The Arc Arcade in Astoria, OR

While we were at the conference we decided to check out an arcade we'd passed on the way to the hotel. It had some cool stuff in the window, and someone had posted a photo of a tardis on the conference website, saying it was at the arcade. We had to go!

It seems to be owned by a group of young gamers, who have a passion for the games of my husband's childhood. And my son's. 

In addition to games for just quarters and sometimes even for free, they also sell comic books, ice cream, nachos, italian sodas, candy and other junk food stuffs - the stuff gamers tend to like! There is comfy seating around the gaming stations, and some booths for eating, too. 

Comfy seats for the big screens.

I haven't seen this giddy a look on my husband's face in...I don't even know when. Like a kid in a candy store, or a father reliving his gaming childhood....with his son. 

There were a couple of TVs on the wall playing cartoon shows. I took this photo for the frame, not the TV. Old skool!

So many cool retro arcade games! All the classics!

Not just one, but several of the machines said this. 

Passing the torch to the younger generation. What a happy Daddy!

This was for ME. The only doctor I ever WANT to see.

There was this Valentines' display in the window outside. 

Pretty silly. I like it.

traveling with chronic illness and allergies, or how to give yourself a panic attack, part 2

We did it. Or more, I made the lists of everything that needed doing and then stayed on top of checking off whether they'd gotten done. And my husband did them all. I helped where spoons allowed: doing laundry, packing the kitchen stuff, the food and electronics and my and my son's clothing. My husband packed everything else, and made sure the house was clean and the chickens were fed before we left. And he tetris packed that car. 

I drove, because winding roads make me carsick, and my son loves it when his Dad rides in the back seat with him. The two of them held the animals on their laps. We had called ahead and requested our room not be cleaned with chemicals, but instead with vinegar and baking soda before we came. It was thankfully only a two hour drive, and it was BEAUTIFUL. I swear, Oregon and Washington are two of the most beautiful places I have ever encountered in my life. I LOVE the Pacific Northwest SO much!

We got to the hotel and went inside and....no harsh smells. I couldn't small the pool! And I can ALWAYS small the pool. It didn't feel overly humid inside either - which hotels with pools tend to do. So far so good!

We had a pet room, which meant other pets had stayed there before, and I could smell the faint smell of dog - but it wasn't bad, and again, no harsh chemical smells other than the sheets, which they promised not to bleach. But those would soon come off. The window opened out to the Columbia River, and the view was lovely - railroad tracks and then water, and the sound of....barking? Sea lions! Incessant barking, but not sharp like dogs....comforting in its consistency somehow, in its constant noise. Background noise. I was going to find out where they were later for sure!

So while this hotel isn't *perfect* (we are in a pet room which has previously had other pets here and my eyes were kind of burning the first day and night), it is as close to perfect as a hotel could be for our price point. No chemical smells, no over the top reactions, soundproofish rooms, HUGE suites - we have a kitchenette area, two beds, a sofa and extra tables - this hotel is BRILLIANT. There is space for the litterbox, the dog crate, all our food, our kitchen stuff if we're frugal about the space, and all the toys, electronics and clothes. 

And. Frenzie's eyes have been watering nonstop since we moved into our house (carpet, gas oven/stove).....by afternoon of the first day being here they were completely cleared up. And no more sneezing - she has been sneezing constantly for as long as here eyes have been watering. So I bet my house IS part of what is making me sick, not JUST the regular Portland mold and moisture.  I knew it was an issue, because Frenzie's eyes have never watered like that anywhere we have lived, plus she is sneezing ALL the time...she is our canary.  

Also, how amazing is this?

My friend M gifted me her scooter while I need it, and it was at S's house. Since she wasn't coming to the conference because of chronic lyme, she suggested I ask C 

9other mutual friend coming to conference and basically running it in S's place) to bring it, WHICH SHE DID - AMAZING. S's eldest helped get it into the van, because they have brute strength apparently!

So my husband and C unloaded it, but no cord for recharging...but the website it came from was listed on the scooter. So I called their after hours number, and they didn't have one, but gave me the # of another health supply place here in Astoria. It was/is RIGHT up the street from the hotel.

The after hours tech met my husband at the store, and gave him a cord we could borrow while we are here! How amazing is that?!? It's a $120 cord and he's just like, "Here, I trust you, go ahead and take it for the weekend."

