12% Reached on ALDA Donations in TWO days!

In just two days, I have managed to reach 12% of my goal! I am just amazed at the amount of support that I am receiving.

I want to share with you some of the comments and blogs spreading the word:

David, a newly late-deafened adult over at Five String Guitar wrote this post that truly made my day.

Nine days from surgery. I am optimistic of course, as always. Failure of any sort, is not even considered an option, as is any medical mishaps.
As my cochlear buddy Abbie told me back in April, on the eve of my first surgical implant when I blogged about my worries after the surgeon outlined the circumstances that can happen (paralysis, taste disorder and death) " Not on my watch, Sir". Abbie typed in my comments in response to my fear of the worst case.

That made me feel good. I believed her then and do now. I have good people in my life with positive thoughts, wonderful advice, and amazing spirit. I like it.

Little things mean a lot? No sir, little things mean EVERYTHING. I have never forgotten those words that Abbie typed in my comments, because they took away a fear, and brought a calmness and determination in me that still serves me as I get ready for my third surgery in six months. A surgery that will once again require a high speed drill to come precariously close to serious parts of my brain....

Val posted a blog about charity event. You can also check out her newly released book, I'm All Ears :)

On to other news... Abbie is raising money so she can attend the Association of Late-Deafened Adults convention known as ALDA. Abbie is a fantastic advocate for hearing loss awareness, she is a cochlear implantee (if that's the proper term, I use it all the time) and uses her fantastic writing skills to create awareness on her blog Chronicles of a Bionic Woman . So donate to send her to this convention because she uses her knowledge and spreads wisdom to many.

Rachel from Cochlear Implant Online left me this extremely supportive comment:

She is a BIG advocate for cochlear implants by blogging various information about cochlear implants, posting comments on other blogs, and helping out with Deaf Village. In order to continue to be a great advocate, she needs to keep herself up-to-date with the latest information. By going to this conference, it will allow her to continue to receive more information and pass on the information that she learned to others.

Jodi has made an announcement this on her blog.

A commenter name Frank just left this on my blog:

Hi Abbie
Looks like you're making progress. Ignore the naysayers. Maybe they're just upset that they didn't think of it first. We are glad to help. Your blog is a real asset to people with hearing loss!

Sam from Welcome to Sam Spritzer's Web Site just left this wonderful comment:

No one is more deserving than Abbie who has made her mark on the CI community a thousand times over! Her contributions on Hearing Journey are immensely valuable to anyone who is considering a CI. I am proud to have met and known Abbie!

Thank you all for your support!!!

Would you help send me to ALDA?

Would you help me attend the Association of the Late-Deafened Adults Convention (ALDACon) in Chicago on Oct 29-Nov 2. I am trying to aim for $1,000 dollars in ten days and during the course of that time I will keep you all updated! The majority of the hard of hearing, hearing impaired and deaf people in the United States developed a hearing loss later on in life. There are some people with perfect hearing that go to sleep one night and wake up the next morning – completely deaf. You have people that worked in loud factories that for every dime they took home, the sound took another hearing cell. You have more and more military personal coming back home with a hearing loss in addition to numerous of other problems. These are the people that I want to learn everything I can about the late-deafened experience.

A person coming from my background – knowing nothing else but living with a hearing loss feels the need to branch out and see how others cope. I had a lifetime of adjusting my eyes to associate the lip formation with words with what auditory input I had. The reason why I would like to go to the ALDAcon is because I want to educate myself on the needs and how I can contribute to empowering those that began their struggle with communication later on in life. It is no surprise to many that I have mentored several people regarding cochlear implant and most of them are late deafened. This is the one group that leaves that just tugs at my heart because I see their struggles written across their face trying to figure out how to make sense of this new dimension of life with a hearing loss.

I want to learn from them just as much as I want them to learn from me.

