Mar 7, 2007
Today was a day of very contrasting emotions. Gary’s mom fell and broke her hip this morning. She had surgery in the late afternoon. So far all we know is the doctor expects her to be able to bear weight on it soon.
On the other side of the emotional spectrum, I took Gary to Montgomery so some things on the mini-van could be customized to him. First came paperwork, and then we waited around until the guy had finished installing something or another (I had figured we were going down too early when the guy had told us to delay an hour in coming, but Gary was so eager to get down there I knew he wouldn’t listen to me if I told him we should go down there even later than the guy said). The guy said it would take him five minutes to finish the installation. His secretary warned us that meant fifteen minutes. I think it was more like a half hour, maybe more (I had brought my story to work on, so didn’t pay attention to how much time had passed). Finally, though, it was time for us to get into the van and check it out. The guy showed us how the controls worked on the transfer base for the driver’s seat. One for moving the seat forward and backward, one for moving it up and down, and one for rotating it from facing to the front to facing to the side (I think it goes 360 degrees, but we only needed it about 90 degrees). It’s going to take me awhile to get that straight, if today’s attempts are any indication ;-).
Gary rolled up the ramp, and I helped him transfer into the driver’s seat from his wheelchair. Actually he didn’t need my help – he says it is an easy transfer. But we both experienced something strange when we sat behind the wheel as if we were driving. The wheel seemed too low. When Gary would turn it, it would rub against his knees (not that he could feel it, but he shouldn’t have something rubbing against his legs all the time). For me, when I would use the gas and brake pedals (I took it out for a short drive), my right knee kept hitting Gary’s hand controls – I am sure I am going to have bruises there tomorrow. (Gary was sitting on his special cushion, which he will have to sit on for drives of an hour or more, while I was just sitting on the bare seat, which accounts for why the wheel placement affected us differently.) We thought this was very strange, because we are both small people. If some tall person tried to drive this van, his knees would be up around his ears. We never figured out why this should be, but I guess we’re going to have to live with it to some extent – Gary already paid for the car, and we were never given an option of who to deal with in getting the car (the disadvantage of getting help from the state I guess, but $23,000 is nothing to sneeze at). The guy said he thought he should be able to lower the seat a little and move the hand controls so we don’t have this problem when we take possession of the car. We’ll see.
Another thing that didn’t quite work out as expected was the lockdown of the wheelchair after Gary transfer out of it and into the driver’s seat – it needs to be locked down so it doesn’t go flying around the van in case of abrupt braking. But, the guy thinks he’s figured out a way, involving bolting down a seat belt into the floor of the van. Gary would then put the belt through the spokes of his chair.
The last thing that needed fixing, at least as far as we discovered, was that the outside mirrors didn’t adjust.
The guy showed us all the controls for various things (lights, wipers, ramp), not that I’m going to remember :-). He also showed us how to take out the front passenger seat and how to manually lock Gary’s wheelchair in position there in case Gary wants to ride like that. To do that uses four separate locking mechanisms – for the front right and left and back right and left of the wheelchair. Given the effort it took this guy to take out the passenger seat, we are not planning on having Gary travel this way, particularly since I would be the one trying to remove the seat! He can just transfer into that seat from outside the van, similar to what he has been doing. That’s a safer way for him to travel anyway.
We had left for Montgomery at one, gotten there around two, and weren’t out of there until five – so we got home around six. I was pooped!
The guy claims we will have the van tomorrow (they will deliver it to us), but since we have learned that five minutes means thirty, that “you will have it this week” means we will be close to having it after two weeks, we figure that we should be getting it sometime next week ;-). Actually, the guy had claimed if we brought someone with us today they would do any last-minute work on it today and we could drive it right home. I’m glad we didn’t get someone else to go with us – either they would have come for nothing, or we’d probably still be there now at 10 pm.
Gary is very excited. If we do get the van this week, he wants to find a parking lot this weekend where he can practice. He asked me if I was comfortable driving it, and I said not terribly and that he could do most of the driving. He then asked me if I’d do some of the driving to Rolla for the math conference, so looks like I’m going to get sucked into that ;-). He’s really got his hopes up to go to the conference, so I hope they come through and get the van to us so Gary can practice and have his new license in time to drive there.
