June 19, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: I rush in almost late and Eloy is ready to hook me up. Phyllis the Nurse introduces me to my neighbor, John, and asks me to talk to him about links for info on dialysis. Well, of course, I tell him about this blog and the links on it’s sidebar. This is John’s first day and once I realize that, after thinking I’d seen him here before, I remember my own anxiety about my first day. “It’s a lot to get used to at first” I say to him. His questions are all about wanting specific answers to the questions we all have: how long do people survive on dialysis? What do I have to change in my diet?, and Where can I get a frosty mug of beer? John and I chat a bit and I mention Da Vita’s website and Phyllis touts the Kidney Patients Assn.
Later Jennifer the Dietician comes along and gives me my newest lab report: all is going well in my labs. Phosphorous and Potassium are both within the limits they should be. That’s all folks!
Notes: In at 76.1 and out at 72.1 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
6/20/07
6/17/07
139) Father’s Day Visit
June 16, 2007
Saturday
El Milagro: When I called in for an early time today, Matt the Tech checked and found out they’re full to the seams with several visitors from another center. So, he says I can’t come in til 3… which is an hour early… which I neglect to mention. Rather, I reply, “Okay. See you at 3:00”, and settle in to a home Saturday agenda of chores and kickin’ back (our first weekend without special events in months).
About noon-thirty Jo the Nurse calls and says someone walked out early (refusing to finish their treatment) so they have an open chair at 1 and do I want it. Even though I’d gotten into my Saturday routine I jump at the chance to get in and outa there early so I can be free for the evening (and go with Lizzie to a shiva gathering for Michael’s mom). So I shoot over there and get hooked up by Eloy the Tech, who is back at the center after a longish absence working in home health care, which he reports wasn’t really his cup of tea. Eloy does an okay job of stabbing me but is a little too quick and rough, reminding me about how Jason is my new favorite sticker. Today I plan to read the new New Yorker and keep track of Tiger in the 107th US Open on the new TV’s that are all installed now.
I am surprised at the New Yorker’s “Austin” edition, with San Antonio-bred Stevie Earl in The Talk of The Town and a feature article about the Harry Ransom Center entitled Letter from Austin. Maybe Austin is becoming a outlying suburb of New York. Now that is an interesting thought. I’m reading the Harry Ransom piece and absorbed in a paragraph about the kinds of infestations found in boxes of papers the center receives. “…staff members are trying to salvage a producer’s box of Hollywood scripts; the bottom of the sheets had been nibbled away by cockroaches. …Mary Baughman showed me… a hundred-square-foot freezer…. She inspected some bug traps…”* and found a spider and silverfish. They freeze these materials to the center to kill any infestations.
As I’m considering frozen insects a hand reaches in to my world and slaps my leg and I look up and it’s my son, Johnny! He and Eddie and Amy are standing there grinning. “Hey Dad! Happy Father’s Day” grinning boy says and the kids are right there in the flesh. Turns out they’ve been at Geneva’s overnight partying and are on their way back to San Antonio to drop Amy off and they head back out to Center Point to the camp. We talk for about half and hour about Eddie’s 21st birthday plans, Johnny’s surfing in Corpus and losing his wallet, and Amy’s finishing college and planning to teach. I ask Amy about her and John, and she replies with a curious smile that they are still “just friends” and John ignores the whole moment. John plans to come back up here next weekend to visit. I talk them into stopping by Kim’s to see the new baby and they head out and I think that they are genuinely enjoying the freedom of their youth. We parents delight vicariously in their youth while we worry about their crashing their cars while rushing through their freedom years. It’s the plight of parenthood.
I read on until I’m tired of that activity and then finish out the session watching Tiger catch up in the Open. Although he is playing well, his putting seems off to me. But he gets close enough to finish up in the lead tomorrow. Such focus and devotion and class this guy has… he is fun to watch. At some point I call Jo the Nurse over and ask her for more details about the person who walked on their treatment. She reports that this unnamed person decided to leave after an hour of dialysis and I ask “Why?” Jo doesn’t know and she only retorts almost defensively that “I can’t make people stay for their whole session.” But why do they leave? Don’t they understand this is really important? “Some people just don’t get it, no matter how much we try to explain the need for complete treatment.” Tell me more, I implore; and she again replies, “They just wanted to leave and I don’t know why”, and it is left as a mystery to me, even though I’ve seen folks walk out. I want to write something in the newsletter about this, but will have to figure out how to make it a helpful piece rather than a scolding piece.
I also ponder Johnny’s Father’s Day visit and my own relations with my dad. Does he get as thrilled when his kids visit as I do? Does the thrill lessen over the years? I remember father-son activities from past years, searching my memories for visions of those times. The ones that come up include desert trips with Army canteens slapping our sides and Dad’s plaid shirts and well-worn khacki pants, and the bows (and arrows in crafted leather quivers) we took to hunt rabbits. I also recall times in the garage being fascinated with his tools and how he knew everything about how to use them to do magic with wood and radios. And how I thought for years that everything he said, modeled, and thought was The Truth with a capitol “T”. When he criticized
my lawn mowing and edging he was guiding me towards my own parental behaviors and statements with my kids; and Johnny adjusted well to hearing my own criticisms towards ‘perfection’. Katie and Shayna not as much, but maybe that’s because they’re girls. Who knows how to deal with girls? Certainly not me. As Father’s Day approaches these are my thoughts and I am tickled pink that Johnny makes it by to say “Hi”, and I too will call my Dad to say “Hi” tomorrow.
Notes: In at 74.3 and out at 72.2 Kgs.
*Max, D.T. (June 11&18, 2007) Letter from Austin: Final destination. New Yorker Magazine. p. 66.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
Saturday
El Milagro: When I called in for an early time today, Matt the Tech checked and found out they’re full to the seams with several visitors from another center. So, he says I can’t come in til 3… which is an hour early… which I neglect to mention. Rather, I reply, “Okay. See you at 3:00”, and settle in to a home Saturday agenda of chores and kickin’ back (our first weekend without special events in months).
About noon-thirty Jo the Nurse calls and says someone walked out early (refusing to finish their treatment) so they have an open chair at 1 and do I want it. Even though I’d gotten into my Saturday routine I jump at the chance to get in and outa there early so I can be free for the evening (and go with Lizzie to a shiva gathering for Michael’s mom). So I shoot over there and get hooked up by Eloy the Tech, who is back at the center after a longish absence working in home health care, which he reports wasn’t really his cup of tea. Eloy does an okay job of stabbing me but is a little too quick and rough, reminding me about how Jason is my new favorite sticker. Today I plan to read the new New Yorker and keep track of Tiger in the 107th US Open on the new TV’s that are all installed now.
I am surprised at the New Yorker’s “Austin” edition, with San Antonio-bred Stevie Earl in The Talk of The Town and a feature article about the Harry Ransom Center entitled Letter from Austin. Maybe Austin is becoming a outlying suburb of New York. Now that is an interesting thought. I’m reading the Harry Ransom piece and absorbed in a paragraph about the kinds of infestations found in boxes of papers the center receives. “…staff members are trying to salvage a producer’s box of Hollywood scripts; the bottom of the sheets had been nibbled away by cockroaches. …Mary Baughman showed me… a hundred-square-foot freezer…. She inspected some bug traps…”* and found a spider and silverfish. They freeze these materials to the center to kill any infestations.
As I’m considering frozen insects a hand reaches in to my world and slaps my leg and I look up and it’s my son, Johnny! He and Eddie and Amy are standing there grinning. “Hey Dad! Happy Father’s Day” grinning boy says and the kids are right there in the flesh. Turns out they’ve been at Geneva’s overnight partying and are on their way back to San Antonio to drop Amy off and they head back out to Center Point to the camp. We talk for about half and hour about Eddie’s 21st birthday plans, Johnny’s surfing in Corpus and losing his wallet, and Amy’s finishing college and planning to teach. I ask Amy about her and John, and she replies with a curious smile that they are still “just friends” and John ignores the whole moment. John plans to come back up here next weekend to visit. I talk them into stopping by Kim’s to see the new baby and they head out and I think that they are genuinely enjoying the freedom of their youth. We parents delight vicariously in their youth while we worry about their crashing their cars while rushing through their freedom years. It’s the plight of parenthood.
I read on until I’m tired of that activity and then finish out the session watching Tiger catch up in the Open. Although he is playing well, his putting seems off to me. But he gets close enough to finish up in the lead tomorrow. Such focus and devotion and class this guy has… he is fun to watch. At some point I call Jo the Nurse over and ask her for more details about the person who walked on their treatment. She reports that this unnamed person decided to leave after an hour of dialysis and I ask “Why?” Jo doesn’t know and she only retorts almost defensively that “I can’t make people stay for their whole session.” But why do they leave? Don’t they understand this is really important? “Some people just don’t get it, no matter how much we try to explain the need for complete treatment.” Tell me more, I implore; and she again replies, “They just wanted to leave and I don’t know why”, and it is left as a mystery to me, even though I’ve seen folks walk out. I want to write something in the newsletter about this, but will have to figure out how to make it a helpful piece rather than a scolding piece.
I also ponder Johnny’s Father’s Day visit and my own relations with my dad. Does he get as thrilled when his kids visit as I do? Does the thrill lessen over the years? I remember father-son activities from past years, searching my memories for visions of those times. The ones that come up include desert trips with Army canteens slapping our sides and Dad’s plaid shirts and well-worn khacki pants, and the bows (and arrows in crafted leather quivers) we took to hunt rabbits. I also recall times in the garage being fascinated with his tools and how he knew everything about how to use them to do magic with wood and radios. And how I thought for years that everything he said, modeled, and thought was The Truth with a capitol “T”. When he criticized
my lawn mowing and edging he was guiding me towards my own parental behaviors and statements with my kids; and Johnny adjusted well to hearing my own criticisms towards ‘perfection’. Katie and Shayna not as much, but maybe that’s because they’re girls. Who knows how to deal with girls? Certainly not me. As Father’s Day approaches these are my thoughts and I am tickled pink that Johnny makes it by to say “Hi”, and I too will call my Dad to say “Hi” tomorrow.Notes: In at 74.3 and out at 72.2 Kgs.
*Max, D.T. (June 11&18, 2007) Letter from Austin: Final destination. New Yorker Magazine. p. 66.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
138) In the News: Immigration
June 14, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: I have my blanket today so I start out happy. Jason the “kid” cannulates me and I like the way he is very careful in the procedures of cannulation. For example, to ensure the needles are drawing well, Jason draws blood from each needle into the syringe and pushes it back into my arm several times to ensure good flow, whereas most techs just check the arterio-venous access. Also, he is very gentle in taping up the access after the needles are set.
I settle back and read about the immigration ‘problem’ in Time Magazine. To me, this is an amazingly stupid problem. For centuries the United States has been a place that welcomed the poor and disenfranchised from other countries. Or, at least we allowed them to come in for the scraps of work and leftover bits of our 'great society'. Many of these folks came into the country illegally over the years, worked hard to scrape out a living in the bottom rungs of society, and became the backbone of the menial labor force. Much of our economy exists on the back-breaking toil of many of these people. Having grown up in the El Paso area, I can tell you that many of the farm workers and cannery workers were illegally in the country. Not to mention the maids, nannies, and janitorial workers. It was my experience that these folks did the labor that most Americans were unwilling to do because those jobs were either too 'demeaning' or too hard on the back. Once or twice in the 70's, when the Border Patrol would sweep through the valley and arrest all the ‘wet-backs’ we valley-living hippies would go for their jobs for some quick bucks. Well, we weren’t used to working 12 hour days for a buck an hour, so we didn’t last long. I worked several times for Mountain Pass Canning Co., in Canutillo and lasted there long enough to make a check or two before I got sick and tired of it, and the Mexican workers could sneak back in to take what they considered to be good jobs. Sometimes, when the Border Patrol came by our little house in the cotton fields to ask about illegal aliens (who actually were humans just like us) we'd tell them "they went that-a-way", pointing down the road in the opposite direction from whence they went. Once or twice we were surrounded by excited Border Patrol agents who inspected the huarache prints in our dusty driveway, only to find out the huarache wearers were us. That's US as in U.S. "Darn", they said sheepishly as they crawled back in their jeeps and drove off down the road.
I get cold again and call Jason over to warm up my blood. A cool trick that I frequently forget while on dialysis is to ask the tech to increase the temp of my blood as it is shot back into my body. Warms the cockles of my heart… as well as my chilly extremities.
Dialysis Tip: For those of you readers who are also on dialysis and feel like you’re in David Letterman’s studio while on dialysis, ask your tech to warm up your blood. You can really feel the warmth spread through your body. Check it out.
Notes: In at 75.4 and out at 72.5 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
Thursday
El Milagro: I have my blanket today so I start out happy. Jason the “kid” cannulates me and I like the way he is very careful in the procedures of cannulation. For example, to ensure the needles are drawing well, Jason draws blood from each needle into the syringe and pushes it back into my arm several times to ensure good flow, whereas most techs just check the arterio-venous access. Also, he is very gentle in taping up the access after the needles are set.
