Wednesday, December 7, 2022

  

Wednesday, December 7, 2022

 

   I added the alphabet writing with my foot to my morning in-bed exercises. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be.

   Today, I had my Kia service appointment to check my car out. I stopped at Atlas Recycling to drop off the bag of soda cans. I also asked about my broken beach chairs. I had cut the material off them, but Scott told me I had to remove all plastic. I couldn't do that. The attendant said he would do it. I told the guy to give the money to someone homeless. He said he would. Afterward, I guessed he might be the homeless person he had in mind.

   I brought the car to the Kia dealership because I had a concern with the car's operation. A friend drove it and experienced a sudden, unexpected surge in speed above the limit set by the cruise control. He declared there was something wrong with my car. I had never experienced it. He never experienced it again. There's a good chance he did something with the cruise control that caused the unexpected increase in speed. Since he couldn't remember doing anything, there was still a chance it had something to do with the car. I recalled the days of the Audi mishaps when the car bolted out of the driveway. It caused seven hundred accidents and six deaths between 1982 and 1987. The prospect of a runaway car was frightening. That's why I took the car in.

  While it was there, I had them do a routine service and checkup. When I got home, I called about another issue. Sometime after I got the car, I pulled into a friend's driveway at night and got a large (over 1 foot high) boulder stuck under my car. (His nine-year-old son had rolled it there.) When I took it in to be checked, they told me the battery shield had been damaged. They would order a new one. That was the last I heard from Kia. Today, I called them to remind them of this needed repair. They called me back to say the shield was scratched but not damaged enough to interfere with service. However, my alignment was out. I don't think the boulder did that. I suspect it was one of my awkward right turns when I went over a high curb. For $89, they could fix it. Sure, go ahead.

  I got a ride home from Kia in their tow truck. The step was too high for me. I could hardly get my foot up on the running board. The driver, an older man himself, had to come to the passenger side and push me in once I got my foot in place. We chatted as he drove me home.

   Greg asked me first how long I had been on the island. He came in 2002. He had been a professional poker player and won a big pot. A trip to Hawaii was part of it. He stopped at the Kia service and gave them his resume. They immediately offered him a job- and he stayed. He loves the climate here. 

   He got married and now has a seventeen-year-old child. He told me he had dyslexia, and his son had problems with autism when he was young. He and his wife worked with the child, and he was "no longer autistic."  

   His son recently asked his dad what to put down for his racial category. His dad said, "Heinz 57 varieties." His mom is Hawaiian, Chinese, and Filipino. His dad is one-quarter full-blooded Cherokee with Scottish, German, and Eastern European in the mix. Sounds like Heinz to me.

  When the car was finished, they called to give me the bill. They charged me for the basic maintenance service. I thought that was covered for ten years. No. The warranty was good for ten years but not for the basic services. Oh. That was upsetting because I thought it was otherwise. When I bought the car, I should have taken a knowledgeable man with me. They could have sold me anything. I asked if it would void the warranty if I used a local shop. No. I just needed to keep all the receipts to demonstrate I maintained the car.  

  I called back. The mechanic said nothing about the issue that made me bring the car in the unintended speed surge. All the stories about the Audi 500 flashed to mind. I had calmed down, but the thought was terrifying. I called Kia back to ask what the result of their check was. They said it is normal for the car to accelerate up a hill. What!!??? He said the car was designed to do that. "What??!!" I said. Then you can't use cruise control in Hawaii because you can't drive without going up and down hills. I should have been told that before I bought the car. 

  I called the owner of the dealership, who sold me the car. I told him what the mechanic said. Cruise control should not be used in Hawaii because of the hills. I finally said something explicit about the car accelerating to speeds beyond the top limit of the cruise control setting. He said it was normal for the motor to accelerate on a hill. However, it would not be standard for the car's speed to go beyond the cruise setting- the issue with my car. 

  A friend helped me calm down with a statistical approach- right in my wheelhouse. What was the statistical likelihood of that happening? That helped. That's how I usually think about things. I was off my pins. I have recovered reasonably well. I still feel raw and know I must be alert when driving. 

  I had an appointment with adolescent D. I talked about his resistance to any form of actual practice. I wanted him to work on copying letters, with or without reading the words, saying each letter aloud, and writing the letter with his fingertip on a surface. This is to heighten his perception of letters. He hates doing it because it is a painful reminder of his disability. I understand, but the choice is between this momentary pain and the long-term pain of never improving. I can understand the dilemma, too. D isn't the only one dealing with choices like that. I can't think of anyone who hasn't made that choice in some area of their life. I encouraged his mom to remind him to do the exercise even one minute a day. Besides whatever resistance he has, he has memory problems. She doesn't like to push him. I don't blame her. A battle royal could ensue. I told her to be just a reminder. It should be his choice. 

  I had a session with Mama K's crew immediately after adolescent D. Twin A was reading away. I saw a few moments when automaticity set in, and she read fluently. So far, she had been completely reliant on conscious decoding.

  Twin E is still dependent on conscious decoding. However, she did remember the word there. It was unclear if it was automatic or if she used the decoding trick of pronouncing the word the, and then adding the /r/ sound. You wind up with the Scottish pronunciation for the word there, but it gets you there.

  I switched from reading comprehension to math with fourth-grade K. Mama K texted me a copy of his report card. It needed to give more information. I determined he was good at reading numbers up to 100,000 and representing those numbers with expanded notation. His teacher sent me the results of his i-Ready diagnostic report. I needed a little help interpreting it. It gave me the information I needed.

  For my last session of the day, I met with eighth-grade K. I worked on a passage from Under the Mesquite, an extended metaphor. It took a lot of work, but in the end, he connected the symbolic reference, smoke, and the actual reference, the father's shifting mood. I don't know what this boy's problem is. I have worked with the autistic, the intellectually deficient, the perceptually impaired, and the inexperienced. K is in a category by himself. His inability to articulate his thoughts is stunning. Or is the problem that he has no thoughts? He functions at most on a third-grade level in his thinking. He has trouble answering basic questions about his behavior. He is always lost. I want to recommend a speech and language evaluation.  

  I started watching Slow Horses on Apple TV. I don't know how much of it I can take.