Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Monthly Archives: November 2009
Unsettling and odd and not a little sad
My mother said to me, apropos of nothing (which is how she said most things, I’m afraid), “Your father really cares about me.” I heard a note of genuine surprise when she described how my dad had visited her in the hospital every day and had stayed with her for hours.
They’ve been married over sixty years, and she’s surprised he cares about her.
Was my father surprised at his own anxiety (which I suspect he’d now deny) when my mother was in the hospital? But it was there in his voice. Are they just now coming to appreciate one another?
Or perhaps this is all ignorance or presumptuousness on my part. Perhaps I’ve had blinders on because all I’ve ever seen of them is the bickering (which in my family involves screaming invectives at the top of one’s lungs). If I had to pick words to describe their interactions over the years, respect and sympathy and concern wouldn’t be near the top of my list. But have I been missing something all this time?
And then there’s my mother’s lack of bile, to put it mildly. This trip, she was pleasant. Really pleasant. Which isn’t like her. Is this part and parcel of her recent problems?
Does it take a certain level of mental faculty to harbor spite, resentment, animosity?
Needless to say, we find this all very concerning.
D.
PS: We’re trying to figure out what our turtles were doing in Chinatown. Supposedly, they were rescued from Chinatown. Were they being sold as pets, or proto-appetizers?
Traffic
We left Vegas at 10:10 AM, pulled into Bako at 5:40 PM. ‘Nuff said, but . . . re: driving to Vegas on holiday weekends? Never again. Next time, we fly. Better yet, we figure out how to visit the folks on non-holiday weekends.
How did you spend your holiday weekend? Hollywood icon Kirk Douglas, now 92 years young, spent it with his wife serving dinner to the homeless of Los Angeles. Story and picture here. All the best to the both of them.
More to come, but not tonight. I’m wiped.
D.
Turkey Day
We made it out of Bako by 9:15 and got to Barstow by 11:30. Seemed like we were making good time, but then we hit parking lot traffic on I-15 North just out of Barstow. About 45 minutes later, we passed the accident site. The tow truck was just then pulling around, towing away the wreck, and the cops were heading back to LA.
After that, we made good time, but it still took about 5.5 hours to get to my parents’ house. For Thanksgiving Day Dinner, they did the smart thing and bought precooked turkey breast and ham. Still way too much food, but isn’t that a Thanksgiving tradition? I mean, did we really need two turkey breasts, a ham, two pumpkin pies, and an apple pie? And my mother was pissed that my dad opted not to make the stuffing.
She seems fully recovered from what I can tell. She’s using her walker more, which is a good thing, and she’s talking to herself as much as ever. She has this way of starting one sentence and finishing another, but that’s nothing new.
Tomorrow we’re going to a mall, I expect. And then we have to convince my parents not to have dinner at a buffet.
How about y’all? Good turkey?
D.
Polypy goodness
One of my favorite things to do in the OR is remove nasal polyps. Got to do it twice today — so this was a very good day indeed.
This is how polyps look when they’re inside the nasal cavity:
Imagine trying to breathe around that.
Here’s how polyps look after we’ve yanked ’em out:
I like removing polyps because it’s a relatively safe and easy (albeit potentially bloody) thing to do, yet it creates a singularly happy patient. These are folks who have had to put up with facial pressure, sinus infections, and often severe nasal obstruction for months or years. The relief they get can be overwhelming.
Chronic tonsillitis patients are similarly pleased, but the operation is so painful it often takes a month or two before they thank you. Nasal polyposis patients are often delighted as soon as they recover from the general anesthesia.
No one knows what causes polyps to grow, but they seem to be associated with chronic inflammation from sinusitis and/or allergy. Some folks with these conditions form polyps, some do not. Once they form, they’re like weeds. We can weed the garden, but we know they’ll be back. Provided we keep the patient as sinusitis- and allergy-free as possible, we can sometimes keep the polyps at bay for years.
D.
Best. Title. Ever.
Best. Concert. Ever. by Jonathan Coulton.
Here’s his version of Baby Got Back . . .
And here’s another great song from Best. Concert. Ever.: Kenesaw Mountain Landis, first baseball commissioner and mean mother — well, you’ll find out.
D.
New critters
Friends of ours from the old days, the pre-Jake years, know us as critter-keepers, lovers of snakes and lizards and frogs and anything else with cold blood. Our collection has waned in recent years because moving is bad for pets and we’ve been moving a lot.
But now we’re settled.
And today, I saw something I couldn’t resist.
Makes Lola’s look like the 7-11
Here in Bako, I’ve found an Indian market, two Chinese markets, a Middle Eastern market, a Vietnamese market. I was beginning to despair of ever finding a market like Lola’s in Santa Rosa, where I could always find a quick and tasty meal for dinner, whether it be perfect tamales or a savory hunk of carnitas. The other day, I mentioned this to my medical assistant. Today, she brought me an ad for Pro’s Ranch Market.
Pro's Ranch Market, the Caesar's Palace of Mexican Groceries
Wandering Pro’s Ranch Market, I felt the same way I do whenever I visit Powell’s Books in Portland: I could spend all night here. I was already running late, though, so I hadn’t the time to look over the outdoor cocina, barely skimmed the offerings of the indoor cocina, and generally did a poor job exploring this wonderful place. I did notice at least four types of homemade mole (and chose the Oaxacan mole, which I hope is mild!), three different styles of chorizo, and a huge tray of pig snouts. In the pastry section, I rejoiced at finding a sweet potato pie. Yes, we’ve already tried it. Yes, it’s delish.
Un-adventurously I bought chile relleno and tamales, the sweet potato pie, wedding cookies and bunuelos (flour tortillas deep-fried and dusted with sugar and cinnamon). I goggled at the various organ meats and fresh yogurt and enormous slabs of flan and bushels of dried chiles . . .
I’ll let you know how the chicken in Oaxacan mole comes out.
D.
The next big thing
I love it when the creeps look creepy.
This guy must be the town dentist.
With dragons like these, who needs blow dryers?
Kill this bad boy and you’ll feel like you’ve really accomplished something. Something more than, say, killed another 120 hours playing video games.
D.