Sorry I haven't posted in what seems like forever everybody. I guess there are some of you out there that, if you didn't know better, might have thought that I'd either fallen off the earth or died since the 19th of December when I last posted.

The fact is, since having my chest drained a second time, things have been great. I feel so much better that it's almost hard to put into words. For the first time since Halloween I have energy, am resting well, and more than anything I am ready to return to work (which I will do on the 3rd of January, 2006).

Now, as for Christmas this year. It was amazing, exhausting, exhilerating, exasperating, action-packed, fun-filled, rewarding, frustrating, and everything in between. I think that we did the best we could to make it a normal (if there is such a thing) Christmas, but the fact is that we've both been exhausted and run down and we're just looking to close the door on 2005 and ring in 2006 on a positive note.

I am walking about two miles a day now and am, as of this morning, down to 212.5 pounds. Basically, in just under 60 days, I've lost a Lauren AND a Sophia, and it feels great. I bought some new clothes for work at the after-Christmas sales and it's nice not to be shopping in the wider than they are long department anymore.

(Okay, that's a lie, but getting back to a comfortable 36 waist is a big deal for me. I don't think I've been a 34 waist since I was about 180, and that only lasted about a quarter in college, so I'm not sure that's a realistic goal).

Hopefully I'll get back into the swing of blogging soon so you all can waste more work time reading what I've written. I also hope that New Year's Eve gives me something as funny as what Christmas night gave me.

Now, prepare yourself. This is (and I swear it) one of the funniest things I've ever heard ANYONE say ever. The fact that it came out of the mouth of the person it did just makes it all the funnier. I now quote:

"One time, I sharted in the wave pool at Lake Lanier Water Park. But just a little..."

That's all for today. Keep your fingers crossed that I'll get more gems like that soon.

Just wanted to drop a quick post on you beyotches and let you know what's up at the TMLSB hizzouse.

For the first time in seemingly a decade, no one is sick, injured, frail, infirm, or even all that grumpy at my house.

Okay, that's not true. Lauren's grumpy, but that's just because she can't seem to catch up on her sleep or she needs more than she's prepar fred to get from night to night. She slept for 13 hours last night, and the first words out of her mouth this morning were "I'm just tired."

Sigh.

Sophia is doing better at night, even sleeping a four and three hour stretch in her basonnet thingy and NOT on me or the wife. The cough's all but gone and she's eating great. Now we can start working on trying to find out why it is that her bowel movements are so putridly offensive.

Really. I've been around a few children in diapers and a few stinky adults, and there are simply not ample words in the English language to describe the Category 5 foulness that this sweet creature produces nearly every time she straightens a leg.

On the fluid news front, it appears that a week after my last thorocentesis, I have not accumulated any more fluid in that area. That means no more cold symptoms, shortness of breath, and most importantly it appears that I am leaving that nagging "I've got no energy" thing behind me. Yesterday I even walked two miles in 30 minutes. No, it's not much compared to Roger Bannister and his four minute miles, but I'm a fat post-cardiac surgery suburban guy who has exercised less in his life than entire casts of "The Biggest Loser."

Yet as I type this, I am down 35 pounds and a steady 215 pounds, which as I've mentioned before, hasn't been on a drivers license of mine since I was a registered voter in the land of Howell Heflin and Bobby Lowder.

I hope this post finds you all well as we close in on the 2005 Holiday. I'd say Christmas but that's apparently an offensive term now, whether it be applied to sales at malls, parties in the workplace or even commercials from my local news providers.

Oh, and one final note. Is it wrong to start a Benadryl IV now on urchin 1.0 so she'll shut the hell up about Christmas and Santa? I mean, we sat last night for about 90 minutes and my brother in law estimated that she spoke over 1,000 words in that time without so much as pausing to gather her thoughts or even to pick her nose. She just vomits words over and over again for what seems like forever. It's sweet, but by 7pm it can be a tick much for mortal parents of her and a one month old to take.

