Experimenting....

....and I just used the Photo Editor to fuse two photos I took in my garden this afternoon. I couldn’t see how it could work because it was a hanging Chinese Lantern, and a fairy on a sundial.

Experimenting for a bit then I got this one where the fairy actually took over the lantern bit.

I quite like it!!!

I had a remapping today on my cochlear speech processor. I had been called for a review early.

I did have questions and some things I needed addressing. But one thing on my list was NO REMAPPING!

The audiologist explained everything on my piece of paper and the reasons why.

Then she gently suggests a new mapping.

“NO” I said.

Then she tells me she thinks it will be better for my music which I desperately want to listen to.

So that is me pulled in...

Her voice sounded completely different with the remapping. I couldn’t tell if it was better or not.

But I had my music with me on my phone.

Tried it with the old drastic mapping that had been done last year.

Then tried it with this new mapping I had been adjusted to today. There was no contest. The new mapping won for the music!!!

However human voices are another thing. Haven’t practiced with them yet. It was disorienting coming home. A bit scary.

Anyway I get home. I put on ‘Everything I Do I Do It For You’, by Bryan Adams. But as the audiologist explained whenever I listen to a song or any music, it takes me me awhile maybe an hour or so before Brain adjusts to it. Initially the song/music sounds like distortion, it is not listenable to. This is every single time (each and every day) I put a piece of music/song on. It is like Brain has to readjust each time.

I asked why this happens, because I don’t understand why if Brain can adjust to a piece of music/song one day, then why doesn’t Brain take that knowledge into the next day when I put that same music/song on again. Why cannot Brain learn and apply that knowledge for the next day?

The audiologist said for me it will always be like this. Brain will have to readjust each and every time (every day) that I listen to the same piece of music/song, and it will take about an hour or so each time for Brain to pull in the strands of music and voice and begin to make sense of it.

The audiologist did point out that many hearing people that became deaf and had the cochlear implant could never listen to music again. They couldn’t make sense of it.

So bear in mind that I was born profoundly deaf and never heard music as a hearing person hears music. And I didn’t have a cochlear implant until my early 60’s. So, even though initially I cannot make sense of a piece of music/song, but after an hour of repeats Brain starts to make some sense of it, and it starts to become something pleasant to listen to. Another hour later it is more enjoyable. The longer I listen to these repeats without a break the better it becomes.

However, tomorrow when I play this music/song again I will have to start from scratch again and it will sound unpleasant and distorted initially, and I will have to do the above all over again.

But this is a small price to pay to be able to listen to songs/music when I couldn’t do so before the cochlear implant.

I now have a boombox and have been playing that Bryan Adams song since about 2pm this afternoon non-stop, and my phone battery is about to die, it’s now 6pm, so 4 hours non-stop. And guess what? Brain is picking up so much from the song and music. And I am so enjoying it.

Not sure what my neighbours think though. I am in the garden under my thatched swing swinging away. It is raining but I am dry.

I suppose it will be Groundhog Day (as in the time loop in the film) as regards songs/music for the rest of my life. But no complaints from me. I am glad my soul, my inner being can have music....ah, the Boombox needs recharging!!! No music now!!!!

Oh well, I will have to go in now and move the hot water bottle (cat Popeye) off my lap...

Mono Monday...out of my comfort zone with this new remapping of the cochlear speech processor today...the serene fairy in the photo is out of her comfort zone not being sleeping on her sundial but hanging in the air.