You Can Help Save The Endangered Klang!

We are raising funds to help pay for the medical, therapy, lost wages, and round the clock Screaming Yellow Zonkers for klangklangston, also known as Josh Steichmann. If you would like to contribute to this noble, just cause then please buy a digital reproduction of one or more of his series of prints of the Salvation Mountain in Niland, CA. We ask that you make a donation in an amount of your choice & by your method of choice to Josh after you download one or more of these high resolution (TIFF) prints. Clicking on a thumbnail will download a file approximately 15mb via Mediafire. You do not need a Mediafire account to download.

You can donate in several ways--if you wish to contribute monetarily, you can send a check or money order to
J. Steichmann, P.O. Box 131254, Ann Arbor, MI 48113-1254, or if you prefer to donate by credit card, bank transfer, or PayPal account, click on the donate button below and to the right.

If your donation is more of the spiritual, moral, or fruit-basket variety--that is, you don't think the post office box would fit that knitted full body suit in size XLT--email us at klangklangston@gmail.com and we'll send you the local street address. Modesty and the thought of all of klang's ardent followers trying to park in West LA prevents us from publishing the exact coordinates here.

If you want to preview the catalog of lower resolution files of the Salvation Mountain photographs, click here.

We appreciate every card, letter, gift-in-bad-taste, and every last red cent and we hope that you cherish your digital file purchase at least as much as you would enjoy an invisible t-shirt.


Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Yeah, see, it's the going there thing…

At the hospital, the social worker that was handling my case said that the UCLA health advocates would contact me, put me in contact with UCLA's lawyers (who would generally help recover the cost of my stay without having to go through the personal injury rigmarole) and line me up for charities.

So, I get this urgent letter from the Health Advocates, and because neither of the phone numbers listed work (800 or 888), I gotta google 'em to get the right local contacts. I end up talking to them and come to find out that they only do the paperwork for Medical/care/SSI/what have you. And, they only do the paperwork if you have minor children (which is why they asked, "Are you sure your girlfriend isn't pregnant?" several times, and I'm like, "Jeez, I hope not. That's the last thing we need right now.") or if you're going to have a disability of over a year. Otherwise, the woman told me, you gotta go down to the Medical and Medicare offices in person. (Amy immediately asked "Why in person?" but I was too busy with my convivial, "Yes, yes, that makes sense," during the interview to ask, because I'm a dumbass.)

So, I guess that's put off until I can reliably get places, though I have to apply—and be rejected—before UCLA will issue their final billing. I realize that Health Advocates are really there for people who are worse off and really can't manage this—despite the accident being pretty fucking undesirable, I really am pretty fortunate on the whole—but I guess what makes me one of those damn socialists is that I really wish there was adequate funding to obviate the hassle for me too.

So… a phoner then?

I got a call about a week ago from someone from Internet Brands called about an ad I'd responded to in, I dunno, September, and just scheduled a phoner for Friday, because what the hell, I might as well recover right into a new job.

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Don't be fooled by the rocks that I got

I'm still working on walking around the block.

Carson's walked with me the last couple days, and I'm making it pretty well. I got the stink eye for not yielding to some woman in a motorized wheelchair, but she was moving twice as fast and was plenty more practiced at maneuvering. But she was gone before I could even think to shrug.

I got my last stomach injection this morning and I'm pretty glad to be done with them. Now maybe I can start looking to ibuprofen, which'd let me step back on the percoset, and hopefully some of the weird opioid side effects will fall by the wayside. Someday, maybe, I'd be able to take shit like this for fun again.

Sunday, March 28, 2010

Brief update

—Almost all the way around the block with my crutch.
—Only two days left on stomach injections!
—Scaling way back on pain killers, as the digestive problems just aren't worth it.

Friday, March 26, 2010

VOLUME

Also, tried no-rinse shampoo for the first time today. The can promised to remove oil and "enhance volume." I've got more volume than a Who concert. The Christopher Walken pompadour really does highlight how insane my bushy beard has gotten, moving me from homeless to sartorially deranged.

Christ on a crutch

I'm off my walker; I got a crutch today. Already, I'm faster, stronger, better. And don't have to slam the walker around in the bathroom.

I had my first follow-up yesterday, with Soohoo, and got the staples out of my leg. Forgot to mention the numb spot; not sure if it's a deal. It's just behind the cut. The cut does look wicked and evil; I'm trying to figure out how to get the photos off my phone.

Amy also took me by the accident site, where I saw that the pavement really is some two-three inches up from the preceding square (panel?).

Monday, March 22, 2010

Follow-ups scheduled

So now I have a deadline for getting into the car (because a bus with a walker seems like something more fun in theory): My first follow-up is on Thursday at 2pm. I don't remember who was primary on what, and I'm seeing Soohoo. If he did the arm, then my splint will come off. If you want to be sure to get your picture taken with the splint, act fast.

