the air and I turned on the fan in the microwave above the stove.

We then retreated to our rooms to try to calm down a bit. “Why?” Kris asked. “Why would I not turn off the burner?”

I explained to her that not only had the burner been on, it had been on as high as it would go. “Oh. That would explain it then. I thought that I had turned it off but evidently didn’t turn it all the way,” she said. A mere 20 to 30 minutes later, she ambled into my room and declared that she had, in fact, turned it off and had no idea how it could possibly have turned itself back on. …more hysterical laughter on my part.

She ranted on for a bit about how her Teflon frying pan is probably ruined. “Will it ever fry another egg? Another pancake? Another quesadilla?” she mournfully wondered. I advised her against cooking before she leaves the house in the morning, for fear that the house would no longer be standing by the time we got back.

“What would you do without me?” I asked her.

“Well,” she said, “I’d wait for the smoke detector.”

Sometime later, Kris opened my door and said, “You just wait. You just wait until it’s your turn. And then I’m going to laugh. I’m going to laugh harder than anyone. All two of us.”

It was at least a full hour later before I remembered my original mission. A drink. That must have been a God given thirst.

Click here to read Kris's version.

Waiting

This evening after I got out of class, I met Kris at Mancino's where she was doing her homework and eating. I ordered a sandwich and tried to brainstorm for my persuasive essay while I ate.

When I left to head on home, I noticed that my car seemed to be shifting kind of hard when leaving the parking lot...and sure enough, it took a good 15 minutes for my car to shift out of first gear. There is nothing quite like blitzing along at 40 mph. I pulled off once and shut the car off in hopes of fooling it into behaving when I started it back up. Nothing doing! Just as I was preparing to pull off the road again because of a line of traffic approaching from the rear, it shifted into second gear. I went on around the block just to make sure that it would keep shifting and it did.

Just waiting....