The Plague

I knew I was doomed.

Jen brings a buffet of illness home with her each day after dealing with parents and students and other staff members who deal with parents and students. And that's to say nothing on my little team of six at the office who one by one have become with infected with clotted mucus, cemented sinuses, and swollen narrowed throats.

I washed my hands. I avoided touching my lips or eyes. I bathed in foul smelling generic hand sanitizer dispensed out of the over sized 32 ounce bottle I keep on my desk. I got sick. I don't know why I bothered to fight it. I should have just licked metallic bathroom stall locks at the office and been done with it.

As a result, the last week has passed in a haze. It's been a blur of getting through my ten hour days at work, getting home to eat easily prepared dinner items (veggie corn dogs are good, ya'll), zoning on the couch to some substandard reality television (which I dearly love, though rarely admit), and falling asleep between 8 and 9 in the evening, to get up at 4 the next morning and start it all again.

I haven't read much. I haven't written anything. And outside of the random kindness of my wife, haven't enjoyed much.

But today is different. Today, the haze feels like it has cracked a bit. I'm not in great shape yet, but it's the first day where you notice that things aren't all bad. I'm glad it happened today since I have to go stand in the cold rain for an hour or so tonight while waiting to get in to see Ben Folds play with Miniature Tigers.

Jen and I are spending zero money these days (and by zero, I mean none) so these tickets along with the ones I got for next month's Whigs show are going to have to last me a long time. Soon, there will be no entertainment for me that cannot be purchased with a leftover gift card from Christmas (thanks to the folks at Jen's school).

So, if you're bored tonight and in Columbus, come grab a scalped ticket off the street and come join us. I'll be the big geeky balding guy, most likely singing along from his usual post on the second tier of the LC's indoor room.

Thanksgiving and Everything After

Normally, me and the wife would pack up our meager potluck offering and head to my brother's place for Thanksgiving. This year though, Jen's mom flew into town, and as a result we wound up deciding to kick it at our house this year for the big feast. Now, I've never cooked Thanksgiving dinner in my life, but I figured I could muddle through. I did. Homeboy cooked it up and surprisingly everything came out pretty well. It might even stick as a new tradition. We'll see.

Friday, we just stayed close to home, drinking wine and watching movies. In the past, I've always referred to Black Friday as Godfather Day since we'd stay home and watch Godfather I & II (never...ever III). But, in mixed company we settled on me hitting Blockbuster for some flicks and then surfed the couch. I started getting antsy by the end of the day, feeling like I wasn't getting anything done, but it was good to just hang out with Jen's mom and kind of reconnect a bit with her.

Saturday was straight up drunkeration. We headed out to a couple of wineries and wound up bringing a case home with us to replenish a supply that had taken a surprising hit over the previous two days. With our supplies tucked away in the racks, we ended our night with yet more leftovers and opened a few bottles.

Our last day together was spent shopping. Jen's mother very generously gave us a bit of a Christmas present early. Jen wanted curtains, so we got to go shop for those. I've never shopped for curtains before, but it was exactly as much fun as I thought it might be. My mood lighted though once I was told that there would be enough cash left over for a record player. I've picked out a very basic model that I'm going to set up in the den with a new component system. Very old school. Can't wait.

And that's that. Mom-In-Law flew back Monday morning, and I'm back at work fighting a cold and just fighting to get through to another weekend. We're quickly using up 2008, and I gotta be honest, I'm not going to miss much of it. There were high points for sure, but I think mostly it was the kind of year you have to have to make you more grateful for all the goods ones.

Hope you all had a good long Thanksgiving weekend. I'll be around...

Snooze

Ahhh, the quiet life.

Jen, still trying to get over a cold and failing miserably, spent the weekend on the couch, leaving me to my own devices. I failed to get creative and spent most of the time hanging around her, fetching soup and Diet 7Up with liberal doses of cranberry juice added.

Saturday morning we had to go do ACT testing. This is something we each do for some extra spending money, and it's easy work. The supervisors are set up in individual classrooms, and I just roam around my assigned rooms, giving them breaks if they want them. Basically, I get paid to read my book in the company of teenagers. (Speaking of books, I'm reading "Heart Shaped Box" by Joe Hill. Good stuff. It wasn't until someone saw me reading it that they mentioned Joe is Stephen King's son. I hadn't realized, but now looking at his picture I don't know how I didn't see it. I'm about half through the book though, and it is really good. I've been striking out with my reading lately, so it's been fun to get into something again.) Not a bad gig. Plus, it's paying for my Kim Jong iLL frames and will finance a new creative endeavor I've got in the works.

It's strange to go back to a school though. Like the hospital, it's one of those worlds that are so easy to forget, but feel so familiar once you're forced to step back into it.


