Livers, work and superstition

A housekeeping note: I’ve now added links to my index page for all my song paradies. So, for those of you with particularly masochistic tendencies, you should find my little ditties easy to locate and enjoy again and again and again. For those of you with better evolved self-preservation behaviors, you now have a list of pages to avoid.

Tomorrow I get tapped again. I’m not nearly as uncomfortable as I was for the last paracentesis sessions, but it definitely is time to lose this fluid again. Unfortunately, the weather forecasters are calling for snow tomorrow, potentially up to five inches. How much they are actually predicting depends on which forecaster you listen to; I’ve heard variations from one to five inches for my area. It’s a long drive to the hospital, and I hope it’s closer to the one inch than the five inch prediction.

I have problems at work at the moment. A department I work closely with has three managers in it that I refer to as “The Three Stooges”. Their antics would be funny, if they didn’t impact adveresly on my job so often. Well, “Moe” took it upon himself about half a year ago to reclassify a certain set of animals we work with here. This caused me to treat the animals under one security level when they should have been treated on a different security level. The Feds found a problem with one of these “reclassified” animals a few weeks, back. I discovered what The Three Stooges were doing when I investigated the problem. The ramifications could be very bad, and the post-digestive food products hit the beanie-cap propeller tomorrow, when I’m not in. I spoke to my boss about the problem this afternoon, so that I won’t be torpedoed (too badly) while I’m not there to defend myself tomorrow. It sounds like Mr. Bossman is taking my side completely, but I still wish I were going to be in the meeting where this problem is going to be brought up. The Feds aren’t aware yet of our little “reclassification” problem, and they are not going to be happy when they learn of this.

The liver transplant waiting list has been updated through 31 January 03 now. I’m creeping ever closer to the top. To my uncertain knowledge, my MELD score remains at 18.

Liver: 416

Liver Status 7 (Inactive): 43

Liver MELD / PELD <10: 246

Liver MELD / PELD 11-18: 116

Liver MELD / PELD 19-24: 11

This means eleven people ahead of me for sure, plus what ever 18’s have been on the list longer than I have.

For some reason, I have gotten it into my head that I know the date I’m going to get the call from the hospital. It’s ridiculous, I know. I do not believe in prescience, and if I did I still don’t believe I have any gift for it. But I still can’t avoid the feeling that I’m going to get the call on March 21st. Since that is the sixth anniversary of the day I nearly died from heart failure, I suppose it makes sense that I put this absurd emphasis on the date for other weighty matters as well. I still feel a bit silly about it. And, truth be told, if I don’t get the call that day, I’m going to be a tad disappointed.