I have to take my mother to a hospital in Little Rock for some tests Monday. For those of you that don’t know, (and that’s all but 2 people) my mother had had a series of arterial bypasses and stints in both legs over the last three years or so. Lately it’s been nearly every three months. A few weeks ago, the doctor went in behind left knee to open up a blockage and she spent one night in the hospital. Things were looking up since she usually spends at least one day in ICU afterward and normally three to four days total in the hospital. Not even two weeks after this last procedure, she had either no feeling whatsoever in her left foot, or nothing but pain. You can pinch a spot and it will stay pink so she is getting blood flow there, but her surgeon is has no more ideas and is sending her to another doctor.
She is scared because a man she worked with went to the same doctor and came home without his foot and eventually lost his leg. I keep telling her that it was his situation, not her’s, and just because he lost his doesn’t mean she will lose her foot. How do I allay her fears but yet prepare her for something that is a possibility? I’ve told her over and over that lets just wait and see what the doctor says and that we can face anything that gets thrown our way. But honestly, I don’t think she can survive losing her foot. She has spent years staying in and staying away from situations that are difficult to tackle. After each surgery, especially when they started gaining in frequecy and difficulty, she became more and more depressed, especially when she wasn’t able to leave the house. She loses her foot, she’ll be too embarrased to leave the house. I am so scared that she will whither away and die.
I used to have an innate talent for saying the right things or at the very least give the heavy a little lightening but my words now sound hollow, even to my own ears. I am truly at a loss and probably for the first time in my life, truly scared of losing a parent.
Yep, that about says it. I’m splitting for a couple of days. Heading to the town that twang built. Little Kurdistan. Guitar Town. Music City, USA. Cashville. Nashvegas. Or simply Nashville, Tennessee, population a bunch. Got a lot of stuff brewing in my head and there is nothing like sitting in a cheap motel alone, just you and 40 fuzzy channels, to stir one’s soul. The first day I plan on exerting only enough energy to consume a plate of wings from Hooter’s and erasing the imprudentattempt at growing a beard from my face.
Friday I am planning to head over to the Mercy Lounge to catch Jason Isbell’s show. If you don’t know who he is (and shame on you), he is a former member of The Drive-By Truckers. He just released a solo album and it is some of the best whiskey-soaked Southern music I’ve ever heard (though I haven’t exactly heard a lot of “whiskey-soaked” anything). If you like DBT, you’ll like Isbell. I saw him in Memphis a couple of months back and he rocked. So come on out and feel free to show me some Music City hospitality by buying me a few Capt and Cokes (well one, I have to drive). I’ll be the alone guy, hanging out in a corner. If they have a corner.
For those of you that haven’t watched the news, read a newspaper, or have been too caught up in hearing Fergie on the radio singing about missing her blanket every hour on the hour to find a forecast, word is there’s a storm abrewin’. Check below :
That there is a hurricane. His name is Dean. Depending on where you live, he may be coming to a coastline near you. Next is the path that Dean is supposed to be hopping along:
Now I say supposed because them hurricanes are a finicky bunch. Just when you think you got where they are heading pegged, they take a turn. Kind of like “Been there, done that. Let’s go over here.” Which brings us to our next nifty state-of-the-art picture:
That area that I circled in a most professional fashion (I got mad photoshop skills, yo.) is where the experts believe Deano could possibly make landfall. That’s after it makes initial landfall on the Yucatan Peninsula, but that’s in Mexico so we don’t care. They are all over here anyway. But I digress . . . .
So basically, if you live anywhere from here———————————————————–to————————————–here, I got something to tell you. There’s a hurricane coming. And there is a reason why hurri is the first part of the word hurricane. All that wind and water will come at you in a hurry. It will knock your shit down in a hurry. So Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, etc, you’ve been warned. You need to pack up and hurry the fuck out of town. Just in case you are unsure of your exact geographical location and whether or not it’s in Dean’s path, there will be helpful men and women wearing rain slickers and holding cameras and microphones to help inform you of the potential possibility that it might land in your area, maybe. That’ll give you time to run down and pick out which 50″ plasma-screen television you want, get a jump start on the looting. Because being able to see all the disaster in 50-inches of Hi-Def glory definitely makes the lack of a roof, food, clean water, and electricity a bit easier to take.
I watched Superbad tonight. Fucking hilarious. Definitely a must-see, if you like the “last year of high school/must get laid” kind of movies. Or even if you don’t. No Hottness for this one. All the girls appeared to be underage (though “legal” in real life) and while I may be a perv, I’m not that kind of perv.
Uh huh. Take this and this, add a small dash of this, mix it all up, and you get suck. And yes, you know what comes next. She’s still kind of hot, especially when sleeping in a white t-shirt and pajama pants sans any underwear.
