Boring medical stuff

Ya know something? I think I'm running out of cheerful on medical stuff. This morning, as I lay in bed, I found myself writing and rewriting a letter to my surgeon, telling him just how annoyed I was at him for violating the spirit of our agreement not to keep my incision open for extra poking. Actually, I was downright angry. His explanation, as best I can remember from talking to him before being discharged from the hospital, was that he didn't keep the incision open, just the catheter in the groin, so that they could look at the heart from that direction, and there was much less chance of infection from that. Well, that is true. BUT. He kept me under anesthesia for several hours longer than expected, giving me a much worse case of post-surgical amnesia than expected (which is especially upsetting to a control freak such as I am), as well as worrying the hell out of squirrel_magnet, waiting out in the waiting area - and waiting, and waiting... Yeah, I am pissed off about that. I'm going to let the letter simmer in my brain for a few more days, refine it to shorter and more civil while still being firm and pointing out the negative consequences of his actions, so probably around next Monday I'll be ready to put it into hard copy and mail it to him.

Meanwhile, however, I will admit that I'm doing OK now. The incision itches, a sign of healing. The shoulder and arm don't ache too much; I haven't needed any aceteminophen (generic Tylenol) at all yet today, and I could reach my own seat belt in the car. Seems entirely likely that I'll be completely able to play the saxophone by next Monday's rehearsal. Just have to be careful on range of motion and weight lifting - I definitely can't carry the bari sax myself for a few weeks; such strain, even if my shoulder doesn't hurt from it, may pull one of the leads slightly out of position.

Other medical stuff on the horizon: starting an active discussion with my doctor and my insurance company over whether it's really safe and sane to stop covering the statin I take, Lipitor, just because one of the other statins is now available in a generic form. Not all statins are identical, nor have all been studied for their synergistic effect in heart failure treatment over and above their main purpose of lowering cholesterol. So I don't think they can be regarded as interchangeable. But, that will require some active intervention from my doctor to justify. Whee.

In other news, we returned some library books today. We have got everything into the new fridge, and reasonably well arranged, and accomplished some other small cleaning and rearranging chores in the kitchen which will make life a teensy bit easier. Things we did not do, which really need to get done soon:

pet store for rabbit and chinchilla food and chinchilla bath dust

hardware store for hardware cloth or chicken wire for enclosing porch for bunny exercise pen

finish Anita's poncho

get hair cut

OK, that's enough.

Cheery meme to offset boring medical stuff

gacked from elfbiter:
[A is for Age:] fifty-mumble
[B is for Beer of choice:] Negra Modelo (one gulp a year)
[C is for career:] none at the moment; vaguely working on music arranger, crochet designer.
[D is for favorite Drink:] jasmine tea, iced
[E is for essential item you use everyday:] eyeglasses
[F is for favorite song at the moment:] all my favorites are long classical pieces
[G is for favorite games:] Tetris clones
[H is for hometown:] depends on your definition. Grew up in near suburbs of New York City.
[I is for instruments you play/played:] Mainly saxophone at the moment, many others through my lifetime.
[J is for favorite juice?:] Tangerine
[K is for kids?:] Cthulhu forbid!!
[L is for last call?:] Various friends making sure I made it out of surgery in one piece
[M is for marriage:] 21+ years to someone whose sense of humor still startles me!
[N is for name of your first true love]: my pet rabbit Oglethorpe?
[O is for overnight hospital stays:] More than I wanted to have.
[P is for phobias:] Yellow-jackets
[Q is for quote:] That Marcus Aurelius quote that lives on my LJ page
[R is for biggest regret:] Never did get serious about playing keyboard instruments
[S is for self confidence:] Depends on time of day, sunspots, etc. - wildly variable.
[T is for time you wake up:] as late as possible
[U is for underwear:] yes, I wear it, what about it?
[V is for vegetable you love:] Most of them, really - even Brussels sprouts. Parsnips!
[W is for worst habit:] Lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy
[X is for x-rays you've had:] refer to answer for overnight hospital stays. Chest x-rays in particular.
[Y is for yummy food you make:] Peach-cherry cobbler
[Z is for zodiac sign:] No Parking