|
|
 Me, Aunt Elsie and Chuck We are back home after our semi-whirlwind tour of the east coast (I say semi, as our intrepid and younger friends Meagan and Jock have been doing a real deal whirlwind tour that you can read about at her blog). In my previous post, I mostly bitched and moaned about the hotel we stayed at in DC. Well, having gotten that out of my system (and written a scathing review of the place for TripAdvisor), I am now ready to move on to the rest of our trip.
We went to Dulles and picked up our rental car (a hybrid, woohoo! – but more on that shortly). Chuck is Gold Club member with Hertz, so we get the special treatment – the shuttle lets us off at the rental area, but we don’t stand in line, we just go straight to our car that is ready and waiting for us. And there she was our lovely Toyota Prius! Wait, that’s not a Prius! That’s a big old Nissan Altima! But it was a hybrid Altima. Then we opened the doors. Blech!!!! The entire car (including the trunk) positively reeked of cigarettes! Okay, now we were officially not happy campers. So Chuck went off to the office, and moments later a guy came out to take it to get washed again, where they claimed to have a magical solution that would make that smell go away. I was hoping to hear that they were also going to penalize the bejesus out of the previous renter who had stunk the car up, but I guess it’s actually okay to smoke in their rental cars. We just always ask for non-smoking cars, and out west at least always get them. Anyway, back the car comes all nice and clean, and it actually did smell okay inside! So we loaded up the car (and let me just say, for a big ass car that Altima had a pretty small trunk – half of it was the battery!) and left the airport. As it was pretty hot and humid, once we started off we rolled up the windows and turned on the air conditioner and just like that the nice pine smell disappeared and was replaced by the odiferous stench of stale cigarettes. *sigh* So we rolled the windows down and accepted our fate. But for the next four days, every time we left the car locked for more than a few minutes and came back, the smell jumped out at us all over again. But the car did get okay gas mileage, so that was nice.
We made it to Baltimore in pretty good time and spent they next two days visiting our friends Judy (Meagan’s mom), Meagan and Jock, and catching up with Judy’s other daughter Amanda. It was Meagan’s birthday, so there was a party with excellent food and cake, a visit to the American Visionary Art Museum, and the consumption of way too many oatmeal and raisin cookies. Yum!
 Chuck and his Aunt Jo Next it was off to Delaware, to visit Chuck’s cousin Jackie and his aunts Jo and Elsie. Jo is 95 and Elsie turned 100 last month. They live about 15 minutes away from each other – Jo in Wilmington, DE and Elsie in Bothwyn, PA. They are in great shape, for the shape they’re in, sharp as tacks and still giving each other a hard time about stuff. We should all age as gracefully! They both have very fond memories of Chuck, as when he was a baby he lived with them for a year while his mother was in a TB sanatorium. His cousin Jackie (Jo’s daughter) is a wonderful person who lives across the street from her mom (how great is that?) and helps her stay pretty independent in her assisted living home. Jackie also has three cats, Tippy, Buddy and Henry, who pretty much rule the house. Buddy is particularly remarkable as he likes (no, really, LOVES) being vacuumed. I shot a video of this, as I had never seen such a thing before. Jackie took us to a fabulous museum quite close to her, the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, PA. It has a fabulous collection of the works of N.C., Andrew and Jamie Wyeth, as well as works by Andrew’s siblings Carolyn and Henriette. The museum grounds are as wonderful as the museum, with a walking trail that follows the river and animal sculptures lurking around every bend (or so it seemed). We didn’t get a chance to visit the Kuerner Farm, but that just gives us a reason to return.
We headed home last Saturday, and when we dropped the car off, bitched about the stinky smell, and they gave us thirty dollars off and a hearty apology. This was a much more satisfying customer service experience than at the DuPont Hotel. So yay Hertz!
I’ve uploaded more pics of the family adventures in Virginia and DC and also a bunch from MD and DE as well.
 me, tiny capitol and chuck Chuck and I are spending a week and a half on the east coast, visiting family and friends. We flew out rfom Long Beach on Jet Blue and landed at Dulles. The plan (okay, the plan I suggested) was to take the Metro from Dulles to downtown Washington. I know, you”re thinking “What Metro from Dulles?” And you’d be right. But I think I convinced a lot of people in LA that there is in fact a very nice Metro stop at Dulles. I’m not sure where I developed this erroneous notion, but I was convinced – and I had Chuck believing it too. Luckily we realized the error of my ways right away and quickly changed gears, arranging for a Super Shuttle ride. It worked out fine, and we were able to enjoy the huge rainstorm that soaked DC last Thursday from the comfort of an air-conditioned van.