Which reminds me, urchin 2.0 is a month old today. The wife and I were shocked at that realization Saturday afternoon. The last six weeks have been so eventful/fortuitous/shitty that we actually made it thru the first month of Sophia's life and barely noticed.

Is that even possible? I mean, with urchin 1.0, we were counting seconds, minutes, hours and days, and this one rolls in and an entire month goes by and we barely noticed that the page on the calendar had turned.

Anyway, I'll be posting some photos soon of both my surgery stuff and of the kids. In the meantime, feel free to click on this link to see some urchin 2.0 photos:

cuteness all over the place

Peace out, peeps.

So, in my last entry, I mentioned a gastric disorder that would probably befall me in the near future. But as you all know, I was kidding.

Only someone didn't know I was kidding.

At 4am Friday I woke up and felt icky. By 7am, I knew the deal:

I had the damned flu.

You have to be fucking kidding me. After all of this, now I've got the flu?

Yes. Yes you do.

But that wasn't all. While I was in bed sleeping all day, the wife was tending to urchin 2.0 and getting 1.0 to and from school. Urchin 1.0 came home from school and seemed fine.

Until about 5pm. And she started barfing.

Alot.

She threw up about every 20 minutes from 5pm until roughly 1:30am.

And since I was still sick, I was tasked with handling that urchin while my wife handled the one month old. Neither were particularly appealing choices when there was only one of us for each, but we did what we thought was right.

I figured I could sleep in Lauren's bed with her and tend to the hurling, but that was not to be. She wanted the entire bed, so she told me to sleep on the floor.

And I did.

She (we) went to bed around 8:30pm, and she finally slept for more than 20 minutes straight at about 1:30ish. At 3:30, I managed to get tylenol and phenergan into her (and she kept it down). She then slept until 6am.

During this period I was awakened by the excrutiating pain in every joint in my body thanks to the late stages of said flu.

Oh, and did I mention that every time Lauren was awake she begged for water? You know, every single time? And that the begging was accompanied by very sad wimpering and topped off with a few big tears?

And there's no reasoning with a three year old about the effects of the flu. All she knew is that she wanted water, and I was the asshole that wasn't letting her have it.

So this morning, in lieu of burning everything anyone had touched in the previous 48 hours, we stripped the beds (again) and washed every stitch of clothing, Lysoled everything, and hoped for a better day.

But of course, I'm not holding my breath.

Since I only have a few minutes between urchin 1.0 going to bed and the wife and urchin 2.0 getting home from a little party, I'll recap what the last 48 hours have been like around here.

First, I spent Tuesday night/Wednesday morning recovering from the second thorocentesis in 11 days.

Then, the wife wakes up Wednesday morning with flu like symptoms. Well, it was more than that since she was throwing up and had a fever. Let's go ahead and say that she had the actual flu.

As any dad would do, I took charge of urchins 1.0 and 2.0 whilst the wife attempts to recover by sleeping, despite urchin 1.0's best efforts. I got urchin 1.0 to school while the wife was still able to stand, but she was dismissed to the upstairs shortly after my return home.

I advised her to take up resting in the guest room. No, it doesn't have any tv, but I live in the other room, and I'd prefer to avoid this strain of the flu if at all possible. I've got my own medical crosses to bear you know.

Urchin 2.0 begins throwing up after eating. Out of three holes. Not nice at all. And on my favorite shirt. Twice. This is not good.

The wife called the pediatrician, who informed us that it was almost impossible for urchin 2.0 to have the flu, and that it must be something else. They then asked how much we were feeding the urchin. We replied "About four ounces per feeding. Is that right?"

"Ummm...no. That's too much. She throwing up because she's full. Don't feed her more than three ounces."

Boy, do we rule at this parenting thing or what?

The wife finally started to feel better around midnight Wednesday.

Thursday morning we were awakened to frequent power flickers, complete with multiple wireless phone beepings every time the power came back on. This happened about 15 times between 5am and 8am.

The power finally goes out for good around 8:30am or so, leaving us like pioneers with a 3 year old that doesn't give a shit about the electricity, she just wants to know why the lights, Christmas tree, her computer, the tv, the DVD player, and the oven aren't working. (Sometimes there's no reasoning with kids).

