Fever and Excitement

Yesterday I woke up feeling far more fatigued than I had the previous couple of days. I thought it was just lack of sleep but then I realised that I was feeling more than a little feverish too. I was grateful for the 24 hour contact line that my temp agency has and called in to let them know I'd be late because I needed to go and see a doctor. The call took much longer than it needed to because my teeth were chattering throughout which made me a little hard to understand.

Against Mum's advice I drove myself to the doctor (didn't want to wake Dad up and I'd already woken Gene up at silly o'clock to confirm my fever). After he noted my visibly swollen lymph node but otherwise healthy self he decided it would be best to rule me out for a strep infection and thus I'm on erythromycin. I must admit the anti-biotics are knocking me around about as much as the fever was but hey it's only been two days of the course and my lymph node is looking much better. More to the point it's feeling better because I can't see it sticking out from my neck anymore.

So two days of bed rest has me ready to head back to work. Mainly so I can finish up my temp contract and runaway to my next job which is with the Darwin Festival. Yay! I leave in just over a week and I can't wait!

Unexpected

First day back behind a desk today and it was a little different to what I expected. My brief involved helping to catch up on a backlog of typing and answering overflow phone calls. Today I ended up being the receptionist which involved a lot more switchboard operation (woo hoo new skill!) and very little typing.

Still it was probably just as well because I was a little sleepy having stayed up far too late last night.

I'm working on Bridge Road conveniently within walking distance of the Ishka warehouse. Mmmmm pretty clothes!

Anyhow I've promised myself an early night's sleep and as it's already 23:51 I'd better get to bed before I turn into a pumpkin.

Small Amusements

I've been hhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifaving a little trouble getting to sleep lately. So I've taken comfort in the vast resource of entertainment that is the Internet.

From the evil laugh activated hand drier to the Death Star-esque building proposed in the UAE, there are hours of entertainment to be had.

Other current internet haunts include:
LibraryThing - where I'm in the slow process of cataloging my books
TwitterLit - First lines of books
The Anticraft - somewhat alternative craft... probably not something to show your folks!
Wired Magazine
Knitty - if only to be indecisive over my next potential knitting project

Tomorrow I'm thinking of heading to the Leica Gallery in Collingwood to check out the Qatar Migrant Workers photographic exhibition. I think I recognised a couple of the guys we worked with in Doha...

We'll see how that pans out when I eventually crawl out of bed.

Just Breathe

Mum didn't come home tonight. Her blood sugar levels are refusing to get off their roller coaster so her surgeon wanted to keep her in for observation. She's in good spirits though all things considered.

The good news is that they only had to do the biopsy once today to get the tissue they needed. We even have results. They're less good but at least we know, the tissue is cancerous. I think Mum will be seeing the oncologist tomorrow to discuss treatment options. Mum called to let us know just after 9pm. Dad's at the hospital with her now and I'm at home doing a call around, manning the phone, minding the dogs and just breathing.

It's not Thursday

It's always reassuring when you get a call from the hospital asking to speak to your Mum when she's actually admitted to the hospital... Anyhow, I guess they don't really talk interdepartmentally much! We should be picking her up from the hospital soon though so all's well.

Now all that remains is more me to convince myself that it's Wednesday and not Thursday. My siesta yesterday after the job interview was enough to convince my brain that it was Wednesday last night... Silly rabbit!

Temp Extraordinaire

I never sleep well when I'm worried I won't wake up in time for an appointment the next day. As a result I was up and in the car to the train station four hours after I fell asleep. Not quite the state of zen I was aiming for in today's interview but it went well regardless.

I may well be the only customer service/data entry/secretarial/admin/teller temp with a fork lift license at the agency...

All was well and by the end of the day I've got my first assignment starting next week. (The one starting tomorrow fell through). Bring on the typing and phones! I want to get my typing speed back up to the 80wpm (words per minute) I used to be at. Down at 68wpm at the moment.

