Cranky Fibro Girl

Harnessing the healing power of snark

Archives for December 2007

Goodbye 2007

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So I had this big plan to write a whole “2007 In Review” post today. But I’m not, because I don’t feel good.

I’ve treated it pretty lightly here, but the truth is that I’ve actually been really sick for the past three months, and am probably looking at a few months of recovery and recuperation.

Fortunately I was told about this great website called CaringBridge, which is a free, nonprofit web service that connects family and friends to share information, love and support during a health care crisis, treatment and recovery.

If you’d like to check out my page, read a little more about my experience with C DIF, or sign my guest book, you can find me here:

Jenny’s CaringBridge site

Here’s to a happy, healthy 2008 for us all!

Follow Up

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Today I had a follow up visit with Science.

This visit went much better than last week’s, because I was able to be seen right away, plus Robert-the-blood-guy knew exactly where to stick me in order to insure the least possible blood-taking drama.

I also met the doctor who is supervising Science.

Good News: He completely believed me when I told him that I’m experiencing reactive arthritis as a result of this illness. (Which was good for him as well, because I had loudly declared to the Universe at large that if one more person said to me, “Hm, I’ve never heard of arthritis happening as a result of C DIF”, I was going to punch them in the face.)

Bad News: When I asked him how long I could expect the arthritis to last he said, “I don’t really know. You’re the first person I’ve ever seen who had it.” (Important Cross-Referencing Note: See also, Being A Trailblazer, And Why Sometimes It Totally Sucks Ass)

Before I could leave I had to let Science take my vitals, a process which really didn’t go very well last time (as you may recall). So we made it through the temperature taking, and the weighing, and then all we had left was the blood pressure reading.

So Science, who is alleged to be a registered nurse, put the cuff on my arm, pumped it so tight I could no longer feel my fingers, and then put the stethoscope…directly over my heart. And stayed there for like, an Entire. Minute. I have no idea what she was listening to-perhaps the dying moans of my poor, deprived cells as they cried out for oxygen.

Finally she realized that something wasn’t quite right.

“Oh, what am I doing?” she asked, laughing giddily.

“I have no idea,” I replied, counting down the seconds until I would be free from the clutches of Science.

And frankly, I think that’s a question you should have asked yourself a long time ago, like perhaps back during the moment in which you were choosing your future career path.

Mixed Metaphors

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On the way to pick up lunch, head-banger music is pouring out of the car stereos, making each individual cell of my body cry out in pain.

Me: “Could we maybe listen to something else?”

My husband: “Sure. I guess we could listen to some Christmas music, since it is still the Christmas season.”

Me: “Right. Until Epiphany.”

My husband (at the same time): “Until the end of all the bowl games.”

My husband: “When the three kings come home with…”(a long pause, while he struggles to remember what the Wise Men brought with them.)

Me (trying to help him out): “A bowl trophy?”

My husband: “Exactly.”

Failure To Communicate

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My husband and I are both very much word people. We love to read, and we often make up our own words and phrases when we talk to each other. And now that he is having to learn Spanish for his job, we often throw in some foreign words to give our conversation a little international flair.

But sometimes I forget this fact, like today when we were opening Christmas gifts with his family.

It is their tradition that we all sit in a circle and open gifts one person at a time, so everyone can admire what everyone else receives. This means that before each round of gift opening, one person is assigned to retrieve gifts from under the tree, making sure that everyone has something to open.

This time it was my mother-in-law’s turn to play Santa, and she was having trouble finding a present for me.

“Oh wait,” she said finally, “this one might be for you, Jenny.”

She held the gift out at arm’s length, squinted at the tag, and then asked, “Are you…’queasy’?”

“Um, no,” I replied, thinking that she was asking about my illness. Then I had an idea.

“Do you mean ‘queso’?” I asked.

“Oh yes, ‘queso’,” agreed my mother-in-law.

“Yep,” I said, holding out my hand. “That one is definitely for me.”

Having Nothing To Do With The Holidays

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Many thanks to my dad for passing this along.

Aircraft Maintenance

Remember it takes a college degree to fly a plane, but only a high school diploma to fix one. Reassurance for those of us who fly routinely in our jobs.

