Were It Not For The Annoyance Of Waking Up

this is another repost. call it an early anniversary republication, the original date of birth having been 10 february 2014.

Last night, I acted on a promise, I announced a dream come true.  Change.

I wrote to a beloved:

i'm trying to change myself -- overnight.  that's correct:  tomorrow, a new me, a new attitude, no fears, no woes, as much appreciation of the beauty in everything as my spirit can take, and large movements of big muscles.   

and learning.  i need to learn.  travel with some one or some thing to a mutual smile. 

no, i'm not on more pain meds!  and i mean what i am saying.  i've no expectation of obliterating my faults, finding god, becoming good or saintly.  in fact, eliminating those subterranean poofy pink desires, choking them out with some living vegetation, would be a relief.

Believe it or not, so far, so good.  I got up with the dawn and baked.  The batter, itself, was enough to satisfy my pissy pickiness, the evident enemy in all of my attempts to accomplish.  Accomplish, yes, without a direct object.

I learned about curling, with a man who ran quickly to his coat closet and found a supremely cool Norwegian cap, a gift someone he'd had business dealings with had tossed into one of their uber-serious business boxes. He then proceeded to decipher the mysteries of curling as the United States men battled the Norwegians, in their flag-coded, wildly paned pants (held up with a white belt).

In between the workout of blending and stirring and pouring and lifting, and the revelatory moment of the blue circle, the stone guided there by sweeping fools and ice chips, I slept.

During the night, I fell into music, a string of dear songs helping the trip to the other side of bed-shaking spasms.  When necessary, I brokered peace between Buddy the Maine Coon, beset with jealousy and insecurity, and Marmy and Dobby, who both have a hunted, haunted look, and have tufts of their hair scattered over the living room rug.  Buddy knows no other way.  He can only feel loved if he is the only available cat.  The look of confusion on his face is upsetting.  The damage he can do to other cats (and to my forearms) is remarkable.  

Punishing a cat is pointless.  I tried giving him a quick swat, and the bewilderment that resulted taught me to never do that again.  It's love, all the way, or nothing.

Fred the Wise sighs over my efforts to create peace.  "Let them work it out," he says.  He who rarely witnesses the violence.

I prayed for Syria and that felt like a waste of time.  I meditated, mindful of Syria, and left it "there," and that was infinitely better for me, though it did nothing for Syria.

To the same beloved, I shared my greatest Olympic memory, one he should have witnessed firsthand -- an account of Brother-Unit Grader Boob and his amazing physical mimicry:

once he hit 6'4", he perfected an impression of a ski-jumper that was astounding.  size 13 feet firmly planted on the good earth, he'd launch, then actually bring his body, pretty much in a straight line, almost parallel with his imaginary skis, forming a perfect V with body, feet, and floor. hands floating at his side.  then he'd execute that lovely bent knee landing... complete with whistling wind noises. 

Were it not for the annoyance of repeatedly waking up, these would surely be my final days.

© 2015 L. Ryan

Dr. Hackenbush! Calling Dr. Hackenbush!

Originally published back in the holiday season of 2008, shortly after our summer discovery that my prosthetic shoulders were harboring pathogens, this piece returns as a 2014 holiday tribute to the medical nitwits currently in my life. Among the nitwits this go-'round? Auxiliary personnel in the billing department of the same hospital depicted below. Also, the various board-certified neurologists who are gleefully passing the buck to their neurosurgical colleagues. Again, this is a repost, Dear Reader, as the Surgical Shoulder Wars are now ended, the bacteria having defeated even the inimitable and marvelous Doctor ShoulderMan.  But the hilarious conversations with medical professionals continue, even if the laughter has become markedly insincere.

*******************************************************************************************

Fred drove through driving rain and piles of slick wet leaves late yesterday (early for us!), so as to get me to the pre-admission registration process at the hospital -- before they stopped taking patients for the day.

No problem. Ruby the Honda CR-V putt-putted happily, veering down the hilly streets, passing the elegant homes on the tree-lined way.

We even managed to snag the premier gimp parking space, and this at a parking deck notorious for being full -- and gimp spaces usually taken by remarkably spry looking folk, and cars without placard or "disabled" license plate. Okay, okay, the correct line is supposed to be something like: "You can't tell by looking!" (Shit, you sure can... It takes a gimp to know a gimp.)

So, Dear Reader, what am I supposed to do when, despite my best efforts... Okay, okay, jeez, you are a tough one, Dear Reader. What am I supposed to do when, after a few lame attempts to keep things on the straight and narrow, the nurse in charge of registering me for Monday's major surgery makes mistake after mistake?

Here is a sample of our stellar communication, verbatim:

The Nurse: When did you last have an EKG?
Me: In August, the last time I was here.
The Nurse: And when was that?
Me: In August.
The Nurse: And where can we get a record of that?
Me: Ummm, here? In my medical records? (See? She managed to get to me -- my "intonation ascendante" is a dead give-away. Ar! I used to get hit on the head with a ruler whenever my "intonation ascendante" gave way. What was that dear old teacher's name? I can't remember, in large part due to his pedagogical concussing, but I loved him.)

[Choo choo! Train of thought! Choo... Back to the scene of the crime... ]

Me: Ummm, here? In my medical records?
The Nurse: Hmmm. Maybe in your medical records.

Then we tried to exchange the information about my last echocardiogram. Should be simple enough. Doctor's name, address, phone and fax numbers, date of the test.

And I have to say that it sort of mattered a lot to me for this information to be correctly received, given that they discovered an aortic arch aneurysm via that test. I had even had a serious bout of chest pain the night before, during which I was unable to banish the thought that, well, "this could be it." I made it from the bed to the wheelchair and then out to Fred's office, and he got me the under-the-tongue stuff. Three of those, five minutes later, I was fine. Still. I cannot banish that fear, not entirely. And so, I faced The Nurse full of conviction in the wonderful potential of our communication skills.

The Nurse: Where was the echocardiogram performed?
Me: In Dr. Rosenstein's office, as an outpatient. He's in the Doctors' Building over at St. Mellifluous. Anyway, it was August 22. 9:30 AM. It showed my usual aortic insufficiency due to a congenital bicuspid aortic valve. Oh, and they found a... dilation... of the aorta, where the aortic arch attaches... so, yeah, that's Dr. Rosenstein, over at St. Mellifluous. His phone is 555-555-5555 and, surprisingly, that doubles as his fax.
The Nurse: Well, I don't know what to do.
Me: Pardon? Can't he just fax the report to you? That's 555-555-5555...
The Nurse: I hate to be the one to break it to you...
Me: What? Break what to me? Does this mean I can't have the surgery Monday? They went ahead back in August, just 3 days later, on the 25th... Why is it different this time, why? [Blither and blather, generalized anxiety bursts loose and flies around the room, backward.]
The Nurse: Dr. Schrödinger passed away last week.
Me: Who is Dr. Schrödinger? He did?
The Nurse: It was very sudden, a massive heart attack. I am sure all of his patients must be terribly upset.
Me: I'm sorry for your loss? [And there it is again -- she's screwing with my intonation encore une fois, de nouveau.]
The Nurse: So I don't know what has gone on over at his office -- hmm, maybe the staff can dig up your records. I'll give Judy a call.
Me: Judy? No, no, I think we have a misunderstanding. My cardiologist is Dr. Rosenstein. And his nurse is Linda...
The Nurse: Well then, why did you bring up Dr. Schrödinger?

It was a rough afternoon. I will say this for her -- she got my blood on the first stick, for which I remain grateful. A few things worry me -- for instance, she didn't give me the red arm band I usually get -- it has something to do with blood, the blood bank?

Wow, even away from her, she screws up my intonation, long distance.

Also, I did as instructed by Dr. Boutiqueur, and emphasized my need for stress-dose steroids (adrenal insufficiency) pre-op -- intra-op -- and post-op! I don't think it was even received by any of her grey cells. "That's okay," thought I, "I will just bring it up again when I speak with anesthesia."