A Year in Review - CI Scores

There, I was today at the Audiology Department of the Hospital University of Pennsylvania, sitting cross legged in the same chair that I sat in 364 days ago when I had my cochlear implant activated. Time is a funny conundrum of sorts because some people claim it is relative, others absolute but the fact of the matter is that it just – flies. My temperament was flickering with nostalgic moments of how just a day shy of a year ago I was reintroduced to the noisy world of sound. I still remember how I wanted to commit mass genocide of anything with the consistency of paper. I remember trying to harbor laughter when anyone – man, woman and child spoke to me as if they were practicing to become an extra in an Alvin and the Chipmunk movie. I remember how a helicopter dangled fifty feet above my head and heard not a thing. I remember my emotions running amok – one day I was on a high, the next I was depressed and one-second I would be savoring a sweet melody and the next I would frown at gosh awful noise. I remember my eye twitching because I was too hasty with my volume and I praise the day it was resolved. I remember people telling me to be patient and that I will eventually reap what has been sewn in my head. I remember all of tedious and trivial details as if it were yesterday and yet I can’t remember what I had for breakfast this morning.

It has been a while since I had a mapping, seven months to be exact. I have developed quite a few gripes over the past couple of months. I have completely maxed out on my volume. I still have the utmost difficulty understanding men and some women. I can understand women with no problem but that can be a bad thing because I understand them too well sometimes. When a man says bosom, it sounds like booze. When a woman says thirteen sounds like fifteen and vice versa. I used to be able to hear the airplanes from in the house and now I can't which is disturbing because I live right near a military base and there are constantly flying overhead. I used to be able to hear better in noisy conditions but I think that is due to my CI needing a tune up badly. Edelweiss sounds like anal rice or anal vice depending on who is saying it and lip reading doesn't help me in the least little bit. I walked in and plopped down and unleashed my tiny list of tasks to be tinkered to my dear audiologist.

Right off the bat, she raised my volume which was a dire improvement. With raising the volume, she raised distortion also. She flattened the lows and tweaked the high frequencies. I was able to hear the sizzle of the S’s and rushing air of the SH sound. It sounded nice and crisp. Amazing what just a little bit of tweaking can do. I am happy to report that Edelweiss now sounds like idle vice which is a drastic improvement over anal rice. Whew! It was time to go into the booth!




You will graphically see as I provided that when I was tested for CI, I bombed every single test with my left ear – zero’s across the board. Quite pathetic I know but what did you expect from an ear with no stimulation for over 15 years.

A month after my CI activation, I was plopped in the soundproof jail and I scored an average 44% on sentences in quiet. The harder test is the words which I scored 8% on, but I managed to score 33% on the phonemes. I get points for phonemes because that means I was able to guess part of the word. For example, the man in the speaker said tick and I said kick – I get points for ick. :)

Five months after activation, I got stuck in the jail again and I scored an average of 79% in sentences in quiet which was well – a 79% improvement. :) My audiologist Jennifer decided that I progressed enough to do the HINT (Hearing in Noise Test) test. She gave me the +10 HINT which means the voices was raised 10dB above the noise and I scored a pathetic 34% on that. Now my one year mapping results – I scored 79% on the sentences in quiet which is not a major improvement from my last test, but I was never one of those people that was aiming for 100% because all I wanted to was to hear something. I feel that I perform much better in real life and the following tests scores prove that. These are the result of the +10 Hint – 74% which is a great improvement from my last score of 34%. My audiologist decided to give me the hardest test – the +5 HINT test which means the voices is raised 5dB above the noise and I scored – 65% :)

Some of you might go, you went through surgery and got your head cut open and you can’t even get over 80% comprehension in quiet! When it comes down to it, I didn’t get the cochlear implant to hit hundred percent in a soundproof booth; I got it to gain anything over zero percent. I was happy with the 44% a month after activation and I am happy with 80% now. However, in all actuality these test scores do not reflect how I feel that I perform in real life. I can see how well I perform just by what I am picking up.

