WTHHL...Month

Yeah, I know. You're wondering where the phuck I've been. Work, work, work. Home, home, home. House-sitting, house-sitting, house-sitting. Repeat...endlessly. However I thought I would stop in and mention that a subsequent trip to Red Lobster Topeka totally redeemed it as a dining destination. The service was the exact opposite of what we were treated to last time. Wait staff took drink and hors d'oeuvre orders within seconds of seating. The food arrived in a timely progression and was fresh, hot, and oh so yummy. Our server was incredibly attentive, almost as if our pictures were posted in the back with the caption VIP written under them.

Work is interesting to say the least. While I still think the new sheriff in town is a good thing, I've learned he's not going to be a daily presence in our working lives, more a one week a month one. Apparently something is going on in Denver between our company and another and this will have him commuting between the two locations. Gee, we really could have used another heart doc in town.

Speaking of docs, I'm still feeling 100% better since the surgery. Kinda silly how long I dragged my feet about it once I had a proper diagnosis, but then again it was nice to fully explore all the options available to me, as few as they were.

So THAT'S how it works...

I can tell by the number of comments I've gotten that you're all dying to know how things are going at work...

Well, we have a new department head and he seems to have his head located someplace other than his nether regions so it's a good thing. He's very good at acting as a buffer between the tech staff and the incompetence that we've dealt with in the past.

Personally I'm doing wonderful since I embraced the idea that good is good enough. No need to strive for perfection. Of course my good is way better than anybody else's best... And if that's not good enough for the company, I got three job offers out of the three resumes I sent out so I know I am employable.

I've had to interact with one of the most difficult people in the company twice over the past week and not only have we both gotten something out of the exchanges, it was actually pleasant!

I've taken on two side jobs over the past month, one of which I am starting to regret. It's a big job as in I'll get enough money from it that I'll end up declaring it on my taxes, but it's starting to look like this is going to be a high maintenance user situation and I don't know that I have the time to devote to a high maintenance customer...

WTHHLWeek

Random thoughts from this past week:

On Tuesday my mirror showed this:

On Sunday my mirror showed this:

My cat knows when I fill up the dog's water bucket in the kitchen. No matter where he is, no matter what he is doing, when I turn around from the sink after filling the bucket he is there wating:

You know you're a shutterbug when you see a four foot snake in your yard and the first thing you try to do is convince the dog to go fetch your camera (she didn't).

I think that wonderful change of life has begun. You know, that second one. You spend several years longing to be "a woman" and then you spend the next 40-odd years regretting that you receive that monthly reminder that you are in fact a woman. I wonder how bi-polar and menopause are going to co-exist in the same household.

Yeah, it's cheesy, but I like the Bionic Woman.

Yeah, he's a ham, but I like Shark. I think if I wasn't a lesbian I'd sleep with James Woods.

WTHHLN @ Red Lobster

I don't know WTHHLN at the Topeka Red Lobster, but they sure weren't about to serve us dinner...

The original Saturday plans were for a picnic out at Rock Springs 4H camp. Rain changed those plans. The weather guessers said the rain would be gone by Saturday morning, but they guessed wrong. So we went to plan B. That was a Topeka run with shopping at Kohl's and Barnes & Noble, lunch/dinner at Red Lobster and a Topeka Roadrunners hockey game. The shopping and hockey worked out just fine.

Red Lobster was something else, though. They apparently were short of busing staff because we had to wait to get a table cleared off. Keep in mind we'd specifically arrived at 3:30 to miss the lunch and beat the dinner crowd. There were loads of empty tables in the place...almost all covered with dirty dishes. Our waitress passed our table twice with assurances she would be right with us before she did in fact come to take our drink order. We finally had drinks at 10 minutes after seating. Another 10 and she took our order. Maybe it fell apart at that point because we both decided to order something different. We are creatures of habit. No Lobster in Manhattan so we pretty much order the same favorite thing whenever we do go there.

10 minutes later we had salads and those yummy cheese biscuits that I love sooooo much. And then...nothing. Tables fill around us, orders are taken. 45 minutes later we have two assurances from our waitress that she's dinged the kitchen twice about our order, but on the second stop with us she takes the time to write our order down all over again! Did she forget to turn the first one in? After seeing the table of five that were seated after we arrived get their entrees, I flag down the manager, who is in the area to bus tables, and ask about the delay in getting our main courses (which, by the way, were promoted specials). He stands there pathetically, shaking his head, no explanation but to say he's very sorry. Magically our waitress appears with our order. Unfortunately it is too late, we've got a hockey game to get to...

And boy was it a game. MAHL hockey. The stars of tomorrow in action today. The players all seem so young, and no wonder! The oldest of them was born in 1987. They'd beaten the TX Tornado the night before and we were hoping for a repeat. When the Tornado scores two goals in the first five minutes, our goalie is thankfully yanked and replaced with last night's goalie, but is it too late? I watch the mascot for the Roadrunners and wonder why it looks like a Cardinal to me. Big, red, yellow beak. I don't recall ever seeing a roadrunner in quite those colors and I lived in the southwest for most of my life. If you're going to bring a team from Sante Fe and change the mascot to a Cardinal, a bird quite commonly seen in Kansas, why not simply rename the team the Cardinals? I don't get it. The Roadrunners manage to tie the score at 3, but the Tornado is relentless and pulls ahead by another goal. We manage to tie it and remain tied through the first overtime. It is not until the shoot out that we fall to the Tornado.

There were a couple of good fights, which surprised me, but maybe it was more to generate fan interest than an honest altercation with the opposing players. Still both teams netted severe 10 minute penalties on players for misconduct. Our team even caught two of those 10 minute penalties.

I hadn't planned on buying anything except maybe a pair of jeans, but I totally lost all resolve when I saw the price and selection on Henley's and 3/4 sleeve heavy T's. I love Henley's. My favorite shirt. I bought eight shirts and managed to keep it under $100. Score! We then adjourned to Barnes & Noble for S*t*a*r*b*u*c*k*s coffee and desert to the meal we never ate (I did end up having the worlds smallest, yet most expensive Brat at the game).

In all fairness to Red Lobster, I have to admit that it's the first time I've ever had bad service there so I will probably give them another try when next we get the craving for seafood. All in all, not a bad day at all.

Target Practice

So my friend Bonnie and I go out to Fancy Creek Range on Saturday to shoot. I joked with the Range Master that like some people hire in people to exercise their horses, the missus hires someone to exercise her guns. I left the revolver at home because I hate it and had no intention of shooting it, but I took the .22 and the 9mm. Bonnie had her single action .38 which I have to admit is a sweet piece, but I frickin' jump every time it fires. The difference between the report of a .22 and a .38 is so noticeable when you are three feet to the side of the chamber. I did my best, but ended up mostly shooting when she was reloading. The .22 holds ten in the clip so I got in a good bit of shooting.

I suck with the 9mm. I only ran two clips through it, maybe three. All my shots went low and right. Well of course they did, the gun is sighted for someone else. When I talked to that someone else and mentioned how bad I did with the Luger, she said, "Well the sights aren't adjustable." WTF? A gun that you can't adjust the sights on? Does anyone make such a thing? No, they don't. It took me one minute of looking at the gun to see the three screws that obviously have to do with sight alignment. But I think I'll keep this piece of information to myself. See, if I adjust the sight to me and she sees how good I shoot with it, perhaps the gun will pass into my ownership...

As usual I did very well with the .22. It just doesn't pack enough power, but is good for practice. Since the range is open every Saturday for the next two months, I'll have to test my sighting on the 9mm and hone with the .22. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go clean the guns.

There's a new sheriff in town...

...and I think we think alike. Work may get immeasurably better over the next month. If not, I have a line on something on the other side of town. Less hours, more pay, better benefits. Oh, but that extra 10 minute commute is a big minus.

Went to the 'ville to see RSLC's gig at Rusty's Outback. Never been there. Not too bad. Outdoors, nice summer-like night. Place didn't get packed until about half-way through the first set. Russell looked good. He's lost a little weight...maybe he can afford to eat less now that music is a full time job and that was a major cut in pay. Or maybe his girlfriend keeps him well exercised. Whatever, the band sounded good and I know how much a comfort it is to play for a hometown audience filled with personal friends so they had a good time. So did I in spite of the fact that I got stood up by my co-workers again. Too bad, I was buying...

A Game Day

...and I'm not talking football. I should have known I was going to be intimately acquainted with the wild side of life from the moment I got up.

There were turkeys in the yard this morning...when I let the dogs out. They (the turkeys) must have not had anything to eat recently as they managed to vacate the yard without depositing any of Maverick's favorite parfume, eau de turkey poop.