Except -- I did not get to speak to anesthesia, despite the fact that my intubations have been difficult
-- to the extent that, at this same facility, back in 2005, they broke three of my front teeth trying to get the damned tube in. Yes, that's right. I have had a slight attitude about their anesthesia department ever since. They paid for the dental surgery, and for the very creative partial that had to be created. But I forgot to make any arrangement for the FOUR other partials that have had to be made. Some major, and ill-afforded, pocket change has been thrown at what looks to be a never ending problem.

Also, the good anesthesia rep is supposed to tell me which of my many meds I can take come Monday morning. The Nurse asked me to take whatever I "thought was right." Okie-dokie. So I am going to dig up the green folder from my orthopedic surgeon's office for the last go around, in hopes that I have the notes from the anesthesiologist about meds.

Because I've a sneaking suspicion that what "I think is right" is probably wrong.

I wonder who it was who cleaned out all sorts of unnecessary paperwork from my office a few months back? Ar! Must have been the same idiot who thought ShoulderMan victorious in the Shoulder Wars.

In summation [Oh, sit down and stop clapping.]: Major confusion about the tests done back in August, and from where the results can be obtained -- and whether the ordering physicians are even alive; no blood being readied for surgery, despite the fact that, back in August, I had a hemoglobin of SIX after surgery; no interview with anesthesia about stress-dose steroids and historic difficulty with intubation.

She jumped all over the MRSA in the nares issue, though. Thank goodness. Whew. What a load off...

Good grief! I got MRSA at the hospital to begin with, and the Fredster absolutely refuses to don the yellow dress and blue gloves -- not only do they offend his fashion sensitivities, but he overheats. There is also a tendency on my part to NOT ask for nursing assistance when I really do need it -- I hate to make someone get all that isolation gear on for what can seem awfully minor (bedpans, pain meds, help turning -- hey, you try it without using your shoulders/arms!).

So this weekend, my ID doctor has prescribed some antibacterial ointment that I am to stick up my nose. Excuse me, up my nares.

My question? If this antibacterial ointment kills the MRSA... why is it considered resistant to antibiotics -- or even at all virulent?

I forgot to mention that The Nurse's understanding of CRPS/RSD, which initially seemed quite promising, ended with her asking about the acronym: "How do you get 'RSD' out of rheumatoid arthritis? I usually say 'RA.'"

Me, too, when I am talking about rheumatoid arthritis!
Sigh.

Calling Dr. Hackenbush, calling Dr. Hackenbush!
(Below, please find the lyrics to Dr. Hackenbush, a musical number that was dropped from A Day at the Races due to concerns about the film's length.)


CHORUS:
So this is Dr. Hackenbush, the famous medico,
You're welcome, Dr. Hackenbush...

HACKENBUSH:
If that's the case, I'll go

CHORUS:
Oh, no, you mustn't go...

HACKENBUSH
Who said I mustn't go?
The only reason that I came is so that I can go.

I'm Dr. Hackenbush,
My medical standing's very high,
Well, anyways, ladies and gentlemen, I
am Dr. Hackenbush

CHORUS
He's Dr. Hackenbush...

HACKENBUSH:
I'm Dr. Hackenbush,
As a matter of fact, to be exact,
I'm Dr. Hackenbush!

FEMALE SINGER (Judy?)
I'm sure that they'd all like to hear,
Some facts about your great career

HACKENBUSH
Although my horn I hate to blow,
There's one thing that you ought to know:

I'm Dr. Hackenbush
Which all my friends will verify
Well, anyways ladies and gentlemen, I
am Dr. Hackenbush

CHORUS:
He's Dr. Hackenbush

HACKENBUSH
I'm Dr. Hackenbush,
You never would guess, but nevertheless
I'm Dr. Hackenbush!

For ailments abdominal, my charges are nominal
Though I'm great for I've a rate for tonsillectomy,
Sick and healthy, poor and wealthy, come direct to me
"Oh, God bless you!" they yell
When I send them home well,
But they never, no they never, send a check to me.

I've won acclaim for curing ills, both in the north and south,
You'll find my name just like my pills in everybody's mouth;
I've never lost a case...

CHORUS:
He's never lost a case...

HACKENBUSH:
I've lost a lot of patients, but I've never lost a case!

My diagnosis never fails, I know just what to do,
Whenever anybody ails, I'm sympathetic too,
My heart within me melts...

CHORUS:
His heart within him melts...

HACKENBUSH:
No matter what I treat 'em for, they die from something else.

When your nerves start to rock, put your faith in your doc,
When you're sick he will stick to the end,
With the possible exception of your mother,
A doctor's a man's best friend!

CHORUS:
Yes, a doctor's a man's best friend!

HACKENBUSH:
A doctor's a man's best friend, whoa-oh,
A doctor's a man's best friend,

HACKENBUSH & CHORUS:
A doctor is a man's best friend!

HACKENBUSH:
Right or wrong, wrong or right,
Night and day, day and night,
On his call you can always depend;
With the possible exception of your mother and your father
And your uncles and your brothers and your nephews and your nieces
And your sisters and your cousins, whom you number by the dozens...

HACKENBUSH & CHORUS:
A doctor's a man's best friend!

CRPS Pain

It's been a good while since I've written just to write, writing as if to save my life, writing just to release toxins.  Smiling, offering to make coffee, smiling, asking which coffee he'd like to have this late morning. Saying "excuse me" to the cat whose tail is in my way.  Checking the phone to see if I missed any calls. Setting the mp3 player to recharge, for the third time in 24 hours.  I put up dishes, washed what was in the sink, all interspersed with continued exhortations to Buddy the Maine Coon to please take his prehensile tail elsewhere.

Even in the night I was thinking of the cyclone hitting India.  Between my screams, I'd have a vision of a young man standing on the edge of the spiral, the whorl, knowing that the edge of a spiral, a whorl is a cutting thing.  I kept half-dreaming him saying a cold and swift "good-bye" to what must have been a mother, nodding to an old man, who had nodded first to him, which my mind-state knew was his calling to sacrifice.
He dove into the cyclone, and as I looked down the line of the cliff, the billowing chaotic universal twist not yet touching holy land, I saw young people, serene-faced, push off powerfully, smoothly, launching bodies into the eddy.

I will hate my mind when the pictures roll in, the bodies floating, the water-borne disease predictions, and, surely, the misshapen face of of what must have been a mother, the stoic cold face of an old man in charge of pointless sacrifice.

I was angry at Fred yesterday, which meant I needed to eat.  Fred had done nothing but make sure, at intervals whose meaning meant something only to him (As long as he could stand?  Whenever he remembered?  If i made a moan?  I know that once he came in when he heard me laughing.), that I was still alive, and had taken my meds.  I went to sleep Tuesday evening with a high fever, the chief odd symptom of which was exhaustion, total exhaustion.  I slept and listened to music from Tuesday evening to mid-day Friday.  No food, enough water to take those accursed meds, the spotlight of Fred's face in mine, and that stupid question:  "Are you all right?"

So I tried to be normal yesterday, my normal and a little of what might be your normal.  I cleaned a bit, chatted cheerfully, answered emails, tried, and tried, and tried.

The exhaustion returned, but not the high fever.  I settled in for a normal night of sleep-some, read-some, listen-to-music-some.

And the dystonia, the spasms, the wrenching screaming twists and deformations hit within the hour.  I promptly informed God that "no, I can't do this," and loaded up on antispasmodics, told myself the usual lullaby:  "You will stop jerking in fifteen to twenty minutes, tops.  Whatcha wanna do until then?"

I walked using my forearm crutches, in a back and forth pattern, not wanting to fall but wanting to force my legs into normal shapes.  If I don't, it's grotesque, even for me, to watch, and hell, only for me, to feel.  When my legs decided they weren't going to move any more, and this after about 3 minutes, I grabbed a cat.  I groomed the hell out of that cat, and since it happened to be Dobby, well, that was swell by him.  Why I did not suddenly leap from the bed every night to groom him with ferocity was the mystery between his ears.
The pain increased as I kept denying muscles, tendons, various sheaths and demon parts the right to transmogrify into whatever rhomboid they felt like.  It was blitzkrieg time.

Fifteen to twenty minutes, tops.

Not quite.

