I read in Media Dis & Dat today of a new park being built in San Antonio, TX. Morgan’s Wonderland, named in honor of his daughter, will be what is probably the first-in-the-world public park with dedicated primary use for visitors with disabilities. Philanthropist/developer Gordon Hartman has even managed to bring the city, county, and local school district in on the project, and is making sure to keep records of the process so that others will be able to duplicate his efforts. Non-disabled children and adults will also be using the facilities, but at this park, disability is not an after-thought or add-on. How neat!
October 19, 2008
Not accessible
What, you are asking yourself, is that picture? Why, that’s the door to the “accessible” women’s restroom at the Travis County Expo Center. The other restroom, in the other building we went to, had a large garbage can holding the door open, making it impossible for anyone in a wheelchair to get by. This one, as you can tell, is impossible to open if you use a wheelchair. And once in, while the wheelchair user stall was large enough, the door swung inward, making it difficult to impossible for someone in a manual wheelchair to shut or open the door on her own. But I guess they figured that no one in a manual wheelchair would be there without an assistant, seeing as how every single entry door had a threshold so steep that it required both being pulled in backwards while a third person held the door to get in or out. And then there were the vendor booths and exhibit sites, in the stock barn, placed so that there was a drop off the pavement into sand at each one.
There is a reason why the Texas Civil Rights Project is suing the Expo Center for failure to be accessible despite their recent multimillion dollar face lift. Go get ‘em, tigers!
(While the site itself has led Carapace and me to decide we will never again go to an event held there, the Expo staff themselves are decent people working in an impossible place. Thanks, especially to Isaiah. We couldn’t have even got away from the car if it wasn’t for him going out of his way to fix Carapace’s chair.)
October 13, 2008
Minor league griping
This past week has been rather uneventful, other than the usual slings and arrows. Which have annoyed me more than they normally do, merely because I had been having a good run of it over the summer. While I enjoyed having several weeks without daily pain, it has a negative in that, with the return of the distinct feeling that my joints are shredding and liquifying, I am irritated unreasonably. It isn’t like I didn’t know that my respite was temporary, and I know it seems petty to be grumpy over having the daily pain again when so many never get a break from it ever.
Still…. Poop. I would like to be able to go to TRF without my knees and hips driving me to the point of tears. How to manage it? My ideas from the summer seem so paltry now. Will two walking sticks work? When I tried it out Saturday, when my kneecaps were trying very hard to take up residence on the backside of my legs, it seemed futile. Should I get a new rollator? I hate taking a rollator to TRF, but what else can I do to take the weight off my legs? Scooter? Hated that, too, at TRF. Things that work well on pavement don’t work so well on hard-packed, sometimes muddy, dirt. And then there is getting about in the shops to consider. You think your local mall is inaccessible? Look upon the ren fest and note how the lack of shop accessibility is the one area in which there seems to be no anachronism. And my very favorite show is always at the least accessible stage. What do people have against ramps? Grumble, grumble.
It’s still not enough for me to not go. Or to not camp. I am looking forward to it. But I also want to have the best experience possible, so if anyone else has ideas, please pass them on.
Oh, also. You know what I hate that isn’t usually painful? Waking up to the sudden sound of a joint going “pah!” And those few moments when I wonder, “OK, so can I still move?” It’s especially unnerving when the joint in question is a couple of vertebrae. Anyone else have this, or is it just me?
OK, I’m done with my whining. Anyone else want to grump about relatively minor things? The comments are open. Oh, don’t tell me how good I’ve got it or offer (yecch) sympathy. Whine, dammit! Whine! Or tell me your hints for ambulating at Big Events.
October 4, 2008
Hooray for the open road!
I was able to park in my own driveway tonight, much to my relief. And we got an unexpected benefit from the road work. The speed bumps are now wider, which means that getting to my place at the end of the street, past 3 speed bumps will no longer be so jolting to my spine. Or injurious to my car’s suspension. So, that’s good.
Still, here’s hoping it will be at least a year before they resurface my neighborhood’s streets again.
In other news, the ankle is getting better. It stayed in place most of today. If I baby it this weekend, maybe it will forget its wild ways and stay where it is loved and appreciated come Monday. As an incentive to good behavior, I ordered new orthotics since the old ones have lost most of their spring.