We spent the first few days in Washington DC, and we stayed at the DuPont Hotel which was located, not surprisingly, in Dupont Circle. It was a great location, near the Metro and within walking distance of a few museums. My sister chose the hotel, based on the recent experiences of a friend of hers who gave it a rave review. It was a nice place, but our room was ridiculously small with what felt like very large furniture – a huge desk took up one whole wall, and the bed took up most of the rest of the room, except for a wall mirror with a three inch frame that left no floor space on one side of the bed,which caused me to stub my toe so badly that I thought I broke it. The bathroom was big enough for only one person to stand in at one time, which was a good thing because when you turned on the shower, the lack of a door or curtain caused the water to get everywhere. None of this would have been quite so bad if I hadn’t seen my sister’s room. It was at least a third larger, and to make matters worse, it was $30 a night less – AND we made our reservations by phone within 30 minutes of each other. When we commented on this to the front desk, they said that their prices were based on the available rooms at the time the reservations were made. In other words, tough luck! A bigger deal on the second day was that they got halfway through cleaning the room in the morning, got dis then left and didn’t come back. So we got back to the room that evening to find everything in disarray. They did make good on that complaint at least. I figure the best revenge is to just never stay there again. Too bad, as in many ways it was a nice place. I took a video to commemorate the room.
On the family front, we had a big get-together at my brother’s house in northern Virginia where we got to see a bunch of my nephews, nieces, and their assorted families. The weather, after the big rain, was apparently quite nice for the east coast in August. It seemed pretty hot and muggy to me, but I was assured that it was unusually pleasant.
On the tourism front, we saw a super Norman Rockwell exhibit at the American Art Museum, and spent a day and a half at the Newseum (one ticket gets you a two-day entry – nice!). The Newseum is fabulous, chock full of all sorts of interesting exhibits and interactive displays (the Unabomber’s cabin, Tim Russert’s office, the antenna from the North Tower of the Word Trade Center in NYC, several panels from the Berlin Wall) . Last Friday we saw the Capitol Steps at the Ronald Reagan Building, and they were very funny – my fave bit was Lirty Dies which must be heard to be understood.
This morning we took Super Shuttle back to Dulles to pick up the rental car that we’ll be using for the rest of the trip. We then drove to Towson, MD where we’ll be vising friends for two days. Then it’s off to Delaware for a few days to visit Chuck’s two elderly aunts who live in the Wilmington area. Then it’s back to Dulles and home.
Pics of the trip are here.
 In the transition area Yesterday, Eileen and I did the Hard Core Sprint Triathlon held on the base at Camp Pendleton. To sum up the event I’ll quote another participant who swam a little better than me or was faster in the transition than me or both. He said, “the swim was frighting, the bike ride from hell never seemed to end, and the run was just painful.” I remember passing him on the bike portion of the tri. The reason I remember is, well, he was 65. You might ask how I know he was 65 and not, say, 55. They write your age on the back of your right leg. Assuming you have a right leg. There was one guy there with a really cool prosthetic and they had to put all his info on his left leg (he was a civilian racer and he was 71). So as you’re racing along you can go, “Ah don’t worry about that guy, he’s not in my age group,” or “Shit, I’ve got to hurry up and pick that guy off!” Anyhow, back to the story. By the end of the race I felt pretty much like the description the 65 year old guy gave above. But not till this morning did I realize how true it was. About 1,300 people started the race and only around 1,000 finished. So I’m feeling much better about my performance.
At one time in my youth I was a pretty good swimmer and I’m still not bad, especially when I get out on a regular basis and train, which I’ve been doing. This tri the swim was ONLY 500 yards, 200 out, 100 across, and 200 back. Now, in a pool I can swim fairly easy and cover 500 yards in about 10 minutes. (My young friend Tyler told me yesterday that it takes him just over 5 minutes, damed kids!)
