Friday, December 28, 2012
Monday, September 10, 2012
Re: May never be whole again
Does your family have an operating room named after them yet? Can you go on disability retirement?
From: David Haile <haile.david@gmail.com>
To: Florene Haile <waynehaile@msn.com>; Carole Haile <caroleha@yahoo.com>; Peter Haile <peterdhaile@gmail.com>; Haile Family Blog <haile.david.amos@blogger.com>
Sent: Mon, September 10, 2012 3:08:10 PM
Subject: May never be whole again
X-ray of my hand showed it isn't healing. Surgery scheduled for Weds to put a pin in the bone.
May never be whole again
X-ray of my hand showed it isn't healing. Surgery scheduled for Weds to put a pin in the bone.
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
Toyota dealers are stupid
Adventures in truck maintenance and why I don't trust a car dealer:
I'm going to write a flaming response when they email my bill to me. I was there 1hr 20min for a scheduled oil change! What I think happened was they found $2000 of work they could do if I'd OK it but when they glanced into the waiting room I wasn't sitting exactly in the right spot they decided to wait until I returned. What they didn't know and didn't go the extra distance to find out and didn't follow through with was when I dropped off the car the waiting room was full so I was out on the couch next to the sales desks - 50 feet from the waiting room. I was back in the waiting room after the first 40 minutes had passed and had someone looked a 2nd time they would have found me. Either of the service persons could have seen me sitting on the couch if they had looked up from their monitors. After a while I started wondering why it was taking so long but of course the person I needed to talk to was busy with someone else and none of the other dozen lazy and bored Toyota employees that were within 30 feet of the customer desk (including Chris the mechanic who worked on my truck and who I didn't know was waiting for my response) could help so I had to wait and wait and wander around and wait some more. The whole shop acted as if they couldn't care less that a customer had work to do and wasn't pleased as punch to spend his leisure time sipping stale Folger's coffee reading Entertainment Tonight. I also am sure they thought that since they had spent so much time inspecting my vehicle I'd be happy to sign on the bottom line so they could get back to the business of rebuilding my car from the ground up while I waited several more days and studied all the horrid details of Whitney Houston's last hours. When the chatty customer service lady finally shut up long enough for me to butt in, I requested a ride back to work because it was taking way too long. She managed to quickly find my paperwork which was full of many items for which she need to lookup the labor costs before I could pay for my simple oil change. I remained cool and said I needed to go. She was able to get permission from Management to let me take my own car back to work and they'd bill me for the oil change and also send the lovely estimate to return my vehicle to its former glory.
DWH
I'm going to write a flaming response when they email my bill to me. I was there 1hr 20min for a scheduled oil change! What I think happened was they found $2000 of work they could do if I'd OK it but when they glanced into the waiting room I wasn't sitting exactly in the right spot they decided to wait until I returned. What they didn't know and didn't go the extra distance to find out and didn't follow through with was when I dropped off the car the waiting room was full so I was out on the couch next to the sales desks - 50 feet from the waiting room. I was back in the waiting room after the first 40 minutes had passed and had someone looked a 2nd time they would have found me. Either of the service persons could have seen me sitting on the couch if they had looked up from their monitors. After a while I started wondering why it was taking so long but of course the person I needed to talk to was busy with someone else and none of the other dozen lazy and bored Toyota employees that were within 30 feet of the customer desk (including Chris the mechanic who worked on my truck and who I didn't know was waiting for my response) could help so I had to wait and wait and wander around and wait some more. The whole shop acted as if they couldn't care less that a customer had work to do and wasn't pleased as punch to spend his leisure time sipping stale Folger's coffee reading Entertainment Tonight. I also am sure they thought that since they had spent so much time inspecting my vehicle I'd be happy to sign on the bottom line so they could get back to the business of rebuilding my car from the ground up while I waited several more days and studied all the horrid details of Whitney Houston's last hours. When the chatty customer service lady finally shut up long enough for me to butt in, I requested a ride back to work because it was taking way too long. She managed to quickly find my paperwork which was full of many items for which she need to lookup the labor costs before I could pay for my simple oil change. I remained cool and said I needed to go. She was able to get permission from Management to let me take my own car back to work and they'd bill me for the oil change and also send the lovely estimate to return my vehicle to its former glory.