Try all night long.  I gave in to the screaming.  I forgave myself the weakness.

I have residual pain in my legs, a new thing to add to their usual pain.  I can only describe it as a leftover electrical burn.  And that is why I try not to put too many words -- ha -- to the work of describing CRPS pain.

It makes you sound like a maniac.

electrocution wallpapers

© 2013 L. Ryan

Please, don't make me lip sync Tina Turner.

Not the way I had hoped to leap back into mine own small blogging world, a moat-sized affair, after a six month or so stint spent dog-paddling in a chlorinated Olympic pool, but we don't get to be in charge of our own relevance -- at least not for a bit.

It's a relief not to be relevant, except, of course, in those instances where I hold the key, the definition, the path, the road map, and the most minute details of Being Right.  Then it's so -- stomping::feet -- frustrating.

Though, again, it's a relief.  I don't have to do anything.

I don't have to don a uniform, nor even dither around with wearing haute couture camo.

I don't have to have my skin, that largest of organs, peel and fall away from vascularized flesh, or have mucous membranes pretty much necrotize on the spot.

I don't have to have any ability to aid, ease, cure, ameliorate, or euthanize stymied by lack of supplies and an overabundance of need.

I don't have to be held hostage by an idiot electorate and its idiot elected representatives.  I don't have to shrink in horror at the echo of mine own words, "not time-sensitive." Were I a man, I am guessing that's a moment when one's testicles withdraw to ear level.

I don't have to be Richard Engel's moral sidekick if I don't feel like it.  I can change the station.  I can forget that Assad will see this as an unscheduled, unexpected extra play period.  I don't have to feel the bile rise in my esophagus, knowing that my life, my childrens' lives, have been measured and found meaningless.

Yes, I have a thang for Richard Engel.  I think he speaks my truths more often than not, though I've noted that he also does stuff about them.  A minor discord.  Truth-speakers need cheerleaders, too. Yay, Richard Engel!  No, I'm not smiling either.

I don't embarrass easily and the fact that our Congress was not immediately called to Washington but was, rather, left to choke on Summer's last wieners and burgers -- better now that we are all foodies -- and put off the "debate" until 9 September, well, that probably has nothing to do with why I can only swallow yogurt.

I went 24 hours without speaking, a respite for everyone.  My vision is blurry because I got confused -- which drops had I put in, which had I put in too often, which were totally forgotten.  I began coughing up blood with my jellied yellow sputum, nothing alarming, I don't think, just a result of force.  I cough like a commando.

When I think of what I wish to blog about, I cannot think.  I long, instead, for things you're used to hearing about -- sleep free from the world's sluttiness, sleep free from dreams of not finding the class, or the classroom, in which I was scheduled to teach, an hour ago.  Yes, I often find all my students scattered about strange buildings, in stairwells, seated alone in empty classrooms (but not ours), raising a ruckus in administration, where administrators glare at me and my long line of ducklings. I try to teach as we rush down hallways, try to make a game of it, but these are the grown ones, the college kids, and I know what they must be thinking.  Something along the lines of... "this class could double as a PE course."

When I think of what I want to say, I feel instead soft arms and hints of hugs, I hear murmurs of mothers, of fathers, of brothers, of sisters, of all of their lovers, recognized or not.  I hear no children.

I wonder what is the right prayer to pray in thankfulness for not being relevant.  Prayer, right now, is divorced, cleanly divided, from notions of encounters and dialogues.  And please don't make me lip sync Tina Turner or do other acts of penitential poignant irrelevance.

Please God, create and destroy, both, my matter...

Should I be glad that this instrument is compatible with my dearth of energy and my excess of repentance?

Please God, create and destroy, both, my matter... 

If we could but distract God for a forever instant, maybe we'd have a chance.  That can be my meaningfulness.  It still professes my cowardice and guilt, but might also gift humanity with the moment it needs, might allow for felonious acts to fall on a felonious physical body, an error from the get-go, creating a wondrous loop of meaninglessness within which you all can choose to finally trim that annoying cuticle on your left thumb, or slaughter the Idiot Think of the Lying Liars and become a worthy dream, not of Marvel Heroes but of marvelous one-by-ones.

Bomb his planes, his weapons' caches.  Kill him and his heinous cohorts in that moment where an old LP spins on the platter, skipping, skipping.  Extra-judicial executions, approved by the death penalty abolitionist too right, too sick to mince her words.  Do I deify myself?  Die for attention?  Do I damn myself, deified while standing on my aching head?  Die for distraction?  Sure thing, let's worry about those questions.

Please God, create and destroy, both, my matter... 

© 2013 L. Ryan

Spew Day

An enlightening day, on all fronts.

Fred is sick of hearing about bad news, sad news, medical news.  Fred is sick of being interrupted. Yes, Fred let it spewwww today!  So I'm sitting here, feeling that safety lies in being mute.

The last eye surgery was yesterday.  Today's pressure check on that left eye revealed a miraculously wunnerful-wunnerful result of ELEVEN. I haven't had an intraocular pressure that low in 20 years.  Is the cure for glaucoma lens replacement?  (Yes, I jest -- because the level of inflammation in that eye is apparently pretty severe, and it is hurting to the point of being bothersome.  One minor bitch; One minor moan.)

It was a rough experience this time, but nothing having to do with the wondrous orbs themselves.  I cleaned obsessively over the weekend, something I do compulsively before any surgery, no matter how small, just in case Fred has to host an Irish wake should I decide not to wake up or pull some other shenanigan or tom-foolery resulting in death.  Do I want my Aunt Nancy to sit in Marlinspike Hall's Mourning Salon, enjoy a complimentary marguerita, only to rise covered in cat hair?  Could I find a restful position in the fiery sulfurous lake knowing that one of the militant lesbian feminist existentialist members of Fred's flourishing ukulele band was distracted from comforting my dear sweet Fred because of a smudge on one of our finest shot glasses.

Anyway, I may have overdone it.  I was twitching like a twitching fool before and, again, after the slice-and-dice.  The staff was, again, wonderful, attentive, professional, compassionate... but the only solution was to get home as soon as possible so that I could eliminate the excess external stimuli (even being careful not to touch me... a surgical team kinda, sorta, has-ta touch ya!).  Even noise and lights can bring on the Grand Spaz these days, so the anesthesiologist was very cool about allowing me to leap from gurney to wheelchair and out the door.  Plus... the antispasmodics I needed, at the doses required, were at home.  I should have brought them, but it just didn't occur to me.

Once home, there was considerably more actual eye pain than the first go 'round, and that became more irritating as the itching arrived, then the small welts around the bandage.  By mid-evening, I was snarling.  First, I replaced the nasty tape holding the eye guard in place with the much kinder version made of paper.  That helped... for about five minutes.  I fairly ripped the whole apparatus off, Fred watching TV next to me with such ADHD intensity that I don't thing he realized what I was doing.  It turned out that the problem was the shield itself.  The right eye received a sweet little unobtrusive plain plastic affair, very light and made of nothing that would dare offend.  Ah, but the left eye... was covered with a metal plate and its sharp edges were protected with a protective edging of RUBBER.  Adopting the deductive brilliance of the inhabitants of 221B Baker Street, I said (pretty much to myself):  "Aha! The game is a not a foot, but an eye!" I went digging through my handy-dandy purple and butt-ugly "eye kit," and praised the Good Lord and my favorite angel, Lo!  "Look, Lo!  I managed to hang on to what seemed like a piece of useless sentimentality!  The original plain-jane version of the eye guard!"

When I speak, I do not use quite as many exclamation marks.

So after a few hours of itching and welts, the problem was mostly relieved by proper tape and and the tossing of the malicious rubber coating on the guard.

The remaining problems?  Well, the Spaz Attacks didn't stop and I spiked a big ass fever, felt like krapola, and toyed with phoning the go-to-guy.  Instead, I had some frozen strawberries and lots of baclofen.  It seemed a reasonable accommodation.