Patience is a beautiful thing when you have it and you definitely need it with a cochlear implant. I got 364 days of certifiable cochlear implant experience notched in my head and I can’t wait to see what tomorrow and the next day brings to me. Each tick of the clock leads to a more enjoyable experience. Put it this way, getting a cochlear implant is like making a fruitcake – it Is a lot of hard work but the longer it sits, the better it is and my bionic fruitcake has gotten better and better with time! :)

The Sounds of Music...

As it would seem that the older I get; the more avant-garde my moments of lacking comprehension seem to get. Either my superb lip reading skills have diminished in the past year or my brain is becoming particularly innovative when watching the zygomatic motion play an intricate part of shaping the lips in such a fashion that I am supposed to comprehend. Even though I have a cochlear implant, I still have incomprehensible moments of where I am left with a rosy kaleidoscope marbled across my face but this moment I must share with you all.

I was spending a lovely evening at home this past weekend, watching television and ooVooing with my bionic belle, Jennifer and my buddy Wayne from around the way. Mother dearest was doing her own thing looking through the online TV guide when she came upon the movie, The Sound of Music. I have never watched the movie but then again, like many movies, they were not available with closed captioning when I was younger. However, we live in a dawn of a new closed captioning era and all the movies I have been so wrongfully deprived of, I can now watch. The capacity of knowledge for the Sound of Music was limited but I knew there was a lot of singing involved from commercials. I made a general announcement on ooVoo that the aforementioned movie was coming on which prompted Jennifer to belt out to the tune of B flat, you guessed it - the Sound of Music. I thought I would have loads of fun with this serenading my two onlookers with my sounds of music, which I will vehemently admit is akin to the Tasmanian devil mating.

And surprisingly enough, I had managed not to butcher the Do Re Mi song when I did my amateur rendition. My mother started a conversation shortly afterwards about a doorbell that my cousin has that chimes after a song in this movie. However, I was having minor difficulty in understanding the name of the song.

“Abbie, I was talking to Patty one day and I heard her doorbell. It chimes anal rice!”

I'm pretty sure I heard that wrong.

“Excuse me?”

“Anal Rice, it’s a name of a flower.”

That’s an odd name for a flower and a song. I furrowed my brows and looked confused.

“Now, it’s a flower?! I thought it was a song.”

“Yes, its a name of a flower and the name of the song in the movie... Anal Rice”

That can’t be right. I’m totally confused. My mother grabs her laptop, starts surfing on the information highway to YouTube to bring up the mysterious anal rice song that doubles as a flower.

“Did they play it yet?”

“No, but here it is!” She presses play on YouTube and I clearly have never heard this song before.

“So this song is...?”

“Anal rice.”

Jennifer and Wayne are listening to this entire conversation. They could clearly tell by the look on my face I did not comprehend the mysterious song title.

“I’m sorry Mom; I don’t understand what you are saying.”

“Anaaaaal rice!” She learned forward, spoke very slowly here and enunciated every word while I damn near went crossed eyed focusing on her lips.

“Are you seriously saying anal rice?”

She flares backwards in hysterics. gasping for air and turning red. I figured she was okay as long as she wasn't turning blue. But it confirmed that she wasn't saying anal rice after all. After a few moments, she recollects herself and puts on her straightest face.

“An-nal rice.”

I shake my head. I did just not understand this. I type in the chat box to Jennifer and Wayne that my mom is talking about anal rice.

“I still think you are saying anal rice. IM it to me?”

My mom, still having a grand old chuckle, feverishly searches for a piece of paper and a pen. “No! I’m writing this out.” I knew she meant business. She wrote out the name of the song and/or flower and passed it over to me and it read - Edelweiss.

"You do know that it looks like you are saying anal rice." She mouthed into a mirror and confirmed that it did. Like I was going to make up that something looks like anal rice on the lips!

