Bull-crap-ola.

How many of you have told me when I’ve felt guilty about relying on you yet again for some necessary kindness that it’s not only not a bother to help but is even a distraction for you from your own day-to-day problems? Lots of you. Did you say that just to shut me up? Over concern for my health? Please. I’m not that fragile.

So why are you robbing me of the essential human tic of worrying about you like you do about me? Why do you deny me the right to fret over your hardships and troubles? Just because some jerk named Conventional Wisdom insists I can’t take on any more?

Did I ever tell you how much I admire Conventional Wisdom?

Now I’m the first to admit that at times my life is so damned complicated or painful or just plain insane I can’t handle any input. But it’s pretty obvious when that’s the case: a) I’m usually in a hospital, and b) I’m even more heavily medicated than usual. It’s not like you aren’t getting strong signals when not to trouble.

So if you don’t see the flashing signs, please, dear friends, stop sparing me!

Despite my somewhat frankensteinish life I am human. And just like the rest of you hominids I can solve everybody else’s problems with ease. Just ask me! Its my problems that are crazy nuts impossible to fix… just like yours are to you. I believe that’s what is called the human condition.

So share already.

Winter green?

Many other flickr photographers (from the Northern Hemisphere anyway) are posting pictures of ice storms, whiteouts, buried snow plows, and barren windswept fields. And here come the Californians showing snapshots of green.

California’s coastal winterscapes can drive the ice-bound crazy. Once again we’re seen as Violating All The Rules and Just Not Making Any Sense. But there is a logic to our seasons, even if it’s obscure. It helps to remember that the planet’s largest heat-sink (aka the Pacific Ocean) is just to our left.

So as a service for those who just don’t get all this green, here’s a short guide to our seasons.

Winter

Every hillside is green. A ridiculous, Irish/New Zealand green. So green your eyes hurt looking at it, especially when the sun shines. Green? In the land of perpetual drought?

The sky is blue unless its raining or the tail of one of the many storms pounding the Pacific Northwest lingers overhead. The fog vanished weeks ago and for a few months the coast is warmer and sunnier than inland.

Temperature: if the current air mass comes from Alaska, cold. If it comes from Hawaii, not-so-cold. Hawaiian air brings more rain than the Alaska variety; something about warmer air holding more moisture. But if the sun’s out, it doesn’t matter whose air we’re breathing. it’s glorious.

Rain: yeah, it rains. It’s rarely a bother, though our weather forecasters go apocalyptic when it happens and we all dutifully complain, even in drought years (most of them) when we shouldn’t. You do hear of the occasional flood when our rivers wake up or of houses rolling off cliffs but no one worries unless it’s our back yard.

To be fair, we do feel winter’s gloom. Short days and cold nights; some storms last for days (when that happens we say the “storm gates” are open), and we suffer mightily from the California variety of Seasonal Affective Disorder when we have to go to the gym rather than play outside. When that happens we take our antidepressants.

But then we turn on the TV or talk to a relative somewhere in the forsaken Back There and we chant our praises to the goddess for letting us live here.

Spring

The sky is a shocking cobalt blue except when it rains or the economy booms and everybody’s commuting.

Rainy days in Spring are technically called “Winter”. California seasons are guided by but not bound to the calendar; that would be limiting which of course is a no-no in the Golden State. One wet day causes little worry – we tell ourselves it’ll save us from drought. And Spring is guaranteed to be back the next day: we put it in our Constitution. During the rare times Spring rains do go on for days we are outraged and scream at Sacramento.

Plants sprout and grow frantically; they know what Summer means (see below) and they’re in a hurry. Massive clouds of pollen spew from everything. Antidepressant sales drop, antihistamine sales skyrocket.

Temperatures are all over the place. 50F highs one week, 70s the next. There are even days – usually in batches of three (that ocean influence; I’ll spare the details) – when temps hit the 90s. When this happens we are convinced we are dying.

Towards the end of Spring bits of Summer appear as the first banks of fog cascade over the hills. It is a beautiful spectacle, but it makes us forget what Summer is really like.

As the rains end, the green hills, thick with tall grasses, fade to brown – “golden” if you’ve been here longer than five years.

As foggy days become the norm, plants stop growing, cats and dogs with their Spring-thinned coats dive under blankets and we refill our antidepressant prescriptions.

Summer

Oh dreaded Summer. Unremitting fog. Gray days, icy nights. Week after week. From mid-June through August. Especially August. Always August.

Mark Twain may not have said “The coldest winter I’ve ever spent was a summer in San Francisco” but somebody did. Bone-chilling cold. Go five miles inland though and you can poach eggs on the sidewalk. Travel between the two too often and the shock to the body can be fatal.

Not a drop of rain falls within hundreds of miles.

The hills are parched. Even evergreen oaks and pines fade to gray in the long dry summer. If you water plants so they don’t die they stop growing anyway: it’s too cold and sunless. You won’t believe it till you see it, but plants can sulk.

