Friends of Melbotis

A huge thank you to all of you who have inquired about Mel's welfare over the past week or so.

Mel's having some trouble with his stitching, so I'm bringing him back to the vet tomorrow, very early. I asked Jamie if I could not see if they could not do a quick patch job at Build-a-Bear at the mall, but she said the vet would probably do a better job.

I want to send special public thanks to a few folks:

• The parents, who have been so supportive
• Jason, who took Lucy off our hands during the days of surgery
• Nicole, who has helped out a lot with Mel over the past week
• Steven and Lauren, who came over this weekend for a quiet night in, to visit with Mel and to wrangle Lucy
• Randy, who generously sent along some delicious looking gourmet dog treats

Mel appreciates it, and we appreciate it.

I do not mean to leave anyone off of the list here. Thanks so much to everyone.

Mel is getting better. Surgery is just tough, especially when you're a dog and have no idea what is going on.

A Post about Mel

You can see a picture of a post-surgery Melbotis at Jason's blog.

Mel looks like 10 Miles of Bad Road

Ho boy.

Well, the left half of Mel's face is shaved, as well as the left side of his neck, and some spots around his legs. His face is pretty badly bruised from the surgery, and his eye is sort of blackened, if a dog can get a black eye.

Jamie's got him pretty well tranq'd up, so he's resting, and seems perhaps... too happy when he does wake up. He has to eat tiny little scoops of his dog food which Jamie has turned into meatballs.

I know in a few days he'll be getting back to normal in spirits, but for now he looks a bit like Batman-villain Two Face.

Also, the cone... I have to put the cone on him again. Which I'm not looking forward to. But he should really wear it tonight.

It looks like the surgery went well. Jamie's doing a great job if taking care of Mel.

he just twitched in his sleep and kicked me in the butt.

Anyhow, he's doing okay. He just looks like a dog that just had serious surgery.

Mel Report

Hey Leaguers. I know less about today than Jamie, but it sounds like Mel's surgery went well.

Jamie dropped him off at 7:00, and heard back from the vet about 2:45. It sounds like the surgery went as planned. As of 2:45, Mel was awake and resting.

Jamie called again at 5:30, and he'd already been up, gone wee, and was hopped up on goofballs.

She's going to pick him up tomorrow afternoon (we're not really sure when). She has to get some serious pick up instructions.

Jason has Lucy tonight, and maybe tomorrow night, so Mel can rest when he gets home. Jeff the Cat will simply get punted if he interferes.

I want to thank everyone for the well wishes and prayers (thanks, Ma!). Mel seems to be on the road to recovery.


UPDATE

It seems we were misinformed. We can't pick up Mel today. Which means Lucy has been destroying Jason's house today for no good reason.

I'll leave it to Jamie and the commenst section to fill in more details.

Everyone Wish Mel Well

Mel is going off to have his surgery tomorrow morning. Jamie, being the good person she is, is getting in the car and driving him up to Round Rock at 6:45 in the morning.

I am convinced Mel will come through with flying colors. He has had a few surgeries before before, and he has always done well. There's also an 85% chance this will get rid of the problem altogether. So, you know, I think he's going to be fine.

The poor guy is going to have to wear one of this big, plastic cones for a while. I think he wore one for a short time quite a few years back, but I am anticipating he's going to be really, really unhappy for the duration. On the plus side, he will get to eat soft food for a few weeks, which he's not been able to do before. Hopefully he'll think he's getting a treat every meal for a while.

The worst thing for both Mel and Lucy will be that, because Mel's surgery is in his mouth, we're going to have to hide all the toys for a while. Mel and Lucy both love their toys, and associate them with playing and being good dogs. In fact, whenever you come back from even a run to Taco Cabana, Mel runs around with a toy in his mouth and cries. At night he walks around with a nylon bone in his mouth like a cigar, or one of his vaguely people-shaped toys that he moves from place to place around the downstairs.

Anyway, no toys for the dogs for a few weeks. And while some small aprt of me is looking forward to not having the clutter, I know that the dogs are going to be deeply unhappy without anything to play with.

So everyone wish Mel well. We'll give a report again tomorrow night.

Mel V. Cancer

The day after Christmas, Jamie noticed Mel had a pretty substantial growth in his mouth. As Mel's gotten older, he's grown these weird little lumps under his skin. We got the first few removed over two surgeries (three?). Essentially the growth in his mouth was a similar lump, only in his gums.

They had scraped a similar lump in April and had it sent off for testing. It came back benign, and we didn't really think too much about it any more.

On Friday, the results from Mel's December surgery came back. Our vet called me on my cell about 3:00. After a lot of explanation of words that really didn't mean a whole lot to me, the bottom line was that they'd found cancer cells in the growth. Mel, my pal, has cancer.

As hard as it was to hear, I also knew it was now my responsibility to share the information with Jamie. And so I asked about our options. Mel is not yet 10, and he's still as frisky as he's really ever been, so letting him just be an old dog and try to just keep comfortable until it gets bad isn't an option.

Apparently there's now dog radiation and dog chemo. For people, who understand what's going on, that's the path you go. For dogs who only know you're taking them to get sick over and over every time they get in the car. There's also a dog oncologist in Round Rock (of course), and so we had options, anyway.

I did my bit of steeling myself on the way home. We were headed out to dinner with Steven and Lauren, and while I wanted Jamie to know, I also didn't want to tell her over the phone. So while Jamie was getting dressed and made-up to go out, I had to drop the bomb.

Jamie is, despite outward appearances, the toughest person I know. She's never given up on anyone or anything, and certainly knows that before you shed too many tears about bad medical news, you grit your teeth and start figuring out your options.