After every flight UPS pilots fill out a form called a “gripe sheet,” which tells mechanics about problems with the aircraft. The mechanics correct the problems, document their repairs on the form and then pilots review the gripe sheets before the next flight. Never let it be said that ground crews lack a sense of humor.

Here are some actual maintenance complaints submitted by UPS pilots (marked with a P) solutions recorded (marked with an S) by maintenance engineers.

By the way, UPS is the only major airline that has never, ever, had an accident.

P: Left inside main tire almost needs replacement.
S: Almost replaced left inside main tire.

P: Test flight OK, except auto-land very rough.
S: Auto-land not installed on this aircraft.

P: Something loose in cockpit.
S: Something tightened in cockpit.

P: Dead bugs on windshield.
S: Live bugs on back-order.

P: Autopilot in altitude-hold mode produces a 200 feet per minute descent.
S: Cannot reproduce problem on ground.

P: Evidence of leak on right main landing gear.
S: Evidence removed.

P: DME volume unbelievably loud.
S: DME volume set to more believable level.

P: Friction locks cause throttle levers to stick.
S: That’s what friction locks are for.

P: IFF inoperative in OFF mode.
S: IFF always inoperative in OFF mode.

P: Suspected crack in windshield.
S: Suspect you’re right.

P: Number 3 engine missing.
S: Engine found on right wing after brief search.

P: Aircraft handles funny.
S: Aircraft warned to: straighten up, fly right, and be serious.

P: Target radar hums.
S: Reprogrammed target radar with lyrics.

P: Mouse in cockpit.
S: Cat installed.

And the best one for last………………

P: Noise coming from under instrument panel. Sounds like a midget pounding on something with a hammer.
S: Took hammer away from midget.

They Could Not Find Their Own Ass With Both Hands And A Map

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That is really unfortunate, because “they” are the people involved in treating my C DIF. Not my doctor-him, I love. But because this illness is becoming more and more of a problem, and because the medicine required for its treatment is apparently handcrafted by tiny elves who live in remote workshops in a distant land and spend all their days grinding down rare nuggets of 24-caret gold into a fine powder, carefully placing the powder into fragile, jewel-encrusted capsules, and then glazing the capsules with the wings of the silver faeries who reside in the blossoms of a flower that only blooms at the stroke of midnight on the top of the tallest mountain when the light of the moon falls gracefully across its petals, causing each individual pill to cost somewhere in the neighborhood of 850 frajillion dollars, my doctor suggested that I allow Science to step in and lend a hand.

So for the next ten days I’ll be filling out excessively detailed reports documenting every, minute bodily occurrence (as in, “Lost 5 eyelashes on upper left side at 10:39 am Saturday morning in freak gift wrapping accident”), and in exchange for all this scintillating personal data, Science is covering the cost of my treatment.

But as grateful as I am for the medicine, I must admit that I have really not been all that impressed by Science.

For example, on Wednesday I arrived at Science’s office, where I was told that I would have to complete a number of tests, undergo a short physical, and provide data on the history of my illness. Part of this data involved the taking of my vitals, which Science knew in advance that it was going to have to do. But apparently neither Science, nor anyone else in Science’s office, possessed a thermometer. So Science was forced to send its nurse (who incidentally, is also Science’s real-life daughter), to the drug store to purchase one.

Once Science was finally in possession of the necessary medical instrument, it tried valiantly to affix a protective plastic cover over the end of the thermometer before placing it in my mouth. But no matter what it tried to do, it wouldn’t fit. So Science was forced to call on the aid of her daughter, who took one look at the situation and said, “Mom, you have to take the cover of the thermometer off first, before you put the plastic part on.”

I very nearly gave up on Science at this point, but unfortunately I was too sick and tired to be able to make my escape.

Science also needed to collect some of my blood, so next we paid a visit on Robert, the guy who collects all the blood. It did not go well.

vampires

Science then informed me that I would have to return in three hours, once I’d taken my first dose of the medicine, in order for Robert to collect even more blood.

I then turned to Science, looked her dead in the eye, and said, “This medicine had Better. Fucking. Work.” And Science had no idea what to say to that, because Science is clearly used to spending all of its time with numbers, graphs, and various bodily fluids, rather than desperate, half-crazed women who have been sick for the past three months and might, at any minute, decide to rip your face right off your head and make you eat it just so they can find a little relief.