On the way to work there was a deer speed bump on the highway...the 70 mph highway. I didn't see it until the last minute and wasn't of a mind to lose control of my car just so I could avoid the blood and gore. Fortunately it had been pretty well tenderized by the traffic that paved the way before me.

Then there was the matter of the game camera. It's a thing hunters use to identify good places to set up for shootin' stuff. Good places as in, Hey, this is a major animal trail here! Look how often the camera catches Bambi and family. And is that Turkey Lurkey and family strolling by? My boss got new memory cards for his game cam but his computer can't handle the size of the cards so we had to get him a new card reader for his laptop. The first picture on the card is him playing with the buttons on the camera. It's a nice big picture. All the other pictures are really small so he must have pressed the button that changes the resolution on the camera. He says that you can't change the resolution on a game cam. He's wrong. I looked up his model and it has four different resolutions you can choose. But I guess Mr. Big Game Hunter knows everything and isn't about to listen to some city girl tell him what his camera can and can't do.

The day is winding down and as I was browsing a friend's blog the dogs decided that there was something foreign in the yard that must be chased. Oh look, it's Bambi. I wonder what they'd do if they actually caught one...

The latest from MicroSnot

Seems that in spite of what users of the software might think, MS is ready to release SP3 for MS Office 2003, but is Office 2003 ready for SP3? Well, not any of the versions that anyone I know runs...

In checking to see if SP3 has already snuck onto my system, I went to the Office update site and had it poll my workstation. Yes, I know I could have just checked the about section on the help menu, but I felt like reading some fairy tales. No, I'm still at SP2 and thank heavens I downloaded the full version of SP2 to my local drive so I can deploy that company wide rather than have to fight my way to configuring Office 2003 back to usefulness on 200+ workstations. I love the way MS describes SP3 on the update site: Microsoft Office 2003 Service Pack 3 (SP3) contains significant security enhancements that practically cripple your ability to work, in addition to stability improvements. Some of the fixes included with SP3 have been previously released as separate updates. This service pack combines them into one update. Note: the colored text is my own, not theirs.

Apparently one of the small drawbacks to installing SP3 is a complete and utter inability to open files that were created before you applied the service pack. In an effort to prevent you from possibly falling into one of the gaping security holes in the suite, MS has decided to prevent the software from actually opening or modifying any existing files. Well I don't know about you, but I've always wanted to have a $795.00 piece of software that just sits on my workstation and does nothing.

Rest assured, they have a workaround. Simply edit your registry to disable all the security features that the service pack just installed. Of course my favorite line in the page describing the download is not the list of things it fixes, nor is it the list of things that no longer work after you install the download. No, my fav section is the To remove this download section...there is no uninstall feature for this download.

I'm too old for this shit...Part 2

Well, I guess I got a little bit younger. After not getting the lawnmower running when we first put it back together, I guess it was good to take a break.

I still do not see anything wrong with the belt path. I did take another gander at the parts schematic for the mower deck and discovered there is supposed to be a washer between the top of the mandrel bearing and the bottom pulley. Really, how significant can a washer be? I didn't know about the washer because it was either missing to begin with or it disintegrated when the bearing seized. So I trudged to the shop where I bought the second bearing (the correct bearing, if you'll recall) and the young man at the counter simply gave me the washer I needed. Just gave it to me. No $1.29, no $.99, no nothin'. Just gave it to me. Sears would charge me $2.92 for the washer plus a minimum of $4.99 shipping and handling. And it's a rather hefty sized washer, let me tell you.

Now I hope the kid didn't think that the mower would turn up in the shop in the next day or two when he gave me the part. It will definitely go to them when it needs service that I can't perform on it, but this particular service is complete. Done. It be fixed. And no, I don't think it was the washer that made the difference because when it was all put back together, it did the same thing it did the last time I put it back together. I think it was shimmying the belt on one of the pulley's that made the difference. One of the pulleys is twice as wide as the belt is. The lower half of the pulley is all shiny with wear, the upper half dark and oxidized. The belt was sitting on the upper half of the pulley once the deck was re-mounted. I shimmied it down to the shiny side and when we started her up, the blades turned without binding and stopping. Hoo-rah!

I'm rather proud of myself, but I still think I'm too old for this shit...

Happy Birthday to...A-man!

Sunday was my co-worker's birthday so today he was greeted with gifts and decorations when he arrived. He and the D-man had done my workspace up with crepe paper for my birthday. I thought I'd return the favor but all I had was hillbilly crepe paper. Yup, I wrapped the chair, monitor, keyboard, mouse, and telephone. Then I hung 'streamers' from the drop ceiling. It came out even nicer than I expected. Bonus: He was well prepared for any shit that happened to come his way...

Sunday, lazy Sunday

Well, lazy for me. I only did two loads of laundry, ran to W*a*l*g*r*e*e*n*s for allergy meds, D*i*l*l*o*n*s for strawberries and cream of mushroom soup, and did my duties at Bonnie's with the cats. I did get to sleep in until almost 9:00 am which was a special treat for me since I rarely have animals that realize I don't have to get up at 4:30 in the morning two days each week. Why don't they get that? Maybe I should feed them tranquilizers on Friday and Saturday nights.

Yes, I've been getting up on time and getting to work on time for two weeks now. We have a trainee in the department and I figured I'd better set a good example. Plus we have a new department head starting Monday so even though I don't give a shit whether I keep this job or not (after all, it is just a job), I decided it couldn't hurt to get off on the right foot with him. Who knows, maybe he'll even make a difference for the better.

Now it's time for me to be un-lazy again and go iron the few pieces of clothing that I mistakenly bought the require ironing. Hopefully they'll wear out soon.

Done, not done

Well the lawn mower still isn't running. Everything went back together just fine, but as soon as you drop the deck to engage the blades the whole thing comes to a grinding halt. I was told to check the path of the belts and they looked exactly like the illustrations in the manual so I'm not sure what to do. I was just so disheartened to have it not work the first time and we were hot and sweaty and hot so we left it for another day. Maybe that other day should be tomorrow and perhaps after having left it alone for a while, I will instantly see what is wrong.

Today we finished up the deck rails. The missus visited some friends in Wisconsin and came back raving about how nicely the rails on their deck were finished with a top rail. Rather than listen to her bitch for the next six months about how we need to do that with our deck I've opted to get 'er done. After all, I do have a table saw...

She measured and bought the boards. We still have stain left over from when we stained the house a couple of years ago. The guy at h*o*m*e d*e*p*o*t sold her some fancy-schmancy screws with a special square bit. I don't have the upper body strength to get the fancy screws to countersink so I've secretly replaced the expensive screws with the old fashioned kind that actually work! I had a little trouble with cutting the angles at first. It seems that whatever direction I think the 45 degree angle should be cut at I am wrong and should do the opposite. This is why girls suck at geometry. It doesn't make sense to our minds.

We only wasted one 3 foot piece and it was doubly painful because it was only 1 inch short of being long enough to use on another section. The longer pieces are a pain in the ass to cut because getting one person that's eight feet away from the saw to feed the board towards the saw without tweaking it out of line with the blade is almost impossible. Still we did pretty good for a couple of novices and next weekend we'll tackle the other deck.

Other than that things are as fine as they've been for the past year. We took a small vacation to Lake of the Ozarks which was nice but ended on a sour note. Maybe we just aren't meant to be together forever.

I'm too old for this shit...

...or "Why am I taking apart the mower deck on the riding mower?"

Because I can, that's why. Yeah, it saves us money; but somehow I thought that at my age I'd be paying someone else to do this sort of shit for me.

We bought a used mower. It's bigger and newer than the one we have and we got a good deal on it. We bought it knowing there was a bearing issue on the left side. We knew it would not be that expensive to fix, but once we talked to someone who'd already done it on the same model, we knew it was probably a job we could handle ourselves which means that me, being the mechanically inclined one, is the one that's handling it.

The non-mechanically inclined one went online and ordered the part based on what the person with the prior experience told us was wrong. I probably should have taken the deck apart before ordering the part to ascertain that that was indeed the part we needed because once the part arrived and I set out to do the job it turned out to be the wrong part. I knew the second that I took the pulleys off and saw the upper bearing that that was the one that was shot. Now chances are because the upper mandrel bearing is shot, it put stress on the lower one so even though I now have the correct part, I'm going to replace both the upper and lower and be done with it.

I better get some nice jewelry out of this...

