So. In the past two days, in which I was away from email, LJ, AIM, and all that... I got 26 emails, which is kinda ridiculous. I have had, in the past two days: an MRI, an MRA (which I have not much idea what that is) and an EEG.

MRI: they asked me "are you claustrophobic?" and I figure it's like an old CT scan machine, in ters of internal tube diameter. I WAS WRONG. It's like "ooo, oo! wedge your shoulders in this tube and stare at this plastic three inches from your nose. And don't move your head. And you can feel free to sleep, BUT. When the machine is so loud that they give you earplugs... I was unprepared for the amount of noises. Anyway.

EEG: first-- 'electroencephalogram' is a cool word, you gotta admit. The waxy shit they stick the electrodes to your head with? not cool. The "you can only have five hours of sleep the night before? Sorta cool-- good excuse to go out on a weeknight and get coffee until late... Procedure was sort of weird-- get wired up, lay down, lay there, breathe really quickly for a pretty long amount of time to high-oxygenate the brain, look and these blinking lights-- through your closed eyelids... And theeeen... pass-the-hell-out. Which is apparently what was supposed to happen. The last thing I remember is the flashing lights-- it went from really slow, to very quickly strobed lights.

So anyway. They're supposed to be able to figure out (better, at least) what the hell is wrong with my head, if it's anything obvious. We shall see.

aaaanyway. I'm tired and need caffeine.

I looked at a three-dimensional picture of my own brain today. I got my shunt checked out, in College Station, by the neurosurgeon who... installed(?) it about eleven years ago.

So they took a computerized CT scan (cranial tomography-- it means they IRRADIATE THE FK OUT OF MY BRAIN and catch the waves to make an x-ray) and a set of regular x-rays, right. The new CT scan machine is AWESOME. Old CT scan machines made me nauseous-- I think I got mildly claustrophobic in them. This machine only went about a foot over my body, and it was much larger inside. Whew.

So the CT scan they took, right. The scan represented as a full 3D document, so the doctor was able to move this slider, and it would go up and down, in layers, in my brain, and show the cross-section on the screen. (not real-time, this is through the computer data they collected)

And the weirdest thing was watching the inside-my-brain-shunt-tube RISE UP OUT OF THE PLANE of my brain, like a plane out of clouds. (yes, yes, the plane in brain falls mainly in the Sp-- (what the fk am i saying? Damn you, 'Enry 'Iggins)) The in-the-brain-cavity portion of new shunts appears quite small. Mine? LOOKS FKING MASSIVE in diameter. Like WOSHIT WOW three-times-the-O.D. massive, by scale. AND it has concentric nubs on the end that sits closest to the center of my head. I got no idea WHY, but i saw it today. Looks markedly, massively different than the ones I've seen of the current tech level. So I hope it never malfunctions-- seems to me it will be even more invasive than the current tech level.. Not only is my shunt PONG-level technology, it's Pong in large-print-Reader's-Digest.

Anyway. So there's nothing wrong with my shunt. And I do have a brain. I saw the sulci (the wrinkles, but that's the real term) and everything. Pretty damn impressive, to me, that three bucks worth of plastic (raw material cost, tops) does that much. Seems like if the thing had to be made out of platinum it'd be worth every dime.

Anyway. Humbled by the medical profession, and impressed by the skill of them. With that, I'm off to bed.

So today, i was in the gas station, buying my $2.49-are-you-people-nuts gasoline, and the cashier rings it up and i almost forgot to hand her my credit card because she had...

SIX FINGERS on her left hand. And i understand that genetically this happens, and in that "You have six fingers on your right hand. Someone was looking for you.", Princess Bride sort of way, it occurs.

But-- one, i've never seen it in person, and two, this was a bizarre arrangement. not like in the movie where the guy has

finger.
finger.
finger.
finger.
finger.
Thumb.

NOOOOO.

finger.
finger.
finger.
finger.
Thumb.
finger.

what. the. fuck.

and she looked slightly amused, and I'm sure i had the "huh-fuck-what?" eye thing going one, all googly-eyed and shit (I do that, if you know me in person)... but, well... when one has six fingers on one hand, you should be used to that...

wow. So that was my "what the fuck" thing for the day.

heh, I saw this: exhibition of scar photos and stories on MetaFilter. And some of those look kinda familiar.

it occurs to me that i have a shitload of scars, too... lessee, I have:

an appendectomy scar that runs for about six inches and dodges my bellybutton on my stomach.

a scar from implanting the drainage tube from my shunt when i was 9 mos. old, on my stomach.

a scar from revising my shunt and implanting the new drainage tube when i was fifteen, on my stomach.

a scar on each ear from the eardrum replacement surgeries (that's two, there)

a hook-shaped scar on the back of my head that's visible when my hair is short, from my shunt, that widened after the second surgery.

and a hernia scar from infancy that's just barely visible.

I think i figured it up one time and i've had somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty to fifty-five big-chop-mark-scar-inducing stitches. that list doesn't count random little dinky scars. but that's seven ways to tell it's me if the hospital loses my fingers and teeth.

I feel bad sometimes when i have my hair short, since that scar bothers my mother. Not bad enough to keep my hair long; it looks too shaggy otherwise, but bad nonetheless.

and the ones on my ears made it where i can't wear earbud headphones... a constant small annoyance around my iPod.

