I'm Moving

To Cowshit Lane. As the local council chairman in the story puts it, "I only wish I lived there because I could put it on my headed notepaper."

courtesy Fark

We Have A Winner!

You know, I've thought a lot of the things I've had to do to care for my various incisions over the past couple of months have been embarassing, painful, sometimes even downright stupid. But today, I think we got a winner for the most ridiculous.

After essentially spray-gluing a bunch of strips of some sort of medical tape to my appendix scar to keep it closed now that the staples are out, the doctor said to me, "Now, do you have a hair dryer?"

"What?"

"A hair dryer. You don't have to change this, but you do have to blow-dry it for about thirty seconds when you get it wet."

Do you have any idea how absurd it is to blow-dry your abdomen?

I just had to do this for the first time, and I couldn't stop laughing, holding the blow dryer and pointing it at this series of tape strips. The laughter made it start to really hurt, but alas, that just made it even funnier.

My life has clearly been transported into some sort of parallel universe.

Silly President, Fighter Jets Are For Actual Members Of The Military

I'm sorry, I know he did a prestigious stint in the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War, but there is nothing sillier than George W. Bush in a flight suit.

And you just know when he was flying that jet, he was making "Neeeeeeeeeeeeerow! Vwhooooooooooosh!" noises. He just has that look on his face like, "Look ma, look pa! I landed on a nookyaler aircraft carrier!"

Some days, I wonder about this country...

Fun With Shockwave

Will The Real Saddam Please Stand Up?

courtesy Dave Barry

Progress Report

- Staples are out, making me significantly happier, though not reducing the pain as much as I'd hoped.

- I really want/need to get out of the house but I still can't walk that far or sit that long without fairly significant pain, so I'm shit outta luck on that front.

- Not much else is going on. I'd better be careful, lest my body decide to inflame another organ to keep itself entertained.

The Worst Part

The thing that drives me the most nuts about this absurd appendicitis bullshit is that it really fucking hurts when I laugh.

Comedic movies have been banned from my DVD player. The Simpsons can be watched because there are usually decent enough breaks between the laughs to recover. I read the Onion far slower than usual this week.

I can deal with the not being able to walk very fast. I can deal with the back pain from lying so as to not put pressure on either of my wounds. I can even deal with the uncertainty this whole charade has thrown my life back into.

But not being able to watch such fine comedies as Airplane!, Some Like It Hot, and Blazing Saddles? It's just pissing me off.

Oh well. I guess I'll just have to survive by trying not to laugh at the shitty dramas on cable TV.

Yay!

So it turns out I may not have to wait another month to finally start working. For those who didn't read my absurdly long appendicitis story, here's the short version.

I was supposed to start training at CPK Monday, and when I called them to tell them I wasn't going to be able to make the training because I'm a) too doped up on Vicodin to drive and b) unable to walk faster than a moderate shuffle, they said oh, well...

There wasn't another training session scheduled, and the manager I talked to said it could be as long as a month before one actually was. I've been unemployed and laid up by various ailments for a couple of months now, and I just about lost it when he told me that.

However, I got the good word today that I can study the written materials at home and come in as soon as my body allows. Hopefully that will be fairly soon, because I'm going a little stir-crazy, since I can't walk more than about 2 blocks without eye-popping pain.

I'm trying to taper down the Vicodin so I don't get addicted or whatever, but I'm still in an awful lot of pain and sense I will be until the staples come out, supposedly within the week. Until then, I shall have to ignore South Park's admonishment that "Drugs are bad, mmkay?"

On the upside, I will have a nice, gnarly scar with which to impress bikers. And that, after all, is my goal in life.

Oh Dear...

I know it's only the Onion, the finest purveyor of fake news, but given my recent string of health-related bullshit, my fake horoscope this week was more than a little disturbing:

Gemini: (May 21—June 21)
You'll never smile again after the tragic loss of your lower jaw and lips.

Jeebus...

Unsolicited Advice To Hollywood

Hey, dumbasses! The following is only my opinion, but given the poor performance of your little movie, I suspect I'm not alone.