I Am (still) the NRA

Amazing how "conservative" I've become since moving to Kansas. Heh, heh. This weekend was a shooting weekend. Saturday there was a Women on Target event at Milford Lake. We did shotguns, air pistols, black powder muzzle-loaders, archery and .22 rifles.

Surprisingly I did extremely well in all events. Surprising because last time I sucked at shotgunning and rifles. Even ended up selling the .22 rifle I got for Christmas because I didn't feel accurate enough (plus I really wanted a pistol to pick off squirrels, not a rifle). But this go-around I did best in the rifle and, believe it or not, archery.


I guess I should not be surprised about the archery. There was a fella back when I was growing up in the wilds of Los Angeles who was a bow hunter. He used to take me to Griffith Park where they had an archery range. This was back when a bow looked more like the kind you'd see in cowboys & indians movies rather than the modern marvels with their wheels and pulleys. I was fairly decent back then when it was a much more difficult piece of equipment to operate so I guess I should not be surprised now that my entire focus can be on siting down the arrow and not on can I draw this thing back far enough to shoot more than 10 feet. I ended up with 75% of my arrows in the chest kill zone. I wish I could say that the arrow I shot in the fake deer's ear was intentional, but I cannot. Ditto the ankle shot.

We had so much fun at Saturday's event that we went out to Fancy Creek range on Sunday and I spent a few hours with a lovely Heritage Rough Rider revolver and a Smith & Wesson .22 automatic. I have to admit preferring the automatic. While the revolver was very pleasant to shoot, I'm fairly lazy and like not having to cock a gun. I also liked that the clip on the S & W holds ten bullets affording more shots between reloads. I shoot well creating nice tight groups. Neither weapon was my own so once I had figured how it was calibrated to the owner it was a simple matter to adjust my point of reference to get the bull's-eye.

Now we're all buzzing about the BOW event at the end of September. Three days of outdoor activities for women only. I just know I'm going to sign up for Skinning and Tanning, the photography workshop and Predator Calling (to lure wildlife to the barrel of my camera lens, not my rifle barrel). Who knows what else I'll try...

Still sick...

I have had a cold since August 4th. It is now the 13th. It cost me 3 sick days at work which have a dollar value of $220.00. I returned to work on the 8th as I was on the mend. Then Friday night it settled in my chest and I had a sleepless night due to coughing spasmodically all night long which left me drained on Saturday. Saturday night and Sunday were better and I worked again today, but the cough remains. And it's an unproductive cough. Hack, hack, hack, but nothing comes up.

Now I've noticed my nasal discharge has once again turned yellow. So if I'm relapsing that bad, should I go to the doctor?

Here's my rant: If you are sick, do not go to work and infect your co-workers. I repeat:

DO

NOT

GO

TO

WORK

Next person who so much as sniffles in my range of hearing will be killed and I feel quite confident my lawyer can win an acquittal based on justifiable homicide.

On the plus side, being home has enabled me to kill two moles. Good way to get some of this aggression out.

Sick

...one of my co-workers was kind enough to share the joy that is a summer cold with the rest of us working grunts. Nothing like sitting around in 100+ degree weather with a snot-faucet of a nose and feeling like a small Asian pachyderm is sitting on your chest.

So I've been laid out with this since Saturday night. Started feeling that back of the throat tickle during the Simpson's movie. Hoping sincerely that the pregnant woman I was with didn't catch it from me. Sunday was miserable, but since my muscles were sore from a Saturday day of moving rock all over the driveway, I didn't mind being forced to take it easy. I do object to having to spend my vacation days, the days I'd planned to use for my upcoming vacation, on being home sick.

So between surgery, the horrendous shit at work, and now being sick, I just haven't felt much like blogging lately. Hope you'll forgive me...

So THAT'S how it works...

...as in it doesn't. Nothing has changed. No one is any better at their job, in fact I'd hazard a guess to say I'm worse at my job. Tickets are still not being entered. Jobs are still being called done when they're not. And I'm still apologizing up and down when things go wrong.

No one has said a word about my meltdown., at least not to my face. My immediate supervisor appears to be none the wiser. I don't believe she's that good of an actress so I have no clue what if anything is happening, but my view says nothing is happening.

So I got a Sunday paper and marked up the classified's. Then I updated my resume. Then I sent the new resume out. But I'm not sure I really want another job where you submit a resume. Maybe I just want to wear the blue vest and say, "Thank you for shopping at you-know-where."

So How's This Work?

I have no idea how this spill your guts to HR thing works. I know HR said that it would take some time to address the issues raised. I spent Monday with a rictus of a smile on my face, barely communication with my co-workers. Who knows about my meltdown? Does management now consider me a liability? A loose cannon? Disgruntled? Expendable?

I've never had a situation that I ended up taking to HR. If it wasn't something I could work out with my co-workers myself, I just made it a learning experience and moved on. What's different now? Why do I give a rat's ass what happens to this company? Why don't I just quit? It's just a job and I can get a job anywhere. Do I care so much because until recently it was the most fun I've ever had working?

I have no illusion that I'm irreplaceable. No one is. I will say that I'll be hard to replace. When I segued from my career in film to being a stay at home mom, I definitely got great satisfaction out of the fact that they had to hire three people to replace me. One to handle the database administration, one to handle the network administration, and one to do everything else I did. But it was also sort of sad to think that I worked that hard. I missed out on a lot of family time by doing that and working so much turned me into a lunatic alcoholic. But I can feel myself turning into the lunatic again and I sure don't want to go back to drinking so I guess I have to trust that whatever is going to happen will happen and it's in God's hands now.

Meltdown

So Friday afternoon I had a meltdown in the HR Director's office. After spending my morning fixing a machine that was deployed to do a specific job without the critical piece of hardware needed to do that specific job and discovering that a co-worker was using out-dated procedures to complete tasks, I'd reached the breaking point. I even took a nice extra-long lunch to try and adjust my attitude, but there was no turning back the clock. That camel's back done broke.

And I didn't even go to HR to discuss it right then and there. I just wanted to make sure that HR could find time in their schedule for me the following Monday, once I'd had time to calm down, reflect, organize my concerns and even possibly offer some solutions rather than just blathering on about all the things that are wrong with my department. Well that was not to be. The Director took one look at my face, closed the door and told me that I looked like I needed to talk, let's do it now.

I flitted over all the issues in my usual rambling, incoherent, couldn't ad-lib if my life depended on it fashion. I know I got my points across and I managed to do it without mascara running down my face like an over-heated Elvira on crack. But I didn't get to offer solutions like I wanted. I've lots of ideas to get the department back on track but since I've spent the last six months complaining about things that never got changed I figured that maybe the problem in the department is me, not my supervisor, not my co-workers. All those wonderful ideas are covered with dust in the back of my head.

So I took HR's advice to have a relaxing weekend and try not to think about it. Some of the issues I raised they're aware of , others they were not. I really do like the people I work with, and I'm not looking to get anyone in trouble but really, if they don't want to do a better job then they need to quit dragging the rest of us down with them. Or at least the company needs to stop punishing the whole department for the actions of a few. It's worse than grade school!

I did spend a little time this weekend putting together a list of suggestions for improvements. Perhaps I'll even get to share them with the company...if my supervisor doesn't fire me for being a rat-fink.

It's a good thing I don't drink...

...but the only way to stay sober, at least for me, is to take an active part in my recovery by attending meetings of alcoholics anonymous, keeping in touch with my sponsor, living the 12 steps, and practicing the principles I've been taught there. So last night I attended a speaker meeting. Because I do these things, there are people that are alive today. Specifically my supervisor.

Yes, I'm going to break the cardinal rule of blogging. The commandment that says Thou Shalt Not Blog About Work. Why? Because I don't give a fuck. I know my job, I do my job and I do it well. I am an anal-retentive-detail-freak and that makes my work as close to perfect as you can get. And that's why when you look at the performance statistics for my department, a department of four, fully 40% of the work completed by my department is done by me. Why? Because after dealing with the nimrods, I mean my co-workers, in my department, people have learned that if they want something done right the first time, your best bet is to call me.

Why do I arrogantly make this claim? Because it's come to my attention that I've been denied a promotion and accompanying raise due to the inaction of my supervisor. And since there isn't much I can do about it, I've decided I don't give a fuck who reads this and who gets offended by it.

Let me make it clear that as far as people go, I really like my co-workers. I've reached an age where I can separate "I like you" from "Hey asshole, your failure to follow procedure is making more work for me." The one has nothing to do with the other. If I like you and I work with you, I can ream you a new asshole over the fact that you have the head of customer service crawling up my ass looking for polyps at 2:00 pm and still buy you a beer at 6:00 pm. Working with you and socializing with you are two different things.

