Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Obama takes second place



As I said in my last post, it was ten years since I was in hospital having my ear re-fitted. How prophetic, then, that Sunday morning sees me felled on the bedroom floor by kidney stones.
I’ve had kidney stones twice before so I knew instantly what was happening.
On the last occasion, I didn’t drag myself off to hospital. I just rolled around on the floor drinking gallons of water, crying and swearing at David.
This time, the onset was somewhat different. When I said felled, felled I was. Luckily, I live just across the road from the hospital so I [eventually] got dressed and dragged myself over there.
The good thing about kidney stones is that on the triage scale, you score third only to birth and heart-attack so you get seem PDQ.
After that, things slowed down a bit and it was decided that I should have them removed.
I’m not a fan of hospital stays and, not that I relish any of them, this one held the promise of few pleasures. Least of these was having some sixteen year old urologist explain to me that they poke a little hole in my side and “dig them out”.
This was borne out by the consent form [basically, a risk assessment] which explains how things are done. This, though, comes with a caveat. Should Dr Crippen so choose, once they get you on the table with your eyes taped shut, they can tinker around to their hearts content. And they did.
As an aside, my sixteen year old medico said that card up the sleeve was the Ureteroscopy.
This delightful process involves feeding a largish diameter tube up the urethra which has within it a tool fro breaking up the stones. Most of the tube is then removed leaving only the portion from the kidney through to the bladder. Because this portion is now wider, it’s easier for the crushed up pieces of stone to pass into the bladder and then out of the body.
In lay-mans terms, they shove a garden hose up your dick with a pair of pliers in the end, have a bit of a cruch about, then they leave the tube behind!
Because the pain of kidney stones derives from the stone passing from the kidney to the bladder, the nice wide tube negates this. I’m assured that the blood that I’m pissing is because of the “localised damage” to the inside of my dick and the “bruising of the urethra and kidney”
Now that I’m home, I can watch the inauguration [or a recording of it]. At least I can stop the program while I run to the loo for a piss and a scream!

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Ten yEAR anniversary



I’m crap with dates, birthdays and the like. I could always remember my Mother’s birthday. Never Dad’s. My brother, John, 13th of August, not that I’d ever send a card to him.
About the only other date of significance is the 13th of January. That was the day I had my ear bitten off.
It’s now exactly ten years ago and yet I can remember everything.
It wasn’t a fight, I was set upon. I can remember the sound, like crunching celery, and I can remember the junior doctor in A&E telling me that I shouldn’t have put the detached piece in ice. I’ll remember that for next time!
I can remember the pain I had to put up with overnight after being sent home with the ear stuck roughly to the side of my head and held in place with a bandage, and the trip over to Mount Vernon Hospital the following day.
Anyway, ten years on and the scars [which were inside and also around the back] have faded and it doesn’t look altogether bad.
Byron is a bit squeamish about touching it and having looked at the photo and seen the hairs growing from it, I’ve given it a miss myself.
I may treat it and buy it a pint this evening.
Any excuse!