Before the race I’m standing down at the beach with Eileen looking at the waves. When we got there at 6:30 AM they were about 3½ feet high and growing. The lifeguard said they would peek about about 9:00 AM. My group went off at 8:45 and Eileen’s at 9:00. By then the waves were more like 4½ to 5 feet. The sets were coming in fairly fast. We had practiced getting through the waves just before the start of the race for the first time. Thank goodness we did at least that. I took off at 8:45 and headed into the water going away from the first turn buoy. That was because there was a current in the ocean going from south to north. So you had to swim starting way south of where you wanted to go just to get to the first buoy. It took me 9 minutes to go 200 yards. The waves were pounding me and I was getting really tired and hadn’t gone all that far. The next 100 yards (going with the current) were a piece of cake. Three minutes and I was there. Turned to head to shore thinking this too would be easy as I was going in with the waves, but was I wrong! As I got into the waves I was really hoping to more or less body surf in. Instead they just pounded me some more. In fact about a 100 yards from shore a really big wave rolled over me and stripped my goggles off my head. They were gone, nowhere to be seen. After 21 minutes I staggered to the beach and realized I still had 18 miles to bike and 3.1 miles to run and I was already exhausted.
It took me quite awhile to make the transition from the swim to bike. When I left the transition area and mounted my bike, my first thought was, “Why can’t I go more that 6 to 8 mph?” Then I remembered we had to go up a long ramp to get to the road. By the time I got to the 9 mile turn around I was feeling somewhat revived and actually picked my pace up some. That is about when I picked off the 65 year old philosopher.
Coming back down the ramp to the transition area again after surviving the hills on the base, (I swear they were at least a 65% grade) I remembered I still had 3.1 miles to run. I got in and out of the transition much faster than the first time and was heading back up the ramp on foot when Eileen caught up with me. We power walked up the hill and started running. I didn’t get far and pooped out and had to walk again. Eileen was still hanging tough and kept going. I, on the other hand, walked and ran the rest of the race. About a ¼ mile from the finish the 65 year old caught and passed me which inspired me to get moving again. With 200 yards to go I picked my pace up and caught the guy. When I came up beside him I asked him to pick it up and we would run in together. He said he didn’t have anything left and for me to go ahead.
At the finish I went over to congratulate him of finishing and that’s when he gave me his account of how he thought the swim, bike, and run went and I had to agree.
I suspect there won’t be any more open water ocean triathlons in my future.
He doesn’t talk about it much, but Chuck is a Vietnam War vet. He spent a year (1970-71) stationed in a place called Vung Tau. He was in the Navy, but was land-based for his entire tour (long story that involves among other things volunteering – which common wisdom says you never do in the military, but he did – and rugby).
Fast forward to last week. Chuck was reading a recent issue of AARP Magazine in which there was an article about veteran benefits. Once section of the article talked about health care benefits in particular. When Chuck was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma in Nov 2008, we wondered at the time where it came from. One cause of NHL is exposure to certain chemicals, but Chuck didn’t fall into that category. then he read the article, and learned that exposure to Agent Orange is an acknowledged cause of NHL. The VA counts as exposure being in Vietnam for as short as 24 hours from 1964-1975. He was there a whole year. We were pretty surprised to learn this, needless to say.
But then the fun really began. We went to the VA website, dug around a while and found this page which took us to this list of diseases associated with exposure to Agent Orange. Holy crap! Now since Chuck is not disabled, I headed over to the health care eligibility page and learned that if he were to qualify he’d have to go to a VA hospital for care. Uh, I don’t think so. We’re sticking with City of Hope. So then I followed the rabbit hole to the Agent Orange – Herbicide Exposure New Presumptive Conditions/Treated in a private (non-governmental facility or hospital and read this:
At a private (non-government) treatment facility or hospital. HIPAA privacy rules require we obtain a signed consent form to obtain treatment records from a private medical facility. Please complete a VA Form 21-4142, Authorization and Consent to Release Information to the Department of Veterans Affairs. However, your claim may be decided faster if you send in the appropriate medical evidence to support your claim. The medical reports must include certain information, such as the diagnosis, that relates to the claimed condition. Depending on the nature of the reports, VA may be able to establish service connection and assign a disability evaluation without further development of evidence or scheduling of additional medical examinations.
Hmm. Next I found this page. And this page, which purportedly allowed me to submit a benefit request online. A process which completely failed on my iMac. Grrrr. After all of this what I learned is that CHuck doesn’t qualify for anything because: a) he’s not disabled, b) he still works and has income (and so do I), and c) he has health care and likes City of Hope.
What did Lincoln say in his second inaugural address? Oh yeah:
With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.
Uh-huh. I’d say that’s a big FAIL, VA.
