One year ago today: March 19, 2025, WIP
Five years ago today: March 19, 2021, WIP
Nine years ago today: March 19, 2017, WIP
Random years ago today: March 19, xxxx, WIP
Divide today into two. This morning, I awoke woozy and leery of side effects. But things are moving fast. At 4:00AM labs, 5:00AM (can’t read my writing), and 7:00AM more X-rays. I’m cold but this time they get you all the blankets you want, making for a good rest. I needed it. My life vest has drained the battery with no way to get it from across their parking lot. They have me in the VIP suite, but the first thing noticeable outside is drunks moaning down the hall.
The morning was all waiting again, I took time to read up on how to get the Arduino to issue “Internet” commands, that is, the HTML that causes web pages to appear. The incompatibility of these systems is a study in itself. Remember, I gave away my HTML book in 1997, saying in effect this stupid system will never catch on. HTML is another millennial brain-fart language, where some dodo threw something together and now the command lines are a mixture of bad fixes, exceptions, and screwy punctuation. For instance, the “title” command has nothing to do with the function of a title.
It kept me distracted, there are commands that count the bytes send by a server, one of the sure signs the crew does not know how to run the ship. I did not wait long, at 10:00AM the staff wheeled me into the OR, where by now I know some of the folks. They cleaned the wound and resealed it with a type of Saran wrap that pulls the chest sides inward, but even I can tell it is not enough. And hitched me to 30-pound suction machine called Wombat, but quickly redubbed the Roomba, as it has to stay connected or begins to chirp.
Pulling out of anesthetic rapidly, I had consultations with two doctors. X-rays and probing showed all the infection is shallow, mostly skin-deep. It is also along the edges that were not staying together. It looks bad, so no pictures. Yet. They also plugged by leg wounds while I was under. The whole process went fast, I was back in my private lounge just after 11:00AM. The staff and service this time around is amazing, an order of magnitude better. Am I in the Presidential Suite? I’m near enough to the nursing station of get coffee on demand.
Lunch was real sweet and sour pork with rice. The floor nurse confirms the wound is “superficial” and the infection is mild with no complications. And while TV (and most TV-watchers) irk me, this room has free movies, which I devour. Movies I missed or did not care to view before, are for the asking. And they are streamed, so you miss nothing during the still-constant interruptions.
PPP
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The second half of today has me on comfy memory foam and plenty of attention. I don’t much question this good fortune. I met a total of seven doctors so far this visit. One was the tambourine player in a band, apparently known for the technique of playing it over his head, but my notes are not clear. He mentioned the labs won’t be back until Sunday, so get plenty of rest. I did, and used waking hours to study serial communication, a system I’ve not used in years. But that’s how idiots arrange things, each one mucking around, throwing code together 10% of the time, and spending the other 90% patching up mistakes. Serial imports a string, so change it to an array, then count the array, and change it back to another string, and away you go. Millennials have had computers all their lives, so they don’t need to know how the silly old system works.
I thought I’d found a Gunsmoke channel, but it was a truly bad documentary. This is my second day back in Florida. The room here is a much different experience, but the place is still designed down to the minimums that stupid people find suitable, including the TV shows between movies. Take the bedside trays, they are the only place to prop your water jug. But the jug is a brand that sweats condensation, which wrecks your notes. But it appears in the generations this place has been in operation, they have never seen nor heard of anyone using the tray as a desk and have no mechanism or inclination to change.
The tethered machine makes pee breaks an ordeal, as the line won’t reach to nice private bathroom and the alarm cannot be disabled. (I later learned the trick of pinching off the air valve). There were fewer interruptions, but still 15 that I stick-tallied all day. I am alert with no chest pain, except where the drain hose goes under the bandages. There is some unavoidable flexing of the area, showing that further work is to be done.
The meals are also superior up here, lunch was turkey, supper was pot roast with mashed.
ADDENDUM
For some reason, I logged this day by the hour, this is the timeline:
7:00 AM – up and noting meds have caused much site drainingI’m such a nice guy, the staff who asked why I am not using a computer to write letters get a three-minute lecture on how that technology is 30 years out of date, but if they work hard, some day they might catch up to where this old guy is on computers. Thirty years ahead of their imagined modern world. I’m reminded of how my siblings sometimes stared in wonderment how I read books, didn’t I know there was a TV right in the next room?
8:00 AM – out of the operating theater and wasted
9:00 AM – still recovering, wasted
10:00 AM – awake and in recovery observation area
11:00 AM – back to my fancy room
12:00 AM – sliced turkey with trimmings
1:00 PM – unbelievably welcome three hour nap.
4:00 PM – beef with mashed and gravy
5:00 PM – study Arduino
6:00 PM – study Arduino
7:00 PM – write letters
8:00 PM – write letters
9:00 PM – free movie
10:00 PM – more movie, my note says “Law & Order”
11:00 PM – another movie, a western called “Horizons”