Cats and dogs grow another winter coat. They sleep and grouch a lot, as do humans (grouch and sleep that is; not sure about our coats).

Every August I check the temperature in Nome, Alaska. It’s always warmer than San Francisco.

Sales of antidepressants are through the roof.

San Franciscans love our fog, but there’s no getting around it: August Summer here sucks.

Autumn

“Spectacular” doesn’t begin to describe this most beautiful of Coastal California seasons – if you don’t count the fires. (Though they can be pretty spectacular too.)

Again, shock-blue skies. The frostbitten tourists leave (too much time spent in T-shirts and shorts during August) and the really fine weather arrives.

Day temperatures are high 60s to 70s. Sunsets are great, the light breathtaking and the fog remains respectfully off shore.

Plants – if watered during the sulky months – burst with joy and go through a second frantic growing and flowering.

Dogs frolic in the parks, cats lounge in the sun and we humans flush our antidepressants down the toilet and resume the jogging and bicycling we started in Spring. We are happy.

Unless our house is on one of those brown, tinderbox hills, then we spend most of the season obsessing about fire.

Sometime in October it rains. Many moan, not wanting to give up the Awesome Season, but a few are relieved. They’re worn out from performing rain dances to stave off the water rationing our whiny weather people and apocalyptic politicians have been threatening all year.

These first rains make our roads slippery but they also wash grime and dust off buildings and plants which make everything look better. The fire season ends.

And in Autumn the most amazing thing happens, the very definition of seasons in Coastal California: within days of the very first rain the dead brown grasses on the hills morph into those impossible fluorescent greens. If the rain continues the grasses thicken and stay green well into April.

And the seasons cycle.

–––

Some say California has only two seasons: a green one called Winter and a brown (golden!) one called Summer. Those are the most easily recognized but they’re the least subtle – or satisfying.

If you just look at the world in binary you miss out on the amazing shades that come between 0 and 1. Here, those shades are brown-to-green and green-to-brown, also known as our really great seasons, Autumn and Spring.

Binary thinking also might cause you to accidentally visit in August, when you’d really be more comfortable in Northern Alaska.

What better way to start a new year than finding what’s true?

Unfortunately, this one truth just led to another, then another and another,
finally to the end of the building.

All true, but no answers.

Maybe next year.

I stuffed the thing in my pocket and went in.

After rolling up my sleeve and getting the poke, I dug out the crumpled paper, went up to one of the anti-vaccine guys and tapped him on the shoulder. He turned around. I silently held out the crumpled paper and stood there. Staring at me quizzically, he finally extended his hand. I dropped the crumpled yellow sheet into his hand and walked away. He looked at me and at the paper, confused.

You can’t argue with these folks. But you don’t have to carry their garbage.

This happened yesterday. The only info you need to make sense of it are a) I was in the hospital for a few days about two weeks ago due to high fevers following an endoscopy (a look down the throat), and b) when they were looking, the docs saw something that concerned them,  declaring it Must Be Removed. I agreed. Now if only I could get it done…

Rather than polish it up and risk losing the, er, spontaneity, here’s the eMail I wrote to my friends.

Went to ENT (Ear/Nose/Throat) clinic today to get the thingy in my throat removed. The following happened:

1. Doc saw me, said situation is exactly what the docs in the hospital had said two weeks ago: growth on pharynx, probably papilloma, needs to come out. Said he’ll do an excisional (right word?) biopsy removing the whole thing (unless it extends into my brain or some other inconvenient spot). I said hooray for that!

2. Doc then repeated exam done in hospital, sticking crazy snake-camera down nostril into throat. Confirmed alien sighting and repeated all he said in #1.

3. Doc then read me my “rights” i.e., told me the risks of removal: broken teeth, breathing cessation, gagging, sore throat.. all the little things that can go wrong.

4. I said “Fine! Lets get this done!” (After you’ve had a transplant little stuff holds no terror).

5. Doc, shocked at my assumption, said: “Oh, no! We don’t do that kind of thing here!” (“Here” being the “UCSF Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery” clinic. You think?) “You have to go to Parnassus (different campus, one with hospital) for that.”

6. Me: “You mean… Moffitt?”

7. Him: “Yes. It’s a hospital procedure. Surgery, actually. You’ll need anesthesia, a room, a…” he keeps speaking but…

8. …My mind stopped processing. When it recovered…

9. Me: “You mean, in Moffitt Hospital, with an IV hookup like I had two weeks ago when I was in there… and when a whole team from your department first found this thing and shared lots of looks of it through your nose camera… the same hospital where my attending doc wanted your department to take care of it right then before I went home… and where I was quite willing to stay an extra day in order to get it done… where…”

10. Doc, with slightly apologetic / mostly I’m-in-control-here look on his face: “Yes! We’ll call to schedule sometime in the next two weeks.”

11. Me: another mental blackout.

No, I did not take him out. Nor did I make a (huge) fuss. My rep at UCSF Medical Center is no worse (or better) than it was before I got there. But JEEZ LOUISE!

