ProfessorTomoe

Crystal Light lemon tea mixed with orange juice. It's 2/3rds of my standard post-op/procedure/whatever recuperation drink. I'd include cranberry juice, but I've already gone through it.

Even if it's "chase on sight?" Baker still won't let Loudmouth into the living quarters of the house. There's no hissing, but there's no passing, either. EDIT: I saw Loudmouth come out of the hallway and go to get some water from the big water fountain. He then went back down the hall, past Baker. Baker started to chase, but Loudmouth stood his ground and hissed him away. Baker looked seriously surprised. They've kept this up for several minutes now—long enough to get Mrs. Prof out of bed and have her give them a talking to. I guess the hissing isn't over with after all. Sigh.

Much appreciated. It's getting a little easier to concentrate now. Just had some cottage cheese to boost the metabolism and brain function. Haven't been able to keep up with my pills today, hydrocodone excluded.

Yeah, and you've got to put up with all of those obnoxious Steeler fans in your new place ...

Mrs. Prof managed to get a pill down Loudmouth's gullet tonight without my help (of which I wouldn't have been any). I think she scruffed him, but I'm not sure. I think this is either pre-scruff or post-scruff tonight. Not sure which.

Quick pic: Loudmouth's roommate Baker, apparently melted from the Texas heat: I had to do some white balance adjustment and gamma correction to get the mud out of this picture. Irfanview 64 is such a wonderful program.

5:38 p.m. CDT 20170818. Still recovering. I had a moment where I almost fell due to trouble walking this morning. Right now, I'm on my second ice pack of the day on my back. The doctor says I can have up to three today, and I'm gonna need 'em. Still having trouble concentrating on things. Breathing is hard enough to concentrate on.

Question: how can you tell when bullying behavior has transformed into play behavior? Baker is still chasing loudmouth down the hall when he sees him, but there is no "hissss" at the end of the chase. Mrs. Prof says that, instead, they both wind up on top of the mattress. Is Baker still bullying Loudmouth, or are they playing now?

8:00 a.m. CDT 20170819. I hate waking up from procedures. Thank you for your good wishes on making this one a good wake-up. I'm still woozy and still surprised that this was the only wheelchair-optional hospital I've ever been to. It was quite a walk to the car, and getting in wasn't easy at all. Can't sit up long on this one. Will stay in touch. Thanks for all you've done.

9:09 p.m. CDT 20170818. I am home, and I seem to be okay. I'm a bit sore, and I will be for 3-5 days until the cortisone kicks in on the proper nerve endings. Thanks for the good wishes. I'm going back to sleep for now.

10:15 a.m. CDT 20170818. Just took my last hydrocodone before the procedure. Waiting for it to kick in a little before I take a shower. That's as difficult as driving. Got a bit of a chill. That's one thing I hate about hospitals, operations, and "procedures"—they're always so cold. 10:21 a.m. CDT. Mrs.Prof is taking her shower first, leaving me to sit here, shiver, and think about the next part of the procedure that I can't stand—the I.V. Lord, I absolutely hate them, and my veins do, to. They seem to know when a needle is coming. They'll trick the nurse into thinking they've found one, then run and hide. I can't count the number of times they've had to re-start an I.V. on me. A couple of times, they've gone in one side of the vein, out the other, and started it anyway. I get horrible, painful bruises when they do that. 10:35 a.m. CDT. The hydrocodone is finally starting to kick in. Mrs. Prof is finishing up her shower, so it's my turn now. See you after the procedure!

4:52 a.m. CDT 20170818. My appointment is less than eight hours away, with the actual procedure scheduled for 1:00 p.m. or so. I can have liquids until 5am, and then I can take my 10am hydrocodone dose with a small swallow of water. I can hydrate for just a few more minutes. Mrs. Prof actually found Beef Consommé at the store and complained about the price when she got home. She wouldn't if she tasted it. It's high up on the umami scale, with soy sauce, carrots, celery, and onion, all cooked in and reduced then strained. I don't remember the exact recipe, but I think I saw Julia Child make it once. Very good stuff. Nom. My last meal before the procedure. 5:08 a.m. CDT. I've hydrated as much as I can. All that's left is my shower, brushing my teeth, and the 10am hydrocodone dose. No other liquids. I'm going to try and stay asleep as much as I can, and that won't be difficult—the hydrocodone is already making it hard for me to see. Thank God I already have all of my paperwork filled out. The nerves are kicking in, so I'm going to take advantage of the "small sip of water" rule to take an extra lorazepam, since I won't be able to take it at my normal time today. I'll chronicle any other thoughts that come to mind. Hopefully there won't be that many. Please wish me luck.

