Third Month Home

To start the third month home, I completed my WAGATHON for Guiding Eyes by completing close to four marathons in the month of September with 104.4 miles. 

In addition to completing my WAGATHON Eve and I also attended my brother’s wedding. Although it was uneventful getting to Utah the Wedding itself was eventful because we were also competing with a 25 mile per hour windstorm as the ceremony started. This windstorm made it so that the wedding itself was quickly moved inside after the ceremony itself ended. As a result of at least 25 people in the house I had to make the tough decision for Eve and everyone else to leave her in the basement as we were having dinner. Making this decision was for the best as the main level of the house was extremely crowded. Once we all finished dinner donuts were delivered in place of a wedding cake. As a result of the windstorm half of the donuts blew out of the delivery man's hands.  If the windstorm did not make the wedding eventful enough, shortly after the toasts began my dad tapped me on the shoulder because he got a call from our local vet stating that our pet dog got out from where she was staying. Thankfully her picture was posted on a local community Facebook page and our dog sitter was able to get her back, but it was quite scary for about an hour or so.

@alexxisb.kerr and Lindsay standing together smiling.

Lindsay and Eve standing under twinkling lights.

The events of the wedding did not end with my pet dog getting out. You see, one of my sister-in-law's bridesmaids chose to go out after all the guests left to have drinks with the local cops, since she is a cop in a city in California. No one knew this until about 9:58 am the next morning as we were leaving the AirBnB and she had a police escort to the airport. This scared us all for a bit as we had a check-out for 10am and we were cutting it close. Once out of the AirBnB we drove around for a bit until we realized that because it was Sunday, and later realized that it was the LDS conference weekend everything was closed. Our only option would be to sit at the Salt Lake Airport until our flight at 7pm that evening. It was a long wait as we arrived at the airport at 12:30pm and we could not check in for our flight until 3pm. With all of this time to kill I chose to get readings done that I had not gotten to over the weekend, as a result of the wedding festivities. In addition to completing my readings, I also had to walk Eve up and down the airport to help get her energy out. Although it was not ideal it gave me the ability to work through dog distractions, targeting, and much more. We finally found ourselves on the plane to go home a little after 7:45pm. 

The Monday after the wedding was rough with Eve and I both being extremely exhausted, but I still had to go to work, as my office was a week out from our 50th anniversary celebration. As a result of this celebration, it was all hands-on deck to make this event happen as soon as I returned from the wedding. My main role in the preparation for this event was to proofread over 80 pages of braille, while also ensuring any other printed materials were made accessible for the event. I thankfully finished all of my tasks a day before the event was to take place. 

Some of the documents that Lindsay had to proofread for the 50th Anniversary Celebration.

The event itself went well with limited hiccups. Those who put the event together made sure Eve and I were sitting in an area where she was less likely to get stepped on and even had a relieving area for her.

Lindsay getting her hair done for the 50th Anniversary Celebration.

Lindsay and Eve standing in front of the BMAC step and repeat.

Lindsay and Eve posing awkwardly at the 50th Anniversary Celebration.

A day after the 50th anniversary event I received a nice surprise package from @esk8er718 and her daughter as a way to congratulate Eve and I for graduating as a team. One of my favorite items that she sent in this package was one of her Seeing Eye leashes that she used with students when she was an instructor. This is particularly a special gift as I realize the amount of lives this one leash changed and something as a handler I will cherish forever.

A package from @esk8er718

On the Monday after the 50th anniversary event Eve and I were visited by a Guiding Eyes representative to work through her sent distractions as well as her randomly stopping. As it relates to her sent distraction it was determined that she needed a Halti to keep her from getting into things she shouldn’t be. This representative and I also realized that Eve may be a little underweight, which could be contributing to her sent distraction. I was also assured during this discussion that what I am experiencing with her weight is completely normal with us just returning home and with time it will all even out.  

At the end of this week Eve, @loveuleslie, and I flew up to San Francisco to see my grandma, aunt, uncle, and cousins. Overall, it was a good visit, but I wish my grandma was feeling better, as she had taken a fall about a month and a half prior where she fractured her pelvis in three places. She is on the mend, but it’s a slow process. Through this experience I learned the hard way that I need to check in on her more, as she is only getting older and as mishaps like this are harder to recover from. 

In addition to seeing my family on this trip to San Francisco @loveuleslie, Eve, and I went into the city to get coffee at @bluebottle. Then we went to @ghirardelli to grab my grandmother chocolate. Once we were done at Ghirardelli we grabbed lunch at @sababa.restaurant. Once we finished lunch, we took pictures in front of the @transamericanpyramid. Before taking @BART back to my grandma’s house we had to find a spot for Eve to go to the bathroom. This was quite an adventure, as there were not many discreet or grassy areas to have her go to the bathroom, but as we were walking, we found an overgrown planter in front of a business building that she loved because she could roll in the grass. As we took BART it helped Eve practice intelligent disobedience on train platforms, traveling on trains, and tucking under chairs.

Lindsay and Eve standing in front of the Transamerican Pyramid.

Lindsay and Eve taking the escalator down to BART.

Lindsay and Eve walking down the streets of San Francisco.

Eve tucked under the seat of BART.

As we traveled home, we did not have the smoothest @TSA experience, while traveling through the Oakland airport. When I arrived at the @TSA checkpoint, I did what I was trained to do, which is to walk through the metal detector and call Eve through once I am through. As she goes through, she will alarm, and the TSA agents are to pat her down and swab my hands. On this particular occasion the TSA agents had me step to the side to allow another party to go through while they were waiting on back up. Once a more senior TSA agent arrived, he insisted on holding Eve as she would cause the detector to alarm again. As this was happening, I knew it was not right, but there was not much I could do as my sister had already made it through the TSA checkpoint. Once I made it through the check point, I was given back Eve, and my hands were swabbed. Once I grabbed my stuff we were on our way to our gate. Although we were on our way to our gate, I learned a valuable lesson through this, which was have one of my travel companions hold eve as I go through the metal detector, so that we are not completely separated and there is less likelihood of conflict.   

On the Monday after returning from this trip to San Francisco I was able to get a weight check on Eve, which confirmed the suspicion that she was underweight at 58.6 LBs. Having weight challenges like this are normal shortly after bringing dogs home, as with everything else the number of treats and food given is a lot of trial and error. The only thing I need to do now is give her 2 ½ cups of food and plenty of treats for good behavior and do another weight check in two weeks to insure she is either gaining weight or back to her target weight.

Later in this week Eve and I had quite the mishap with our paratransit, where instead of going to my office at CSULB my paratransit ended up at Disneyland. In some cases when things like this happen the paratransit service that I use can send the driver to the rider’s location, but in this instance because the ride was booked online there was no telling who made the error, so my only option was to find a different way home. Thankfully, I know the bus route home from my office quite well, as prior to the pandemic I was taking it five days a week. As a result of doing so it gave Eve the ability to learn a new route, while practicing taking the bus, crossing streets, etc. She did amazing with this route and even got us home an hour before my 4:30pm class at SFSU was to begin.

Eve laying down while we were waiting on a bus.

To end our third month home, I was asked by CSULB’s Career Center to speak on a Disability Inclusion Panel as part of Disability Employment Month. During this panel discussion I was asked questions about how Eve helps me at work, what other accommodations I use, and any other advice I could give job seekers with disabilities. 

Screen shot of the Disability Inclusion Panel that Lindsay participated in.