What made it easier to share, of course, was seeing Mel when I walked in the door. As usual, he was sitting on the couch, ears pitched forward, tail spinning wildly and happy as a clam.

"You aren't sick."
"Nope."
"Look at you."
"Yup."
"We've got a long way to go before we write you off, pal."
"Thanks!"

And so on the way to dinner we discussed our options, and talked about the fact that Mel was okay right now. So what we have to do, we decided, is just make sure he's a happy boy.

Saturday we took Mel and Lucy to the dog park, where Mel ran around just as happy as ever, playing king of the dog park while keeping that nice safety zone close by, with Lucy playing the little tag-along sister.

He is not sick. He is fine. He can play and chase the ball and goof with other dogs, and when he comes back to check in with you, his eyes are still that same bright brown, his tongue still pink, his ears still perked and eager.

On Monday Jamie went to see the vet and got the name of the Oncologist and Surgeon team. Yesterday Mel went to the oncologist for a CAT scan and to get checked out.

They think they can get it with surgery. He's going in next week for a consultation. He has no idea what's going on, but he's still Mel.

"Do you have any idea what's going on?"
"None."
"They say you're sick. You've got the cancer, pal."
"The heck you say."
"Yeah. On your gum."
"Oh. Yeah. That figures."
"It's not supposed to metastasize. They think they can get it with some surgery."
"Oh."
"So it's gonna get cleared up. But it's going to take some tough days ahead."
"Okay. Jamie will take care of me?"
"You know she will."
"Okay, then."
"We're gonna have you around for a long while yet."
"And then where will I go?"
"A place full of couches and tennis balls, other dogs to play with and an endless sea of Milk Bones."
"Will you be there?"
"I'll catch up sooner or later."

It Ain't Grey's Anatomy

Apparently Glenn Beck has never been to the ER.

I'm not dismissing the man's health issues, his misery or his concerns. And as much as I don't really think his show is... good... I will be curious to see what happens based upon his recent escapades at the hospital.

You can read Beck's account here.

You can read the story here.

But, from the description I see here, his visit is either par for the course for the average trip to the ER, or maybe marginally worse.

I'm not sure if Beck's surprise comes from his expectations of a clean and happy ER based upon years of TV shows filled with caring doctors who weep whenever someone has a boo-boo. Or, not to be a jerk, but it could also be that Beck has been living in a celebrity cloud long enough that he is shocked to find out about the sort of service the average person expects, even when in dire pain. In either case, the only thing in the story that surprised me was that they found dirty bandages in the shower. Which might just mean that they didn't get to clean the room between patients because they were running patients through so quickly.

The League doles out advice: By the way... if you start to think you need to go to the ER because you're in pain, go... Waiting at home just adds to wait time you're going to get when you get to the ER. We've done 8+ hours of just sitting in a waiting room before seeing so much as a nurse. There were reports of hospitals in Mesa with 16-24 hour waits in the ER.

Sitting for hours in the cheapest chairs the hospital could buy while you wait to get a room and talk to someone about your pain is not where you want to be when your eyes are bleeding out or whatever.

There's really nothing like the ER to remind you that you are not a special snowflake in need of special attention. No matter what you came in with, if you didn't come passed out in an ambulance or with a piece of metal in your head, 50% of the people sitting around you are as bad off as you are (or worse), and they've been waiting longer than you.

Here's what I want to stress, and where I think Glenn Beck is off-base: The people who work in hospitals have the hardest job in the world. I'm including them with combat soldiers.

No matter what these people are making, its not enough.

When you or I go off to work, we sit at a desk in front of a computer, or put on a tie and depose people all day. These people put on clothes specifically designed to be cheap and washable because they will be covered in blood, vomit, and other bodily fluids before they finish their 12-hour shift.

When I screw up at work, a project slips a day. When these people get a new client, which is every few minutes, their client could potentially die on them. And I've spent enough time in hospitals and ERs to tell you, most people walk out of the ER after they've been seen. But sometimes people, despite herculean effort, do not walk back out again. If things are taking a little while for you to get your shot of morphine, Mr. Beck, it could be because the guy on the other side of the curtain was in cardiac arrest and heading into the light.

I've seen kids with lite-brights shoved up their noses, people who had bugs stuck in their ears, people so constipated a doctor was going to have to go in manually, people who were in kidney failure and didn't know it carrying gallons of extra fluid around, knees completely shattered from a bad touch-football play, people with broken limbs, folks with mysterious stomach ailments that have lasted weeks and only now become unmanageable... And I do not work in the ER. I am an observer.

And these people do this every single working day. Every day.

On the regular hospital floor, its a bit different, but there it's often even more life or death. People check into the cardiac floor because their lives are at stake, not because they need some vacation time. These are people with dignity being asked to wear a flimsy robe and sit still for days while they're poked and prodded. Some of them have other ailments. Some are in pain.

Here's the other thing.... if you're not feeling well, and they keep asking you if you need more pain meds, and you keep saying "sure", they will give them to you right up to the point where you might slip into a coma. After all, they have no idea how much pain you're really in except by what you tell them.

If the employees seem a bit callous, you have to understand the wall they set up between themselves and their patients. I think that's more than understandable for people who live around misery every day of their professional lives. Ask a cop, soldier or even a person involved in criminal law if it doesn't all get sort of detached after a while... Glenn Beck can walk into a hospital and walk out again, in relative certainty he need not visit again for years. Doctors, nurses, techs, administrators, janitors... the people who keep the hospital working are the same folks who see thousands of Glenn Becks in a year, and will see just as many next year.

