*growl*

How to get a pissed off bear...

Confuse the notes on doctor appts...Tu 8/31 1:45pm... Tu 9/6 8:45am...

So what do I do...I'm up and out the door super early...and get to my appt today at 8:30am...to promptly realize that my appt is at 1:45pm.

*mutter* *growl* *complain*

A day of hiding....

Other than taking Sean to work and picking him up...the only thing I'm doing outside in the real world is going to the DMV to get an Illinois Drivers License...other than that...I'm not going out in public...it's the one thing I do on my birthday. I don't like the whole singing servers/cake/stupid crap in public on my birthday. I'd rather have a small get together at home where I can be myself amongst friends and not have an entire restaurant staring at me.

Ah well, it's offical. It's 12:36am CDT...at 3:10am I turn 32... Damn...it seems like 30 was just last year.

It's amazing how much quicker the years pass as you get older and a year is a smaller and smaller slice out of your total life experience...

Happy bear bounces...

The music says it all..

Powerplay - No Limits - 2 x 12" single U.K. Promo # Z1
Tracks: Circus Ring (Original Version)
Circus Ring (7" Version)
Hi Hi Friend (Dub Version)
Circus Ring (Military Mix)
Circus Ring (Album Mix)

I have the Original/7"/Album....now the Military Mix...

I *don't* have the Hi Hi Friend Dub Mix...

A totally unexpected song to find while surfing the 'Net today...

What other fun oddities will turn up today? I have a few tracks I'd like to find..

Paul Kelly - I'll Forgive, But I Won't Forget
Hunters + Collectors - Around The Flame

Back from the dreamtime...

*chuckle* 8:31pm Sydney time..and what ever this horrid song is that they are playing at the moment the chorus contains "We're gonna make this shit happen now" ... I love Super Request on Triple J...it's a showcase of just how bad popular taste can be...no matter where you are ;)

Just a gentle reminder of how things work Down Under...you can swear on TV...you can show sex on TV...but you can't show gun violence or glorify guns. Amazingly the crime rate in Australia is much lower than the US (on a per capita basis, obvious the fact they only have 20 million people drops the crime numbers)...

Anyways...

I woke up about 3:30 after having been asleep for about four hours. I had the joy of a full hour massage from 's friend Matt. He's in school to be a therapist and will be certified in June, so I was a practice client for him. God, if that's what an "in training" amateur can do...

But I woke up from this dream...and kept waking up...in this dream I was in multiple dreams (i.e. a dream in a dream in a dream ...)

In ascending order (the order I woke up from them in):

1: Working on a Wisconsin DOT crew laying Christmas lights along I-94 between the Dells and Madison...Christmas lights? Strung out via extension cords 50' at a time ... from rest areas?! What the f*ck?!

(Real world note: hold on...Placebo covered "Running Up That Hill?...Triple J plays odd stuff...though it's a good remake)

2: Talking to a woman and her daughter in the back of their pick-up (sitting on the tailgate) about the road crew that was laying Christmas lights (but I wasn't a part of the crew then) but I was hitchhiking across Wisconsin for no reason..just out wandering the highways...at a rest area?!

3: Talking to a woman and her son in their Blazer about working at KVSC as a morning DJ...but how I was now working on a road crew in Minnesota laying Christmas lights between Albertville and Maple Grove...but how KVSC paid better (it was a volunteer positon in reality) because I enjoyed what I did and getting to talk to people...and why was I at the SA off 95th Ave and I-94 in Maple Grove during this?!

4: Talking to people from KVSC (at the station) and for some reason we were having an all night party at the station and I had to leave the party (in the backyard..if you know KVSC, you know the backyard)...and do my Monday morning shift... (this makes sense aside from the party...you know...it might actually have been related to trivia....ponders this s'more)

5: Being in Milwaukee, talking to more unknown people about my life and what I'd done with it (not much)..this was by far the shortest dreamscape...lasting just a few seconds as far as I could tell...

6: Being out with Sean having dinner and talking about our life together, but this was clearly a decade or more in the future, as we were both in successful jobs and doing fairly well...and owned a house together.

7: I'm not sure if this was another level of the dream...or if I just woke up twice...but I think that I dreamed that I woke up from dreaming about this dream...then finally woke up into "reality"

Talk about fucked up...

