ProfessorTomoe

I feel very tired.
Trans visibility day always falls on March 31. Easter happened to fall on March 31. Certain Republican douchevolcanoes decided to pretend to be angered by this and demanded an apology from trans people in a blatant attempt to stir up outrage among their voters.
This is offensive in so many ways. Just to mention a few:
1) They are demanding that trans people apologize for existing. They know perfectly well we won't and plan to use our refusal to further outrage their befuddled and frightened voters.
2) Their pretense that it is somehow the responsibility of trans people that a holiday that falls on a different day EVERY YEAR happens to coincide with an unrelated holiday this year.
3) Their use of a holiday meant to honour a man who preached tolerance and acceptance as a tool to further promote hatred and intolerance.
4) Their assumption that their voters are so blisteringly dim-witted so as not to know how calendars work.
5) The possibility that a number of them actually are that dim offends me personally.
Sigh.

Thank you!

I fell of the stoop yesterday (had issues with getting the bike out and closing the door) so I have a bruise on my right hip and left shin.  My left arm still hurts. It's raining so I have knee issues. Going to go back to bed in a few.

I got a flu shot and pneumonia shot today.  My left arm hurts and I expect to feel like crap tomorrow.

Yesterday sucked and not the good way
1) rode my ebike to Walgreens to get a gallon of milk. They were out.  This is a total of 1.6 miles.
2) Due to it being good weather and forecast to rain over the weekend I decided to ride to Braum's, the local ice cream and dairy store.  It's about 1.5 miles to the store.  Got to the store.  Felt a little dizzy when I got of the bike.  Went in and bought 2 gallons of milk because they had 2 for $6,
3) Put the milk jugs in my backpack. I've done this several times before.  Strained my right arm a bit getting the pack on.  Also a common thing.
4) Started to get out of the parking lot.  Felt a little trouble going out the driveway.
5) Tried to turn to the east on the side rode.  
6) Ended up going west for about 10 feet and fell over. 
7) Could not stand up.
8) A guy who I didn't get his name saw me fall and stopped to help.  He had a pick up, so I asked if he could give me a ride home.  As it happens he was going north, so it would only be 2 block side trip for it.  He agreed.
9) Tried to stand up.  Could not.  Asked him to help me get up.  Didn't help.  My legs were like rubber.  After a few tries I asked him to call 911 as I didn't have my phone on me.  Note to self, never go out with out it.  He had a conversation with the 911 dispatcher, found out the ambulance could only take me to the hospital.  Decided on getting the fire rescue people
10) They show up.  Ask me a few question to establish that I was functional.  I answered  all of them correctly.
11) They take vitals to include blood sugar level.  It was a bit high and my pulse rate was high even for me. I normally have a 100-103 rate, was 125.  The waited 5 minutes and took them again.  They noticed that I was "sweating bullets".    They were not quite sure that I shouldn't go to the hospital ED.  After some back and forth we decided that I should because I still couldn't stand up.  Called for ambulance.  Also called police to take my bike home and put it on my porch.  Would not fit in the police car, so he left.
12) Ambulance arrived.  Fire guy said they would take the bike home. Got loaded on the the ambulance.  Still couldn't stand up.  They got me loaded on there bed thing and went to the hospital.
13) Got put in a room.  Nurse comes in and takes vitals, again with blood sugar level.  All about the same.  Doctor comes in, asks the same questions as the fire rescue guys did.  Poked and prodded me. Did the strength test where you pull on her hand.  Left the room
14) About 3 minutes later a nurse come in and says the doctor says I need IV fluids.  Started drip. I asked for some thing to read.  She came back with a novel about Burma.  I had problems holding the book up. 
15) About this time I could move my legs and if I didn't have an IV,  the blood pressure cuff, and the blood oxygen meter attached to me, I felt like I might be able to stand up.  
16) Took me in for a CT scan.  Had issues getting on the bed of the scanner.  After I got back I had control of my arms enough read novel
17) After about 5 minutes after the scan a nurse came and gave me a meclizne pill, for vertigo.  Legs felt normal, but I was still dizzy AF.  Was left alone for 10-15 minutes.  Got to page 108.
18) Was feeling more or less normal.
19) Doctor comes in and says my CT scan was normal.20) Waited a few more minutes and the nurse comes in and disconnects me from all the tubes and wires. Says I can check out.  Had a copay of $37.50
 Asked her about how I could get home.  She reminds me that the bus stops here. Little did I know at the time that it was the last bus running for the night.
21) Waited about 20 minutes for the bus.  He arrives, asks me where I'm going, then starts blasting the local rock station on the radio.  He turns it down and ask me if I wanted to get off at the justice center as it's only a few blocks from my destination and would save me 30 minutes.  Passed on this as it's actually 6 blocks and I didn't feel like walking that far as the destination I asked for is literally across Pine from my house. Starts blasting rock again.  Good thing I like rock.
22) Got home.  The bike and back pack was on the porch blocking one of the doors.  I tried to open the other locked door with my key.  Had trouble getting key in hole, so I curse a bit and  so I moved the bike and go in the unlocked door.  Unknown to me I dropped my wallet/keys on the porch.  Took bike into the living room where it's normally at.  
23) Got in and freaked out about my wallet not being in the pocket of my hoody.  Spent 30-45 minutes looking for it.  Did not find it.  Decided to look on the for it in the morning as my porch light was burned out.  
24) Went to bed.  Tried to pick up my Chromebook.  Dropped it.  Picked it up.  It's bricked.  Cussed some more and went to sleep thinking I would look for in the morning.
25) Got up in the rain.  Went out and found the wallet/keys.  
And how was your day?

