Lyme's Disease - It Is Real

Don't you hate it when I don't post anything for a long time?  I have a real good excuse this time.  I've been sick.

About 10 days ago I was taking a shower after working in the yard all day and I noticed a hard lump on my leg.  It was at an old angle, but as best as I could tell it was a purplish color and it felt a bit like marbles underneath.  I checked it out on the Internet and by my awesome self-diagnosis skills determined it to be a spider bite.  If I felt bad the next day, I was definitely going to the doctor.  My wife drew a black circle around the bite with a Sharpie to ensure that we knew if it got bigger.

It never got bigger.  I never felt worse.  The area softened to its normal state.  It was never hot.  It never itched.  It never hurt.  However, the odd coloring never went away.

On Monday, a full 9 days later, I started feeling like I was in a funk.  I attributed it to being in the sun all day while we were at the Dover 400.  I was basically in a stupor and was useless.  I think I even left work later.

That night I suddenly, and I'm not exaggerating, felt weird.  My body was getting achy and I wasn't able to sleep.  It felt like the onset of the flu.  I ended up watching 3 episodes of Fast & Loud between midnight and 3am, which is a really cool show.  Check it out.

The next day I called out from work and basically slept all day.  Achy body and everything.  I called out again the next day, but felt a little better - 42.6% better to be exact. However, I now had a low-grade fever.

This morning I woke up and my chest was really tight and it hurt.  I have a chronic cough.  And asthma.  And reflux.  What a wonderful combination!  The discharge is lovely.  Anyway, today's discharge was slightly bloody.  Doctor time.

I rattled off my symptoms to the doctor and she said it looks and sounds like Lyme's disease.  They're doing blood-work to confirm.  The chest sounded terrible, so they did an X-Ray to confirm pneumonia.  That came back negative, so I'm being treated for bronchitis.  Ever been on Prednisone?  That's like getting a blank check to act bat-shit crazy.  Side effects include irritability, nervousness, hyperactivity, dimmed cognitive abilities, frequent urination, and a strong desire to raise taxes and ignore the Constitution.  Hey, wait a minute......I might be on to something here.

So - in conclusion, self-diagnosis on the Internet is not always a good thing, if you get anything that looks like this on your leg, then go to the doctor RIGHT AWAY!!!!  It's a lot less colorful than it was, but still colorful enough.  Hopefully my Obamacare will pay for this.

Home Sick

No, I'm not homesick, but I am at home and I am sick. I haven't felt well since last Wednesday. I thought I was coming down with the flu or something. However, the next morning I felt somewhat better. No flu.

However, every day I have been tired and feel like a low grade flu. I'm slightly achy, certainly can't hold my own attention. On Monday my wife informed me that 3 of my daughters' friends have been diagnosed with pneumonia. I looked pneumonia up on the Internet. It usually has red or pinkish phlegm, painful coughs, soar throat. I do not have any of these symptoms. However, what caught my eye is that 3 million people per year get pneumonia in the United States. Half a million are admitted to the hospital. Five percent of these people will die. Yikes! I don't want to die. (At least not yet - I haven't had sex with Reese Witherspoon yet!)

So I go to the doctor. He asks all those normal questions. He asks if I am coughing. Of course I'm coughing. I cough all the time. A combination of asthma and reflux will do that to you. However, I admitted that I am coughing a little more than normal. He listens to my chest. He asks me to take a deep breath. I breath in and nature takes over. I probably damaged his eardrums with the rocks jostling around in my lungs. He says in addition to my other problem, I have a respiratory infection.

He asks if I'm peeing a lot. Now that he mentions it - yes, I am. Am I dehydrated? Why, yes to that, too. Do you feel really tired all the time? I think he's on to something. I ask if he thinks it's mono. He says not really because my glands aren't swollen, but all signs point to mono. He thinks it's definitely a virus. He sends me for a urine and blood sample. I thought they would call today with the results, so perhaps I'll call him tomorrow.

The good news is that I have to stay home for 2 days - at least. I fight with him vigorously for 0.2 seconds. I concede. I inform my wife of the good news. I could see the look of fear in her eyes. We get in each other's hair when I'm home for more than a few hours a day.

Since I'll be home, I know that I'll get bored. I go to the library and get The Year of Living Biblically by A. J. Jacobs. I've already read 115 pages. It's really funny - and informative. Did you know that if the wife of an adversary grabs your penis - you get to cut her hand off?

I can't read all day, so I pick up a few movies. So far today I've watched the 1955 Oscar winner for Best Picture - Mister Roberts. It stars Jack Lemmon (one of my favorite actors - check out The Odd Couple and The Apartment. These are funny classic movies.). Then I watched Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. I remember this movie being pretty good. I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow to have my head checked. That movie sucked. I also picked up The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the 1939 version, Fargo (never seen it), and The Best of Woody Woodpecker, disc 2. This should keep me busy for the next day or two.

And I get to take naps (cuz I don't feel good). I took a 2 hour nap with my 3 month old daughter this afternoon. We both liked it.

Cold and Sick

The weather has changed here in Carroll County. The leaves are in full color and falling fast. The wind is whipping around in our urban-sprawl development. Each morning I am greeted with a sheet of frost across my lawn and across the windows of my car.

It's about time to find that ice scraper. I spend about 10 minutes each morning waiting for the forces of Ford engines to generate enough heat to clear my windshield. Call it laziness. My ice scraper is somewhere. It's not in my car. But it's somewhere. One day, I'll remember before 6:45 in the morning to look for it.

So this change in weather has taken its affect on me. I usually get sick some time in the fall. It hit me last week. I started getting a headache and have just felt like blah for several days. Though not enough to keep me from my highly important job.

Yesterday was a different story. I woke up and fell asleep. Did anyone get the tags of that bus that hit me? I slept in until 8am. My son (bless his heart), came upstairs with orange slices and some eggs for me to eat. It was his idea.

After the kids went to school I began to watch movies. And watch movies I did. I started off with National Lampoon's Van Wilder, the Rise of Taj. It was expectantly dumb. I then got caught up in the Crime Doctor series on TCM. I was parts of 2 movies, though there was a nap in there somewhere, so I can't say that I watched the whole thing. My wife watches my niece, so we had to squeeze in Wallace & Grommit. After I put her down for a nap, I watched The Sting II, which I saw years ago. Definitely not as good as the original, but not bad.

I finished the day with watching part of The Blob - the original one with Steve McQueen. However, my wife made me turn it off because she said it was inappropriate for me to watch with the kids. I'm a little confused. How can an obviously fake horror movie from the 1950's be worse than anything she watches on MTV in front of the kids? Every show on MTV is required to say "bitch", "ass", "hell", and "fffckkkk" (with a lame attempt to bleep out the "uh" in the middle.

Anyway, I posted several bios on Wikipedia and did some cleanup on the others. Three cheers for my nerddom!!!

Hopefully, I'll feel better later and I provide an update on Dictator O'Malley's temper tantrum.