Come pre-dawn, the only remaining difficulties were... the bleeping spazzes and the freaking fever with the helpful addition of severe pain in the shoulders and hips.  By the time they'd rechecked my eye pressures (not believing the initial reading of... read it again:  ELEVEN!), someone announced, "You feel like you have a fever," to which someone else added the helpful echo, "And your cheeks are bright pink and your eyes are kind of glazed...." There just being three of us in the room, there ended the commentary, as I had nothing to add to the conversation.

No, it all mostly boiled down to "give your internist a call," which is medical CYA terminology.

I don't think I will bother him yet.  The steroid dose is being tapered down, that can create its own havoc;  The surgery may have set off a CRPS inflammatory hoe-down;  The cleaning-of-the-manor escapade may have aggravated the infection in my bones.

So my money is on feeling a bit better day by day, with worse days interspersed just for normal insanity's sake.

On the way home today, in between Fred delivering various sententious sentences, we stopped so that I could buy some cheapo-cheapo production's (remember them?) reading glasses at a large grocery. And, of course, the ever comforting and increasingly necessary plain lowfat yogurt, the equally comforting and always important hair gel for the curly headed living in high humidity, and the surgical reward treat, which turned out to be NOT CHOCOLATE.  I don't know how it happened, but Fred's surgical reward was a well-chosen tin of chocolate-covered espresso beans and I opted for the veggie chips -- beets, green beans, zucchini, that sort of thing.  Basically fried stuff covered with salt.

And -- I cannot remember the last time I set foot in a grocery store -- I got to deliver that famous line once we were home and I was stashing away the purchases:  "We forgot the milk!"

So that you are not deprived of any interesting morsel of information, since putting up the groceries, I organized the next week's eye drop schedule (turns out the right eye still needs 'em, but in different amounts) and worked on getting the fever down.  I also managed to develop, and it may have shown up here and there in this post, some resentment over Fred's righteous outbursts.  It's the delivery that gets to me... The I-have-held-in-my-suffering-longer-than-your-average-person-would-be-able-to righteousness... The I-am-such-a-chipper-and-cheery-communicator-why-can't-you-be-like-me condescension... and then there's my guilt-because-I-know-the-essence-of-what-he-wants-because-he-has-asked-for-it-before.  What I don't get, and just cannot abide, is how he turns things that are positives (to me, their verbalizer) into negatives.  This can only be by the action of HIS brain and standards.  Most of the things I discuss simply ARE, and are offered as such.  Information.

That this outburst came shortly after I informed him, happily, that sweet Hannah (my hero -- the young girl who had the rotationplasty and has now had a SUCCESSFUL BMT!) is going to be on the Today Show next week.  A cause to rejoice, I thought.

Clearly, I want to be right.  Clearly, I don't want him to be right because I don't want to be wrong. That feels the most awful of all -- never, ever should I want for dear Fred not to be right.

He's a stud muffin.  He's a sweet heart.  He's a good guy.  And he is becoming foreign to me.  I spend much time trying to arrange a life for him should I die -- because I truly don't think he has the foggiest notion of how much it costs to live, how one goes about living.  He's the guy who never repairs anything and then is shocked when things fall apart.  I obsessively clean the lint trap on the drier and note on the kitchen calendar when the A/C filter was changed.  I budget for repairs each year because I know who is gonna pay (until, of course, Captain Haddock surfaces one late autumn day in his miniature submarine, tossing about reimbursement checks as if we knew we could count on getting them to begin with... and then the grog flows, and remembrance goes, and before you know it, it's "dive, dive dive..." and the Great Cuss-Artist of the Moat descends like a drunken ghost...)

And now I am having moments of resentment -- which logically can only be expended on myself, as I am the creator of the need.

I am the ruination of Fred's life.

I just did not need the reminder.

So that was my day.  It may be that the Spaz Attacks and the Fever, plus the irritation (ever so slight) of the eyes... it may be that I am feeling as if I've no skin at all.

Oh... and then there's the whole Syria fiasco set to go off, some say, on Thursday between lunch and 4 o'clock tea.  Why we cannot turn the whole affair into an elegant but non-fussy extra-judicial execution of a Head of State, I dunno.  No one ever asks me.  I think it's a cheerful, uplifting solution.

Love you (Well, some of you. You know who you are.  And hell, if you are someone I've never even met, but need a little love, take some:  It's yours!) --

profderien  

Amie de la Bonne et Belle Bianca Castafiore, Guardien de Frédéric, et Une Personne Extrêmement Déprimante et Dépressive qui Devrait Probablement Etre Evitée à Tout Prix --

Grosses Bises!






© 2013 L. Ryan

Corey Dutina Of Pura Vida Bracelets Is A Good Egg

I'm a visual person, which makes my declining eyesight a bitch of a situation.  But mostly it's for finer stuff, like the details of a television show -- and when was the last time the details of a television show or a movie really made that much of a difference?  It's this online stuff that is getting difficult.

Well, this is ONE post that is not a woe-is-me.  Do you remember that old post, written in the middle of a long ago ManorFest, when Tête de Hergé suffered from a heat wave from Hell?  And our fridge and freezers died?  With all the beastial flesh for ManorFest at risk?  Oy, what a crisis!

We turned to the Queen of the Universe at Sears Customer Service, and then to her supervisor, for help.  Help, alas, was not easy to obtain due to... well, a host of dirty word concepts, the typical ones having to do with Customer Assistance. It was like a Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks' comedy routine, scripted back in the days of the "2000 Year Old Man."  At least on our end, there was a lot of laughter, as we were beyond tired and facing a night of roasting, and pit watching, and wild abandonment of mandatory kitchen safety measures, with half the population of the territory at risk.  Praise the Lord for On Site Universal Health Care Coverage & Catering.

Hey, take a moment and enjoy Reiner and Brooks again.  This is the stuff that makes me laugh.  I just hooted my way through three paragraphs, and hooting is where it's at... Then I will regale you with the tale of a true Customer Service Employee, my hero, Corey Dutina.

 Mel Brooks: The 2000 Year Old Man -- uploaded to YouTube byRogerBsDelaine

Let's see. My opening, irrefutable assertion was my essential visual orientation.  That extends beyond entertainment, believe it or not.

Okay, I'm sentimental.  Looking, simply looking at a meaningful something can save a moment teetering between disaster and absolutely fine.  Touchstones for the eye.

Add to that a tactile element, if possible, and it's a reminder to center, a centering focus, that goes with you everywhere.  That's right -- hand and arm wear.  Rings.  Bracelets.  It is difficult, with CRPS, to wear any ring, any bracelet, but I consider them Physical Therapy, like doing the dishes and the laundry, and giving Dobby the beloved belly rub.

Of course, I've fallen in love with Pura Vida Bracelets.  I've owned my own versions of their pricey textiles for years, and making them is probably pretty easy... but well, when I'm depressed, I spend money.  Just last night I ordered a new shower chair to replace the one with the screw that has been ripping a hole into my right haunch for months.  I'm snappy.  Taking care of business.  And so on.  This time, I got a stool that... swivels!  My back shall have equal time.

Right.  Bracelets!

First I purchased the lovely Deep Impact Pack,
shown on the right.  The colors.  The imagined sheen.  The sale price plus 20% off.







But what I had long wanted was the NEGU Charity Pack.
And it has been perpetually out of stock.  So I

put it on my Wish List -- who actually uses Wish Lists?  Then, suddenly, it wasn't a question of wanting it, it was a question of needing it.  Near the nadir (one can never be sure) of my depression, I was trying to keep good thoughts for Brayden and Ashley, and their families, as well as even more potent meditations for my darling Fred, for TW, for Grader Boob, for my mother and her blessèd relatives (myself, TW, and Grader Boob, excepted).  And I knew I was losing my own fight, weird as a fight to stop fighting can be, as a fight!

NEGU used to make me snicker in derision.

Never
Ever
Give
Up

If you had decided to give up, wouldn't the concept of NEGU, a creation to honor the mantra of a 12 year old girl dead of a brain tumor, of course, reduce you to snickers of derision?

Probably not.

I decided I needed the damn bracelet.  Mostly as a reminder of dignity, and humor, and all of the other saving graces.  Beauty.  Silence.  Mother Earth.  My responsibilities.  That stuff.

