ellenspictures

Author: Hope Never Vanishes

  • Who Nose?

    Who Nose?

    Not mine but somebody else’s sinuses…

    I always since fifth grade and probably before that have had “sinus trouble”. I remember the big green pills that looked kind of like M&M’s that I had to take to help with this when I was a kid. I think that if you live where we do, everyone pretty much deals with this eventually because we have the humidity + crap in the air + lots of pollen and basically, the human nose and our animals, too, eventually go “snotty” and get clogged up and damaged so something gives.

    In my case it was a torrential nose bleed. Holy shit! One box of Kleenex later and the bathroom looked like a crime scene! Couldn’t get it to stop no way no how. Didn’t have the right “spray” to stop it. Squeezed my nose as the “inter-google” told us. Hubby drove me to the 24-hour pharmacy to get some of the “right spray”. Bleeding so much that I couldn’t get the spray to the source of the bleed. By that time it was coming out both nostrils! Holy crap!

    Ended up in the ER, with my blood-pressure raised so much it was like somebody gave me a cortisol cocktail with a side-car of adrenaline! The nurse said, “honey, calm down”… Sure. All my blood is coming out of my nose and you want me to calm down… Right-o! Not.

    Eventually, the nurse gave me a nose plug device, and a cold pack to put across my nose, and the bleeding calmed down. The doc came in after an hour or so, and checked me out. He told the big nurse to jam the Dristan up my nose and with three squirts in each nostril, after a bit, the bleeding slowed to a trickle whereby at that point, I think I could have used a transfusion… They said, “you didn’t lose as much blood as you think.” I thought, “you didn’t see the bathroom!”

    And no, hubby had nothing to do with this other than to be so kind as to drive me to the all-night pharmacy, and then to the ER and sit and wait for hours with me until I was cleared to go home… He is a saint. That’s the plain truth of this story.

    Next chapter. After deeper examination, I ended up going to a specialist. At the second visit, a CT scan of my sinuses was performed. I have a long list of “issues” that come with long term damage – probably not the worst they’ve seen, but probably not the best either… So I am lined up for a “nose job” – to correct the deviated septum (warped), and open up the circuitous clogged passages that look like some sort of video game maze quest for treasure tunnels…

    Apparently, after about a week or so, I should be good to go after they open things up with these little balloons that they poke up in there and “push” these passages open, and tell them “stay”, which apparently they do. Not sure what the procedure is with straightening the crooked septum – some sort of electrical thingy they use, apparently…

    And there are these things that hang down that have gotten over-sized that they are going to “trim” somehow. I dunno, but I hope they know what they are doing! I’m sure they do thousands of these because everyone here suffers and the ones who just can’t stand it anymore go and get this done.

    Someone who had this done told me how it went for her, but that was five years ago and well… you know, things get “different” in medicine. It’s not like it used to be, that’s for sure. I’ll find out soon.

    I’m here to tell you that if I reach this point, I’m there, dude, and I have and I am. Hubby asked, “will there be bruising?”, and I said, “God, I hope not!” I think he is worried about appearances, LOL!

    Just tell them I had a “nose job”. It’s the truth.

  • It is the day we say farewell to 2022. Good riddance.

    It is the day we say farewell to 2022. Good riddance.

    For now, let’s look at the political scene.

    It’s crazy, still, but it looks like people are coming to their senses that the orange orangutan is radioactive. Slowly. 2023 will bring more to this ongoing saga. For those of us who are in our later decades, we really are stunned at what has happened.

    We also have a shocking situation in Ukraine, with a bully madman having attacked in March, trying to seize what they had no rights to seize. Simple land grabbing via military attacks. They are not winning. The Ukrainians are fighters and clever. It is going to be a long bloody war. Senseless. Devastating. Insane.

    large group of people holding banner on supporting ukraine
    Photo by Mathias P.R. Reding on Pexels.com

    Eyes on Europe and the UK, where leadership in different countries shift. France remained stable barely. Italy is now under a government that may turn back pages in history. The UK? What a mess. Since Brexit, there has been nothing but an unfolding debacle with monkeys driving the train off the bridge.

    Now, the weather.

    Wind patterns and temperatures from NASA satellite images and sensors – vectors overlaid

    We had our second-most severe cold weather outbreak over Christmas, following a summer of hellish heat. We saw a monster hurricane devastate Florida. We’ve seen fires continuing in parts of the US and we watched Europe suffer horrid heat this year. The planet is changing rapidly as scientists predicted it would, and at a faster rate than predicted. This threatens food supplies, health, and welfare of all people everywhere on the planet.