“Oh that makes more sense.” Shortly thereafter, Von Trapp family started singing Edelweiss. I listened but it still sounds like anal rice no matter who said it, sang it or screamed it. I can say that I successfully ruined my mothers perspective of the song. She decided to include the lovely doorbell owners in the loop via email...

Hello Stroh and Patty,

Let's call this "Fun moments with the deaf. :)

While talking to Patty one day, your doorbell gave off a very melodious tune of "Edelweiss". Now explaining to this to a deaf girl sans head hardware was rather an experience unto itself. Explaining to Abbie who was in lip-reading mode at the time about the flower and song "Edelweiss" has prompted this message.

From now on unto the time when the doorbell ceases to work, the tune of "Edelweiss" will be known as "Anal Rice" as the lip formation of this word looked just like I said exactly that!

With this little bit of mirth and love to all three of you, I bid you goodnight hoping this finds you all in good health.

Fran

I think my mom might be right, I am seriously over due for a mapping...

Cochlear Implant Anniversary

I can’t believe a year ago I was sitting Indian style in a paper thin cotton gown surrounded by the ugliest drapes I ever set eyes on observing nurses in colorful scrubs decorated with the sweetest little creatures pushing metal carts from patient to patient.

I can’t believe just a year ago I was listening to a train like sound going around and around my head providing me with an undesirable melody that just wasn’t quitting.

I can’t believe that one year ago today, I underwent surgery to have a cochlear implant inserted just underneath the skin of my head.

Ever since that day, my life has changed in ways that I never thought. I feel so enriched by the people I have met, the sounds I have heard and the experience of discovering what I have been missing all of these years.

Happy implant anniversary to me!

Hearing the Ocean for the First Time

Later that evening, Jen and I went to Point Pleasant Beach. I grew up with some strong nautical family ties to the ocean. I grew up with the beach at my doorstep. When I lost my hearing in February of 2007, I was still hoping that my hearing was going to come back any day. I realized that it wasn’t after I went on a vacation with a couple friends to Myrtle Beach a few weeks after my nose job. We were only about a block away from the ocean and all of us went down to go for a run on the beach. After spending twelve hours in the back seat of a car barely being unable to communicate with anyone in the front seat, I was looking forward to being on familiar grounds. After climbing a very large sand dune, I saw the great Atlantic Ocean and then I lost sensation in my knees. The warmth of sun was there, the sand diffused underneath my feet and the distinct smell of the salty air permeating my nose just like old times but there was something missing. The ocean ambiance was – dead. I couldn’t hear the waves crashing five feet way from me. The seagulls soared right over top of me and I couldn’t hear them utter a sound. The passersby on their morning stroll stopping to wish us well. I was living a silent movie. The wind kept blowing several strands of hair in my face and I thought with my hearing aids, all I would have heard is the wind whipping around. I just pulled my sunglasses over my eyes and cried while I was running. I decided the second I got back that I was going to make an appointment for a cochlear implant evaluation. I tried to make the best of my vacation by trying to find my hearing in the bottom of a bottle.

Jen and I were on a mission because neither one of us had heard the ocean since our cochlear implants have been activated. I thought it would be a great experience since she is a few hundred miles away from the seashore. I have been hesitant on going to the ocean because part of me thought I might have disappointed in the way it sounded. I couldn’t think of a better person then Jennifer to share this listening experience with. If it were anyone else, I would be willing to bet I would have heard nothing but nagging but this was our moment.

But there we stood, side by side with the full moon illuminating the night sky with the eastern seaboard 10 feet away from us. We tossed our sandals and let our toes sink into the wet sand and we listened. We listened to the seagulls cussing the ocean wind with their calls, the rising roar of the ascending tide and the crashing of the waves, the trickle of water being pulled back into the sea and the gentle drone of foghorns in the midst of the ocean. We stood there just listening to the ocean ambiance discovering how it sounds all over again. It used to sound so harsh with the wind swirling and waves crashing wearing hearing aids, but I realized that a majority of my infatuation with the sea were visual. After 28 years and one cochlear implant, I finally heard the rhythm of the ocean.