Overall, I'm pretty healthy, though. I've been really lucky, but I'm glad I respond well to surgery. And i hope they never knock me out again, actually.

seeing and hearing an ambulance that is busting ass (lights, sirens, the works) honk out the "Hullabaloo caneck caneck" (da-da-da-da, da-da, da-da, say it out loud in that cadence, 4, short pause, 2, short pause, 2) on the horn is, for lack of a better word, insane. It's also why i like it here...

Hullabaloo Caneck Caneck (for those of you who aren't familiar, and there are many) comes from the Aggie War Hymn and is a short way to identify yourself as an Aggie.
in the war hymn, "Texas Universtiy" is the University of Texas, we just refer to them as "t.u.". Also, in the war hymn, "Varsity" is the proper name for Bevo, the University of Texas' mascot, a longhorn.

Yes, we have some wack-ass traditions...and i wouldn't take anything for them.

blah blah blah classes blah.

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Went to dinner last night with Em, Janel, Che', Pat, and Blythe. Good stuff. Haven't seen Em in a while... And i think Blythe is kinda out of the loop on Cepheid-type stuff. Not her thing, so much. When talk gets all geeky, i've just learned how to keep up. i'm still not really up on some of it, either. (But i did like the Matrix, as she doesn't. Which, considering her usual taste in movies, isn't really that strange.)

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I think that she and I are watching movies tonight (either Saw in the theater, or Pulp Fiction and *insert name of movie i can't remember here* at my place), assuming Blythe's not dead from being tired. Not enough sleep, these last couple days. I'd be exhausted, and thus, I know she has to be wiped out. (and if we watch Pulp Fiction and she likes it, there's no reason we can't watch Boondock Saints, and that's always a good thing.

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my eye's hurting less, but it still looks like someone blew smoke into my eye for a month. And it's sensitive to light, which, i think is bad. woops. think i might have scratched it, or maybe it's growing something. (eep)

*crack*

ahhh, that felt better. cracked my fingers. that somehow helps a lot, adn it's much more satisfying when they all crack at once.

that's about it for today...

ow. my eye is all red. wtf. stupid eyeball.

I knocked the shit out of my test this morning. awesome. (well, it sure felt like i did. I hope i'm right.)

I'm going to take a nap, my freaking eye is pissing me off, and maybe some rest will help.

woops. after I go get my photos from HEB. some I want, some I don't. Not sure which is which, so i had to develop 'em all. eh.

later, yo...

OK... so the shunt is better this morning. Thing is, all the "diagnostics" they doat the hospital cost a wheelbarrow full of money. and the time (once, in 23 years) that it screwed up, i was positive it was bad. this thing is just irritating,lately. but, since i have had several (hah, understatement) operations, and all of them, at one time or another, give me crap... this is really nothing new. And I should know that.

So I'm gonna hold off. if it does anything that is on my watchlist (and there's a bunch of things, that are BAD), i'm in there so fast they won't even believe it. but... for now... i'm watching it.

Thanks immensely for the good thoughts and good vibes. All are very appreciated.

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If you could send an anonymous set of good vibes out, there is a person on my friends list who will be receiving a shunt, much like mine, in a few weeks, and he could use your good thoughts. thanks for that, too.

OW.

okay,now i'm getting actual, painful twinges from the connection site (at the upper back corner of my head) for the tube on my shunt. calling tomorrow (in about 6 hours, actually. going to sleep now, i think.

prayers, crossed fingers, that'd all be well appreciated, if you can spare 'em.

I'm officially getting fucking scared now.

the thing I dislike about this thing (other than having a tube implanted in my brain) is that they say that the way I'll know something is wrong, is that badbadbad shit will begin to happen. and that it will seem like a logical progression to come to the hospital. The complete and utter lack of symptoms, until shortly before a large problem is at hand... that bothers me. A LOT.

I really really hope this thing doesn't fuck up. I very seldom get scared, but... this is doing it, really well right now.

*jspurlin is actually freaked out by this thing, for the first time in a LONG time. like eight-plus years*

(this will probably be nothing, but... i'm getting it checked. I swear. 6 hours.)

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EDIT: There will be an update, one way or the other, tomorrow, just to let y'all know everything is fine. (which, *fingerscrossed*, it will be.)

hanging out in Corpus for the weekend. good stuff.

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my shunt(see comments here for explanation) is acting up, something fierce. not sure what to make of that. yes, I should get it checked out. much more of this and I will. not much to be done, unless it stops working. I'm keepiung an eye on it, believe me. (well, not so much an eye, since it's on the upper-back-right corner of my head, but... you get the idea)

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gonna be glad when school starts back up people get back in town soon.

---

busy week next week, what with paying bills and lining up classes. ecch.

--me-and-jamie-watchin'-movies night was good.
--Read or Die was good.
--I'm beginning to get into this whole 'anime' thing. heheh. I'll be a real Cepheid yet.
--Boondock Saints is still awesome.
--my room is clean (yeah, holy crap, i know...)
--my room looks huge when it's clean.
--I need sleep.
--the plan tomorrow is to go on a road trip date in Houston after Jamie gets out of class. sangria2, if you see this, give me a call, maybe we can all get together...
--OPEC will love me, soon, if not already. (I wondered about that christmas card from Yemen...) So much gasoline being used lately.
--I currently have three stainless steel staples (*ka-chunk*) in my left temple. (and the doctor says regardless of how cool i think they are/look, they come out next week. damn.)
--I no longer have a funky lil' bump on my left temple. yay.
--yaawn.
--going to sleep.
--Goal is to go ride my ass off on my bike tomorrow, weather and sleep needs permitting. (weather not permitting, i wear swim trunks and go anyway. hah.)
--so tired.

g'night, folks.