Let me make it clear that as a person I like my supervisor. She's a really nice person. But nice doesn't get the job done. She is completely ineffective when it comes to lobbying the board room for the things my department needs to function to the best of it's ability. She's so busy being nice and polite and trying to be liked that she's become a doormat for the vendor that supplies some equipment to us. She is completely ineffective at getting my co-workers to do the job to the best of their ability. Seriously, with all my complaints about the same issues over and over, if this is the best of their ability then they need to quit their day job and find another gig.

The job is not that hard. We have detailed written procedures for almost everything that have been fine tuned over time, complete with troubleshooting tips. We have an easily searchable helpdesk with detailed notes on service calls and there's not too many new issues that crop up that haven't been covered before so when an end-user has a problem that has already been solved somewhere else, it's just not that difficult to check out the trouble tickets and see what worked before.

She's either incredibly smart or incredibly stupid and frankly I'm leaning towards the stupid. She asked me to act in a supervisory capacity and mentor my co-workers, which I did without benefit of title or pay increase, for the last quarter of 2006. But friendly coaching didn't seem to have any effect on their behavior and I got fed up with that and told her so back in January. She then asked me to keep her in the loop when I ran across things that weren't being done in the proscribed manner. I did this by forwarding her the helpdesk tickets where procedures were not followed, issues were not resolved due to a lack of research into the issue /interest in the issue on the part of the technician handling the call, and where I thought user's behavior was creating the problems we were having to fix.

For six months I've been "keeping her in the loop" in this fashion and nothing's changed. I figured she either thought I was being picky or just didn't give a damn. I come to find out, she didn't know what the "forwarded ticket" emails were so she never bothered to click the link and read the ticket to see what was going on.

Finally last month, an overworked and over-burdened me sent my co-workers an email pointing out two instances where I had just spent hours apologizing to department heads about something that was done incorrectly because of a failure to follow procedure. I blind copied my supervisor on the email...and she replied-to-all.

Then during the course of my annual review she had the balls to tell me that because the department went to hell in a handbasket in January I did not get a promotion and raise. Because of her failure to address the problems that I had clearly pointed out to her, I got screwed. And I'm not OK with that. Not OK in the least. I don't give a shit if I get fired over this. I can have any job I want any time I want and if I lose my job because I pointed out that my supervisor didn't do her job, so be it. But when I walk out that door, everyone will know that the problems in the department are not a result of my action or in-action, but hers. I hope HR has a fire suit for my exit interview...

Take it easy...

I thought I would share with you what Vampyra did to my hand. You can't even see a bruise on the other hand, the one that actually got a successful IV insertion.

But enough about the damage. The good thing is that my gallbladder was in bad shape for a long, long time and I didn't even know it. Since the surgery I've eaten all the things I normally eat with no problem. I've even eaten some things I don't eat all that often, like lobster. We had a lobster feast Saturday night, just two days after surgery!

I enjoyed lazing around for a few days without any obligation to do anything at all. It was sort of weird, but really nice.

I had planned to return to work Monday morning, but when I got in my car and tried to operate the gas and brake pedals, my abdominals objected. I tried again later in the day. You know how you always feel better as the day goes on? So I went out to my Monday night AA meeting and did just fine. I did better than just fine. I stopped at the grocer's on the way home for some must have items like toilet paper and milk. When I went to start my car it was dead. Deader than it's ever been. I've just replaced the alternator in the past year and I didn't notice that the amp meter was not registering so I'm thinking battery. I got four years out of a two year battery so I'm happy with that. Fortunately the grocery store was just down the street from Wally World and the tow truck was able to get me there before closing so I put another two year battery in it. Needless to say I was exhausted when I got home.

Vampyra

So let me tell you about my friend Katie, aka Vampyra. Katie is a nurse at unnamed surgical center. She took me back to the cubicle that was my surgical prep area. This is the area where I change into the wonderful hospital gown they love to make you wear, give you pre-op drugs, ask those last minute questions and make you sign the waiver (right after you've packed your eye glasses in the bag of personal items) absolving the medical team of all liability should things go dreadfully south when they're performing the procedure. Oh, it's also where they hook up your IV.

Katie became affectionately known as Vampyra after two failed attempts to hit a vein when hooking up my IV. I have bruises on the back of my left hand and on my left wrist that might go away before 2010. She was persistent. She dug and dug in each of the piercings in a vain (pun intended) attempt to hit the mother lode. Now I have huge veins. You'd have to be blind to miss them. If I wasn't so squeamish about needles I could easily be a heroin addict. Granted, I may have jinxed her by mentioning my fear of needles, but still, she's a fucking nurse. What is this, her first day out of school?

I had, at this point, decided that if she failed on the third attempt, I would put my clothes back on and reschedule this for her next day off. Three dry holes was gonna be my sign from God that today was not gonna be my day. Katie, sensing that she was very close to death, decided that cowardice was the better part of valor and passed the task of starting my IV off to another nurse. A nurse named Red. I took that as a good sign.

It''s All a Blur...

So Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were all spent getting ready for Thursday. I had to be at the surgical center at the butt-crack of dawn. The surgery went fine. It took a little longer than expected because my gall bladder was a little more fracked up than they expected. Turns out it's been in bad shape for quite some time and is probably the cause of much of the upper back pain I've experienced over the past few years.

I'm sort of angry about a couple of things right now.

One, I think that the medical community should have connected my back pain with my gall bladder a long time ago. One of my back issues is a classic sign of gall bladder trouble and since nothing else they did to relieve that issue resolved it, you'd think they'd dig a little deeper for the cause.

Two, my partner is totally worthless when it comes to having my back in a hospital setting. I know she doesn't like hospitals and doctors and all that shit. Probably because she likes to ignore when something is wrong with herself in the hope that it will just go away. Well fine, that's you and your shit. But don't tell me you're going to be there for me when you aren't capable of being there for me. We were talking yesterday evening when the anesthesia had finally worn off and I was mentioning something or another that I'd told her before. She said no, she didn't remember what I'd told her. She'd tuned it out because it was yucky and she didn't do yucky. Excuse me? So when I was still in out like a light recovery and my doctor came and talked to you about what went on in the operating room, you just tuned him out? And you call that being there for me? When I had the nerve to be upset about this revelation she got pissed...at me. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to handle this one. Personally, I think it's a deal breaker.

Return from the 3rd World

So the Missus made it back from India. She was amazed at the poverty. But the most amazing thing to her, was how happy these people are. These people with nothing. They are the happiest people on earth. They don't know they have nothing. Let me clarify that, they have nothing if you compare their daily lives to the daily life of the average American. They are grateful for the little they have. This may have been a life changing experience. Everyone should send their cranky, spoiled-rotten, Nike wearing, cell phone toting teenager to a rural area of India for two weeks.

Naturally her internal clock is fracked up. She got in about 11 a.m. and after bringing me up to speed in the whole trip (her cell phone didn't work there and internet access was almost non-existent) she slept for about 4 hours and then I woke her up for a few hours in the process of getting her back on Kansas time. She went to bed again at about 6 p.m. and slept through until about 10 a.m. this morning at which point I caught her up on all the news she missed while she was away from CNN.

Dinner for Two

So I had Bonnie over and we cooked the remaining steaks from the BBQ that did not occur on Thursday. I cleaned up the house in preparation for the return of the Missus from India. We had a real India connection going last week...

She was actually in India, and I ran across something made in/by India:

Dinner for three?

I had planned to have two of my co-workers over for dinner last night. I was grilling steaks, some zucchini and red potatos, bookended with a nice little salad and lemon meringue pie. But Daniel had to golf instead so Anthony & I agreed we'd try it another time.

Celebrate!

We do a little thing called birthday night at AA. The last meeting of the month, we celebrate the sobriety milestones of everyone who's marked another increment of time in their sober life. This particular group celebrates 30 and 90 days; six and nine months; the first year and each annual period after year one. Last night we feted the Junies of which I am one. I have attained 10 years sober. I did not do it by myself. If we could do it by ourselves, there would be no AA.

I owe my sobriety to good sponsorship, the fellowship of AA, the 12 Steps, a benevolent higher power (so different from the God of my childhood) and the support of family and friends. Without even one of these tools, my sobriety would come to an end. They are vital to my survival as a humble, sober human being.

To everyone and everything that has had a hand in this journey I've taken, I say thank you. Let's do another 10 years...one day at a time.

