Happy Valentine's Day!

(custom 'Goudey card' I made the other day)

On Tuesday, I sent Shan a dozen roses +2 to the school. I sent them early because I wanted her to be able to show them off all week! There were a dozen red roses from me and two white ones from the kids.

The original plan for Saturday was for us to go to the movies, acting as chaperones for Tyler and his date. As fate would have it, the girl's father never said if she could go, so that didn't pan out, and shan ended up fighting a cold.

Shan got me one of my favorite things of all: baseball cards! Now you talk about a woman that knows her man! :-)

Here's wishing everyone a Happy Valentine's Day!

So, what do YOU do on a day off?

I woke up this morning and helped a little with the kids as they got ready for school. My main job today was taking my Mom to the airport, so she could get to Pittsburgh. She and I left around 8:30 this morning in the middle of a very foggy, soggy day.

We got to the airport around 10:15 this morning and Mom told me to just pull up to the curb and we would take of check-in at the curb. Her flight was scheduled to leave at 11:45 and at the Little Rock Airport, guests can only get to the top of the escalator (for all intents and purposes), so parking would have been a waste.

We got her checked in and said our goodbyes. I decided to run to Hobby Town, USA, down the road and see if I could pick up some boxes to ship baseball cards in. Sure enough! I also picked up a couple packs of cards just for kicks.

After that, I headed home. On the way, the rain came in waves. At times, things were nearly clear and at other times, you couldn't see anything until it was almost too late.

I decided to run through Mickey-D's for lunch. Since the Mcdonald's in Hope is now a recently poured cement slab, I haven't had Mcdonald's in a while and I was craving a cheeseburger. What my Mom failed to tell me was that her driver's side power window has a slight issue. You see, once the window goes down, it may or may not go back up again, depending on how much it likes you at the time. evidently, I had made it mad. I started driving down the Interstate with the rain pouring in and the window down. I looked every bit the hick I felt like - cruising down I-30 in a Cadillac in the rain with the window down... Brilliant.

I eventually, lowered the window all the way, and this time when I pushed the "up" button, the window started up! I did not let go of the button until the window was sealed shut.

I fought high winds and driving rain off and on the whole way home. I was surprised no one went careening off the road!

Once at home, I decided to put together some of the baseball boxes I am giving away. I have a gazillion cards, bought before i had my "12 Days of Christmas" giveaway. The problem is that I ended up winning nearly every eBay auction I had bid on, so my 'stash' of cards grew by about 20,000 or more! Ouch. Well, I decided that I would give them away on my baseball card blog. The response has been great! So, for the past few weeks, I have been organizing the cards and packing them up for shipment. It's actually been a lot of fun. And a LOT of work.

I picked up Tyler from school, ran through sonic for supper, and headed home again.

all in all, not a bad way to spend the day off in my book...

Wherefore art thou?

Hey. How's it goin'? Been a while, huh? Yeah, I haven't stopped by here in a few days. What have I been up to? A little of this, a little of that... Oh, yeah, and I took Mom to the emergency room.

(caution, this could get graphic... or gross.. or both... at least for a little while)

Sunday afternoon, she called me to tell me she had been throwing up since 3:00. She did not look good (sorry Mom). We called her insurance company, who have a 24/7 registered nurse on duty you can get info/help from. After spending some time on the phone, the nurse said it was best if we got Mom to the ER.


The closest hospital is Medical Park in Hope Arkansas. Frankly, it sucks. But, it is close. When we got there, there were half a dozen or so people there and they had been waiting up to SIX HOURS and had not been seen yet. In the meantime, we sit down and I go over and get Mom checked in. And we wait... and wait... all the while, Mom is puking her.. well, I'd say guts, but really, her guts were long gone by this point, so let's say knees, up.

By the time we got called back, we had been there about two and half hours (I think, my memory is a little fuzzy and I didn't even have medication), and by then, Mom had been puking her ankles, toes, and I am pretty sure she was sucking pieces of the floor up through her body.


The doctor and nurses got her settled, and after a bit, she was given some medicine to calm her stomach and make her a little loopy. Well, a lot loopy, really. She began telling me that the room was fuzzy. Then, she said she could see all kinds of things when she closed her eyes. She said a few other things, but even I couldn't make a coherent enough grasp of it to relate it here. She has some xrays done.

Around 10:30pm, I took a short drive to Taco Bell (what else is open that late on a Sunday evening in Hope, Arkansas, other than Waffle House?). It's not really short the way I went, though. I took the by-pass, which was actually longer than just cutting through town. It was late, what can I say?