Of course we will bring it back! But what kind of alternate Universe have we entered here? What an amazing gift, all of these people doing all of these amazing things so I will have more mobility. And needed, because there are sea lions on the docks, just happily barking away, day and night, and clearly they WANT us all to visit them and bask in their fearsome glory.

traveling with chronic illness and allergies, or how to give yourself a panic attack, part 1

This weekend we are on the Oregon Coast at an unschooling conference, for four days and three nights. Because of the length of time we would be away, we brought the dog and the cat with us to the (thankfully pet-friendly) hotel. I almost had a panic attack before we came, just about having everything we would need to get through the time here.

Once upon a time, several lifetimes ago it seems, in my late teens and early 20s, we used to go to science fiction conventions regularly, and therefore spent a lot of time in hotels. All I needed was a couple of changes of clothes, my toothbrush and some long t-shirts to sleep in. We'd share a room with 13 other people, spread all over the floors, in sleeping bags, on cots and mattresses, some just on the floor. After all, a con wasn't about sleeping, it was about partying (and gaming for some). The room was mostly a place to keep our stuff, shower, change clothes and catch a nap - and also, to hang out and party with our many roommates. I LOVED it. I loved going to cons, it was about as stress-free as life could be - the only thing we ever bothered to stock up on was alcohol - everything else came as it was needed and/or was inconsequential.

Oh, how my life has changed. I still love going to conferences, but now staying in hotel is fraught with anxiety - will the hotel rooms be cleaned with harsh chemicals? Will the sheets be full of bleach? Will I be able to smell the pool from my room? Will there be mold? Will there be a kitchenette and a fridge in the room, for our food? Will there be a lot of noise in the halls? Will I be able to hear other guests in their rooms? Will I be completely overstimulated and overwhelmed by the people and events happening there? Would I be able to sleep?

The amount of stuff we need to bring in order to manage my health and make everything okay for me to go away from our home is...well, anxiety-producing. Bear in mind it's not just me, but my son and all his things, and the dog and cat, too...and we drive a compact sedan, which makes packing like a complicated game of tetris.

To bottom line it, we have to bring half of our kitchen - we can't eat at most (if any) restaurants, so we have to make sure we have all of our own food. And I can't really eat packaged food, so it needs to be cooked.

The list of what we bring looks something like this: 

Kitchen
toaster oven
hot plate
vitamix
dish pan for washing dishes (hotel sinks are notoriously small and awkward for dishwashing)
utensils: 3 each butter knives, forks, spoons; spatula, can opener, veggie peeler, tea strainer, chef's knife, wooden flat-edge spoon
cutting board
dish soap
hand soap (hotel soaps have chemicals I don't tolerate, not to mention perfumes)
3 each small plates, dinner plates, bowls
1 stir fry pan, 1 small pot for boiling water (our kettle is ceramic and heavy so I worry it will be damaged in transit)
mixing bowl
nut milk straining bag (for straining my green juice)
coffee press (my husband has to have his java)
dish towels
dish cloths
fabric napkins

Food includes veggies, meats, fruit, fat, salt, honey, jam, sunbutter, anything packaged any of us can eat, all gluten-free, corn-free, egg-free; food for cat and dog, tea and coffee, and as much filtered water in glass as we can fit in the car - enough, hopefully, to last the 4 days. 
All our meds and supplements, portioned out for 4 days

Sleep
Pillows, leg pillows, blankets, sheets to fit the hotel beds, comforter - I can't tolerate the detergents and bleach they use on hotel bedding, so we have to strip the beds and use our own. 
CPAP machine
sleep mask
fan for white noise
nose drops (for CPAP)
distilled water (for CPAP)

Electronics
3 laptops
2 kindles
2 tablets
2 smart phones
2 power strips
walkie-talkies
chargers for all
SLR and point and shoot cameras and cables to xfer images to computer
wii u
wii u games in cases
4 wii motes and remote charger
2 wii nunchuks
2DS XL
Gameboy Advance

Pet
Folding camping dog crate
litterbox and litter
Dog toys
Dishes for food/water
Treats
Leash/poop bags

Misc
Plush for kiddo (he has a HUGE duffel bag he uses for his plush, and he fills it)
Notebooks and pens for zentangle doodles
Scissors
Sharpie markers
Bedtime reading

And in my purse as always, cash, basic first aid stuff, my Vogmask, and my epipens

And then of course clothing plus swim stuff just in case we decide to use the pool (I react to chlorine, so is unlikely, but you never know) and toiletries

And ALL of this has to be packed into a compact sedan, along with three people, a cat and a pug. Which honestly wouldn't be as big a deal if it weren't for needing to pack four days worth of food  - that takes up a LOT of space!

So you see, along with all the worries about being in a hotel in a city I'd never visited, so didn't know how I might react - anxiety!