I did my first mud run last Saturday. It was a filthy blast. A mud run, for the uninitiated, is an obstacle course run that always includes, you guessed it, mud pits. Yesterday’s was the the Irvine Lake Mud Run, a 3.8 mile course along the banks of Irvine Lake in Orange County. We were coerced encouraged to run the race by a longtime running friend of Chuck’s who is blind. her regular guide couldn’t make the race, and so she called Chuck, who has led her on runs and in races before (leading a blind person in a run is a skill that not all people possess – and I would be one of those people who does NOT possess the skill. More on that later.). He tried to weasel out by telling her how slow he was, but she countered with telling him how slow SHE was – it was clear he was going to lose that argument as she is incredibly tenacious and stubborn – so he caved and agreed. I thought it sounded like fun, so signed up too.
Charlene was recruited for the race by a group that was raising money for the Gavin R Stevens Foundation. They needed a real deal blind person to run the race with them (to add, I guess, some verisimilitude to the undertaking) and not surprisingly it proved tougher than they expected to find a blind person willing to undertake a mud run. Charlene is a balls to the wall athlete who has been blind from birth. She has run marathons, done sprint triathlons, completed a 50 mile race, (tandem) biked in Europe – there’s not much she’s afraid of (except flying insects getting in her face). The race officials were going to let her go around all of the mud pits to which Chuck responded, “No way!” and made her go through at least a few of them. He went through a bunch as well, and ended up sliding into one pit that turned out to be deeper than he expected. At the finish he was so mud-covered that we couldn’t really see what he had done to himself, but later in the day it was clear that he had done a bit of a number on himself.
 Day One, after washing  Day Two, looking icky  At the doctor's  Three days on antibiotics As the images show, things got ugly. It didn’t help that the next day we decided to do an ocean swim and he pulled on (then pulled off) a wetsuit over the leg. Each day the leg became a bit more tender and got redder and angrier, and finally this past Wednesday, as puss started oozing out from the chunkier wounds he decided it was time to go see a doctor. Three prescriptions and one shot later we headed home. He’s on two antibiotics and has some cream he’s supposed to put on it. What was really amazing is it took less than 12 hours on the antibiotics for his leg to look better.
The thing is, we forget that he was getting cancer treatments for 18 months, and that those only wrapped up about six months ago. The chemo took such an obvious toll on him – he lost his hair and looked and felt awful, but he was on immunotherapy treatments for an additional year. And though the immunotherapy drugs didn’t make him lose his hair or look sick, the one thing ALL the cancer fighting drugs had in common was that they kicked the crap out of his immune system, leaving him vulnerable to infections of all sorts. He’s had two colds in the past six months – and this is a guy who never gets sick! Cancer is a real bitch, and the recovery is no cakewalk either! I’m going to try and make a bigger effort to remember that and try to keep him from doing any extraordinarily harebrained activities in the future (hahaha!!). Like I said, I’ll TRY.
Anyway, he’s mostly fine now (nothing’s oozing) and plans on staying out of mud pits for a while.
I was reading an article just now about a guy who blew off his arm lighting some illegal fireworks. Slick! And ow! And it’s not funny (okay, a little, in a sick sort of way)! The article then went on to point out some safety tips from the Consumer Product Safety Commission (they also said that 6,000 people went to emergency rooms on or around the Fourth of July last year). Here’s my favorite tip (and I think it’s a tip that we would ALL be wise to observe):
- Never have any portion of your body directly over a fireworks device when lighting the fuse.
This ends my public service announcement for the day.
Since today was the 4th of July, Chuck and I headed up bright and early this morning to run the Pacific Palisades Will Rogers race. This was the 33rd year for the race, and I think five or six for me, and who know for Chuck. It’s advertised as a neighborhood run, but over time has grown and now even has timing chips. And herein lies my story.
I’ve been running races for, well shoot, 34 years or so. Over the course of those years I’ve seen a lot of changes take place in the running and racing world. It’s been a bit seesaw-ish, sometimes running was replaced by aerobics, or rollerskating, or disco dancing as the happening way to get fit. But over the past ten years or so there has been a steady increase in the popularity of running (and racing). That’s a good thing, right? Sort of. The downside of it is that there’s been a real trend away from serious racing to a more casual let’s just go out there and have some fun, take the kids and heck even bring the dog(s)! And don’t observe even the most common of courtesies and get out of people’s way. Stuff like that.
Take today for instance: and I have to, at least to some extent, blame the race organizers. As I said, they advertise this as a neighborhood race. You have a pretty big ass neighborhood when 2,500 folks show up, and you use timing chips and charge $45 per head to run. But that’s cool. What’s not, in my mind anyway, is that the organizers persist in letting people with dogs and people with strollers mix it up with the general running population. The first two miles or so of the race are pure mayhem where the main goal is to stay upright and not get run into. Two years ago (this isn’t a new problem) I was shoved to the ground in the first 50 yards, and the idiot who did it just kept right on going. Because he was so going to win that race! (Not.) Grrr.
