urbandruid

I promised an update, didn't I? Yeah, I thought I had. It's taken me a few days to get to it- and I actually have been meaning to do it for a while.

I guess the easiest thing to do is to group the updates by subject, so, in no particular order-

State of the Kidneys: I had blood work. I had a CT scan. I had other tests, and the less said about those, the better. What did my doctor learn from all this, you ask? #1, by the time the doc decided to do the CT, the stones were gone. The only thing he saw on the scan were really good pictures of my poor inflamed bruised-up kidneys. He thinks I had a couple stones and they passed. No, really? #2, as to the blood work and other tests- half the reason he wanted to do these was to get baseline readings. But at least according to his nurse who called me with the results, all of my results are 'normal', nothing jumped out at them, I'm probably 'just one of those people', etc. *headdesk*

State of the School: I still think they should issue hunting licenses for freshmen. We have way too freaking many as usual. It's about the middle of the semester, and my teachers are piling on the work. Especially my Spanish prof, who is really easygoing but who I think my classmates have managed to royally piss off. Our attendance has more weight on our grades than our exams do, and you get extra credit points at the end of the semester if you have perfect attendance. Which is great, except it means everybody comes to class, even the people who don't want to be there. And all they do is talk. In English. When we're supposed to be working in pairs or groups or even when the prof is lecturing, these idiots are chattering away, texting, answering their cell phones... Today he took roll halfway through class, gave us a ten minute break, and told us we could all leave if we wanted to. He says next time he's just going to tell them to leave. Three people left, and you'd be amazed how much quieter it got after they did. Here's hoping they don't come back.

State of the Laptop Hateway: This stupid fucking computer, I swear to Gods... it's been trying to die for a while now, you all remember the keyboard adventures (I still have keys that don't work, or work very rarely) but now it seems to be spreading to other components. A couple weeks ago, Anna here decided she didn't have a CD drive anymore. And has been unable to recognize that the thing's still there, ever since. Then one day last week my mouse refused to work. It came back, but I'm seeing a sign of the times here. Mom was talking about replacing the computer for Christmas anyway; now we're crossing our fingers the thing lasts that long. Also wondering how much fun it's not going to be to try and get all my stuff off of here without a damn CD drive. (I hadn't, of course, updated my backup CDs in a month or so, as of the CD drive crash.)

State of the Big, Time-Consuming Project: Goes a little like this. School's doing a semester in London in the spring. It's not cheap, but it looks fantastic. My geology prof, who I really like, is one of the teachers who's going, and she clued me into a major national scholarship for students who want to study abroad. I had to write an essay, plan a project to promote studying abroad and the scholarship, send transcripts, and fill out a ton of forms, which is what I spent half of September and the first part of October doing. I'll know if I get the scholarship in mid December, and at this point I've just accepted that I'm going to be stressed beyond belief until then. The scholarship is up to $5,000. Even with the financial aid I discovered I qualify for this semester (*thwap* to the guidance counselor for sucking at her job as usual) if I don't get the scholarship, I can't go. And I really, really, really want to go. I think I have a fair shot, because the scholarship people like junior college students, students who've never studied abroad before, and, yes, folks, disabled students. Check, check, and check. It's gonna be great if it all comes together, but in the meantime it's also been this huge mess of stuff and bureaucracy and red tape and nonsense, and it's driving me insane.

State of the Fam: You guys know I love my family. I do. But with everything that's going on lately my bullshit threshold is practically nonexistant, and hanging around my relations isn't exactly stress free. Sometimes we think Grandpa is doing better than Grandma, which, considering, is really freaking scary. They both tripped and fell last week; Grandpa bruised his knee, Grandma gave herself a hell of a black eye with her glasses. They did at least get checked out by the infirmary people at their nursing home, but still, Mom and I were facepalming when we found out about this. (And note that we found out when we met them for dinner one night last week, when Grandma took off her sunglasses.