Sunday, March 21, 2010

Impact plus 16

Yesterday highlights: Chris (Mr. Zarquon) came over with mac & cheese, Venture Bros., and Hellboy. Then we talked about robots, telepresence and deep-sea salvage. "Where does the person end?" He recommended TED talks. I know I'm behind on TED. Wasn't it just in Long Beach?

Also watched Olympic women's gold-medal curling. Sweden won in extra end? Best game I've seen, even if Canadians lost. Late to the Olympics too, but so what.

Mac and cheese was Alton Brown kicked up with great cheddars, and Scottish(?) bleu. Tasty stuff—I like that all my nerd friends have worked on developing good palates.

In recovery news, with Amy's help, I did about ten stairs. Hard, but I'm getting there. And managed to go from a usual knee stretch angle of about 135-130° to probably 120° after ice and massage. I'll do more belt pulls today.

Grind, Grind, Level

Wheew.

As most of y'all know, I took a wicked whip offa my bike two weeks ago, leaving me with a broken femur and ulna. Since then, I've been laid out, working on recovering as best I can with the invaluable help of more friends than I even realized I had.

So far, I've worked hard at the PT and gotten to the point where I can sit up, stand, walk with a walker, get to the bathroom (fracture pan to bedpan LEVEL UP bedpan to drop chair LEVEL UP to commode LEVEL UP to using the extension in the regular bathroom and wiping on my own LEVEL UP), fix my own food (breakfast, lunch and dinner today). The exercises still hurt like a mf and leave me wiped, but grind grind grind. It's like Final Fantasy without the level breaks. Still can't do stairs, and god knows when I'll be able to ride in a car or even type two-handed, but at least Amy's gone from worrying about 'round the clock care to being able to grab dinner tonight with her friend.

And throughout, I've been all overwhelmed and choked up at the awesome help from people all over—though the locals have been phenomenal.

So, just a note to let you all know that I appreciate this and am still working hard on my end.

(written by Josh--c&p/ed by pops)

Friday, March 19, 2010

Help Wanted: Discreet Gentleman's Aide

Josh and Amy could use some housework help at specific days and times. If you're available and interested, get in touch with Amy at achatfie[at]gmail[dot]com. Thanks!


Wednesday, March 17, 2010

klang update March 17

hi folks,
thanks so much for helping out last weekend. the visits, books, dvds, cards, etc. all made me and josh feel a lot better. he is doing much better in terms of moving around. he'll have some physical therapy visits this week which should get him up and moving around even more. i do need a bit of help with someone to be here while i have an appointment tomorrow morning and also could use some visits for help with housework and cheering josh up throughout the week. thanks to amber for agreeing to be on-call today for emergency medicine pickup coverage.

also can someone forward this to scody and send me her email addy? thanks. we have eaten 90% of her ratatouille and it was delicious.

if you can sign up to help: Doodle Calender

i kind of made up some times when visits might be nice and possible given your work/school schedules, but we're flexible. if you have an idea for another time to visit, pls email or call me to check to see if it's OK.

--amy

Friday, March 12, 2010

Klang goes home to Palms today

brief (if that's possible for me) (see it started already) klang update.

He's gettiing sprung from RR-UCLA today & we're putting together a doodle scheduler later today as I get info from Amy, for those LA-fites who can/want to read Klang some bedtime stories. Or run some errands b/c Josh ain't running nowhere notime soon. (Triple negative--that's still a negative right? Damn, I miss Sparky Anderson)

Last night some amazing people came together to help Amy clear room in their apt. for a hospital bed and other appliances for our gentleman of leisure (space kitty & mr space kitty, Isaac & Amanda, Maureen, Carson B, cat) . And others volunteered to come & help in other ways (bookhouse, scody, and more).
Amy loquitor: we ate thai and cleaned the whole house. nicer than ever. annette cleaned the fridge and freezer and organized everything into plastic bags. a goddess. carson scrubbed the toilet and even the leaky spot behind the tank (!) and dealt with josh's "filing pile" and "art pile" (!!). it's like a team of cleaning ninjas showed up. we figured out the bed too, and will have space for josh and me and 1-3 guests at a time. perfect. thanks.


I talked to Josh for a few minutes & he was able to share some stories of life in RR-UCLA that had us both cracking up. While we were talking they strapped a mechanized boot on him to alternately stretch & flex his leg. Mecha-Klang hilarity ensued. Accompanied by the Whelk's drawings. Uncanny. Some barbs about Donna Harraway not quite getting all of the kinks out of cyborg theory. Something about being on the frontlines of cyborg praxis. And some choice expletives when they tried to get his mass vertical--with the PT folks exhorting encouragement like "The screws are weight bearing, get it? Weight bearing!" with klang responding that yeah, he got it, but the rest of the leg didn't RTFA.

We were originally coming out for spring break until the break turned out to be Josh's leg & arm. Now it looks like August unless they need us sooner. Plan on a mega-mecha-klang meetup in the swelters of SoCal August.