Urchin 1.0 decides to become ADD and tourette's syndrome-ish all at once, and urchin 2.0 decides to only eat an ounce at a time every 90 minutes, never burp and leave un GODLY shits all day.

The power finally returned around 2:30pm or so, or maybe it was 10am tomorrow. I have no idea, but it was the longest seven hours of our married lives.

At one point Lauren was acting so crazy that I actually told her that if she didn't settle down I was going to hit her over the head with a shovel.

She was unfazed.

Wife agreed to take urchin 2.0 with her to a party to "give me a break for Wednesday," only to have urchin 1.0 go fucking nuts and start crying about not staying home for a Madagascar frozen dinner AND not going to dinner with uncle todd, nick and jack.

That's right. She was hysterical about both. If I lived near a bridge abutment, you wouldn't be reading this, as I'd have driven into it on the way to dinner.

Finally, Lauren agreed to eat at Beef O'Bradys. I had the chicken caesar and a cold beer and she had the kids nuggets and fries and a pack of oreos. When done, she started crying about her fucking Madagascar dinner again. Thankfully, no bridges were nearby.

Oh, and to top it off, she had to pee while we were there. So I took her into the men's room and into the only stall to a commode with one of those split front seats that require little girls to sit sideways, which we've done many times before.

This time, however, she stopped paying attention, let her arms go limp and I watched her fall into the fucking toilet.

Father of the year right here.

So that's it. Since giving in to Allstate about my September accident in which I had no fault whatsoever, things have gotten worse. And the only reason I did that is for karmic protection.

All I have to say is that if one more thing even moderately annoying happens to this family, someone's gonna pay.

(Seriously, I'm kidding about the threats. But come on folks. Enough's enough).

The good news is that I'm down to 215 pounds. Another four pounds and I'll see a weight that hasn't been seen since I returned from Auburn in 1989 with my Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior fifteens attached.

Stay tuned. I fully expect to wake up with pink eye, an abscessed tooth and the gout, all the while pissing out of my ass for no reason in particular. It seems to be my destiny.

In light of the fact that I had to be at the hospital for a 7:30am appointment this morning, I went to bed early and got a good night's sleep...right?

No.

I watched the Falcons-Saints game until around 11:30pm or so, talked to the wife while she was feeding urchin 2.0, then finally went to sleep around midnight. I woke up at about 3:10am or so to feed the baby (as it was my turn), finished up, put her down, added a hit counter to my blog and got back to sleep about 4am. Around 5:40am, Sophia rustled and I awoke (just five minutes shy of my alarm) and I got up and out of the house at a svelt 219 pounds complete with a peanut butter sammich, a Ken Follett novel and my I-pod.

See, even with an "appointment," one thing I've learned is that an appointment just means that someone will see you that day. Patients wait for surgeons...not the other way around. So I figured my best bet was to get there early (6:45am) and get in the line early so I'd maybe get first available or at the very worst get done before noon.

I took my seat after checking in at desk four (my lucky desk) and had a couple of nice words with the very nice ladies at the admit desk there at the Stella Marris building. As has been the case, every person I came into contact with was professional, warm and friendly and very adept at putting folks at ease.

Anyway, back to the story.

My appointment was at 7:30am and lo and behold, here comes my nurse. She took me back through pre-op (where I'd last been prior to the big operation) to an area that appeared to be more of an open pre-op area. Not that it matters.

What I immediately noticed was that there was no ultrasound machine.

Why does that matter, you ask? Simple. The last time I had this done, the doctor used the ultrasound to locate the low spot of the fluid and monitored the progress of the gravity draining with said machine.

While waiting for Dr. Murphy to show up, I spoke with the nurse and Lisa (Dr. Murphy's assistant and nurse) about said ultrasound.

"Not using one," they said.

Uh oh. Sounds like we're going prospecting.

Anyway, Lisa assured me that Dr. Murphy was on his way after changing clothes and at about 7:40am, in he walked.

