It is nothing new that a wheeler is wearing a couple of key chains every now and then.
Slowly this technique gets a little annoying and a bit out of hand…!!!
(picture is not faked!!!)
If the chains are collectively lying around, for no apparent reason a Gordian knot is formed again and again. I explain this by the momentum.
Therefore I have meanwhile established a key chain
hanging board parking place.
Maybe I should sort the key chains by spectral colours.
I heard that disabled parking permits can virtually vanish into thin air and can’t be found in the car anymore.
They possibly fall into black holes. Partial drifts in the space-time continuum are nothing unusual anyway.
Everybody knows it when you are looking for something, can’t find it, and suddenly it is back again.
As rumour has it, the permits are also stolen at night by SUV and cabriolet driving pedestrians.
But there is also the variant that the permit has never left the vehicle.
The permit is not gone, you just don’t see it any more…!!!
The permits are laminated in plastic foil and therefore quite slippery. Apply the brakes forcefully a couple of times, and the parking permit vanishes rapidly between front screen and dashboard like in a letter box.
Then a good fisherman or the new application for the VIP permit is required!!!
I can’t advise the extraction of the car dashboard to anyone, something is always creaking afterwards.
It’s absolutely clear that most of the people with walking disability have fixed their parking permits in their cars in some way.
But if you are regularly taken along by different people in their cars the parking permit should stay removable and can’t be fixed with a “final solution”.
OK…, it could…!!!
As “final solution” I recommend to adhere the permit to the windscreen with a special glue which hardens under ultraviolet light (the sun will help), e.g. Loctite 30xx.
A theft of the parking permit is only possible including the screen then.
If I am on the road with a friend in his car, I made the experience that the dashboard jump for my permit is nothing unusual.
The easiest way is to stick some self-adhesive rubber pads or non-slip mat underneath the permit, or to put it like in the picture below in a thick cover.
The non-slip mat is available in the do-it-yourself store around the corner in car accessories or from the company Dycem, (see older blogposts Technical Aids for Quadriplegics Part I und Part IV), who makes very good technical aids which I have tested myself.
This special English disabled parking disc is good for maximum 3 hours parking, presumably like in Germany in restricted parking zones, is new to me.
I am currently thinking about illuminating my disabled parking permit with a LED matrix as you can see on television if a new CD is presented.
Click on tag “Handicap Parking to read other nice stories!
I already mentioned several times that I should rest my broken leg despite orthosis in an elevated position as much as possible.
To rest the leg elevated sitting in my own wheelchair under my desk on a small flower stool turns out to be a little inconvenient, especially when you permanently need something, or the arm is not long enough again…
I refuse the tank wheelchair in my flat (see blogpost below).
The latest “technical aids construct” appears a little clumsy at first sight, but is well thought on and almost ready for series production.
With a Swedish drawer box, the book “Our Wonderful Planet” and a blue pillow of a German coffee roaster a rolling board for flower pots from my stairwell which I coaxed as permanent loan from my neighbour was pimped to the exact positioning height of my leg.
Rolling board
I now put my leg coolly on my rolling board-drawer box and drive comfortably with my wheelchair under the desk.
With a special adaption on the wheelchair my rolling board should also be outdoor suitable. A medical device number has been applied for, and a motorization is currently in the planning phase!
After a few months in the hospital you get on rather friendly terms with nurses and physicians.
Of course a little piece of humour belongs to it as well.
If one as quadriplegic (spinal injury in the cervical area) like me can’t use arms and hands in an efficient way any more, spaghetti are not the favourite type of pasta.
One day the nurse came with the lunch, it was spaghetti, put it on my bedside table and was waiting for my comment if he could cut the pasta for me.
He was waiting for the comment in vain. I tried to eat these long objects by myself, have to see it sportingly, luckily I was not hungry…
It was a perfect show!!!
At some time a physician came into the room and watched this scenario with the pasta and me slightly grinning, but didn’t propose to cut the pasta neither, and I wasn’t keen on asking her.