The reason reality shows are popular is that you meet characters over a longer period of time and get to identify with and/or hate them, and grow to have relationships with them, just like in sitcoms and dramas.

One-off movies like The Real Cancun are bound to fail because there is no identification with the characters, the key to making the mundane seem exciting.

That, and having an ugly fat guy in the commercial wearing nothing but a Speedo and asking who's ready to party may not have been the best way to attract moviegoers.

The Appendicitis Story

For once, I have become extremely grateful that I'm horribly addicted to ER, because otherwise, my appendix probably would have burst before it occurred to me that there might be a problem.

Let me back up a little bit.

Wednesday night, I was sitting around, being my normal lazy self and watching television all night, and when I got up, my right side was sore. I figured I had just been laying on it weird, and gave it no more thought and went to bed.

Except when I woke up, it hurt more, and the pain was just in one area of my right side. So I thought hm, I seem to remember from eight bajillion episodes of ER that lower right quadrant pain is a symptom of possible appendicitis.

I checked the list of symptoms online to make sure I wasn't making this up, and I noticed I had a couple of the other symptoms, including serious loss of appetite. The last time I ignored something, it became really painful and led to my last surgery, so I figured I should get this checked out.

I had a job interview, so I made an appointment with the doctor at Student Health Services for later on in the afternoon. My pain kept getting a little bit worse and a little bit worse as time went on, and I knew that this was not a good sign.

When I got to the doctor, she informed me that I probably didn't have appendicitis, since I didn't have a fever and wasn't nauseous and/or vomiting. Except I haven't puked since I was 11 and got food poisoning, so I have to be REALLY sick before I get the latter.

She took some x-rays and had them draw some blood and told me to come back Friday morning to get checked on, since they'd have to analyze the blood samples and x-rays overnight, and she wanted to see how the pain was progressing.

I decided not to notify certain parental units about this possibility at the time because the doctor said it probaby wasn't appendicitis, and certain parental units practically have a heart attack every time I sneeze.

Well, I walked back up there Friday morning, and while she thought my x-rays might indicate my pain was from (don't laugh) severe constipation, I had an elevated white blood cell count and something that was supposed to be between 0-20 was 21, things that might indicate appendicitis.

She then poked at my stomach again, at which point it became pretty obvious that the pain was much worse than it was Thursday, so she said I needed to go to the Emergency Room, where they could perform a CAT scan to officially rule out appendicitis.

So they sent me over to the hospital in a cab, and when I got there, I made the mistake of mentioning the Student Health Services doctor's possible other explanation, which led to an extremely annoying sidetrack that took about four hours before they decided to finally give me a CAT scan.

After feeding me a bunch of liquid iodine so that the CAT scan could...well, scan, they finally determined that I did have appendicitis after all, and that my appendix was officially coming out. This would be my second operation in thirty days.

You can imagine how pleased I was to hear this.

So I got to call my parents to tell them the wonderous news, even though the doctors still hadn't particularly told me what time they were going to yank the offending organ out, so my folks were somewhat surprised.

I had to call my roommates to tell them I wasn't going to be home that evening, and I called a couple other people because I felt like bitching. I was eventually interrupted by a very nice young surgeon who explained the procedure to me.

Best line of his explanation: "The appendix basically exists to do nothing until it gets inflamed, and then it exists to put surgeons' kids through school."

It turned out that the surgeon who would actually be performing this operation was the same surgeon who removed my pain in the ass last month. This guy and I have officially decided we know each other way too well.

I sat around the ER for a couple hours while they cleared out a room for me, and they eventually dragged me up to surgery, where I discovered the third-year med student who was going to be assisting was...well, only three years older than me, which was slighty disturbing.

Brief tangent: Riding in an elevator while lying down is one of the most incredibly disorienting experiences I've ever had. I've never done it before, and it felt so, so weird. It was like trying to drive upside down or something.

I actually remember much more about what happened just before the surgery than I did before the last one, since I think they knocked me out a lot earlier in the process for the last one. This time I actually remember them bringing me into the operating room.