My view while patrolling the halls.

After testing, we had plans to go run around and do some shopping and then head over to my brother's place to see my sister-in-law (home from the hospital and doing well) and watch a football game that neither Jen nor I had much interest ing. She was feeling worse than ever though, so we cut our errands short and headed home. That's where she stayed the rest of the weekend.

I watched some slasher (Hatchet, Mr. Brooks) movies, played Dr. Mario with the infected one, did what cleaning I felt like and headed out on Sunday for our weekly supplies of frozen whole wheat waffles and Coke Zero. Jen slept on the couch both Saturday and Sunday, so I fell asleep each night watching reruns of the US version of The Office.

Big times, kids. Big. Times.

Sitting in the Waiting Room

Blogging from my phone from a hospital waiting room. My sister in law is on the table right now and they're removing more cancer that was just discovered. Her recovery time just doubled as a result. but she'll be ok. I'm not sure what to do with myself here in all this quiet.

The ceiling rises above me five stories. At the top is a balloon that got away from someone. It's a bit shrivelled and deflated making me think it has been up there a week or so.

There's no TV here but rather a monitor with patient's surgical updates displayed. Each patient is assigned a code number so there are no confidentiality issues. Nikki's code is 27313. I plan on addressing her as such from now on.

...

It's now hours later, and things have settled down. Nikki's surgery, which was supposed to be around two hours long, wound up being just over four after they found some suspicious cells along her bowel. The surgery went very well though, and they are confident that everything that could have been a problem was either removed or burned to a crisp. She's got a long recovery, but she's doing great so far. Good news pretty much across the board.

Jen and I debated going to see the Blue Jackets play tonight as it's their home opener, but decided to put it off. Watched the game on television instead and am now heading to bed. It's been a long day.

Vaya Con Dios, Felipe!

My sister-in-law is a nurse. That's the only reason why she was able to insist on a CAT Scan instead of the Sonogram when she was having Gallbladder troubles. The CT revealed a Gallbladder that was most likely dead along with a 7" X 4" mass that had taken over her left ovary. At first they called it a "genetic mass" and had a name for it that I've since forgotten.

Basically, it's a mass of genetic matter that has been with her since birth. Some people believe it's what's left of an unabsorbed twin. Within the mass there are sometimes teeth and hair. She felt dirty, like she was somehow flawed.

I tried to make her feel better by reminding her that people are just gross by our very nature. We're shitting, farting, seeping creatures who are nasty as a rule. She smiled, but we both knew seepage, no matter how unpleasant, isn't the same as a lump of stuff that may or may not have been a sister or brother in your belly. So instead, I named it. I figured if she had to have a growth like this, and it had hair and teeth, it might as well have a name, and so...Felipe was born.

Still freaked by the development, she pushed for further testing. Again, she's a nurse and it's probably the only reason she was accommodated so quickly. That's when they saw the shadow within the mass and said the word "cancer" for the first time. They would operate on the following Tuesday and determine exactly how bad things were from there. We prepared ourselves to say good-bye to Felipe.

Tuesday, I got to the waiting room with Jen just as my brother came into the room. They had taken her back, he said. The surgery would start any time now. We all sat down and stared at our shoes. She pulled a decent crowd, but it was a crowd that kept their heads down. Her friends, nurses who were making pests of themselves with the doctors, reported that the Gallbladder removal had started and was going well. They sat with us and we chatted.

The first surgeon came out with pictures. He explained his part of the surgery was a piece of cake, and that they were starting the removal of the mass now. I got to see Nikki's liver, and yes...I got to see Felipe. I saw no hair or teeth. To the untrained eye, Felipe looked like he belonged there. He was just another pink wad of internal mechanics that appeared to serve a purpose.

A couple hours later, the second surgery was completed and my brother was ushered into another room for the report. The cancer was confirmed, and a full hysterectomy was done. The prognosis was good though, There would be some chemotherapy, but this form of cancer was very receptive to treatment, and while there is some cleanup to do, everything looked great. This was a bit of spin of course. No direct lies were told, but they didn't go into the details that they disclosed today.

And still we don't know everything yet. The Pathology report is expected later today and that will tell the rest of the story. That will be the point that they are able to start discussing stages of the cancer and then get a specialist involved. And so we wait. There is always some piece of information that is out there on the horizon, and we are just now realizing that this is something we're going to have to deal with for a long time to come.

When it's all over though, I'm sure we'll have great stories to tell. These are the things that define families and relationships for a while, and that part of it I'm not concerned about. It will just intensify what we already have between us, and what is there is good stuff.