I settle back and read about the immigration ‘problem’ in Time Magazine. To me, this is an amazingly stupid problem. For centuries the United States has been a place that welcomed the poor and disenfranchised from other countries. Or, at least we allowed them to come in for the scraps of work and leftover bits of our 'great society'. Many of these folks came into the country illegally over the years, worked hard to scrape out a living in the bottom rungs of society, and became the backbone of the menial labor force. Much of our economy exists on the back-breaking toil of many of these people. Having grown up in the El Paso area, I can tell you that many of the farm workers and cannery workers were illegally in the country. Not to mention the maids, nannies, and janitorial workers. It was my experience that these folks did the labor that most Americans were unwilling to do because those jobs were either too 'demeaning' or too hard on the back. Once or twice in the 70's, when the Border Patrol would sweep through the valley and arrest all the ‘wet-backs’ we valley-living hippies would go for their jobs for some quick bucks. Well, we weren’t used to working 12 hour days for a buck an hour, so we didn’t last long. I worked several times for Mountain Pass Canning Co., in Canutillo and lasted there long enough to make a check or two before I got sick and tired of it, and the Mexican workers could sneak back in to take what they considered to be good jobs. Sometimes, when the Border Patrol came by our little house in the cotton fields to ask about illegal aliens (who actually were humans just like us) we'd tell them "they went that-a-way", pointing down the road in the opposite direction from whence they went. Once or twice we were surrounded by excited Border Patrol agents who inspected the huarache prints in our dusty driveway, only to find out the huarache wearers were us. That's US as in U.S. "Darn", they said sheepishly as they crawled back in their jeeps and drove off down the road.
I get cold again and call Jason over to warm up my blood. A cool trick that I frequently forget while on dialysis is to ask the tech to increase the temp of my blood as it is shot back into my body. Warms the cockles of my heart… as well as my chilly extremities.
Dialysis Tip: For those of you readers who are also on dialysis and feel like you’re in David Letterman’s studio while on dialysis, ask your tech to warm up your blood. You can really feel the warmth spread through your body. Check it out.
Notes: In at 75.4 and out at 72.5 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
6/14/07
137) Freezing Dialysis
June 12, 2007
Tuesday
El Milagro: Slightly late today so I apologize to Carol the Tech and she allows it’s okay. Doc and crew come by to find out how I’m doing and I can’t think of anything obnoxious to say, so I just say “I’m fine”. Today I have forgotten my blanket, since I washed it and neglected to put it back in my Da Vita sports bag. So, I am freezing in here and trying to find a way to cuddle my body up so as to keep feet and arms warm. No sleep today due to my freezing. I watch the news and PBS. At the end of it all, the tech I don’t like comes up to de-cannulate me and I hesitantly allow him to do it, although my blood pressure shows my state rather alarmingly at 157 over something. I actually can’t find anything to complain about as he is taping me up…. except that he drips a drop of blood on my shirt. But, in his defense, when he notices the drip he offers to get some hydrogen peroxide to clean it. And he is generally more quiet and cautious with me as a patient than he was the last time.
Notes: In at 75.6 and out at 72.1 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
Tuesday
El Milagro: Slightly late today so I apologize to Carol the Tech and she allows it’s okay. Doc and crew come by to find out how I’m doing and I can’t think of anything obnoxious to say, so I just say “I’m fine”. Today I have forgotten my blanket, since I washed it and neglected to put it back in my Da Vita sports bag. So, I am freezing in here and trying to find a way to cuddle my body up so as to keep feet and arms warm. No sleep today due to my freezing. I watch the news and PBS. At the end of it all, the tech I don’t like comes up to de-cannulate me and I hesitantly allow him to do it, although my blood pressure shows my state rather alarmingly at 157 over something. I actually can’t find anything to complain about as he is taping me up…. except that he drips a drop of blood on my shirt. But, in his defense, when he notices the drip he offers to get some hydrogen peroxide to clean it. And he is generally more quiet and cautious with me as a patient than he was the last time.
Notes: In at 75.6 and out at 72.1 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
6/11/07
136) Day 17 at the KFF
June 9, 2007
Saturday
Kerrville Dialysis Center: Even though I left the ranch late this morning at 5:15 a.m. I still arrive here at 5:30 on the dot. And then I wait in the waiting room for 20 minutes before they come to get me for my session. (At El Milagro we just walk in and casually go to our chair, or one of the techs or nurses points out our chair. Since it is always a good idea to see if the dialyzer is yours, it’s a good idea for you to look yourself.) Here in K-ville they are much more formal, and have a nice new place, and everything is clean and sterile. And you wait in the waiting room like you’re at a doctor’s office and it you can’t just walk in and find your seat. Its more medical, but, the workers aren’t as well-trained or professional; or maybe they just don’t have as much experience. Not the nurse. The nurse is a black woman from somewhere in the Caribbean, judging from her accent, and she seems very professional and on top of her act. Watching her guiding the others and their going to her with all sorts of easy questions that any tech should know about setting these machines, I can tell they don’t really know, nor are they confident in their actions. Today I have Barbara, who doesn’t know anything about folk or singer/songwriter music and only slightly more about sticking patients, it seems. She is very tentative and I have to encourage her all along the way. She makes a few slip-ups in the steps which complicates her procedure. When I am hooked up she goes to the nurse to ask several questions about setting my machine. I ask Barbara, in a casual, sort of ‘make conversation way’, if the Hispanic guy, Johnny Mata, ever went to the festival last weekend, and she replies, “Nah… he always says he’s gonna do something and then just ends up cruising around town.” I reply that that’s too bad since Judy Collins was really something to see. And she goes on to say that she hasn’t lived in K-ville that long but she hears that the folk festival is “fun”. I reply that it is also a great way to hear some excellent musicians and then we talk a bit about what Austin is like. Talking helps calm Barbara down and she actually does an okay job of sticking me. After I’m all hooked up I want to go back to sleep so I pull my hat down over my eyes, turn on my radio to San Antonio’s NPR station, and try to sleep. The center’s radio is tuned to “the Ranch”, the pop country station here and I think that if they don’t even listen to KFAN (all Texas music) they probably won’t get excited about the festival. I doze. The guy next to me is the ‘bad attitude’ patient I’ve seen every time I’m here. He seems mad at the world; has lost a leg to diabetes, has his other leg all lizard skinned and pealing, and gruffly talks to the staff making demands and cursing under his breath. He is the one who pulls a black blanket up over his head and stretches it so it looks like a shroud stretched over a round topped telephone pole. Then he never moves a muscle until the end of his treatment, when he emerges all squinty-eyed and mean. I feel for him. It is amazing that there aren’t more patients like this guy… for some of these folks their lives are just a series of steps down into oblivian (a word that I hear in several of this weekend’s singers).
I sleep soundly for about two and a half hours and then awaken to someone yelling out in pain, probably from cramping. It’s 9 something and I wish for more sleep but the lights are bright and I look around and see all the other people and start wondering about them. Several retired folks with khaki’s and polo shirts, one truck-driver looking man who is has that barrel-chested look of truckers. Several overweight women who look like they have wildly swollen ankles, and one very businessy looking guy who is working on his laptop and reading the New York times at the same time! He has a plaid button down shirt on and looks like he just came from his office in the bank building…. In Saturday business dress. He keeps his tassle loafers on during dialysis and seems very adjusted to this necessity for productive living. Some people are watching their TV’s that swing around from behind them to within 5 inches of their noses and they look like Mr. Magoo’s peering into their tubes from so close it casts an eerily ghostly light across their faces.
Quiet Valley Ranch: At 10:15 I’m outa there and drive back to the ranch and arrive in time to find a good parking space and hike over to the kitchen in time to have pancakes and turkey sausage. I walk through the breakfast line, which is weird cause I’m usually working and just as I get to the hotel pan of banana pancakes which I can’t have, I say, “You got any regulars?” and Andrea turns around from the griddle and plops two on a plate and I’m surprised and amazed at her timing. I get my cakes and go out to eat and Lizzie joins me, taking a break from making coffee. I’m famished so breakfast is a welcome feast.
I do my shift after Shabbat services where Rabbi Kerri talks about tzedakah (not Neal*) and giving 1% more than is required and then I go to make about 1001 chocolate chip cookies. I’m on that kitchen krew with Julie and Mona and Mona rushes through the whole process without much thought about quality (More about Mona reported by The Austinist**) and Julie wants to finish to be done (going as far as to find tubs to put the cooked cookies in rather than waiting for Cari to find the big rectangular box I remember from years past). Charlie pops into the kitchen and falls into helping and making jokes. I’m happy he stopped in because it feels a bit disorganized until he gets there and the result of his showing up is that I don’t care so much about working with this krew. As we plop dough down on aluminum sheets and all three of us are baking them in the convection oven, I am still pondering tzedakah, giving, and being of service in general. Charlie gives completely when he is around, zipping around and doing whatever needs doing. This is giving from the heart. With three of us putting in sheets and keeping time and bringing ‘em out to cool, it is amazing we don’t burn more, but I manage to burn a few trays. After Julie leaves and Cari comes in and shows us which boxes she wants them in, we re-box the cookies and Charlie eats cookie dough and I eat crispy over-done cookies until both of us are a little sugar-hyped and saying silly elegies for the cookies. I note here that Charlie has memorized more tidbits from early 60’s TV than anyone I know, and I note to myself that he must’ve spent a lot of time watching the tube.
When we’re done with the c
ookies I trek down to the tent and take an after-dialysis nap. Liz and the kids are down the road a ways with Theresa using a Wet Willie*** that Bobby built at a guy’s lake. I sleep with a slight breeze flowing over me and am pleased at the angle we set the tent, since the light breeze comes right through and is cooling. Actually, the tent has been really comfortable this year and I think Liz is over the pop-up. Sometime later the girls show back up and we all get ready to go to a catfish fry at the Bobby-Thomas-Mitch campsite on the lower high road.
Later still we hear great music from Tom Russell**** and Bob Livingston*****.
I must report it is much better being able to get dialysized here in Kerrville! The last weekend includes great music, relaxing visits with friends, enjoyable work on the Kitchen Krew, and fun watching the little girls get older and bolder in their festival exploring. All in all, another wonderful Kerrville Home vacation.
Notes: In at 74.2 and out at 71.2 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
*Neal Sedaka, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; www.neilsedaka.com
**The Austinist, retrieved 0nline June 2007 from http://www.austinist.com/archives/2007/05/30/austinist_at_the_kerrville_folk_festival.php - 39k
***Wet Willie, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; http://www.wetwillieslides.com/index.php
****Tom Russell, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; http://www.tomrussell.com/index_flash.html
*****Bob Livingston, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; http://www.texasmusic.org/
Saturday
Kerrville Dialysis Center: Even though I left the ranch late this morning at 5:15 a.m. I still arrive here at 5:30 on the dot. And then I wait in the waiting room for 20 minutes before they come to get me for my session. (At El Milagro we just walk in and casually go to our chair, or one of the techs or nurses points out our chair. Since it is always a good idea to see if the dialyzer is yours, it’s a good idea for you to look yourself.) Here in K-ville they are much more formal, and have a nice new place, and everything is clean and sterile. And you wait in the waiting room like you’re at a doctor’s office and it you can’t just walk in and find your seat. Its more medical, but, the workers aren’t as well-trained or professional; or maybe they just don’t have as much experience. Not the nurse. The nurse is a black woman from somewhere in the Caribbean, judging from her accent, and she seems very professional and on top of her act. Watching her guiding the others and their going to her with all sorts of easy questions that any tech should know about setting these machines, I can tell they don’t really know, nor are they confident in their actions. Today I have Barbara, who doesn’t know anything about folk or singer/songwriter music and only slightly more about sticking patients, it seems. She is very tentative and I have to encourage her all along the way. She makes a few slip-ups in the steps which complicates her procedure. When I am hooked up she goes to the nurse to ask several questions about setting my machine. I ask Barbara, in a casual, sort of ‘make conversation way’, if the Hispanic guy, Johnny Mata, ever went to the festival last weekend, and she replies, “Nah… he always says he’s gonna do something and then just ends up cruising around town.” I reply that that’s too bad since Judy Collins was really something to see. And she goes on to say that she hasn’t lived in K-ville that long but she hears that the folk festival is “fun”. I reply that it is also a great way to hear some excellent musicians and then we talk a bit about what Austin is like. Talking helps calm Barbara down and she actually does an okay job of sticking me. After I’m all hooked up I want to go back to sleep so I pull my hat down over my eyes, turn on my radio to San Antonio’s NPR station, and try to sleep. The center’s radio is tuned to “the Ranch”, the pop country station here and I think that if they don’t even listen to KFAN (all Texas music) they probably won’t get excited about the festival. I doze. The guy next to me is the ‘bad attitude’ patient I’ve seen every time I’m here. He seems mad at the world; has lost a leg to diabetes, has his other leg all lizard skinned and pealing, and gruffly talks to the staff making demands and cursing under his breath. He is the one who pulls a black blanket up over his head and stretches it so it looks like a shroud stretched over a round topped telephone pole. Then he never moves a muscle until the end of his treatment, when he emerges all squinty-eyed and mean. I feel for him. It is amazing that there aren’t more patients like this guy… for some of these folks their lives are just a series of steps down into oblivian (a word that I hear in several of this weekend’s singers).
I sleep soundly for about two and a half hours and then awaken to someone yelling out in pain, probably from cramping. It’s 9 something and I wish for more sleep but the lights are bright and I look around and see all the other people and start wondering about them. Several retired folks with khaki’s and polo shirts, one truck-driver looking man who is has that barrel-chested look of truckers. Several overweight women who look like they have wildly swollen ankles, and one very businessy looking guy who is working on his laptop and reading the New York times at the same time! He has a plaid button down shirt on and looks like he just came from his office in the bank building…. In Saturday business dress. He keeps his tassle loafers on during dialysis and seems very adjusted to this necessity for productive living. Some people are watching their TV’s that swing around from behind them to within 5 inches of their noses and they look like Mr. Magoo’s peering into their tubes from so close it casts an eerily ghostly light across their faces.
