It’s been way too long since I posted here. I hope to post more frequently.
Why haven’t I posted for several weeks? One reason: I’ve been ill for three weeks, culminating in five days in the hospital. (If you go to the site, my room was the middle one on the second floor: just above the apostrophe in "it’s." I had a very persistent pneumonia.
I also had intravenous fluids, including lots of antibiotics. Frequent breathing treatments accompanied the usual check of my "vitals": blood pressure, temperature, oxygen saturation in my blood, pulse. I’m pleased to report that my pulmonary function test (not an easy procedure) showed my capacity to be "normal" for a man of my age, height, and weight.
Anyone who’s spent days and nights in a hospital knows that one’s mortality is foregrounded, even though one’s illness isn’t critical. I had plenty of time to reflect on diet and exercise and make decisions about refinements and changes. Other patients’ coughs and moans punctuate one’s sleep; the med evac helicopter tends to come and go at intervals throughout the night.
I received very good care from the nursing staff, my doctors, and the technicians in various laboratories. The meals were against the stereotype of how awful hospital food is; the food was plentiful and reasonable good, with the exception of some unfortunate vegetables.
Decades ago, I worked in two hospitals (Mt Zion Medical Center in San Francisco and Newman Memorial Hospital in Emporia, Kansas) as an orderly in Central Supply. That lead to two or three interesting conversations with nurses, including one of the younger nurses, who was astounded that we used steel needles that I cleaned, sharpened, packaged, and sterilized. "You’re showing your age!" she said. But I don’t need to talk about steel needles to show my age.
Five days essentially away from computers and news was a real vacation. Actually, the hospital is very computerized. Everyone but housekeeping and the doctors came into my room with a computer. But I didn’t have to use them. The hospital’s Web site says it won "Health Care’s Most Wired" for 2007. I believe that. There is even WiFi for patients, but after one very tiring session with my laptop, I sent it home. (As you can tell, now that I’m home, it’s hard to stay away from the computer, but it does tire me, so that’s it for now.)