We made small talk about my fluid, mostly about if it was my fault, could it be prevented, etc. Small talk. Especially since we'd covered all of that just the day before in his office. What it was was nervous talk.

So as I did before, I sat sideways on the gurney and leaned forward on the table, but this time Dr. Murphy asked me to just sit straight up instead.

I got the usual "You're going to feel a burn" while getting the four or five shots of lydocaine just prior to pushing that little three-pronged arrow tip thru the gap in your ribs.

I immediately noticed a different sensation than last time I had this done.

"Ummm...are we using the vacuum version of this instead of the gravity drain?" I asked.

"Yep," he replied.

"Oh. That's why it feels funny," I thought.

I noticed more discomfort from the negative pressure than last time, but since this effort took 25 minutes instead of 90 minutes, I understood that.

Basically what they use is a jar that is somehow made into a vacuum, and they stick one end of the tube into the jar and the other end into me.

So I'm sitting there chatting with them all, when all of a sudden I felt funny.

"Hey you guys, I'm feeling a little faint," to which Dr. Murphy replied "What?"

I repeated "I'm feeling faint."

And the next thing I said was to myself and then out loud. "Why am I laying on my side?"

"Because you fainted," said Lisa.

Oh God dammit. I've fainted.

"How long was I out?"

"About five seconds," Lisa said.

Oh good. I thought I'd made an ass of myself.

The other nurse got the obligatory cool washcloth to put on my vagina...I mean forhead, and I immediately started feeling much better.

The Doctor said I might as well stay on my side until he was finished, which took a grand total of about 25 minutes.

After he bandaged me up, he asked "How much fluid did you say you thought was in there?"

"About a litre and a half I guess."

"Not bad," he said. "It was about 10% under that." He washed up and headed for the door and turned just short of that and said "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go do some actual surgery."

(That dude's funny. I like that kind of stuff).

I then got a portable chest x-ray done and when they returned it, it looked about like the one did after the emergency draining last Saturday. Lisa and I decided that I should go get another x-ray at my regular doc in a week or so, have a look at it (since I now know what I'm looking for more than most GP's) and if there's more there to just call them to set up another tapping.

And then, as quickly as it had started, it was over. I got dressed, had a water and headed for the car, and was home by about 9:30am.

Not bad for a Tuesday morning at the hospital, eh?

And just so you know, I came home and re-weighed. I was 219 when I left the house, and despite drinking two waters and eating one slice of pizza and one peanut butter sammich, I weighed 217.

Bring on the speedo!!

So if you've read my last entry, you know that the wife and I have decided to take our lives back. Hooray, Koombayah and all of that shit.

Last Wednesday, I went to see my regular Doctor (Doctor Henderson, aka the guy that's saved my life twice since Halloween 2005) about the sinus infection and cold I have had.

He looked, listened to my lungs, and did a couple of x-rays (again) and decided that my breath sounds in my left lung were diminished (again), just as they were Saturday morning just five days prior.

"Is it bad?" I asked.

"It's not as bad as last time, but there's still a good amount of fluid there." He said. "I think you should make an appointment with your surgeon in the next week or two and have him take a look and see what he thinks and what he wants to do."

Since my Doctor Phil(ip) hadn't steered me wrong yet, I called that day and made an appointment to see my surgeon for an x-ray and a consult after that.

I got there about 1pm today (half an hour early, cuz that's how I roll) and picked up my x-ray order and walked (not drove) to the building where I'd get the x-ray done. It wasn't a mile, but it wasn't next door either. See how I was taking my life back?

I got the x-ray, looked at it, held it up next to Wednesday's and last Saturday's and said the following:

"Well God dammit."

There isn't as much as there was last Saturday (when only 1/3 or so of my left lung was visible on the x-ray), but there isn't much less either.

I walked the x-rays back to my surgeon's office and waited my turn (I was still about 30 minutes early for my actual appointment).

In the meantime, I was sitting next to a very fit looking guy of about 55-65 and his wife, and no one was saying anything. Finally, she left to make a phone call and so I asked him "So...whatcha getting done?"