Quiet Valley Ranch: At 10:15 I’m outa there and drive back to the ranch and arrive in time to find a good parking space and hike over to the kitchen in time to have pancakes and turkey sausage. I walk through the breakfast line, which is weird cause I’m usually working and just as I get to the hotel pan of banana pancakes which I can’t have, I say, “You got any regulars?” and Andrea turns around from the griddle and plops two on a plate and I’m surprised and amazed at her timing. I get my cakes and go out to eat and Lizzie joins me, taking a break from making coffee. I’m famished so breakfast is a welcome feast.
I do my shift after Shabbat services where Rabbi Kerri talks about tzedakah (not Neal*) and giving 1% more than is required and then I go to make about 1001 chocolate chip cookies. I’m on that kitchen krew with Julie and Mona and Mona rushes through the whole process without much thought about quality (More about Mona reported by The Austinist**) and Julie wants to finish to be done (going as far as to find tubs to put the cooked cookies in rather than waiting for Cari to find the big rectangular box I remember from years past). Charlie pops into the kitchen and falls into helping and making jokes. I’m happy he stopped in because it feels a bit disorganized until he gets there and the result of his showing up is that I don’t care so much about working with this krew. As we plop dough down on aluminum sheets and all three of us are baking them in the convection oven, I am still pondering tzedakah, giving, and being of service in general. Charlie gives completely when he is around, zipping around and doing whatever needs doing. This is giving from the heart. With three of us putting in sheets and keeping time and bringing ‘em out to cool, it is amazing we don’t burn more, but I manage to burn a few trays. After Julie leaves and Cari comes in and shows us which boxes she wants them in, we re-box the cookies and Charlie eats cookie dough and I eat crispy over-done cookies until both of us are a little sugar-hyped and saying silly elegies for the cookies. I note here that Charlie has memorized more tidbits from early 60’s TV than anyone I know, and I note to myself that he must’ve spent a lot of time watching the tube.
When we’re done with the c
ookies I trek down to the tent and take an after-dialysis nap. Liz and the kids are down the road a ways with Theresa using a Wet Willie*** that Bobby built at a guy’s lake. I sleep with a slight breeze flowing over me and am pleased at the angle we set the tent, since the light breeze comes right through and is cooling. Actually, the tent has been really comfortable this year and I think Liz is over the pop-up. Sometime later the girls show back up and we all get ready to go to a catfish fry at the Bobby-Thomas-Mitch campsite on the lower high road.Later still we hear great music from Tom Russell**** and Bob Livingston*****.
I must report it is much better being able to get dialysized here in Kerrville! The last weekend includes great music, relaxing visits with friends, enjoyable work on the Kitchen Krew, and fun watching the little girls get older and bolder in their festival exploring. All in all, another wonderful Kerrville Home vacation.
Notes: In at 74.2 and out at 71.2 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
*Neal Sedaka, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; www.neilsedaka.com
**The Austinist, retrieved 0nline June 2007 from http://www.austinist.com/archives/2007/05/30/austinist_at_the_kerrville_folk_festival.php - 39k
***Wet Willie, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; http://www.wetwillieslides.com/index.php
****Tom Russell, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; http://www.tomrussell.com/index_flash.html
*****Bob Livingston, retrieved online June 2007 from the official website; http://www.texasmusic.org/
6/6/07
135) Nap Time at Dialyville
June 5, 2007
Tuesday
El Milagro: Today it seems like I’m rushing over to the center to take a nap. What a hectic last week it’s been. Kim the nurse sticks me today and comments on how big my fistula has grown since she first stuck me the first time I came here. To me it seems the same, but I acknowledge her comment with a “Hum?”. She also mentions that she really liked reading the newsletter that came out this morning and that she wished her English was as good as mine. I reply, “Well, I was born and raised here and your English is very good for someone who came to the U.S. as an adult”.
It feels good to just lay back and take a nap today, listening to NPR in my earphones and totally sinking back into my chair, and letting out a deep sigh. It seems like the confluence of the folk festival, bill-paying time, lots going on at work, and being behind on household chores has drained us of our energy. I get to come here and crash out… but Liz has to find some other excuse to kick back.
The last weekend in Kerrville was fun. My dialysis in Kerrville went well, work on the kitchen krew was fairly easy, and the music and visiting with friends was as usual: excellent. We had planned to stay through Sunday night in order to see the Lost Gonzo Band* reunion and sat through rain and a show stoppage due to lightning. Then, while Eric Taylor** was doing his set, the lightning increased and struck closer to the ranch and they finally cancelled the rest of the performances. So, we stayed down there in the rain for no show. Asi es la vida.
Tonight I drift in and out of dreamland, and finally wake up to watch NOVA: an episode about the real story of “the great escape” during WW II.
Notes: In at 73.6 and out at 72.1 Kgs.
* Lost Gonzo Band Homepage retrieved June 2007 from http://www.texasmusic.org/lost_gonzo_band.php
** Eric Taylor retrieved online June 2007 from http://www.bluerubymusic.com/bio.html
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
Tuesday
El Milagro: Today it seems like I’m rushing over to the center to take a nap. What a hectic last week it’s been. Kim the nurse sticks me today and comments on how big my fistula has grown since she first stuck me the first time I came here. To me it seems the same, but I acknowledge her comment with a “Hum?”. She also mentions that she really liked reading the newsletter that came out this morning and that she wished her English was as good as mine. I reply, “Well, I was born and raised here and your English is very good for someone who came to the U.S. as an adult”.
It feels good to just lay back and take a nap today, listening to NPR in my earphones and totally sinking back into my chair, and letting out a deep sigh. It seems like the confluence of the folk festival, bill-paying time, lots going on at work, and being behind on household chores has drained us of our energy. I get to come here and crash out… but Liz has to find some other excuse to kick back.
The last weekend in Kerrville was fun. My dialysis in Kerrville went well, work on the kitchen krew was fairly easy, and the music and visiting with friends was as usual: excellent. We had planned to stay through Sunday night in order to see the Lost Gonzo Band* reunion and sat through rain and a show stoppage due to lightning. Then, while Eric Taylor** was doing his set, the lightning increased and struck closer to the ranch and they finally cancelled the rest of the performances. So, we stayed down there in the rain for no show. Asi es la vida.
Tonight I drift in and out of dreamland, and finally wake up to watch NOVA: an episode about the real story of “the great escape” during WW II.
Notes: In at 73.6 and out at 72.1 Kgs.
* Lost Gonzo Band Homepage retrieved June 2007 from http://www.texasmusic.org/lost_gonzo_band.php
** Eric Taylor retrieved online June 2007 from http://www.bluerubymusic.com/bio.html
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
6/1/07
134) Newsletter Memories
May 31, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: On time today and Carol rushes over and cannulates me in about 30 seconds flat! This place is hopping today. I turn in my final copy of the first “El Milagro News”, a newsletter that I’ve taken over from the volunteer who didn’t complete it in April. This is a product of the new Patient Advisory Committee (PAC), which I volunteered to sit on. I didn’t really want to do the newsletter but I do want one to exist and, as with many things in life, if you want them done right you must do them yourself. So, the newsletter looks pretty good and is a start.
I am remembering the copies of a newsletter my mom created on shipboard as one of the first Army wives to be transported to Europe at the close of the big war. These were copied into the appendix of the book my dad constructed of my mom's letters home during that period. Having read them and then created my own newsletter for the center, I have the sense that the experience is somewhat congruent. I hallucinate that I can imagine what it was like for her to be writing her newsletter on the high seas. And that gives me a smile, thinking that I somehow get closer to her by doing things she did. As a kid it was always like that for me. We spent summers at her family’s cottage on a lake in central Michigan and as I was growing up I compared my experiences to hers as a youth at the same cottage. She picked wild blueberries and I picked wild blueberries. She ran in corn fields and ate fresh corn off the stalk and my cousin and I did the same. She learned to row the boat to the end of the lake to hunt for turtles and then I did that too one summer. She swam the lake behind her dad rowing the boat, and I swam the lake behind her rowing the boat… and, maybe it was the same boat. So, now when I am creating a newsletter, I feel like I can relive her experiences writing a newsletter. That is an unexpected benefit that I can be thankful for while taking over this PAC task. Now that I'm doing it I want to see it grow and develop into a useful tome.
A new female doc comes by to do rounds and I pay little attention. I’m still miffed about the Moritz off my case thing. I don’t want to talk to new docs… I just like my old cranky obnoxious Moritz. That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it!
Notes: In at 74.2 and out at 72.3 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
Thursday
El Milagro: On time today and Carol rushes over and cannulates me in about 30 seconds flat! This place is hopping today. I turn in my final copy of the first “El Milagro News”, a newsletter that I’ve taken over from the volunteer who didn’t complete it in April. This is a product of the new Patient Advisory Committee (PAC), which I volunteered to sit on. I didn’t really want to do the newsletter but I do want one to exist and, as with many things in life, if you want them done right you must do them yourself. So, the newsletter looks pretty good and is a start.
I am remembering the copies of a newsletter my mom created on shipboard as one of the first Army wives to be transported to Europe at the close of the big war. These were copied into the appendix of the book my dad constructed of my mom's letters home during that period. Having read them and then created my own newsletter for the center, I have the sense that the experience is somewhat congruent. I hallucinate that I can imagine what it was like for her to be writing her newsletter on the high seas. And that gives me a smile, thinking that I somehow get closer to her by doing things she did. As a kid it was always like that for me. We spent summers at her family’s cottage on a lake in central Michigan and as I was growing up I compared my experiences to hers as a youth at the same cottage. She picked wild blueberries and I picked wild blueberries. She ran in corn fields and ate fresh corn off the stalk and my cousin and I did the same. She learned to row the boat to the end of the lake to hunt for turtles and then I did that too one summer. She swam the lake behind her dad rowing the boat, and I swam the lake behind her rowing the boat… and, maybe it was the same boat. So, now when I am creating a newsletter, I feel like I can relive her experiences writing a newsletter. That is an unexpected benefit that I can be thankful for while taking over this PAC task. Now that I'm doing it I want to see it grow and develop into a useful tome.
A new female doc comes by to do rounds and I pay little attention. I’m still miffed about the Moritz off my case thing. I don’t want to talk to new docs… I just like my old cranky obnoxious Moritz. That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it!
Notes: In at 74.2 and out at 72.3 Kgs.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
5/29/07
133) Kerrville Folk Festival & Dialysis
May 26, 2007
Saturday
Kerrville Dialysis Center: Today I get here right at 5:30 am, even though I left the ranch 10 minutes late and it was rainy and foggy the whole way into town. The story is that I couldn’t get the dialysis shift I wanted in the afternoon, so I had to accept a 5:30 am time for my dialysis. I figured that when I got here I could re-negotiate a better deal for next weekend. (However, they only have two shifts and the other starts at 9 am, so 5:30 is better for me) This center is beautiful, with in floor scales, all new dialysis machines, floating TV’s, and a beautiful patterned tile floor. All of it looking spanking new and fresh and clean. I feel funny walking in with my muddy Chaco* sandals and mud-splattered legs.
I’m muddy because Quiet Valley Ranch** is like a huge gooky mud pie right now. Mostly the foot-deep mud is in the parking lots and all night long we in the staff campground hear people gunning their cars thinking they’ll get some traction and be able to move. But they don’t get traction in the mud, and they slide around bopping into other cars sometimes and generally getting deeper engaged in the muck. The sounds are of engines racing, the wrrrssshhhhhhh of tires spinning in the mud, and the voices yelling encouragement or warnings or directions for the mostly futile attempts at freeing the vehicles. Sometimes there’s wrrrssshhhhhhhing, then yelling, and a crunch at the end, indicating that there’s another victim of people trying to leave the festival. The later it gets Friday night the less we hear from the parking field so we drift off to sleep with the constant rain ebbing and flowing on our tent top.
I worry about the alarm going off so I wake up every half hour or so to check and see if I’m late. I wake up at 4:30 and it’s early. Then I wake up at 5:10 and I’m late. I rush out and walk through the staff tents quietly in the drizzle and fog, up the puddly dirt road to the staff center and out into the parking lot, finding my way along grassy areas that soak my Chacos and then through 6” deep mud to my truck, that I parked up on the grassy side of a hill. It’s downhill all the way to the road so I make it without any problems and I’m on my way into town slinging mud from my tires for the first quarter mile.
So here I am in a new center, hyper conscious about how they stick me and watching carefully to see if they look professional and competent. They do. The only thing I can think of to complain about is that it is difficult to go back to sleep cause they keep their bright lights on all the time. At El Milagro, after they hook you up, they turn down the lights if you want it that way. Here they aren’t set up to turn down the lights because they are long light fixtures that go all the way down the hall-type room that is the center. So I pull my hat’s bill down over my eyes and make the best of it. I actually fall asleep quickly and sleep until about 9 o’clock. Then I set my radio to San Antonio NPR and listen to the weekend programming until I get done at 10. I feel pretty good and shoot outa there to find a place to get an oil change and lube job before heading back to the ranch.
