Parkinson's: Creaky Floors and Snarky's Big Adventure

 

Snarky Parky & me

A Journey Into Parkinson's With Nancy Mellon

Coordinated by Corrine Bayraktaroglu

Dear Snarky Parky Blog Reader,

I would like you to know that my view of our B&B stay is because I have Parkinson's. I learned during this adventure that I had new needs that were very important for my being able to be comfortable in a space. My darling husband has already made a lot of changes to our living space for my safety and comfort. I need to be careful and think through where ever we might go these days. So my apologies to our wonderful host, it is not about you. It is about my learning about my changing needs. and probably being cranky about the lack of sleep.

Please read on in the spirit of fun,

Nancy

Snarky Goes On A big Adventure

½ The Story

 I was very excited.  Steven and I and the Snark,  were going on a big adventure. 

EMPOWER U EXPO:

Taking Control of Parkinson's Disease

This Education Driven, one-day Health Fair provides a positive, interactive approach to helping individuals with Parkinson's disease take control of their disease, maintain their identity and improve their quality of life.

It sounded great.  It was being presented by the Cleveland Clinic, A Parkinson's Foundation Center of Excellence and it was free!

The people running it had really thought carefully about what people with Parkinson's might need for their comfort.

• There was free, valet parking, so we could  arrive right at the entrance and wouldn't have to walk too far.

• The format  allowed participants to attend as much or as little as they chose.

• The program activities were short, only 25 minutes.

• The activity rooms they were in and the exhibitors' tables were close together.

• There was 10 minutes between each session. (Time for a bathroom stop and check out an exhibitor table on the way to the next session!)

• Each block of time- had only 2 sessions to choose from.

•  In between each block of time for educational sessions, was a block of time for an exercise activity.

Cardio Drumming

Chair Chi

Tennis for PD and Rock Steady Boxing

PD Dance

Exercise with Total Healthworks

• The expo ended at 3:30, so there was plenty of time to rest afterwards.

• Food was being offered all day, not at a set time. (Oh My Gosh, it was free too!)

Breakfast 8 am – 11 am

Lunch  11 am – 1 am

Break items 1:30-3:30

Beverages available all day

Water available in each room for taking medication.

They sent a clear email, the day before, to remind you of a couple of things-

• The event space might be cold with the air-conditioning and to wear layers.

• To wear clothes and shoes that were comfortable and allowed us to be active.

• To bring our medication.

•  If we needed an assistive device, to bring our cane or walker.

 Speaking of which, I am now carrying a spiffy wooden cane, with a smooth, neatly etched mane, on a brass horse head on top. It garnered some compliments at the expo.  Steven says I shouldn't put Fifi on the cane, It will spoil the elegant look that was admired at the expo. (Fifi was a gift to my Auntie Mame when she was sporting a cane and wanted some kind of fun decoration for it. I made a white, French poodle out of  nubby cloth with yarn for it's hair. And I created a pattern to sell, and one more white and one black French poodle  to take pictures of. So, I still have a Fifi I could put on my cane. So there, Steven!)

Is this a same FiFi we stuck on a pole back in  our yarnbombing days 

 Steven decided that it would take us about 3 hours to drive to the Expo. Eek! The activities begin at 8 am! Since I am still dealing with insomnia, mornings are an iffy proposition for me, (Actually they have always been  troublesome for me.  Eileen likes to remind me of how I was always sleeping in homeroom in high school.) 

So Steven and I decided to go the day before and find some place to stay that is near by the event. He searched the internet and found for us, an interesting sounding, 4 ½ stars B&B, about 5 minutes away from the event center. Alright, we were set to go on our big adventure!

Considering how many rest stops we needed to stretch our cramped legs and visits to the  bathrooms, it was more like a 4 hour drive.  But we talked and listened to music and enjoyed it.

We arrived at our B&B.

 OK! time for the Snark to take over this part of the story.

HIYA KIDDIES.  WELL WE FINALLY GOT THERE.  STEVERENO OPENED THE DOOR, which had this fancy lock on it, Sheesh , the lock even talked later and said “someone is at the door.” The host with the most, yelled from the back- “Come on in.”

There were boxes of tee shirts everywhere. The host guy came out and asked if we were going to Porchrokr.  YEA THAT”S THE WAY IT”S SPELLED.  He is going to sell the tee shirts at the Porchrokr tomorrow.  They had cool designs on them. It was big, hairy guys and maybe beer barrels? some kind of logo thing for his dad's bar. The guy told some pretty great stories about the bar and his dad. It had been in his family for 70 years. I'm not sure how- but his grandfather had a piece of the action too. Stevereno, who always likes a good story, bought one of the guy's tee shirts.