The Cutter

So I had my consult with the surgeon and all my questions were answered in detail. Explained to my satisfaction were the reasons why I'm not a candidate for drug or sound stone therapy. What might happen if I do nothing---I may never have another attack or I may end up in the emergency room one night with a surgeon that doesn't do laproscopic surgery when it's an emergency. The during and post surgical risks were explained ad nauseum and the doc has a good track record which means I'm either in good hands or he's due for a whopper of a fuck-up. I hope I'm not the fuck-up.

Other than the trip to the surgeon and the Missus being in freakin' India, the only thing of note that happened was birthday night at AA. I celebrated 10 years. Un-freakin-believable. It's been one hell of a journey.

What the hell happened last week...

Busy week at work. I'm not going to break my no-blogging-about-work vow, but I will say I actually went into heavy overtime this week. I'm working on a list of things I want covered during my annual review and hope to get what I'm asking for. If not, adios amigos.

So with the long days at work, that left little time for blogging. I was trying to spend as much time with the Missus as possible since she's off on another whirlwind tour of the world. She'll actually be circumnavigating the globe this time and racking up the frequent flyer miles.

I finally heard back from what I casually refer to as my regular physician. He wrote me a letter thanking me for the clarification and stated that he'd be happy to set an appointment with me to discuss my concerns. Depending upon how the consult with the surgeon goes this Tuesday, I may take him up on that offer.

Not much else going on here in Kansas so I'll stop before I start boring myself.

House sitting

That's where I've been all week. Not one, not two, but three houses. My own, owing to the Missus being out of town until Thursday past. My best friend's owing to the fact that she too travels for the same company and a co-worker had a business trip where she needed child care. My house is a piece of cake now that the fence is up and the dogs can be left to patrol their little piece of paradise.

Friend's cats are low maintenance. Towers of food and water so it's just checking to make sure they're well supplied and a scoop in the dish for the neighborhood cat she feeds. I hesitate to call him a stray. He's never been malnourished. Even if he was a stray, he wouldn't be malnourished with the wealth of mice and birds in mid-America. He's just neglected. Perhaps someones outdoor cat. We've treated him for ear mites which he tolerated quite well and gets along with her cats when they're all out in the yard together. He tried to come in the kitty flap one time and that's when her guys set the boundary, "NO, you are not coming in the house." So this past winter friend picked up a smallish igloo dog house on close out and a round foam bed and kitty's pretty much set any time he wants to come around.

Co-worker has a dog, cat and teenage daughter. The kid is out of school so she can care for the animals during the day, it's just the overnights alone that were a concern. The kid is a really good kid. Not snotty, not reclusive. Doesn't think she's a woman trapped in a teenager's body so she's low maintenance too. In fact but for the night we came back to my house for BBQ with the Missus, she cooked every night. Eats healthy so there was nothing on the menu to disturb my gall bladder.

I'm starting to lean more towards the surgery. I'm amazed at how many people I work with or know from around town that have been walking around for years without a gall bladder. And I've eaten with these people and I see that they eat well. They all say that every once in a while they pay for eating something extra fatty, but that occasionally it's worth it. And the really cool thing is that pretty much every one's had it done by the same doctor, the one that I have an appointment with on the 26th.

I didn't get all my questions answered by the nurse, because she didn't have the answers, but the surgeon will. She did look into finding out if there's anyone doing the sonic therapy that pulverizes the stones, but the few she found indicated that the size of my stone is an issue and they've not had success with larger gall stones. She also pissed me off the day I went in to talk to her. I was looking for a dialogue, not some health care professional handing down unquestioned recommendation, but someone to listen to my concerns, my opinions and if warranted, poke holes in my beliefs. I was of the opinion that the stone was a relatively recent development. She is not. But rather than say that while we were in the exam room discussing my limited options, she waited and made a comment over her shoulder as she was walking down the hall away from me. She said, "I don't think this happened in just three months." and was gone. Wait a minute. I don't give a shit what you think if you don't have some facts to back up what you think. I'm not there for your opinion, I'm there for your god-damn medical expertise. Trust me, I will revisit this with her when next we speak.

I have not heard back from my regular doctor since I dropped the letter off at his office and frankly I'm surprised. I thought he would have called and said he wasn't going to change his mind or yes he was. Either way, I at least expected the courtesy of a call back. I'm not as pissed as I was at first but I'm still mad enough to make some nastiness float about the 'net.

Everyone's back in town now so I'm down to watching one house again and I'm doing pretty good on the pain front by keeping my diet low fat. Tylenol keeps it manageable during the day and the kick ass meds the nurse prescribed knock me out an night. I'm getting some good rest. Hey, I hear having your gall bladder removed is good for about a 15 pound weight loss!

You haven't seen the last of me...

So I call the clinic of the physician I see since I moved to Kansas to discuss treatment options for my condition. I hardly ever go to the doctor. Firstly I'm incredibly healthy in spite of my former drinking habits, my former obesity, and my continuing addiction to nicotine. Second, my lack of health insurance has made it so that visits to the doctor are a necessary, not just an I don't feel so hot proposition. I haven't had a drink in almost 10 years, I'm not as slender as I could be, but still 65 pounds below my all-time high, and I'm not going to beat myself up about the fact that I can't quit smoking. Sure, I'd live longer if I did, but what they don't tell you is those extra years are the bedpan years. I'll pass thank you. Besides, there's no way for me to quit smoking without going postal on everyone in a two hundred mile radius so you can all thank me now for not quitting.

I speak with Dr. X's nurse who listens to my brief description of why I'd like to see the doctor and after a few minutes comes back on the line to inform me that Dr. X doesn't do second opinions (which is not at all what I've asked for) and that since they have a doctor that just quit the practice leaving them short handed and I've only ever been to see them once, Dr. X declines to set an appointment with me. I am dumbstruck. First, I know I've been there more than once. Three occasions come to mind immediately (I'm sure I can think of more given time), plus he is the primary care physician of my nephew, who lived with us for years and he's the primary for my life partner. WTF? I thank her and hang up. After a night sleeping on this development, I decide to write Dr. X a letter asking him to reconsider his decision:

Dear Dr. X,
I am writing to protest your refusal to set an appointment for me to discuss with you a diagnosis I recently received after a trip to the emergency room at Unnamed Hospital.

Your staff could only find one record of my visiting you, which is incorrect. I personally have seen you or another physician at your clinic on at least three occasions over the past 5+ years. My very first visit to you was when my life partner and I were adopting our nephew and the process required that each member of our household undergo a physical examination. We were very new to the area and chose to keep our healthcare local rather than go to Manhattan or Topeka. I am ridiculously healthy and am not one of those people who calls the doctor every time they get a hangnail so my visit count with you is low. Sorry, I'm not going to be the patient that funds a new wing at the hospital. The low visit count is also due to the fact that until recently I had no health insurance so a trip to the doctor for me was something that was done only, only, only when absolutely necessary.

My life partner is a patient of yours and you are the primary care physician for our nephew. They have received frequent treatment from you and other physicians at your clinic. I feel I may have been penalized in this instance because there is not a familial relationship of blood or marriage noted in your clinical records reflecting the fact that we are indeed a family that is treated by you and Clinic X.

My recent visit to the emergency room has resulted in a diagnosis of stones in the gall bladder. I do not disagree with this diagnosis and am not looking for a second opinion or someone to either confirm or refute the diagnosis. The emergency room doctor, Dr. Z, is not my primary care physician (due to my good health I don't declare a primary care physician, I've had no need to) and since he is affiliated with the healthcare clinic at Unnamed Hospital, I elected to continue seeing him on this issue for the purposes of medical care continuity, not out of any physician preference or loyalty. What I do disagree with is his recommended course of action. He will not detail any options but one for this condition and I wanted to speak with someone else regarding all the options, however remote they may be, for this condition's successful outcome.

Therefore, I humbly request that you reconsider your decision and grant me a few moments of your time to discuss what my healthcare options are for this condition.

Sincerely,
Your Patient (who is in great deal of pain)

Now, I truly hope he will reconsider. If not, I fear his name will arise in a negative connotation in every blog I can possibly post to every time someone Google's his name.

The Hope Diamond?

...and so begins my frustration with conventional medical care.

The results of my endoscopic exam were no ulcer. So why am I taking medication for an ulcer? I thought this was a good question. So when I called my diagnosing physician on Wednesday to discuss the endoscopy results, schedule something to take another look at my gall bladder (which had previously been dismissed as a cause), and ask if I should continue the ulcer medications I was told, "The endoscopy did not rule out an ulcer lower in your system so continue the drugs." This instruction came from the clinic nurse as Dr. Darey was a little too busy to come to the phone. But they did in fact schedule a sonogram of the gall bladder for Thursday morning.