Consumerism at its Finest

With the fever gone, I'm left with a vague sense of disorientation and lungs that supply a never ending supply of Bubbalicious-sized wads of phlegm. Oh, yes...it's as delicious as it sounds. At least I'm getting back to my good old gross self.

Last night we finally got cable connected for our new home theater setup. Two knuckleheads rolled in behind schedule and rushed to just get through the job. They were terrible. After pushing a hole through the drywall in the wrong spot (just four feet off from their target) and just narrowly missing my dogs that I had caged to keep them from being under foot, I was the one that had to measure to get them in the right spot. It had taken us forever to get the time scheduled, and I just wanted the box installed, so I stood over them and dictated what they should do and when. It sucked, but at the end of the night, I had an HD DVR installed and life is good. After a quick call to Time Warner cable this morning, we got all the install fees waived and they'll be out to patch the extra hole in my wall. Everything is finally set up, and now I just need to learn how to use everything.

Let's see...what other news is there? I'm approaching a new milestone in the diet. It won't be long before I cross the 130 lbs down mark. I'm hoping to get around the 150 lbs mark and then start transitioning off this lovely little diet and get on with a normal life. Well, my personal version of a normal life.

And then there's the television. The Series 750 LCD televisions by Samsung are the culmination of eons of evolution, decades of research and development, and the pinnacle of scientific toil. When combined with Blu Ray, the television perfectly recreates the majesty of nature across its 52" screen, while removing the annoying requirement of heading outside and getting exercise. When playing Grand Theft Auto IV, you can see the road grit on the city streets and the splintered skull fragments fly. When watching "Lost in Translation" you feel like you could curl up like a cat and nap inside one of Billy Murray's facial pits. It makes me wonder how anyone could handle watching pornography on a screen this size. I think it would scare me.

The television is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen, and it makes me proud to be a good little consumer. This much I know.

You Give Me Fever

When I was a kid, I got pneumonia and it kept me out of school for a solid month. When I first got sick, my fever was so high it scared my family. I remember being plucked into a freezing tub while my mom cracked ice trays into the water telling me that she knew it hurt, but I had to stay in the water. I don't know how high my fever went, but the hard-boiled feeling I had stuck with me. For what seemed an eternity I lay in bed, sweating my way through dreams and hallucinations. All of these years later, there's still one that I remember.

My eyes were open, which now tells me this was more of a hallucination that actual dream. The world was black and white like the small television I was allowed to have in my room at the time. I knew I was in bed, and could feel my wet sheets and soaked pillow under my head, but my bed was actually along the curb of a suburban street. When I opened my eyes, I could see a corner where children ran around, playing tag in the bright gray glow of a street light. I saw one boy chasing another, and was scared when I realized he had a spear in his hand. He got close to the slower boy he was chasing and flung the spear, hitting the kid and piercing him through the back and out his chest. The boy being chased stopped, laughed, and then pulled the spear through his chest and began chasing the other kids.

I hid my head behind my pillow, and tried to make myself as small as I could amongst the pile of sheets and blankets I had shoved to the side. When I opened my eyes to spy on the action, one of the kids had spotted me and was coming my way. The moment we made eye contact, he started running toward me and I knew there was no escape for me. When the spear went into me, I didn't feel a thing. The boy turned and began running back toward the streetlight. Relieved that I wasn't in pain, but angry at being picked out to be "it" I ripped the spear from my body, and flung it at the running child, catching him between the shoulder blades. He fell, and I don't remember him getting up.

Ever since that illness, my mind doesn't handle even the mildest of fevers with any form of grace. With a 100 degree temperature, the walls between sleep and wakefulness dissolve into a porous mess of consciousness making me uncomfortable and a bit paranoid. At the very least, it makes an average illness interesting.

So, I got sick Monday and took the day off yesterday to sleep on the couch. I had a pretty decent fever rolling, and so I curled up to sweat under some blankets (I was chattering teeth without them) and turned on my brand new 52" Samsung LCD TV (details in another post) and loaded up the five disc DVD player with some movies so I could have some background noise as I slipped in and out of consciousness. I chose what I thought would be good stuff to have in the background that I wouldn't have to think to hard about. It's not that they were all cheery options, but they were all choices that were very familiar to me that I could start watching at any point and know what was going on. I chose:

Lethal Weapon
Almost Famous
Six Feet Under (two discs of the first season)
Platoon
Lost in Translation

It wasn't until my fevered mind started to blend them all together in the late afternoon along with a touch of reality that I realized what a bad idea this was. Everything melted together and my dreams were filled with post-death reconstructions, poorly written cop-buddy banter, pretend 70's rock music, Viet Nam, and images of Bill Murray's quiet contemplation. I didn't think I would make it out alive.

Next time, I'm just going to leave the television off. Lesson learned.