At one point though, I came around a curve and drive down the road some, then I come around another curve. For an instant, I am pretty sure I had just come around this curve. Holy crap, I'm in the Twilight Zone, or Groundhog's Day, or some new bizarre combination of the two! As I focus my eyes, I realize I am not quite where I thought I was, and indeed, there are two curves, and life is basically normal (minus the fact my mother was lying in a hospital bed finally NOT puking up the kitchen sink).


I get back to the hospital and decide the best thing for me to do is eat my supper in the hospital parking lot....in front of the ER waiting room... Yeah, that was my 'best' thing. Seriously, exactly when did my brain shut off, and really, should I be driving? I'm not thinking so.

I head back into the ER and a few minutes later, we're told Mom gets to check into the Hotel Medical Park. You check in, but you don't check out... or you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave... or well, you might as well check out and leave because we're all going to the monster truck rally. Take your pick.

Evidently, she has several air pockets trapped in her intestines, and her body is not too happy about it. She'll have to stay for observation, hydration, and pseudo libation in the form of drugs.

Mom tells me to go home and get some real rest and for me to come back in the morning to See how things are. I protest, but lose the fight. Amazingly, the drive home was nowhere near as eventful as the trip to Taco Bell. Evidently, the ghoulies and ghosties decided they had better things to do.


Fast forward to this morning. No word form the doctor. The nurse comes in and Mom is gone for an updated xray and an ultrasound. I play UNO on my HTC Touch while I wait... Oh, and I answer email and surf the web. Yeah, we're not supposed to have our cellular devices turned on, but really, do cell phones affect medical equipment at all? I sincerely doubt it. Though, I did notice there was a 'code blue' for the guy in the next room while I was trying to look up a problem with my company's web server. I thought it was a K-Mart thing... Just kidding. Calm down..... I know what a 'code blue' is. And, no, the guy in the next room did not code out. Heck, I don't even know if there WAS a guy in the next room! I'm trying to keep things light here, people!

After Mom gets back, the nurse says the doctor comes in at 10am. He then reads everybody's charts. He goes to see the patients in ICU. I've always wondered if first-year doctors go around saying that alot, thinking it's funny: "I Se You in the ICU!" Yeah, prolly not. After his stint in ICU, Mom's doctor would make his regular rounds. It is at this point, the nurse says, "On a good day, you'll see him by noon. On a regular day, by 2 or 2:15 tops." Nice. mom tells me to go to work.

After lunch, John and I stop by to see how things are going. Still there, still no doctor. Back to work. Not long after I'm back, Mom calls to let me know that the doc says things have moved a little and that there air pockets down there. Mom is put on a liquid diet for 48 hours. But, the nurses are working up her discharge papers! Wahoo!

A couple hours later, Mom is ready to go (feeling MUCH better), and so am I!


Oh, there is one little thing I forgot to mention. Yeah, on Tuesday, Mom is flying out to Pittsburgh. Her best friend is having open heart surgery, and she wants to be there for her. So, in the hospital one day, in Pittsburgh the next. THAT is my Mom...

The waiting game

I am writing this while sitting in the waiting room of the Freeway Medical building in Little Rock. My mom had an appointment for her back at 10:30 this morning. It is now 1:00 in the afternoon as I write this. We are still waiting for her to go back to get her treatment. And, then after that, we are to go to physical therapy.

I foolishly assumed we would have eaten and been on the road home by now. Not even close. At this point, I don't even know if we'll be home in time for supper! Yeesh.

Since the building has wireless, I have been able to do some work online. I should ask the boss if I can claim half a day's work since I am working on my 'sick time.'

My question is this: why would a doctor schedule surgeries and treatments on the same day? There is a room full of people that could have been gone from here long ago. instead, we sit here waiting... and waiting... and waiting. At some point, they should just tell everyone to reschedule their appointments and buy us lunch!

Ever had one of those days?

I had 'one of those days' twice in a row...

I'll start with today (Wednesday) and work backward. I had a movie in my head. You know, when you can picture the actor and you know what the movie was about, but you can't remember the name of the flick to save your life? Yeah, one of those. I knew the actor was Gerard Depardieu. I knew the movie featured him being interrogated by a couple of German soldiers (more on that in a sec), and I knew the movie was from the mid 90's. So, I began my search to ease my mind. No luck. I looked through IMBD and even found several sites that listed all of his films. Nothing rang a bell. Then, I tried Yahoo answers. Unlike the millions of people who ask before they search, I actually searched the site for the actor's name.