But they were never in stock, these loops of blue and white and black, a reminder to rub against my burning skin, something to focus on when I can no longer make out the details of my miniature Rothkos -- and don't even START with me about Rothko, details, and the sizing of the stuff.

So when I was applying my discount for the very available Deep Impact bracelet, I asked about how the heck to get a NEGU charity pack.  And got an unexpected reply:

Hello Retired Educator!
I could make a NEGU pack for you if you want to order it!
Let me know :) 
Corey Dutina, The Problem Solver

And from that point on, poor Corey discovered that I attract bad luck as readily as cat hair.  We went through me not trusting him, we went through my credit card being declined, which encouraged me to not trust Corey, and then, I dunno, NEGU won out... and I woke up this morning to another missive from The Problem Solver:

I will make one available on the site. Let me know when you are ready to purchase because I am only going to put one online for you!

Well, that killed my distrust, and as soon as I signed on, up popped old Corey Dutina in my lower right hand corner, asking if he might be of assistance.  Sure as tootin', the side reported no NEGU bracelets were available, but within seconds, up popped a grand total of ONE available.  I snatched it up, as much as one can when computer shopping, and thanked Corey profusely.

It's in the mail.  

So, pay attention Pura Vida Bracelets -- your employee Corey Dutina, The Problem Solver, went above and beyond the dull patina of normal customer service and onto a higher plane of shining bright platinum.  He did well.  He's a good egg.  Give him a raise, or something else that he might want.  I mean, a strange woman, who doesn't explain herself, just wrote to say she needed, more than wanted, one of your bracelets, and he made it happen, overnight.  

I am going to give up, I really already have.  But I don't have to do it painfully, for myself or for anyone else. In fact, it is required of me to strive for the opposite -- for joy, laughter, silliness.  

I'm just struggling because I've never learned to be honest, emotionally.  With all I've "learned" about centering, about sitting with what I feel, I still am driven to inflict it -- upon myself, upon others, especially those most trying to help.  Upon you.  A cruel writer to her readers, that's not helpful.  If I ever have an idea worth noting, why should you trust me?

Today was better.  Very high pain, but I tried to react differently, as in not reacting.  I took my meds, and curled up with it.  Watched fuzzy television.  Adored Dobby and Buddy, who are, it looks like, either extremely close animal buddies, or fervent feline gay boys.  They comfort each other, which is great, but Buddy, in his exuberance, keeps injuring the older, wiser Dobby -- a very small animal.  We had to goop his eye last night, and in typical Dobby fashion, he forgave us, purring and delivering head rubs with glee within the next five minutes.  His eye is still red, but the other scars he's obtained from love's blossoming are healing.

I got a bit of work done, not much, but enough to feel less like a slimy slug.  The area formerly known as the left shoulder is hot and throbbing, clearly all a-bubble with that detestable character, the gross Frank Pus. The right hip is in competition.  I'm gonna win a medal, or a ribbon, or something.

Every moment is a new start.  I may not get anywhere, but I'll NEGU my way along.

Ah... good news.  If we can swing it, I'm going to get to meet Maranda, Brayden's Mom, and hopefully, Brayden and Mason, too. Maybe next Wednesday, as fate would have us seeking medical succor at the same time in the same area.  Ah, fate!  The latest news on Brayden is that as his broken leg heals, they'll start him on some new, stronger chemo meds.  They are still scouting out possibilities for him, but he's in uncharted territory.  If you think about it, in a NEGU frame of mind, uncharted territory is a place of limitless potential.


 Jessie Rees Foundation.-- NEGU and her JoyJars

On March 3, 2011 eleven year old Jessica Joy Rees was diagnosed with an inoperable and incurable brain tumor called DIPG.  That same month Jessie started her treatment consisting of 30 rounds of radiation and daily chemotherapy at Children’s Hospital Orange County. It was also during this time she asked her parents, “How can we help them?”.She was referring to all of the other kids fighting cancer.Jessie had a burden for her peers and decided to do something about it.  She also wanted to encourage them to with her little motto “NEGU“, which stands for “Never Ever Give Up.” This simple little thought has become “Jessie’s Wish“.Jessie dreamed of the day that her little motto would become an inspiring message of hope to every child and family.Ten months and two days later, Jessie lost her fight on January 5, 2012. On that day she also left behind a global movement of compassion that her foundation continues with the support of amazing corporations, athletes, charities, volunteers and people like you!

If you skipped the Reiner/Brooks videos up above?  That was stupid.  Go back and watch 'em.

My Normal: Am I There Yet?

I'm trying like crazy to return to "my normal."  

Garderobe, Peveril Castle, Derbyshire

This is a term now in my daily lexicon -- it used to be set apart.  (In that there field, yonder, a little farther, a little farther, more to your left -- LEFT, I said -- yep!  Right there!  Good job, Dear Reader!)  It used to be confined to exam rooms.  "So, would you say you're close to 'your normal'?" might be an insightful question for Dr. Shoulderman to ask after giving me a prosthesis, taking away a prosthesis, putting in a spacer, taking out a spacer, or removing the shoulder joint altogether.


The only intelligent answer is a one-sided shrug and a heart-felt muttered: "I guess so." Or just omit the shrug.  We never wanted to hurt Dr. Shoulderman's feelings.

It's that time that comes every three years or so.  My private long term insurance company that pays me 60% of my pay, post retraction of any bit of money due any agency (even my union dues!) at the level of pay I was receiving in the year 2000.  The following year, of course, was when Fred had to stop working because "someone" had to be here to call 911 in case I didn't feel like it. [Ha?]

I'm pretty sure they surveilled us and I bet that was a grand old time for some poor soul.

Anyway, now it's pretty much as my go-to-guy MDVIP doctor promised me it would be:  "No one, ever, is going to question your need for disability coverage.  This is permanent, this is not going to get better."

He actually does have a sense of humor, this devout man.  I've heard him laugh, even inappropriately (the true test of mental health).  I've seen him hold his head in his hands more, though.  And since he and his partner left their huge group practice to go off and practice excellence, he's felt free to say he'd pray for me.

One of his best jokes yet?  I said, "I hope you had a good Passover." He responded, "Did you go to an Easter sunrise service?"

I about died laughing.

So first thing I do wrong this time -- and I'm back to talking about getting re-certified as a bona fide gimpette -- was not notifying the disability insurance company that my phone number had changed.  Oopsies. (I'm channeling Rick Perry.)  So when my "case coordinator" attempted to call, and got the old "disconnected" message, her natural assumption was that I'd grown new arms, legs, bones, and a better brain and had run off to Mexico, living high on Mexican hogs via that aforementioned 60% bounty.  Plus the extra pesos brought in by selling my mail-order drugs.

That's right. I -- me -- moi -- am a cartel.

I knew I was up to something!

Anyway, this is always a time of stress, in spite of my humor-possessing but humor-skewed beloved doctor's assurances that I am "totally and permanently disabled." This is always the juncture when the neighbors might have mailed the company that tell-all video of Fred and me waltzing on the veranda, or me jogging off to teach my early morning yoga class at the community center eight miles down the road.

Hey!  Did I tell you that I have new whatchamacallits?  Elbow crutches, you know, with the cuff the fits on your arm?  Two of 'em!  One for each side, and yes, that part is tricky.  The goal is to be able to stand for three minutes (still don't get how anyone chose "three" as a goal) which I absolutely CANNOT do -- BUT I can walk around for almost that long!  Maybe half that long!  So long as I am within crash reach of the bed or wheelchair!  It's actually pretty cool, even if annoying know-it-all people around me keep changing the various length settings on the suckers.  Fred has never been man enough to accept that I am way-y-y taller than he is.  Way-y-y.

So the forms are here for me to fill out.  I keep moving them around.  I doubt I'll be able to write legibly.  Maybe I can type out the answers, print them, and attach that to the original document?  Or do they want to see me scribble?

On the phone -- we did "connect" -- Gladys, or whatever her name was, seemed thrilled that I still had the same doctor as three years ago, as six years ago, as nine years ago.  "That makes it easier!" she crowed.
I had to pause as a vivid image of the man, his head gently knocking against the doorframe, overwhelmed me.

