Jan 252008
CNN was running promos this morning for a story about “the amazing wheelchair that climbs stairs” or something to that effect, but I turned it off before the story aired. I’m beginning to suspect that the news outlets possess several variations of the wheelchair-that-climbs-stairs piece that they pull off the shelves whenever they need to fill time. The technology itself certainly isn’t new; I saw these chairs being demoed four or five years ago. But able-bodied folks seem to get a kick out of watching us gimps go up stairs all by ourselves. I’m going to record a video of myself typing a blog post, stick it up on YouTube, and see if that gets a similar reaction.
It’s just a little annoying to have able-bodied people constantly ask, “Why can’t you get one of those stair-climbing wheelchairs? I saw it on CNN!” as if the news of its existence was a revelation to me. Well, because you need to be able to balance your torso, and people using heavy motorized chairs often can’t. And most insurance companies won’t pay for them. And what if it breaks down halfway up the flight of stairs?
The Independent iBott or something? I never saw any film and I read about it with some disbelief. Do they know what difficult narrow-winding stairs, turning around broad wells Europeans used to build in the beginning of the previous century!
Oh, ..wonder if my English doesn’t sound a bit like Chinese.
Mieke.