I think the surgery was around 8 (I lost track of time after about 6pm, when I had to surrender my watch), and it supposedly took about an hour. They kept me in recovery for a while, until about midnight.

I found out later that a bunch of my friends stopped by around 10 and were initially told that I had been discharged (the clerk just read the computer wrong: I had been discharged from the ER, but discharged into surgery).

When they heard this, they decided to do the only logical thing: Go drink and come back later.

About ten minutes after I was finally wheeled into my hospital room, and after asking the nurse to tell my folks that I was out of surgery, the nurse came back with some sweet, sweet morphine, and said I had five people (six, actually) who wanted to see me, but that she'd tell them I was asleep.

I was like, hell no, bring 'em in! I was still fairly disoriented from the anesthesia, but it was really nice to see some friendly faces, and I remember trying to crack jokes, but I honestly don't remember a damn thing I said.

I must have looked like hell, because I do remember everyone looking fairly concerned. But then again, this was only about 3 or 4 hours post-surgery, so I guess you're supposed to look like shit at that point. Everybody left and I tried to get some sleep.

One of the various times I woke up from the pain, the nurse told me as she was giving me more morphine that they had called both my parents and that my dad was going to come up on Saturday morning. I sort of already knew that.

When I talked to him, he sounded really concerned, and I told him, you know, I could tell you not to come, but I know you're not going to listen, so do whatever you want. So, obviously, he came. Mom, fortunately, realized that one parent would be more than enough and agreed to be updated by phone.

Fun highlights of my hospital stay:

- The first time I had to get up to use the bathroom, the combination of the morphine and the still-not-worn-off anesthesia made me really lightheaded, and I stood up too fast and almost cracked my head when I passed out, except a nice nurse caught me, who I spent the rest of the evening apologizing profusely to.

- Taking an unbelievably slow walk around the hospital with Mark and Nate when they came to visit. I seriously moved about six inches every time I lifted my foot. It was pretty ridiculous, but they were really good sports about it.

- The IV nurse pronouncing my IV unsatisfactory and assuring me that since she did this all the time, hers would be better, then proceeding to poke me four or five times before she actually got another line going.

- Attempting to explain the appeal of "The Osbournes" to one of the night nurses, who looked about my dad's age (66).

- Having the nurse who told me I was about to be discharged almost forget to take the IV out of my arm before they let me out.

- My dad having to tie my shoes for the first time in about fifteen years (he guessed 20, but I said, "Dad, I don't think I was tying my own shoes at age 2." I was a smart kid, but not that smart) when I couldn't bend over to get them on when I was leaving.

I got home yesterday around noon, and I really want to thank everyone who's been helping me out with this, which is pretty much everyone I know. As much shit as we give each other, my group of friends really cares about each other, and they've all been incredible.

I must say, there's no better way to feel loved than to have a small, useless organ removed.

I was supposed to start working today (Monday) but since I can still only move at a moderate shuffle, that's not gonna happen. CPK said they don't know when the next training session's gonna be, and I'm restricted from lifting anything over 20lbs for the next two weeks anyway.

So I guess I'll be resting for another few days, hopefully getting these damnable staples out of my stomach soon and feeling much better soon. Dad's gotten off of PANIC PANIC PANIC! mode since he sees that I'm doing okay, and is headed home tomorrow.

All I know is, I'm going to start slapping people who ask me, "What else could possibly go wrong?", because after this, I really, really, really don't want to know what else is going to go wrong. Knock wood, it won't be anything.

Only time will tell. And maybe more CAT scans.

Update

So my body continued its revolt against me by giving me appendicitis.

I had my appendix removed friday night, almost exactly a month after my other surgery. I'm doped up pretty good right now and still in a fair amount of pain, but I'm home, and I feel a lot better than I did Saturday, so these are all steps in the right direction.

My dad came up from Atlanta and everyone's being really nice to me, now that I've apparently assumed the role of "The One With All The Medical Problems" in our group of friends. Thanks to everyone who's been being absurdly nice to me while I'm sick.

Further details to come, it's been an odd weekend.