Monday, July 14, 2014

July 14, 2014

Interference on my Sound Processor?
July 14, 2014

There are times when I hear well with my Cochlear Implant and times I do not hear well.  Sometimes just all of a sudden I will get very tinny sounds.  Voices won't sound normal and background sounds remind me of talking into a barrel.  I have never determined why it changes.  Tonight at supper with friends, at the same place where we eat with these friends almost every week, things sounded terrible.  I don't know if there is interference from some mechanical device at the place or from a TV or radio being used.  I feel that it is electronically triggered somehow.  After we ate and walked outside the cafeteria, things were more normal.  Sure wish I had an expert that could follow me around and figure out these episodes.  At home this evening listening to television the sound was fine.

One night last week one of our sons called and I had the same experience on my cell phone with him.  We ended up talking on the amplified speaker phone which is less satisfactory usually.  He had tried twice on the cell phone but that is where I had the problem.  Later that same evening, my daughter-in-law called on my cell phone and we did fine.  It boggles my mind that I can't figure this out.  We go back to Houston in two or three weeks.  I am hoping that at that time we can get an answer or two.

The rest of my day was rather quiet, but busy.  Funny thing happened.  I spent a lot of time filling out two different surveys.  They were totally unrelated but we both interesting.   I had received a letter a few days ago telling me I would be getting one about quilt related things and to please take time to answer it.  I think it turned out to be over 20 pages of small print.  I had to pull out my reading glasses to fill the thing out.  I think I spent 2 hours working on it.  It was an amazingly well thought out survey.  They said it was to go to manufacturers of quilt products: sewing machine, quilting machines, fabric, tools, patterns, magazines, and books to name a few. 
A small portion of my fabrics.
The questions really made me think and the answers in some cases startled me.  I know that I have a large investment in quilt fabric.  There is no argument on that subject.  There are always jokes among quilters about hiding fabric from their husbands but I have never done that.  Ron knows and supports my addiction - oops, my love of quilt making.  I want my fabric where I can see it to know what I have and to keep me inspired and encouraged to keep sewing.  But one question had to do with how many spools of thread I had and what would be the replacement cost.  Wow!  Fabric and thread have skyrocketed in price in the last couple of years and it would be a major outlay to replace all my thread!

Some of my spools of thread.
Many of my quilt books have been gifts (my first quilt teacher gave me many of her books when she decided to give up quilting).  The books would be expensive to replace.  Putting a dollar value on those items as well as my sewing machines, tools: rotary cutters, cutting mats, templates, scissors, pins, needles for both hand and machine sewing, and all the other amazing tools was shocking.  I have valued my fabric collection from time to time, but not all the other things.

Then the survey asked about where I buy all these things: quilt shows (mostly), quilt shops, sewing machine shops, chain stores like Hobby Lobby, Michaels, Joanne Fabrics, on line, from catalogs, and on and on.  They asked where I learned to quilt (a lady from our church), and if I take classes and if I go to quilt shows (yes and yes), and how much time I spend on line looking for tools and fabrics (not much).  I find I want to feel the fabric and have been disappointed sometimes with fabric I have ordered.  There are shops I have learned to trust on line.  Anyway, it was a very interesting two hours.
Books and projects
In the afternoon I filled out a survey for a college student that reminded me of one of the things that often happens in surveys.  Questions can be presented in a way as to produce a certain outcome from the survey.  The first half of the survey was that way.  It was not written by the student, but rather it was a professionally prepared set of questions.  I was very disappointed in the way things were worded.  They would have done well to hire the company that wrote the survey I did earlier in the day.  The second half of the second survey had to do with emotions and empathy (the first part did, too, but not in the same way).  This had to do with how you relate to characters in books, movies, plays, etc. and how you react in a crisis (I am usually calm).  As for characters in movies and books, I rarely relate to them on a personal level, except for one series of Christian fiction books I read about 10 years ago.  That main character could have been me.  I really learned so much about some of my attitudes from that series.  I think those books changed some of my attitudes. Back to the survey, that survey took less time to fill out but I really disliked the way questions in the first half were geared to produce a desired outcome.

At the office after the surveys, I worked on preparing things for a new sewing project.  I spent time reading the instructions (I could not have made it through this day without a good pair of reading glasses) and preparing some  fabric.  After we got home from our dinner with friends, I completed the project.  On a scale of one to ten I am about an 8 in my satisfaction of the project.  Not perfect, but fun.  Maybe I will show you a photo another day - after it is given to the intended recipient. 
Some left-overs from tonight's project.
I did spend some time on line trying to find a downloadable pattern for another project and I guess I am not a very good searcher.  I did not find what I wanted, so I will have to make it up as I go along.  I may have to wait until tomorrow to try out that project.

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