Out of The PIT

Last night while we were following the directions from the GPS for our hotel, I noticed that the GPS never made any left hand turns. Each right hand turn was followed by another right. I think we had about a dozen right hand turns, and no we were not going in circles. Still, I was quite impressed with the situation where we were taking the shortest route without back tracking, or retreading and not making any left hand turns.

So soon after I posed about my finger diagnosis on Wednesday, I tried to check my abscess to see if I could get to the hang nail. It was so swollen that I couldn't budge anything, so I left it. Moments later, I was wondering why my finger was wet: I had somehow ruptured my abscess. Pus was oozing down by finger and my swollen flesh slowly deflated as the yellow milky fluid dribbled down my nail. This went on for a minute or so before the flow ebbed. There was much less white flesh left over, and the pain from the pressure had eased tremendously. I sopped up the remaining fluids (no blood) with facial tissue and went to bed. The next day, the large green blotch that was marring my finger was a fraction of the size it was the night before. I was on the track for recovery. Today, my finger is feeling much better. I can apply pressure and typing is no longer a chore. The finger is still a little swollen, but my tiny defenders have won out on the end. No need to go to a doctor I gue...

Our annual tradition on Valentine's day is for me to get MJNL one rose for every year we've been together. This year would have been 11 roses. After last year's bouquet, we realized that the flowers that we got basically went into the garbage soon after acquiring so instead of getting roses, MJNL told me to get her a live flower, orchids in particular. So this year begins a new tradition of getting MJNL a new orchid for Valentine's day. Our track record with orchids have not been good either, but at least they are not guaranteed to die.. On other news, I found out the name of the condition that I have on my middle finger: Paronychia. Basically a fingertip infection. In my case, caused by a hang nail. Can be bloody painful at times. We will see how it progresses, but I may need to go to the doctor sooner rather than later for antibiotics.

I had an annoying hang nail a week ago and clipped it off. Or at least mostly clipped it off. I was unable to get a clean cut and ended up pulling at it and ripping it off (and subsequently retracted under the skin). A couple of days later, my finger felt a little sore where the portion of the ripped nail that stayed attached and tender when I pressed on the skin. The soreness got more and more pronounced until this weekend when I noticed at green tinge on the skin next to my nail. It was a small green line, but not very prominent. Things came to a head yesterday when the green line got a lot larger and my finger was noticeably swollen and very tender to the touch. I have a bad feeling that the that nail shard I left attached is somehow slowly pushing into my skin as the nail continues to grow. It looks as gross as it is painful. I was going to go to a doctor to take a look at it today if the finger was worse than yesterday, but it seems about the same as before. I'll keep ...

So my last living grand parent is now in palliative care. She had a stroke a couple of weeks ago and things just went downhill from there. We (including EYS) said our good byes already so it is a waiting game for us. Some of the rest of the family are having a bit harder time, but when someone is not eating, or drinking, or connected to a tube, it is only a matter of time..

So I got sick this past weekend. In fact, I am still sick. Mild flu like symptoms: hacking cough, runny nose, chills, exhaustion, and some muscle aches. It was not so bad as to force me to stay in bed except for New Year's Eve when I just wanted to sleep the whole day through, but the rest of the weekend was manageable. Now, considering that I had a reunion I organized on Friday night, a gym day I organized on Saturday, New Year's Eve celebrations on Sunday, I probably should have stayed at home for all of these instead of going out to share my cloud of germs with others. EYS is also sick, I can tell from her lack of appetite and huge gobs of snot she keeps rubbing out of her nostrils. (When I say huge, these are adult sized gobs coming out of a nose less than half the size of mine, so when she complains about her nose, she is not kidding.) I was hoping to avoid getting sick again this time of the year and thought we were doing good up to Christmas, but I guess "'t...

So during our annual Christmas dinner with the clan, my dad fainted and fell on the floor. He was out for less than a minute and came too, but we figured that calling the ambulance was a good idea, considering that his face went ashen and he started to pass out again after we sat him down. Lifting his legs helped and he came to. The paramedics arrived and found that he was pretty normal, but he went to the hospital with MJNL anyway just to make sure that there was nothing more serious going on, considering that he had a fainting spell a couple of months back as well. After spending all night at the hospital, he came back with nothing indicating any issue, which is a relief. Everyone at the party was pretty frazzled, but it all ended well enough!