I'll be the first to admit that I was totally perplexed by it all...parts of it make sense..and I understand some of the later bits...but the work crews/chatting with people while hitchhiking...I don't get those.

A normal update day...

Well, I now have an appointment with the neurologist at 8:30am on Tuesday Sept. 7th, which is much better than the mid-November date that I had.

I'm still sore and having some nervous issues (pain/pins and needles in the legs) but it's getting better.

Tonight, I'm "treating" myself to a full body massage. I rarely take time for myself, but a friend of is going to school for massage therapy and is looking for new people to practice on...so I'm going down there tonight.

I can't drive my van (it's just too uncomfortable/rough) so tomorrow morning I have to drive to work, then drive to the bank, pay my car insurance (it's due tomorrow) and then do laundry. Of course, they are in opposite directions...oh well. I'll be happy to just be out of the apartment and getting back to a semi-normal life.

Part of me feels weird because I'm looking forward to running to the bank and doing laundry. I'm actually looking forward to it. It just seems odd...

Update on the broken bear...

Well, It's now official.

I have MS. Scar tissue is visible on the MRIs in my low back. No active lesions, but the MS is active and progressive.

I have to call my neurosurgeon to follow up tomorrow (later today) and see about changing the medications that I'm on.

Vicodin == great painkiller and sleep aid...isn't helping with muscle spasms

Prednisone == steroidal anti-inflammatory..needed to calm the aggravated nerves and trying to beat this attack into regression...however it jacks my blood sugar levels into the stratosphere...to the point that for any extended duration....I'll need to be on some form of insulin and/or a no carb diet.

I do need a good muscle relaxant...I'm still having low back spasms...but that's unrelated to the MS (most likely stress related) but it's still enough that it keeps me from sleeping and sitting...

I should be content that I'm getting answers and that I have a confirmed diagnosis...but there is still so much to be done...treatments to be explored...and a life to restructure...

How do I work when I can't sit or stand for long periods of time and I can't lift? I now get to explore the options of being on disability..because I could go for the next two years in remission/non-active status...and overnight get thwapped down to doing nothing and being hospitalized for a week.

I just have to keep telling myself...I'm alive. I'm mentally all here and right now, it's a weakness/flaw in just the right leg...I can still do most things...except for biking, hiking, rock climbing...and then the downward spiral starts again...

Things are getting better...the diagnosis is confirmed. I still have though this is showing us much of our love for each other and how much we mean to each other...and I still have my friends who are there and check up on me quite often. It's the whole work/finances thing that is tearing at me psychologically.

My biggest hurdle is getting through this mentally and keeping out of the black depression that is looming all around..and the suicidal thoughts that call to me off and on throughout the day.

I'll post more tomorrow on the rest of my life and the good things that are happening...there are plenty of good things...but I know people are really worried about this and how I'm doing...

A huge thanks to everyone who has called, e-mailed, posted a comment and just generally helped keep me pulled together during this whole ordeal...

Post hospital entry #2

Well, I'm home again.

Spent five more days in the hospital...

I don't have spinal cord damage, compression, or other problems related to my lower back disc problems.

However, I do have something seriously enough wrong that I occasionally lose the feeling in my right leg and on rare occasions can't urinate. (at all).

I'm following up with a neurologist, a neurosurgeon, and a urologist.

The neurosurgeon has ruled out surgery for almost everything....the neurologist is unsure but wants to run more tests, and the urologist is involved due to the bladder problems.

All I know is that I get to spend the next month getting tested, poked, prodded, MRI in the brain (already had the entire spine done) and who knows what else in an attempt to find out what's wrong with me.

I'm scared as lots of possiblities are ruled out...others come up that scare me more. Spine surgery is out definately out (Good news)...MS is a distinct but remote possibility. (*BAD* News).

Fuck me gently with a chainsaw...

Well, I'm not longer on the contract with Spherion. I'm still "employed" but I have no job placement at the current time.

My back is starting to hurt more and more...if it's not stabilized/equalized by the evening, I'll be paging the neurosurgeon as ordered.

