Thursday, April 30, 2009

"The" Day In The City

Some of you may remember a post I wrote a while back (I was going to put a link to it here, but the day is going by quickly) about my oldest daughter showing some characteristics of Marfan Syndrome. The orthopedic that sees her for her scoliosis suggested ruling it out.

This involves a trip into the City to a Floating Children's Hospital to see a Genetic Specialist. That appointment was last Thursday. A week ago today actually.

Before we headed by train into the city, I took $60 out of the bank (I had some ones already), thinking this would be more than enough money for our trip.

HA! (and for good measure) HA!

After parking and then searching for a metal box with our number on it, so that we could slip four $1 bills using origami and a piece of metal to push it in, to pay for parking ... we hopped onto the train.

We are lucky, being one town away from a rail stop. It's easy to just get on and enjoy the ride. (especially where I don't commute anymore) There was much to discuss with the upcoming Anime Convention. The conductor came by and asked me how old my girl was ...

"Ten" came blurting out of my mouth and there was uncontrollable laughing. The conductor didn't say he didn't believe me but he did only charge us $15 for round trip.

Once we arrived in the city, we quickly found our way down to the subway, where there is always someone interesting to raise your eyebrows at. It costs $2 to ride and there was no one to charm either. So I put $20 on a ride ticket and off we went.

There was no problem getting to our appointment on time. A vacant waiting room with the only activity being a girl in a wheelchair with an I.V.- bag of what looked like milk going into her arm. It wasn't long before the doctor came out and took us back to an exam area. My girl and I answered questions. Her about general health and me about medical history. There were measurements of arms, legs, feet, hands and her skull taken. Found out that she will need to be scheduled with a pediatric cardiologist and just like that we were done. No results yet. Just more tests.

Nothing bad, not yet anyway. We had to stop in the gift shop, someones friend came to visit and we were caught unprepared. This resulted in my carrying 18 pads in my bag, which doesn't zip closed and is more like a small tote bag, constantly threatening to fall out. I would stuff them back down, but then I would need my wallet or the subway map and up they would come. Life I tell ya ...

After that ... we were left with over 2 hours to kill. No problem, back on the subway we stopped in at a historic site for CHOW and SHOPPING. Mostly just looking, not so much shopping because everything is so expensive. For example, two burgers, fries and drinks cost $20.50. Granted they were grilled and not fast food, but geeze, for that price, I'd at least like to be guaranteed a table.

We ate outside in the sunshine, although it was windy.

There was much discussion over COW socks. My daughter's latest obsession is with cows and all things cow related. Said socks? $10 for the pair. Oh they are cute, have little anti-slip pads on the bottom and have the cow face on them and I relented. She didn't ask outright, she didn't beg, you could just see it on her face ....

That left me with $1 in my wallet. $1?

As we walked a little further, we saw a show about to begin. Personally? I would have just kept on walking, by then it was getting close to us needing to find the subway and head back ... but my girl asked me to sit down.

And we did. We sat and watched the entire act of comedy, juggling and silly tricks. It was so much fun to sit and laugh and ... mostly ... enjoy the moment. At the end the performer explained that the historic place didn't pay him for his services and that tips would be much appreciated.

There went my last $1.

It was all too soon that we were finding our way back, on the subway to the train and heading home. Not really with any answers but with a fun day under our belt.

(see previous post for pictures)

1 comment:

Sassy said...

Sounds like your day was PRICELESS! =)