But I F-I-N-A-L-L-Y got my medicine. And the second trip to Robert was a little easier. And I have been faithfully filling out my worksheets (“At 5:04 am, right buttock began twitching uncontrollably in time to the song, “Ice, Ice, Baby”).

And even though Science did give me a little check to cover my traveling expenses, right now?

bruises

My feeling is pretty much that Science can just go ahead and suck it.

But Wait-There’s More!

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So as I mentioned yesterday, I finally escaped Excessively Loud Jolly Man and made it in to see my doctor. He, I, his medical assistant, we were all pretty sure that yep, I still/once again have C DIF, and that it’s time to move up to the seriously bad-ass medicine for this round of treatment.

Only he wouldn’t give me a prescription for said medicine until he got back the results of my stool sample. Which was fine, except that they wouldn’t take my sack of poo! They told me I had to drive it over to the hospital and find someone over there to take it.

So I did, even though it was extremely odd to basically be chauffeuring my poo all around the greater Atlanta area.

I parked, and for the sake of this story, let’s say that my parking lot was in northern Georgia. And then I had to walk all the way over to the front desk which, metaphorically speaking, was all the way over in southern South Carolina. There I once again had the privilege of informing a complete stranger that, Hi, I’m carrying around a sack full of my own poo, looking for someone who will pretty pretty please take it off of my hands.

At which point the receptionist looked at me, looked at my bag, and said, “Well okay, but first you’re gonna have to go and take it to get registered.”

Me: (blinking)

Me: (as in, I have to register it so that it can go off to an educational summer camp and then get into a really good school with all the other stool samples?)

So I trudged on over to, say, central South Carolina and explained my situation to yet another random stranger in hopes that maybe she would finally give my poo a loving home.

But no, they wouldn’t take it in there, so they called the courtesy (golf) car(t) to come and take me back over to northern Georgia, which is where I started out in the first place.

Finally, almost an hour later, I found the correct lab where I was met at the reception desk with…stunned outrage and indignant disbelief that, of all things, I brought a stool sample! To a lab! A stool sample on which I had the audacity to expect them to perform laboratory tests, if you can even believe the nerve of me.

I had well and truly had it by this time, and was one dirty look away from responding, “Look, lady-I wasn’t the one who decided to go into a job where you have to deal with other people’s poo on a daily basis. It’s not my fault.”

So she was a real bitch, which is really not what you need after suffering with hostile alien bacteria for over 2 months, but in the end she took my stuff, and they did the test, and it came back positive, which meant I could finally start treatment.

I’ll save that story for tomorrow, because it I don’t really have the energy right now to write about how I almost had to rip someone’s face right off and make them eat it. That’s a story for another day.

So, This Is How My Day Went

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Over the weekend the Hostile Alien Bacteria returned to my intestinal tract for the third time. This time I decided to go and see my real doctor, as opposed to The Only Doctor Who’s Open At 5:00 On Sundays When You Become Deathly Ill.

Fortunately I was able to get an appointment right away, but on the way there I was making up so many horrible stories in my mind (I’m going to be an invalid forever, They’re going to have to rush me to the hospital, my body is eating itself from the inside out) that by the time I arrived I was mere moments from full-blown hysteria.

After I checked in I decided to do some writing, because that usually helps me calm down. Just as I sat down and pulled out my notebook, an elderly gentleman somewhere between 70 or 80 entered the office. I didn’t really pay him any attention, until he started to speak.

Because this man was loud. He spoke IN ALL CAPITAL LETTERS. And by God, we were all going to benefit from his wisdom and wit, whether we wanted to or not. It was not that he was senile. It was more that he had a compulsive need to keep everyone’s attention on him at all times, in addition to being completely unable to entertain himself for more than 30 seconds at a time.

Perhaps sensing my need for some blog fodder, this gentleman sat down next to me. However thanks to my highly honed hermit sensitivities, I knew how to be polite without inviting any further contact; namely, smile gently but without making any actual eye contact.

But Excessively Loud Jolly Man was undaunted by my defenses. After he’d exhausted all possible greetings to the room at large he thought for a moment and then said, (to no one in particular), “YOU KNOW I TRY, BUT EVERY TIME I TRIM MY FINGERNAILS, I END UP CUTTING THOSE SUCKERS TOO SHORT.”