I said to her that next time when the food is spaghetti again I would be motorised. I would only need two tie wraps to fix a fork. But had the suspicion that my milk frother would be a little bit too fast. We both had some fun. She didn’t seriously believe the thing about motorisation.
I only thought: You don’t know me!!!
Have a look yourself, one week later the
9,5 Volt Spaghetti Tetra Fork
About risks and generated injuries please contact your physician, nurse or nearest do-it-yourself-store staff.
Addendum: Construction manual for spaghetti tetra bit by popular request.
Saw a standard fork off and forge it flat. Really flat.
Saw approx. 5 cm off an M6 Allen key and weld it lengthwise to the fork stump. Not to the tine, I know it can happen!!!
Polish the welding seam with a one hand angle grinder. If possible keep a little bit of the welding.
Balance the bit at low speed on a drill press with a rubber mallet like a car tyre. Placing additional weight is not absolutely necessary.
Buy a cordless electric screwdriver with very low rotation speed, otherwise the special fork can be used to whip cream.
Boil spaghetti, and it’s done.
Safety instruction: Don’t start screwdriver with fork brought into the mouth, otherwise only the dentist will be happy.
I am attributing the development of this technical aid exclusively to the excessive consumption of the finest high quality medication.
Otherwise this special construction is hardly explicable retrospectively.
With this
Thermo Transport box
which can be fixed around the wheelchair I might get a minijob as pizza boy.
In this box not only the pizza stays hot, but alternatively the beer stays cold as well.
If you are typing with only one finger like me some tips fall by the wayside for lack of typing. But therefore one talks to another!
If ideas are helping other handicapped, and they are publishing these in other medias, i.e. typing for me, then I take the freedom, do it like Guttenberg and copy it:
Many tips are received on Tenerife in the health resort Mar y Sol from other concerned people. Steffen (alias for Rollinator), wheelchair user as well, brought me to a great medical device:
Both my wheelchair and my stairlift have sharp edges on which I hurt my heels occasionally.
Additionally my legs angle spastically in the night and thus the foot is rubbing tightly across the bed sheet with the heel.
Result is a bedsore at the heel.
Although there are special cushions which are fixed with Velcro strips, they are not useful for me. Due to strong leg movement unfortunately the cushion is not where it should be any more the next morning. Steffen recommended a
Tubular Bandage from towelling
(Nobafrott PZN 7094346), which usually doesn’t slip off and led to the healing of the bedsore.
I bought the bandage rather low priced at the HAD pharmacy (vitaware.de) for 85,09 Euro. The length of the bandage should be generously measured – can be cut from the 5 m.
Source: Olaf
When I sleep a night with the “socks” I don’t have swollen feet in the morning anymore.
The use of the tubular bandage has to be discussed with the physician for possible thrombosis risk or blood pressure problems!
We don’t want to harm anybody and assume no liability.
The photo with the crossed socks reminds a bit of a pirate flag, “Mouse Ahoy”!
In general I don’t give way to panic and usually am not even afraid when I am carried up or down a stairway, provided that the volunteers don’t have 1,5 per mill blood alcohol level and are able to stand on their own.
The only thing which makes me uneasy is to get in and out of the car in the dark – we wheelchair users are not always home after dark although this is the general opinion.
In this process the car door has to be completely opened for the whole time, and I don’t want to end up as figurehead of another car driver.
To be seen better in the dark by other car drivers and provide a nice view to passers-by I have decorated my
driver’s door type Christmas tree
a little bit:
Red plastic reflectors from car accessories attached to the driver’s door from the outside which are also visible from the front.
Red adhesive reflectors, stuck to the inside of the door.
A small battery-operated white LED lamp is stuck to the door with double-faced adhesive Velcro tape!
The absolute highlight is a blinking neon yellow-green battery-operated fluorescent bar.
I have introduced this part already in my blogpost from 09.03.2011(see older blogpost).
Safety instruction: The fluorescent bar causes nausea and insanity in the long run.
As you can gather from my words I am already beyond saving for years!