State of the Parent: Mom gets her own section, because she's saner than the rest of them right now. Of course, it turns out that her foot still hasn't healed from the fall she took months ago, so now she's in physical therapy for the foot. Only the doc who's sending her for the PT just put her on medicated patches, and while she's wearing those they can't do half the treatments at PT that have really been helping. Mom's been getting that kinesio tape like that US women's beach volleyball player wore at the Olympics, and she says it's really been helping. We're pretty sure all the drug patches are doing is masking the pain, and I know there've been a couple days when Mom has pushed herself too far, because it didn't start hurting when it should have. Mom's considering smacking the doc upside the head. If she doesn't, I may do it for her, 'cause I've about had it.

State of the Druid: Actually, between one thing and another I've about had it in general. It's election day, to which I say, "Thank Gods, now you can ALL shut the fuck up." We vote absentee, I sent in my ballot last week, and I really do not care at this point. California has this charming measure on the ballot, Proposition 8- asshole conservatives want to amend the friggin' state constitution to say that 'marriage is only between a man and a woman', blah, blah, blah. Bigots and homophobes r'us, especally around here. They've been demonstrating for the damn thing in major intersections, the mall, and around the Barns and Noble. I gave them the thumbs-down, each individual idiot, as we drove past on Saturday. I swear they were so pissed they were turning purple. One guy waved his giant American flag at me, like the finger of admonishment. To which I say, it was fucking raining, asshole- flag's supposed to be put away. Honestly I felt like I was very restrained- I didn't give them the finger, or roll down the window and scream at them, which is what I really wanted to do.

I really wanted to dare them to take their little hatefest on the road to San Francisco, and see how it played out there. I'll spare you guys the rest of the rant, but those people really made my blood boil.

In better election news, our illustriously moronic mayor, Alan Autry (yes, that Alan Autry, whom you might remember as "Bubba" from In the Heat of the Night...) decided not to run again, so at least we're rid of that embarrasing idiot. Who always seeemed to be under the impression he ran the county and the state, instead of just the city. IIRC, he wanted to pass a city ordinance about illegal immigration. We're in the middle of California, not the Mexican border. He spent most of his time at Starbuck's and the gym, anyway. I may miss having him to kick around, but... I think he'll be like George W. Bush. We can always still make fun of him.

*sigh* Moving on. I'm so stressed I'm hardly sleeping, or at least I don't feel like I am, and I need a vacation. Oh, and if I could just hear a "yes" from the scholarship people...

Oh yeah, I knew I forgot one.
State of the Ants: Because it's only just now starting to cool down, the little fuckers have been making incursions through most of September, and we found a few in the kitchen last week. I foolshly put on some clothes they'd had access to, and ended up with a TON of bites, 10+, which is not good when you're as allergic as I am. It rained a lot over the weekend and yesterday, and I hope they all drowned.

...I think that was everything. *hugs*

Ugh...

Okay, to make a long story short:

1.) Have kidney stones. Plural. Not sure I want to know how many exactly, but it's been pretty miserable.

2.) It's too fucking hot, making the kidney stone thing even worse.

3.) I have an appointment with a specialist on the 10th, which I'm really nervous about.

4.) DSL is down, because apparently the phone company thought this would be a good time to mess with me. Yeah. I thought it was just the modem, but the ISP guys say it's the line, and I'm inclined to believe them.

5.) Mom goes to see a podietrist today for this foot thing she's got. We think we know what it is, and it could be kind of bad.

So, yeah. That's where we are. Somebody hug me?

Ugh... So today's the first day of class. Oh, joy.

It's going to be 94 F, which is a downgrade from the 97 they were predicting last night.

This still sucks.

It sucks even more because I spent the last 2 weeks fighting a kidney infection, the last 10 days or so on major antibiotics, and I still feel like total crap and am hurting in places I shouldn't. I'm going back to the doc on Thursday, unrelated mole removal, and I'm debating if the kidney stuff can wait till then.