It's good to have something to do again. Something to keep me busy till I find more exciting things or August comes around for Fringe... which ever happens first!

Mum's in hospital for one more night as she's having a biopsy tomorrow there. It seemed easier that way. She's definitely home tomorrow after meeting with her dietitian. No results on her blood tests just yet but I think she's just happy to be coming home again.

Eep! Got to run. Almost time to go to work again!

A Longer Post for a Shorter Day

First day back in a theatre today and it was a good feeling. Bump ins are good fun, almost as fun as bumping out...

It was a slow starting day beginning with a hot shower that I'm grateful for as Dad didn't have hot water due to a black out. I was less awake than I thought I was as I managed to stick my right index finger partway into the toaster in an attempt to retrieve my toast. Unsurprisingly this resulted in a small burn on the right side of my finger. Sadly despite my first aid training the first thing I did was swear and blow on it before thinking (quite literally) what the hell are you doing you idiot, run it under cold water! Which I did. It didn't help. Stupid burn. The chilled water made it a bit better but eh... give it a few days.

After work I headed to Knox to get a pressie for my cousin Nadia who's birthday is on Sunday and to pick up a couple of headbands for Mum. I also picked out my birthday books using the voucher from my family in Canberra. I ended up with A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian by Marina Lewycka, A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon and another book who's title escapes me but has something to do with time lords from memory (not Dr Who).

Armed with a bagful of books I headed to the hospital to visit Mum. She was in fine spirits and was sure to let everyone know that she was feeling much better and was ready to go home. We're still waiting for the blood test results to come back but the specialist/surgeon seems fairly confident that she can come home tomorrow. In true Mum fashion she's already packed and ready to leave. Ever the organised one in our house!

Tomorrow is a long day of spending QT with Mum and trying to catch up on sleep, bookended by a job interview in the morning and a bump out late that night. It's good to be busy again. If only for a day!

Mum's Sad Pugs

Mum's back in hospital after a feverish night last night. They're running more blood tests to her disdain as she's a little over having needles. Not to mention how unimpressed she looked when they came up to her with a drip.

Anyhow, they're concerned that there could be an infection so she's on antibiotics while the tests are done.

She's still in good spirits though and claims that she could go ballroom dancing right now. We told her that it's a little late in the evening for that. Spoil sports I know...

The pugs however know that something's up and were unimpressed that we left with her and returned home without her.

Sad pandas!

Hitting the Town

Last night Gene & I decided to hit the town (the cinemas at Eastland anyway) and see a movie. It's been awhile. Hot Fuzz was the last thing we saw and that was in Geelong. We're slowly moving closer to the CBD in terms of distance...

There really wasn't much on. We could have gone to see Spiderman 3 but it was a Friday night that screamed annoying teens in the cinema so we chose to see The History Boys.

The basis of our decision were the billboards and the big bright signs we'd seen for it in London's West End earlier in the year.

Tickets in hand we entered the cinema to find ourselves the youngest audience members by a clear 40 years.

Still, it was a great show. There were parts which seemed very theatrical and I'm keen to read the play script now. In fact we're both wishing we'd seen it on stage as I can see how it may have worked a little better. It was different watching a show with an audience that's at least a generation older than you. Hearing the different points of laughter (compound adjectives and all) and the similar points.

Being the party animals that we are, we're heading out again tonight to a swing ball to dance the night away. Should be good!

A Pug's Life - Keep On Rolling

Click on the images to make them go big! :)

Staples & Yarns

Today started as many do with Mum & I on the couch knitting & crocheting. Admittedly mine started much later than hers did as I was attempting to catch up on the sleep I didn't get over the weekend.

After a quick lunch we headed back to the hospital to catch up with the surgeon for the latest round of results. Oh and to get the staples/stitches removed. Having never seen staples being removed from a wound (or surgical staples in general) it was interesting and odd all at the same time. I think the removal of stitches was more painful to watch and I'm not sure why...

