She Hasn't Sung

I was hoping to put a couple of my stories to bed with this week's story, but truthfully the fat lady has not sung. (If that offends you, it is a joke, a very old joke. Go ahead and change "lady" to "guy", if that makes you feel better. Or just get over it.) Anyway, my recent stories have not reached an end.

We can start with my recent health "scare". My battle with sepsis may or may not be over. After five days in the hospital and twelve days of outpatient antibiotic IVs back at the hospital which led to a follow-up appointment with an infectious disease doctor and a primary care doctor, I have been told our fight is not quite over. I will need fourteen more days of oral antibiotics.

With any luck, the oral antibiotic will get the fat lady singing and we can put this chapter of a crazy life to bed. The doctors are more than slightly concerned about the chances of a return, due to the fact they have not determined as to why I had sepsis to begin with.

With all I have said, I have shown progress. Before leaving the hospital, I had a semi-serious procedure to have something called a "midline". The midline was to prepare me for the outpatient IVs I was set to receive. Simply put, a midline was a tube inserted into my left arm's huge and rock-hard biceps. The tube ran exactly eleven centimeters into my armpit following a vein. I covered my eyes during this procedure because even though I consider myself as being all man, I am really wimpy looking at things like blood and stuff. ( I know that was useless information, but this is MY story. I can say what I want.)

Part of the reasoning for the follow-up appointment at the infectious disease doctor's was to remove the midline, which hopefully I would not need any longer. As it could only happen to me, the doctor's midline removing nurse had a personal situation and was not available to remove the midline. I would need to return to the hospital to remove the midline. The hospital employs midline-removing nurses.

At the hospital I was required to check in, pick up the stickers that attach to the hospital papers (I'm sure for billing), and head to the midline removal room. Once the papers were in order, the lovely, midline-removing nurse began to remove the bandages around where the midline entered my rock-hard and slightly hairy biceps.

Pay attention now. As the nurse was finished removing the bandages and what hair they were attached to she said, "I'm finished". I prepared myself emotionally for her to remove the midline. And she says, "I'm done, You just pull these out" I COULD HAVE DONE THAT. Most likely I would have passed out, but I could have done that. No technique, no pain, no nothing. Oh, she did apply pressure at the point of entry. I would have figured that out myself. (If I was awake.)

So here is where I am, if the oral antibiotics work the fat lady sings and I will never type midline again.

There is one more story for which the fat lady has not sung. Unfortunately for at least me, it looks like it could be a while before she sings. It is the story of Elaine's (and my) puppies. When I was confined to the hospital, a family decided to rescue a puppy to combat Elaine's loneliness in an empty house.

To make a long story short, we now have two puppies at our house, Gordon and Goose. Elaine was hoping for a puppy to cuddle with. We didn't exactly get that, YET. What we have now, is two puppies who don't chew on furniture or thing like that. They have us to chew on. I drove to town to buy a package of Band-Aids for my hands Puppies and blood thinners are necessary compatible.

We haven't had puppies for the last fourteen years, which means we were younger when we had the last puppies. I think I'll be fine if the stores don't run out of Band-Aids. We laugh a lot.

The puppies sleep in a crate at night. All night, every night. At 6:30 AM they let me know they are ready to go outside. I can let you guess who gets out of bed to let the puppies out. Or I can just tell you. It's Band-Aid Monner. In fairness, Elaine feeds, waters, tries to cuddle, and applies my Band-Aids (and antibiotic cream). I don't see the fat lady singing any time soon.

God Bless, Love Ya, Buy yarn

Our crazy lives!

Monner