I also had my blood drawn at the lab, regularly scheduled. The Neanderthal in residence  gave me a hematoma (blood blister) the size of a grape.

All in all a great afternoon.

To belabor the obvious: besides being very inconvenient (and uncomfortable: the growth is irritating), think of the money wasted: another day, maybe another night in the hospital. A totally unnecessary visit to the ENT clinic to confirm what they already confirmed. Billing for same. Hospital resources wasted. My time wasted. Docs time wasted.

Usually these stories point the wagging finger of shame and blame at the insurance company/HMO. Not this time.

UCSF Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery Department, come on down! This is your FAIL!

People leave all sorts of stuff on city streets.
Sometimes you just can’t resist a sit.

Go, HealthNet!

Go, America!

Ok, I’m getting sentimental here. But I’ve opened yet another door of the Medical Winchester Mystery House – an autoimmune condition this time – and I’m in need a bit of sentiment. I’ll write the gloomy stuff later, but right now…

I’ve posted (and posted and posted) about Otto, my dog. I’ve said less about my ex-cat (ex-mine that is, not ex-feline), Orion. Orion now lives with a dear friend, partially due to my medical adventures, but he’s still a frequent visitor.

More important, Orion and Otto are… well, it’s kind of hard to say what they are to each other: lets just call it a really really strong bond. Orion was here first, and when Otto arrived as a 7 week old puppy they fast became inseprable. Breaking them up was one of the sadder things I’ve ever had to do. It’s been sadder yet for the two critters.

During Orion’s last couple of stay-overs, I started taking notes on life with a cat and dog. Anyone who lives with both knows that the usual cat rules and dog rules – and your life – change erratically.

So here are the notes. And please: send along your own observations. No doubt we can come up with a book.

Life with a cat and a dog, in no particular order…

• It is difficult to do yoga or any other floor exercises if a dog is around. It is beyond impossible if a cat AND a dog are around.

• Cats are fast, but they’re not nearly fast enough to stop a dog from stealing from their food bowl.

• 1 cat + 1 dog = 4(x) mischief.

• A cat can wake up a sleeping dog – and a sleeping human – simply by walking silently through a room.

Corollary 1: A cat can suddenly appear right before your eyes – if it wants to.
Corollary 2: A cat can disappear right before your eyes. Same “if”.
Corollary 3: A cat can hide from a dog too, but it takes more effort than fooling the human (that canine nose).

• A cat will con a dog into doing things that the cat knows the dog isn’t supposed to do.

Corollary 1: The cat will walk away.
Corollary 2: The dog will play on the human’s sympathy and blame it on the cat.

• Cats don’t do rules.

Corollary 1: Dogs happily do rules, but not if a cat’s around.

• When the two of them decide that you’re to be “it”, you’re hosed. You might as well stop what you’re doing and join in the fun.

Corollary 1: Dogs and cats agree on one thing: they positively hate having their humans sit in front of a computer. When they decide to work together to remedy the situation, give up.

• If a cat likes (tolerates?) a dog, he’ll put up with a lot of canine roughhousing. Up to a point. Then the cat either a) runs off, or b) goes straight for the dog’s jugular. Orion did this to Otto to quiet him down one recent night. The night before, I saw a lion kill a donkey (on TV!) using the exact same technique.

Corollary 1: The dog instantly calms down when teeth are lodged in his throat.

Corollary 2: This technique is scarier to humans than to the dog.

• Life with a dog and a cat is very challenging because together they’re way smarter than we are. And a whole lot more fun.

Otto is REALLY good at removing squeakers from toys. If he doesn’t do it the moment he gets his little paws on a new one, it will happen. It’s just a matter of when.

Last night a friend came by for dinner. As it was raining all day and he’d been stuck indoors with his dog, Jake, he brought Jake along for some R&R with Otto.

After much trading of toys, guarding of bones, and competing for chewies Otto normally ignores, my friend and Jake left. They left behind a small red squeaking ball. Otto of course found it.

This afternoon Otto ran about the house squeaking it constantly. This evening, when I went to throw it for him, the squeaker no longer squeaked. It just rattles around inside the ball, a dead piece of plastic. 

Somehow Otto managed to disable the squeaker without the usual shredding and body parts. A sort of laparoscopic squeakectomy. I’ve called him the surgeon before when he’s dismembered some stuffed critter; I guess he’s upgraded his skills.
365-48

ANYway, apropos of nothing…

I notice our new president is left handed. So was the one we just sent back to Texas with his tail between his legs. Now, based on personal observation – I observe lefties a lot – I’ve concluded that we lefties are either:
                       a) smarter than, or
                       b) stupider than
average. We lefties don’t tend to do in-between. I think there’s even research to prove the idea, but I’m not going to take time looking it up. Sure seems like Obama and Bush prove the point though.

Me? Where am I on the either-or scale? Wellllll… I figure I’m both smarter AND stupider than average. Depends on when and how you measure. (See title of blog above.)

Happy evening, people. Even you righties.