Tuesday, June 4, 2013
LOLCATS WEEKLY ROUND-UP FOR 4 JUNE 2013
TREADING WATER
Just et a bean and sausage burrito followed by peach crisp. Jessica the nurse has been and gone. My pulse ox was 84% after having been off O2 for an hours, so am leaving it on again today. I am so exhausted I have trouble writing simple sentences.
The sleep study has been delayed another week, paperwork issues. I hope they don't ask for the copay up front. The MD I recently left behind in favor of the new one has gotten months' worth of bills ready (funny how they had the staff to get right on that, but not to answer my health need calls, etc) so I am suddenly out an extra $150.
Some good news is that I found a temporary work-around for the "upgrade" the folks at I Can Haz Cheesburgr inflicted on their own site last week, which made made it impossible to see all the raw LOLCats flowing in. It was that stream I trawled looking for my weekly round-up. They made the change allegedly to interface between with FB, but as with all FB changes, it was bound to have a crap result on their actual users. I went to google to find other disgruntled consumers and discovered a so-far usable back-door. After I post this, I'll go assemble a LOLCat post for this week and get that up as well. Then to sleep without real rest again.
Friday, May 31, 2013
SO NEVER LEAVE ME LONELY
Gillian Anderson and Archie Punjabi in "The Fall"
Awakening from a dream in which I have a lover with two beefy / teefy / blondie teenage boys. We are driving down a dirt road to pick them up at the lake. The radio is playing:
Each time we meet, love
I find complete love
Without your sweet love
What would life be?
Tweaked the cannula a little last night. Slept 6 hours and only slight headache. Scoutie pressed against my legs.
Yesterday was no nap after only 2 hrs sleep: I could not surrender consciousness that night, took more courage than I could muster. And of course that became the day of endless intrusions, maintenance crew, deliveries, phone calls, new "How are WE today" nurse...Today at the least I have a carotid doppler at some point. Get the AC freon checked. Call the Gilead social worker.
I need my own personal pulse oximeter. Nurse said WalMart had 'em for $25, $15 less than elsewhere. Add it to the list. My sat when she got here, after I'd been off O2 for a few hours, was 90%. Went back up to 95 after I pulled into 2 liters for five minutes. Math I must manage now, in addition to carbizmas.
Dinah's weekly vet visit reveals she has gained back all the half-pound she lost last week -- Zillah remarked "That cat, she's tricky". Diplomatic way to put it. Scout has now developed feline acne on the right side of her chin and we commenced treatment with hydrogen peroxide today, under strenuous ginger protest.
Margot got a chance last night to watch Clare Balding's latest documentary about the suffragettes and agrees with me as to its excellence. I recommend it without reservation; don't know when it will reach the American airwaves. I also avidly watched and appreciated the Time Team special about the tsunami on England's northeast coast about 8000 years ago that permanently altered Brit geography and culture.
But the best thing on TV, hands down, is "The Fall": extraordinary writing, as good as "Broadchurch" and visiting the same general theme from a completely different perspective. The role allocated to Gillian Anderson's character is that of a woman who refuses to operate within "female" boundaries, and how she handles the resultant dehumanization with her assumed masculinity. Now that they have added in Archie Punjabi (KALINDA!!!) as her medical officer, my fascination is absolute. Apparently it is the highest viewed BBC show in years and they have already signed on a second series. I only wish American TV would give female actors such complicated, intelligent characters as in "The Fall" or "Scott & Bailey".
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
MUST GIVE US PAUSE
Spherical colonites of Nostoc commune, a bluegreen algae, photo by Gerd Guenther
I just finished another visit with my new MD, Doctor Matt. She is going to do another blood panel to recheck my thyroid, in particular, but her main impression is that I am at dire risk from sleep apnea of fairly recent onset. The oxygen tank will remain until I can get a sleep study with a firm diagnosis.
