As has become my tradition, with the last Everything But Imaginary before Christmas, I’m running down all the Christmas comics I could get my hands on this year… and this year friends, there are a lot of them! Take a look!

Everything But Imaginary #334: Ghosts of Christmas Comics 2009

Inside This Column:

It was a beautiful big “colonial” clock in Spencer’s, Kodaikanal. I remembered a funny joke: “Hickory Dickory Dock, 3 mice ran up the clock, the clock struck one, and the others escaped with minor injuries!”

Failure overseas rarely results from technical or professional incompetence. Multinationals take their international business seriously and typically send abroad high achievers who have proven skills and expertise. But their success is usually in their home countries, where their skills, style and attitude may be exactly the opposite of what will work overseas. Employees’ ignorance of or inability to adjust to foreign ways are usually what cause problems.

In one country people know in vivid details the colors, designs and sounds that appeal to various customer groups. Careerists climbing the corporate ladder study intently the values and norms that characterize their company’s “culture” so that they can maneuver successfully toward the top. Negotiators approach their bargaining table with a rich understanding of what motivates their adversaries. When it comes to foreigners, however, people see only silhouettes. Overseas many foreign companies approach their customers, colleagues, and employees with an ignorance that would be unthinkable on home ground. They are willing to transact business with foreigners without understanding who they are, what makes them tick, how they view the world and how their corporations. Because they do not look behind the foreign mask, their approach to international business is often like shadow-boxing. They deal with imaginary targets.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

One lesson I learned from Charles Kirk is to always play (on the long side) the strongest instrument available and never settle for less.

I have been focusing on day trading rather than swing trading (which I usually do) and want to take advantage of the volatility in the indexes within the trading range we are stuck in since November.

I have been using the Advancers - Decliners along with the Tick to choose whether I play the Q’s, SPY or the Russel small caps IWM. Notice in the charts below the Zero line and where the indicators are. I also like to plot a 10 or a 20 MA to make it easier to visualize. Today the choice is the SPY as the strongest instrument to play to the upside.

Welcome. I hope you enjoy your time at my blog! As time goes on I will be spouting off about all things that tend to get under my skin.

And the many more topics that somehow I find daily that just ticks me off!!

The Hundreds drop a limited capsule based on their mascot Adam’s rival Badam. “Who’s Badam? If our buddy Adam is a relatively easy-going, nice, happy incendiary device, Badam resides all the way at the opposite end of the spectrum. Badam always looks like he’s seen better days, thanks to his bloodshot eyes and his sour expression.” The Badam tee and Badam New Era fitted hat will be available this Friday at the THLA and THSF stores.

More looks at the Badam items from The Hundreds after the jump.

**WARNING: this is the longest entry I will most likely ever write, and I promise it will get more interesting from here on out. All of the boring history is comprised in this one entry, and after that it will be nothing but fun! (…ok, maybe not.)

The first time in my life that I had what I would categorize as a health issue was at the age of 10, when I began having knee pain. It progressed through age 12, at which point my parents began looking for the source of the problem. Several X-rays and MRIs later, it was determined that there was no visible cause for my pain. I was given my first knee brace in seventh grade.

Around the same time, I developed pain in my stomach that was accompanied by mild nausea. Nothing seemed directly responsible for worsening the pain, but nothing eased it, either. I spent almost half of my time at summer camp in bed, unable to attend events or lessons. Later that Summer when I arrived home, we began seeing doctors to investigate the issue. I was given an upper-GI exam as well as a stomach X-ray, and put on medication to relieve what they determined was IBS. I was medicated for several months, ineffectively, and the symptoms later went away without correlation to the treatment.

When I was 15, I began having more severe pain in my knee, which was also accompanied by back pain, neck pain, and headaches. It was assumed that most of this was caused by wearing a heavy backpack – though symptoms did not improve or worsen based on backpack weight – or stress. Headaches would center around the temples, and often caused pain behind my eyes; this was mostly thought to be due to lack of sleep.

At the age of 16, I lost the use of my right arm for close to four months. I was in 10th grade, and had been developing pain in my wrist, forearm and hand over the course of the calendar year; one day, it got bad enough that I could no longer hold a pencil, brush my teeth, or fasten my pants with my right hand. Several doctors, including a hand and wrist specialist, examined it. I was tested for carpal tunnel, tendonitis, and several other conditions; they determined that there was nothing wrong. I was given a brace for my wrist, and a cortisone injection into my hand. Neither solved the problem (the latter made it worse) and I learned to write with my left hand in order to continue my schoolwork. I was unable to continue playing piano or violin, which I had at that point been playing for close to ten years.

Over the next two years, my symptoms worsened with the addition of sleep issues (severe night terrors, insomnia, restless sleep) and anxiety. I graduated high school with my class, at the age of 18, and moved to Indiana. While there, I frequently had episodes of anxiety, coupled with dizziness, nausea, and bouts of unprovoked depression. I began to have incidences of not being positive where I was – feeling “floaty” or “spacey” – though they were infrequent. I became more sensitive to the cold, and had frequent problems with circulation that resulted in parts of my hands and feet turning white and numb.