Quiet Valley Ranch: When I get back, I’m too late to work breakfast at all… in fact I’m too late to even eat breakfast. So, I find the girls at the Shabbat services at Threadgill Theatre, help Cari pour the wine and grape juice for Kiddush, say "Hi" to everyone, and then Liz, the girls, and I walk back to our tent. Shayna & Maya want to go swimming in town but I convince them to change their plans because I don’t want them getting stuck in the mud and I don’t want to loose my great parking place near the staff campground gate. The girls are sad but perk up at the idea of walking down the road a half mile to Turtle Creek and checking it out. I go back to the kitchen and help Cari cut apart 100 pounds of frozen chicken for the dinner stir fry. Then I head back over to Threadgill to hear the last of the children’s concert, and then wander over to say hi to the Tod Group at their new Comfy Campsite on the lower high road. Mitch has 'our' pop-up set up nicely right below the group, built a deck, and has out the party lights we never could use cause we didn’t have electric.
I am the guy who does the theatre rush at 6 and gets our usual seats 5 rows front center left. The concerts are great (especially Michael Smith*** and Denise Frankee****) and it is again like “being home”… that feeling that many of us get, I suspect, when we settle into being on the ranch, weathering whatever the weather does, chilling out (as the kids would say), listening to great music, and seeing good friends. I am totally tired out by halfway through Johnsmith (http://www.kerrvillefolkfestival.com/2007_1_5.htm ) so I walk back to the tent and turn in early. Later I hear Liz getting the kids all settled in their tent: its as if it is a distant radio broadcast in my dreams, and I poke back into semi-consciousness as she bounces onto the air mattress. I’ve modernized our 10x8 tent this year by cutting a piece of 3/4” exterior plywood in the shape of the air mattress, routing the edges to a nice roundness, and leveling the downhill side with rocks so we have a perfectly level platform bed. No more sliding down hill on the air mattress and I contend that now its as good as the pop-up. At about 4 am we hear Shayna softly calling “Mom?”…. “We’re all wet cause you left our door open”. Rather than start a midnight discussion about 10 year olds and 'responsibility', we just want to be quiet and get back to sleep. We bundle the kids into our warm and dry tent and they immediately go back to sleep… and their wetness changes the humidity in our little blue tinted universe inside the box (tent). When we get up to do out morning kitchen duty at 6:30 we hafta crawl over little girl bodies spread out in our entry hall. Liz throws them on the air mattress and we’re out in the crisp morning air and on to work on the Kitchen Krew.
Today we’re making egg-artichoke casserole and I’m doing food prep (17 hotel pans serving 28) and Liz is making coffee. We actually made too much (highly unusual) for the over 400 people who made it over for breakfast before we close at 11, and I label the remaining 40 servings or so and put them away for the weekday crew. Nightly rain and the festival’s aging population bring more and more people to breakfast. We think it’s the popularity of our menu tambien.
As I’m about to get ready to go to Threadgill to hear the New Folk Concert Lizzie springs it on me that the girls wanna go home. Liz is tired and wants a quiet day at home for a change, Maya has a rash that itches, and Shayna misses Chelsea. I relent easily and we pack up the truck, batten the hatches on the tents, and find Cari and Stuart to make our excuses and get on the road. Another first Kerrville weekend is done with and we’re heading up the long hill to Fredricksburg talking about the highlights of the two days back at the festival for year number 13!
Notes: In at 73.9 and out at 72 Kgs.
* Chaco’s Headwaters available online at http://www.chacousa.com/
**About QVR retrieved online May 2007 from the KFF website at http://www.kerrville-music.com/about_qvranch.htm
*** Michael Smith retrieved online May 2007 from the KFF website at http://www.kerrvillefolkfestival.com/performers/2007%20KFF/k07_michael%20smith.htm
****Denice Franke retrieved online May 2007 from the KFF website at http://www.kerrvillefolkfestival.com/performers/2007%20KFF/k07_denice%20franke.htm
New Readers: For a Welcome post, click August 2006 on the sidebar.
Saturday
Kerrville Dialysis Center: Today I get here right at 5:30 am, even though I left the ranch 10 minutes late and it was rainy and foggy the whole way into town. The story is that I couldn’t get the dialysis shift I wanted in the afternoon, so I had to accept a 5:30 am time for my dialysis. I figured that when I got here I could re-negotiate a better deal for next weekend. (However, they only have two shifts and the other starts at 9 am, so 5:30 is better for me) This center is beautiful, with in floor scales, all new dialysis machines, floating TV’s, and a beautiful patterned tile floor. All of it looking spanking new and fresh and clean. I feel funny walking in with my muddy Chaco* sandals and mud-splattered legs.
I’m muddy because Quiet Valley Ranch** is like a huge gooky mud pie right now. Mostly the foot-deep mud is in the parking lots and all night long we in the staff campground hear people gunning their cars thinking they’ll get some traction and be able to move. But they don’t get traction in the mud, and they slide around bopping into other cars sometimes and generally getting deeper engaged in the muck. The sounds are of engines racing, the wrrrssshhhhhhh of tires spinning in the mud, and the voices yelling encouragement or warnings or directions for the mostly futile attempts at freeing the vehicles. Sometimes there’s wrrrssshhhhhhhing, then yelling, and a crunch at the end, indicating that there’s another victim of people trying to leave the festival. The later it gets Friday night the less we hear from the parking field so we drift off to sleep with the constant rain ebbing and flowing on our tent top.
I worry about the alarm going off so I wake up every half hour or so to check and see if I’m late. I wake up at 4:30 and it’s early. Then I wake up at 5:10 and I’m late. I rush out and walk through the staff tents quietly in the drizzle and fog, up the puddly dirt road to the staff center and out into the parking lot, finding my way along grassy areas that soak my Chacos and then through 6” deep mud to my truck, that I parked up on the grassy side of a hill. It’s downhill all the way to the road so I make it without any problems and I’m on my way into town slinging mud from my tires for the first quarter mile.
So here I am in a new center, hyper conscious about how they stick me and watching carefully to see if they look professional and competent. They do. The only thing I can think of to complain about is that it is difficult to go back to sleep cause they keep their bright lights on all the time. At El Milagro, after they hook you up, they turn down the lights if you want it that way. Here they aren’t set up to turn down the lights because they are long light fixtures that go all the way down the hall-type room that is the center. So I pull my hat’s bill down over my eyes and make the best of it. I actually fall asleep quickly and sleep until about 9 o’clock. Then I set my radio to San Antonio NPR and listen to the weekend programming until I get done at 10. I feel pretty good and shoot outa there to find a place to get an oil change and lube job before heading back to the ranch.
Quiet Valley Ranch: When I get back, I’m too late to work breakfast at all… in fact I’m too late to even eat breakfast. So, I find the girls at the Shabbat services at Threadgill Theatre, help Cari pour the wine and grape juice for Kiddush, say "Hi" to everyone, and then Liz, the girls, and I walk back to our tent. Shayna & Maya want to go swimming in town but I convince them to change their plans because I don’t want them getting stuck in the mud and I don’t want to loose my great parking place near the staff campground gate. The girls are sad but perk up at the idea of walking down the road a half mile to Turtle Creek and checking it out. I go back to the kitchen and help Cari cut apart 100 pounds of frozen chicken for the dinner stir fry. Then I head back over to Threadgill to hear the last of the children’s concert, and then wander over to say hi to the Tod Group at their new Comfy Campsite on the lower high road. Mitch has 'our' pop-up set up nicely right below the group, built a deck, and has out the party lights we never could use cause we didn’t have electric.
I am the guy who does the theatre rush at 6 and gets our usual seats 5 rows front center left. The concerts are great (especially Michael Smith*** and Denise Frankee****) and it is again like “being home”… that feeling that many of us get, I suspect, when we settle into being on the ranch, weathering whatever the weather does, chilling out (as the kids would say), listening to great music, and seeing good friends. I am totally tired out by halfway through Johnsmith (http://www.kerrvillefolkfestival.com/2007_1_5.htm ) so I walk back to the tent and turn in early. Later I hear Liz getting the kids all settled in their tent: its as if it is a distant radio broadcast in my dreams, and I poke back into semi-consciousness as she bounces onto the air mattress. I’ve modernized our 10x8 tent this year by cutting a piece of 3/4” exterior plywood in the shape of the air mattress, routing the edges to a nice roundness, and leveling the downhill side with rocks so we have a perfectly level platform bed. No more sliding down hill on the air mattress and I contend that now its as good as the pop-up. At about 4 am we hear Shayna softly calling “Mom?”…. “We’re all wet cause you left our door open”. Rather than start a midnight discussion about 10 year olds and 'responsibility', we just want to be quiet and get back to sleep. We bundle the kids into our warm and dry tent and they immediately go back to sleep… and their wetness changes the humidity in our little blue tinted universe inside the box (tent). When we get up to do out morning kitchen duty at 6:30 we hafta crawl over little girl bodies spread out in our entry hall. Liz throws them on the air mattress and we’re out in the crisp morning air and on to work on the Kitchen Krew.
Today we’re making egg-artichoke casserole and I’m doing food prep (17 hotel pans serving 28) and Liz is making coffee. We actually made too much (highly unusual) for the over 400 people who made it over for breakfast before we close at 11, and I label the remaining 40 servings or so and put them away for the weekday crew. Nightly rain and the festival’s aging population bring more and more people to breakfast. We think it’s the popularity of our menu tambien.
As I’m about to get ready to go to Threadgill to hear the New Folk Concert Lizzie springs it on me that the girls wanna go home. Liz is tired and wants a quiet day at home for a change, Maya has a rash that itches, and Shayna misses Chelsea. I relent easily and we pack up the truck, batten the hatches on the tents, and find Cari and Stuart to make our excuses and get on the road. Another first Kerrville weekend is done with and we’re heading up the long hill to Fredricksburg talking about the highlights of the two days back at the festival for year number 13!
Notes: In at 73.9 and out at 72 Kgs.
* Chaco’s Headwaters available online at http://www.chacousa.com/
**About QVR retrieved online May 2007 from the KFF website at http://www.kerrville-music.com/about_qvranch.htm
*** Michael Smith retrieved online May 2007 from the KFF website at http://www.kerrvillefolkfestival.com/performers/2007%20KFF/k07_michael%20smith.htm
****Denice Franke retrieved online May 2007 from the KFF website at http://www.kerrvillefolkfestival.com/performers/2007%20KFF/k07_denice%20franke.htm
New Readers: For a Welcome post, click August 2006 on the sidebar.
5/18/07
132) A Good Day
May 17, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: I got here on time today and as Jason was canulating me, I noticed that Jennifer the Dietician was going around the room reporting back to folks on their latest blood work. On my right, there was an older woman and her daughter who are here for the first time and being taught the process by Ron the Nurse. The older woman seemed not too sure about the whole thing and her daughter was trying to be upbeat, saying things like, “Wow; if I were here I’d just take a nap or watch TV.” and “this place is really pretty nice, isn’t it?”. I imagine the older woman is her mother, and she sees right through her daughter’s façade of fun-ness. Nobody is thrilled to come here the first time. Later on, after the daughter leaves, the old woman pulls her red tartan plaid blanket up over her head and doesn't come out for hours. At times she peeks out like a turtle peeks out of it's shell to see if it's safe.
Jennifer the Dietician comes over and reports to me that all my blood work was excellent this time! My phosphorous and potassium are great and my blood count is back up. This is two good lab reports in a row! WOW! I can run out and break my diet rules with impunity!
Well, maybe I can have one enchilada and take my Fosrenol right afterwards. Actually, I’ve been taking ½ a Fosrenol in the middle of each meal cause if I take a whole one afterwards, it makes me nauseous. I got tired of that real fast so I changed my order to taking ½ in the middle and that has led to these fabulous lab reports. Before I had to take so many meds, I used to wonder why anyone would not follow their prescriptions to a ‘T’, but now, as one of the medical guinea pigs, I see the reasoning behind patients ignoring their doctors and experimenting with different doses at different times than the doctors prescribe. Its like taking back some control over your own self: I have more autonomy when I decide how and when to take my meds. And this time it is working. I must admit that since my Fosrenol (an outrageously expensive medication; which is why it works, maybe) has helped my phosphorous get back into the “normal” range, I have been experimenting with eating small tastes of a few of the foods on the “NO NO NO” list, just to see what would happen. And wha-da-ya-know… this month’s phos numbers are still okay. Makes me wanta cheat just a little bit more. Lets see… I think I’d like some mixed nuts.
So Jennifer reports and leaves and I get back to listening to All Things Considered and then turn over to some PBS show since Survivor is over. I drift off a little and then…
POOF! Right in front of me is my smiling son Johnny, looking scraggly and extremely huggable. “Hi dad” he says, and I say, “Johnny!” and he bends over to hug me but that really isn’t gonna happen in my prostrate position so I just put my hand up and pat his face as he bends over. He’s smiling and I can’t even describe how it is to open your eyes to see your son after 10 months of not seeing him. He looks just the same! His mom brought him by after picking him up at the airport and we converse a little before they go out to dinner. He’ll be around all weekend before going down to Center Point to work at Camp C.A.M.P. for the summer. What can I say? The boy’s back and he brought all his parts back from Hawaii. It is a good day!