October 2, 2008
It figures
So, today they closed down my street to do road work. Meaning that I can’t park near my place. And, of course, this morning, my left ankle went out on me. The ankle has since been joined by a metatarsal. Now, this may not sound like much to you, but if it doesn’t, it’s only because you aren’t the one trying to walk with a foot that feels like a large shard of glass has taken up residence in it. Parking on the next street over is hellish. I am not happy about having to cross through dark yards from the next street over to get to my street. No consideration for accessibility was made at all. This doesn’t have to be done this way. Half a street at a time could be done. The way it is being done is just stupid.
September 18, 2008
Blue Tag
For months, Carapace and I told ourselves we’d be sure to bring the camera to take a picture of this parking space sign. Today, at last, we did. Underneath the traditional blue handicapped parking sign is another sign, in red and white: ”If you don’t have a handicapped sign, and if you are planning to park in this space, the owners of this property will place on your bumper the following sticker: I (heart) parking in handicapped spaces and I don’t care.”
I suppose it would be better if the owners would simply call the police to have the vehicle ticketed, but maybe some people are motivated more by the threat of a public shaming than by a fine. In any case, I’ve never seen the two spots with these signs being abused by non-placard holders.
March 12, 2008
Raaaahr! Monster gets its reward
Raaahr! Monster gave me plenty of sympathy and care during my last migraine, helping me go to work and sleep and everything I needed to do despite the fact that I was nauseaus and hurt 5 days running. As a reward, Raaaahr! Monster got to do fun things with me and MD this past Tuesday, when we went to the Witte Museum in San Antonio. Sadly, we did not get to take pictures of Raaaahr! Monster at the human body exhibit, but R!M still got in plenty of mugging for the camera.
By the way, the Witte was pretty accessible, though parking still stinks. Wheelchairs are free to use, which is nice. The Pecos River exhibit is annoying for wheelchair use, since the floor is made in imitation of the caves. And they could do with some better thresholds to help get from one floor surface to another. There’s a children’s area that doesn’t appear to me to be accessible except maybe to an adult who is watching. A kid using a wheelchair would be left out of the fun.
(If anyone wants a Monster of their very own, MD handstitches them inbetween rolling her eyes in her head and incomprehensibly mumbling. Email me and I’ll let you know what her current inventory is.)
June 12, 2007
Plus!
I am so easy when it comes to entertainment. A town half an hour away just got a brand-spanking new HEB Plus!, and I have so wanted to go to one for, oh, ever since they first started being built here and there. But more there than here, and I wasn’t about to drive 2 hours just so I could go to what I was hearing was the most wonderful grocery store ever. But, dang, it’s the most wonderful grocery store ever, and the closest I was getting was the TV commercials.
Until yesterday! Yay, I drove over there on the way back from work, me and MD, since we both work at the same place. First thing, there was lots of handicapped parking. Second thing, it seemed to all be full, except for one spot a bit up an incline. But that was the best we were going to get, so we took it.
We had already agreed that if there were no shopping scooters, we’d just go in the door and look to see how big the place was, but not actually try to do any shopping. However–get this!–despite there being so many gimps at the store that they had run out of gimp parking, there were still plenty of charged-up, ready-to-go, scooters! Plus!, indeed! So we each got a scooter, which was astounding, because usually we only get one and have to take turns.
And the aisles were wide!
And there were so many other people on scooters, it was like a convention.
And the people who weren’t on scooters were all smiling and saying “Oh, excuse me, let me move out of the way.” This even though they were coming across us scooty types on every aisle. Once, after I had put something in my cart that made it hard for me to see what sort of clearance I had, I clipped a display rack, sending manual can-openers tumbling to the floor. Three young men, none of them employees, rushed over and started picking them up, assuring me that they had it under control and not to worry.
I drove down the baking goods aisle, and came across something that made my eyes start to tear up: a whole section of GF cookies and baking mixes. With my favorite ginger snaps that must be torn into immediately just sitting there, waiting for me. I took them home and had my way with them.
OK, there was one guy in the entire store who seemed completely oblivious and constantly kept wandering over to where I had to be creative in order to miss him, but maybe he was trying to flirt? If so, he should have made eye contact, but as it was, he was just irritating. But not so irritating that my trip was spoiled.
Oh, then the scooters took us back up the incline to my car. And that was good, because you really can’t get up hills very well by foot with only one properly working hip.
MD and I have decided to go back once a month. That’s something, because she usually hates big stores and crowds.