I can't say how much asking questions, and not expecting nurses to treat you like a customer, helps. They aren't working on tips or commission. You are not always right. Be nice. Say "please" and "thank you". If you think something is wrong, ask. But ask politely. These people are dealing with people in eight other rooms, each as sick or sicker than you. And before you start buzzing the nurse for a cup of juice for the tenth time, think about how you'd want other patients to be if you were in need of immediate help and/ or croaking.

I think this is also worth calling out: as scary as it is, medicine is not an exact science. No two people are alike, nor are the ways in which their particular ailment will be managed.

Glenn Beck may be an individual snowflake regarding body chemistry, and it may be true that his system did not know how to manage the meds he was given in order to help him. When you enter the hospital, they are making the best decisions they can based upon the best info available as it relates to the most people. Any time you take a pill, it can have unknown side-effects or known side-effects.

I don't think I'm telling anyone anything that you don't already know.

What I find ridiculous is that it took Beck having a bad few days of health to take notice that people can't be cured with a pill or that their problem won't be resolved in an hour, as if they were dropping clothes off at the dry-cleaner. Further, he's asking each and every hospital worker to care as much about his woes as he does, and, Leaguers... that isn't going to happen. Hospital staff do care or they wouldn't be there. The pay isn't good enough to put up with the day-to-day insanity of healthcare work if they didn't care (and I've personally talked to one young nurse who confessed he couldn't take it any more and was quitting after years of schooling).

I find it a bit unrealistic that Beck identifies the necessary emotional detachment required to work in stressful conditions day-after-day as a sign of a failing healthcare system. There's probably some grain of truth in that insofar as there are not enough hospitals and too many people going into ERs who could just as easily head to the local minor emergency center. And, yeah, the ER nurse didn't do everything exactly to Mr. Beck's satisfaction. The ER's are overcrowded, but it doesn't sound like Beck was seen any faster or slower than when you see other folks fast-tracked. The delays he experienced weren't done out of spite, they were part of procedure so each person is seen and given full attention. Further, "doctor's orders" isn't just a term from the movies. It's what nurses and techs must wait in before doing anything. It's procedural, and not always lightning fast. 40 minutes is fast.


The League doles out more advice: If you're as jacked up as Beck claims he was (and I believe he was that bad), call an ambulance. Beck has a lot of money and no doubt decent insurance. If you can get into an ER under your own power, the ER staff are going to make their own decisions. They aren't always the right ones.

But what Beck experienced was "Fast Tracking". That's the coveted position of the ER visitor. They saw he was messed up. They got him back second. He doesn't know how long the person who was seen before him was there, he doesn't know which nurse or doctor that person was going to see. Most often you do NOT go from triage into the back. That's what they do with you when they actually care ow you're doing.

If his wife had to hoist him, its because neither of them asked for a wheel-chair or help. Which is... not a great choice and doesn't tell anyone you're in the level of pain Beck was in.

They have these charts at the hospital with a pain scale of 0-10. They even have little descriptions and/ or faces for you to match your level of pain. I'm not sure "I'd lost all hope and wanted to die" is exactly how they put a 10 on the chart, but it also doesn't sound like they avoided trying to help beck outright. It sounds like he got the same treatment I see everyone else getting.

For an interesting response to Beck's rant, check out this nursing forum.

Of course a lot of what the nurses have to say about orders, side-effects of meds, etc... is going to get ignored by Beck, lest he admit he just had a bad experience as a side-effect of surgery and medication and not get a new cause to rant about.

Howdy, Leaguers.

Well, this week has been quite busy for The League. The new job has thrown me in head first, but by accident. I was supposed to shadow a producer, but unfortunately her mother took ill, and now I'm filling in for that producer. So I've been dropped in the deep end.

Aside from a constant low level feeling of confusion, and an additional creeping sleepiness that pops up like clockwork at 3:00 each day, I'm liking the new job quite a bit. They are making an effort to make sure I'm properly trained, despite the missing producer, and everyone I talk to takes time to answer my questions. I'm honestly a bit thrown off by not working in a crazy public sector setting and all that that implies.

Last night I had not yet even arrived home when I was informed that Lucy had puked twice. It seems that the allergic reaction from the weekend had some latent effects of the GI-tract variety, and so it was that I made a mid-week return trip to the Doggy ER. They're theorizing that Lucy's troubles were a further portion of her allergic reaction to whatever it was she got into this weekend. I'm happy to say she seems much, much better this evening.

In addition to that, I'm tyring to adjust to a work schedule again, and, honestly, that schedule is a bit deeper to keep than waking up between 9:00 and 10:30 for a big day of watching daytime TV and looking online for job postings. So I'm going to bed a bit earlier and trying to get adjusted. Look for normal blogging to resume in the not-too-distant-future.

SATURDAY NIGHT'S ALL RIGHT FOR BLOGGING

Well, Leaguers, we had ourselves a less than stellar Friday night and Saturday. As some of you may recall Jamie was having some trouble with migraines. Well, she's been on a pretty good preventative. Some might say... too good. She and her neurologist agreed that the preventative had been working (more or less) for so long, they couldn't be sure if the preventative was actually helping or if she wasn't having trouble anymore. So, they decided she should cut back on her preventative to see what was going on.

Long story short, we spent last night at the lovely new hospital about three miles from the house in their all-new emergency room. And, man, it was actually a pretty nice set-up. If you could ignore their "Nurse Call" alarm that sounded more than a little bit like a Disney Princess toy. Over. And over. And over.

Quote of the evening? By a young woman (who was wearing nothing but a bra for some reason) to her nurse: "The doctor said I had an er- er- ruptured ovarian cyst. I didn't even know I HAD an ovarian cyst!"

This somehow beats:
"Were you punched in the throat?"
"I dunno. I think I got hit like a thousand times! Huh huh huh huh huh!"
I have no idea what happened, but I saw the guy, and SOMEBODY beat the tar out of him. He was still managing to keep it sunny side up despite the black eye and whatnot. Good for him.

