The Elevator is a MAN!

5-20-2005
The Elevator is a MAN

I headed to Baltimore this morning for my 3rd mapping. This is the first time it’s rained since my hook-up. I thought it sounded very strange on our roof, even MORE strange on the top of my umbrella while sprinting to the car! However, I had to sit and DIGEST the sound a little while, when I heard the rain hitting roof of the CAR! WOW. Not actually a pleasant sound, but I did get use to it. The car sounds completely different when driving on wet roads. The windshield wipers were amazing. Thump, thump… Thump, thump! Now THAT was great sound! I can put up with the sound of rain on the roof of the car if I get to listen to the windshield wipers!

I left a little early because I wasn’t sure how bad traffic would be with the downpour. When I arrived at the parking garage, I craned my neck out the window to see if I could hear the ticket machine that GAVE me a yellow ticket “talk”. Wayne, a fellow CI friend who also goes to JHH, told me that he thought it talked. I couldn’t hear anything except for the click that it made as it stuck my ticket out. (Reminded me of someone sticking their tongue out!) It MAY have said something, I just couldn’t catch it. If there hadn’t been cars in line behind me, I may have hopped out and grabbed the machine by both cheeks(?) and begged it to talk. I controlled myself, and drove on through. At least I knew I’d have a talking machine as I left!

When I walked through the lobby towards the elevator I really switched into “intense” listening mode. I really wanted to hear the elevator ding when it arrived at the first floor. I didn’t hear it, but I’ll keep on trying! I did make an amazing discovery! I knew the elevator “talked”; announcing what floor you are on as it stops at different floors. After realizing this from my 2nd mapping experience, I asked the family what elevators have I been on before that talked! They really had to put their “thinking caps” on, because it doesn’t register to them if an elevator talks or not. Excuse me, but I don’t get that at all! How can you not know what elevators talk? I mean talking elevators are the kind of things I would expect to find in the Smithsonian’s! After the elevator stopped at the next floor to let someone off, I realized it was a masculine elevator! I was sure I heard a feminine elevator earlier this week! I wasn’t about to ask my fellow elevator passengers if the elevators were different genders, however. There are enough folks in the hospital vicinity, who already think I’m nuts! So I am going to assume that I’m hearing it differently TODAY. But it was definitely a man’s voice.

Even though I was almost 30 minutes early, my audi wasn’t busy so she came and invited me back right away. We walked past her office, and I took a deep breath. I realized we were headed for – THE BOOTH! Now in recent days I have heard this described at THE TORTURE BOOTH, so I felt a little panic. Smile! She tested what I could hear with some beeps, and then some simple words like ice cream, baseball, hotdog, etc. Do you know at one point she mouthed “wow”? That’s good, right? Grin!

We were only there for about 10 minutes. She then took me back to her office. She paged the doctor who saw me this past Tuesday to check my “air pocket”. The doctor had a break and so walked down right away to see me. She was pleased to see that the air pocket was completely gone and said she’d tell Dr. Niparko. They advise I stay on the Claritin D to control my allergies until mid-summer at the very least. As I do not look forward to having another air pocket from a tear in the Eustachian tube, I will follow doctor’s orders to the letter. Grin!

My audi hooked my CI up to her computer and we again went over sounds. The first sets of sounds were clicks – sort of like what I remember the old rotary telephones sounding like when you dialed a number. However, this test had various tones of these clicks. I think I did very well on this test. When we proceeded to the pure tone beeps, I was really surprised that I did not hear these as well. Perhaps as I have always had an easier time with percussion types of sounds, I heard the clicking sounds better? When the higher tones were being tested, I am sure I missed some of these. These tones tend to compete too much with the tinnitus in my right (non CI) ear. It makes it very difficult to discern what a tone is, and what is the rrrring, that is always present. She also tested my nerve response, tested how well I heard simple words while her mouth was covered, and then simple sentences.

She told me I was doing VERY well. She tweaked some of the programs again, and added BEAM to one. Part of my homework is to test my t-coil switch in looped rooms (like my church) and the television, as I have an FM loop pad under my recliner. I’m going to have to practice switching to t-coil, however. I am just now learning how to move back and forth from program to program. At least I don’t turn myself “off” anymore – which was something I did constantly at the beginning. I am VERY pleased that even more of the “tin-like” sound is gone from voices. It really does get better and better each time I see the audi. I don’t get to see her for a whole month, however! She said to email her if I have any problems, and she does answer emails right away. She did tell me before leaving that I’m very expressive! She said she really enjoys seeing my face light up in amazement. I really can’t get over hearing her when she covers her face!

I listened to the masculine elevator all the way down. Sigh. It was a different elevator so they must all be men. I suppose I can live with that. Now I need to interrogate the family at supper what ‘gender’ all these other elevators they say talk are!

As I circled down 4 floors of the parking garage towards the exit, I crossed my fingers that a live security guard would not be standing at the ‘ticket eater’ machine. Crossing your fingers never works for me – there he stood right by the exit! I rolled my window down and stuck my little ticket in the machine. I almost fell out of the car AGAIN as I heard it say plain as day, “Thank you very much!” GRIN! How did I miss the ‘very much’ part on Tuesday? Golly, do they teach good manners here in Baltimore or what? I tried very hard to compose myself, and refrained from ‘patting its head’ as I really knew I might be banned from the garage if I kept petting the machines! The ticket machines are definitely feminine, however. Very girly-girl voice, without question!

Lots of homework this month! It’s becoming a lot of work! But it’s worth it!