He said "I'm having valve replacement."

"Are you getting the robot deal?" I asked.

"Yeah. How about you?"

I then told him my story, and by this time his wife had returned. Between them, I bet they asked me about 150 questions and I seemed to make them feel a little better. He was acting cool, but I could tell he was a little freaked. Who wouldn't be? It's heart surgery for God's sake.

After we talked for a good 20 or so minutes, they headed out for pre-op stuff (as his surgery wasn't until Wednesday or Thursday), but not before I wished them good luck. I think they both felt a lot better, and I felt better having eased some of their fears.

An interesting story about this guy. He told me that he'd had reflux so bad for so long that he was in constant pain for years. When they finally got that controlled with medicine, he literally woke up the next day and said to himself "What the fuck is THAT pain right there?"

Next stop: Cardiologist.

Diagnosis: Failing valve.

Crazy, huh?

Anyway, I got into a room and relaxed by reading the book "Whiteout" by Ken Follett until Lisa or Dr. Murphy were able to talk to me. (That didn't take long by the way. This isn't a bitch post about doctors and their schedules. I'm just establishing a timeline).

They both agreed that I had built up enough fluid that they wanted to have it drained. Again.

For those of you that haven't backread my blog (shame on you), here's some important information. The draining process is called Thoracentesis, which is:

a procedure to remove fluid from the space between the lungs and the chest wall called the pleural space. It is done with a needle (and sometimes a plastic catheter) inserted through the chest wall. This pleural fluid may be sent to a lab to determine what may be causing the fluid to accumulate in the pleural space.

There. Now let's return you to our story.

I asked if there was anything I had done or not done that would cause this condition or if there was anything I could do to prevent it.

No to both counts.

"It just happens," he said. "It's not uncommon for this to happen several times to a patient."

(I'll act in the meantime like he didn't actually say that last part).


"So when would you like to get the fluid drained?" Lisa asked me.

First I said ASAP, but it was getting towards 3:30 in the afternoon, and since Atlanta traffic in general (and Pill Hill traffic in particular) suck ass after 4pm, I asked if I could get it done tomorrow. As in around noon.

Lisa said "Okay, I'll let the 4:30 appointment for today go and see what's available for tomorrow."

Great. That sounds great.

She returned and said "I've got a 7:30am tomorrow."

Shit.

"Can I take the 4:30pm today instead?"

"Let me check...nope. They've already given that appointment slot away and there's no more staffing for the afternoon."

"How on earth did I lose a slot in three minutes?" I asked incredulously.

"Happens all the time," she said.

"Okay, is there a chance I can get it done later today? I mean, I'm here. I'll wait."

She said "Dr. Murphy might be able to do it at 5:00 or 5:30 this afternoon, but it could be later."

"Fine with me. I'll wait."

She left, came back a few minutes later and said "It'd really REALLY help us out if you could take the 7:30am tomorrow."

Shit.

"Fine," I said. No big deal. I'll just get up at 5:30am for the first time in 6 weeks and drive over there for a chest draining without all of the romance of the ER like last Saturday. Just me, some lydocaine, and a thirsty Bic pen-sized drain.

The good news is that if it's a litre and a half or so like it looks, I'll lose another 3 pounds tomorrow morning in about 90 minutes, and for about five bucks a pound (based on the $15 co-pay. If this is follow-up and no co-pay is required, this weight loss is free). At this rate, I could hit 200 or less by Memorial Day.

That's a weight I haven't seen since Jeff Burger was the QB at Auburn and I was using his name to score tail as a Freshman in college, even though his isn't spelled right. (In case you must know, I explained away the Burger / Berger disparity by saying we were half brothers. Man, freshman girls from the country were dumb).

Anyway, if I do hit 200 or less, you can count on seeing me in a Speedo at the pool this summer.

Guaranteed.

Yesterday was December 10th and marked the one month anniversary since my bypass surgery. Since then, I' ve had highs and lows, but personally (healthwise), more lows than highs.