Dead silence in the waiting room, because what the hell do you say to that?, and also, maybe if we just pretend we can’t hear him, he’ll finally stop talking.

But unfortunately, we were not that lucky.

Because although his hearing seemed to be a bit impaired, his eyesight was keen enough to notice that I was writing, or in his mind, doing something that didn’t involve him, and so he was immediately compelled to get involved.

“MIGHT I ASK WHAT YOU’RE WRITING?” he inquired in a tone that at first glance seemed polite, but was actually designed to 1)make me feel bad for ignoring him, and 2)impress everyone in the room with his charming and witty manner.

I wasn’t really writing anything in particular, plus I really didn’t want to be in a conversation with this man, so I gave him a polite, but definitely a brush-off, kind of answer.

“I’m just doing a little writing practice,” I said, immediately turning back to my notebook in hopes that he would get the message to please, please just leave me the f*&% alone.

“I UNDERSTAND THAT, BUT WHAT ARE YOU WRITING?” (so clearly, he didn’t understand AT ALL).

“Well, you know how athletes have to practice their sport every day? I’m just practicing my writing.”

“I UNDERSTAND THAT, BUT ARE YOU WRITING ABOUT SOMETHING IN PARTICULAR?”

F*&% politeness.

“Nope,” I said brightly, and went back to ignoring him.

Apparently that did the trick, because after that he left me alone. But unfortunately for everyone else, it meant that they were now the objects of his attention. And of course that meant that his next victim was…the woman in the wheelchair.

“MADAM,” he began, full of the confidence that he was only about to ask what we all wanted to know, but wouldn’t ask ourselves, as well as the confidence that we would all be so grateful to him for retrieving this information, “MIGHT I ASK WHAT YOU’RE DOING IN THAT WHEELCHAIR?”

Noticeable change in the room’s barometric pressure as we all gasp silently in horror.

But she was a polite, Southern woman, so she said, “Well, I’m just waiting to see the doctor.”

“WELL I UNDERSTAND THAT, BUT MIGHT I ASK HOW YOU ENDED UP THERE IN THE FIRST PLACE?”

Fortunately at that very moment, in what I can only describe as some extremely well-timed Divine Intervention, the nurse called my name and I bolted out of the waiting room.

Because it was only a matter of time before Excessively Loud Jolly Man noticed that I’d brought with me a stool sample, and we were all forced to hear,

“MIGHT I ASK WHY YOU’RE CARRYING AROUND A SACK OF YOUR OWN POO?”

Thank heavens for small mercies.

When All Else Fails, Here’s Something You Can Try

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Many thanks for this to Diane, Queen of Plan Be.

A New Weight Loss Program

Yesterday I was buying a large bag of Purina dog chow at Wal-Mart and was about to check out. A woman behind me asked if I had a dog. On impulse, as this was a stupid question, I told her that no, I didn’t have a dog, and that I was starting the Purina Diet again.

Although I probably shouldn’t, because I’d ended up in the hospital last time, but that I’d lost 50 pounds before I awakened in an intensive care ward with tubes coming out of most of my orifices and IVs in both arms.

I told her that it was essentially a perfect diet and that the way it works is to load your pants pockets with Purina nuggets and simply eat one or two every time you feel hungry. The food is nutritionally complete so I was going to try it again. (I have to mention here that practically everyone in the line was by now enthralled with my story.)

Horrified , she asked if I ended up in intensive care because the dog food poisoned me.

I told her no; I stepped off a curb to sniff an Irish Setter’s ass and a car hit us both.

I thought the guy behind her was going to have a heart attack, he was laughing so hard!

WAL-MART won’t let me shop there anymore!!!

Suddenly, Conjugating Verbs Doesn’t Seem So Bad

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Actually, I really do enjoy my job of tutoring high school kids in Spanish. But there are times, like when I’m having to conjugate the verb “to be” for the eighty-seven bazillionth time that session, that I am severely tempted to claw out my own eyes, just for a change of pace.

But then last night I watched an episode of “Top Gear” and learned that some people’s jobs involve being able to successfully pass the (auto) “industry standard” Escaping From Army Snipers test.

All things considered, I think I’ll stick with grammar.