Another Day in Gitmo

Let's see, sleep deprivation - check. Uncontrollable light and dark - check. Horrible food - check. Cruel tricks like giving me almost enough IV tubing to reach the toilet, but not quite enough - check. Long stretches without human contact or love - check. Morphine on demand - check. But wait. That changes everything.

My last 24 hours consisted of short stretches of dozing before being roused to take various measurements. A short period of feeling absolutely marvelous leading to the mistaken hope that I could blow this pop-stand come morning. What actually awaited me come morning was a splitting headache accompanied by chills. So much for going home.

I met with a new doc today who looked like something right out of a charles addams drawing. He was tall, thin - approaching cadaverous, and wore his black hair split up the middle and splayed to the sides as though styled by an axe. I am assured that he is brilliant and an expert in his field which is the study of lungers and other excretions that emanate from the lungs. I actually kind of liked him, but then again I am a big fan of charles addams.

I had another C T scan of the lungs an hour ago but the results are not in. Sometime in the near future I get to participate in some enhanced sputal ballistics in an attempt to get a gob of goo to travel from my lungs to a specimen cup without getting contaminated. I'll let you know how that goes.

He's a Flip-Flopper

In my world, I am always suspicious when things go too well. I was in that frame of mind on Thursday, when I pulled the nasal packs out of my nose at 5 AM so that I could breath through my nose and get some sleep. Aside from a low-grade fever that cropped up that afternoon, there was no visible sign of having gone through two surgical procedures the day before. All was good.

Last night, I went to bed with juddering shakes and fever induced dream snakes crawling all over my body. I was in the EMOR by midnight and told to make myself at home for a few days.

Today I am enjoying push-button dosages of morphine to try to control whatever is chewing through the frontal lobe of my brain. The staff admits that they are more or less guessing at this point as to what is causing the pain and how to deal with it.

As for me, I am looking fondly at the button that will shoot the next dose of morphine into my IV. Once I push that button, my ability to write will most likely disappear.

So my friends, I will leave you now and try to post again when the fever gods let me up for a breath of air.

I also am alive

Time fun when you're having flies.

Oh lordy, what all has happened since my last post? Risa started a job. We bounced back and forth from the Twin Cities a bunch. I went to the Mayo for a CT scan which showed continuous improvement on the lymphoma front and was graduated to quarterly visits instead of monthly. We drove two cars to Madison to pick up my daughter and her ungodly amount of shit. The station wagon looked like a pregnant Conestoga wagon with her futon frame, futon mattress, and a bicycle strapped to the top. Needless to say, mileage suffered on the way back. I scheduled my nasal reaming (this Wednesday) and managed to piggy-back a little lower body snip-snip into the mix as well. I plan on being a total baby latter this week. We have worked hard to get the deck fixed up with furniture, plants and bird feeders. Now if it would only warm up. That big, glorious body of water in front of us makes us pay for our spring pleasures.

We had a sieta de mayo party that was well attended and that I can't remember much of. My son, daughter, and I went to the memorial service of a dear friend and old neighbor who passed away due to acute leukemia. This brought back many memories for us as we struggled to find the right words of comfort for the surviving family who had lost their mom and wife. Turns out, there are no right words.

Now we are all in one house again, albeit a new one and are working on finding the harmonic dynamic of being a family under different conditions. My daughter is struggling with finding her place in a "new/old" town where she doesn't have any real friends yet. She has a job of sorts working the pool at a golf clubhouse, but that really hasn't started up yet, so she is spending a lot of time wondering what to do. She misses all of her old posse who are 150 miles south of here.

My son is looking at his last two weeks of school and IS NOT EFFECTIVELY LOOKING FOR A JOB - the little weasel. He apparently sees his role as driving around visiting with his friends and hanging out. Where he is getting his gas money is a mystery. He must be mugging old ladies.

The household has expanded its population of four-legged creatures as well. We now have two dogs and a cat so all in all, things have gotten more lively.

I am also setting up my stained glass studio again. I have been dragging my crated up glass around for thirty years now and I figure it's time to do something with it again. I have a potential job waiting if I can ever get hold of the client to select the type of glass he wants. I'll let you know more on that later.

Today is memorial day and we are going up to my brother's place for a BBQ. The weather has been beautiful (if cool by the lake) over the past four days, but today it is clouding over with sprinkles forecast for the afternoon. I wouldn't mind some rain actually. It's been very dry so far this month.

So that's life around here. I have been thinking guiltily about posting, but there always is some piece of work waiting for me. Maybe as I will be forced into inactivity for a period of time later this week, I will have more time to post. Till then -- TTFN