Yesterday however, I decided to make a change. First of all, you all may recall a blog about a car accident I was in back in September that was totally not my fault and was ruled an uninsured motorist accident, meaning I was on the hook for $250 but with no impact on my rates or driving record.

I have been fighting this since the beginning saying that I wasn't gonna pay a thin fucking dime for an accident that I only kept from being much much worse.

Well yesterday I gave in. In an homage to the show "My name is Earl," I decided that fighting this thing over a piddly $250 bucks was risking some karmic change that I wasn't willing endure.

I also decided yesterday afternoon that I was not sick anymore. Sinus infection, ear infection, busted eardrum, whatever. I am not sick. I will go about the business of resuming my life. I will exercise, eat right, help take care of my babies, and do the things around the house that I can until such time that I can't. I will go to my doctor's appointments and if they have to drain fluid again, so be it. But I am living my life.

Yesterday, we cooked steaks on Saturday night for the first time in seemingly forever. I had half a ribeye and a quarter of a twice baked potato, and both were awesome. The steaks were actually some of the best that we've ever made.

I also had my first beer since Halloween, and let me tell you, it was glorious. It was like that sip you got as a kid when your grandpa let you open his little pony Miller High Life and take a sip before you gave it to him. It was glorious.

I also enjoyed the fact that I could eat a reasonable sized meal, have two beers (which is within the surgeon's recovery guildelines for me, by the way) and enjoy a regular, old fashioned Saturday night.

I'm also down 29 pounds as of this morning. That brings me to 221 pounds which is a level I haven't seen in several years. I actually mentioned to the wife this morning that if I could somehow hit 210 by New Years, I'd be seeing a weight that my body hadn't known since my Junior year of colllege in 1989.

I'm not sick anymore. I'm not.

It's good to feel like I'm on my way back.

Most of you know but if you don't here's the deal:

Baby Sophia had seemingly been under the weather since around Monday or maybe Tuesday of this week. The wife took her to the pediatrician on Wednesday and he said it looked like a mild case of RSV but that we'd caught it early.

By last night, Sophia was a mess. Coughing, gagging, throwing up, etc., and she couldn't lay anywhere but on someone in an upright position.

Last night around 7pm, Molly and her sister took Sophia to Scottish Rite's ER here in Atlanta. She was having increasing trouble breathing and eating, to the point that she'd cough repeatedly, gag a bunch, then throw up what she'd eaten. She also has been incosolable and unable to sleep for more than short periods and only if she was laying chest to chest with one of us.

She was diagnosed with RSV and some respiratory something yesterday and they said if she wasn't better by friday, to bring her back. In seeing that she was not only not better but was in fact much worse, we skipped the wait one more night step and made the move.

I think we did the right thing in that they x-rayed her lungs and there is no pneumonia, which is very good. We are nebulizing her every 4 hours (prior to feedings) which has helped a lot. I am hoping she's turning a very soft corner.

I have, for some reason, nearly ceased my recovery. I've currently got a blown left eardrum, infected left ear and left sinus, and a cough that would make someone not married to me kill me when I wasn't looking. The cough feels similar to the one I had before having the half gallon of fluid drained from my chest last Saturday, which is both scary and quite possibly a relief. For if it is fluid, at least I know that can be fixed in about two hours time.

I only hope that if it is fluid, they don't decide to go back in and poke around again to see what it is or from where it is coming. That's the double edged sword of medicine. They can fix you if they know what it is, but sometimes, YOU don't want to know what it is.

Now, to answer a question from one of my readers, ATB. He writes:

If Auburn goes down to Orlando to play in the Capital One Bowl, but nobody is around to actually watch it, does it really happen, (or matter), afterall?

Well atb, that can't happen. Because both Auburn and Wisconsin travel well, and by all accounts this Auburn team finished the season as one of the 8 or so best teams in the country. I suspect the answer would be different around Camp Randall however. I'm betting that Auburn's gonna put the wood to the Badgers and send Barry off in a way that he might not like.

Look for Tuberville to unleash the hounds that day, my friend.