I've always been confused as to why more hospitals aren't networked or don't maintain a database of patient info at their fingertips. We may have gotten into the ER at 7:30, but Jamie was admitted much later. Well, Leaguers, there's nothing like trying to help a nurse input literally pages of fields when a nurse is a "hunt and peck" typist. Not to mention when the programmers insisted on a hard-coded list of options rather than allowing for blank fields in some key locations. Especially at 2:00 AM. Especially when the nurse is insisting she can't do anything until all the data is loaded. And then the lab tech accidentally fires a vial of Jamie's blood into the air and suddenly there's little drops of Jamie everywhere, inclduing the tech's otherwise sparkling white outfit.

Good times.

Most hospital cafeterias sell some incredibly unhealthy options for both their staff and for patient's families. Cheeseburgers, chicken fingers, etc... Not so at this place. Probably because the budget for this brand-spankin' new (albeit completely empty) cafeteria is much higher than is required to feed the handful of patients and staff actually in the hospital, it appears the cafeteria staff are going all Colonel Kurtz and fancy themselves gourmets. I had a lovely lunch of salmon with a mushroom-butter spread, whipped potatos with a hint of bacon, and fresh steamed asparagus. This meal would have run me $17 at minimum most places. At the hospital it ran me $7.00, with a large drink.

Anyhow, Jamie is doing fine (aside from some oddly high levels of potassium) and she's home again after being admitted over night and through most of the day. At least this hospital provides a half-way decent bed option for folks who want to spend the night. Just no pillows or blankets. Those you must steal from the elderly patients who cannot defend themselves.


In non-hospital related news, the house showed twice today. Which meant I also managed to get locked out. It's a long story, but it involves me, my house key being inside the house and an overzealous realtor. I was waiting to hear back from our realtor, Pat, whom I was hoping would be able to let me in with the key from our lockbox and in order to kill some time I went and wandered around some stores.

I found a little kid's Batman digital camera on sale for $19. It can fit neatly in your pocket, has built in memory, is compatible with decent memory cards, can shoot video and came with photo editing software and video recording software. $19. Some kid in a sweatshop in Thailand just made me a real bargain.


Lucy would like to steal your soul now, please!

NEWS

If you've been keeping up with "League of Melbotis" or "Adventures of Steanso", you are probably familiar with Jeff Wilson. You may know him as CrackBass.

Last evening, while leaving a concert outside of Austin, Jeff and several others (including, I believe, Sigmund and Kim Bloom) were struck by a motorist. Jeff is in critical condition in the intensive care unit at one of Austin's finest hospitals. Sigmund received several injuries, and I believe Kim has a broken leg and is under observation for possible internal injuries.

At this time, I don't have many details. Jeff is not conscious. My brother, Jason, left Houston at 8:00 this morning to get back to Austin.

Jeff has many, many friends, including folks on this website. As I understand it, there has been a stream of visitors from all over Austin to see Jeff and lend his wife, Mandy, a hand.

I'm asking that you guys keep Jeff and the others in this accident in your thoughts and prayers over the next few days.

And for the love of God, please remember Jeff, Sigmund and Kim when you decide to get behind the wheel after you've had a drink.

***UPDATE***

Steanso has updated his blog.

More after the jump.

Here.

living la vida loca

(editor's note: this is not written to illicit sympathy. Rather, Jamie and I sort of just had a bad day, and I thought I'd share.)

Man.

Last night Jamie and I spoke on the phone before I got home about how all we were going to do was watch TV and and read.

When I walked in the door, Jamie was already working on some fajita ingredients. "Do you hear that?" she asked. There was a loud hissing sound coming from outside the sink window. Not a snake hissing, like compressed air escaping.

Sure enough, when I stepped outside the sound was coming from the direction of the air conditioner. Immediately we called an air conditioning repair service, hoping that, at best, we could make it through the night and the air wouldn't fail until the temperatures fell outside.

The first company informed me that they weren't even taking on any new customers, thanks to the busy, busy season. Luckily the next company was able to send out a repair person (the next morning). With Jamie scheduled for dialysis in the morning and myself scheduled for meetings in the morning, we had to put off the repair until any time between 10 and 1.

So... about twenty minutes after dinner and dishes, I was reading a book when I realized "gee, it's getting pretty warm in here..." The blower was still on, but the air was no longer cool.

It was getting pretty warm pretty fast, and as we're often a little overly cautious with Jamie, I started calling hotels to find Jamie a place to sleep. My gameplan was to get her a hotel near her dialysis location (where she has to be at 5:15 MWF), and then I'd get up with her, shower at the house, feed the dogs (who would spend the night outside), and go to work as early as possible. Jamie would be able to wait for the air conditioner guy for a while, and when I was done with my meetings, we'd tag team, and I would send her back to the hotel.

It took me four hotels to find a room. And checking into a hotel (without vibrating beds) the same night you call is an expensive proposition.

We ended up at a very nice Holiday Inn just South and West of the house. I watched the Mercury on TV, read a few pages and went to sleep.

At 2:00 in the morning Jamie was yelling for me from the bathroom with the complaint that "I need to throw up and I can't. And I can't breathe."

For those of you who haven't had a silent heart-attack, these symptoms may indicate that Jamie was doing some wicked after-hours partying. As far as I know, that wasn't the case. She was more than a little weirded out, and for maybe the first time in our adventures, she requested EMS help.

The front desk was pretty helpful, and within, literally, five or ten minutes four burly firemen/ emergency responders were standing in our hotel room. Now, I've spent a lot of time in ER's, and the stuff you see on TV is mostly horse-hockey. These guys, however, had the coolest system of testing and report-out that I've seen, with two guys checking things on the wife, one guy doing all the questioning, and one guy overseeing the operation to check for mistakes.