DWH
Monday, March 5, 2012
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Good concert! Sotto Voce
Though the first half could have been 20 minutes shorter, the tuba/euphonium concert was very good. The most impressive player was the low tuba player. It could have sounded like any marching band tuba but this guy was a master. He had a PhD in tuba, or something like that. The 2nd low tuba, Nat McIntosh, was the guy who founded and is the leader of the Young Blood Brass Band. Mom/Dad - if you don't recognize the name just search for it in Google. It is a very good and very popular hip-hop horn group at the top of the charts around the Haile house. He was the only player that wasn't a college music professor and he made fun of himself for trying to hang with the others. The 2nd euphonium player was much younger than the others and a recent addition to the group. I could tell that the reason they picked him was because of his ear. They play very difficult music but intonation would be extremely important in a horn group like that one. They had such close harmonies! They never stopped and tuned. They were always micro-adjusting their horns as they played - especially the low tuba player. The 1st euphonium player was the recognized tone leader of the group and one of them said he was responsible for the popularity of the group compared to other similar groups because of his tone. He played the highest and fastest parts and was the most technically flawless player.
http://tubaquartet.com/
Their finale was arranged by the Youngbloods guy. It featured screams and yells and singing through the tuba while playing and mouthpiece pops and rhythms tapped on the metal while the horn parts were sometimes very tightly synchronized and sometimes independent. The encore piece was a slow Irish tune (I should know the name) that was so wonderful it almost brought tears to our eyes. Part of the song they stopped playing and just sang the tune acapella.
It was interesting that Nat McIntosh would be considered the celebrity of the group and the most famous tuba player of modern times, yet no attention at all was given to him other than him being the founder/leader of the Young Bloods. He's from Longmont, CO - born 1978. He tours constantly. I hope he's putting some $$ away because that is a tough life!
The group spent the day before the concert at Big Horn High School running a master's class and giving a short concert. They spent the day of the concert at Sheridan High School doing the same thing. They also gave a concert at the WYO earlier in the day to a large group of elementary school kids.
http://tubaquartet.com/
Their finale was arranged by the Youngbloods guy. It featured screams and yells and singing through the tuba while playing and mouthpiece pops and rhythms tapped on the metal while the horn parts were sometimes very tightly synchronized and sometimes independent. The encore piece was a slow Irish tune (I should know the name) that was so wonderful it almost brought tears to our eyes. Part of the song they stopped playing and just sang the tune acapella.
It was interesting that Nat McIntosh would be considered the celebrity of the group and the most famous tuba player of modern times, yet no attention at all was given to him other than him being the founder/leader of the Young Bloods. He's from Longmont, CO - born 1978. He tours constantly. I hope he's putting some $$ away because that is a tough life!
The group spent the day before the concert at Big Horn High School running a master's class and giving a short concert. They spent the day of the concert at Sheridan High School doing the same thing. They also gave a concert at the WYO earlier in the day to a large group of elementary school kids.
Ice Memories
We came across an interesting phenomenon over the weekend. It has been in the 40's and 50's lately. We were driving on roads in Story that are snow-covered all year long. Since we haven't had snow for a while the roads were packed down hard like ice. Add the warm temperatures and you have ice with a thin layer of water on top. It is the slickest surface I've ever seen! Even our Prius with traction control and studded snow tires had a little trouble with it. It was too slick to walk on. 4WD wouldn't matter nearly as much as having good snow tires that can grip ice. Even the slightest grade made driving difficult.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
That was an expensive bug to swat
It all started on October 20, 2011 when I was riding mountain bikes with a friend. We'd just finished a long difficult section with lots of switchbacks and hit the fast part of the trail - slightly downhill in the trees around Clear Creek in Buffalo, WY. A gnat or similar small bug hit my face and I reached up to swat him just as I came over a very small bump in the trail so down I went! I stuffed head and shoulder into the dirt at 15 mph. Stood up, was a little dazed, could tell that my right shoulder was damaged, had to sit down before I passed out. Friend Steve helped me limp 1/2 mile to the road, he rode down to get the car and took me to the emergency room in Buffalo. X-Rays showed damage, doc had seen this injury many times and it almost always heals itself.
Three months later the bones in my shoulder were still knocking around in certain movements so I went to the ortho center in Sheridan. X-rays and an MRI show that it is at least a Category 3 shoulder separation as well as a torn muscle around the rotator cuff. The separation is bad enough that it will never heal itself. It will require a tendon from a cadaver to fix it! Surgery will be scheduled tomorrow and is likely to be a week from Thursday (my choice). Recovery will include 6 weeks of no muscle movement of the shoulder followed by 6 weeks of careful non-strength activity. Rehab will consist of someone else moving my arm around for the first 6 weeks. The tendons will reattach within 6 weeks but the muscle on the rotator cuff needs to fully attach before the arm is ready for normal use.
I'll get it done now so I'm ready for activity when summer arrives.
Three months later the bones in my shoulder were still knocking around in certain movements so I went to the ortho center in Sheridan. X-rays and an MRI show that it is at least a Category 3 shoulder separation as well as a torn muscle around the rotator cuff. The separation is bad enough that it will never heal itself. It will require a tendon from a cadaver to fix it! Surgery will be scheduled tomorrow and is likely to be a week from Thursday (my choice). Recovery will include 6 weeks of no muscle movement of the shoulder followed by 6 weeks of careful non-strength activity. Rehab will consist of someone else moving my arm around for the first 6 weeks. The tendons will reattach within 6 weeks but the muscle on the rotator cuff needs to fully attach before the arm is ready for normal use.
I'll get it done now so I'm ready for activity when summer arrives.
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