Like Fred, he had told me he was "overwhelmed."

Neither of them know it, but both of those moments were... sea change.  Pearls, eyes.  But it doesn't read that way, seem that way, exist that way, for Gladys.

I'm still having gastrointestinal bleeds on an ongoing basis, particularly when I don't follow the strict instructions not to take the drugs which help my bone pain the most.  I am doing so less and less, until the next time I cannot use my legs due to pain, cannot straighten them, and definitely cannot stand on them.
Here's something funny.  You know how people lose socks?  That great eternal mystery?  I lost the ankle brace that was making my right ankle fracture bearable.  No, I am NOT kidding.  And I always thought the punchline was that socks had PAIRS.  I only have the one sweet, little brace -- it has no sibling.  My theory?  It's here.  Somewhere.  Yes, that qualifies as a theory.  What do you want?  There was a thief in the night (swam the icky algae-afflicted-as-never-before moat, jumped into Marlinspike Hall via a well-used garderobe -- eww! -- bypassed the small golden museum quality pieces scattered about and took, instead, my damn ankle brace?  Here's the blatant flaw in your version, bud -- I am not sleeping, not since the return of the suicide-inducing spaz attacks.  Even the cats are staying away.  And since I've started guessing at how much insulin I might be needing, I've been in a jolly blood sugar roller coaster kind of mood.  A bit of advice for you:  don't take insulin, then half eat half a salad.  You might be unlucky enough to fall asleep.  I -- being forced awake -- simply transformed into Hulkette, snarling and green.  Fred did the bright thing and ran to get the jalapeño, red pepper-flaked with Thai chili sauce brown rice to shove down my throat... running right past the left over holiday peppermint candy.

What I dislike most about episodes of the sort?  I get paranoid afterward.  Fred must hate me.  The Domestic Staff seems distant.  Bianca has a sudden extra shift at the bar (the opera was among the first and hardest hit by Tête de Hergé's plunge into forced sequestration -- damn this proclivity for copying the politics of governing exhibited by failed and dying systems!).  Buddy came, but decided I'd be best comforted if he deposited his Maine Coon ass right where my shoulder used to be.  Buddy left shortly thereafter, as in:  Buddy fled.

I dunno.  Am I back to "my normal" or not?

What?  You afraid I'll bite your freaking head off if you try and answer?

An Anniversary Repost: Little Green Apples

I'm having trouble using my hands today... and then there's this pesky newly broken ankle.  O, Woe and Alas, and Poobah!  So I wondered what I was writing about on May 6, 2009.  Yes, that's right, an anniversary repost.  It's bittersweet, as it turns out, being a memory of one our now lost pets, the one, the only Uncle Kitty Big Balls, shortened to an affectionate "Little Boy." Fred loved him so... he was totally Fred's best buddy.  Me, I was good for putting out the kibble and for a good scratch and grooming session -- but for pure love, Fred and Little Boy, all the way.  There are other things to commemorate on May 6th, so happy birthday to those things, too.  Really. I mean it.  Sorry.  Did you ever notice that bitterness leaks?

***********************************************************

 The one day we had open for this week -- Thursday -- has now been filled with yet another visit to the Infectious Disease office, as they want a higher vancomycin trough level. We went by yesterday to pick up the antibiotics-in-a-ball to learn that we are going to dosing every 12 hours.

Today I see Bob for my first post-op visit; The Fredster has dinner with the Existentialists; and we proceed with... The Taming of Uncle Kitty Big Nuts, our newly rescued cat!

Yes... last Wednesday, as I lay dying in ICU, Fred delivered quite the performance.

The male cat, formerly known as Little Boy, is brother to the last cat we rescued, Little Girl, now officially known as Marmy. We took her in off the mean streets of Tête de Hergé so pregnant that she was sway-backed; Her humongous belly almost touched the floor; She waddled around, miserable, swishing her swishy tail. Of her five kitten litter, we kept the runt, known to us as Dobby. Dobby is our little idiot.

Sam-I-Am, the elder spokesman for the group, was born in a Walmart -- hence we named him for what's-his-face... Sam Walton, with a deeper, more appreciative nod to Dr. Seuss. Known to his friends as Stinky Boy, Sammy's life is filled with neuroses. I love him bunches. What can I say? He likes to kiss me.

When I was little, I wanted to be a vet and had a fairly active veterinary hospital that specialized, it seemed, in rehabilitating birds. My grandfather and a neighbor of his down the curvaceous country lane kept me supplied with injured blue jays and carrier pigeons. I raised a blue jay that had been tossed from the nest by one of *those* types of mothers -- he was a small ball of wrinkled skin with a huge gaping mouth and wirey neck -- eyes closed. I fed him purée of bugs with vitamins. I taught him to fly. Neither of us thought much about the details of first flight -- he fluttered, dipping and rising, his path almost plotted out by slow, huge dashes in the air -- "landing" with a complaining screech amid the branches of the crabapple tree next to Granddaddy's back porch. We had no exit strategy, and he almost spent the night in that crab apple tree. Usually, Squawky flew about the neighborhood during the day, coming into the house just a few times, and usually to hide his catches of bugs under the cushions of my grandmother's old-timey loveseat. She hated that bird. At night, Squawky came inside. He was killed by a hawk the next summer -- having lived only a little over a year.

Fred had me in tears as he pitched the notion of adopting Marmy's brother, "the sweetest cat in the world." I felt like the big bad meanie -- not wanting him near the others if he had anything infectious, not wanting to have to clean up after another long-hair.

Still, I made it out of ICU and meant to keep my promise. Little Boy, or Uncle Kitty Big Nuts, was delivered to our vet for a complete overhaul on Monday -- he had a large leg wound that they cleaned and packed with a drain, large nuts that they snipped, ear mites that they smote, plus worming, flea treatment, and a very punk whole body shave, as his long white and grey fur was matted beyond hope of repair by brush or comb. All his shots, too.

Amazingly, Uncle Kitty of the Former Big Nuts is disease-free. I just knew that The Fredster would come home Monday night sobbing, because the little guy just looked so very rough and haggard, limping and way skinny.

Yesterday, we set out to see The Boutiqueur, so punchy already that we sat giggling in the waiting room, sipping gourmet coffee. I had a fever and couldn't breathe. Saw Boutiqueur and got my first and best piece of practical advice. Should my lungs shut down again, and if I am alone, COUGH. Cough as hard as I can. The thing is, my brain seemed to be the first thing to stop working!

Anyway, we got lost in the parking deck, and by the time we found Ruby and loaded me -- they wanted $5 for the privilege of spending an hour and two minutes in the doctor's building.

Then we got lost on the highway, then we were found, and proceeded to the damned Infectious Disease group o'peeps. After that? Speed-demon Fred floored it across town to the vet's office, where we picked up a cross-eyed and bewildered Little Boy.

He is ravenous and has gulped down three cans of food. His sister and the rest of the feline crowd huddle outside the bedroom door -- Sammy is growling, Marmy is "ack-ack-acking" away and seems very happy, and Our Little Idiot, Dobby, is the most affected, surprisingly.

We are planning a family reunion and low key meet-and-greet for this afternoon, before we haul ass to see even more white coats.

Esquisse and Incubare

Insomnia, Part Four

Can you handle more late afternoon communiqués from this puss-filled, brain-damaged, hot-hot-hot me?

There are some relative newbies to the blog, and if my brief introduction to them at another social (but never the socialist, how long shall I be denied?) web site -- dedicated to the prospect that most anyone is a poet -- OH, CAST THIS SENTENCE INTO HELL'S PIT.

There are new Readers aboard.  They come from two main sources, pools of candidates drawn from their cool, dank waters by curiosity, and fear.  The trustworthy ones, with whom you'd leave your babe-in-arms for the weekend -- with a minimum of Pampers, four jars of strained organic peas, and an extra dark-dyed onesies to hide the spills -- are from this place called All Poetry.  That's right, optimists dressed up in smeared black eye-liner, but who will coo for the baby as soon as your back is turned and your ear obstructed by layers of doors, and a mile or two.  Ah, but the shifty-eyed devils, mostly men with severely scraped faces, clinging to the dangling scraps of their dissipating morality, mummies come unwrapped, are panicked Walmart pharmacists and mid-managers.

