Brokener

I was a bent, simian, Chaplinesque shuffling question mark when I woke up this morning, so I made an appointment to see a doctor between my classes (I had a group presentation in the first one), correctly predicting that I probably wouldn't make the later one. It was hard to hide my pain at school, hunched over as I was, looking like I was carrying an imaginary piano, but that didn't mean I'd take insults lying down.

"Dan!" Rich said. "You look awful!"
I punched him in the shoulder.
"What's up with your back?"
"Oh! My back, you meant."

I told the doctor my life story, said I was being seen by other doctors for the five-year-long back issue, but I was more immediately concerned that I'd been 5-foot-7 the last four days. He prescribed a torodol shot (muscle relaxer) into my back, flexeril, and tylenol with codeine, as well as an X-Ray and MRI, since he said I'd need that for my Ortho appointment in two weeks. He also said my blood pressure was very high, though he thought that might be because of the pain.
He went to DOCTOR school for that kind of diagnosis.
He was also the first doc to bring up the possibility of someone convening a Medical Evaluation Board if I couldn't get into shape. Which means (most likely) getting kicked out of the military. As if I wasn't already aware of the consequences looming over me these five years, can you just get me out of pain, you cold heartless prick?
After about an hour, the shot kicked in so I could finally stand up and walk normally, though the back was still very tender. But at least I could render a proper salute to those walking by, as opposed to, you know, ants.

I am sick of hospitals, sick of telling the same stories, sick of trying to remember what medications they've already tried. Sick of the time away from my wife and, in some cases, personal expenses that have been required:

• Military Chiropractor
• Traction
• E-stems
• Steroid Injection
• Civilian Chiropractor
• Surgery
• Pool Physical Therapy (Aqua-aerobics with old people)
• Military Chiropractor
• Civilian Acupuncture
• Civilian Massage therapy
• Steroid Injection
• Military Acupuncture
• Steroid Injection
• Chocolate Hydrotheryapy (okay, that was fun)
• Traction (Spinal Decompression)
• Torodol Injection
• Drugs, drugs, drugs, drugs

I think I felt good about myself in 1990. I could run a mile and a half in under 9:30. I looked pretty sharp in uniform. And I had a crush on a girl named Ainsley who lived back in D.C.

Deep Thought III

If you can't roll down your car window, you're not allowed to use the drive-thru service of an eating establishment.

It's a federal law.

Broken

When the Dayton Pain Center pulled me apart on Friday, I think they pulled something.
On Saturday, my back seriously hurt, a sharp pain in the lower-left quadrant. This is different from the usual residual numbness/tingling I feel in my left leg and foot, almost constantly. By Sunday, I could no longer stand fully erect. I was headed to the ER if I woke up the same today, but I could stand, though with some compression and pain. Which got progessively worse as the day went on. At least lying down feels okay and I'm still getting sleep.
I had my annual military physical last week to coincide with my birthday, and although my EKG was fine, my cholesterol was better than it was a year ago, and my hearing and eyesight are still fine, I'm still a sliver of my former athletic self. If slivers were measured in kilotons. The flight doc scheduled me up to see the orthopedic surgeon on base to follow the last of my spine-stretching sessions at the downtown hospital, which have not worked at all, obviously. I always feel worse leaving there than I do going in.

Sometime this year, new neighbors moved in behind me (relative to where the head of my bed is), and while they're not as loud as the guy was on the other side (because they're not around as much), they usually get home around midnight, then make a ton of noise in the room behind mine. I actually knocked on their door to ask them to hold it down on my birthday when they had people over till quarter till one. They also have a very cute little dog the size of a nerf football, but it has been whining for three hours now. I can hear it most nights, carrying on until the owners get home. My white noise machine is right by my head to drown out the poor mite's yelps. I'm going to write them a note to see if they'll trust me with a key to let the dog out when it's sad and loud...perhaps that would be better, they'll deduce, then a noise complaint to the landlord. I'd hate to do that...it's not the dog's fault. Better to have a home than not, better to have owners than not, but sheesh. Not fair to the rest of us to have to listen to that all night every night. Get the dog a friend to keep it busy.