Notes: In at 75.2 and out at 72.2
Thursday
El Milagro: I got here on time today and as Jason was canulating me, I noticed that Jennifer the Dietician was going around the room reporting back to folks on their latest blood work. On my right, there was an older woman and her daughter who are here for the first time and being taught the process by Ron the Nurse. The older woman seemed not too sure about the whole thing and her daughter was trying to be upbeat, saying things like, “Wow; if I were here I’d just take a nap or watch TV.” and “this place is really pretty nice, isn’t it?”. I imagine the older woman is her mother, and she sees right through her daughter’s façade of fun-ness. Nobody is thrilled to come here the first time. Later on, after the daughter leaves, the old woman pulls her red tartan plaid blanket up over her head and doesn't come out for hours. At times she peeks out like a turtle peeks out of it's shell to see if it's safe.
Jennifer the Dietician comes over and reports to me that all my blood work was excellent this time! My phosphorous and potassium are great and my blood count is back up. This is two good lab reports in a row! WOW! I can run out and break my diet rules with impunity!
Well, maybe I can have one enchilada and take my Fosrenol right afterwards. Actually, I’ve been taking ½ a Fosrenol in the middle of each meal cause if I take a whole one afterwards, it makes me nauseous. I got tired of that real fast so I changed my order to taking ½ in the middle and that has led to these fabulous lab reports. Before I had to take so many meds, I used to wonder why anyone would not follow their prescriptions to a ‘T’, but now, as one of the medical guinea pigs, I see the reasoning behind patients ignoring their doctors and experimenting with different doses at different times than the doctors prescribe. Its like taking back some control over your own self: I have more autonomy when I decide how and when to take my meds. And this time it is working. I must admit that since my Fosrenol (an outrageously expensive medication; which is why it works, maybe) has helped my phosphorous get back into the “normal” range, I have been experimenting with eating small tastes of a few of the foods on the “NO NO NO” list, just to see what would happen. And wha-da-ya-know… this month’s phos numbers are still okay. Makes me wanta cheat just a little bit more. Lets see… I think I’d like some mixed nuts.
So Jennifer reports and leaves and I get back to listening to All Things Considered and then turn over to some PBS show since Survivor is over. I drift off a little and then…
POOF! Right in front of me is my smiling son Johnny, looking scraggly and extremely huggable. “Hi dad” he says, and I say, “Johnny!” and he bends over to hug me but that really isn’t gonna happen in my prostrate position so I just put my hand up and pat his face as he bends over. He’s smiling and I can’t even describe how it is to open your eyes to see your son after 10 months of not seeing him. He looks just the same! His mom brought him by after picking him up at the airport and we converse a little before they go out to dinner. He’ll be around all weekend before going down to Center Point to work at Camp C.A.M.P. for the summer. What can I say? The boy’s back and he brought all his parts back from Hawaii. It is a good day!
Notes: In at 75.2 and out at 72.2
5/13/07
131) Trying for Luxury
May 12, 2007
Saturday
El Milagro: I'm on time and I saunter into the dialysis clinic as if it is a spa and I'm gonna sit and relax and get my blood done. Matt hooks me up and everyone seems to be in a cheery mood, like the spa workers would be. Actually, it would be neat if they had people her to do your nails... well, I mean it would be nice for the women, of course. As Matt is canoodling me, there is the new woman next to me again and today she has two of her friends over here, seeing what kind of torture she is going through (at our spa). One of them goes on with Kim the Nurse about being from Arkansas (Little Rock) and came over just as soon as she could, and she had no idea Mildred was in such a state. Matt interupts her to say he's from Memphis, and I remind him Memphis isn't in Arkansas, and he replies that East Memphis is in that state.
I settle back with my radio tuned into the rest of Folkways and read the new New Yorker. I pretend we're at the spa and this is all luxurious treatment. In our spa Crystal is the Toe Girl, Matt and Heather are these Swedish massage people that climb up on your back and beat your muscles into a relaxed state. Kim and Celeste are the Asian accupunturists that go around with prayer hands, nodding their heads in agreement with everything you say. "Ah yes. We have much pleasure to fix you." as they stick skinny needles in your eyebrows and earlobes. I guess Gladys wold have to be the Chinese Doctor and Phyllis would for sure be the manager of the place, running around enuring everything is going just so.
I read on and listen to Live Set after Folkways and hear a great little band from New York: the Slackers. Off and on through the afternoon I think about Moritz dumping me and decide that it's unprofessional to not clearly tell your patient your're transferring them, especially after 10 years of the doctor / patient relationship. I am sure Moritz doesn't think of it this way... in fact he may not of thought of it at all. And, I may be hallucinating this whole thing, cause Jennifer the Dietician may have been wrong. Time will tell. More on this story as it develops.
Notes: In at 73.9 and out at 72 even. BP running in the normal range.
Saturday
El Milagro: I'm on time and I saunter into the dialysis clinic as if it is a spa and I'm gonna sit and relax and get my blood done. Matt hooks me up and everyone seems to be in a cheery mood, like the spa workers would be. Actually, it would be neat if they had people her to do your nails... well, I mean it would be nice for the women, of course. As Matt is canoodling me, there is the new woman next to me again and today she has two of her friends over here, seeing what kind of torture she is going through (at our spa). One of them goes on with Kim the Nurse about being from Arkansas (Little Rock) and came over just as soon as she could, and she had no idea Mildred was in such a state. Matt interupts her to say he's from Memphis, and I remind him Memphis isn't in Arkansas, and he replies that East Memphis is in that state.
I settle back with my radio tuned into the rest of Folkways and read the new New Yorker. I pretend we're at the spa and this is all luxurious treatment. In our spa Crystal is the Toe Girl, Matt and Heather are these Swedish massage people that climb up on your back and beat your muscles into a relaxed state. Kim and Celeste are the Asian accupunturists that go around with prayer hands, nodding their heads in agreement with everything you say. "Ah yes. We have much pleasure to fix you." as they stick skinny needles in your eyebrows and earlobes. I guess Gladys wold have to be the Chinese Doctor and Phyllis would for sure be the manager of the place, running around enuring everything is going just so.
I read on and listen to Live Set after Folkways and hear a great little band from New York: the Slackers. Off and on through the afternoon I think about Moritz dumping me and decide that it's unprofessional to not clearly tell your patient your're transferring them, especially after 10 years of the doctor / patient relationship. I am sure Moritz doesn't think of it this way... in fact he may not of thought of it at all. And, I may be hallucinating this whole thing, cause Jennifer the Dietician may have been wrong. Time will tell. More on this story as it develops.
Notes: In at 73.9 and out at 72 even. BP running in the normal range.
5/12/07
130) Dr. Moritz Ducks Out
May 10, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: It seemed like it was gonna be a normal dialysis day, which I’m not writing about so much anymore, cause some readers complained that my “normal” dialysis is boring. YES! It is boring lots of time; and that’s the point you all!
At any rate, today I come in and I’m a bit late (30 minutes) and Carol the Tech informs me that I’m not gonna get my full dialysis cause they hafta take me off at 8:30 pm. So, tonight I’ll only get 3.5 hours of blood cleansing…. Damn. And I’m the one who can’t understand other people “coming off early” or not running their full session… and, here I am doing it too. I must work on getting here on time. I used to make it on time every time. I’ve slipped up; probably because it has become such a normal part of living that I take advantage of it… or, something like that.
Well, at some point, Jennifer the Dietician steps over from the long meeting she has been doing with one of the new patients who is sitting right next to me today. She says my blood count is up again and supposes that the added Heparin is helping and nod acceptance of that fact. At some point during our little conversation I think I say something about Dr. Moritz and she replies something like, “Well, he’s not your doctor anymore, now it’s ___”, “the new doc” that I’ve called Nicholas and Lt. Fuzz at times. My reply is “WHAT? I don’t think so. Moritz is my doc!”, to which she replies, more cautiously, “No. Crowder (or whatever his name is) is now your doctor, because he is doing the rounds and signing things.”. I say, “Well my insurance shows its Moritz and I just had to get a new permission for him to keep seeing me.” And we went on like that for a few minutes with me unbelieving and her for sure.
I don’t want a new nephrologists! I’m happy with the grumpy Dr. Moritz! So, now I have to figure out what to do about this situation. I can always make an office appt. to see him, but then it’ll cost me $35 bucks to argue with him about staying as my doctor. I’ll have to be thinking this one over for awhile. So, as Roseanne Roseannadanna always said, “It’s always something.”
Notes: In at 74.9 and out at 72.7 Kgs. In 3.5 hours.
New Readers: Now you can access this blog simply by typing “Jack’s Kidney Adventure” on Google and it’ll take you right here! Cool, huh?
Thursday
El Milagro: It seemed like it was gonna be a normal dialysis day, which I’m not writing about so much anymore, cause some readers complained that my “normal” dialysis is boring. YES! It is boring lots of time; and that’s the point you all!
At any rate, today I come in and I’m a bit late (30 minutes) and Carol the Tech informs me that I’m not gonna get my full dialysis cause they hafta take me off at 8:30 pm. So, tonight I’ll only get 3.5 hours of blood cleansing…. Damn. And I’m the one who can’t understand other people “coming off early” or not running their full session… and, here I am doing it too. I must work on getting here on time. I used to make it on time every time. I’ve slipped up; probably because it has become such a normal part of living that I take advantage of it… or, something like that.
Well, at some point, Jennifer the Dietician steps over from the long meeting she has been doing with one of the new patients who is sitting right next to me today. She says my blood count is up again and supposes that the added Heparin is helping and nod acceptance of that fact. At some point during our little conversation I think I say something about Dr. Moritz and she replies something like, “Well, he’s not your doctor anymore, now it’s ___”, “the new doc” that I’ve called Nicholas and Lt. Fuzz at times. My reply is “WHAT? I don’t think so. Moritz is my doc!”, to which she replies, more cautiously, “No. Crowder (or whatever his name is) is now your doctor, because he is doing the rounds and signing things.”. I say, “Well my insurance shows its Moritz and I just had to get a new permission for him to keep seeing me.” And we went on like that for a few minutes with me unbelieving and her for sure.
I don’t want a new nephrologists! I’m happy with the grumpy Dr. Moritz! So, now I have to figure out what to do about this situation. I can always make an office appt. to see him, but then it’ll cost me $35 bucks to argue with him about staying as my doctor. I’ll have to be thinking this one over for awhile. So, as Roseanne Roseannadanna always said, “It’s always something.”
Notes: In at 74.9 and out at 72.7 Kgs. In 3.5 hours.
New Readers: Now you can access this blog simply by typing “Jack’s Kidney Adventure” on Google and it’ll take you right here! Cool, huh?
5/4/07
129) Short Post (or, the Phosphorous Blues)
May 3, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: I arrive on time today, get poked by Jason the Regular Guy Tech, and have a nice session of listening to NPR and watching TV. Jason is fairly new around here, and very careful and considerate in his cannulations. It is good, because I hallucinate he is learning and is motivated to build rapport with patients and do a pain-free job on them as much as is possible. He and I have begun to talk some when he is assigned to my chair.
I notice by reviewing these posts, that exactly one year ago today I posted (#6) about talking to Jennifer the Dietician and beginning to learn about the phosphorous blues (all the foods that I shouldn’t eat, how high phosphorous impacts the body, etc.). It seems that those blues have been playing in my life most of the past year and maybe I have now adjusted my diet sufficiently, found the right binders, and had my machine time adjusted enough to move beyond these blues. If I hadn't escaped them, I coulda been the old dialysis blues man, singing and playing the phosphorous blues.
“Oh I can’t eat no pancakes, nor enchiladas eitha,
cause if mah phos gets too high I get the phosphorous feva.
Its been years since ah seena,
mah avocada and sardina….
and ahm singin da blues. Dose phosphorous blues.”
Well, I guess you can tell I’m no singer songwriter, but I do respect those guys (and gals). If any of you songwriters happen along here on this blog, please feel free to write me a song about my phosphorous blues.
Actually, my phosphorous is a lot better these days; I’m just waxing romantic. Its almost as if it's too scary to be funny about when it's on top of you so meanly. Such is our lot in life, I guess.
Notes: In at 74.6 and out at 73.3 (ending BP = 126/60) And Again: Now readers can google my blog by typing Jack’s Kidney Adventure in quotes on google and it’ll take ya right there.
Thursday
El Milagro: I arrive on time today, get poked by Jason the Regular Guy Tech, and have a nice session of listening to NPR and watching TV. Jason is fairly new around here, and very careful and considerate in his cannulations. It is good, because I hallucinate he is learning and is motivated to build rapport with patients and do a pain-free job on them as much as is possible. He and I have begun to talk some when he is assigned to my chair.
I notice by reviewing these posts, that exactly one year ago today I posted (#6) about talking to Jennifer the Dietician and beginning to learn about the phosphorous blues (all the foods that I shouldn’t eat, how high phosphorous impacts the body, etc.). It seems that those blues have been playing in my life most of the past year and maybe I have now adjusted my diet sufficiently, found the right binders, and had my machine time adjusted enough to move beyond these blues. If I hadn't escaped them, I coulda been the old dialysis blues man, singing and playing the phosphorous blues.
“Oh I can’t eat no pancakes, nor enchiladas eitha,
cause if mah phos gets too high I get the phosphorous feva.
Its been years since ah seena,
mah avocada and sardina….
and ahm singin da blues. Dose phosphorous blues.”
Well, I guess you can tell I’m no singer songwriter, but I do respect those guys (and gals). If any of you songwriters happen along here on this blog, please feel free to write me a song about my phosphorous blues.
