Friday, September 9, 2022

 Friday, September 9, 2022  

I listened to The 5 Stories audio file last night as I fell asleep. I went out quickly. I wanted to see if the audio file could positively affect my mind as it has had on some of my students. Students who had problems with speech, verbal expression skills, and associative recall have all shown improvement. I didn’t know if it impacted any of the latter, but I woke up with a quiet mind. Wow! Is it the audiofile that did that, or was there some other factor, like the excitement I felt from talking about all the approaches and exercises I developed with Shelly?

    The whole session with Shelly was talking about my work. Shelly kept coming back to the BrainManagementSkills. She thought that was the primary thing I was anxious to share. Nay. That’s at the outer edge of my work. There are all the methods and exercises I developed to teach word recognition, comprehension, and writing skills.

  I called the company Shelly recommended, Linknow Media. I got an answering service. The company was in Eastern Canada and on EST. They were already closed. The woman who took the message was unpleasant to deal with. If Shelly hadn’t told me she had a lovely experience, I would have blown off the company then and there. I left my name and number.

  The podiatrist’s nurse called me yesterday to say they ordered a weighted X-ray for my right foot with my local Kaiser clinic. I have no idea why he ever told me to get this X-ray on Oahu when it was available here. I had a telephone appointment with the podiatrist on Tuesday. His nurse told me to get the X-ray done before then.

   I don’t have to make an appointment for an X-ray here. I stopped off, signed in, and went to the waiting area. I passed a long line of people, all elderly. They were lined up for the flu shot and/or the Covid booster. I figured I might as well get on the line today and get it over with. Then I learned this was the first day the booster was available. The lines were not usually this long.  

   It was good to see June again. Yes, the X-ray technician and I are on a first-name basis. I’ve been in to see her a lot this year: two hip X-rays, one of my left ankle, and now one of my right foot. E

  I spoke to adolescent D’s mother. I told her how he told me he already knew what I taught him but was too lazy to do the work. She said he was defensive; he didn’t know how to do it. I agreed he didn’t know how to do it independently, but there were other concerns. First, did he realize he couldn’t do it? Second, this behavior would not play out well in the real world. He would get himself in a lot of trouble.

  I learned something new about him. He is meticulously neat in the real world. His room is neat; if a pencil is out of place, he moves it. However, his writing is a mess. There is no sense of order.

    I came home from a short walk in the neighborhood to find a text from Yvette saying she had Elsa downstairs. She barks while I walk. Yvette was concerned it would disturb Scott, who needs healing sleep now.  

   He came out of his room. He was wearing a sweatshirt with the hood up. He had been cold last night. I thought shock was settling in. He looked worse now than he did on Thursday. I remember I was fine after my surgery. It was three weeks later that I started having problems. The impact of having his throat cut open and having two neck discs removed and replaced is showing up.  

  When I tried to open my Facebook page this morning, there was no problem. I have no idea what the problem was about last night. I showed Scott the work Mei and Peter had done on the deck. The house is a business venture; they rent it to tourists. It sits right at the water’s edge. They had a ten-day window to rip up and replace the old deck. Getting someone to do a job on a schedule around here is impossible. They come when they come. While the store loaded the planks, they had to unload them themselves. When they ripped up the old one, they discovered the support beams needed to be replaced, too. They worked like dogs for ten days. I showed Yvette and Scott pictures of the job they posted on Facebook. Scott saw a problem. The material they were using required special installation. If improperly installed, the planks would swell. Mei and Peter were halfway done, and their renters were due. They roped off the uncompleted section. I had to decide whether to interfere and communicate Scott’s concerns or not. Ow!