The next day, I wanted to take Jen by my job because when I go out on break, I walk passed these trees and I keep hearing this high-pitched sound that mask everything else out. It is driving me bonkers! I keep asking my hearing friend keeps telling me that it is bugs or tree frogs. Somehow, I am not satisfied with that answer. I wanted to see if Jen could pick the sound up with her cochlear implant. They weren't chatty this weekend. Jen even tried to coerce them to talk but wouldn’t you know the darn frogs were off for the weekend?

*UPDATE* They are Cicada Bugs!


After Jen shooting me some strange looks, I pouted because I want my audiologist to map out these friggen frogs. Anyway, I thought we would continue with the nautical theme. I decided to take Jen to the Barnegat Lighthouse whom my great uncle was the lighthouse keeper in 1915 to 1926.


I have been up and down this lighthouse several times, but I felt as they added more steps. I was tuckered out by the time I climbed back down. I had no idea how my great uncle climbed seven gallons of oil up and down those steps every single day. God bless that man.



Then we headed down towards the jetty rocks and admired the boats rocking in the water. We hit up a Sonic restaurant and I got this Route 44 Diet Cherry Limeade and that was very delish. We were so exhausted by the end of the day that coffee didn’t do a darn thing for us.



We just came back home and slapped our laptops on our thighs and typed away until we passed out.

The next morning, it was time for Jen to go back to Tennessee. I didn’t want her to go because we were having so much fun together. I purposely had thought of getting lost so she could miss her flight, but I opted for driving extra slow. I miss her already! But, I wouldn’t trade in the experience of being with her who is someone that can understand where I am coming from in all aspects is unbelievably refreshing. She is a special lady that always has a place in my heart.

My bionic belle comes to vist!

Every hour of this past weekend felt happy hour because my wonderful friend, CI mentor, fellow blogger and mother of five adorable kiddies Jennifer flew in from Tennessee and stayed the weekend with me! When we met in Reno for the first time, it didn’t feel like it was the first time we met. We clicked, we really clicked. The fun does not falter between us. The thought of waiting one whole year for the next hearing loss convention to see each other again did not appeal to the likes of us. Quite frankly, neither one of us are that patient so we moved it up a bit :)

Friday night, I slipped behind the wheel of my new white Toyota Prius that I have nicknamed the Incredible Eco-Egg, to trek across the Garden State into the city of brotherly love to pick up the fair southern bionic belle. I still get a surge of excitement every time I get behind the wheel because the feeling of being green has a cheaper price tag attached since I am now getting fifty miles to the gallon. That’s right, fifty, 5-0, five dash zero, 50 miles to the gallon :) But, I was ten times more excited that I was going to pick her up and submerge her in the New Jersey finger flippin’ culture for the weekend.

We had timed the flight perfectly because as soon as she got her luggage, I pulled up and we started flapping our jaws. I felt as we picked up right where we left off in Reno - minus the interesting fan club. We had some time to kill before we met up with Wayne Roorda, who is another AB user and his very lovely wife Lili for dinner. Since I am the native, I felt it was my duty to give her a little scenic tour. I picked a part of South Philly that was just a little too urban for our countrified doll. I was watching her facial expression change as our surroundings went from social suburbia where all the houses were decorated with shiny new siding and plantation blinds with to poorly painted row houses with the cheapest bed sheets hanging in the windows littered with cigarette burns haphazardly filtering the afternoon sunlight. I forged ahead down the one way street past the barren school yard. I drove through the underpass where a rusted shopping cart was missing a wheel supported the cardboard structure. When a gloomy site passes by your eyes, it goes in slow motion because it is sad when you realize that is going to be someone’s home tonight. I come to a stop sign, glanced over to the left, and notice a thick young girl covered in tattoos that look as if she were going mullet hunting. All Jennifer kept saying was, “We don’t have things like this back in Nashville.” I bet she didn’t. My gas gauge started emitting a beep and flashing. It was letting me know that I needed to get gas now. I took it as a sign and got the heck out of the ghetto. Women's intuition and all that jazz...