I know, I should shut up and just enjoy the race or quit doing it if it’s so annoying. I think that’s what we’ll do next year, or find a local race that nobody know about (and then I won’t write about it). I also realize that I am really sounding like an old grump in this post. Argh!! Not only that, I’ve become a SLOW grumpy old fart!!
*sigh*
Of course, both Chuck and I had to buy iMovie for the iPhone ($4.99). It’s fun and really easy to use and a deal at that price. It looks in your Camera Roll for video you shoot (or you can shoot the video on the fly) then you can edit it by giving the video a theme and soundtrack if you like. You can also do some simple cutting/edits as well. Once you’ve done all that and saved it, you can use the Flickr app to upload it to your Flickr account, or use the option in Camera Roll to upload the move to your YouTube account. Both work great, but if you upload the movie to Flickr it does some major compression generating a pretty low quality film. YouTube uploading generates a better outcome. Here’s the YouTube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-CyUcGqvDk (with the vuvuzela button!), and here’s the Flickr movie: http://www.flickr.com/photos/osheas/4734621960/. You can see the difference. Keep in mind that the iPhone 4 can capture HD video, so that gives you some idea of Flickr’s compression.
More on battery life next. Oh, and the burning question we’ve all been asking: will it blend? Yes it will!
Hi, my name is Eileen and I’m an Apple fangirl. No, it’s true.
I proved it today by standing in line for seven hours to buy an iPhone 4. If that’s not true devotion I don’t know what is. The good (bad?) news is that Chuck stood in line with me. And you know what? We had a pretty good time! They gave us water, lemonade, sandwiches and cookies (we heard a rumor that the line in Pasadena got coffee and Danish *sigh*).
But by 2:30pm we were the proud new owners of iPhone 4′s, and let me tell you, there us NO comparison between the iPhone 3G and the 4. And between the first gen iPhone and the 4? Well, it’s like trying to compare a Gremlin and a Porsche. As in, it’s just not fair. The iPhone 4 is the smartphone we’ve all been waiting fir (those of us who’ve been waiting). It’s fast, responsive and elegant. The screen is crisp, type is clear, apps open instantly. Sweet! The camera is a massive step up from the 3G. And it shoots video! My instant recommendation: if you are eligible to upgrade, do it! And if you’ve been holding out for the right time: it’s here! This is the realization of all the possibilities that the first gen iPhone tantalized us with. Seriously.
I sold my 3G today for $110 at sellyourcell.com. I might have done better on craigslist but the value has been dropping so fast it seemed wise to move quickly. That brings my upgrade price down to $189 (we opted for the 32GB model) before tax. We’ll be changing our data plans too, as we never come close to 200MB/month. All in all, it was a pretty successful day, albeit pretty exhausting. It’s hard work, standing in line. For hours. And hours.
Quote of the day from one Apple employee to another: “Don’t you go all OMG on me now!!” Can you guess where we were? Hint: it’s south of LA County.
We all have stories. And our families have stories. What are they? What do they say about us, about our parents, about our families? We were talking about Chuck’s story last night – well, really about Chuck’s mom’s and dad’s story. Their story is one of romance, of timing, and choices. Chuck is not an O’Shea by birth but by choice. His stepdad’s name was O’Shea, by birth Chuck’s name was Poland. His mom and stepdad met and fell in love at at a TB sanatorium. Yes, you heard that right. She left Chuck’s dad in New Jersey, left a cushy world of privilege for a life with a man ten years her junior who had no job or prospects to speak of. Chuck and his sister left most of their things behind in New Jersey, starting fresh with their mom and the man who became to all intents and purposes their dad. They saw their real dad twice after that, both were sad, short visits where there was little connection. They weren’t his kids anymore. They had become O’Sheas.
A few years ago we went to New Jersey and I saw the, well, mansion may be too strong a word, so I’ll just call it the big ass house where Chuck grew up. And I saw clearly then the reality of the choice that his mom had made all those years ago. She literally gave it all up for love. She and Chuck’s real dad and stepdad are all dead now, so we can’t ask them the big questions, like “Was it worth it?” “Would you do it all again?” We go through life, making choices, making decisions. Sometimes we think the decisions out, other times we just jump. In my life I have never heard of anyone who made a leap of faith the size of Chuck’s mom. Could I have ever made a choice like that? I have no idea. Could you?
|
|