Actually, my phosphorous is a lot better these days; I’m just waxing romantic. Its almost as if it's too scary to be funny about when it's on top of you so meanly. Such is our lot in life, I guess.
Notes: In at 74.6 and out at 73.3 (ending BP = 126/60) And Again: Now readers can google my blog by typing Jack’s Kidney Adventure in quotes on google and it’ll take ya right there.
5/2/07
128) International Worker’s Day
May 1, 2007
Tuesday
El Milagro: I noticed another new patient here today and mentally noted that I need to introduce myself to the patients on my shift (who don’t already know me) to let them know I’m their representative on the El Milagro Advisory Committee. I am also now on DaVita’s Patient Citizen’s Group now so today is a serendipitous occasion for celebrating patient’s (worker, client) voice in our care. I am sitting here considering these things as Matt the Tech is poking me and going on about something or another while I half listen and half recall past May Days from the sixties. It’s funny, I think, that May Day is simultaneously a holiday of cheer with children dancing with ribbons around a pole; a Catholic holiday honoring Mary; and a day to honor Loyalty to America and the Labor movement. These last two are of particular interest to me, as they might be seen as an example of the Americans lacking cognitive complexity. According to Wayne Duehn, cognitive complexity is the ability to see things in shades of gray, rather than black or white. I might note here that social workers who score high in cognitive complexity do better in their careers and are better able to join with a variety of clients.
So, back to May Day. Socialists and labor movement folks celebrate on May Day to remember the Haymarket Riots in Chicago back in the late 1880’s. In the late ‘60’s and early 70’s, we usually celebrated May Day with either a large dinner or a small march, depending upon our energy level. At any rate, May Day was a day to celebrate, as was Arbor Day, and Frank Zappa’s birthday. So then, in the 1920’s President Eisenhower proclaimed May 1st as Loyalty Day and suggested that all Americans celebrate their loyalty to the nation on this day. Some believe that this was proclaimed specifically to counterbalance the socialist workers celebration of May Day as a call for workers to commemorate the Haymarket Riots and to join together to celebrate the social and economic achievements of the working class.
So May Day evolved from pagan dance day to Christian “Mary Day” to socialist commemorative day, to Republican loyalty day. It somehow fits that the May Pole was originally (Norse) thought of as an axis connecting the underworld, the real world, and the heavens, since all the various folks who have claimed meanings on this day fit somewhere along that axis, I’m sure. I can picture it now: socialists, children, dancing ladies, republicans, Catholics, and flower children all dancing around the May Pole with their multi-coloured ribbons of dogma. And as they sweep around the pole, two by two, their multi-coloured ribbons join together making a stripped barber pole that draws them closer and closer until they have to touch and even maybe hug each other. Or, maybe they all get tied together on the pole…. Either way, it is a nice thought and maybe that’s what May Day is all about.
These were my dreams as I dozed away my time in dialysis, and then awoke to watch a fascinating NOVA on the secret work of Issac Newton. Somehow all is connected. So it goes.
Notes: In at 75.9 and out at 73.0 (no problems with low BP today) Oh yeah! Now readers can google my blog by typing Jack’s Kidney Adventure in quotes on google and it’ll take ya right there.
* “May Day” retrieved online May 2007 from Wikepedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_Day
Tuesday
El Milagro: I noticed another new patient here today and mentally noted that I need to introduce myself to the patients on my shift (who don’t already know me) to let them know I’m their representative on the El Milagro Advisory Committee. I am also now on DaVita’s Patient Citizen’s Group now so today is a serendipitous occasion for celebrating patient’s (worker, client) voice in our care. I am sitting here considering these things as Matt the Tech is poking me and going on about something or another while I half listen and half recall past May Days from the sixties. It’s funny, I think, that May Day is simultaneously a holiday of cheer with children dancing with ribbons around a pole; a Catholic holiday honoring Mary; and a day to honor Loyalty to America and the Labor movement. These last two are of particular interest to me, as they might be seen as an example of the Americans lacking cognitive complexity. According to Wayne Duehn, cognitive complexity is the ability to see things in shades of gray, rather than black or white. I might note here that social workers who score high in cognitive complexity do better in their careers and are better able to join with a variety of clients.
So, back to May Day. Socialists and labor movement folks celebrate on May Day to remember the Haymarket Riots in Chicago back in the late 1880’s. In the late ‘60’s and early 70’s, we usually celebrated May Day with either a large dinner or a small march, depending upon our energy level. At any rate, May Day was a day to celebrate, as was Arbor Day, and Frank Zappa’s birthday. So then, in the 1920’s President Eisenhower proclaimed May 1st as Loyalty Day and suggested that all Americans celebrate their loyalty to the nation on this day. Some believe that this was proclaimed specifically to counterbalance the socialist workers celebration of May Day as a call for workers to commemorate the Haymarket Riots and to join together to celebrate the social and economic achievements of the working class.
So May Day evolved from pagan dance day to Christian “Mary Day” to socialist commemorative day, to Republican loyalty day. It somehow fits that the May Pole was originally (Norse) thought of as an axis connecting the underworld, the real world, and the heavens, since all the various folks who have claimed meanings on this day fit somewhere along that axis, I’m sure. I can picture it now: socialists, children, dancing ladies, republicans, Catholics, and flower children all dancing around the May Pole with their multi-coloured ribbons of dogma. And as they sweep around the pole, two by two, their multi-coloured ribbons join together making a stripped barber pole that draws them closer and closer until they have to touch and even maybe hug each other. Or, maybe they all get tied together on the pole…. Either way, it is a nice thought and maybe that’s what May Day is all about.
These were my dreams as I dozed away my time in dialysis, and then awoke to watch a fascinating NOVA on the secret work of Issac Newton. Somehow all is connected. So it goes.
Notes: In at 75.9 and out at 73.0 (no problems with low BP today) Oh yeah! Now readers can google my blog by typing Jack’s Kidney Adventure in quotes on google and it’ll take ya right there.
* “May Day” retrieved online May 2007 from Wikepedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_Day
4/29/07
127) Bob Wills Day @ Dialysis
April 26, 2007
Saturday
El Milagro: I had called and Phyllis the Nurse said come in at 2:40 or so. Here I am pulling into the parking lot at about 2:45 thinking I have been taking advantage of the flexibility about chair time by coming in late too frequently. Now I am one of those people I used to complain about when I started: the people who meander in here whenever they damn well please. Hum? Is it the entitlement of the one-year-tenured-patient syndrome? Or am I just becoming lackadaisical about getting to a place where I get stuck with needles, sit around feeling my butt ache, and my legs twitch? I'll have to ponder this (Al and Richard: remember Ponder?).
Today is
Bob Wills day up in Turkey, Texas. Damn! I’d like to be there too rather than sitting here attached to this machine. Old Steve the crazy English keyboard guy might be there. Today the population of Turkey goes from 500 up to about 9500 and the current Texas Playboys with Johnny Gimble raise their fiddles in honor of “the King”.*
Crystal the Tall Tech cannulates me and we briefly discuss our views about seeing reality, living in San Marcos, and being happy that school is almost over for the summer. Melissa the Perky Tech comes by to check my machine and reports she’ll be on the third shift next month. Ron the Nurse, remembering my last session, asks Melissa to watch my BP and let him know if it goes down below 100. Chris the Tech is here today too, with his loud and somewhat depreciating comments shouted across the room to other techs. I believe that in Chris’ world he is raising the spirit of the place with his antics. Its as if he is a sales rep for poseur. And, he should be able to exist in the world with the rest of us… I would only wish he’d whisper.
According to an overheard conversation Ron is having with another patient, there won’t be many chairs on our shift since we are taking on new patients. I see one today, I think. He is a Hispanic guy with a long braided tail down his back, and a yellow shirt. He evidently was here years ago, cause Carol asks him how he’s feeling and... it’s not well. He’s in the corner today, hidden behind a column, so I can’t observe him much. It’s like a grocery store in here today… people coming and going with their blue baskets of paraphernalia. Someone’s eating something I smell faintly… like in a grocery.
I’m reading the new Alex Delaware novel and am totally involved in it. Picked it up in the airport in Lubbock last week. Bad choice, money wise. I paid airport bookstore prices… but I couldn’t help myself. I’m cruising the store tiredly, looking around at the new political tomes and all of a sudden my eyes fall cross the thick new Kellerman** book and its as if it FLASHED neon at me. I was drawn to it hypnotically and HAD to buy it, even at the outrageous airport price. Oh well. I heard on TV last night that I am in the middle of the richest population yet; the middle-aged 60 year old baby-boomers. We buy books in airport bookstores and don’t blink an eye. So there!
Notes: In at 75.5 and out at 72.3... and my BP stayed around normal the whole time.
* “Turkey Will Swing This Weekend” retrieved April 2007 from the Amarillo Globe-News website, http://getout.amarillo.com/content/outings/042707_bobwillsday.shtml
** Jonathan Kellerman retrieved online April 2007 from http://www.jonathankellerman.com/
Saturday
El Milagro: I had called and Phyllis the Nurse said come in at 2:40 or so. Here I am pulling into the parking lot at about 2:45 thinking I have been taking advantage of the flexibility about chair time by coming in late too frequently. Now I am one of those people I used to complain about when I started: the people who meander in here whenever they damn well please. Hum? Is it the entitlement of the one-year-tenured-patient syndrome? Or am I just becoming lackadaisical about getting to a place where I get stuck with needles, sit around feeling my butt ache, and my legs twitch? I'll have to ponder this (Al and Richard: remember Ponder?).
Today is
Bob Wills day up in Turkey, Texas. Damn! I’d like to be there too rather than sitting here attached to this machine. Old Steve the crazy English keyboard guy might be there. Today the population of Turkey goes from 500 up to about 9500 and the current Texas Playboys with Johnny Gimble raise their fiddles in honor of “the King”.*Crystal the Tall Tech cannulates me and we briefly discuss our views about seeing reality, living in San Marcos, and being happy that school is almost over for the summer. Melissa the Perky Tech comes by to check my machine and reports she’ll be on the third shift next month. Ron the Nurse, remembering my last session, asks Melissa to watch my BP and let him know if it goes down below 100. Chris the Tech is here today too, with his loud and somewhat depreciating comments shouted across the room to other techs. I believe that in Chris’ world he is raising the spirit of the place with his antics. Its as if he is a sales rep for poseur. And, he should be able to exist in the world with the rest of us… I would only wish he’d whisper.
According to an overheard conversation Ron is having with another patient, there won’t be many chairs on our shift since we are taking on new patients. I see one today, I think. He is a Hispanic guy with a long braided tail down his back, and a yellow shirt. He evidently was here years ago, cause Carol asks him how he’s feeling and... it’s not well. He’s in the corner today, hidden behind a column, so I can’t observe him much. It’s like a grocery store in here today… people coming and going with their blue baskets of paraphernalia. Someone’s eating something I smell faintly… like in a grocery.
I’m reading the new Alex Delaware novel and am totally involved in it. Picked it up in the airport in Lubbock last week. Bad choice, money wise. I paid airport bookstore prices… but I couldn’t help myself. I’m cruising the store tiredly, looking around at the new political tomes and all of a sudden my eyes fall cross the thick new Kellerman** book and its as if it FLASHED neon at me. I was drawn to it hypnotically and HAD to buy it, even at the outrageous airport price. Oh well. I heard on TV last night that I am in the middle of the richest population yet; the middle-aged 60 year old baby-boomers. We buy books in airport bookstores and don’t blink an eye. So there!
Notes: In at 75.5 and out at 72.3... and my BP stayed around normal the whole time.
* “Turkey Will Swing This Weekend” retrieved April 2007 from the Amarillo Globe-News website, http://getout.amarillo.com/content/outings/042707_bobwillsday.shtml
** Jonathan Kellerman retrieved online April 2007 from http://www.jonathankellerman.com/
4/28/07
126) The Good with the Bad
April 26, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: Got here late at 4:30 today, after driving in fast from Corpus Christi. This dialysis business doesn’t always mix well with the life of a traveling training troubadour. My BP is 142 over something: San Antonio corridor traffic stress + 80 mph, no doubt. I weighed in at 76.2 (that’s 167 lbs. folks) after two days of gorging myself on sea food at Snoopy’s*
and Doc’s. I’m sorry I ate that last bite, but not much.
So, I’m late, and heavy and Carol the Tech negotiates with me to only take off 3 and save the rest til Saturday. I tell her I’m sorry she’ll have to stay til 9 and she says “thanks” and adds, “We’re setting you to finish with the others, since we have to flush the frazzletops tonight.” “Cool!” I reply. Nice tech!
Thursday
El Milagro: Got here late at 4:30 today, after driving in fast from Corpus Christi. This dialysis business doesn’t always mix well with the life of a traveling training troubadour. My BP is 142 over something: San Antonio corridor traffic stress + 80 mph, no doubt. I weighed in at 76.2 (that’s 167 lbs. folks) after two days of gorging myself on sea food at Snoopy’s*
and Doc’s. I’m sorry I ate that last bite, but not much. So, I’m late, and heavy and Carol the Tech negotiates with me to only take off 3 and save the rest til Saturday. I tell her I’m sorry she’ll have to stay til 9 and she says “thanks” and adds, “We’re setting you to finish with the others, since we have to flush the frazzletops tonight.” “Cool!” I reply. Nice tech!