I was so panicked about this trip. I mean, I couldn't know until we got there how I would really react...and that was enough. But trying to get ALL that stuff not just packed, but also packed into a compact sedan, still leaving enough room for the humans and animals? I mean, was it even possible? And would just getting ready wipe me out so much that I'd be crashed the whole time I was there? Would I even be able to leave the hotel room when I was there? 

a whole new world

I'm trying to process my world now.

Here we are at a four day unschooling convention - a nice small one with only about 30 or so families in attendance.

Because my health has been challenged with FIbromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, chemical sensitivity, I have had to learn to be extremely careful in the world, and my world of late has been limited to mostly my own home and the occasional trip to the grocery store or to see a movie, and really not much else.

I thought that this would be a better convention for us, because it's fewer families, and I would be able to manage the smaller amount of people (compared to the other one we've attended that has over 700 families and is completely overwhelming). The hotel is smaller, there aren't many people, and my son's BFF, who lives outside of Seattle, is here with his brother and mother.

I overestimated what I can handle.

Once upon a time, the word 'convention' meant me and a big group of friends in a hotel with thousands of people, walking the hotel ALL weekend long. The room was for 1) storing our stuff, 2) refilling our drinks, 3)changing our clothes and 4)sleeping (well, napping really). We were rarely in it, and if we were, there would be a dozen other people with us. I almost never stopped. Three days straight. We barely packed anything, sometimes even forgetting to bring a change of clothes. We brought alcohol in spades. If we ate, it was out at whatever fast food place was nearby. (I'm talking about science fiction conventions, these were our home away from home, and we looked forward to every single one that happened, several times a year).

Fast forward to now: we packed half our kitchen because eating out anywhere can be fraught with foods I'm unable to eat without reactions. Brought all of our own food, and the crockpot, an induction burner, a pan, dishes, our own beverages (NO alcohol), all my supplements. We have all the clothing we could need, toys to play with, our computers, my CPAP machine, my fan for white noise, my sleep mask, the toaster oven, and our own bottled water. Oh, and all our own bedding, including sheets for the bed, because we are sensitive to the bleach and petrochemicals in detergents. Packing the car, which my husband had to do alone because of my not having any spoons to help him, was like a live action game of tetris, because we have this small sedan and still had to fit three people in it after filling it with all of our stuff.

Once we got here, all we really wanted to do was recover. The first room they gave us had apparently just been cleaned with some kind of toxic chemicals, because within ten minutes of being inside it, I was lightheaded and felt sick. A friend across the hall let us smell her room, and it smelled much better, so my husband went to the front desk and asked if we could switch rooms. Luckily they were really understanding about it, and switched us to one that "hadn't been sanitized" that day, and she said they have other guests like that, who call ahead and ask for no chemicals. she even offered to go get us linens that were different, but we said no worries, we brought our own. So we opened the window, which looks out to the mini-golf course, and we were good.



We saw kiddo's BFF for awhile, then bed, and yesterday was the first full day. We went back and forth between their room and ours. Their room is upstairs and in another building - above the pool and down the hallway from it. You can smell the chlorine in their room. After the first visit of only a half hour or so, I couldn't be in their room anymore for the chlorine smell. Again: dizzy, nauseated, room spinning.

We went to see The LEGO Movie at 2, and when we got back I was completely spent for the rest of the night. Just - ZERO spoons left. I spent the time in the room while the boys visited friends. I was just WIPED.

So today I'm here in bed again, in the middle of the day, watching hotel cable and typing this. Noticing that although I can hear the people playing mini-golf outside, and the kids playing in the hall, and there is a whole convention of people out there, and I WANT to go meet with them and interact and play....I just need this downtime right now. I need the recuperation time between events, because there is just NOT the energy in my body to handle being ON all day, even for one whole day, let alone two in a row.

So instead of reaching out and making new friends, I am choosing self-care, and just trying to make peace with my needing this time in the room to rest until we maybe go to the beach today (we're on the coast right at the ocean) or whatever we end up doing that does require my moving and being up and around. And even here, as far away as our room is from the pool (it's actually in the other building, so down the hall, out one door, across a 5 foot walkway, in another door, and there's the pool), I can smell the chlorine - it was burning my eyes last night until I realized Husband had closed the window while we were out, and I opened it. In addition, I was having pretty intense brain fog - within a half hour of opening the window, I could think again. It was noticeably different. amazing, right?