For good or ill, in that five minutes between placing the call and the burly firemen showing up, Jamie threw-up. A lot. Her fajita dinner came back for all to see.

We immediately theorized that a recent chnage in her meds was probably the culprit, but once you set the wheels of Emergency Medical Services in motion, it's best to just them do their thing.

In the middle of all the medical fiddle-faddle, I sort of had a 2:15AM out of body experience. There were four strange men in my hotel room, the room that I really shouldn't have been in, and one of them was wearing his baggy fire fighter pants.

Because Jamie had a heart-attack in 98 or so, her EKG's are always a little off. We had to promise the firemen that we would be headed to the ER, so off we went.

The ER had some folks waiting around who had obviously been there for a while, so I was beginning to wonder exactly how long we would be stuck watching re-runs of "Cheaters" on late night TV. One gentleman who had a hurty elbow was yelling at the nurses that he had been there for a long time.

Note to people who go to the ER: Hurty elbows will not get you seen quickly. Today we learned that a possible silent heart attack gets you the Gold Member Treatment. Jamie was seen almost immediately, and we got a room within half an hour. Unfortunately, the room was in the "Crash" area, where you're almost guaranteed to see a dead person or two before the end of the visit.

And, sure enough, I was sitting there for all of five minutes before some poor soul under a sheet was wheeled by.

Meanwhile, the guy in the next room was "crashing", which understandably draws the attention away from the non-crashing patients. Such as Jamie, who was feeling much better at this point, and me, who was trying to immerse myself in my "JLA: Greatest Stories Vol. 1".

Here's another important life-lesson, Leaguers... yes, you went to the ER because you felt poorly. But when someone just died and someone else is working on it, it is NOT the time to cause a scene because your discharge paperwork is taking a few extra minutes.

One charmer in our ER, who was decidedly not ill enough to actually be in the ER, started walking down the hallway shouting about "Where's my nurse? They said they was coming back in five minutes, and it's been fifteen!" When a nurse tried to explain that they were having a critical situation, she, being well trained as an American to expect instant gratifcation at the expense of everyone else, began shouting about how she "didn't care". And how she was "going outside for a smoke and they needed to come find" her.

When it was expalined that a patient had just died, and could she please lower her voice for the families that were around, she suggested "get him a body bag" loud enough for the entire ER to hear. At this point security was called, which made her grab her items and head for the exit. I'm not really sure what happened after that.

You don't often see ER staff that angry, but, man, yeah... they were all pissed after that. But they LOVED us, for not screaming in the hallway.

Jamie was released at 4:45, so we dashed to get her to dialysis. I drove back to the hotel, slept for a few hours, picked her up, and went to drop her off and grab the free breakfast at the hotel. Apparently, the breakfast wasn't free, we learned, when we were handed a bill.

Returning to the room, the phone immediately rang and the front desk called.
"Did you call for emergency services."
"Yes."
"And what was this regarding?"
"My wife wasn't feeling well, but she's been to the ER and stuff, and she's okay now."
"...you just called for Emergency Services."
"No, I called at 2:00 this morning."
"I have emergency services on the line, and you just called for assistance. I have them on the line."
"No. I called at 2:00 this morning."
"Let me put them on."
"Sir, do you need assistance?"
"No, we're okay. Your people already came out here at 2:00."
There was sort of a bit of dicussion going on at the front desk that I could hear on the line. "We have the wrong room."
"Okay then," I said. "I'm going to hang up. Thanks."

By 9:50 I went to sit in the house and wait for the air conditioner repairman (from 10 - 1, if you're checking facts). So, anyway, I waited. And waited and waited. It was pretty hot, but I brought in a fan and sat pretty still and watched "The Roaring Twenties."

At 1:15 the company cut me off at the pass and called to let me know my repairman was en route. He showed up about twenty minutes later, sweaty and disheleveled, and honestly, looking pretty tired. He got cracking, located a freon leak (that hissing), told me he was going to gauge me, I agreed, and he went to work.

Being the smart guy I am, I went out to his truck with a glass of water, neglecting to put on shoes in the 110 degree heat, burned my feat, handed off the water and went to clean up the plotch of cat barf Jeff the Cat had deposited in by the bedroom door.

Jamie called and announced "My car won't start. I tried to go get some lunch, but my car won't start."
"Of course it won't," I replied.

The gentleman was done fairly quickly, ran through the bill with me, I paid, and changed my air filter (helpful league tip: don't use the solid, nice 3M air filters. Apparently they're too good and make your air conditioners work overtime, shortening the life of your air conditioner).

I drove back to the hotel, started Jamie's car on the first try, retrieved Jamie and checked out. And they didn't even bill us for a second night when they well could have.

Anyway, I'm a little pooped. And poor.

Jamie's feeling better and, in fact, is playing with Lucy right now. We have AC, and things are, for better or worse, back to normal.

But in the past several weeks, Jamie's car has had some minor problems, my tires and radiator needed to be replaced, Lucy was in the doggie ER, Mel had some very minor problems from his surgery, Jamie's been in and out of teh ER three times, and the AC died on the house. I'm just waiting to be diagnosed with a brain cloud.

At this point, you sort of have to be optimistic. I figure we're due for things to balance out.

Wednesday

Well, Wednesday was just an oddly decent day. I got a lot done at work, it wasn't as mind numbingly hot out as I'd suspected, Dan called me at work to fill me in on some Blackboard updates (and life updates), and I got to leave work at a decent time.

