Carp in my tunnel

8/12
I am still here, although it seems like I must be somewhere else too. There isn't that much here here anymore, and using the garage as living room/kitchen/dining room/garage is getting reeeaaallllyyy old. My health is fine, but this getting old is getting old. I started getting this numbness in my right forearm and hand, wild tingling sensation running down my arm, and I figured it was due to too much keyboard action at work and paintbrush action at home. But, I thought I should mention it to my doc, and he figured there was this off chance the leukemia had settled into my skull, where it likes to hide. He ordered up all kinds of tests, neuropathies, bone marrow biopsies, trigonometries, funky blood tests, CBCs, met panels and 8x10 glossy photos with circles and arrows on the back explaining what I might have.

So I went to see the nerve people. You all know I have plenty of nerve, but they had to check. They hooked me up to this Abu Ghraib castoff machine, put a bunch of electrodes on me, and started zapping and ramping the juice until I was jumping, shouting 'Kill, Kill', and my muscles were twitching and fingers flailing and arms a flapping, and I asked for more so they hooked up the other side and did it again. Man, what a rush! They said I had a lot of nerve.

So then they took this long needle with a wire on it, to test my conductivity in case the lights went out, and they stuck it in the back of my neck. I love how they always say 'Little bee sting here', and it is never like a little bee sting. If you've been stung by a bee, you know those suckers last a while, throbbing so you can take your pulse off it even after an hour. The needle sticks last about 3 seconds and then they don't hurt. This was like that too, more like acupuncture, and it turns out I am conductive because I shorted the breaker on their panel. They got it fixed up and stuck the needle in a bunch of other places, in my arms and hands, and then the doc said 'Well, I know what you have', and she handed me this handout, and it said 'Carpal tunnel'. I said 'Wow, doc, that's great news!', because it was really, since I didn't have any little leukemia bastards hiding in my skull or spine or eyeballs and probably didn't have to get all those other tests and I hated trigonometry. It was a sine, but don't get me off on a tangent.

So now I can look forward to these crazy tingly shooting buzzes going down my arm into my hand every now and then, and I get to wear one of those cool braces on my hand, and it is very fun painting and trying not to drop the brush when the whole thing starts in to humming, but I am going lefty more.

The freaking remodel is going through some real slow phases, but things are looking up. The plastic that was draped all over the place is gone, but the fine layer of dust remains, and it will remain, because now the texture guys have to come back and fix some areas they didn't texture well. The kitchen cabinets are going in, the countertop guys have taken their measurements, the stucco guys are lost in outer space, the tile guy quit cause he didn't like the tile we chose, too complicated, see ya loser. I am trying to get ahead of them and paint, but I've passed them and I may have to repaint. After I painted the kitchen Dana decided she didn't like the color, so I repainted that, luckily it was an easy job with all the cabinets covering most of the walls, and this was before the cabinets were there.

8/20 I went off looking for a photo, and started trying to post it about 3 days ago, but freaking blogger couldn't get it up. Photo erectile dysfunction. Maybe I'll try again. Dana and I took John off to college Friday, to Sonoma State, the end of an era and beginning of an era. He would have been happy if we could have just dumped him and his stuff at the curb, he was in such a rush to get rid of us. Dana was ready to buy him a new Ipod, cell phone, laptop, anything to ensure he won't forget us, but I held her back. He is cooked and done, let's hope he is smarter than I was at 18 (or 28 or 38 or now, for that matter). Dana was sure she would get all teary, and was sure I would too, but something about the way John was literally pushing us out of his dorm kept us from lamenting too much.

It's now Sunday and that means I have to get more paint and do more painting. Mikey is coming back from a week in Big Sur camping with friends, and Dana has gone off to get him. I wonder if I have reached some blogger size limit, as I can't get any photos on the site. I will post now so you can see I am still alive, doing fine. Tomorrow starts steroid week, so I have to go get a blood test.