If you're of new readership but deny the provenance I just outlined, well, please, make yourself at home.  No childcare duties for you, no burden of instant animus.

Yesterday was a good day.  I put in almost eight hours of uninterrupted domestic labor and The Manor reflected my work in smells of polish and cleansers, in neatly made beds, and with the faint suggestion of the scales I practiced on Fred's piano every time I happened to pass by.  There was pain galore but manageable, until it wasn't and so I quit, happy with the hope of maybe sleeping well as recompense.

Hopes dashed, I got up to do more laundry, to swap one novel for another, to tend to Bianca's ever-broken heart and chipped thumbnail, to assuage Sven's jealousy of the fruit of his loins, the lascivious Cabana Boy -- who, cad that he is, is circling the weepy Castafiore -- and, as always, making time to brush the screeching Dobby.

Night turned into gloomy day, a pork loin was roasted, then neatly divided into five appropriate plastic containers, a few overdue gifts sent, along with overdue bill payments, and I bid "good luck and be careful" to Fred as he took off in Ruby, one outrageously large Maine Coon kitten tucked under his arm.

Yes, Buddy's second trip to the vet.  Fred believes Buddy's psychic frequency so attuned to his own that he won't cage him for the trip, nor for the time in the waiting room full of dogs, bunnies, ferrets, and other sick felines.  Have I not described Buddy's claws?  His natural exuberance?  Like Fred, I place loads of faith in Buddy and in the alignment of our stars -- but straight into the carrier he'd go were I the one driving and responsible for tempering any hint of waiting room mayhem.

I'd be sure he was ensconced in my familiar scent -- a towel, a t-shirt -- and had a favorite toy, at the present time one of my red mohair leg warmers tucked over and over until a tossable ball.  A kiss on the nose, and the bars of that cell would clang shut until the vet needed to handle him.

He's fine, by the way.  A bit of conjunctivitus, easily fixed.  We'd have had it cured days ago if only common sense had kicked in.  We treated the *one* eye, without doing preventative maintenance on the other.  The day after we congratulated ourselves on a vet trip averted, Buddy began rubbing and weeping from the other eye.  Duh.

I'm at 102, precisely.  Between 99 and 101, I am energetic and productive, and find it easy to delude myself.  I'm a happy girl!

Topping 101 -- and, for those of you in the know, doing so while on steroids -- changes everything.  I spent five hours choosing which gift basket of organic nuts and trail mix to send to my MDVIP Go-To-Guy and his staff in honor of their finally catching up on The Walmart Affair.  I would update you on that store's continued slow dance with idiocy, but even I am sick of it.

At about 101.5 I decided to read, then changed my mind in favor of listening to music, then opted to do both at once.  When I stopped checking it at 102, I did the unthinkable and turned off the somehow turned on television, in mid-Chris-Matthews, Hardball be damned.  There was an irrepressible air of clucking chickens loose in the bedroom.

Yeah, so back to this poetry business.  I haven't written poetry in years and still haven't, despite having posted some decided crap at this All Poetry site in the last few febrile days.  "Publish your poetry online,"it crows,  its symbol being, of course, a crow.

And they quantify to beat the band.

"428,081 poets."  Oh dear God.

I apparently joined some years ago, using the moniker of one of our dead cats, Monaghan.  It's not that we have a huge supply of dead cat monikers, but over time, well, beloved kitties pass on.  He was one cool cat -- a fighter (we didn't "get" him until he was an adult and such delayed neutering has less of an effect on habits such as knock-down-drag-outs in the street) and a jazz aficionado.

Hey, and here is a hint for the ages!  My password is "mon philosophe préféré + 1." So go ahead, my friends, and hack away.

According to the many quantifiers, I've submitted SIX poems, though I can only find five.

I cannot write poetry.  I may have already said that.  Once upon a time, yes.  And quite well.  Enough to be published in a fairly above board, non-vanity press kind of way.  With a check in hand and everything.  But no longer.  It hurts, frankly, and is terribly embarrassing.  So, I'm thinking this All Poetry site is the perfect place for me.

I wrote this just about an hour ago, entering my first contest.  Contestants are to begin this "round robin" skill test by submitting but one strophe, to begin with, based on a sketch that looks to me like two Japanese waifs clinging to one another seconds before being obliterated by an atomic bomb.

Winners of the first round are invited to add a second strophe and so on.

So this was my initial attempt, composed as you see it, online, in less than five minutes.  It would have been less than two minutes but I had to go pee mid-creation.  I titled it "Esquisse":

Pen, ink, charcoal: I try to honor what 

made it, not who, resisting the forced

twisting of my vane to the East

on this decidedly Western day,

and the visual bane of pen, ink,

and charcoal clues, hand-swiped

beastly bled-of-color visions, various 

bleak bombs, the requisite clinging siblings, 

and wonder whether to thank the artist 

for cuing up the Orient as horror's home

again (though my vane does creak,

rust breaking, trailing oxidated orange,

auroral to the curse) -- for that 

is not my home.

I suspect that I won't survive the first cut, if only for lack of enthusiasm.  Also, I don't think I've accumulated enough points, applause, comments, or money to be eligible to enter a contest to begin with.  You get points by participating, basically.  You tell other poets how wonderfully dark and at risk for testicular or breast cancer they are, you get points.  You click on one, two, or three icons of clapping hands, and are awarded points for your "applause."

But what makes you a poet, above all, is buying into a plan -- gold, platinum, paste, cubic zirconium, and so forth.  And even if I was willing to fork over 50 bucks to treat my favorite medical team to organic trail mix and an oversized "Thank You" card, I cannot seem to pay up for the privilege of purchasing space for my word assassinations.  The pop-ups and constant reminders that I'll get to use amazing fonts and words of many colors, plus buy the approbation of the equally talented have yet to sway me, have yet to give Discover, Visa, or Master Card the necessary impetus to pay up.

But it will probably happen.

Have you eaten yet?  I hope not, because here is "Incubare," written in as much haste as the esquisse above, but six days ago.  Feel free to trace the ascendant line of my accumulated poetic maturity.


i found two old lovers in one
week: one buried in an old miscellany,
the other beaming like an olive about
to burst a pit, but blunt handsome still.

(oily, though, as i always felt his favorite words 
to be -- smarmy, taken, snatched.)

the older one no longer lives in london,
or he does, but back then he loved to write
from rome, writing "cara mia, cara mia..."
until i thought i would simply weep.

(but see, he was -- in faith -- in love 
with my best friend, she who married someone
else.)

she sent me many postcards, all with
dreams of barnes casting down, with lightness, the church's doors;
dancing in a couplet, a doublet, wearing burgundy tights,
a velvet cloak, dancing down the aisle 
to embolden the unhappy pair, and to carry her away.

our loves and lovers of the time:
buried in miscellany, so cut to the quick
as to make precious acceptable --
we panted for his preciosity --
and then, older, buried in the borrowed, 
published, known, stealing the words
right out of people's mouths,
grease on his lips.



I will have to cough up something worthy soon -- a sestina, a rondeau, something that says I know form.  Content, for me, there, will always be as content is for me, here:  always a meta-something. Poetry is always and only about poetry.

Oh, sweet Reader!  A cold sweat is breaking on my brow....  How wonderful!  I must be on my way down.  In a bit, then, I'll wash up, don the jammies, and give this thing called sleep another go.  It's either that or more poetry, and I don't need to wait for the polls to know which way the wind blows.

Twist and Shout! Squirm and Yowl!

I apologize if my blog has become a subspecies of MSNBC, a sad-sack simulacrum of policy wonkiness, a frizzy and frazzled, very fuzzy firewall of feminism, a wailing wall of brother worship, and a kibble-driven, scratch-behind-the-ears yowling orgy of feline fascination.

I'm so sorry if my blog showcases personal fixations on heroic bald scarred kids -- though I draw the line at any mention of "angel wings" -- and on Fred, himself heroic and scarred, but defiant of baldness.

