Poke Berry Field

We went for a walk in Hitchcock Woods this morning to take advantage of the slightly cooler temperatures. We did a little 2.9 mile loop* and we passed through a spot I’m not so sure we have been before, Poke Berry Field. If we have visited this spot before it was so long ago that I have forgotten it. The berries must be about to get ripe as someone has parked a purpose built Poke Berry Trailer here in the field in preparation for their harvesting.

*I say little, because when we got home my wife felt she hadn’t walked enough, so she went back out and did her 3 mile loop on the dirt roads of the horse district…

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Tran?si?tions since 10/24/08: 1143

Settling In

I seem to have settled in at an every other pace. Well, that means tonight I should post something and I pretty much have zero to write about, so it’s junk time.

The FRS are playing pretty good baseball right now and have managed to get a couple games above .500. They are still in last place in their division, but everybody is all bunched up and they are only 2-1/2 games behind the leaders. This is all pending the outcome of tonight’s game and things are not looking too good.

I’m watching the game on MLB.tv using the Roku box. Every day so far they have had a Free Game of the Day and this is the first time the Sox have been on for free. I think it helped that there are only three big league games in total going tonight and the FRS game is the only one in the eastern time zone. As strange as this seems the worse part of watching the game on MLB.tv is the lack of commercials. The deafening silence for 2 – 3 minutes while staring at the logo is UN-nerving.

The CNC machine I sort of learned to program and then just recently sort of learned how to operate is in the building. Our maintenance is hooking up power to it and when they are done the fine folks of Ellison Technologies will come in and put it in complete working order. Then the fun really begins.

My taste buds are still slightly whack after 5 days of being off the antibiotics….

Unintentional Phallic Symbol?

Or is it just me?

I love some Diet Dr. Pepper and I have graduated from my one 12oz. can a day to one 16.9 ouncer. In between I would buy an occasional 20oz bottle out of the machine, but sometimes I wouldn’t even finish the whole bottle. At a $1.25 it was kind of a waste.

Today after I had poured the last of the half litter bottle into my mug and I placed the bottle back down on my desk it just looked a little “dirty.” Maybe because the diameter of the bottle is smaller than the 20oz and then again slightly taller as well, giving it a decidedly male profile.

P.S. The 24oz bottles are even worse.

House Hunters Tatooine

We have a guideline here Casa de Bogardus that if control of the remote is in possession of one individual and that individual leaves the room, after a period of time the person not in actual custody of the remote may take temporary possession of the device until the original possessor returns. Such temporary possession becomes permanent after a slightly longer undetermined period of time.

Donna was watching House Hunters Getaways* when she left the room for a few minutes. I was listening to the FRS getting their butts kicked by Tampa Bay on the laptop and after a few more pitches leaned over and grabbed the remote to do a little surfing for background imagery. About 10 channels later I found two droids (not phones) walking across a desert.

*Is it just me or does this show now have more permutations than CSI or Kardashian sisters?

The PCP told me this morning that my blood work was peachy keen and the hospital hasn’t called to tell me one of my blood cultures turned into a pulsing, glowing broccoli shaped thing, so I must be fine. I’m going to blame my slight puckishness on the two antibiotics I’m taking, because I know for sure that they are responsible for making my mouth taste like I’m sucking on nickels.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Tran?si?tions since 10/24/08: 1143

Patient Zero of the Zombie Apocalypse

Yesterday I had a colonoscopy, and I got cheated and then I got more than I bargained for.

The last time I had one of these puppies, the 4 to 5 hours of trippy liquidness post procedure almost made up for the crappy (figuratively and literally) preparation. But this time they had a new way of putting you to sleep, it is very fast acting and very fast in clearing your system. When I woke up in the recovery room I was as alert as I was when sitting in the waiting room beforehand. What a let down.

We went home I had lunch and then I got in bed to catch a nap. I never did get any shut-eye, about 45 minutes of tossing and turning I started to get cold, real cold. I started shaking and couldn’t get warm. Donna took my temperature and it read 96.9. She filled the bathtub with hot water, no cold used at all, and I bet that the water temperature was about 110°. It took almost 3/4 of an hour in the tub before the shaking stopped. I stayed in the water about fifteen minutes more and when I exited the bath I looked like a cooked lobster. After that my temperature was now reading 103.