Also, of course, Jamie is home from the hospital. She went in to the ER on Monday around 1:00 AM and was admitted, so she was sort of hanging out without much to do at Chandler Regional until Tuesday evening.

She's going to see a pulmonologist (outpatient) to check up on some breathing stuff she's had going on for a while, but otherwise she seems okay. Jamie, of course, took the opportunity in the hospital to tell Dr. Chang I'd been running. He didn't exactly praise me for my astounding transformation, but it was kind of funny how he was more than ready to switch gears and discuss that instead.

So, this evening was kind of nuts with the finale of Lost (which Jamie taped, and which I will not be watching), the Suns/Mavs game and finale of American Idol. I'm kicking myself now, but since we assumed the Suns were sunk, we tuned in to AI. Obviously a very, very bad call.

That said, American Idol turned out to have, arguably, its most entertaining episode to date. Pairing contestants with showbiz success stories, it made for a pretty good variety show without all the self-congratulatory hoo-hah of an established awards show. I mean, where else will you see Mary J. Blige, Live, and Burt Bacharach under one roof? Where?

But, of course, they also had Prince, who reminded us EXACTLY what a performer can be. Thank you, Prince, I had almost forgotten. How have I never seen him live? I'm not living right.

And the show was funny. AI gave in to it's inner dorkiness for the AI Awards, giving some of the not-so-lucky contestants an opportunity to take the stage. And while Clay Aiken may now look like the lost child of Barry Manilow, it was funny to see him as a seasoned performer.

We tuned over to the Suns/Mavs game with three minutes left, saw our boys were down and tuned back. We were more than a little stunned to see the news after the show announcing a Suns victory. I am, I admit, more than a little surprised. Winning Game 1 at Dallas didn't seem to likely. Now for Game 2 the Mavs are really going to be looking for blood.

New comic day brought a conrnucopia of good stuff which I didn't get much of a chance to read. 52 is turning out to be a very interesting read thus far. I guess it's on my recommend list. It's fun to have a book to look forward to every week, so, sales willing, I'll be curious to see what lessons DC takes from 52 as far as marketing strategy.

I still have a stack of other stuff to read, including two Gail Simone written comics (Birds of Prey and the new Secret Six book).

No Superman books this week. Trimming it down to two regular titles is leaving me feeling a bit high and dry, and with JLA on hiatus until July, All-Star Superman a bi-monthly and Superman/ Batman on a wildly irregular schedule, it's just not always as easy to get my Superman fix as I'd like.

Also: Parents called. New Frescata sandwich at Wendy's was okay for what you pay, and Lucy was able to entertain herself all night with a tennis ball.

Hope your Wednesday was a good one.

Well, today was a real gem.

I'll try to keep it all short, but we headed to the ER this morning as Jamie had numerous, seemingly unrelated symptoms like a fever, a sore throat, a migraine and probably some other stuff.

However, after sitting there for two hours (I started the second Augusten Burroughs memoir) Jamie decided she really didn't feel all that bad. At least not bad enough to deal with the ER anymore. NOTE: The ER is for people with a medical emergency. about 50% of what you see come in can be dealt with by putting an ice pack on it and a splint from Walgreens.

Anyhoo, we checked out having only, really, checked in.

We kept Jamie's pre-scheduled appointment with her doctor. It seems she may be dehydrated, which is a tricky thing for a dialysis patients. She may also have developed an allergy to something out here. And she has waxy build-up on one ear.

Anyhow, nothing major. She's doing okay, but we're really going to have to keep an eye on her hydration levels.

When we got home, I guess I'd been pretty stressed. I sat down and read a few comics (this was around 4:00) and I fell sound asleep for an hour.

Anyhow, I don't have much to add, but since I've somehow accumulated dozens and dozens of comments from Sunday's posts, I thought maybe I'd step in to say thanks for all the participation! I feel like the first Summer of Superman post was a hit, so I'll try to think of some other posts I can do in keeping with the theme.

Ya'll have a good one.

Melbotis's Bubble of Blechhhh

Last night after dinner and AI, Jamie asked me to look at Mel's incision where he had his surgery. I guess earlier in the day she'd had a look and it appeared he was getting some fluid build-up behind the scar.

I pulled up his shirt and a bubble the size of my fist was right behind the scar. Mel was happy as a clam and appeared not to notice.

Our vet was long closed so we rushed to the 24 hour clinic a few miles from the house. The place was run suspiciously like a people ER. The only difference being that they weren't worried about getting sued, I guess, because the nurse in triage looked at Mel's bubble and said, "I'm going to save you two hours of wait. Go home and put some hot wash cloths on the bubble for fifteen minutes. Do this twice tonight. Go see your vet first thing in the morning."

I have no idea what this was supposed to do, but we went home and put hot wash cloths on Mel's bubble. I made arrangements to miss work in the morning, made appropriate e-mails and checked on Mel who was, still, happy as a clam.

This morning he woke up and the bubble was slightly larger. I went for my run and at 8:05 I called the vet to get an appointment. We were to go in at 10:00.

I took my shower and got cleaned up, checking on Mel through the window to see how he was doing. He was pretty much standing in the yard happily wagging his tail.

Jamie came home from dialysis, scarfed down an Eggo and we were ready to roll. Mel came inside, and I immediately noticed his bubble was gone. He had a small rupture in his scar that was no longer bleeding, where, I assume, he scratched open the bubble or it just popped. Either way, he'd drained the darn thing.

We still drove him to the vet where they added some staples to his scar and told us that, apparently, what he'd had was "serum". I'm still not sure I'm buying their answer, but it's just bodily liquid that can form at a surgery site.

Bottom line, Mel is fine and I missed 3 hours of work. And somewhere in our yard is a puddle of Mel's blecchhh...

Hey, ya'll.

