Rollator

    Sister Anne got Dad a new walker, and it's really great but problematic. It's a Rollator, a four-wheel walker with brakes. The model may be Hugo, or maybe they just named the dang thing. The problems are many. It's quite heavy. It won't fit in my trunk. It's hard to fold up. It's harder still to unfold. It has a seat but to sit on it you have to chock the brakes; the only way I see to do this is to hold the hand brake grips, but if you do that you can't stand up again. I hope that I'm just an idiot and am missing a bunch of obvious stuff. Maybe it will work out brilliantly. But I have my severe doubts.
    Let me stress that none of this is a criticism of Anne, who is one of the world's greats. What I question is who did they design this for? Because you don't need a walker unless you have severe balance problems or weakness problems. A walker that you have to lean down to fold or unfold is not going to be helpful. A walker that's too heavy to lift isn't going to be helpful. A walker with a seat is no use if you can't get up again. Again, I hope I'm wrong about everything. I'll admit that I didn't read the instructions all that closely once I had the thing assembled. But I suspect that we're going to be sending Hugo back, a pity really.
    Yesterday my trip to Congaree National Park the previous day became retroactively a lot less fun when I found a tick attached to the back of my neck. Knowing that I should have put him in a jar and gone to the doctor with him, nevertheless I didn't, freeing him on the front porch. No common sense, me. But I'm reasonably sure that there is very low incidence of Lyme disease and Rocky Mountain spotted fever in central SC. Knock on wood. But I admit to feeling more than a little nervous about it.