As usual, insurance and money is the hurdle. I can't get to a sleep lab without ambulance transpo, and Medicare won't cover a non-emergent ride. My home nursing agency appears to have figured out a way for me to have an in-home study, but are trying get around the 20% Medicare copay which may well amount to $1000. I will let you know how this goes. I think my life is going to hinge on treatment around this.
Just had a good cry with Tammi patting my arm and Scoutie standing on me anxiously. What I keep feeling at the moment, besides fear, is luck -- lucky to have this new doctor, lucky for the people around me who won't let me sink like a stone. And lucky to have a machine feeding me air. Air is a blessing.
Monday, May 27, 2013
NEW POEM
ON THE VALUE OF ANOXIC HALLUCINATION
We are given more sensory apparatus than we can handle
at once. Maturity means learning to ignore.
Time elephant-charges by us or stalls out
(You know that's true) .
We obey two rules: stay alive, and
write a story to fit the chaos. What you do for me
is listen. All I ever wanted.
by Maggie Jochild, written 27 May 2013, 10:23 p.m.
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
LOLCATS WEEKLY ROUND-UP FOR 21 MAY 2013
Here's the weekly best of what I've gleaned from I Can Has Cheezburger efforts.
There are some really creative folks out there.
Type rest of the post here
Sunday, May 19, 2013
HAITCH TWO OH AND HYPERGONADISM, ETC
Skwirl con cajones gigantes
I still am not sure how to evaluate what the nightly oxygen is doing: Mostly good, certainly going to continue it. I wake up with daily headaches but they are lessening. My morning sugars have plummeted, is that related? I am frequently sweaty at night. I am sleeping longer but still desperately needing daily naps. So something else is still going on. At least Scoutie has now, finally, relaxed about the new Monsser at bedside.
In fact, Scout had a major breakthrough this week -- she can now leap up onto Dinah's eyrie. So keeping her from Dinah's wet food is a fucking issue again, and Dinah's weight gain (another tenth of a pound this week) may be in jeopardy. Further, in figuring out the route aloft Scout sent a massive stack of books and boxes crashing to the floor in the study. After that happened, Dinah refused to answer my calls or come within sight for 12 hours overnight, leaving me to imagine her lying dead or dying beneath a heavy pile. I once again lay awake for hours, sick with dread, wondering whether to wake up Win and Sheldon for an energency call. But at 9 am, Tammi arrived and said Dinah was in the other room, smirking as I begged out her name. It is a real piece of work to love that cat.
I spent some time last night reading what turned up for a Google search of "squirrel testicles". We had a new raider at the burd feeder, a squirrel with unbelievably engorged scrotal balloons in variegated colours. My research revealed this is their high breeding season and yes, they do swell and change hue when the hormones are in full use. But I could not find an image to compare with our guy, whom I have named Zucco Skwirl. Even the examples in the attached video are only half the gonadal size of our Zucco Skwirl. He joins our recognition list, along with Mama Skwirl, Finger Skwirl (one of the fingers on her right front paw is deformed into a permanent fuck-you finger), and the late Overreaction Skwirl, who died horrifically in front of Margot the first day of her visit here last month. No, you do NOT want to know what happened.
I decided to not hand on the note nurse Jessica wrote to the tweaker about my Foley mishandling. Earlier I'd asked the tweak to read aloud some cooking instructions on a bag of rice, and I realized while she is technicall literate, I could argue against full reading comprehension. And Jessica's note was emphatically angry. Instead, I set aside any impatience and kindly, creatively taught her how a Foley functions using some spare nasal cannula tubing and a poet's vocabulary. She got it, she really did, and her hands-on cleaning of me shifted. We both felt triumphant. I'll have to re-do it next weekend, she cannot retain, but such is attendant reality.
I also took this morning's shift to pass on what I know about cooking potatoes, rice, and aromatics. Wound up with some great dishes for lunch and dinner, imparted real food skills maybe she will use elsewhere, and feel grateful to have had enough extra energy to manage it. Oxygen? It's a GOOD thing.
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