Over the last year or so, many of my weekend nights as a free-swinging bachelor have been spent with women of a certain ilk. During some of these wild nights, it’s been asked if I have gotten any photographic evidence, which, on one occasion, I was fortunate enough to capture the moment in a picture. I have just finished spending a Friday night with a female who is crazier and more spontaneous than those two of Nipplecest fame combined. And not only did I get photographic proof of her depravity, I also got video. Careful if scrolling down to take a look, it could possibly be NSFW . . . .
First, the craziness as still life . . . .
She then tried to disentangle what she had done . . . .
Then she just gives her self over totally and loses all self control . . . .
Depending on your point of view, she’s either a complete upgrade or downgrade in comparison to my typical Friday night retinue. I like to think they make up one kick ass dichotomy.
That little pixie was My Toes and she got a little bossy. The whole thing started when she told me my hair was a mess after I had removed my cap. That brought back great memories of when she was 3-4 years-old and used to sigh heavily and roll her eyes if my hair wasn’t to her liking and then spend many minutes artfully brushing it straight down, giving me a little space in my bangs to peek out. Since three years had passed, I guess she found that style outmoded and decided to catch me up to the times by putting my hair up. That’s what I get for buying her that Bratz PlayStation game. After removing her handiwork and returning my hair close to its former unkempt state, she told me I was no longer allowed to wear a hat. She asked me why I wore it in the first place and was a bit incredulous when I told her that I wore it because I didn’t have time to fix my hair since I was in a hurry to come see her and her brother. She decided to overlook her skepticism and told me that I could wear a hat only when I was in a hurry to come see them, but not at any other time would it be allowed. She’s such a cute little tyrant.
Went to see Queens of the Stone Age with a couple of friends in Memphis last night. The show has been over for roughly 7 hours and my ears are still ringing like a fire alarm. Does that mean I am getting old or is it too many years of cranking up that “Hard Metal” music I wasn’t supposed to be listening to? Either way, the show fucking rocked. Finally got to see them in a small venue and it definitely made the difference. Who knew you could go to a QOTSA show and a Huey Lewis song would break out? Rocked. I tried to take some pictures but my digital camera out-smarted me. I only got one viewable picture, which I took by accident while trying to futz with it.
I don’t even know whose shoe that is. Guess my dreams of being the next Neil Zlozower are over.
Had a shit night at work. Hand started hurting, it was hot as hell, I actually had to work while at work, and everybody decided to pick today to be an ass. I am too much of a pleasant, dedicated employee so it surely had to be THEIR fault, not mine. Decided to medicate at least some of the bs away. It’s a wonder how much more tolerable work can be when chased with a couple of 7.5 milligram oxycodone (taken a prescribed 4 hours apart, I’m not a junkie).
Stopped in to see the head of Human Resources on my way out this morning to tell him about my hand since it started hurting more during my shift. Normally I would have spoke to the Safety Coordinator for this kind of situation but he is on a leave-of-absence fighting a life threatening disease, whic means he’s got way more important stuff to worry about and that I had to deal with the head idiot. I told the asshole what happened, that I had told my immediate supervisor minutes after it happened, and that I just wanted to give him a “heads up” in case it turns into something worse. I assured him I wasn’t trying to make it a big deal, that I had four days off so it most likely would be fine by the time I got back, and that it was basically my fault. His response was “Well isn’t there a safer way to do that?” Well, obviously, or there would be no need for the conversation we were having. “Well you need to inform your supervisor.” As I just told him, I had already done that. When it happened. Three days ago. “Well, I am the one you need to talk to if you need to see a Doctor.” I know, which is why I am having this mind-numbing discourse instead of devouring a couple of Croissan’wiches and mega-miligrams of ibuprofen so I can put me and this shit day to bed. Just think, he had to attend many college classes and I had to skip many college classes just so we could have this conversation.
I really don’t think it will be a big deal. It’s still a little swollen but everything moves as it’s supposed to. I just wanted to be sure to dot and cross all the appropriate letters. I should have plenty of time to heal since I am taking off a day early to go see Queens of the Stone Age with Gann take care of a sick relative. My gimp-ness even gives me a valid reason to defer any moshing. As if me being too old and too wussy (and it’s just plain stupid) isn’t good enough.
. . . that if you took a roll of paper weighing more than 2900 pounds with a diameter of roughly 50 inches, spun it at a speed of 1260 feet/minute, then placed your hand in the less than one inch space between it and the apparatus that is making it spin, that shit would hurt? Guess I should have been a bit more attentive when we covered this in high school science.
I am fortunate that I didn’t break it or worse. My arm was also pinned under a long metal bar which prevented me from pulling it out. Fortunately I had the sense to take a step down after only a couple seconds and got hand and arm free. Which is ironic because if I’d had “sense” a few seconds earlier, I would’ve found way to some way a little safer to accomplish what I was trying to accomplish.
These are after a little more than 24 hours of “healing.” It’s a kind of hard to tell due to fuzziness but it’s a little swollen and I have an industrial version of carpet burn.
(Note to self: Please clean fingernails and find a damn tan before posting pictures of self on internet.)