The technician who performed the procedure did not offer any information as to what she might have seen, the results must be interpreted by a radiologist and then forwarded to my doctor. Fortunately the referring physician's clinic is located there at the hospital where the ultra-sound exam was performed so I didn't think there would be too much lag time. I was not disappointed, he called shortly after I left to tell me I had a stone of large proportions in my gall bladder and probably several smaller ones keeping it company. He continued to explain that the hospital had a surgeon that could perform a removal of the offending organ this coming Monday. Excuse me? Do not pass go, do not collect $200, go directly to surgery?

I don't think so. I'd already researched gall bladder disorders and knew that there were at least two less invasive (and also less successful) treatment options that could be taken prior to surgery. He was not even willing to discuss them saying, "In my experience, surgery is the most successful way to deal with this condition." You're all of 28 years old you little whipper-snapper. I'm old enough to be your mother so don't you dare use the phrase "my experience" in a sentence with me!

The before-you-go-to-surgery methods are drugs to dissolve the stones (slow going), a procedure that injects a flammable anesthesia into the bladder to dissolve the stones (very dangerous), and a sound wave therapy that pulverizes the stones into a size where they can pass naturally from the bladder. Since my stones are likely cholesterol stones that are a direct result of my excessive chocolate and donut consumption of the past three months, I see no reason why I can't do the following:

1. Quit stuffing my face with donuts.
2. Quit stuffing my face with chocolate.
3. Take the stone dissolving drugs.

Since my attending physician is unwilling to discuss alternate methods with me, I have an appointment to meet with the nurse that I normally see at his clinic. I trust her and I know that she'll give me the straight line on whether or not this is an option for me. I also plan to make an appointment with the physician I've seen the most (which is not much as I'm ridiculously healthy most of the time) since I moved to Kansas.

Today sucked

The pain was about a 3-4 all day. It woke me at 2:43 pm. God I shouldn't have had that Big Mac and fries for dinner. I tossed about for an hour before I decided I'd be more comfortable just getting up and having some cereal. My stomach has been gurgling and I've been belching all day long. Nothing seems to offer any relief except the Tylenol which I take sparingly. I debate returning to what works best for pain, ibuprofen. Hey, I have no ulcer, why not use the good stuff?

I'll tell you why. I've spent a good deal of the afternoon researching gall bladder disorders and it's not pretty. Chances are the ibuprofen is partly to blame due to it's effect on the liver. And everything I've read tells me that gall bladder stones start in the liver. Of course conventional medicine want to immediately rip the gall bladder out, and while that does appear to make the pain cease and desist, it has a very negative effect on your digestive process---for the rest of your life. I have no intention of ruining my perfect track record of no invasive procedures to the body if there are other options.

So tomorrow I go for a sonogram of my gall bladder to see if it's well and truly stoned. I expect this to be the case. If the current crop of stones cannot be eradicated with ultrasound, then I expect I will take the homeopathic route and make diet modifications (I have a sneaking suspicion that my high donut consumption as of late may be a contributor), I may even go so far as to try the gall bladder cleansing that I've read so much about today. Seems like everyone but the MD's are behind it. I should probably also consult my chiropractor. I read a blog entry by a woman who swears by her Chinese Herbalist but I doubt I will find anything like that in the middle of Kansas. Still the Herbalist's gall bladder cleansing routine sounds much like the other only with nasty herbs instead of oil.

Today's food intake: Cereal for breakfast, Macaroni and Cheese (apparently cheese is a no-no, but it's my favorite food) for lunch and I'll probably have the rest of the Mac n cheese for dinner along with a bagel. Drinks were my two cups of coffee, lots of water and ginger ale left out to go flat before drinking. I should probably skip the fatty ice cream tonight. Nothing after midnight, but the sonogram doesn't involve drugs to knock me out so I'll be ready for breakfast when it's done!

Sun comes up, it's Tuesday morning...

Well Tuesday all the meds had worn off and I definitely knew someone had stuck a tube down my throat, but it was just irritation, not pain. Work was crazy, but I'm going to stick by my policy of only mentioning that subject in passing. Suffice it to say I slept well, two hours on the couch (during the hockey game) and then the rest of the night in bed. Up before the alarm due to the "extra" sleep.

If neither the hernia, nor the Shatzki's Ring are responsible for the pain I am feeling I guess it's time to look a little more closely at the gall bladder...

Not an ulcer...

...but not out of the woods yet. Hmmm, does this mean I have to change the label for these entries? Naw, that's what we started out thinking and that's what we'll leave it as.

It's not an ulcer, it's a combination of two things. That nasty almost pneumonia I had a while back? The one that had me coughing like a lung was going to be expelled? Well apparently that gave me a hiatal hernia. It's a small one and it will in all likelihood heal on it's own. It's treated with the same medications as the ulcer as the main symptom is acid in the esophagus.

The other issue is a heretofore undiscovered birth defect called a Schatzki Ring. It's an area of the esophagus where it's much narrower than above or below. Normally not a problem until you add in some stomach acid. Once the hernia's healed it should cause no problems but if it does, it's a simple balloon dilation procedure done by the GI guy again using the endoscope.

Yes, I'm relieved, but not thrilled about the other two items. Still they are non-life threatening and manageable. I now know why no one blogs about the actual procedure. No one freakin' remembers it! The last thing I remember before the procedure is nurse Michelle spraying the local on my throat and telling me to swallow. The next thing I remember is the Missus stroking my hair and asking if I was awake. Demerol good. Demerol very good.

More research...

So I'm looking for personal accounts of endoscopic exams today. Not a whole lot of blogging going on about the subject, probably due to the aforementioned drugs. No one seems to actually remember the procedure. Did find one post from a woman who's friend underwent the procedure without the mind-altering drugs, just the local and the friend's recommendation was: TAKE THE DRUGS!!!!!! Have yet to find any horror stories and, quite relievedly, no posts where the last post ever made to the blog was, "I'm undergoing an endoscopy tomorrow..."

I believe I've mentioned that my digestive tract is operating at a snail's pace and I constantly feel bloated. My stomach looks distended and yet I've lost 10 lbs. over the past month. How I managed to do that on a steady diet of chocolate and doughnuts is beyond me and if I think about it too long, I'm sure I can diagnose myself with some rapidly progressing form of cancer quicker than you can say Dr. Kevorkian was just released. The whole point of the previous is that one of the things they do during the procedure is to pump you full of air in order to give the camera some room to maneuver and have a clear view. I pray that the drugs will make me ignore that feeling and hope one of the medications does something to suppress my gag reflex. I would hate to be the patient that hurls all the contents of her stomach across some unsuspecting doctor. It's a small town, I'm sure the word would get around...

On the sleep front the news only gets better. I'm used to performing some combination of sleeping positions during the night to fend off lower back pain. My modes are:

1. On my back with a pillow under my knees
2. On my left side with the body pillow tucked between or under one knee and right arm slung across the top of it
3. The reverse of item 2

Because of the odious discomfort and pain caused by my condition, I've only been able to sleep in position 3 which does nothing for my low back. This morning I woke up in position 2, the first time I've been able to sleep on my left side without pain for over two weeks. And that's a victory, folks!

Research

...so I'm researching endoscopic exams on the internet, the great font of all knowledge. Lot's of stuff from the medical community on the subject. Sounds pretty straightforward. Wondering though if I shouldn't have the best friend accompany me on this outing instead of the Missus. Would hate to be grilled by her whilst still under the effects of the supposed truth serum-like drugs they will apparently pump me full of. Not that I have anything to hide, mind you. I'm faithful and true as the day is long, she just doesn't like to hear my truths when they are in direct conflict with her unique view of Our World According to the Missus. On the other hand, I'm totally looking forward to being stoned again...

Another good night

Seems like the new combo of meds is doing the trick. I'm far from 100% but I really started feeling better Wednesday night and that was my first good night of sleep in a while. I don't get enough sleep to begin with (and I'm not complaining really because that's my own damn fault) so when I'm sick enough to make the little sleep I get even more ineffective, it just colors my whole life.

I got the appointment for the endoscopy set for this coming Monday. I was a little upset that it wasn't made for sooner, but really, the way my stomach has been feeling it's probably a good thing that it's taking a little while. Don't think I would have gotten it any sooner living in a larger city so I'm satisfied. Had a moment of comic horror in making the appointment. They weren't sure if the paper work I need to fill out would reach me via mail so I said it was OK to fax it to me at work. I figured I could either go haunt the fax machine until it came in or if the receptionist got to it before I could, I wouldn't be too embarrassed about the information being seen by someone else. WRONG!!!! They faxed the wrong paper work. Well, the forms were right regardless, but the instructions were for an entirely different procedure with an entirely different approach. Do you see where I'm going here?

