OT: Good thoughts, please

Tomorrow morning is John's angiogram. In case you don't know what that is, here's what they'll be doing: They will sedate him, make an incision in his groin, insert a catheter and thread it all the way up to the arteries around his heart. Then they will inject dye so they can see what's going on in those arteries.

The irony of all this is John is probably the last person to need this test. His heart may be working at about 2/3 capacity (if that), but I'm betting his coronary arteries are clean as a newborn. His weight, blood pressure, cholesterol and pulse are all low. He does more exercise than most men half his age do, he eats healthfully, he's never smoked, blah blah blah. But they're doing it anyway. I guess they have to with all heart patients.

The test itself takes about 30-45 minutes. But there's a lot of prep, and afterward, he needs to lie flat without sitting up for two to four hours. And let's face it, it's Kaiser Permanente. There will be time delays and bureaucratic snafus. So I'm not sure when I'll be able to take him home. At least I have a proper address (the facility has multiple buildings and it's a huge maze) and the direct phone number of the lab area. 

I'm more nervous than he is, I think. I made the mistake of looking up the test online and reading the litany of things that can go wrong (bleeding, tears in the artery, heart attack, infection, much more). Reallllly stupid idea. I know they have to list all that crap for legal reasons, but it's enough to scare a person half to death.

John went to a lawyer today and had a medical directive and a simple will prepared. He's also giving me power of attorney, and the potential responsibility of that is terrifying. He said this procedure and all the prep and so forth is like a "trial run" for when he has open-heart surgery. Whatever. I don't even want to think about that now. I just want to get him through this stupid test and get him home so he can rest and recover. He's not supposed to do any bending or lifting for a couple of days, no driving, etc. He can go back to work on Monday, though.

I am not as on top of my game as I hoped I'd be. I had a coughing fit on Tuesday night in bed, and I guess my body was sick to death of all the stress caused by all this damned coughing. Because when I woke up Wednesday morning, my lower back was out. Bad. Saw the chiropractor, and I have been using ice-packs and Advil since then. I'm a bit better, but still moving gingerly. Hopefully it will be even better tomorrow. 

Notice I asked for good thoughts. I didn't ask for prayers, because I don't believe in them. But if you do, and you feel like throwing one or two his way, have at it. I'll take anything.

I just want him to be OK. 

Will update when I can. Meanwhile... have a great weekend, y'all.

Much better :-)

Yesterday I worked out, and today I got worked over. Definitely feeling better.

Steve showed up bearing Trader Joe's treats (chocolate-almond Lacey's cookies and triple ginger snaps -- yummm!), and we spent some time catching up. I was still coughing, but more than ready to play once again.

Damn -- skip one week and Instant Wuss! My right cheek marked with several red dots, just from his hand. But that didn't mean I wanted him to stop, of course. He asked for my preference: Bed or ottoman? I was already fog-brained from the extended warm-up and I didn't answer. "Would you like me to choose for you?" I nodded. He chose the ottoman. I do like it there; I can pile up the pillows and get a nice high butt thrust.

Here I am placing said pillows:

Flattering angle... not! (eye roll)

You know, he's still insisting that he's always right. I said I suppose that we're all allowed at least one delusion in life. He agreed and went on trying to convince me what a good one this delusion was. When just his hand didn't work, he moved on to implements. 

He said that the lexan paddle was his favorite. Oh, really? I suggested that perhaps he should use it on himself, if he likes it that much. "Great idea!" he enthused. "I'll just pretend I'm hitting myself with it! AH! Oh, that feels good! I love that! Want me to hit myself again?" 

Arrgggggghh. 

OK, at least this angle is better. My legs don't look like they're two feet tall. ;-) Five implements, three of them from Cane-iac. 

I did feel like my tolerance was a bit diminished, but that's no doubt due to illness and some residual weakness. I still relished it all, settled into it and grew quieter as the scene neared its conclusion. (That quiet happened sometime after I gave him a ration of noise for constantly saying, "There you go." "There you go." It's like a freaking tic with him. :-Þ)

Later, after some lovely and much-needed aftercare, I asked if he'd take some more pictures. I'm still working on my new book, and I've had to think about what I want to do for the cover. With Late Bloomer, I had Zelle's amazing designing talents. But now she's working full-time plus doing a lot of family caretaking, and there's no way I would prevail upon her for this. I don't really feel like working with someone else, and lord knows I don't know how to design a book cover. So I checked out the Cover Creator function at CreateSpace, where I'm building the book. They have a selection of pre-fab covers that you can customize (not a whole lot, though), add your own pictures, etc. So I thought it would be fun to have a cover photo of me in front of the computer, tearing my hair out or something like that.

Here's the photo I put on the front (the space was small):

And on the inside cover page, where I have more room, I used this:

Then, after double-checking the interior and converting it to a PDF, I sent the files to CreateSpace for their review. If all is good, they'll send me a proof copy. Exciting stuff. :-) The final version ended up being 164 pages after I'd formatted it. That's for a paperback; yeah, I'm still doing a real book. Later, I'll see if Blushing Books or Stormy Night Publications (or both!) are interested in carrying it, and if so, then I'll have an eBook version with them (and they design covers, so perhaps they can do something fun for the Kindle version). Lots of possibilities.