I stayed feeling warm the rest of the afternoon and when I still didn’t feel right about 6:00PM we took my temp again and it still read one hundred and three! I took an extra strength Tylenol, drank a cold soda, ate some cold jello and after an hour my temperature had “dropped” down to 102.6°

Next stop was the emergency room. They took my temperature and of course it read 99.1°. Debated going home, but opted to stay and get checked out more thoroughly. The ER doctor ordered chest and abdominal x-rays, looking for clues. He had several vials of blood drawn for lab work along with a urine sample. He also had the nurse fill 3 bottles about the size of something from a mini bar with blood that were for culturing. While we waited for lab results I got a litter of saline in my IV.

The hot bath, the ER visit, the staying at the ER and the ER doc’s testing were all done with consultation with the doctor who did my scope.

No one was sure exactly what was going on with me as these we atypical of what to expect after this procedure. I was in no pain, I just got the chills real bad and then went into the overheat range. The X-rays were fine, no bowel perforations and no fluid in my lungs. Urine was fine. My blood work did show that my white blood count was at 18k, with 10-12 being normal. I obviously had infection of some kind, but no one knew what kind. I either had a simple bug picked up from somewhere and it was unrelated to the procedure or it was related and could get much worse, plus they wouldn’t know about the blood cultures until 12 hours or so later, they wanted to keep me overnight.

We balked at this, I was feeling fine. The ER doc called my primary care physician and after a few minutes the poor schmoe who was on call came in and examined me, he finally agreed to let me go home if I let him administer the first doses of two different antibiotics right there (plus give me prescriptions for filling later.) One was a pill, but the other one took 90 minutes to drip into me via IV. We finally left the ER at 1:30AM this morning.

I have to give a blood sample tomorrow, then see the PCP on Friday and see if my white blood cell count comes down. Of course we are still waiting to see if one of those blood cultures goes mutant, and I become Patient Zero of the Zombie Apocalypse.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Tran?si?tions since 10/24/08: 1139

It’s Not A TV Remote

It doesn’t use infrared (IR) light, it works on radio waves, there is absolutely no reason to take it out of your pocket, turn around and point it at your car to lock the doors.

Who?

While I was standing around waiting to talk to someone before being allowed to drive BMWs and its competitors, I got into a little conversation with a gentleman who was standing there. He was casually well dressed and I assumed a salesman just standing around waiting for the low hanging fruit of customers falling out of the new 3 Series after the drive.

We chatted a bit about cars with their rapidly expanding use of technology, especially BMWs. We then traded push button start/proximity key fob stories. Mine was about getting out of the car and “locking” it by pushing the button on the door handle, being greeted by a long loud chime and not being bothered by it. It wasn’t until a couple of days later that I learned that the sound was indicating that the car was *not* locked. Turns out that you can not lock the car with a fob inside the vehicle. Mine was in my pocket, but Donna’s was in her purse which we were trying to lock in the trunk.

His story involved a friend who showed him how easy it was to start his new car, just get in and push the button. His friend then let him get in the car and push the button. Of course it wouldn’t start, his friend was standing outside a few feet from the car. Ha, ha.

After driving all the cars I had to fill out a little survey. I thought it was going to be about which car I preferred and why, but it was mostly about my satisfaction on how the event was run. Every question got high marks except the last, it asked did I enjoy meeting the Olympic athlete? I had to respond that he wasn’t there when we were there. So I asked the girl giving me the survey who was our athlete, she said, “Larry Myricks, former Olympic long jumper.” I was too embarrassed to tell her I had no clue who that was.

This morning while reading a the paper I noticed a small photo and article about the BMW event. There in the photo was the guy I was chatting with and, you guessed it, he was identified as one Larry Myricks.

Knowing what I know now, I kind of wish I could get another chance at that conversation…

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Tran?si?tions since 10/24/08: 1138