Shortly afterwards, we met up with Wayne and his teeny tiny wife of 30 years at a Mandarin Restaurant in Cherry Hill. I hadn’t seen Wayne since Reno and it was such a pleasure to see him again. This was my first time meeting his wife who just a doll. Jennifer had an itching to try something new and it included tentacles. She decided to try an itty bitty octopus with doctored up with habanero peppers. She cautiously placed the octopus in her mouth; eight limbs and all and then proceeded to chew.


And chew.

And chewed some more.

I went to get my second helping.

Came back and she was still chewing…

Once her incisors managed to macerate the poor thing, she offered to share her second one with me. I toyed with the idea of going on a chewing marathon to burn some extra calories but after pushing it around on the plate...



I politely declined. We ate enough to feed a small army and began to wobble our way out of the door but not before I plowed through four different fortune cookies until I found a one that I was satisfied with :)

After finding the perfect fortune, we took some pictures as you can see here! Wayne and Lili, thank you for dinner, I had a very lovely time and we must do it again!



After dinner, I loaded the Incredible Eco-Egg with Jen and myself and we began the trek back home. I made Jen count how many diners there were along the way. I think she lost count. We managed to get home at a decent time and we just chatted with my mom. I introduced her to the flying fur ball otherwise known as Bella. She took a liking to the southern belle. :) Surprisingly, we closed our eyes at a decent hour…

The next morning, I presented to Jen a cup of coffee big enough to go fishing in. I think my mother’s special blend got her motor running in no time at all. We put our batteries in and got a move on to face the day. I introduced her to one of our shiny aluminum sided diners where everything is cooked from scratch and served on 20” plates. We ordered some French toast, which was more like half a loaf of bread sliced three times. We wobbled out of the diner, quite literally.



I had made tentative plans with Sam Spritzer a few weeks ago to meet and through some trials and tribulations, we managed to meet up on Saturday afternoon at a nearby mall! My first impression was that someone drank his milk when he was younger because I was prepared for his vibrant personality but I was not prepared for his height. I think I got a crick in my neck straining to look up at Jen and Sam :) Since Sam has bilateral cochlear implants, we decided for acoustic purposes to stick him in the middle. I stood on the right side so I could my implant on my left ear would catch whatever Jen and Sam said. Jen stood on the left side so her implant on her right ear would catch Sam and I would have said. It is so much simpler when I am around other cochlear implant users because they are aware of how to maximize the listening experience. If I were to frantically shuffle around anyone else, I get a questionable look. With everyone properly positioned, we walked around the mall and chatting about anything and everything. Not that I am short, I am more fun size then anything but I had to keep looking up at their lips and I couldn’t very well watch where I was going. I kept walking into tables and the like. I thought for my own personal safety that they should sit down. :)


I had such a great time with the two of them just shooting the breeze with Jen and Sam. I am looking forward to seeing him at the Nashville HLAA convention next June!

Part 2 up next :)

Kim, Robyn, Tina and Clifford the Big Red Dog...

A couple weeks ago, I ran over to the Say What convention that was being held in Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love to meet Kim from Living With Questions, Robyn from The Ambling Rambler and Tina Childress, an audiologist with Advanced Bionics and a bilateral cochlear implant recipient. Kim and I were texting the day before we were going to meet and the last text before I fell asleep was that she wanted to go get another apple dumping. As I shuffled my feet towards the bedroom, I was staring at the screen of my blackberry, wondering the hell was an apple dumping. I made an executive decision to sleep on it.

The next morning, I was still just as puzzled about the apple dumping. I decided to ask my mom who is popular in the family for being a sponge of useless knowledge. I figure if anyone would know it would be she. Much to my surprise, she had no idea. With very limited knowledge of apple dumping, I forged ahead to Philadelphia.