So it comes to the fact that we are living in an ordered universe. We run around trying our best to make our appointments, as if our miniscule activity can change the flow of time, or influence the grand scheme that ticks along at it's own majestic pace. When will we realize that we are but pawns in the grand scheme of things? When will be sit back and accept that we will fit into the flow of the Universe in just the way we are supposed to? All the way back from Corpus from the time the girls were getting shrimp sandwiches at Snoopy's on our way out I was saying to myself, "We will move along at our own pace because we just have to keep moving. We will be on time or we will be late. It's just what it is. All things are already perfect and let's not fight it." We are not correcting course to have control, but to stay in the flow of the universe. The sooner we realize that the better off we are. 'Nam myoho renge kyo'... [all things according to (the Universe's flow)]
I settle in for a snooze after the long road trip and wake up for Survivor, of course. My boy Yao Man** is still doing well and that is enjoyable to observe. And then at about 7:50 pm my machine blinks it’s beeping and I’m done. Boy, three hours seems a LOT shorter than four hours. I am holding my poke holes for 10 minutes before Carol tapes them up, and zippo…. I’m outa there and on my way home.
Notes: In at 76.2 and out at 73.5.
* Snoopy’s retrieved online April 2007 from http://travel.yahoo.com/p-travelguide-3005289-snoopy_s_pier_corpus_christi-i
** Yao Man retrieved online April 2007 from http://www.cbs.com/primetime/survivor14/survivors/yau_man.shtml
(From My Memory)
April 24, 2007
Tuesday
Now it’s history and fading fast in my memory… but, last Tuesday was a horrible session. I can remember the feelings more than the actual events, although I reported them to several people the next day. As in other yucky sessions, I started feeling faint and clammy near the end of my session. My BP was down to 84 over 56 or some way low numbers and my feet were starting to cramp. Ron was the nurse on duty and Mat was the tech. Matt originally stopped the cleansing process and just ran the blood through the dialyzer but that didn’t work. Then they added some liquid and that didn’t help. Then Ron gave me some hot, salty chicken broth and that tasted terrible; like chicken broth ala salt block: picture a salt cup filled with thick chicken broth. Pffft! Finally, my BP raised to about 105 over something and I was able to stand up and wobble around. I got outa there about 8:45 and navigated home, only to crash out on the couch, totally wasted. In my delirious dreams my son, Johnny, is lecturing me: “We gotta take the good with the bad, Dad”.
Notes: In at 74.5 and out at 72.6
4/22/07
125) Earth Day 2007
April 21, 2007
Saturday
El Milagro: A new girl tech comes up and says, “May I stick you?” “Sure”, I reply, “…as long as you do a good job. (a few seconds) …and I’ll tell you if you don’t”. <-- I said that! The strengths-based constructivist trainer of hundreds of family counselors across the land! Can you believe it? I didn’t even catch myself in that moment and correct my statement. It was ten to twenty minutes afterwards that I caught myself and then I scolded myself in my brain. Can you see, dear reader, how quickly and unconsciously we all can slip right back into a deficit-based reality? And then we scold ourselves for it internally in a deficit-based stern parent voice. So, I sighed and said in a softer, more accepting voice, “It’s okay Jack. Every slip-up is an opportunity for re-commitment to the way.” I had been able, at least, to say thanks to her as she computo-doc’d my cannulation. That was more of a habit. And it is a good habit, I maintain, to thank all people who serve us in any way at all.
I was able to climb out of my kiva of gloom. Internally I sometimes imagine the above kinds of thought-u-lations as some sort of internal gnashing and cleansing and visioning such as our native peoples did in their subterranean kivas*. I am taken down there into the lower middle region of my own personal self brain/heart and wrestle around with my critical self (critical parent, negativity, glass half emptyness) in the dark shadowland. And as the fire gets going in the middle I quit the fight, settle into a long sigh meditation, and let it all out. Then comes the part where I jump up and run around crazy in the firelight and the shadows dance accross the hierglphed wall. I get speared with visions of possibility, and then cleansed by sweating out the demons of deficit, and finally am encouraged by the great spirit. Then I climb back out into the sunlight of a crystal clear New Mexico desert.
I am one of the last people to get dialysized today because I’ve been working on Katie’s Graduation Announcement. It is a quiet Saturday: I listen to KUT Live Set, snooze-a-nopolis, and then watch the first hour of Roman Holiday. Boy! Those were the days!
Update Since Last Post: Since my last post things have been the same and different… kind of like life in general. I got a good blood work report; both Potassium and Phosphorus are GOOD! (Phosphorous was 4.7 [3.5 to 5.5 is normal] and Potassium was 4.9 [3.5 to 5.5 is normal]). A few staff have left the center (Diane said goodbye to me and ensured me she is going to a better job) and maybe there are some new ones, like the young woman who stuck me today. It’s hard to tell. I ask a nurse, “Are you new?” and they reply “Only today”. I think new staff should go around and introduce themselves to the patients.
A guy that started dialysis around the same time as me has left the planet (He was a kinda scroungy looking guy who had a old worn quilt he dragged in and out with him and he reminded me of Linus in Peanuts). According to the gossip, he had open heart surgery, started missing his dialysis, and was found dead on his living room floor. Another old person passed away too, but I don’t know much about that one. We are a group of patients who pass through the center as most of the staff stand around serving us in the moment. And then we are gone. Some of us die and move onward in that frame. And a few of us get a new kidney and go back out into the world, like we are running out to recess. So it goes.
My yearly report still rests in my old G3 sitting over at Mac Alliance waiting for someone to merge the hard drive into our new silver tower Mac OS 10.something. When I get it, you’ll get it.
Notes: In at 73.4 and out at 72. (Blood pressure is more normal low rather than low low.)
* “Kiva” retrieved online April 2007 from Wikepedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiva
Saturday
El Milagro: A new girl tech comes up and says, “May I stick you?” “Sure”, I reply, “…as long as you do a good job. (a few seconds) …and I’ll tell you if you don’t”. <-- I said that! The strengths-based constructivist trainer of hundreds of family counselors across the land! Can you believe it? I didn’t even catch myself in that moment and correct my statement. It was ten to twenty minutes afterwards that I caught myself and then I scolded myself in my brain. Can you see, dear reader, how quickly and unconsciously we all can slip right back into a deficit-based reality? And then we scold ourselves for it internally in a deficit-based stern parent voice. So, I sighed and said in a softer, more accepting voice, “It’s okay Jack. Every slip-up is an opportunity for re-commitment to the way.” I had been able, at least, to say thanks to her as she computo-doc’d my cannulation. That was more of a habit. And it is a good habit, I maintain, to thank all people who serve us in any way at all.
I was able to climb out of my kiva of gloom. Internally I sometimes imagine the above kinds of thought-u-lations as some sort of internal gnashing and cleansing and visioning such as our native peoples did in their subterranean kivas*. I am taken down there into the lower middle region of my own personal self brain/heart and wrestle around with my critical self (critical parent, negativity, glass half emptyness) in the dark shadowland. And as the fire gets going in the middle I quit the fight, settle into a long sigh meditation, and let it all out. Then comes the part where I jump up and run around crazy in the firelight and the shadows dance accross the hierglphed wall. I get speared with visions of possibility, and then cleansed by sweating out the demons of deficit, and finally am encouraged by the great spirit. Then I climb back out into the sunlight of a crystal clear New Mexico desert.
I am one of the last people to get dialysized today because I’ve been working on Katie’s Graduation Announcement. It is a quiet Saturday: I listen to KUT Live Set, snooze-a-nopolis, and then watch the first hour of Roman Holiday. Boy! Those were the days!
Update Since Last Post: Since my last post things have been the same and different… kind of like life in general. I got a good blood work report; both Potassium and Phosphorus are GOOD! (Phosphorous was 4.7 [3.5 to 5.5 is normal] and Potassium was 4.9 [3.5 to 5.5 is normal]). A few staff have left the center (Diane said goodbye to me and ensured me she is going to a better job) and maybe there are some new ones, like the young woman who stuck me today. It’s hard to tell. I ask a nurse, “Are you new?” and they reply “Only today”. I think new staff should go around and introduce themselves to the patients.
A guy that started dialysis around the same time as me has left the planet (He was a kinda scroungy looking guy who had a old worn quilt he dragged in and out with him and he reminded me of Linus in Peanuts). According to the gossip, he had open heart surgery, started missing his dialysis, and was found dead on his living room floor. Another old person passed away too, but I don’t know much about that one. We are a group of patients who pass through the center as most of the staff stand around serving us in the moment. And then we are gone. Some of us die and move onward in that frame. And a few of us get a new kidney and go back out into the world, like we are running out to recess. So it goes.
My yearly report still rests in my old G3 sitting over at Mac Alliance waiting for someone to merge the hard drive into our new silver tower Mac OS 10.something. When I get it, you’ll get it.
Notes: In at 73.4 and out at 72. (Blood pressure is more normal low rather than low low.)
* “Kiva” retrieved online April 2007 from Wikepedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiva
4/12/07
124) One Year on Dialysis!
April 12, 2007
Thursday
Note: I have been considering my experiences over the last dialysistic year and began to draft a post about them and then my computer's hard drive crashed, so now you have to wait, dear reader. Soon I will be able to salvage some data from that old disc and transfer it to my new computer. Then I will transfer my musings up to this anniversary post. Stay tuned. <-- New ONE YEAR musings at the end of this post, added 8-29-07!
Also, yesterday, on my anniversar
y, Kurt Vonnegut died. This blog’s readers have no doubt seen many Vonnegut quotes throughout the posts, and it is only fitting to commemorate Vonnegut by remembering his thought on our purpose on the planet: "I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you any different."* The picture above was the only one I could steal from Google Images that showed the old geezer with wings, which I thought highly apropos.
El Milagro: Today Gladys cannulated me and Phyllis the Nurse stethed me. I sounded good to her. I told her about Vonnegut and we got into a discussion about all his great books, and then similar books, and then she asked what my favorite book ever is. I stopped and thought for a minute: “Wow there are so many excellent books… which one to pick right at this moment… which will come to mind first?” and I replied, “Duh! ……………………The Grapes of Wrath.” She hummpfed and said something like, “Makes sense”. She believes a person's favorite book is like a short personality profile of the reader. But I think you can't judge a book by looking at it's reader. Her favorite is one I can’t quite remember right now. The title is up there in my fuzzy brain somewhere, shifting about making itself almost known to me, but not quite clearly enough to label and spit out. I must find out from her and include it in this post. We both went on for awhile listing off favorite books, mine including The Glass Bead Game, Breakfast of Champions, Incarnations of Immortality, Illusions, etc. She did so too and we compared our picks. Phyllis and I don’t talk much these days and I miss that… but the place has become very busy for the nurses, so it seems she just shoots around from patient to computer to the back of the counter. The nurse's movement is similar to a pin-ball in a wacky game where the chairs are the pop bumpers and the front counter is a kicking rubber, and the staff are the balls being flipped around by the beeping machines, which of course are the jumbo flippers.
Survivor is on tonight and I begin watching it and then doze off in the middle. Dozing off during Survivor? it must be getting too boring for even me, one of their two staunch surviving watchers. I slept through the part where they divvyed up the one tribe into two teams and had the immunity challenge. I woke up to see 4 disappointed survivors heading up the trail to tribal council and then, after a short Q/A about who likes who, one got their flame snuffed. So it goes.
Notes: In at 75. and out at 72.8 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 10 over -20. (gniddik tsuj)
* Robinson, M. (2007) Kurt Vonnegut dead at 84. Retrieved from the Washington Post website at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/12/AR2007041201159.html
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
So, how can I characterize this past year? It has been a real drag on the family. The older kids worry about my health and Katie has even ruminated about her fears with her friends. Liz has had to adjust her whole life around my various disabilities, diets, medications, and schedules. And Shayna, on some level has to be careful how close she gets to her daddy (<-- my hallucination).
Anytime a long-term chronic medical condition invades a family it becomes a daily reminder of the fragility of life. We who have this daily reminder (like the fickle finger of fate) can likely think it is by the grace of God (Buddha, Brahman, Shiva, etc.) that we ae here every day to enjoy living. The sense of control and future planning of our lives is shattered. We no longer have control and we are reminded of that fact daily when we take our 10 to 12 meds and when we do our time on the machine of life.
When I had no ESRD I ofen went for months at a time without thinking of my mortality or having the spectre of death wiggling it's woeful way into my schema of life. These are my thoughts on my anniversary of starting dialysis.
Thursday
Note: I have been considering my experiences over the last dialysistic year and began to draft a post about them and then my computer's hard drive crashed, so now you have to wait, dear reader. Soon I will be able to salvage some data from that old disc and transfer it to my new computer. Then I will transfer my musings up to this anniversary post. Stay tuned. <-- New ONE YEAR musings at the end of this post, added 8-29-07!