As time went on, I remembered the movie was about a death or suicide. This was getting me nowhere fast. And then, I remembered it wasn't German soldiers. It was two police officers. Ah... Well, after poking around a bit, I found what I was looking for. The movie is "A Pure Formality." It's a French movie with English subtitles (yeah, I like artsy movies) and it came out in 1995. How did I even know about this movie? IFC used to run it a lot a few years ago. Why it popped in my head today, however, I have no earthly idea.

So, now I had a title and a year. All I had to do was search Amazon and eBay for a good price on the DVD. while I did find it in both places, it was NOT a Region 1 movie, meaning I could not play it on my DVD player. Dang it. I did find it on VHS, though, so I might buy it and convert it to DVD, but that is a pain.

I'll let you know. Of course, now that I put the puzzle together, I may forget about the whole thing and just grab a coke and be happy.

---

Before the 'pure formality' brain takeover, I had a tech meeting today. It went really well, and I think was one of the most productive meetings I've had in a while. I am so glad these meetings are working out as well as they are. I wish more techs would attend, but I do understand why they can't all come. There is work to be done at the district.

We talked about the state security policy, what summer trainings they would like to have for themselves and what trainings they would like to see for the teachers. we also took a look at windows 7, which will blow most users out of the water. basically, Microsoft took everything wrong with vista and threw it away. I'm pretty excited about win7.

Before the meeting, I came in to the office and had a box in my chair. I checked the purchase order number on the label and knew this was our 75 flash drives for a project. I opened the box and found... umm... 38 flash drives. That would be about half of what we ordered. I immediately called the rep and chewed him up one side and down the other. we were supposed to get 38 TWO-PACKS, not 38 single packs! Later in the day, I had a voicemail that said he made the mistake and put in the wrong part number and that we should have our replacements asap.

In the meantime, I get to send the other ones back. All I have to say is that I am not paying to send them back. they screwed up, they can pay for it.

---

Back up to yesterday (Tuesday).

I've been trying to figure out just how to tell this story. You see, it has to do with my mother going to the doctor and my total misunderstanding as just what she was going to the doctor for in the first place. Allow me to start at the beginning.

My day started with a trip to one of my schools so that I could install and setup SharePoint web services on a server they have. It has been a while since I have installed that from scratch, so my brain was trying to play catch up.

Because I had this install to do, Shan took Mom to her doctor's appointment ( am taking mom to a different appointment on Thursday, but more on that in a bit). I am at the school, flipping through books, checking my steps, etc. Of course, things aren't quite going right, so I have to actually remove some of the installed updates so that I can install the software I need to install, so that THEN I can install the updates we need. Yeah, one of those kinds of days.

Mom was told to be at the doctor at 7:00 so that she could get her anesthetics for her appointment at 8:00. At 10:00, Shan calls me to tell me they had JUST THEN taken my mom back for her work to be done. I couldn't believe it!

After that, the tech I was working with had to meet with an electrician, so he left me to install the software. Everything was going fine. And then I couldn't find the license key for the software. I called the tech, who told me where to find it. I looked and no luck. Since I had access to all the servers, I decided to look around the files and see if I could find it myself.... After about 30 minutes of checking and taking care of other things with my Smartphone, I decided I wasn't going to find the key and instead focused on work I could do through my work webmail.

I was a bit frazzled and frustrated.

Shan called to tell me my mom was done with her appointment. Here is where things get muddy in the space between my ears. In my head, my mom was going to get the shot for her back pain. Shan tells me the doctor gave mom some meds to help make her sleepy, but they weren't working. so, they gave mom some more, and THAT wasn't working. the doctor gave her as much was allowed without admitting her to a hospital for local anesthetic, yet mom was totally awake. So my mom is totally awake while to doctor is going to give her the spinal injection. So far, things make some sense.

Then, Shan tells me that mom had to have a tube put in her mouth, and in order for them to do that, they had to give mom some kind of drink to number her mouth. Somewhere in mind, I ask myself, "What does she need a tube in her mouth for a back injection?" The next thing I hear is that the doctor tells mom that she does not have cancer. I tell myself, "well, I’m glad to hear that, but why are they checking for cancer during a back injection?" My mind is still trying to figure out where the software key might be, and trying to make the connections between a spinal injection and a search for cancer...

Later, as Shan is give me a few more details of the day, I obviously was very confused as to why they would be doing all this internal stuff for a back injection... And then Shan says, "Umm, this was her endoscope for her stomach. You are taking her for her back injection on Thursday."

And that is when the light came on. They weren't sticking things down mom's throat, giving her all those meds, and letting her be wide awake for a back injection!! It was for her STOMACH EXAM!! DUH!!

Yeah, one of those kinds of days....