I would say I know just the place, but the Humane Society has pissed me off again. I went to pull my 11-to-12 shift I signed up for two weeks ago to sell low-cost spay/neuter certificates, and saw there was a card table up front just for that purpose. Some lady was finishing up a transaction with two customers, so I waited for her to finish and told some Director that I was reporting for my shift. She started to tell me how to fill out the forms, how to handle credit card purchases, and then the lady finished, so she handed me over to her for training.
"So," she said. "Do you have a veterinarian already picked out?"
"For what."
*blink*
*Blink!* "Ah. No, I'm a volunteer, and I'm here to do what you were doing."
"What? I thought I was here until 1 or so."
The director went to check the schedule, and sure enough, there I was, 11-12, with no one signed up from 10-11 or 12-1. So this random lady randomly assigned herself or whatever so I told her if she wanted to stay she could, I had other things I could be doing. Like trying to stand.

Sell Me Your Nuts

As I mentioned earlier, the Humane Society is selling low-cost spay and neuter certificates Saturday through Tuesday, and I signed up for a shift on Monday to man a table for the RUSH of people expected to stop by to purchase them. Yesterday I also picked up a couple flyers to distribute out at AFIT.
As I was putting one up on the bulletin board students use to sell things or advertise homes for rent, Rob saw me:
"Whatcha selling, Dan?"
"Ovaries, actually."
Rob seems to know me well enough that that answer didn't seem to phase him.

There was another, bigger board across from the bookstore, and I smiled at the cosmic canine irony that the only blank space (honestly!) available to tack up the flyer was next to someone else's advertisement selling puppies at $100 apiece.

One of these is a professional

Samuel


Chudo


Pecorino

...but the other two need to get adopted, so get thine arse collective down to 1661 Nicholas Rd immediadamentay.

Chudo has been there a while. It's a good photo -- he's often up on his crate in his kennel. (He's bouncy.) Asia's still here, but Alaura and Sheba were adopted. And there were a bunch of empty kennels, so that's nice. Walked an energetic tri-color hound named Syllus who scratched my arm from jumping up, and when I put him back in his home, I heard from the next (I thought) empty kennel over a BAM...BAM...BAM...BAM... and saw that it was a dog outside on her run slamming her door over and over with her paw but without the sense to walk through the opening before it shut. I had to go in the kennel to hold the door open. Beautiful dog that looked like a black fox. With one blue eye.
A little cocker spaniel named Suzy Q was a dear, yelping little whines at being petted. And then I met Samuel, listed as being 8 years old, so either he's been a heavy smoker, or I've got the healthiest, robustiest, bestiest 8-yr-old dog in the world back home in Bailey Roo.
But at least I did my good Volunteer Deed of the Day when I informed the staff that Samuel's kennel had both a "Ready for Adoption" tag and a "Not Ready for Adoption" tag. I was asked to remove the latter, which I did with aplomb.

If you're interested in Pecorino, his photographs can be viewed at www.anzenbergergallery.com I saw him in this month's Smithsonian. Basically a dog that a photographer adopted who kept getting in the way of his pictures, so he just started photographing him in everything. Like Europe.

Tom Turkey

The boy's 4-month check-up was today, and he now weighs in at an illustrious 14 pounds and is exactly two feet tall.

Mommy does some right-bicep curls.

He had a hip x-ray to try and see why there sounds like some random clicking in there, but the images seemed to come back okay. So except for having to get some vaccinations, it was an altogether successful visit for the loin output module being.

Virginia is for Lovers

So I will love my lover there, then, for a while longer, on Uncle Sam's dime.
I received my follow-on assignment notification on Friday, and it's what we hoped for when we started this split deployment in May -- a return to home base. I get to mow my own lawn, clean my own toilets, and live like a married couple.
The dogs were very excited to hear the news.
"Yay!"
"Really?"
"Yahoooo!"

I'll be working at Ft. Belvoir, an Army base, for a civilian organization, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (www.dtra.mil), working with all the military services (my boss will be a Marine), and experiencing this thing I hear about called "traffic."
But who cares.
I'd buff the elephant stall at the National Zoo with a Swiffer Stick (TM) and 409 if it meant I could kiss my wife every night.