Today was a day of very contrasting emotions. Gary’s mom fell and broke her hip this morning. She had surgery in the late afternoon. So far all we know is the doctor expects her to be able to bear weight on it soon.
On the other side of the emotional spectrum, I took Gary to Montgomery so some things on the mini-van could be customized to him. First came paperwork, and then we waited around until the guy had finished installing something or another (I had figured we were going down too early when the guy had told us to delay an hour in coming, but Gary was so eager to get down there I knew he wouldn’t listen to me if I told him we should go down there even later than the guy said). The guy said it would take him five minutes to finish the installation. His secretary warned us that meant fifteen minutes. I think it was more like a half hour, maybe more (I had brought my story to work on, so didn’t pay attention to how much time had passed). Finally, though, it was time for us to get into the van and check it out. The guy showed us how the controls worked on the transfer base for the driver’s seat. One for moving the seat forward and backward, one for moving it up and down, and one for rotating it from facing to the front to facing to the side (I think it goes 360 degrees, but we only needed it about 90 degrees). It’s going to take me awhile to get that straight, if today’s attempts are any indication ;-).
Gary rolled up the ramp, and I helped him transfer into the driver’s seat from his wheelchair. Actually he didn’t need my help – he says it is an easy transfer. But we both experienced something strange when we sat behind the wheel as if we were driving. The wheel seemed too low. When Gary would turn it, it would rub against his knees (not that he could feel it, but he shouldn’t have something rubbing against his legs all the time). For me, when I would use the gas and brake pedals (I took it out for a short drive), my right knee kept hitting Gary’s hand controls – I am sure I am going to have bruises there tomorrow. (Gary was sitting on his special cushion, which he will have to sit on for drives of an hour or more, while I was just sitting on the bare seat, which accounts for why the wheel placement affected us differently.) We thought this was very strange, because we are both small people. If some tall person tried to drive this van, his knees would be up around his ears. We never figured out why this should be, but I guess we’re going to have to live with it to some extent – Gary already paid for the car, and we were never given an option of who to deal with in getting the car (the disadvantage of getting help from the state I guess, but $23,000 is nothing to sneeze at). The guy said he thought he should be able to lower the seat a little and move the hand controls so we don’t have this problem when we take possession of the car. We’ll see.
Another thing that didn’t quite work out as expected was the lockdown of the wheelchair after Gary transfer out of it and into the driver’s seat – it needs to be locked down so it doesn’t go flying around the van in case of abrupt braking. But, the guy thinks he’s figured out a way, involving bolting down a seat belt into the floor of the van. Gary would then put the belt through the spokes of his chair.
The last thing that needed fixing, at least as far as we discovered, was that the outside mirrors didn’t adjust.
The guy showed us all the controls for various things (lights, wipers, ramp), not that I’m going to remember :-). He also showed us how to take out the front passenger seat and how to manually lock Gary’s wheelchair in position there in case Gary wants to ride like that. To do that uses four separate locking mechanisms – for the front right and left and back right and left of the wheelchair. Given the effort it took this guy to take out the passenger seat, we are not planning on having Gary travel this way, particularly since I would be the one trying to remove the seat! He can just transfer into that seat from outside the van, similar to what he has been doing. That’s a safer way for him to travel anyway.
We had left for Montgomery at one, gotten there around two, and weren’t out of there until five – so we got home around six. I was pooped!
The guy claims we will have the van tomorrow (they will deliver it to us), but since we have learned that five minutes means thirty, that “you will have it this week” means we will be close to having it after two weeks, we figure that we should be getting it sometime next week ;-). Actually, the guy had claimed if we brought someone with us today they would do any last-minute work on it today and we could drive it right home. I’m glad we didn’t get someone else to go with us – either they would have come for nothing, or we’d probably still be there now at 10 pm.
Gary is very excited. If we do get the van this week, he wants to find a parking lot this weekend where he can practice. He asked me if I was comfortable driving it, and I said not terribly and that he could do most of the driving. He then asked me if I’d do some of the driving to Rolla for the math conference, so looks like I’m going to get sucked into that ;-). He’s really got his hopes up to go to the conference, so I hope they come through and get the van to us so Gary can practice and have his new license in time to drive there.
posted by Peg Daniels at 8:16 PM
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