Many wheelchair drivers with a spinal cord injury are only able to sweat a little bit, or not at all anymore. This sounds rather nice for one moment.
No wet clothes any more, garlic as much as you like, and the deodorant stick dries from non-using in the bathroom cabinet. I also belong to the tribe of the
Antiperspirantians (Non-sweaters).
There is just one hitch:
If it is more than 25° C and I am physically active, or just standing around meaningless in the sun, my body temperature rises constantly.
From 40° C my body decides to leave the wheelchair with a floor transfer.
To counteract this we arm ourselves with a customary
water sprayer for flowers.
I was absolutely convinced that each wheelchair driver concerned would know this, thus I had never mentioned it before, but unfortunately this is not the case!
At the last World Cup pedestrians have constantly borrowed my
thermo sprayer.
It was possibly due to the fact that we covered the roof and the sides of the roofing with black plastic sheets in order to better see the beamer picture.
There were perceived 80° C, but maximum 58°C!
If you have a belt out of Velcro tape you can fix the sprayer to it.
Such a water sprayer is great, but I am warning it’s highly addictive!
Addendum, an ingenious aid: Click on tag “cooling vest and cooling cap“
Wheelchair users and their bathroom equipment is an endless subject!
The mounting height of the bath mirror can lead to the move-out of the partner if no agreement is found.
To avoid these discussions, usually cost-efficient (ho, ho, ho)
movable mirrors
are recommended. How are you supposed to see anything without binoculars in such a thing when it is skillfully mounted under the ceiling, and who moves it if needed?
My tip is a, mounted to hobbit size, a telescopic round
Make-up Mirror
made by the
Swedish meatballers.
Model: FRÄCK 5,99€ The mirror of my wall cupboard is with its height just suitable for eyebrow shaping.
Now I can finally see if my nurse is botching with the shaving.
As self-confessed hobbit with 1,38 m total height forehead top sitting in the wheelchair you have to confess every now and then that the upward reach is a little limited.
My well-tried
key hooks
suddenly have a perceived height of 2,10 m after my accident.
If you aren’t a friend of the fishing sport then taking down the keys turns out to be a bit tedious and can be dangerous.
The usage of safety glasses and helmet is mandatory.
The
Yellow North European Furniture Elks
are offering a
magnet holder for kitchen knives,
which I have declared as
vertical magnet key holder.
Watch out, there are two types.
One of the holders just succeeds to prevent a paper clip from falling down.
In winter or rainy weather, almost all pedestrians take off their shoes in front of their door and sneak in socks over the laminate.
I absolutely appreciate that this makes sense when you have estimated 2 kg snow on the soles of your shoes
and you don’t like to go sledging in your flat.
You won’t believe how much snow or rain water can stick to a wheelchair.
Even the wiping of the wheelchair tyres with discarded towels is rather difficult if you are not a Paralympian or contortionist.
To counteract the spring tide in your flat
I have purchased a carpet as it is usually lying e.g. at the entrance of department stores and positioned it outside of my door in the staircase.
These carpets absorb up to 6 liters of water per m².
With its size of 230 cm x 120 cm my
wheelchair tyre cleaning carpet
(wheelchair doormat)
could actually absorb more than 16 liters rain water.
Before I roll into the flat I am doing two laps on the carpet in the staircase, and the wheelchair tyres are clean and dry.
Up to now the maximum “filling capacity” was not reached yet.
You have probably noticed already that I am a self-confessed pedant in the technical area.
I am very lucky that my family and friends again and again take their time to realize my sometimes a bit weird ideas in the area of technical aids.
It is hardly possible to do this myself with my handicap.
At this stage many, many thanks.
If I wouldn’t have this kind of help my technical aids would be a lot more basic.
Here is a great idea how you can help yourself as quadriplegic with the most simple means.
The tie wrap on the phone has amongst others the reason to hang the phone over the brake of the wheelchair.
Thank you for the tip, I need more of these!!!
Even I can write serious blogposts.
Where have my pills gone?
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