My departmental co-worker brings me the eight page fax and I think there was a smirk on his face, but he's always smiling so who knows...I flip the cover page and there in huge letters at the top of the page is the word Colonoscopy. WTF? Excuse me, you people are not taking the scenic route to get a look at my ulcer. The shortest distance between the nearest entrance and my ulcer involves a mouth approach! In a panic I dial the doctor's office to confirm that I understand which procedure I'm scheduled for. The woman who faxed the info is gone for the day, but the receptionist checks my record and says I'm scheduled for an [insert acronym here] . I say I don't know what that alphabet means will you please tell it to me in layman's terms. She replies they'll be going down my throat. I say thank you, because if you're going the other way I'll pass and just suffer out the rest of my days. Still, before I go I believe some felt pen on my ass that says, "Exit only. Do Not Enter" is in order...

So Thursday I felt well enough to make the Appleby's run that we IT people had planned for last Thursday when I first got sick. We got a gift certificate from one of our co-workers for some work we'd done on her personal computer and wanted to spend some quality time out of the office together so we could eat drink and bitch and moan with impunity. We had a great time. I really like the guys I work with. I'm sure there are times when I piss them off as much as they piss me off, but when all is said and done I think we are a great team and work well together. I probably ate too much on this little outing, but I was not as uncomfortable as I have been over the past week so it was a victory. I just wish my digestive tract would speed up a little. It just seems to take forever to get things to make it from going in to coming out but I'm told that's a side effect of the meds. Can't wait for all this to be over.

To sleep, perchance to dream

Well I don't know if I dreamt last night but I do know that from the time my head hit the pillow until my alarm went off, I did not awaken once (that I remember). I started feeling better about 9:30 pm and slept lying down. I felt rested when the alarm woke me up.

I'm still really tender in the top of my abdomen, but I was actually feeling good enough to cancel the upcoming endoscopy. Then I decided that I didn't want to have to make that appointment again if this should recur a month from now.

Still think it's an ulcer

So the doc and I went over all my notes from the weekend. I kept track of what I ate and when. What meds I took and when I stopped the one that I thought was hurting more than helping. What made me feel better; what made me feel worse.

He still thinks it's an ulcer, but it may be a biggun. The mother of all ulcers. He agreed that two of my complaints may have been a result of too high a dose of the p*r*e*v*a*c*i*d so he cut that in half and threw a new med into the mixture. He's also going to schedule me for an endoscopic exam. If it is a big ulcer, it's going to increase the healing time and we need to know that. If it's not an ulcer, we need to know that too so we can move on to a more appropriate treatment. He mentioned hernia and of course, the C word as other possibilities.

Last night I was able to sleep all night in my bed, only waking up once at 12:30 to swig some Pepto, but then I was awake again at 3:30 for good. I call that an improvement.

A Six

That's what I've gotten up to on the ulcer pain scale between Sunday and today. Not enough for another trip to the emergency room, but enough that I will be calling the doc in the morning because I don't think I should be feeling this much pain. Fortunately my attending is also the doc that saw me at the emergency room so there'll be no catch-up factor.

Guilty?

The missus is feeling guilty about my ulcer, as well she should. No, she's not the only cause but I only had to be missing one of the four contributors for it not to have happened and after all the shit I've put up with for the past ten years, it's about time she took some responsibility. There, I feel better.

So she waited on me hand and foot Thursday. Friday I was well enough for work again and after grocery shopping (on the way home from work) she took me out to dinner. Today she sat through three hours in a movie theater (an unheard of feat) so I could see the new Pirates movie (which is specatacular!) and then grilled my favorite steak exactly the way I like it.

We also met up with the tow truck driver so he could deliver my car and the replacement brake part out to my mechanic's house. Hopefully he will work on it this weekend and next week I will once again have a car that stops when you press on the brake pedal.

Now if you'll exuse me, I'd like to get some rest...

Don't ask for whom the bell tolls

...it tolls for me. I don't remember Tuesday night, but Wednesday night is firmly etched in my brain. Pain. Lots of it. Up all night. Chest pain on the internet. Knowing my history I vacillate between heart attack and ulcer. Two grandfather's dead in their early 40's of heart failure and the knowledge that women's heart attacks are frequently mis-diagnosed as severe indigestion have me worried. On the other hand ibuprofen abuse, caffeine and nicotine addiction and the unusually high level of stress in my life over the past year have me 99.9% sure it's an ulcer.

When my hot-hot morning shower still leaves me pale as a camp-bunk sheet, I opt to go to the emergency room at the Podunk hospital. Based on the average age of the local residents, I figure they are well versed in heart attack protocol and I'm not disappointed. Before I am finished spelling my last name I am whisked to a bed and hooked up to an EKG. When the first dose of nitroglycerin lessens the pain, I really start to panic and my blood pressure crests like a tsunami in Indonesia. After assurances from the nurse that nitro makes everything feel better, I subside to a more normal level of fear.

EKG looks good. Subsequent doses of nitro lessen the pain no further and I start to wrap my head around the fact that I've finally managed to develop one monster of an ulcer. Treatment? Knock off the ibuprofen, cut down on the caffeine, quit smoking (riiiiight) and reduce stress levels. Oh, so I'm supposed to quit my job and girlfriend?

Hot tip from the heartland...if you have stomach acid, for god's sake don't take Tums. Turns out that added calcium actually increases stomach acid. Go figure. The manufacturer adds something that causes stomach acid to their product.

Busy day, busy night

The day just flies when it's busy and so does the night. A mole invaded my freshly weeded flower bed and I had to kill him. Sorry, but it's the only way. I did pick up the plants for my color pots and to fill in the bare spots from last year's annuals, but I don't know when I'll get to getting them in the ground. Tomorrow's supposed to be stormy.

I'm working on a co-worker's personal computer. It's a mess. I don't think her kids ever saw a download they didn't like. It's full of all sorts of nasties so I spent the night making a cd of utilities to try and clean it up. Tomorrow, we'll see how it does.

Hiatus?

Just for a day Everything that happened tonight goes in a different blog.

Quiet in the country

Slept in again! What's up with that? Usually one weekend morning I'm rudely awakened by someone telling me the dogs need to go out...am I dying?

Caught an auction at the Clarion and the department store was having a BOGO $ .99 sale that I couldn't pass up. Meat on the grill and then a little catching up on email. I think it might have been the perfect day.

Everything's Relative

We had a visitor from the west coast last night. Three visitors in fact. We got a call early this morning from my partner's nephew. Seems his mother gifted him with a car and he, his wife, and their baby flew into St. Louis to get it and drive it back to California. We are just off the interstate on the way back so he wanted to stop and visit. He's doing well now that he's gotten the teen-aged wildness behind him and before his hormones kicked in back in the late 90's I'd always enjoyed his company. I wasn't really looking forward to meeting his girlfriend or the baby. I rank a zero on the maternal instinct scale. Never wanted children so babies hold no attraction for me.

They arrived promptly at 5:30 and we had a wonderful dinner of grilled steaks and some nice sides. He's even more handsome now. Works a physical job so he's in excellent condition and smart enough to hold his own in a conversation with me. The girlfriend is not at all what I expected. Based on nephew's mother's description I expected welfare grabbing, spam sucking trailer trash. She's not that at all. She's polite, can speak in complete sentences with proper grammar and pronunciation. She clearly adores both nephew and their child. And the child. Babies don't make me all ga-ga, but this one is clearly special. Tiny, quiet, beautiful. She looks like a doll I saw advertised in one of the Sunday paper circulars. Life-like skin, eyes and hair, the doll is baby perfection if I ever saw it. Well this live baby looks just like that. She was so quiet I barely knew there was a baby in the house. Honestly the dogs made more noise about being banished outside that this child did.

Girlfriend clearly was impressed with the house and grounds. My partner had me fire up my laptop and we took her on a tour of available local properties at one of the large internet real estate sites. She was quite in awe of how far your housing dollar can go once you get away from LA. We reiterated our offer to nephew of assistance in housing, etc. if he would move here to attend the school we've recommended to him on several occasions. Completing the courses at this school would enable him to pretty much write his own ticket just about anywhere in the country and all it would take is a one year investment on his part. I think we now have his girlfriend in our court and may see some success in getting him to do this. He works hard now, has admitted his past errors and has risen above them. It would be nice if he would accept a little assistance now in order to make a brighter future possible for him and his family.