Symptoms continued to worsen through the age of 21. I had moved from Indiana back to Philly, lived in several different parts of the city, and moved to Portland, where I currently reside. Two months after my move, I was at work (Starbucks) when with no warning, I became unable to put weight on my left leg. I had shooting, burning pain down the entirety of my left leg, centered in my lower back/left hip area; it felt as though someone was holding one torch under my foot and a second one to my lower back. I was taken to the ER. After a series of questions, the doctors determined that I had Sciatica; I was given a muscle-relaxant and a narcotic and told to stay off my feet for the weekend. Though I don’t remember that weekend, the pain did not stop when the medication wore off.

When, after two months, I was still suffering, I found a doctor and asked for an appointment to assess my body and why I was in so much pain. Several co-pays and a few X-rays later, the doctor pulled out a medical encyclopedia to “show [me] what is wrong with [me].” They had found that the lowest vertebrae in my spine was partially fused to my tailbone, and partially had never formed into bone (i.e., was still cartilage). I will never forget the doctor’s exact words as he leaned against the table in front of me:

“The difficult situation you’re in is that you are going to be in a lot of pain for the rest of your life, and there’s not really anything that we can do to help you.”

After we left the office, my partner and I cried in the car for 45 minutes. In the next few months, I found a pain specialist, in hopes that he would give me more answers and better options for treatment. His theory was that my spinal condition was not responsible for the majority of my pain; instead, he diagnosed me with a combination of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Fibromyalgia. He refused to give me medication or physical supports, stating that it would only make my body weaker. He said that the only way to improve my condition was to be physically active despite the pain. I was running 15 miles a week and working two jobs; he said I should run with weights. I couldn’t win. At one point, I slammed my fist down on the table and told him that I was at the point of having to prop myself up on counters at work in order to remain standing (it was true), and that I wasn’t leaving until he gave me something to help with the pain.

That is how, at the age of 23, I began wearing a knee brace – sometimes two – a back brace, and a brace on one or both of my wrists. I should have been born a robot.

He also tried giving me Celebrex, an anti-inflammatory – which didn’t work – and Lyrica, an anti-seizure drug used occasionally to treat fibromyalgia – which didn’t work – and Tramadol, a mild pain medication – which also didn’t work. I was put on cyclobenzaprine (a muscle relaxant) as a sleep aid, which went quickly from putting me in zombie-mode to landing me in an addiction. I stopped taking it when I realized what had happened. I also stopped going to my appointments with him. In the interim, I saw an orthopedic specialist, a rheumatologist, a neurosurgeon, an infectious disease doctor, and one or two other specialists, none of whom had answers. According to my labs and all of the tests, I was fine. I still couldn’t stand at work without assistance. And at this point, I had paid close to $4000 in co-pays for appointments and medications alone, after insurance.

Midway through the runway march of doctors, I was recounting details of the trials and tribulations of being a medical anomaly when a friend, C, mentioned that my story sounded similar to that of her girlfriend, N. N had been through similar struggles and was diagnosed several years ago with chronic Lyme disease. C told me about how politicized the arguments around Lyme are, but at that point I had no frame of reference for anything. It wasn’t until I stopped seeing my pain doctor that I began to look into the possibility.

I found a doctor in the nearby town of Kennebunk, ME. After one visit, he told me that I exhibited a large number of symptoms of chronic Lyme, and requested to do deeper testing…but start treatment before we even got results. In the six months since I began receiving care from him, we have tried several rounds of medication, including Doxycycline; a combination of Biaxin and Plaquinil; a combination of Mepron and Zithromax, later adding in Flagyl; all with the additional use of Ambien for a sleep aid. Despite several rounds of medication over a six month period, I had seen no improvement of symptoms and was, in fact, getting worse. I had developed neurological symptoms as well, such as short-term memory problems, stuttering, stammering, and general confusion and spaciness. I also developed symptoms similar to those of acid-reflux, whereby any food consumption (as well as times in which I was not eating) caused moderate to severe abdominal pain. Additionally, fatigue had become so unbearable that I had begun spending between 6 and 8 hours a day in bed, not by choice.

After seeing no results, I finally listened to what C & N had been telling me for over a year: I made an appointment with N’s doctor in New York, who is a well-known name in Lyme research and a large believer in the existence of chronic Lyme disease. During my almost-two hour appointment, he took a full medical and personal history, and discussed my current state of being. He said that my history looks like a case file that a class would use for undiagnosed Lyme. He also believes that I have a co-infection called Bartonella, which affects the GI tract and makes it nearly impossible for the body to absorb oral medication, hence why none of the antibiotics had made a difference (he said that I had probably been absorbing around 10% of what I was putting into my body).  He ordered a few more tests, drew a lot of blood, and wrote some prescriptions.

He decided to keep me on Mepron and Zithromax at much higher doses to compensate for the absorption issues. He is also adding an intramuscular medication to bypass the GI tract entirely. Additionally, after arguments with the insurance companies are complete, I will be getting an IV port put in, and will be starting two different types of IV medication – one for four days at a time, the other for three – and will be doing daily IV treatments for probably the next year, depending on if and when my condition improves. I will also be on several supplements including Colostrum, fish oil, a multivitamin, and Diflucan (to decrease the amount of yeast buildup in my stomach from the antibiotics).