Okay, so... today sucked. Jamie woke up around 3:45 AM and noticed, "Hey, I can't breathe." So we went to the ER and got her fixed up. Turns out she has a touch of the pneumonia. Fortunately, around our house, a touch of pneumonia is nothing to get all that wigged about. Now how does one get pneumonia in PHX? I have no idea, but if someone could do it, it's my wife.

Anyway, she's doing better. A little rest, a couple of pills, and we're right as rain. No need to move the house to the lee side of the stone or anything.

Anyhow, I am pretty tired, so I'll abbreviate tonight's post by celebrating the Suns' victory over the Houston Rockets, and this with both Amare and Kurt Thomas out. And, uhmmm... what else.

Man, I'm pretty tired. Ya'll are on your own.

Hi Leaguers - Mrs. League here, back from el hospital. Am typing one handed so this will be short - just wanted to thank everyone for their support and good wishes! It's good to be home and I hope this time I can stay home.

Looks like I got out of the GPS business too early:

"Turn left in 500 feet....fool!"

League Post-Thanksgiving Wrap-Up

Ugh.

So Tuesday night when I called home to see how Jamie was doing and to let her know I was en route, she had "the tone" in her voice. 'The Tone" is my catch-all indicator that something is wrong with Jamie. It's better than suddenly hearing vomiting or finding her passed out on the floor, but it's still not a lot of fun.

Anyhoo, in order to receive her pherisis and dialysis treatments, Jamie has a fistula/ shunt (whatever you want to call it) that is a vein they've sort of beefed up for easy access. Back around Halloween, Jamie had a blood clot in the fistula and she'd had surgery to clear that out.

Well, whether it was tied to the surgery or something else, Jamie had an infection on her arm.

Tuesday night we went to the ER to see about getting the red patch looked at, but with a hundred screaming children between us and a doctor, we decided to hold off until morning when Jamie was set for dialysis. Wednesday, the dialysis center sent her back to the ER where she was seen, given antibiotics and admitted.

Jamie's folks came into town Wednesday, as did Doug and Kristin. Wednesday night, while Doug, Kristin, Judy and I enjoyed a lovely pasta dinner, Jamie and her dad hung back to get Jamie's ever-growing boil lanced. She also received some anti-biotics.

Thursday was mostly observation.

Friday Jamie was supposed to go home, but her surgeon showed up, saw the infection was worse than previously believed, and Jamie was scheduled for a surgery for Friday night. The surgery didn't go quite as planned, and they had to do a few extra things, but Jamie came out of it just fine, short a vein in her leg.

Luckily, lots of family around meant that Jamie has had a constant stream of family running around trying to make sure she's okay.

Everybody but Judy has now departed, and tomorrow Jamie is scheduled for a few things. I think she'll be coming home mid-week, which I am really excited about. We just bought a new Christmas tree (yes, fake, darn it!), and we need to find new decorations and a star for the top.

So what was I thankful for this year?

1. Jamie was able to fight off another potentially dangerous illness
2. Family, both here and across the country
3. Modern medicine
4. Doctors, nurses and techs of an excellent caliber at CRH
5. UT's ability to win, even when they're playing like they ate too much turkey
6. The Phoenix Suns, for being an excellent distraction while Jamie is in surgery

Hope everyone had a better Turkey Day than us.

Home for the Holidays?

Well, Mrs. League is home once again.

Last Sunday Jamie went into the hospital with some weird breathing problems. We've had some interesting medical issues here at League HQ over the years, but breathing hadn't yet made the list.

At first I thought Jamie had some sort of upper-respiratory infection, but it went from "a little trouble breathing" to "horrendous wheezing and gasping" pretty quickly. Luckily, when we hit that point we were already in the ER. (And just a quick reiteration, the real world ER is nowhere as romantic or exciting as the one on TV. Mostly you repeat your medical history ten times to ten different people and they look at you sort of blankly. Also, answering lots of insurance questions).

Mad props go out to the doctor who prescribed the upper-throat breathing treatment, because that really, really helped.

Anyhoo, Jamie was moved upstairs into the hospital around 7:00pm, and from there, Jamie's usual doctors got to work. Her blood levels were all out of whack and they needed to keep an eye on her.

Jamie's mom flew in (again) and helped out this week, sleeping in the weird pleather chairs they provide for visitors.

The bottom line is that Jamie is going to go on dialysis (again) and will get on the list for kidney transplant (again). So while we may have taken a step backward from the pheresis treatments Jamie was getting, she's gonna get on the list for a new kidney.

Jamie came home Friday, and we've been trying to just enjoy a little peace and quiet. While the hospital is as nice as they can make it, it's still the hospital, and I think Jamie is happy not to be hanging out with an IV in her arm and electrodes stuck all over her body.

If you have a kidney you aren't currently using, or one which you think you could spare, please put it in an envelope and send to

Jamie's Kidney Bank
1234 Arizona Ave.
Chandler, AZ
85249

We'll be having Jamie's side of the family in this week for Turkey Day, so expect posts to remain infrequent until after the holiday. Lots of prep to do and not a lot of time to do it in.

Anyway, that's the scoop. Hope it explains why things have been so quiet on this end.

Greetings, Leaguers - Mrs. League here. Long time no blog.

So...I get migraines. Recently I've been forced to make numerous trips to our local ER just to get some relief. I bring this up not to seek sympathy but to lay the foundation for my collection of tidbits. Folks, the emergency room is a strange place and the people who occupy it stranger still. Here are some bits and pieces from my recent travels...