That's all for now. Hopefully things will quiet down here and improve here enough over the next few days that I'll have some more to write and the time to write it.

Later.

So last week, urchin 1.0 finally recovered from her unbelievably bad cold/whatever it was, only to pass it on to me. That's fine. I'm a tough fella. (chuckle). But by Friday night, the consensus was that I was not looking my best. I knew I had a cold in my chest and a left sinus infection, but it also didn't seem too bad.

That night around 2am, I awoke with a pain in my left ear that was indescribable. I looked on the pillow and realized that I was bleeding out of my ear.

"That settles it," I said to the wife. "I'm going to the doctor in the morning for some antibiotics."

I was in the parking lot of the Doc in a box at 8:30am Saturday morning so I could be first (or second). There's no point in waiting in line first thing in the morning for a doctor, but that's just me.

So I got in first, and was greeted by Dr. Henderson (the guy that sent me to the first cardio stress test back in November) saying "How's my favorite patient?"

I told him my story, he checked my blown right ear, then wanted to listen to my lungs. He didn't like how they sounded, so he decided to do a couple of X-rays.

When they came back, he said "The good news is that you do, in fact, have an ear infection."

(That's the good news?)

"The bad news is that you've got a lot of fluid in your pleural cavity around your lungs, and I want you to go to the ER at St. Joseph's right now. I don't want you to drive there. I want you to get someone to take you and they'll take care of this."

Umm...what the fuck did he just say? Fluid in my chest? WHAT??

So I drove to my daughter's soccer game to tell the wife, who was just finishing explaining to our soccer parent friends all of the stuff we'd been thru in November. I told her, and her dad (who was in town) agreed to drive me to the ER.

I called my cardiac surgeon on the way, and I got to the St. Joseph's ER around 11am. I was in a room (Room 29, in case you were wondering) within 15 minutes and was getting poked for blood work and IV's (8 times, I believe, before they were successful thanks to my flat, dehydrated veins).

I was given a breathing treatment of Albuterol and after the Doctor looked at my X-rays, he explained what was going to happen to me.

The process is called Thoracentesis, which is:

a procedure to remove fluid from the space between the lungs and the chest wall called the pleural space. It is done with a needle (and sometimes a plastic catheter) inserted through the chest wall. This pleural fluid may be sent to a lab to determine what may be causing the fluid to accumulate in the pleural space.

Normally only a small amount of pleural fluid is present in the pleural space. Accumulation of excess pleural fluid (pleural effusion) may be caused by many conditions, such as infection, inflammation, heart failure, or cancer. If a large amount of fluid is present, it may be difficult to breathe. Fluid inside the pleural space may be found during a physical examination and is usually confirmed by a chest X-ray.

What? You want to put a what where to do what?

Anyway, they sent me down to the ultrasound department where the nurse located the right place between my ribs about halfway down my back on the left side to perform the procedure.

The doctor came in, asked me to lean forward over a table a little and he started giving me novicane injections, making a small incision, then a couple more injections, and that was that. Before I knew it he was draining the stuff.

We spent about 90 minutes doing that and he talked to me the entire time to be sure he didn't go too far and create what's called "negative pressure" in the chest cavity, which can apparently be excrutiatingly painful. (I was certainly NOT signing up for that).

When they were done, he said the fluid looked good in that it was infection free and only had a little blood in it. He was, however, a little shocked to see that he'd drained over half a gallon of fluid from my innerds.

My immediate thought was quite positive. "Hey...I just lost about four pounds. Kick ass!"

Then it was back to X-ray for another set of pictures for the after of the "Before and After," and then it was back to the ER for another breahing treatment, prescriptions, a referral to an Ear, Nose and Throat guy for my whistling eardrum, and finally to checkout.

Time total spent in the ER: about five hours.

Time wasted there: Only about 30 minutes. Yet another great time at St. Joseph's hospital (and I mean that).

So now it's heavy antibiotics, Albuterol treatments every four hours, Loritab for the pain (and believe me, there is some), and hopefully a non-surgical solution to my left eardrum.

See? Nothing exciting ever happens around here.