    Politicians don’t do the right thing. Climate deniers block funding for solutions designed to shore up infrastructure that has been damaged or that is degrading due to age. Each time there is a cold snap they retort that climate change is not real. There is a personality pattern that has been identified that shows the complexity of what makes these people deniers. The big question is will they ever relent before we totally destroy our home. It’s not looking positive on that note.

    Creepy Disease Outbreaks.

    SARS-CO-19

    We’ve endured nearly three years of coping and mitigating SARS-CO-19 and all its variants. We are “vaxxed to the max” which has helped us avoid hospitalization with this disease. We’ve seen how miserable and scary this disease can be – and how unpredictable. We still are hearing about the unfolding long lasting effects. With every little ailment, we don’t know if it’s a long symptom or injury from the virus or something else unrelated.

    And in 2022, we’ve seen the emergence of influenza and now RSV that not only is attacking kids, but adults, too. It worries scientists and world leaders as the response was not stellar and was variable across the world. This does not help get control early before deaths become widespread. China has failed. Some countries have given up. Some have fared better than others. It’s a story that is a cautionary tale.

    What’s Positive?

    Always the dragonfly is a symbol of hope and survival.

    Hope remains. Living one day at a time, hoping for better times and doing what we can to make those happen. What do we look for? Signs of health. Signs of sanity. Signs of happiness. Signs of peaceful coexistence. Are we idealistic? Yes. Someone has to be. But we are also pragmatic. We are going back to drawing and maybe painting, but beginning with drawing, at least. Got some pastels from Santa – a lovely set of Conte’ pastels. Let’s see what happens.

    Happy New Year! Bring on 2023.

  • Very cold and crazy. At the holidays. Is it a gift?

    Very cold and crazy. At the holidays. Is it a gift?

    “White Dog on Snow” – The 2021 Freezeageddon – we are missing this girl this year.

    This holiday season started off as normally as it could. But then. The super-winter-weather-bomb cyclone event named Elliot (like a winter Hurricane) – the swooping down of the Arctic Vortex like this has caused havoc for millions of people this holiday:

    That is where it is today – and let’s just say people in places along the yellow and above that are freezing their asses off or buried in snow today.

    So, as you might expect, this is doing a big number on the US power-grid. Thanks to the tracking by the good folks at United States Power Outage Map – you can see for yourself at any given moment. Today’s winners are North Carolina, Tennessee, and Maine, with South Carolina and New York as runner-ups. Our famous Texas ERCOT grid, which promised full capacity is apparently still not there yet – oops. To be fair, part of Texas is actually in the MISO grid, but you would never hear the “dear gubner of Texas” say that out loud.

    Today’s power outage winners – a high level view of who is in and who is out of power on the morning of Christmas Eve 2022. Yesterday it was awful as Elliot has moved eastward across the USA – leaving freezing cold temps and/or precipitation for some.

    An important bit of research was published in September of 2021 in Science Magazine Linking Arctic variability and change with extreme winter weather in the United States | Science – with an explanatory infographic that tells the historical story of the Arctic and the influence of the big melting that is causing the shifts.

    So, where is Santa in all this?

    Current 10:47 AM look at where Santa has been already and where he and his sleigh are headed next…according to the Google Santa Tracker https://santatracker.google.com/

    Again, Google’s Santa Tracker gives us the view of where Santa is at the given moment on Christmas Eve having already begun his journey over 24 hours ago… Looks like he is over Russia at this hour. We’re not going to explain why “Vladdie P” isn’t getting a visit. That’s just obvious. But all the good children will certainly have the magic of Christmas wherever possible. Let’s hope that Santa encounters no issues as he works his way west to complete his journey! He has lots of experience, so we would expect that he knows the ropes, despite the climate change woes.

    For us here, it is small gatherings with family and friends. Colder than usual. No precipitation. Just riding the waves of memories of Christmases past and per my usual I hope for Peace on Earth and for people to get along better than they have been of late (and I’m talking about the whole wide world, not that I’m doing anything but feeding my hopes into some sort of pleading prayer stream…).

    OK, I was excited about something, but not sure what Dad was thinking!

    I am moved to write when I get to this time of year. Lots of the flowing memories and anxieties that come with the celebration of what this is all about.

    Sweet Jesus

    I am thankful for the gifts of the people in my life. For those who have left us, I am grateful that at least I had them in my life for the period of time that was meant to be a part of my role in this ongoing theater of life on Planet Earth. I am missing my people who are not here. Every year I miss them all the time. Guess this is just part of living…

    Happy Holidays to All!