ProfessorTomoe

http://www.egscomics.com/?id=2386

As with the thread from the previous incarnation of the board, I begin this one with a request that the information within remain confidential. This is a thread for those seeking support as they deal with very sensitive situations involving either their own or a loved one's health. Please let this be a thread where such information can be shared with a level of trust. Now, back to the topic at hand. I picked up my second filling of Brintellix yesterday—all $141 of it, for a month's supply. I find it odd that it is an antidepressant, yet the price is so high that it is depressing just to purchase it. As for its effects, I'm still getting used to them. I haven't been able to sleep for more than three hours at a time for a couple of weeks now. When I do wake up in the middle of the night, I'm not groggy. In fact, I feel for at least a short time that I've had a decent night's sleep. That sensation only lasts a few hours, though. I don't crash out—I just sort of fade to the point where I need to sleep again. Very weird. I've also lost weight. Not a lot, but every pound counts, and it's been a slow and steady drop. Some of this might be related to the small dose of metformin that I'm on (my A1C hit 6.5 again, causing my primary doctor to freak out). I seriously don't know. Whatever the reason, it made my cardiologist happy at my appointment yesterday. Speaking of cardiologists, mine determined that I am status quo as far as my PVCs are concerned. He hasn't seen them in the short 30-second EKGs he runs at every appointment, but the memory of my Holter monitor results from several years ago is enough to keep him on his toes. Still, he saw no reason to increase my lisinopril or to add a beta blocker to my shoebox full of medicines. I hope this thread will be as useful as the last one was. Thanks for any support you can provide.

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.

If you've kept up with one of the other threads on the Off Topic Forum, you'll have heard of a certain feral cat that sits outside our house and yowls for attention every night. Here's a picture of him: Due to the sheer volume his lungs can generate, as well as to his stamina (he can carry on for HOURS), Mrs. Prof and I long ago named him Loudmouth. We've doubted if he's really a true feral cat or an abandoned house cat, because he enjoys being petted and brushed and will even let you pick him up. Mrs. Prof tried once letting him indoors, but he acted too much like an alpha cat and didn't exactly get along with our indoor cat, Baker. However, he didn't freak out about being inside. Instead, he seemed comfortable being indoors. A few days ago, after Mrs. Prof went outside for the umpteenth time to pamper Loudmouth (who's even allowed her to treat him with Revolution), she broached the subject of bringing him inside. I didn't see any choice—it was either that, or live with the nightly yowling. She proceeded to spend this past weekend catifying one of the rooms of our house so that Loudmouth could be quarantined until properly introduced. Yesterday, she'd set up an appointment for both Loudmouth and Baker to be seen by the vet. Of course, when the time came to leave, Loudmouth was nowhere to be found. (She took Baker, though, who got a clean bill of health.) This morning, she went out back (see the above photo of our patio) to feed the ferals. Loudmouth was still a no-show. She checked the front door, which is where Loudmouth holds his nightly concerts. Bingo! Loudmouth was there, waiting for food and a brushing, She brushed him, and then went back inside and put food in the cat room, expecting to find Loudmouth still waiting out front. She then opened the front door. No Loudmouth. Just as a last chance, she checked the back again. Loudmouth had joined the ferals and was eating. She picked him up and brought him inside, saying to him, "Are you ready for your outdoor days to come to an end?" She then put Loudmouth in the cat room. Mrs. Prof has occasionally gone in to check on Loudmouth during the day. He's eaten, used the litter box, and, when she's been back there, he's been "very loving." He's shown no tendency to start up one of his opera performances. Yet. Outside the door, Baker has skulked around when Mrs. Prof has been in the room. He's a bit jealous and will need extra attention tonight, I think. Loudmouth will be taken to the vet on Thursday (the earliest day available for Mrs. Prof) to check for diseases. If he's got anything communicable, he goes back out. Otherwise, he gets treated and/or vaccinated. Then the process of acclimating him to our household will begin. Updates, possibly including Trail Cam photos from the cat room, will follow. This is going to be interesting.

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.

Should we throw in an EF-0, just for grins?

@mlooney and I will transport you both to the Tornado Alley area where you can experience the *real* joy of a supercell thunderstorm.

Ah, I feel flush with the power of the 1970s ...

We're weaning Baker off of the Elavil and putting Loudmouth on it, as per the doctor's original instructions. Loudmouth is extremely difficult to get a pill inside—harder than Baker!

Just like the thread title says, this is for documenting your brushes with fame, no matter how small or how large. There are only three rules: No intentional one-upmanship for its own sake. It must have actually happened, although documentation is not required (no tall tales, in other words). No posting of the Four Yorkshiremen sketch video. I'll try and start things off with a small brush with fame. Share your own, please!

Would he understand it?

If you call my landline right now, you'll get through. However, if someone calls while the line is busy, instead of my voice mail they'll get a high-pitched squeal followed by the three error tones and a, "We're sorry, all circuits are busy now. Please try your call again later," followed by a rapid busy signal. Bizarre. Happens when I check my voice mail, too.

The Texas Bathroom Bill did not make it out of special session. Good. That would have cost the State mucho dinero.

5:07 p.m. CDT 20170816. Weird developments after taking my 20mg dose. Mrs. Prof went in to the office today, so I took advantage to try a couple of new audio plugins and listen to how they work on some music. One thing led to another, and I eventually wound up going through most of my old files, looking for stuff to work with. I then crashed out. I woke up about 45 minutes ago and couldn't find Loudmouth. Baker was easy to find—he came out of his litter box, barfed an empty stomach on the floor, and went to refill it. He'd apparently scared Loudmouth so bad that he wouldn't come out from under the bed for a good 15 minutes. Once I got him out and reassured him, I got back on the computer and switched over to the news. I'm glad I'm not doing 3x20mg beyond today (it'll be 4x15mg from tomorrow on). Twenty mg is a bit much.

Well, she accepted it, as long as it came from a nurse. We're switching back to 4x a day dosing, though. 4am/10am/4pm/10pm, if it works, 15mg per dose. That'll start tomorrow, because I've already taken my 20mg dose for this morning. Quite frankly, the nurse was perplexed at why I wasn't taking the full dose. I didn't get a chance to explain Mrs. Prof's paranoia over the whole thing. Besides, I'm only going to be at that level for two days prior to the procedure. I'm more scared over the procedure than I am over the medication, to be honest. She doesn't seem to be worried at all over the procedure.