TALES FROM THE ER

1) Approximately one half of patients in Chandler, AZ are seeking medical assistance for...kidney stones. No kidding. One in every two visits we are treated to medical personnel informing the person behind the next curtain that "it will pass". *shudder*

2) According to the PA (physician's assistant) in the room next to us last night, "you'd be surprised how many folks come in with bugs in their ears". No, this was not some figure of speech. The woman he was treating had, in fact, arrived with a beetle scratching at her eardrum.

3) If you are an 8 year old with a Lite-Brite bulb stuck up your nose, you will be rushed down the 'Fast Track' hallway.

**with the two above examples, I am seriously considering stuffing a walnut up my nose next time we go in just to see if I can get a room faster.

4) It is perfectly acceptable to treat your 2 year old (who is there to for medical attention I might add) to Diet Pepsi and handfuls of Skittles at 4 a.m.

5) No matter what the programming or what time of day, the volume on the waiting room television is set to 180 decibels. This is especially peaceful in the wee hours of televangelists and infomercials.

6) If you already feel as if you’re going to throw up, Everybody Loves Raymond playing at previously noted decibel level *will* push you that extra mile.

7) Last night we witnessed a parade of around 10 family members of one patient (mostly children of around 10) marching back to their loved one’s treatment area with dinner in hand.

8) It is literally impossible to shock anyone working in the ER. These people have seen everything. You could walk in with a barracuda attached to your forearm and the triage nurse would blandly ask “and how long have you been having this problem?”

9) Bags of McDonald’s can be seen accompanying one out of four waiting room parties. Apparently, the emergency room is a great place for “lovin’” a chocolate shake and fries.

10) It is often impossible to tell which member of the Mickey-D’s group is actually sick. The hospital arm band is the only giveaway for the injured individual. This is especially true with children, and why it is difficult to have patience when these happy tykes get whisked away to treatment before you even see the folks in billing.


I hope I have passed on some useful information should you ever need to visit this magical land.

So, this past week will surely go down in my personal history as The Week of General Annoyance and Chaos.

Returning home from last weekend's wedding, I felt a bit drained. Tuesday by lunch, I pretty much knew I was not going to make it to work on Wednesday (especially when, in the middle of sentences, my throat would sort of quit making noises, and I sounded like someone was turning my personal volume up and down).

Wednesday I stayed home, tried to take it easy, and generally felt pretty lousy.

Thursday I went to work, felt awful, skipped out early and I have no idea what I did or said Monday, Tuesday or Thursday while I was in the office.

Thursday night around 4:30 a.m., Lucy began hacking with a horrible cough. She's a puppy, and, naturally, I totally wigged out. But at the same time, my vet's office doesn't even open until 8:00, and aside from the hacking cough, she seemed fine. "It's Kennel Cough," Jamie and I decided and went back to bed to try to sleep.

At 8:00 I finally got ahold of the vet, got an appointment for 11:30, realized I was still pretty sick, and flopped on the couch.

By 9:30, Lucy was now no longer coughing. She was just hopping about in the yard looking happy as a clam.

At 11:10 I tossed her in the portable kennel and got her to the vet. The only coughing she would do was when she would pull too hard on her collar. "Oh, it's kennel cough," they said. Told me it's viral, sucks to be me, and told me to wait it out. I got an anti-biotic (in case it wasn't viral) and was told to give my puppy robitussin. Seriously.

Lucy hasn't coughed since.

That didn't keep her from crying for no reason at 12:00 Friday night, which got her butt kicked outside until the next morning.

Saturday Jamie got up before me, made pancake batter, woke me up, told me it was pancake time. We had lovely pancakes.

I was still sipping my tea when she leaped up and began cleaning the dishes. After washing and drying the large, class cutting board, she took a sharp left turn from the sink to put the cutting board onto the island and turned directly into the open dishwasher door. This has the effect of putting a massive hole in her leg that was gross and bloody.

To her credit, 1) Jamie put the cutting board down square on the counter. 2) She never yelled, or cried or passed out. And believe me, this gash was worth yelling, crying and passing out about.

Long story short, we lost Saturday at the emergency room while Jamie got sutures in her leg to make sure she didn't unravel like a cheap sweater.

After we got back from the ER, we more or less took it easy.

Last night we saw Kung Fu Hustle, which is, Leaguers, the best entertainment for your dollar in the cinema at this moment. Great action, very funny, and a pretty good story.

I never saw Kill Bill (either Vol. 1 or 2), and I sort of got the feeling that the scenes with Lucy Liu must have lifted bits from Kung Fu Hustle. If anyone has seen both movies, let me know.

The day, today, went fine. Ran some errands. Bought some pants (khaki and olive) and a belt (black, leather, gold finish belt buckle) and an official Amare Stoudemire jersey I found on sale for half off.

And how did this come in handy? Leaguers, Mr. and Mrs. League spent this glorious evening witnessing Game 1 of Round 1 for the Phoenix Suns in the 2005 NBA Play-Offs.

Boo-yah.

The Grizzlies played a good game, but just didn't have it in them to defeat the mighty Phoenix Suns in this game. Game 2 might be another story. Tonight, however, The Suns landed a 114-103 win.

(What the @%$& happened to the Spurs, man? Let me tell you, The Purple Palace went beserk when they heard that score announced.)

Sadly, our seats were surrounded by many more children this time than the previous game, and some sweet, white haired ladies two rows down, so I felt compelled to self-edit before shouting at the refs, Grizzlies, and the Gorilla.

And, before you ask... no, the half-time show was not the Blues Bothers again. But, they did keep a theme of blue. This game had The Blue Man Group at half-time. These guys were actually pretty fun. Unfortunately, nobody will ever get me to pay for Blue Man tickets in the future now that I have seen them more or less for free.

Anyhow, my voice is gone and I'm still in a good mood, despite my otherwise jacked-up week.

Suns in the play-offs. Hurray!