Once I arrived at the hotel, I sent a text to Kim to let her know that I was standing guard at the door. :) A few moments later, Kim came out with open arms and a beautiful smile. We gave each other a big bone crushing hug. Her personality and cherubic giggle endeared her to me. We chatted back and forth until Robyn materialized next to us. The fair skinned Robyn came all the way from New Zealand for a month long vacation or holiday as she calls it. Since she came from abroad, she came with an accent, one that I never encountered before. I wasn't too worried, but I was surprised at how soft spoken she was but what really threw me for a loop was the lack of the enunciation of the R's. Apparently, New Zealanders does not pronounce their R's as we do here. Here is a sample conversation that we had.

Robyn: "....I'll meet you at the bah."
Kim : "The what?"
I thought she said back?
Robyn: "The baaah."
Kim and I focused on her lips.
Robyn: "The baaaaahr."

Ah hah, we figured it out. She said bar. :) Amazing how the subtle nuances of a language can present a wee bit of a challenge. :)

And off to the bar we went, which was more like a casual dining establishment. You didn't really think that we were going to throw a few back at eleven in the morning, did ya? We sat and chit chatted for a bit. Robyn joined us with moments to spare since she had brought tickets to go on a tour in the Museum of Art that was leaving shortly. I wasn't going to let her get away without posing for a couple pictures that was shot beautifully by Kim's friend, Lorne. Before she left, we made plans to meet up later on in the evening to spend a little more time together.

Shortly after Robyn left, Tina had arrived at once! We decided that lunch was a matter of utter importance. That is when Kim brought up the infamous apple dumping. This was my opening to make an inquiry to clarify the apple dumping. Kim enunciated her lips as she said, apple DUMPLING. I started to laugh as I told Tina and Kim that this entire time, I read her text as apple dumping. Tina started cracking up and made the most fitting comment, "Not only are you hearing impaired, you are visually impaired (brief pause) cognitively impaired." I was inclined to agree with everything she said! I whipped my blackberry out of my pocket and hunted down the text that Kim left to reread it and sure enough, it said apple dumpling.

However, I was right back to where I started, clueless. I asked Kim what was an apple dumpling. With signs of exuberance in her eyes, she told me that it was an apple baked in a pastry crust, drizzled with a cinnamon sugar sauce and it was served with ice cream or cream. After I gained five pounds just listening to her, I decided that we better get a move on to find the purple trolley otherwise known as the Phlash to go over to Reading Terminal Market. Armed with my handheld GPS (I have an innate fear of getting lost.)

We had no problem getting on the Phlash trolley. By the time, we got off the trolley I had visions of a cheesesteaks from Rick's Philly Steak, dancing in my head. I manage to get the cheesesteaks dancing in Tina's head. We had a bit of trouble finding Reading Terminal Market but my GPS got us there. Unbeknownst to us, it was the Ice Cream Festival that weekend there. It was a shame but my GPS couldn't find Rick's because we were nearly to slip into a diabetic coma if we didn't get a cheesesteak stat. We sacrificed by running to the first cheesesteak booth we saw. We managed to find a nice table in the back, away from most of the noise, which was very helpful for the lot of us.

After a wonderful lunch with the gals, we headed over to this little Amish booth to test drive an apple dumpling.. It was oh-so-delish. After the dumpling went down the hatch, Kim and I decided to head towards the loo for some bladder relief. Tina decided to gather some sweet stuff from the candy store. Right before I walked into the bathroom, out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glance of this fuzzy red dog as big as a house playing with some kids.



I couldn't remember the name of the dog, I thought it was Spot but I was wrong. I thought how cool would it be if we all got a picture with the big red dog. Sooooo, while I was standing in line waiting for the next available stall, I sent a text to Tina, obviously not even thinking on how peculiar it must have sounded to her.

