Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Another good thing about the iBOT


If you've been reading this blog or if you
know me personally, you probably know that I
have two dogs. You probably also know that I
take them to the dog park regularly. You probbaly
also know that dogs poop... a lot. You probably
also know that dog people have to clean up after
their dogs and dispose of the stuff appropriately.

You probably don't know that when I was a kid,
my mom used to clean dirt off my face by licking her
thumb and then wiping my face with her saliva coated
thumb. She now claims to have never committed such
atrocities, but my memories of it are so vivid, it
almost seems like it just happened yesterday. My
mom cannot argue that it only happened in my night-
mares because my sister witnessed and was also a
victim to our mother's torture. Between the spit
thumb and her goulash, I really think my sister
and I deserve an apology, but anyway...

I vowed to never ever do that to my children, and
I'm proud to say that I haven't. There was one
time when my thumb starting heading towards my
tongue and my tongue started to come out of my
mouth, but I caught myself within a matter of
inches.

Do you know there are individually wrapped wet
wipes? Much of my childhood trauma could have
been avoided if my mom had kept a few of them
with her wherever she went. Sadly, she didn't,
and I have the permanent emotional scars to prove
it.

I was at the park yesterday and Gus did his thing.
As I rolled through the grass and dead leaves, I
didn't realize that I ran over some doggie diarrhea.
It stuck to my wheel and half a revolution later,
it was all over my coat sleeve and glove. This is
where the wet wipes come in. I always keep a few
with me. Always. You just never know when your
kid is going to have dirt on their face or when
you're going to get dog shit on your coat.

What in the world does this have to do with an iBOT?
Running over dog poop won't be such a disaster in
the iBOT!!! The wheels on the iBOT are smaller and
don't come near my coat sleeves! And instead of
touching the wheels, I move a joystick! This is
great news because as I was trying to clean up my
coat yesterday, I got a little on my hand. I know,
it's gross and I apologize for being so graphic, but
it did happen. I cleaned myself as best as I could
with the wipes and then I went home and washed 500
times with soap and water.

P.S. Yesterday I was telling my friend Bill (who is also
a wheelchair user) about my experience and he told me that
wheelchairs are feces magnets. I didn't believe him but
then I checked my owner's manual, and sure enough, right
there in bold letters: DANGER - wheelchairs attract shit.
;)

------------------
Today's photographs were brought to you by the
letter h. ;) :D

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The letter h. and the number 4... Four photos! Ha Ha HA ha... (Imaginary Count Von Count accent).

The photos turned out wonderfully! I am impressed by how much of the purple in hellebore you were able to capture considering how dark the actual flower petals were. I think the hellebore you posted at 1:04 is my favorite. You did a very cool thing with the pussywillow. It looks.. so.. so.. surreal.. almost animalistic. I will have to see what else I can dig up in my yard!

And about the actual post... My aunt used to do the nearly-as-gross clean up method of using the child's own spit to clean up his or her face. "Annie spit", and then swoop swoop the face is "clean". I guess it is what cats do.. sort of.

h.

Shannon said...

Okay, I have a confession to make. Don't tell anyone though. I've used my finger and my daughter's spit to clean her face.