driving

Driving to Dinner

map sacramento to occidental

Driving to Negrit's ItalianPsyching myself up for a trip tomorrow. I need to drive to Occidental. It is about 103 miles and can take from 2.24 hrs. to forever depending on the traffic and road conditions. Right now the minor and sometimes major street flooding is of concern. Hope the rain tonight is not to bad.
I used to love to drive anywhere anytime – let’s go attitude. But anymore I tend to avoid it like the plague. Driving wears me out. Sitting that long turns my feet into burning balls of fire (well if feels that way) and the constant having to pay attention while the world zooms by is a major brain drain. Yep driving long distances kind of sucks anymore.

Driving in bad weather

The weather has been crazy here lately. Lots of rain, snow in the mountains and foothills, tornado’s, thunderstorms, you name it have been going on. Driving on a nice clear day is not so bad as long as I am in familiar territory. Driving in foul weather not so nice. My friend Mikey is going along for the ride – thank goodness! Hopefully having a navigator will stop me from getting lost LOL. Good to have such a good friend.

I plan on taking my camera along and hope to get some good pics along the way when we stop for a stretch. Hope I do not get the shot of a lifetime while floating away weeee ….

OK over dramatic but honestly driving anywhere right now is kind of dumb if you can avoid it. So but of course my little white truckie, Mikey, and I will be out there in the weather! Why you might be asking yourself? Well it is a dinner for my parents 60th anniversary. Do not get me wrong, I want to attend their dinner but golly did it have to be darn near to Bodega Bay? My brother lives in Santa Rosa, his kids live somewhere a bit up north from there. So rather than meat half way . … story of family life. Yeah the one and only brother that responded to me telling him I had MS by uninviting me to Thanksgiving.

I guess if my 83 year old parents can make the drive so can I. Dinner is going to be at an Italian Restaurant that is noted for being old school – hope the food is good.

Map of where we are driving.

map sacramento to occidental

from google

sac to occidental

google earth

Well here is to hoping that driving to Occidental and driving back turns out to be no big deal and the weather is not too bad.

If I get any pics I will post when I get back.

PE Class, Wildwood Flower, and Buttons

Augh you might be asking what in the world do adaptive PE, flowers, and buttons have in common. The short answer is me LOL.

Hang on to the edge of your chairs now because this is going to be one of those real exciting blog posts that you surly spent hours awaiting!

First off I could take paragraphs to go into all the things I can no longer do. Or pontificating on all the stuff you can do and I can not or things I can do and you can not. Blah blah blah it is all lip service no? (in this case keyboard hitting).

Seriously, I can not be the only person with MS that finds it highly annoying to read about some great and wonderful accomplishment someone with MS has managed. That really does not cheer me up or make me strive to reach for the the stars. And it has the rebound effect (or is it affect?) of the inevitable comments from family – gee they climbed a mountain with MS so what is the big deal about not wanting to go camping where there is no running water and the closest restroom is 10 campsites down. Obviously you should be able to do that it is not like climbing a mountain you know!

Then again should I really feel bad and guilty or be berated because I can still drive, or make it up the stairs? Is not my personal perspective of suffering good enough. I somehow do not qualify? I have come around to the conclusion/belief that each and every person who overcomes any disability whether judged big or small is busy climbing their own mountains. And these mountains can be akin to pole vaulting over mouse turds to raising a truck over ones head. They all count.

And the above being the lead in to why I really like my adaptive PE class. It is a diverse group that gathers four days a week for an hour in the short bus trailer. I have yet to hear, see, or  sense from anyone in the class that someone is better or worse or crazier or sicker than someone else. It is what it is.  People who can’t talk use those boxes to communicate,  the blind, the wheelchair bound, the mentally disabled, the goofs like me – we all just – well are.

It is the first place I have been with people who are not close friends that when my brain has gone south and it appears I took a stupid pill where I did not feel stupid.

Moving on without a segway into the next topic – I have decided to learn to play wildwood flower on the dulcimer. I have listened to a few renditions of the song. My favorite is June Carters last recording of it. I think I have figured out the notes – well a few might be missing – but I will see.  It is not easy to find TAB notation for the old style noter and drone playing. The ones I have found on the net are for chording and finger picking.  Big attempt for me as I still have problems with Go Tell Aunt Rhodie LOL But I am gonna give it a try.

Rush hour traffic here in Sacramento is the pits. I really dislike driving in it anymore. But the shop where the Luthier can put the strap buttons on my dulcimers does not even get in till 4:30pm. I am getting smarter here now so give some credit, I know that it would be a bad idea for me to install them even though I have done many over the years on guitars. So I put on my brave face, kissed the dogs goodbye and ventured out onto the evil freeway – at the start of rush hour(s).

I did not get lost, I did not crash, and on the way back home in the peal of the rush I turned on my truck radio. Yes, I made it home and listened to some tunes on the way. Not really that distracting because top speed was about 20 for most of the trip.  The dogs were really impressed with the strap buttons and I suspect the fact that I made it home before doggy dinner time had a lot to do with that.

Now I can hold and play my dulcimers without them shooting out off my lap like rockets headed for a crash landing!

So today I just was, I made a goal, and I did something normal.