Due to the fun and games I had yesterday (short version.  Massive vertigo while on a bike, ended up hospital) by the time I was up for taking pictures of Explorer she went into her midday hide mode.  Maybe tonight.

Now that you mention knees, it's time to bring you up to date on a situation with my own, that being my left replacement knee. I got up to get something out of the kitchen about 10 days ago, and I damned near didn't make it. My left knee felt like it was going to go through an explosive disassembly on me. I grabbed my cane, made it back to my chair, and sat down, but the pain didn't subside - it got worse, climbing up to a 9.5 on the 0-to-10 scale. It made me sick to my stomach and drew tears.
I managed to get an appointment with the knee surgeon's office two days later. They didn't see any structural problems on the X-ray, but they were able to tell that the joint was loose when they gave it the side-to-side shake test. They suggested doing surgery to put in shims to tighten up the mechanical joint, to which I agreed. They've already called to schedule. I've got a cruise-convention that I can't miss at the end of March, so the surgery won't take place until April 2nd. Until then, I'm using the cane 100% of the time, as opposed to just outside of the house before the incident occured.

Not my kind of music but I played while I was doing my morning chores.  It made them more pleasant.  Explorer jumped on the desk while it was playing, but I don't know if that was due to her normal jump on the desk or not.

Well, whatever it was, it was somewhat alleviated by reseating the dressing. The nurse had put it on in a sideways orientation. I had her put it on in the more conventional top-to-bottom orientation, and I felt immediate relief. It still itches a little bit just by being there, but not nearly as much as before.
The sleep situation is still there, albeit not as bad. I guess. I've been asleep most of today. We shall see what the night brings.
Tomorrow is going to be interesting as well. We're doing a "down-and-back" to the Georgetown area to finally have family Christmas with the rest of Mrs. Prof's kinfolk. We'll be driving in excess of 3 hours down and 3 hours up, plus we'll have the party at one of her brothers' homes, so who knows how I'll respond. One thing is for certain - I'll be doing an IV infusion while we're in transit on the road, since the cefepime plus the vancomycin usually takes about 3 hours to infuse. My morning infusion is scheduled for sometime between 9:30 am and 10 am, so we'll probably have to pull over down just north of Waco to get it started. My nighttime infusion starts 12 hours later, so I'll most likely be home before we start it up.
No, it's not TMI, I'm just planning for myself. Gotta get this crap laid out in my head before we leave. Besides, if I get back and find the house ransacked, I'll know to whom I should point the cops at. 

Low though my expectations for 2024 be, still, wishing you all a happy new year!

"The Human has stopped coughing and is sorta up an  moving.  And he wants to sit in this chair.  Meh, might as well let him" - Explorer the Cat.

No worries! Stress comes with the job right now, thanks to osteomyelitis. You have fun on Christmas day yourself, ya hear? 

Sorry, I did not mean that to be stressful. Hope Christmas day goes well. I saw grand kids today, going to be with family tomorrow as well.

I am home, with home-based intravenous antibiotics. We start infusing through a Tunnelling PICC line in the upper right corner of my chest Sunday morning shortly after 10am. Wish us luck.