We all jammed into the  dinning room.  

What  was on the walls? My GRRL was looking at a painted wooden block that had some Fancy letters painted on it.  IAAMOG. She didn't know what it meant, that's my grrl..  (Next morning, the host guy, gave Stevereno 3 wrist bands that had the same letters on it.  He said it meant “I'm a  man of God.”  Stevie boy was supposed to give 2 away and wear the other one.)

On the wall facing us was a 5 ft by 3 ft painting of  Jesus's long suffering face. And smooshed in between was a very fancy Latte, Hot Cocoa, Tea maker machine.  This guy liked fancy, modern toys, It had all the bells and whistles, which my grrl could never figure out. She was offered a latte and said no thanks. So the guy tells us a story about the painting, how he got it, how much it cost. And then he told us the story behind the sodas in the glassed in, open view, full size, soda holder. Then he talked about all the intestin' things you can do in this burg. Stuffed in, next to the soda holder was a brochure rack with what looked like a l,000 brochures in it.

After that came a lot more stories about his unhappy family. I could see that my grrl was fading she had been standing this whole time and looked kinda peeked.

OK, that's enough Snarky, I am taking over this story again. When our host finally said “let me give you a tour.  We are a full house tonight! I was more than ready. He took us up the stairs past the large painting of a skeleton laughing outside our door. All the doors had vintage metal locks that clinked as they were opened and clanked as they closed. .The antique knobs on the doors made a rattling sound as they swung around.

.It was a small room, with another small room squeezed up next to it and another one a couple of steps away. The one bathroom for all, was at the end of the tiny hall.  I hadn't known that we would share a bathroom when we had booked the  B&B.  Note to me and to Steven. Never Again.

Ours, was the AnnieBabe room. It had an 8x10 photograph of the hosts mom in her nursing cap with her original acceptance letter from her nursing school. Was mom AnnieBabe?  The room also boasted a 2 foot by 4 foot photo, of his 1960's family, within touching distance of the right side of the bed. It was 4 little kids in front and mom and hairy dad in back. The kids were all holding on to one, large, dead fish.  The boy in the middle was clowning around with his eyes crossed and his tongue poking out of his sideways tipped head..  It was definitely our host.

 The room had a thick carpet on it that couldn't muffle the sounds of the creaking floor beneath. Every step I took creaked.   As I learned before midnight, so did every one elses. Everyone's floor creaked and you could hear every step that anyone took in each of the rooms or out in the hall. Everyone went out in the hall. They all had to use the bathroom. So did I.. I waited until I wasn't sure I could wait anymore.  Then as I heard more jangling and creaking, I waited some more.

 It was a horrible night. I was up most of it. Not wanting to disturb Steven and  not having anywhere else to go, I sat in a chair, stood up to stretch my cramping  legs and then...sat back down. I tried to figure out how we could leave in the middle of the night but everyone would have heard us. And we couldn't even pack up our stuff without the floor creaking.

 So I stewed and  thought awful, negative thoughts. This is it. I can not do this anymore. I would have laughed at all of this before PD, but now, it is too much. Tomorrow morning  we will go home first thing in the morning. I took more medicine at 3 am and creaked as quietly as I could back to bed. I finally fell asleep.

 At 6 am Steven's alarm went off and he got up.  I couldn't hear him go down the hall, I found out later the stinker had a secret skill.  He hugged the edge of the hall- no squeaks! But I did hear the chunky, metal S latch click on the bathroom door. At 6:30,  the music started.  Our host had something jazz like on, it turned into very loud rap when he left to go sell his tee shirts..  I got up. I had slept about 4 ½ hours and felt better. .We would go to the Expo.

 So dear hearts, I will write next time about the truly wonderful experience we had at the Expo.  Hard to believe but IT WAS WORTH IT.

 Cheers,

Nancy and the Snark.

Footnotes From Corrine: Oh my goodness what a description of your B&B , it's like something from Hammer Horror Films or  Twilight Zone. I was holding onto the edge of me toilet seat Hah! I'm glad it was worth it and look forward to hearing all about it. 

Joking aside I'm sorry it was such horrid stay and night. 

Sending love from Arizona