Other than that, today's a shitty day. I'm feeling like I should just end it all. No job, facing back surgery, and feeling like a deadweight on the entire world...

Hi all..

I just got home from two days in the hospital. I'll be back at work on Monday.

Ugh...my back went out again. I have a narrowing of my spinal canal, combined with two degenerating discs in my low back. The combo of the two is that it's fairly easy for me to irritate those nerve roots (going to my legs) and lose feeling, feel nothing but pins/needles, get wrong never signals (pressure == cold, touch == pain), and can't weight bear.

I'll be resting up this weekend. I'm not to sit for prolonged periods of time (more than 30 minutes) so I think what I'll be doing at work is working for 30, take a five minute break to walk around and stretch my back...repeat throughout the day.

When I'm feeling better and can explain the whole story, I'll post it here. It's kinda funny how it all came to happen this time...

The Love They give us...

Odd that the song that's playing is the song that's playing...it's the instrumental version of this...

I must thank the Lord and Lady for those lil things that remind us of the Spirit and the Divine and that they are there. My mom sent me my birthday money early (my birthday is 30 Aug)...and that was spent taking Sean out to dinner, paying bills, and doing #4 today along with getting an oil change in Sean's car. There was a small mixup on the contract I was working on and I wasn't getting paid the "completion" pay I thought I was getting. I get home and what's in the mailbox. An early birthday card from my Dad and step-mom with just enough in it to replace my monitor. (What I was going to do with the contract money)...

I'll admit that I'd been somewhat selfish and had really been questioning my faith in the Divine and in Spirit and I asked for a sign that they are indeed there and it wasn't something that I was deluded myself into believing.

Funny, our household budget is now liquid enough to get us through until my regular paychecks come in starting on 20 August. There's been other smaller things that have happened and personal epiphanies I've had that remind me that I'm definately happy to be alive and that They truly are here and watching us (and are part of us).

In my own way, I did get what I want. The financial hardship of the next two weeks has been alleviated, my faith has been restored and I'm happy to be alive.

Making a list and checking it twice...

Well, I'm on Sean's computer...sorta.

I'm using a program called "VNC" to export the display of my computer over to his WinXP box.

Until I pop out of full-screen mode, it's as if I was sitting in front of my own computer (aside from the mouse pointers being different)...

My list for the day was...

1: Clean the kitchen
2: Mop the kitchen
3: Vacuum the apartment
4: Attack the huge pile of "We'll do it sometime" laundry (Okay, there's an army duffle full of a few odd things and four sets of sheets...but other than that it's ALL done. Sean now has socks and shirts. Lots of them. Clean ones even.

Puff went the magic smoke....

Well, it died.

My trusty Phillips 107E monitor with the bad cable just couldn't take the beating it was getting from the constantly changing signalling from the video card. It let out a loud pop...and a cloud of smoke...and that was that.

I've stolen 's monitor from his Dell..and after figuring out what it was got it working on my machine...but now is monitorless until I can get the next project done and buy myself a new tube.

*sigh*

I was hoping it would last another 48 hours...as the project is that close to being done and delivered. Oh well.

*bids adieu to a monitor that's moved at least 20 times between dorm rooms and apartments in three states...*

Wierd wants and desires....

I want to find the old KIIK-FM/103.7 Davenport jingles...

From the top of signal hill....KIIK...Davenport...KIIK 104 Quad Cities....

and there were several other variations on that general theme. I grew up on the mighty KIIK 104...and I still have those stuck in my head....along with listening to Friday Night Videos *in stereo* on KIIK 104 because they were the sister station to the Quad Cities NBC channel WOC/6 (though I watched the Peoria NBC WEEK/25...which made commercials waaaaaaaaay more interesting...audio for something in the Quad Cities and video for something in Peoria)

If I could find a copy of even one of the top of the hour legal ID jingles from the KIIK 104 Davenport days...before they went to KUUL Oldies (I've still not forgiven them for that...) I'd be extremely happy.

Is Slashdot Slashdotted?

Did Slashdot die?

For the last day or so, I'll get 503 Service Unavailable errors, even though all the other sites hosted by the OSDN group are up and running fine.

It's not like there's a status page for it like there is for LiveJournal that's hosted off-site so we actually have some idea of what's going on.