So the important news is that the results are looking pretty good. Fairly normal in fact. There are still a few cells that they're concerned about but it's looking relatively good. They'll do another biopsy and try to get a few more cells but if the results are still inconclusive I think they'll just monitor the tumour. So far there's no treatment required. Mum's pretty happy about that part!

Staples removed we hit the shopping centre to pick up some wool (because clearly we needed more). I'd accidentally bought the one ball of the wrong wool for a blanket that I'm crocheting and as I'm halfway through... I've also started working on the Sudoku throw rug that Mum and I are making for the couch. Photos soon I promise!

The Little Things

Mum's looking better with each passing day and even though she had her biopsy today she was still pretty cheerful.

Dad and I were with her when her lunch arrived.



It was so good to hear her laughing again. Even if she was holding her stomach in slight pain to do so. You see, the spoon in the picture is actually a tea spoon. While she had ordered a small serve she wasn't quite expecting it to be that small.

I think she's looking forward to coming home to a home cooked meal!

Spunky Medical Staff

I spent most of the day at the hospital with Mum today. The remainder of my day was spent rushing around the house failing to find various items that Mum was after as well as the car keys. Happily the car keys were located (down the side of the couch where most lost things go). The crochet hook is still M.I.A.

She's much happier today and I think a fair bit of that has to do with her having had her first meal in four days. Mum's also been moved to the bed by the window which is a little nicer. We're considering holding the dogs up to the window to say hi to her :)

Many thanks to all who have called, visited etc. It's all greatly appreciated and Mum's in good spirits.

The specialist came to see her today (spunky dresser) and is organising another biopsy tomorrow as the second lot of tests on the tumour have come back as inconclusive. So it's back to CT-scan-land tomorrow.

Must say it was cute medical staff night tonight... rather cute nurse attending to the room opposite Mum's. Anyhoo... must go and do something productive like watch the Gilmore Girls episode that Gene taped for me.

Happy Beanie Smart Cookie

Yesterday was Gene's birthday. I was not as prepared for celebrations as I'd planned to be as it's been a big week at home. (I keep saying that but the weeks seem growing exponentially).

I started and have already failed my attempt for 1 photo per day. No matter it's the quality over quantity thing I say! I will share two photos though.

The view from my window:


Dad's first finger-knitting experience:


Dad learnt how to finger knit earlier this week and what you're seeing in the picture is a headband he made for Mum.

Further finger-knitting explorations have been put on hold as Mum went into hospital on Friday. Turns out she has a lesion or tumour on the head of her pancreas (might not be diabetic after all). So she went in for surgery on Friday where they removed her gall bladder (neither of my parents have gall bladders now) and bypassed the ducts that had been blocked by the growth. Sadly they couldn't remove it as there were too many surrounding blood vessels. So they took a biopsy and we'll know the results today or tomorrow. It's looking like she'll go for radiotherapy when she's better. Mum's still in hospital, probably till the end of the week but she's recovering well with her sense of humour well in tact.

While I'm sure other things happened this week I can't recall them. Priorities and all!

So it was Gene's birthday yesterday and I was unprepared. The space invader socks have proven far more time-consuming than I had bargained for and I had to start again with finer wool and less time. The short-row knitted beanie that I'd started for him was gigantic. It was looking a bit disastrous. I had to resort to plan B - making it up as I went along. In the end there was a large cookie cake (think two cake sized cookies with chocolate-cream-cheese icing) and a crocheted beanie. Why the cookie-cake? When I was at uni in Ballarat in one of my end of semester assessment interviews the topic of Gene came up and one of my lecturers said that Gene was a smart cookie (I was a good fish apparently). As for the beanie it was crocheted quickly in Gene colours as he said he'd lost his Barcelona beanie.

Happy Beanie Smart Cookie! I hope you still had fun even though you had to work last night!