Since I spent all weekend popping the painkillers said doc gave me for the infection, and need to take more after I eat breakfast, I'm thinking it probably can't wait. Will call her after I get home from (whee, yay) class.

I don't have class till noon, which'll give me time to fight the bookstore lines and go get my new student ID/library card, if I decide I'm up for that today. And I only have to buy one book, for Oceanography, since we use the same Spanish book for Spanish II as we did for I (Thank you, Professor M!)

I keep trying to console myself about the back to school thing with all the good stuff about school- access to our library, whose nonfic section rocks; no freshmen in my classes; two profs who are really good and whom I like; and, well, I was getting a little bored anyway.

On the flip side we have: State U cut their fall enrollment again, and we know what that means- Freshman Menace, redux; the heat; the fact I feel like crap.

Oh yeah, and I'm exhausted, because I've been staying up later than I should have to watch the Olympic finals in stuff like gymnastics and swimming. (No love to NBC for intentionally putting the best stuff on dead last. And I'm still pissed about equestrian being on freaking Oxygen, too. Assholes...) Network gets nasty letters when I have time to write them.

It's gonna be a long day.

Did I mention I don't really want to do this right now? If it just wasn't so hot... (Okay, I'd still be annoyed and tired, but I wouldn't be as worried about my kidneys.)

Anyway, I apologize for being so out of touch for so long. Kidney infections really suck, and I think I've had this one for close to a month. Yeah, I know, I'm an idiot. I was going to call the doc ages ago, before I thought I passed that stone, but things calmed down, so I figured I was clear of whatever it was. Then it started up again week before last, and I did call her.

And now need to call her again. Bleh.

Kidney infections suck.

I'll tell you this, though- those freshmen had better stay the hell out of my way, or I may not be entirely responsible for beating their ankles with my cane, not to mention all the swearing.

Well, learning new vocab words is all part of the college experience, yeah? ;)

It's hot. This is gonna sound stupid, considering I basically live in the desert and should be used to this crap by now, but I hate that it's hot.

I'm really tired, probably a combination of the heat, the fact that it's too hot to eat much of anything, and the hours I've stayed up waiting for scans to finish in the ongoing attempt to fix my computer. Which brings us to...

State of the Virus: Insidious little fucker. My tech guru at http://forums.spybot.info has had me run various malware scan and removal programs, and a couple things to log all the junk my system is running, and I swear every one of them finds bits and pieces of crap that shouldn't be there. Bit by bit I think we're getting rid of this thing. I've only been getting help for the past two days or so- there are a hell of a lot of people with this virus- and already Anna's running closer to normal. Before things were so slow that it was almost like having dialup again.

The only thing is, most of these scans they're having me run are full system ones, and since I have a lot of crap on my computer, it takes them an avarage of 2 hours to run. Longer if I do a bunch of other stuff. Upshot being, I'm mostly leaving the computer alone even though it's running a hell of a lot better. /State of the Virus

On a side note I have to say, if you've got virus-y computer problems and are in over your head in trying to get rid of them, the http://forums.spybot.info people are awesome. If I ever get nuked with anything else (let's hope not) I'll go back there in a heartbeat.

Moving on. Too much working at the computer and sleeping, not enough fluid intake- my kidneys are starting to get pissed at me again. I really really don't need this, you know? So now I'm drinking so much water and diet Sprite that I swear I'm drowning in it. Hope I'm drowning the kidneys, anyway.

Let's see, what else is going on? The grandparents are out of town, and they've got neighbors watching their place and watering plants, so we're cool there. Going to call my aunt & uncle and see if they want to go catch "The Dark Knight" with us. Otherwise Mom and I will probably go check it out on our own this weekend. With my aunt and uncle or not, we'll do our usual "we ain't paying your snack nazis a dime" thing, aka buying some candy at Target, stuffing the boxes with tissues so the candy doesn't rattle, and smuggling said candy into the theater in our purses. We usually buy bottled water, only because we haven't figured out a way to smuggle that in yet. :)

I've seen people smuggle potlucks in, though- usually during big premere weekends when the theater employees are more concerned with keeping people from blocking the fire doors and other crowd control stuff, 'cause if the fire marshall shuts them down they make no money.