Birth Announcement

As I reflect on the halfway-to-seventy aging process, I will borrow some profound words from philosopher/songwriter Haywood Banks:

I am older than a lot of famous dead guys
A lot of famous dead guys didn't live as long as me
Oh sure: they accomplished more in a lot less time
But they are dead and what good does that do you?

Heartsafire

Click

It finally hit me.
Starting in Turkey, when I had to leave The Dog (hi, Ann) in the states temporarily, the pet food aisle at the grocery store always made me sad. Here again, since May, every visit to the commissary brought a tear to my cockles while walking past the kitty litter and chewy bones, knowing I didn't have a purr or wag waiting for me when I got home.

Today, for the first time, it was the diaper aisle.

I would bet that shoppers don't usually see grown Majors stick a bottom lip out at a plastic bag of underwear.

Halle Berry Marries Stanley Lujah

It seems someone licks a memory at the Humane Society.
The volunteer sign-in book was moved for the third time, but I found it in a corner of the office labeled "Volunteer Central", and it had announcements to us about updating our applications, future volunteer opportunities, and new dog socialization forms they're using.
And a majority of the kennels had little cards attached with the dog's names written on them!
And look! Pictures of dogs -- not kennels! Enjoying a walk or at least some fresh air or sticking a happy tongue out! With nary a fence! Asia, Alaura, and Sheba say "thanks!"



I also walked two big dogs, Frank and Marley, a Lab/Shepherd mix and Wine More Hiner, who nearly tore my shoulder out of the socket, so I balanced it out with a jack russel terrier and a wee puppy cattle dog that I just carried into the back yard to run around and lick my nose.
(Fiffer was gone, but the name was still on the cage... forgot to ask after him.)
I pet some kitties in the non-spa room, signed up for a shift to sell low-cost spay & neuter tickets on 27 Feb, and left that place much happier than I had in a long while.

Making Macroeconomics Fun

Because it's not quite difficult enough to understand the material in English, economists also tend to throw in a latin phrase or two just for kicks, such as ceteris paribus (loosely translated as: all other things remaining the same), ex post (after the fact), and ex ante (before the fact).

Our professor had built some slides for us and the title of one of them was trying to relate the fact that Investment is always equal to Savings after the fact, but it appeared as:

• I=S ex post

He had trouble moving on from there.


...What are we, twelve?

Thank God They're Gone

I am so glad to be by myself again. All that conversation and comfortable sleep and love can get to a guy.
It was actually good timing that they left on Sunday; Monday morning at 3:38 the building's fire alarm went off. As opposed to the annoying beep of my personal smoke detector from a few weeks ago, this was a screeching wail that could have probably been heard in Cincinnati and would no doubt have damaged my son's personal growth.
Once I hit my clock alarm, white noise machine, lamp, desk, anything to make it stop, I finally got up and put some sweats on to investigate. Since my apartment is primarily made up of

• A) Cement,
• B) Metal, and
• C) Sprinklers

and I was neither hot nor drenched, I figured it was some post-Super Bowl partied-out drunk yahoo who had pulled an alarm for fun before leaving the building, bringing me back to Freshman year at college, where fire alarms were a thrice-nightly event. I crawled into a ball on the couch, stuck my fingers in my ears, and waited for the fire trucks to arrive and assess the situation and please make it stop.

It has also dropped into the 20s and 30s after being relatively niceish during their visit, so again, good timing all around for the boyo's first plane trip. Though his first night he woke up with a funny asthmatic breathing pattern that had us worried for a second. It was as if his nose had the hiccups. But he stopped after a while.

He seemed to recognize me, and I enjoyed being able to get him to go to sleep in my arms after fussing in his crib, but Daddiness still feels temporary and sporadic.
Roll on, President's Day weekend.

Hello I've Been Here Thirty Times

I couldn't volunteer today because we had an afternoon briefing scheduled at school, but I had a short time to show the Humane Society to the visiting family. The wife was very impressed with the new open-safari cat room, basically a free-roam area with about twenty cats comingling with a half-dozen different structures and trees and houses and ledges to climb in and on and through. It was raining pretty hard out, so I didn't walk any dogs, though I did let Asia out for a quick tinkle (she had that look). But the Rottweiler's cage was empty. "That's good news!" my wife offered.