Also, yesterday, on my anniversar
y, Kurt Vonnegut died. This blog’s readers have no doubt seen many Vonnegut quotes throughout the posts, and it is only fitting to commemorate Vonnegut by remembering his thought on our purpose on the planet: "I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you any different."* The picture above was the only one I could steal from Google Images that showed the old geezer with wings, which I thought highly apropos.El Milagro: Today Gladys cannulated me and Phyllis the Nurse stethed me. I sounded good to her. I told her about Vonnegut and we got into a discussion about all his great books, and then similar books, and then she asked what my favorite book ever is. I stopped and thought for a minute: “Wow there are so many excellent books… which one to pick right at this moment… which will come to mind first?” and I replied, “Duh! ……………………The Grapes of Wrath.” She hummpfed and said something like, “Makes sense”. She believes a person's favorite book is like a short personality profile of the reader. But I think you can't judge a book by looking at it's reader. Her favorite is one I can’t quite remember right now. The title is up there in my fuzzy brain somewhere, shifting about making itself almost known to me, but not quite clearly enough to label and spit out. I must find out from her and include it in this post. We both went on for awhile listing off favorite books, mine including The Glass Bead Game, Breakfast of Champions, Incarnations of Immortality, Illusions, etc. She did so too and we compared our picks. Phyllis and I don’t talk much these days and I miss that… but the place has become very busy for the nurses, so it seems she just shoots around from patient to computer to the back of the counter. The nurse's movement is similar to a pin-ball in a wacky game where the chairs are the pop bumpers and the front counter is a kicking rubber, and the staff are the balls being flipped around by the beeping machines, which of course are the jumbo flippers.
Survivor is on tonight and I begin watching it and then doze off in the middle. Dozing off during Survivor? it must be getting too boring for even me, one of their two staunch surviving watchers. I slept through the part where they divvyed up the one tribe into two teams and had the immunity challenge. I woke up to see 4 disappointed survivors heading up the trail to tribal council and then, after a short Q/A about who likes who, one got their flame snuffed. So it goes.
Notes: In at 75. and out at 72.8 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 10 over -20. (gniddik tsuj)
* Robinson, M. (2007) Kurt Vonnegut dead at 84. Retrieved from the Washington Post website at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/12/AR2007041201159.html
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
So, how can I characterize this past year? It has been a real drag on the family. The older kids worry about my health and Katie has even ruminated about her fears with her friends. Liz has had to adjust her whole life around my various disabilities, diets, medications, and schedules. And Shayna, on some level has to be careful how close she gets to her daddy (<-- my hallucination).
Anytime a long-term chronic medical condition invades a family it becomes a daily reminder of the fragility of life. We who have this daily reminder (like the fickle finger of fate) can likely think it is by the grace of God (Buddha, Brahman, Shiva, etc.) that we ae here every day to enjoy living. The sense of control and future planning of our lives is shattered. We no longer have control and we are reminded of that fact daily when we take our 10 to 12 meds and when we do our time on the machine of life.
When I had no ESRD I ofen went for months at a time without thinking of my mortality or having the spectre of death wiggling it's woeful way into my schema of life. These are my thoughts on my anniversary of starting dialysis.
4/11/07
123) Of Tylenol & Cuttlefish
April 10, 2007
Tuesday
El Milagro: Today Matt cannulates me. Dr. Venkatesh comes by with the crew doing rounds and answers my question about taking Tylenol for arthritis in my hand. She says it’s okay. I’m guessing now that old Moritz has given up doing the rounds, maybe because he got a bad rap on City Search: “…Dr. Moritz('s) ...bedside manner was appalling. He was often grumpy, humorless and seemed distracted -- as if he would rather be somewhere else. When I expressed concern about discomfort during a procedure, he actually scoffed at me, telling me "I did this procedure on a 28-year-old woman yesterday and SHE didn't need any pain medication."” Now ya can just see Moritz in this conversation and it does sound just like him. But, he thinks he's being cute and charming when he does that stuff. What a doc.
I napped until the News and then watched NOVA. Tonight was a fascinating segment about the mysterious cuttlefish* and their visual tricks. According to the narrator, this sea animal may be the closest thing to what we might find on an alien world. Wow: an alien-type thingy right in our back ocean! I am always amazed at the ways different species have evolved to exist and even flourish in this world, and believe me, the cuttlefish takes
the cake. This fish (actually it’s a cephalopod) would be happy on the streets of Las Vegas… if Las Vegas streets were water… and if, under the water, the neon lights still worked. Cuttlefish actually look like a moving neon sign with flashing stripes kinda like the syncopated light bulbs that make arrows pointing at motels. Or, like zebras with stripes moving from their heads on back over their bodies and off their tails. These fish hypnotize crabs and zap them with their tongue-like tentacles.... very cool.
And, so it goes on a Tuesday night at the dialysis center.
Notes: In at 75.5 and out at 72.8 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 116 / 66.
* Kings of Camouflage. Retrieved online April ’07 from the NOVA website, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/camo/change.html#ch03
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
Tuesday
El Milagro: Today Matt cannulates me. Dr. Venkatesh comes by with the crew doing rounds and answers my question about taking Tylenol for arthritis in my hand. She says it’s okay. I’m guessing now that old Moritz has given up doing the rounds, maybe because he got a bad rap on City Search: “…Dr. Moritz('s) ...bedside manner was appalling. He was often grumpy, humorless and seemed distracted -- as if he would rather be somewhere else. When I expressed concern about discomfort during a procedure, he actually scoffed at me, telling me "I did this procedure on a 28-year-old woman yesterday and SHE didn't need any pain medication."” Now ya can just see Moritz in this conversation and it does sound just like him. But, he thinks he's being cute and charming when he does that stuff. What a doc.
I napped until the News and then watched NOVA. Tonight was a fascinating segment about the mysterious cuttlefish* and their visual tricks. According to the narrator, this sea animal may be the closest thing to what we might find on an alien world. Wow: an alien-type thingy right in our back ocean! I am always amazed at the ways different species have evolved to exist and even flourish in this world, and believe me, the cuttlefish takes
the cake. This fish (actually it’s a cephalopod) would be happy on the streets of Las Vegas… if Las Vegas streets were water… and if, under the water, the neon lights still worked. Cuttlefish actually look like a moving neon sign with flashing stripes kinda like the syncopated light bulbs that make arrows pointing at motels. Or, like zebras with stripes moving from their heads on back over their bodies and off their tails. These fish hypnotize crabs and zap them with their tongue-like tentacles.... very cool.
And, so it goes on a Tuesday night at the dialysis center.
Notes: In at 75.5 and out at 72.8 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 116 / 66.
* Kings of Camouflage. Retrieved online April ’07 from the NOVA website, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/camo/change.html#ch03
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click August 2006 on the Sidebar.
4/8/07
122) Low BP Saturday
April 7, 2007
Saturday
El Milagro: I had called earlier and talked to Phyllis the Nurse and arranged to come in at 1 pm. So, I arrive at 1:05 pm and they stop me at the door with "Hold on... we're not ready... they're just now pulling the needles on the person in your chair... it'll be a few minutes." So I turn around and retreat to the waiting room and sit and begin to watch Madagascar which is fairly watchable. There I sit for 45 minutes watching and waiting.
Finally get called in at almost 2 and get hooked up. My beginning BP is 108 over 59 and I'm feeling fine. I finish watching the movie and then flip over to the Master's to watch Tiger and company. Tiger isn't playing so hot, but always great to watch. By the time I'm done, I'm ready to get outa there cause with the 45 minute wait, my session is extended to 6 and a half hours.... way too long to spend in dialysis.
Afterwards we went out to eat with the relations at Romeo's and that was nice.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click:
http://jakidney.blogspot.com/2006_08_01_archive.html
Notes: In at 75.2 and out at 72.7 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 102 / 57.
Saturday
El Milagro: I had called earlier and talked to Phyllis the Nurse and arranged to come in at 1 pm. So, I arrive at 1:05 pm and they stop me at the door with "Hold on... we're not ready... they're just now pulling the needles on the person in your chair... it'll be a few minutes." So I turn around and retreat to the waiting room and sit and begin to watch Madagascar which is fairly watchable. There I sit for 45 minutes watching and waiting.
Finally get called in at almost 2 and get hooked up. My beginning BP is 108 over 59 and I'm feeling fine. I finish watching the movie and then flip over to the Master's to watch Tiger and company. Tiger isn't playing so hot, but always great to watch. By the time I'm done, I'm ready to get outa there cause with the 45 minute wait, my session is extended to 6 and a half hours.... way too long to spend in dialysis.
Afterwards we went out to eat with the relations at Romeo's and that was nice.
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click:
http://jakidney.blogspot.com/2006_08_01_archive.html
Notes: In at 75.2 and out at 72.7 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 102 / 57.
4/6/07
121) Yao Man Chan
April 5, 2007
Thursday
El Milagro: Today Diane checks my BP before sticking me and its 110 / 48! That is really weirdly low! It seems weird to the machine too, as it beeps and flashes a RED warning that the BP is too low. I sit down and the sitting BP goes up to 116 / 60 something. The techs ask me if I feel dizzy or faint and I don’t, so they “know nothing” (Like Sgt. Schultz** in Hogan’s Heroes) and just shrug their shoulders. So, what a way to start a session. Inside my head there are nameless worries running around screaming like unruly kids. Of course, these worries could be good for raising my BP. According to Medline Plus*, low BP is 90 / 60, so I guess that mine isn’t so bad after all.
I try to chill out by listening to All Things Considered and then snooze thru the News. I do wake up for Survivor, although it just doesn’t attract me like it used to. I am only fascinated by one character; Yao Man Chan***, a computer engineer from California. This 54 year old has a young heart, sharp intellect, and is able to think things through well and find creative solutions to get the job done. In tonight’s somewhat physical activity of using Fijian blowguns, spears, and bow and arrows to shoot at targets most of the participants just picked up the tools and used them without any forethought or consideration what-so-ever. Yao Man picked each implement up, studied it carefully, thought about the instrument and his physical stature and strength, and then used his analysis to combine tool and tact and he actually hit each target. With the arrows, he went through the pile and selected one that was the straightest. To me its neat to see this older guy outthink the young lugs in the pack of survivor wanna-be’s. Unlike earlier series where there have been several people to watch and cheer on, this one only has one person worth watching, from my humble perspective. So this is what I write about today… which suggests there ain’t much of interest going on here in dialy-land. Such is Life in Life-Alysis.
Later: Now when you click on the article on selling kidneys (see last post), there is a link to an article against that practice. The link is as follows:
Jha, V. & Chugh, K. S. (2006) The case against a regulated system of living kidney sales. Nature Clinical Practice Nephrology (2)9, 466-467, retrieved online April 2007 from
http://abcnews.go.com/images/WNT/The%20case%20against%20a%20regulated%20system.pdf
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click:
http://jakidney.blogspot.com/2006_08_01_archive.html
Notes: In at 74.6 and out at 72.8 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 132 / 69.
*“Low Blood Pressure” retrieved April 2007 online from the Medline Plus website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/lowbloodpressure.html
** “Sergeant Schultz” retrieved April 2007 online from the Wikipedia website:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hogan's_Heroes#Sergeant_Schultz
*** “Yao Man Chan” retrieved April 2007 online from Survivor website:
http://www.cbs.com/primetime/survivor14/survivors/yau_man.shtml
Thursday
El Milagro: Today Diane checks my BP before sticking me and its 110 / 48! That is really weirdly low! It seems weird to the machine too, as it beeps and flashes a RED warning that the BP is too low. I sit down and the sitting BP goes up to 116 / 60 something. The techs ask me if I feel dizzy or faint and I don’t, so they “know nothing” (Like Sgt. Schultz** in Hogan’s Heroes) and just shrug their shoulders. So, what a way to start a session. Inside my head there are nameless worries running around screaming like unruly kids. Of course, these worries could be good for raising my BP. According to Medline Plus*, low BP is 90 / 60, so I guess that mine isn’t so bad after all.
I try to chill out by listening to All Things Considered and then snooze thru the News. I do wake up for Survivor, although it just doesn’t attract me like it used to. I am only fascinated by one character; Yao Man Chan***, a computer engineer from California. This 54 year old has a young heart, sharp intellect, and is able to think things through well and find creative solutions to get the job done. In tonight’s somewhat physical activity of using Fijian blowguns, spears, and bow and arrows to shoot at targets most of the participants just picked up the tools and used them without any forethought or consideration what-so-ever. Yao Man picked each implement up, studied it carefully, thought about the instrument and his physical stature and strength, and then used his analysis to combine tool and tact and he actually hit each target. With the arrows, he went through the pile and selected one that was the straightest. To me its neat to see this older guy outthink the young lugs in the pack of survivor wanna-be’s. Unlike earlier series where there have been several people to watch and cheer on, this one only has one person worth watching, from my humble perspective. So this is what I write about today… which suggests there ain’t much of interest going on here in dialy-land. Such is Life in Life-Alysis.
Later: Now when you click on the article on selling kidneys (see last post), there is a link to an article against that practice. The link is as follows:
Jha, V. & Chugh, K. S. (2006) The case against a regulated system of living kidney sales. Nature Clinical Practice Nephrology (2)9, 466-467, retrieved online April 2007 from
http://abcnews.go.com/images/WNT/The%20case%20against%20a%20regulated%20system.pdf
New Readers: For A Welcome Post, click:
http://jakidney.blogspot.com/2006_08_01_archive.html
Notes: In at 74.6 and out at 72.8 Kgs. Standing BP at the end was 132 / 69.
*“Low Blood Pressure” retrieved April 2007 online from the Medline Plus website: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/lowbloodpressure.html
** “Sergeant Schultz” retrieved April 2007 online from the Wikipedia website:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hogan's_Heroes#Sergeant_Schultz
*** “Yao Man Chan” retrieved April 2007 online from Survivor website:
http://www.cbs.com/primetime/survivor14/survivors/yau_man.shtml
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