My white blood cell count is down, from 15.2 to 11.9. I'm going home today, barring any last minute screwups. End of line.

Surgery went well, and the bone biopsy is still cooking in the lab. So far, nothing has grown. Meanwhile, the 1-2 punch of vancomycin and cefepime appears to be knocking back the infection in my leg and knocking out the infection in my foot. I've been advised that, if nothing grows off of the bone biopsy sample, I could be sent home as early as Thursday with just oral antibiotics. That would please Mrs. Prof to no end, since it would allow her to take me down to the Austin area for her family's Christmas get-together on Saturday. Only time will tell.

Good point, and ouch! Maybe you can still squeeze it in? Here's hoping . . .

What makes things worse is that my surgery will probably be pushed off into 2024, when the deductible count resets. I'd met my catastrophic out of pocket deductible for 2023, so the surgery *was* going to be free. Not any more. Sigh.

Hope things go well for you.

Saw my pain management doctor today. He's keeping me on the 8mg dose of the Dilaudid for now. The exact dosage is one to two 8mg tablets three times a day. I told him that I'm having to take the 2x dose often, especially yesterday morning when (I'll man up and admit it) I found myself in silent tears from the pain.
Mrs. Prof and I went home afterward, grabbing some fast food on the way. It made me sick to my stomach, necessitating the use of a Zofran anti-nausea pill.


I've been needing Zofran all too often lately. Every meal seems to make me queasy, and it seems like every other day or so I'm taking a Zofran. I don't know what the deal is.

Oh, one other thing - Mrs. Prof strode out of the computer area Saturday afternoon and pronounced, "Someone loves me, and it isn't you," with a grin on her face. She then showed me a pair of silly-looking cat slippers that someone for whom she had done a favor had sent her as a gift. Nice, comfy looking. Still, not a challenge one should allow to go by if at all possible, and in this case, I had a retort. You see, I had ordered her a birthday gift - a pair of lab-grown diamond earrings (small diamonds, but that's all I could afford) - and I'd hoped to give them to her at Friday's family Thanksgiving get-together. Well, UPS thwarted that with late delivery, but they did deliver while she was out running a cat errand Saturday morning. I'd opened up the package and was ready to spring it on her at the proper time, and wouldn't you know it, she presented the proper time with her little "someone loves me" remark.
So, after letting a few comedy beats pass for effect, I went and retrieved the Zales box and brought it over to her. I then pronounced, "Someone loves you, and it's me," and handed her the box. The look on her face was priceless. She appreciated the gift very much, especially after I reassured her that I didn't break the bank in purchasing them (they were $59 plus tax - like I said, they were small). I had her try them on, and she looked lovely in them. Mission accomplished, on both fronts.

Oh, one other thing - Mrs. Prof strode out of the computer area Saturday afternoon and pronounced, "Someone loves me, and it isn't you," with a grin on her face. She then showed me a pair of silly-looking cat slippers that someone for whom she had done a favor had sent her as a gift. Nice, comfy looking. Still, not a challenge one should allow to go by if at all possible, and in this case, I had a retort. You see, I had ordered her a birthday gift - a pair of lab-grown diamond earrings (small diamonds, but that's all I could afford) - and I'd hoped to give them to her at Friday's family Thanksgiving get-together. Well, UPS thwarted that with late delivery, but they did deliver while she was out running a cat errand Saturday morning. I'd opened up the package and was ready to spring it on her at the proper time, and wouldn't you know it, she presented the proper time with her little "someone loves me" remark.
So, after letting a few comedy beats pass for effect, I went and retrieved the Zales box and brought it over to her. I then pronounced, "Someone loves you, and it's me," and handed her the box. The look on her face was priceless. She appreciated the gift very much, especially after I reassured her that I didn't break the bank in purchasing them (they were $59 plus tax - like I said, they were small). I had her try them on, and she looked lovely in them. Mission accomplished, on both fronts.

Due to living alone and not wanting to go out and make some one work on a holiday (i.e. waitstaff) I got my self something special for Thanksgiving.  I'm having steak later today!

You wouldn't believe how much better I believe, pharmaceutical-wise. Pain-wise, however, I'm hurting more. That's the sad thing. The morphine did more for me in terms of pain relief. Everything hurts now. Everything hurts.

Morphine is closely tracked as a controlled substance, so the distribution bogs down.
Glad you figured it out and are feeling better.