Marginal Thoughts.
Nicole's Random Fun Facts!
(Written at 2:30 on Friday; not updated because I am that friggin' lazy.)
Days since Bill and I said to each other: "If we do a little cleaning every night this week, we won't have a whole big mess to clean up the night before your (my) mother comes:" 5.
Amount of cleaning we've done since then: 0.
Number of gross, disgusting dishes currently in the sink: 12.
Length of time since Bill completely cleaned off the top of this desk: 2 weeks.
Percentage of desktop now visible: 25%.
Number of CDs scattered all over desktop: 20.
Number of nail polish bottles sitting on living room end-table: 9.
Number of books, magazines, and old Washington City Papers on the floor: 31.
Number of hours until my mother's estimated time of arrival: 23.
(But I feel so productive now that I've made this list!)
... All content copyright 1999-2000 by Nicole Willson. No ripping me off.
4/28 -- MRI 2: Judgment Day.
(Well, not quite. Judgment Day isn't until Monday, and probably not even then at the rate this whole ordeal seems to be dragging itself out.)
Friday morning I had my second MRI, which was done on my neck to check for any possible neurological conditions that might be causing the bizarre health problems I've been having this year (optic neuritis and a numbed right hand, for those of you who just tuned in).
Even though I got through last month's MRI okay and they aren't painful, I really wasn't pleased to be doing all this again so soon. If you've never had an MRI and don't know what they're like, you're placed on your back and rolled into this long, narrow tube for the X-rays. I don't know what the procedures are for MRIs on other parts of your body, but if you're having them done on your brain and your neck, you can't move your head at all once the procedure starts. Sounds easy enough, but I guarantee you that once you're told not to move your head, it's all you'll think about doing. Especially if you're born to fidget, like me.
It doesn't hurt at all but the x-ray machine is incredibly loud, and apparently some people get claustrophobic in the narrow chamber and end up yelling to be let out. Overall, it's just not a fun experience. Not painful, but uncomfortable and rather strange.
I got a new restriction today: the technician told me that because they were going to be photographing my neck, not only did I have to hold my head perfectly still but I also had to try not to swallow while the machine was working, because the motion in my throat could screw up their pictures. Oh, sheesh. Go ahead -- think about trying not to swallow for the next five minutes.
Instead of packing my ears with foam rubber to protect them from the noise, the technician popped earphones on my head and asked me what radio station I liked. I couldn't think of the numbers of the ones I'd been listening to most recently and stammered out "WHFS," a local alterna-rock station that used to be a really good independent station but was bought out a while ago and now just sounds like your basic corporate FM junk.
Oh well. I lucked into a commercial-free hour, at least. As they wheeled me into the tube, the song on the station was Radiohead's "Creep," and the lyrics at that moment seemed oddly fitting: "What the hell am I doing here?/I don't belong here."
The procedure took longer than usual because the technician told me I have a short neck and they were having trouble getting good pictures; she had to repeat the longest scan twice. Geez. Excuse me for not being Grace Kelly.
Oh well. I go to the neuro again on Monday to find out the results of this MRI. I'm not sure which possibility is less appealing: that the MRIs will turn up something, or that they won't.
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