I also saw some people bring McDonald's into a movie, including ice cream. How they got away with that I couldn't tell you- you could smell french fries ten rows away.

Anyway, I'm off for a nap. I think my computer's recovered enough that I could risk Trilly tonight- if, you know, I'm not Typhoid Mary, and anyone wants to risk talking to me. :)

I don't think I've ever been this miserable for this length of time before. I think I've spent most of the past week on the phone to my doctor's office, mostly leaving messages for the chick who does their referrals. I finally got ahold of her yesterday. She seems to be having trouble getting me an appointment with a kidney specialist. I looked in the phone book, and there are only nine of them in town. I'm worried about this. I already had to get them to give me a refill on my pain meds because I ran out while waiting for them to get me in to see someone...

I hate my life sometimes.

So, in between everything else I have to do today, I've got to call her back again, find out how it's going, and get ahold of my NP. Since at this rate I have no clue how long I'm going to have to just hang out and wait, I really need to know what to watch for, what kind of things should send me running straight to ER.

I went to class on Tuesday, and was pretty miserable. It's very hard to concentrate when you're in pain and/or on pain meds. I want to not go today, especally since spring break is next week, but I can't stay home today. We have a test. I've tried to study, but I'm not sure how well I'm going to do. I'm trying not to worry about it too much. I have enough to worry about, not that this ever stopped me before.

The only good news I have right now is that the childrens' hospital overbooked their volunteers, and so my group didn't get to go last Saturday, which means I didn't miss our going. It's probably the only good thing that's happened lately, now that I think of it.

I'm not looking forward to the rest of today at all. I'd love to go back to bed. *sigh*

I've spent most of this week feeling absolutly terrible. I'm fighting off a kidney stone, and I think it's making everything else go a little nuts.

So in case anyone's wondering where I've been, the answer is pretty much "curled up on the couch moaning and watching Law & Order or CSI re-runs because I feel too crappy to do anything else".

Just about the time I think maybe I should go to the doctor, I wake up feeling a bit better, and decide to hang in there and see what happens.

I have a ton of catching up to do, naturally, so we'll see how far I get on all that stuff before I start feeling like crap again.

I have this doctor's appointment this afternoon. I'm really nervous. I always hate going to the doctor- too many visits in the past, I think- but not for some reason it seems worse. I don't want to end up in the hospital again, and logically I know that's probably not going to happen. I'm not nearly as bad as I was last month. Just enough pain for me to know it's there, none of the other stuff- the absence of nausia and vomiting is a real plus, might I add.

So really I'm much better than I was last time around. I am. I just don't want this to be happening at all, and I think that's the basic problem here. I don't want anything to be wrong with me at all. And I'm not looking forward to all the tests. I'm so tired of all this medical stuff; it seems like it's always something, every time I turn around.

I feel so much better today that it's really tempting to call and cancel the appointment, skip the chat with the NP and the tests and all of that crap. But I don't dare, because it'll just happen again, and probably worse for being ignored.

And maybe it won't be as bad as I think it will be. Maybe I won't have to have too many tests, maybe they won't be awfull, maybe the NP will have some good ideas on how to keep this from happening again.

My mother keeps reminding me I'm going in for help. Which is true, but, you know, she gets to sit in the waiting room with a magazine. I am, as always, the one who gets to walk through the doors and hear them close behind me, and deal with my own pain and my own little medical nightmares.

Just for once I wish they could be someone else's problem. (Which is a really horrid thing for me to say, but I think it's true anyway.)

And in the meantime I'm getting almost nothing done. I have all this stuff I need to do, some of it in the to-do list of doom, some of it in my notebooks, and a great deal of it in my head- and I've done hardly any of it. Part of it's been worry over the health stuff, but I've got to admit a lot of it is just pure laziness.