Aggieville, Alky-ville

Every college town has it's bar section and even Podunk, Kansas is no exception. Ours is Aggieville, in tribute to the days when K-State was pretty much just an AG college. Every other store front seems to be a bar, cheap eats, coffee shop, or other retailer targeting the students. Some are nicer than others. Some are pluperfect pits of despair. I went to one of each last night.

Co-worker #1 and I hit Buffalo Wild Wings where my partner in crime proceeded to get me hooked on trivia games. Interactive trivia games. Halfway through the first game, the batteries on my player started to die and I was forced to play on a second unit. Because I was unable to log out of the first unit, I had to play the rest of the night with an alternate identity. And of course I could answer every single question in the game we sat out, but I had a blast. The food was good and so was the company.

Co-worker #1 was supposed to accompany me to the location (The Pit) where co-worker #2 was running the sound board for the bands playing but he pussied out because he had to get up early in the morning for a volunteer stint at a charity function. I don't know why I hate The Pit so much because the babies running interference for under-age drinkers usually card me at the door, which makes me feel young. Could it be the aroma of beer-vomit that hangs like an invisible cloud? The smell of stale smoke and used condoms in the bathroom? I won't call it a rest room, you wouldn't want to spend any time resting there...

Co-worker #2 has several electronic boxes set up on one of the tables on the patio (at least the air is fresh there) with pretty blinking lights everywhere, most of which he says "...mean nothing." So far no other co-workers are present but we don't have long to wait until they start trickling in. The band on stage, Squished Bread, was supposed to be a trio but they've imported a slide guitar player who was the best of the bunch, yet unmiked due to his unexpected presence. They are playing the sort of music I expected to hear when I moved to Kansas, corn-pone, barn-raisin' country. Of note was their version of Paradise, a song I used to cover when I sang with Al & Arlen. They slowed the beat waaaay down and it was an interesting cover. I wish the slide guitar had been miked as he was the stand-out on this song. Co-worker #2 says the headliner rocks, but I can feel Squished Bread killing my weaker brain cells and it is rather late so I bid my friends good night and head for the hills.

In the Garden of Eden

It's Spring and the garden beckons. Even after working a full day, there is daylight long enough for me to spend a couple of hours in the flowerbeds in the evening. I trimmed all the stuff that got killed in the late cold snap and pulled all the little weeds that are poking out, most of which can have their life cycle interrupted by merely stirring up the thick layer of cypress mulch. A couple of spots are bare, but I still have a bag from last spring that never got spread around.

All the roses save one are coming back from the freeze and most of the perennials too. Even the tulip magnolia that I butchered last year because it had gotten completely out of control. I still haven't done any new plantings, but I wanted to make sure that there would be no more cold and I wanted the flowers to last a little longer into the summer so this year I've intentionally delayed planting. I think this weekend will be spent sowing annuals, maybe some of the new perennials I saw, and creating my own color pots (although the ones at w*a*l*m*a*r*t looked awfully nice yesterday. There was some dark bird with bright red blazes under the wings flitting about the garden section and singing at the top of it's lungs. I love Spring. Can't wait for the fireflies...

AA...again

Gosh, I just can't seem to skip those pesky meetings, can I. Especially the ones where I've made commitments. Wednesday I'm the secretary and for May I'm the clean-up detail. I would rather hang after the meeting than have to get there early so if at all possible, I sign up for clean-up rather than set-up or Greeter. Still I do occasionally function in those other roles. I presented the flyer I've made for our annual picnic meeting, a masterpiece if I do say so myself. Then I did something really stupid. I agreed to speak at a meeting. It's someone else's annual picnic meeting and it's out at the lake, which means it's probably going to be big. Not just one group like I'm used to, but all the groups that meet at that particular location throughout the week. I can't believe I'm saying yes to this. I haven't done any public speaking since I got my new teeth. But it's rude to say "no" to an AA request so I suck it up and will do it. Maybe this time I can get through it without notes. I should be able to do that. It is, after all, my life.

When I got home I realized it was time to update WIIW and I hadn't done any prep work beyond getting the new puzzle ready so that took up the remainder of the evening and that's what the hell happened last night.

Where the hell have I been?

Well, what the hell happened for the past few nights is I've been off in the wilds of Oregon visiting the male parental unit. He's a caveman. He has satellite TV but no computer, no internet. Positively primitive. Still, I gotta love the old guy. He bought me a retirement home in La Pine. Just 20 short minutes south of Mt. Bachelor. God I love to ski. I just hope I'm still young enough to enjoy it when I am ready to settle in there.

I'm back now and will keep in touch more often...

A Woman's Work Is Never Done

I cleaned house. My partner has been out of town on business and when she's gone, I lose the extreme neat-freak tendency and just let the place go. I also moved into the master bathroom while she was away so I could re-caulk the shower in my bathroom and give it plenty of time to a) do a good job and b) have plenty of time to dry before being used again.

I have a movie I need to watch, Flags Of Our Fathers, but it will have to wait until another day while I spiffy up the place...

One Day At A Time

I went to an AA meeting. It was definitely a meeting I needed to attend as I heard a lot of things I needed to hear and was reminded of the things I really need to do to maintain a sober, happy, mentally healthy life. I almost blew it off since I really should clean house before my better half returns from a business trip but I've learned that when I'm thinking I can afford to miss a meeting, I can't afford to miss a meeting.

Will This Never End?

Another stormy day in Kansas. The water rises all around. I can't believe how high the rivers are and my pond is almost back to pre-drought levels. The storms are only severe tonight. No tornado warnings but when lightning stikes a tree in the backyard, the dogs and I decide another evening in the basement probably isn't a bad idea.

Tornado Warning

The animals and I hid in the basement most of the night because the weather man told us to. We left one animal upstairs, Darwin,* as a sacrifice to the tornado gods.




*Actually Darwin wouldn't come out from under the bed to go to the basement. I wouldn't intentionally sacrifice an animal, would I?

Home Alone

I found out it's going to cost almost $500 to fix the turn signals on my car. Yeah, I could probably use hand signals, but that's not really an option when it's pouring rain or even hailing (not that I do a lot of driving in hail, I try to avoid that). Besides, I'm not sure if anyone under the age of 40 understands exactly what it is I"m doing when I'm sticking my arm out the window. Still, I imagine one or two tickets for forgetting to do the old hand signal will about match the cost of the repair so I'll bite the bullet and get it done. The part should be in next Tuesday.

I stopped at the local hardware store to rent a sawzall so I can install the new bigger-better doggie door for the girls. I'm sure once they see the improved version installed they'll be running in and out of it pell-mell.

Dinner consisted of yummy leftovers from dinner at Harry's. After dinner I spent far too much time on the Internet catching up on other peeps diaries and fell exhausted into bed. And that's what the hell happened last night...

Dinner at Harry's

Harry's Uptown is the high end restaurant in Manhattan, Kansas. I've always loved going there and by the standards of where I used to live (Los Angeles), Harry's is not that expensive. I'm not sure why we don't go there more often. Probably because the last thing we want to do after getting home from work is drive all the way back into town (a trip of what, 13 minutes?) to have dinner out. Amazing that we used to drive an hour and a half to visit insert-name-of-popular-restaurant-here yet we've become so Kansas that driving more than 5 minutes to get to anything seems like an outrageous amount of time.

But I digress. What the hell happened last night is that my best friend and I went out to dinner at Harry's. We were wild, we were decadent, we were starving. She started with the lobster salad while I chose the smoked chicken pizza. Her prime rib was medium, mine was as rare as possible. She finished with the home-made chocolate-chip cheesecake while I had some trendy looking thing of mascarpone cheese with a vaguely unpleasant tasting cookie sticking up out of it like a remnant of the WTC towers, all of it drenched with under-ripened raspberries.

Going to Oregon

We booked our trip to visit my father in Oregon. After we got the flight booked the internet broke and the only car rental site that would load was A*v*i*s. I think their IT people launched a DoS attack on all the other car rental companies (and I tried them all) so that people could only reserve cars at A*v*i*s. If that's how A*v*i*s tries harder, I recommend you buy stock in the company. They obviously know what they are doing...

Oops! Another blog...

I tried to get to my blogger blog using the wrong login (blogger instead of google). On load, blogger informed me I had no blogs did I want to create one?

That's how whatthehellhappenedlastnight got created.

Then I saw the blurb about "...are you missing a blog from this list? Try logging in with your google account. So now I have two blogger blogs...

Just what I needed...another blog.

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