So I'm the canary in the coalmine. And until I figure out the way to healing (believe me, as I sit here I am working on THAT), this is my life now. There are some things that sadden me about it, like the part where I don't get to connect with the people I want to connect with, or do things like stay up talking to people until the wee hours. It's lonely. An there are other things I am glad about, like that I WAS able to make it here, so my son could be with his friend, and my husband is here to accompany him and is a great support.

And hopefully later today, we WILL be able to go to the beach.

where wrong turns lead we will follow

There is this fantastic little thrift store a few blocks from us - we call it the Hospice Thrift, as all the proceeds are for hospice care and it is staffed by elderly women who are quite proud and particular. The prices are fantastic, and they never sell junk - nothing broken or partial  - they run it like a boutique and everything in that store is in good condition or better.

The other day Kiernen and I were about to go to the bank and the library - which when we come out of where we live, are to the left. This was my only errand, so I was surprised to find myself pulling out of our lot and turning right.

"Why did I just do that?" I said out loud to Kiernen. "I'm going the wrong way. Oh well, no matter, I'll just turn left ahead and double back."

So I did, and we were then driving up the street toward that little thrift store. It came into my head to go there, since we hadn't been in awhile and sometimes, you just never know, there are treasures waiting to be found. I needed some dowel rods for a project - perhaps they'd gotten some in? I asked Kiernen if he was interested in stopping there, and he was. I fleetingly wondered if they ever got LEGO in their store, but seriously fleetingly. I figured not - LEGO is expensive, and people who own it know its value. Old sets can be resold on Ebay for more than a person paid for them, after all. And lots of folks just plain saved them from their childhood for their kids.

Kiernen's Lego, for example, consists of pieces from my own original Lego set when I was three or four, plus additional Lego my brothers added to it growing up, plus so much new stuff. His kids will have the Lego collection to end all Lego collections, especially if we keep going at this rate.

Thought tangent aside, we got to the thrift and went in. As we approached the toy section, I noticed an unopened Bionicle box sitting on the shelf. Or Kiernen noticed it. One of us saw it and I took it down and handed it to him. $4! A steal for a 2004 (I think) Bionicle - and I also remembered Kiernen had been wanting his own Bionicle.

"Cool!" I thought, worth the trip. We looked around in the little 25 cent toy bin and looked on the shelves...and then I saw it. A LEGO Creator set. $5. I'm not one to turn down cheap Lego - an opportunity to add even more Lego to our collection? Great! I was happily showing Kiernen, then we were looking around at the rest of the stuff, when I noticed something I hadn't noticed before: a large bin on the floor with a huge clear plastic bag inside it. And it was full of...are those Megabloks?

No. It was marked $40 and it was completely full of genuine Lego. I didn't even think about it - I untied the bag to make sure, but it was true - it was almost ALL Lego. Kiernen is no fool - he knows his mother is a huge sucker for a deal, and a huge sucker for Lego, and a huge sucker. Ha! I kid. And I really am a big softie when it comes to stuff like this. I didn't have many toys growing up because my mother didn't have much money, so I completely overcompensate for my own lack of toys in childhood by making our home into what really resembles an awesome toy store.

Kiernen said hopefully, "Are we buying this, Mama?" as he helped me untie the bag and go through it to confirm that it was, in fact, Lego. (We are snobs and purists when it comes to building toys, thanks in large part to having actually purchased a Megablok set long ago - and never since.)

When we got the set home, we poured it all out to see what we'd actually  gotten.

Looks like about 9 different bases (whoa!), 2 big bags of LEGO, plus the medium bag of LEGO Creator. Cool!

 A close-up of the first bag - looks like some castle stuff:

 Bag two looks like some kind of underwater set...

 

The LEGO creator bag with miscellaneous pieces:

  

We poured it all out on the floor to see what's there.

Whoa! Click any photo to embiggen and see more detail.

 

a whole ship already built from the underwater set: 

 Parts of a castle:

 The LEGO creator pieces all poured out:

Some kind of ship that isn't actually LEGO:

Then later, I went online to see what the sets actually were, because it looks very much like we have two full sets - and I mean the big sets - plus some assorted bases and pieces. MSRP on EACH of these two sets is around $90. Not including the Creator set, NOT including the Bionicle. We bought over $180 in Lego for less than $50. The deal seeker in me is elated. The kid in me is screaming with joy. The me in me is totally blissed out.

Oh, and the sets themselves?

Royal Knights Castle and Neptune Discovery Lab

The directions weren't included, but Kiernen now knows we can look up directions online, which we have, and are building the castle set currently. He is truly delighted in this new score, as am I.

All for having taken a 'wrong' turn and deciding to go where that led us.