At the most, four minutes have elapsed since I saw the six-foot fuzzy red dog. Once we finished doing our lady things, we started walking out and I'm talking about this big red dog and Tina and Kim are looking at me as if my magnet were on too tight. Tina asked me whether I read her reply to my text, which I didn't. I'm trying to dig my blackberry from the deep depths of the rabbit hole otherwise known as my purse while I was leading the pack out of the bathroom in search of the big red dog, but there was no big red dog in sight.

I glanced over my shoulder at Tina and Kim and their face said it all, I was obviously elected as the queen of the monkey people. Mind you, I am dead serious about seeing this six-foot fuzzy red dog. Without missing a beat, I stop some woman walking by and ask her point blank, "Have you seen a big red dog in here?" As Tina started laughing out loud, the woman clutched her purse to her side, took a couple steps back and exhibited some signs of uncomfortableness as she said, "No." I could clearly see that I weirded her out. I thanked her for her time and went to the spot where I last saw the dog, hoping to see some red fuzz from the costume to prove that there was a six-foot fuzzy red dog standing there. Much to my dismay, there was no red fuzz anywhere. I had the nerve to stand there and think to myself how strange that was because dogs always shed. :)

I finally pulled my blackberry out of my purse but I just clutched it in my hands because I had important matters to attend to, like track down a six-foot fuzzy red dog. Tina asked me whether I saw any pink elephants flying around too. Now I am just finding this whole situation just plain funny because this is such a classic situation that I get myself into, I see something that no one else does and as usual, I end up looking like the leader of the village idiots. However, it became a matter of principle that I had to find this six-foot fuzzy red dog. I decided to ask a man this time. I scouted the area for a man that looked as though he was hanging around in the area for the past five minutes and I found one, right by the loo with his arms crossed. It looked to me that he might be waiting for his wife. So, I walked right up to him and asked if he saw the big red dog anywhere and he said nope. Things were not looking good if I had to go to court and prove that I was sane.

I finally open up Tina's reply to my text and it said, "Wtf?" My thoughts exactly, wtf is this dog!? I thought the reply was appropriate and I'm glad I didn't open it up earlier because it wouldn't have packed quite the same punch. The gals appeased my insane curiosity by looking up and down the aisles for this dog but no avail, there was no six-foot fuzzy red dog anywhere. Did it run away to the nearest fire hydrant or something? The six-foot fuzzy red dog didn't have a name until Tina mentioned the name Clifford the big red dog. She's a mom; it’s her job to know the name of popular children books. :) What do I know? I'm pushing 30 here, the last time I was a kid was... and lets not get into that.

Anyhoo, I didn't know what else to do, pass out flyers for a missing six-foot fuzzy red dog or walking around shouting CLIFFORD hoping he would come when he was called. We started walking towards the exit of the market when I had to ask one more person. It was just a matter of principle. I asked a woman that was a spitting image of Aunt Jemima if SHE had seen the six-foot fuzzy red dog. She said that she has in fact seen Clifford the big red dog and pointed towards the back, right where I spotted the damn dog in the first place! I lunged with such excitement at the girls and let out a "Ah hah! Did you hear that?! Aunt Jemima over there said Clifford the big red dog was here! Ah hah, told you!" However, I gathered that neither one of them felt that Aunt Jemima was a credible witness.

It wasn't until a week later when I got a comment on Facebook from Tina, with a link to a news article about the ice cream festival at Reading Terminal Market featuring...

Clifford the Big Red Dog. :)

I was telling them I'm not nuts :) but I am good for entertainment.

After the whole red dog ordeal, we did a little retail therapy and headed back to the convention by the way of the Phlash which took a little longer than we anticipated. Kim and Tina went to their rooms to get ready for their dinner and I jumped at the chance to spend some more time with Robyn. I'm so glad that I got a chance to spend some more time with her because she is just simply a delight to be around. When the dinner was about to start, it was time for me to bid adieu. It was sad to have to say goodbye since being around all of them was like a breath of fresh air.