I really needed today. I was feeling rather forlorn with this damned cold; the blog felt stagnant and forgotten; and all I could do was cough and keep yawning to pop my right ear and think about John's upcoming angiogram. (Note to self: do NOT look up medical procedures on the Internet. Really bad idea.) Seeing Steve was, to use the word I did earlier, restorative. 

He told me several times today during the scene that I please him. It's most definitely mutual. Even if he is delusional. ♥

Happy Father's Day

To all my friends who are fathers, to all my friends who have fathers, Happy Father's Day. To all who are missing theirs, as I am, I hope you've had some good memories today, some warm thoughts. 

We visited my stepfather last night. I'm still coughing and my ears are still popping and doing weird things, but the worst of the cold is well over and the time of contagion is past. We took him to dinner and had a few fun hours. It's kind of surreal -- he is 95 now, and the sight of him makes me nervous. He's... shrunk! There's no other way to put it. He used to be a robust, fit man of 6' 2", about 195 pounds. Now he weighs 149 and his body looks like a bundle of sticks and twisted pipe cleaners. Hugging him feels like hugging a skeleton. But he's still sharp and funny, can hold up his end of the conversation just fine, and he's a joy to be around. I gave him a card that read: "Our family may not be perfect"-- (oh brother, is that the understatement of the year) -- "but the best thing about it is that you're in it." That's the truth.

I think I've told every anecdote I can think of about my father over the years in these blogs, and my bleary congested brain can't come up with anything new right now. So I'll just do my usual -- post an old picture and send my love out to Dad's essence; always with me, because he's always in my head and heart.

My 18th birthday -- forever ago.

Seeing Steve on Tuesday instead of tomorrow. So I have another day for recovery. I may even attempt a visit to the gym; I have not moved a muscle for a week and a half. Trouble is, the least bit of exertion (and at this point, we're talking about laughing too hard) brings on a coughing fit. But I have to get back to my routines sooner or later. I'll take it easy, I promise.

Good night, Dad. ♥

Well, the good news is...

... I have no secondary infection. I thought for sure I did. Because this is one of the worst damn colds I've had in a long time. 

It basically ate my entire week. I have done next to nothing and have only been out to go to the doctor, to pick up some more Advil and go to the bank. No gym, no nothing. Gym -- ha! Between the plugged-up ears (and resulting loss of equilibrium) and my barking cough, one jumping jack would put me in the hospital. Fortunately, I've had some work to do, so that provided some distraction.

I finally broke down and went to the doc on Wednesday, because I thought I might have an ear infection. She said no, but everything is swollen and inflamed because my sinuses, and I quote, are "filled with crap." I also told her I haven't been able to sleep because of my cough, so she gave me a scrip for cough medicine + codeine, and suggested I use saline nasal rinse. Oh, joy. Ever pour warm salt solution up your nose? It's about as much fun as it sounds.

More good news: John did not come down with this, this week. I hope the germs escaped him and aren't merely incubating. He needs to be healthy for his angiogram next Friday. On Thursday, he has an appointment with an attorney to make out a living trust/medical directive. If the unspeakable happens, I will be responsible for decisions about his care, and also inherit his estate. Scares the freaking hell out of me, honestly. But if he loves and trusts me enough to do that, then I need to honor it. It's not like we think anything is going to happen; it's more like a worst-case scenario. Because if something did happen and he didn't have any sort of wishes stated, everything he has would go into probate, and then whatever didn't get sucked up by the lawyers would end up with his next of kin. NO WAY. I can just see his vulture sister swooping in, plundering his bank accounts and claiming his Waterford crystal.

Anyway, enough of that. I feel a little better, although pretty tired and listless. My ears are still pluggy. And my cough, while at bay during the day, bursts into full cry at night. The first night with the codeine syrup, I took the instructed one teaspoon. Oh, please. That did nothing. So I took another teaspoon, fell asleep for about an hour, then woke up coughing my brains out. Took a third teaspoon and then slept for the rest of the night. So last night, I cut to the chase and just took a freaking tablespoon. Fell asleep, but woke up four hours later... you guessed it, coughing my brains out. I give up. I guess I'm stuck with this for as long as it takes. I don't think I'm contagious anymore; these are just the dregs, although they're taking their sweet time wearing off.

So on with the tea w/honey and Airborne, the Advil, and the sleep whenever I can snatch it in between bouts of gagging on my own lungs. And hopefully, I can get back to real life soon. And play, dammit!

Have a great weekend, y'all.

First clip up!

As I sit here steeped in misery and mucus, Lily was kind enough to distract me by sending some stills from the first clip she put up. In this one, I'm getting a most unwelcome visit from an IRS agent. Apparently, my tax records are somewhat suspect.

I'd had an inspiration for a sight gag, so before the shoot, I sat with my calculator, turned on the PRINT function and started typing/printing out slips of paper with numbers on them, to serve as receipts. I kept this up until I'd collected a bagful of them. During our interview, Robert said he wanted to see my receipts, so I presented the bag to him. Surprise, surprise -- he wasn't pleased with the lack of organization, and he said I needed to do something with them.

So I did.

I guess he wasn't too pleased with that, either. Even more demands -- I had to fetch my own hairbrush. Oh, the horror.

This was our second-to-last scene, so we went a bit heavier than we'd done on the first two. He was able to get me to transition from name-calling to pleading with a lot of convincing from that damned brush.

If you needed any more evidence that the IRS really sucks, this is it!

You can read more details here.

Cold, begone. I will have no more of thee.