Friday at the House

Welcome to another riveting report from the lofty rooms of Canuck Place Hospice. Not a great night in terms of the namesake team...4-0 thrashing loss to Minni.....speaking of thrashings...Thrashers won and are now tied with the 'nucks for the LAST playoff spot...
I am growing a 'make the playoffs' beard and am desperate to shave it off...I guess I have one more week to determine my facial fate.

In the house this week...again with not so very original made up names...Krista, Jeffrey, Aldo, and Conrad.

Conrad is pretty much unable to communicate verbally...but he makes fantastic 'raspberry' noises with his tongue. He spent the night up in the school room making noises...taking off his socks and trying to take off his shirts. He also has an incredible reach with his arms. He managed to grab at Krista's arm pillow as we rolled past...and manages to grab almost anything within a 1m reach of his chair.

Krista is from Vancouver Island. Krista has Duchennes's muscular dystrophy which by all accounts only affects boys, but there is a very small percentage of girls with Duchenne's. I have not seen her for a year and she looks really good. She is going to be back in a couple of weeks for a 'girl's teen weekend' and I am really happy that my wife Cynthia will be taking a couple of hours to do the girls' makeup on the Saturday.

Aldo is a favorite of mine. I hold him responsible for a serious incident that took place at the house last year. Aldo has a serious love affair with Star Wars. I was armed with a hockey stick light sabre and a Darth Vader type sand bucket mask that enabled me to breathe with the patented Darth Vader heavy breathing sound. I was kicking Aldo's rear end with jabs and slashes and all sorts of fantastic moves. He is pretty aggressive in his chair so you have to watch your toes. I made a fantastic strike and moved to the left rapidly...not seeing the steel pole sticking out of the ground. My knee struck the pole with so much force that it made a resounding "GONG" and the echo reverberated for all to hear. The trouble is ...nobody heard it...all they could hear was my howling. My family counselor partner for the night was Martin....he has no sympathy whatsoever for me. He, for all intents and purposes, believed that I was faking it. This comes from a man who works in the post office and had to go on medical leave because he poked his eye with his thumb. Maybe it wasn't medical leave...but it was pretty serious!!
Aldo loves dinosaurs and Star Wars. He likes to play computer games and he is a really smart Grade Fiver.

Jeffrey made me laugh tonight. He is neat kid in Grade 9. He is in the house for respite care this week and has an appointment with a sleep specialist. I think they want to check that his 02 levels are ok while he sleeps. I told him that technology has advanced to such a point that during the test they can actually see the dreams he was having during the test. I had him hook, line , and sinker. He was really worried about it until I told him I was kidding.

I had had a really tiring week. I was really happy to end it with a night at the house.
malcolm

No House report--thank you to my brother!

No house report this week. I had to miss because I was in Whistler's Callaghan Valley for the Canadian Cross country Nationals.

Thank you to my brother Neil for donating $100. Each year Neil has donated and last year he donated more than he bargained for. It was his Brodie Enduro bike that was stolen off the back of my car. I still have not replaced it....sigh.

Thank you, Neil.
Malcolm

Success!

There is a veritable cornucopia of bike parts in my back yard. I deftly manoeuvred one rear wheel from a large framed bike to THE BIKE and now can go forward with reckless abandon. I can even stop now because I moved a couple of less worn brake pads.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle...get?....re-cycle....sigh

The end is Nigh

A flat rear tire.
Now what will be next?
Oh Patron of Bikes...where are you?

Canuck Place video

Many cool things happen at Canuck Place. This video gives great insight to what happens at Canuck Place. Please watch!

http://www.canuckplace.org/video.php?id=64

Malcolm

Frozen testicular syndrome - FTS

Known more commonly as FTS in my training vernacular this syndrome is most common to the cyclist with poor riding posture, no cycling shorts, and perhaps a prostrate un-friendly cycling seat. I googled the term and, having found nothing on the web, would like to claim rights to the FTS-frozen testicular syndrome name.
The syndrome need not be explained in detail but suffice to say that a combination of a poor seat and ambient temperatures of 10 degrees celsius or less causes the rider grief.
malcolm

a most excellent win

The canucks had a tremendous win last night...thankfully. keep the faith...keep the faith

A bike patron

First off...Canucks for Kids raised a ton of money yesterday...and the 'nucks won a big game to boot. Thank you to everyone who participated and donated for the big night.

Now...to business. I need a bike patron. This realisation came to me yesterday as I tried to get my keys out of my back pack while approaching the garage door to the parking lot. With one hand on my front brake and keys in the other...I was not able to apply enough brake pressure to stop...and consequently used the slowly rising garage door to stop. Very embarrassing. On the way home I had to stop to fill my tires with air again...up from their present 30 psi to the prescribed 55psi. No wonder I was moving so slow!

Any body who is willing to sponsor me in the form of a bike...I am all ears..brake pads...and under inflated tires.

Malcolm

Canucks for Kids Telethon

A big day for The House. The Canuck's organisation is responsible for almost 1/3 of the operating cost of Canuck Place. That is a big chunk of change at over 1.3 million.

Support and GIVE! https://www.canuckplace.org/canuck/donate.php

Canucks for Kids Fund Telethon - Thursday, March 6th
March 06, 2008

Join in the 2008 Canucks for Kids Fund Telethon in support of Canuck Place Children's Hospice

The 2008 Telethon will be held during the Thursday, March 6th Vancouver Canucks hockey game versus the visiting Nashville Predators.

Receive your Exclusive Canucks Photos by donating today!
# Donate $100 to receive an 8x10 photograph of Trevor Linden entitled “Celebration”

# Donate $150 or more – you receive the Roberto Lunogo “Great Save” photograph and the “Celebration” photo.

Friday at the House

Another great night despite the Canucks losing.
Miracles of miracles Tony, Kyle, and I were at the house together for the first time in about 5 months. Kyle has been with the house as a peer volunteer for years...and he volunteers everywhere else, and is a full time time student working on I don't know how many degrees.
Our shift starts at 5 pm. This is what happens when you come to your shift; you sign in, go and find out what is happening from the 1-5 shift volunteers, and then go EAT.

Like every house the kitchen is the heart of the house and Shelley cooks some mighty fine cuisine. Everybody in the house comes down for supper...whether you can eat or not!

In the house this Friday are Brad, Saul, Kevin, Kent, Morgan, and Mikey (again...not real names...do you realise how difficult it is to come up with fake names that fit?)

Saul has been in the house for over three weeks. He lives in the Okanagan and has been getting stuff done at Children's Hospital I think. I would hazaard a guess that he is pretty tired of being here.He and Tony hung out in in the big TV room most of the night.
Brad is an 18 year old who is in for some respite care.
Kevin is a Grade 5 boy from the Okanagan and has been at the house for a week with his mum, dad, and "my boy" Justin his 2 year old brother.

Kent. Not sure how old Kent is. If you want to see his face you need to hold his head up for him. When you do that you are rewarded with a huge grin and these incredibly bright eyes. Kyle was hanging with Kent and Brad while I was playing blocks with Justin...Kevin's 'boy'. Kyle thinks that Kent is having a seizure of some sort. He goes down to get a nurse and I watch Kent. The seizure stops and I lift up Kent's head. He kind of stares blankly at me for about 30 seconds...and the BANG...his eyes turn on and he flashes a big grin!
Mikey has just hanging in his chair fading in and out of sleep the whole night!

A little later Kent lets loose some nasty smelling farts...we think it might be time for hime to go to the Kid's Floor and take care of something important.

Another neat night at the house.
Malcolm