I went up to the front desk. The people I know/knew are still gone, so I assume they've quit or have been laid off. Still, I asked the kennel manager where "my" Rotty went.

"Oh, are you the one who brought him in?"

First of all, NO dammit I VOLUNTEER HERE EVERY WEEK and NO I DIDN'T BRING IN A HALF-STARVING ABUSED DOG AND AM ALL OF A SUDDEN WONDERING HOW HE'S DOING WITH A BRIGHT CHEERY SMILE AND A THREE-MONTH OLD SON ON MY ARM. WHERE THE HELL'S THE DOG.

The lady just shook her head.

"...what?"

"He kept growling at people," she said.

"Never growled at me."

"Me, neither. Well, after he jumped on me that one time, and I told him to quit it. But (some vet) went in to listen to his heart and he even growled at him."

So he's dead now. The dog who nuzzled my shoulder and leaned into my hand and wagged his tail and said hello to me with his eyes and was getting healthier by the day was deemed scary dangerous because he -- bit? No. -- growled from his kennel in the lonely corner in the back. Any of the staff take five minutes to get to know him? Take him out for a stroll? Get him adopted? Call Rottweiler Rescue? Let me say goodbye? Anything?

In Colorado Springs, they had hundreds of pets and euthanized countless per day. I don't know how my wife stood it. But there, a kennel with an unadoptable dog in it was taking up space that an adoptable one might be able to use. It made sense. It was fair. Here? Four empty cages. Someone just gave up. That's not humane. That's just easy.


I'll be back next week. There was a scared dog up near the front that needs attention, Asia needs to lose some more weight, Fiffer still needs to learn some manners, Sheba too, and this one and that one...

In the Neighborhood

Apparently, mi espousa hadn't read the memo about military members being allowed past security to meet family members, so she was a mite surprised to see the Big Fella.

Although I think there's also a rule about being allowed to pick up babies, too (I'd brought a stroller in, on the offchance that Ryan was sick of being a fannypack).

He seemed to know my face from somewhere. Perhaps my wife shows him pictures. No problems with air pressure or turbulence (though his bowels didn't appreciate the altitude change, apparently), and his only issue was not getting enough sleep on the plane because they were parked right underneath the intercom speaker. Stoopid announcements.

Well, it was bound to happen, in our household: his feet are turning into paws.

Desserpointing

You go to Kentucky.
Granted, it's not Tuscalooga, Alabama, nor am I even sure such a town exists, in the deep deep south, but the girl holding the door open at Applebees did say "Ha" when she probably meant "Hi." So we are definitely southwardesque. And not in North Dakota any more ya sure betcha.

I drove down there Friday to tour a Civil War battlefield in Perryville (pop: 8) for research on a paper I'm doing, and stayed in a B&B in nearby Danville (pop: old). On my way back into Dayton, I was stopping by some friends' house for dinner, so I thought I would bring a Kentucky dessert from Kentucky, only the proprietors of the Golden Lion B&B couldn't think of what that would be. They suggested I try the nearby bakery, and they, too, to a man and woman, were stumped. "uh...How about cherry pah?" one suggested. I kermit-grimaced. "There's nothing here that is just well-known in Kentucky?" "Let me check with (someone) in the back..." I was very excited for them. "See?" I said. "Next time someone asks the question, you all will know!" The girl came back. "He said they're ALL Kentucky desserts."

Sheesh.

I didn't know what to expect, but I still felt like I was in the south, and the south is known for its desserts:

• Georgia: Peach cobbler
• Texas: Pecan Pie
• Florida: Key Lime pie
• Mississippi: Mud Pie
• Louisiana: Crab Cakes
• Arkansas: Doughnuts and Schlitz

I went with the Butterscotch Cream Pie, since it sounded pretty scrumptious.

I have petitioned the guvnunh to make it the Dessert of Kentucky. Though my friends' 19-month-old's signature is kind of hard to read, what with the butterscotch smudges.