Of Dentists, #HarryPotter Boxes, Haircuts, Interacting With #Blind People, #Baking, Weather Reports, And Telephones

My dentist appointment at the end of May went well, though I personally think it was a total waste of time.

They called it a, "Consultation appointment," and it basically involved the dentist there taking a quick look at my teeth, and asking if I agreed we should try the laughing gas form of sedation - like the gas and air they give women in labour sometimes - before resorting to the one they do via an IV. I did agree - if nothing else, because the effects of the laughing gas are easier to shake off - so I booked the appointment to actually have it done, and went home. Of course, since - as I've mentioned before - nothing gets done quickly over here, the first available slot they had was on July 3rd at 11:00am. So that's when I'm going.

All being well, after that I can stay away from dentists until I'll be due for my next regular check-up. Well, at least I'll get a couple of months break. Though it literally will only be a couple of months at this rate. *sigh*

We've got several appointments happening over the next several weeks now. Lilie has her grooming appointment tomorrow (June 19th) and her vet appointment Friday (June 21st) at 10:00am and 9:30am respectively. I've got my dentist appointment in two weeks time (July 3rd) and Logan has his vet appointment the next day (July 4th) both at 11:00am on their respective days. Then Kelly has a follow-up appointment for one of the things they're looking in to as potential causes for the sores on his legs on July 11th (I think that one's at 11:00am too). He's also waiting for some blood test results, which may or may not result in other appointments for him to try and get answers about this leg thing.

Anyway, back to a few weeks ago: at least the cab rides to and from the appointment were fun...

The driver who took me there was one I haven't seen in ages, but used to see a lot when we lived in the old place. He knew Kero, and remembers hearing him howling as we pulled away, and barking excitedly as we returned, every single time. So we spent the whole ride talking about dogs.

On the way home, my cab driver was a Harry Potter fan. It came up because I was wearing the Hogwarts t-shirt that was one of the ones I got from my Harry Potter box. So we spent the entire ride talking about Harry Potter.

Two of my favourite topics of conversation! *wink*

Hey, speaking of Harry Potter: I haven't shared the contents of my May box with you yet, since we didn't have the photos ready for the last Tuesday in May, and then I was posting about Logan. So, I'll share those with you today.

There was a t-shirt with Cornish pixies on it...

An ornamental lantern, like the one Hagrid uses...

A Gringotts vault key...

Some elixir of life tea...

A print featuring the recipe for a love potion called Amorenthia...

An educational decree proclimation scroll...

And a pin badge with, "You're a wizard," written on it...

There was one of those scratch cards again too. Once again, we didn't win anything. But never mind.

Also, back at the start of April, they offered the chance to buy an extra special edition box. I wasn't going to bother, because the special editions are always more expensive than the normal ones, and getting them all can make things quite expensive. But then I saw what the theme was. It was a house elf box. I had to have the Dobby box! So I ordered one, and it FINALLY came at the start of June. Inside was...

A pair of socks...

Because there had to be, of course. Don't understand why? Read the books or watch the movies (especially near the end of "Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets" and - if reading rather than watching - the middle of "Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire"). I knew there had to be socks, but didn't know what would be on them. Turns out my socks have bats on them.

There was also some S.P.E.W. stuff, of course. Don't know what that is? Again, see "Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire" (you'll get more from the book). You might get the gist from the slogans on the t-shirts though...

I've now got my very own S.P.E.W. badge too...

There was also some "free house elves" tea...

A letter opener...

And a couple of pictures of Dobby the house elf...

I had kind of hoped Dobby's picture would be on a t-shirt. It would have been cool to have a Dobby t-shirt. Especially since there were two t-shirts in the box. But never mind. I still liked my Dobby box.

I've enjoyed all my Harry Potter boxes, actually. It looks like these will be the last ones for me though. Why? Because we've been having some payment issues with them for most of the time I've been subscribed. They keep insisting they can't take the payment on the day they try (no matter how much is in the bank) and say they take the money on the 14th of the month, but take it any time between when the previous box comes out, and the 15th of the month. In December, them messing about over the paments cost me that month's box, and I had to reactivate my subscription (which had only been running a couple of months at that point as it is). Now they appear to have cancelled my subscription again. I love the boxes, but don't like dealing with the company who do them, or the fact I can never be certain when they'll want their money, so I'm not bothering to reactivate it again. So, like I said, it looks like these will be the last Harry Potter boxes for me.

In other news:

Kelly and my Mam hate that I usually cut my hair myself, which is what I've been doing for the past several years.

I started doing it myself because of a combination of hairdressers who wouldn't listen to me (considering themselves better at judging my hairstyles, since apparently not being able to see means I don't know how I want my hair) and then charged me extra for giving me a style I didn't like, and health issues making booking appointments in advance tricky. Also, it's cheaper to do it myself. But both of them hated that I did it, even though they did admit I didn't do too bad of a job, considering it's not easy to cut your own hair yourself in general, and my being blind makes it even more difficult.

I mention this because I actually went to a hairdresser at the start of the month.

