Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

Looks like tonight has a theme: ambulances. Spent a few hours in the emergency room keeping my brother company (a cow orker had started driving him to a hospital from work, but when he got a lot worse they pulled over and got a cop to summon an ambulance, so even though my experience of that part of the evening didn't involve an ambulance, an ambulance was involved). Looks as though he managed an abdominal hernia plus a muscle strain -- they observed him for a while then discharged him with a prescription for painkillers, a note for work, some workers'-comp paperwork, and instructions to get a followup with his regular doc to find out whether non-emergency surgery is needed soonish. I drove him back to Bowie after calling Mom to tell her what was up.

Just now, I turned onto Lombard St. and was about to head for my usual parking space right in front of my door, when an ambulance zoomed up and stopped in the left travel lane a space further up, and a police car blocked access to "my" space. Looks like one of the people next door is having trouble -- as I pulled into a space across the street, another cop parked right in front of me with his blinkin' lights all a blinkin'. Gee, maybe my initial thought to detour over to the cheap gas station before coming home would've been a good idea after all. (But I'm tired.)

Spent most of the time with my brother talking about: how he hurt himself, the gig I had on Sunday, clock and watch escapements, designs for transmissions with continuously-variable gear ratios, the metric system, and flywheels and energy storage. I also spent a little time talking to a cute doctor about football (we both root for both the Ravens and the Redskins, wish Darrell Green could go out on a Really Up Season, and hope Ray Lewis is well enough to play soon). I talked to the other cute doctor too, but mostly just about my brother.

You know, it only just now occurred to me that the genders of the medical staff would've seemed like some sort of role reversal thing twenty years ago: both his doctors were women and his nurse was a man.

Woke up this morning blind. Couldn't open my eyes. Hurt like
Hell. Finally got 'em open a wee tiny bit, one at a time, but
am effectively typing this post blind (please excuse typos).
Got a friend coming in a couple minutes to drive me to Kaiser
Urgent Care -- felt lucky to be able to make out the Kaiser
phone number on the back of the card, and to find friend's
phone #, otherwise I'd have been sending email to a couple of
mailing lists begging anyone in B'mre to come read the phone
number to me. This is [bleep]ing scary. Eyes feel like they're
on fire; like there's acid on the insids of the lids and more
in the air when I try to open 'em.

No fair no fair no fair %stomp% @pout@ [badwordbadwordbadword]

Interestingly the dangerously steep back stairs seem less
scary than the more reasonable front stairs when I can't
see. I go up and down the back stair often enough to have
reliable muscle memory on it, and I can keep a hand on the
ceiling all the way down.

Hope I don't have to wait forever at Kaiser.

One friend drove me to a Kaiser Permanente Urgent Care location, where we sat for a while until they took me in to measure the usual stuff (bp, pulse, temp, O2), then he took off because he had someplace else he needed to be, but first he contacted another friend to make sure I'd have a ride home.

They measured me, put me in a wheelchair 'cause it was easier than guiding me, and pushed me back out to the waiting area. About an hour and a half after I got to Kaiser, my left eye started gradually hurting less. By the time they showed me to an examination room at the two and a half hour mark, I had my left eye partly open and could see enough to walk to the examination room myself. Another twenty minutes and the doctor came in, by which time I could open the left eye all the way and the right eye a little, but couldn't focus on distant objects. So I guess my immune system was finally catching up or something.

Doctor diagnosed conjunctivitis, said it was likely an infection rather than just an irritant (I forget which direction the yellow discharge counted in that -- I'm guessing it was in the evidence-of-infection column), and prescribed an ointment containing cortisone and an antibiotic. Said to use it for five days if it helped, but to call back if it wasn't making a big difference after two days. At this point I can see mostly normally (I feel like I'm focusing on distant objects, and large objects look like they're in focus, but I can't resolve small details on distant objects (as well as I normally can, that is) -- I'm not sure what to make of that) but my eyes still hurt. It varies from "irritated and dry feeling" to "Burns like the Fires of Hell". I'm about to go put the ointment in. (The ointment sounds unpleasant. It had better make me feel a whole lot better, or I'm going to have to get really creative with my whining!)

Second friend showed up just about the same time as I finished paying the pharmacist. Going home wasn't direct, but I did get home. Got to go launder the pillowcase, sheets, and blankets, then rest. Doctor said the reasoning behind my hypothesis (that I was exposed to an infectious agent at the emergency room last night) was sound but inconclusive -- he seemed to think it was likely. (An irritant would've been likely to produce symtoms in the hour or two I was in bed before falling asleep -- this gave no warning last night, just woke me up with the pain this morning.) After reading the pamphlet I found on conjunctivitis, I'm wondering whether it's any more likely that the cold virus I've been fighting for a week (and am doing much better with, by the way) managed to spread to my eyes ... in which case the antibiotic won't help. So if the antibiotic does help, it was likely something from the hospital, and if it doesn't help it was either a virus from the hospital or I didn't pick it up there at all.

So that's the status of my eyes at the moment.