I'm really back

[Guest guest]

Well as much as I'd rather be back on the beach I am right here in my living room in Durham. Today I took Matt and to Greensboro to get the bus back to Boone. They were laden with their luggage, souveniers, a cooler and their bicycles....It was comical watching them make their way towards the bus terminal.

We had a really wonderful week. We had rain twice, both times in the evening which was perfect. Other than that the weather was hot and sunny....just what you want in a beach week. Cape is a historic little town on the southernmost end of the Delmarva peninsula. Very very quiet and very very peaceful.

We arrived their last Saturday. I had brought my own concentrator and 6 E tanks. I had arranged with my local provider to have a provider in the Cape area deliver 8 additional E tanks to me on Monday August 3. Now because I am with a regional provider (as opposed to a national provider like Apria or Lincare) I knew I was going to have to pay for the tank delivery in Cape since Medicare will only pay one provider at a time. What did surprise me was that the charge for these E tanks was $20.50 each. That's approximately twice what my local provider charges for them. Outrageous to say the least but it was my vacation and I had no choice but to pay it. It turns out that this provider charges vacationers more than their regular customers.

Long story short I paid the money and the tanks were delivered first thing Monday morning. The delivery guy could not have been nicer, introduced himself, we chatted about the town. He told me where he lived.... about 4 blocks away, was the music minister at one of the churches in town....really nice guy. He proceeds to bring the tanks in. The tanks were E tanks but instead of green on top and then metal on the bottom these were painted green all over. They were clearly labeled oxygen though so I didn't think too much of it. So the guy leaves and we go about our day.

A couple of hours later I attempt to lift one of the tanks so that I can attach my conserver. I could just barely lift it.....surprised I tried another one....very very heavy about twice as heavy as a normal E tank. My son and I examined it and came to the conclusion that it was IRON. Iron!!! Are you freaking kidding me? You supply a disabled person with IRON oxygen tanks??!!! But wait, it gets better. My son lifted it and put it in my cart and I went to attach the conserver....could not open the tank. I tried, my son tried, tried. It would not budge. We tried every tank he had delivered. We could not open any of them. How insane is that?

My son says, 'we should go to his house and tell him to open them'. Brilliant. had mentioned he was having lunch at home and by this time it was noon. So I hooked up one of my tanks that I brought from home, my son hoisted one of the iron tanks on his shoulder and off we went. I knocked on the door and opened it and the look on his face was priceless. Complete bewilderment. I explained what the issue was and to his credit he was both horrified and embarrassed. He came right over and used a heavy duty wrench to open the tanks and at that he struggled. I questioned the iron tanks and he said, 'yeah they're old but that's what we use. most of our customers aren't really very ambulatory'.

So the rest of the week was uneventful from an oxygen point of view. We had a great time, I walked, the kids rode bikes, we fished, caught crabs, ate lots of seafood, got lots of sunshine. We swam, played scrabble, cards and watched movies in the evening. We shared one bathroom without killing each other (if anything is a miracle that is LOL) It was just a really wonderful week and my next goal is to be able to do it again next year but next year I want to rent a house for a month! I can dream can't I?

Beth

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