I've talked to Mrs. Prof, and her Bucket-list item was fulfilled when the WWII monument went up in DC. Her father didn't talk much about what he saw at Normandy, probably because of all of the carnage he witnessed. I'm not sure she'd want to go by herself, especially since she didn't make LHB during auditions.

Mrs. Prof checked the rain gauge a little while ago. We've received SEVEN INCHES recently—enough to bring our dying basil herbs back to life!

You speak the truth there. That's what I went through in the 2009 broken ankle disaster. It took them an hour per ankle for the rebuild operation. In other news, this 60mg hydrocodone daily total is harder than hell to get used to. I'm getting hit by an uppercut every time I take a dose.

For the first time since we brought him inside, Loudmouth ate kitty snacks! He's always turned them down before. We've offered him the Cat-Man-Doo chicken snacks and whatever snacks are freeze dried raw (Baker wouldn't even touch the latter, and he's started barfing the former). Today, I tried the Orijen snacks. Baker loved them. Loudmouth wouldn't take them from my hand, but he did eat them off of the cushion in front of him. Result! The Orijen snacks had boneless chicken, boneless turkey, chicken liver, turkey liver, and boneless flounder (?) as their ingredients. Weird mix, but I'm not gonna argue as long as the cats eat it.

3:56 p.m. CDT 20170817. Whew. Just talked to Baylor Scott & White's Pain Management department and cleared up one rather big point. I'm not going to be unconscious for two hours tomorrow. I'm only going to be out for 20 minutes. I will be there for two hours, though, mostly in post-op as they make sure I'm in good shape after the procedure and don't have any spinal damage. It's still a scary thought, as tomorrow's 12:20 p.m. CDT appointment time approaches.

And don't forget this timeless classic:

I'm a member of the University of Texas Longhorn Alumni Band, and as such an incredible opportunity has opened up to me. Here's the Longhorn Alumni Band (LHAB) invitation: Thanks to my health, I'm not going to be able to go. I can't even handle a trip down to Austin for an LHAB performance. There is no way, not even with tomorrow's procedure, that I would be able to guarantee my health through September 15 of this year, much less June of 2019. My wife's father came in on the second wave as a medic at Omaha Beach on D-Day and survived. Imagine what emotions she would experience at such an event. Damn frustrating thing to receive one day before the major medical procedure I'm going to go through.

Much appreciated. I'm driving Mrs. Prof a bit spare at the moment with my worrying. I get the feeling a Zofran emergency will be called for tonight. Two hours of back procedure. Not fun. Complete with wings on the finger? Now, that I can relate to! I can make a pinhole camera. At the very least, there's the Science channel's coast-to-coast coverage.

True, but a thunderstorm did spawn an EF4 just a couple of miles east of us (and just a couple of blocks west of our friends) the day after Christmas in 2015. We're in the zone where we live.

8:03 a.m. CDT 20170817. T minus 28 hours 17 minutes until I go into the hospital for my pain procedure. I'm getting nervous as hell, and Mrs. Prof isn't having it. I'm making a grocery list, since I can have things like soup and cranberry juice up until 8 hours before the 12:20 p.m. CDT procedure. One item on it is Campbell's Beef Consommé, which she claims she's never seen. I am dubious, since I used to do all of the household shopping until I got sick. I e-mailed her a link (you can see it here) so she can't say she doesn't know what it looks like. I have yet to hear from the hospital, and I'm starting to doubt that I ever will. I'll just show up at 12:20 tomorrow and get ushered back to a surgical area. I'm borderline freaking out, given my previous experiences. God, I'm just staring at the page here, trying to think of something to type, and nothing is coming up. My right back/side is hurting, and I can't take my next dose until 10am. I need strength that I don't have right now, and I don't know where I'm going to get it from. I am scared.

Loudmouth does not seem as freaked out by the current thunderstorm as your normal household cat. I mean, he had to live out in the stuff for several years.