Do I weep with regret for forcing you to read abject descriptions of even the most minute cattle prods of CRPS spasticity?  Do I sniff and snuffle for stuffing my pain into your brain?  Am I embarrassed by the profusion of photography of purple feet?  O!  I do, I do, and I am.

Apology, regret, and red-faced shame:  Check, check, and check.

Who says I don't get through my daily To-Do Lists in an efficient manner?  It's the Etch-A-Sketch version of blogging.  Or is it more akin to a good Catholic confession?  Shake it up baby now... Hail, Mary!

Uploaded by BeatlesCentral on Mar 31, 2008

There.  Ah, the bearable lightness of the unburdened soul.

Now that the evangelical, conservative wing of My Dearest Readers has been appeased, can I get on with it?  Because things are just going to shit around Marlinspike Hall and if I cannot vent with wild abandonment, my head will explode -- and how many times can that happen before it leaves me somewhat neurologically impaired?

Okay, so I retired my CRPS quilt.  It was a lovely hand-stitched thang, washed twice a week for ten years of so, and therefore softer than any damn baby's butt.  However, the loose threads and disintegrating batting became an obsession for my little OCD feline, Dobby the Runt.  I've swooped down upon his nibbling little head and extracted a good 10 inches of thread from his tiny esophagus.

You'd think that defeating this dangerous compulsion would be a good thing, pure and simple. I found online, and on sale, a twin-sized quilt of all cotton, made in India (where they know what to do with cotton), pretty (but not in an obnoxious quilty way -- it recalls a forest floor more than a hunter's cabin), and soft as all get out, even before it's welcome home dip in the washer.  What I really wanted, but could not afford? A quilt made of recycled saris. But I know my place among the 47%... and buying a quilt made of recycled saris might upset some numbnut's understanding of poverty.

I know, also, that cats are creatures of habit.  I get Dr. Jon's newsletters.  I read the best vet columns.  We have a boatload of pheromone sprays that purport to "calm your cat" in times of change and stress.  You know, like when you retire a ratty quilt and replace it with one that doesn't put your animal in danger of intestinal obstruction.

Her troop being on sabbatical from crazed touring, and having moved from our supply of fine merlot toCaptain Haddock's collection of heavy, square, green bottles of rum, Bianca Castafiore has taken to burrowing her ample derrière into my favorite arm chair, snug in one of the few corners in our round bedroom here in the West Wing private apartments of The Manor.  She's fascinated with animal behavior.  She also hums and mumbles that damned signature aria of hers, incessantly, loudly --

[Comment n'être pas coquette?        

Comment n'être pas coquette?]     

Ah! je ris de me voir  

 si belle en ce miroir,   

Ah! je ris de me voir  

si belle en ce miroir...

which doesn't help a whole lot.  The Castafiore somehow encourages the current rampant insanity that reigns among the Feline Triumvirate regarding this new quilt.

I try to drown Bianca out with combinations of television, radio, and my preferred musical choices, none of which come close to Gounod's Faust.  My head aches from the noise.

But worse than the brain pain are the aches, scratches, and bruises I am sustaining from the well-planned blitzkrieg attacks on the new quilt, under which is curled, unfurled, and nuggled -- mine own body.  Dobby started it, of course.  

He jumped, all lighthearted and Dobby-ish, as only a Dobby can be, onto the bed and then, as if in a Romney elevator, ascended a good 3 feet in the air.  The cat was growling like a dog when he landed back on the bed, glaring at the quilt and giving me the stink eye.  Stiff-legged and goose-stepping, he approached the quilt... and sank his needle-like little teeth into a section that happened to be covering my right calf.  Then off he ran, to organize the troops.  I decided to let the blood and accumulated lymph drain freely, because otherwise I'd have to deal with the half-cackling, half-singing Drunk Diva, and my ability to resist coldcocking her was poor, at best.

Lambeth Walk -- Nazi Style (1942)

Anyway, as I've been stuck in bed, due to a perfect storm of Stuff, neither my quilt nor I look terribly appealing.  Bloody, bruised, wrinkled, subjected to round after round of coordinated feline terrorism and operatic bullying, dehydrated, and febrile...

So, Dear Readers, you may tire of my Obama-gushing, my knee-jerk liberalism, and how very much of a sucker I am for all things whimsical, but you must grant me this one outlet for the expression of the unbelievable pain and abuse lurking just beneath the sparkling, reflective surface of the moat encircling Marlinspike Hall.

Truth to Power!  Truth to Power!

I have a new quilt:::I am the Voice of the Oppressed.  Someone please call Tante Louise (and tell her to have the SWAT team bring coffee).*

*Where is Fred, you ask?  Have you ever heard of the hyperfocus aspect of ADHD?  Last I heard, he is transcribing Wagner's Ring Cycle for ukulele and guitar.  Unless the Valkyries evoke some vague memory of me -- as they did, once upon a time -- Fred will be unavailable for several days.  Help!

What Happened to All the Clanging Brass Balls?

Maude: You know, at one time, I used to break into pet shops to liberate the canaries. But I decided that was an idea way before its time. Zoos are full, prisons are overflowing... oh my, how the world still *dearly* loves a *cage.*

**************************************************************************

It's a gritty morning.  I need to do a dozen things, eleven of them clamoring to have been accomplished yesterday.

For once I'll spare you.  I put the Maude quote up top to get that crap out of my system.

So let me tell you about the brief visit with my Hawaiian-shirted, sandal-wearing NeuroMan on Thursday.

By the way, he continues to throw his staff under the bus for having attributed my spasticity to cerebral palsy (though Thursday, he said MS).  He further maligned this poor staffer for having ordered him an artichoke and olive pizza when what he craved -- and he is clearly a man of cravings -- was anchovies and onion.

I forgave everyone again, assuring them that there was not even the opportunity for offense being taken, at which I got the usual strange looks.

I had written out a text for him, as it was also, on Thursday morning, a gritty morning and I needed to do a dozen things, eleven of them clamoring to have been accomplished on Wednesday.  The epistolary version of my appeal to him for help began:

today's visit has several goals and i'm not leaving without answers.
just kidding.

He let me down, he really did.  He made squeaky noises about my need for specialized researchers who have been dubbed by the Queen as acceptable distributors of drugs in off-label uses.  He said, this is something that PainManagement Dood should be in charge of... or anyone... anyone ELSE.  "But I don't know enough, I don't specialize..."

Alarms, sirens, bright lights made my brain hurt.  No one knows, no one specializes, you dimwit hawaiian-shirted, sandal-wearing pseudo-cool guy!  Even the moody medico brave enough to infuse me with vast amounts of intravenous ketamine knew that.

He dared start to lift a lip in a sneer at my exposé on neuroinflammation, neuroautoimmunity, and my multimedia presentation of the DVD "Why am I still sick?" which is about biofilm infections.  If you claim not to know, if you claim to be ignorant, then don't hint at an upper lip tic when presented with information.

So I hit him squarely in the nose and kicked him where his brass balls were supposed to be a-hanging.

Brass Big Boy Nuts

Okay, I either hit him squarely in the nose and kicked him where his brass balls were supposed to be a-hanging or I said, "I need you to step up."  It amounted to the same thing.

Turns out he yammers, too.  So I told him to step up, several times.  It turns out that the thought of my good MDVIP go-to-guy doctor sets off fireworks in my verbiage.  He always steps up.  He takes the risks.  He never yammers, never makes excuses, and the goddamn Queen curtsies to him.  And he doesn't get the money the specialists get (InfectiousDisease Dood?  Oh my God, I am still getting EOBs that are clearly built on the art of upcoding) -- nowhere near.

That may have been the persuasive part -- not my anger at NeuroMan's neutered attitude, but my admiration for MDVIP go-to-guy, and my desire to protect him.

I left the office with 3-months worth of memantine [a med used for Alzheimer's that is an NMDA receptor blocker], and a prescription for dantrolene, mostly used in MS patients for spasticity.  Add that to Tuesday's Mobic, and I strong-armed my way through a fucked-up medical system with some success.  I can now predict that October will not be the month in which I succumb to suicide's sexy call.  Should there be any improvements, you, Dear Reader, will be the first to know.