I wasn't going to. I was going to just cut my hair myself again a couple of days before Chris (the dog courier) came with Logan. It was past over-due for it, which is one thing we did actually all agree on. But my Mam said she'd pay if I'd go to a hairdresser, and Kelly said he'd even stand outside with Lilie if he had to. So I agreed. With a fair amount of reluctance, I have to admit; mostly I just agreed to make them happy.

So, I looked for a hairdresser, and booked an appointment.

As it happened, Kelly and Lilie didn't have to stand outside after all, since we found one nearby that I considered reasonably priced - still more than I think haircuts should cost, but not as expensive as a lot of hairdressers - so was happy to try, that allowed dogs inside. Mam still had to pay the bill though.

Since I had to sort a photo for Mam to see, I figure I might as well show you too. So, here's me after my haircut:

Rather annoyingly, they at first demonstrated one of the things mentioned on this post about the dos and don'ts of interacting with a blind or visually impaired version, which - as it happened - I'd actually been reading during the eMail and blog post checking I was doing shortly before going for my appointment. I walked in there with my cane, with Kelly clearly giving me verbal warnings about steps to ensure I definitely knew about them (Kelly and Lilie were behind me, since there was only room for one at a time to go through the door). First thing they did was tell me to take a seat, "Over there," (even though I know for a fact they know I'm blind, since I'd pre-warned them, and the cane's a bit of a giveaway too). They were some of the good people who listen though, and were a lot more helpful about where, "Over there," might actually be once we pointed out they had to be, and properly guided me to the other chair when I needed to move from the waiting area to the chair I'd be having my hair cut in. Just goes to show a lot of the time it's just that people really don't know. Perhaps posts like the one I just linked to will help teach those people who fall in to that catagory. If you're one of those people, you might want to read that post. It goes along nicely with the "How do you politely offer to help blind people?" post I wrote early last year.

For the record: the offer to attempt to answer any questions you might have, which I made at the end of my post last February, still stands.

Anyway, back to the hairdresser...

They were nice people, and did at least listen to what I said, so I'd go there again, especially given their willingness to learn how to interact with a blind person properly, and fact they didn't even once think they should discuss how I wanted my hair done with anyone but me. I still think haircuts cost too much though. The place I went too doesn't seem too badly priced, but I mean I think haircuts cost too much in general. That's never going to change. I know hairdressers have bills to pay too, but still... *sigh* I did take some comfort in the fact a cup of tea or two was included in the cost, even though I actually didn't accept the one I was offered. I might have done so though, and might do so next time. Plus, at least I was offered one.

Speaking of cups of tea: I did some baking a couple of days before Chris was due to bring Logan home from the breeder, so I could offer him some cake and a cup of tea when he got here. I'd asked him about his cake preferences, and he said his favourite was lemon drizzle cake. I'd never made that, and didn't want to be experimenting when it was for company, but I did make a lemony cake. Here's a photo:

I'd made some brownies too, which I didn't bother taking photos of. I made those mostly for Kelly's sake, since he doesn't really like lemon cake of any kind. Chris would have been welcome to have a brownie too, if he'd wanted one. As it turned out though, Chris didn't have time to stop for tea and cake. He'd planned to, but arrived later than planned, and needed to go somewhere else by a certain time. Never mind. More lemony cake and brownies for us.

Anyway, our weather's been all over the place over the past few weeks. It's been sunny, windy, rainy, stormy, warm, hot, slightly chilly. Sometimes even all of the above on the same day. We've even had times where it's tried to be a few of those things at once, which was interesting. Thankfully though, the one it's been least has been hot, which suits me fine, since that's the one I hate. It's also the one that's toughest for me and the furkids to deal with... Especially Mollie.

I don't know if it was because of the weather, or if something else happened, but we ended up without our mainline phone working for a day and a half a couple of days in to June. It was out of order long enough that I used my mobile to give Chris a heads up, in case it wasn't fixed before he was bringing Logan home, and he needed to get in touch with us. We're not sure what happened. All we know for sure is it stopped working in the middle of me talking to my Mam on it, and when we got in touch with the phone company - thankfully I had my mobile I could call them with - they said there was a fault on the line. Our internet was working, but not the phone part. Just as well it was only the phone part though, or I'd have been even more irritated than I already was that I was looking at a potential five days without it working. They said they aimed to do it sooner, but it could take that long to fix. As it turned out, it took them less than two days, which was a relief after the original timeline I was given. Even more of a relief was the fact whatever the issue was came under the stuff that's entirely their responsibility to deal with, so it cost us nothing to repair.

Well... Other than preparing for Logan's arrival, and getting used to having two puppies - yes, I'm still counting Lilie as a puppy, even though she's over two; Lilie has the mentality of a puppy still, even if she's old enough physically not to be considered a puppy any more - instead of one now, as well as teaching Logan some of the rules he needs to learn - like how nipping at your big sister is not allowed, since he's currently still in the nippy stage all puppies go through, and don't Lilie and I know it - that about covers the events of the past couple of weeks. Besides, this post is starting to get a bit lengthy, and I'm sure you have other blogs you'd like to visit today too. *wink*