I am procrastinating on filling prescriptions, but will hopefully do it within the next few days and be starting the new round of meds within the week – minus the IV, which takes more negotiating. I am excited to eventually feel better, but not feeling too positive about the current state of things. I recognize, however, that I am lucky to have some amazing people in my life, including my partners and parents, who are willing to go to great lengths to make sure that I am okay. You are all amazing, and I am thankful every day for you and your presence. I love you. Thank you.

Next entry will not be NEARLY as wordy, I promise. Just had to get the history down at some point.

Best,
s

(CFD.net.au – Contract for Difference, Share, Forex, ETFs, Commodities Traders) –

October 9, 2009

Concert promoter Live Nation and ticket-seller Ticketmaster, both based in the United States, had announced plans in February to create Live Nation Entertainment – the “world’s premier live entertainment company.”

But on Thursday the Competition Commission provisionally …

Source: British watchdog says opposes Ticketmaster tie-up

People’s Republic of MOZAMBIQUE

stamp: 2,50 escudo

year: 1980

insect: tick – Amplyomma hebraeum

Data: (0 = disabled, 1 = enabled/menyembunyikan icon)

Unless you are really interested in Levi Johnston thinking about posing nude, or Kate Hudson winning the New York Yankees 27th World Series ring, there has not been much going on in the world of pop culture.  So to pass the time until the next big thing, I present to you iClectic iPod: Part 2 brought to you by Apple.

“Don’t Stop Believin’” by the Cast of Glee

I promise you all I did not pick this to start, but I will admit, I cannot get enough of Glee. After watching the pilot episode in the beginning of the summer, I had my doubts about a show that focuses on a school organization that ranks at the bottom of the food chain, but as soon as the cast sang Journey’s most famous track, I knew all was right in the world.

“Gone” by Daughtry

For being someone who co-writes a blog about pop culture, I am not a huge fan of American Idol.  I am not sure why I am not glued to my TV set every Tuesday and Wednesday from January to May; OK, maybe it’s because I am still a little bitter about Clay Aiken losing in the finals of season 2.  Anyway…there have been a select few who I do enjoy listening to, and that does include Chris Daughtry.

“Walkin’” by Miles Davis

And here is where things get eclectic.  Being the marching band nerd that I am, I cannot get enough of that cool jazz sound.  Jazz is one of the very few genres of music that was born right here in the good ole U.S.A., and I feel gets sadly classified in the “noise” category.  Well Mr. Davis surely has done his job in keeping Americans tapping their toes to jump, jive, and wail.

“Me and Mrs. Jones” by Michael Buble

I am going to admit something that I have held inside for a very very long time: I have a huge “man-crush” on Michael Buble.  I don’t need to have his looks, I just want his vocal chords!  No matter what he sings, it’s so good, and soooo cool.  Actually, he is “Mr. Cool”.  With all of the “noise” that you hear on the radio today, I am so glad the 21st Century has its’ own version of Sinatra.  Sure this is a cover, but he sings the pants off of it!!!

“Walking in Memphis” by Marc Cohn

The reason why I love this song?  Two words: Stu Shames.  If you live in the Philadelphia metropolitan-area, you need to get yourself to 2nd Street Annies to see this man.  Formerly the the headline act on Saturday nights at the Piano Bar at 20th and Arch, Mr. Shames keeps you entertained all night long with all the musical greats including “Walking in Memphis”.  Not to mention how do you get “10 feet of the Biel?”

“In the Heights” by the Original Broadway Cast of “In the Heights”

I’m very shocked to see that I am half way through my list of ten, and this is the first Broadway song that has come across my iTunes.  Regardless things continue to get more eclectic.  ”In the Heights”, winner of the 2008 Tony Award for Best Musical, tells the story of the Washington Heights section of New York City.  The show really took Broadway by storm as the music incorporated a unique yet tasteful mix of Broadway classics and rap music.   Here is just a small taste of what you can experience as the show starts its tour in the very near future:

“If Today Was Your Last Day” by Nickelback

I will now pause as you make a sarcastic comment about me liking Nickelback.  Ok, done?  Well I am glad we got that out of the way.  If today was my last day though, instead of listening to this song, I’m pretty sure I’d listen to “Photograph” instead.  Ok, feel free to judge me more.

“All that Jazz” by the Revival Cast of “Chicago”

Well so much for only one Broadway song to be featured in this list.  But this song does hold a special place in my heart as this was the first song I ever played in competitive marching band.  Though, you also got to love it because it features the lyric “I gotta pee!”  Ok, maybe I went to far there…

“Can’t Buy Me Love” by Michael Buble

I told you I had a man crush.  I think is it true, you can’t buy me love, but you could surely buy me tickets to see Michael Buble.

“Louder than Words” by the Original Off-Broadway Cast of “Tick, Tick…Boom!”

“Tick, Tick…Boom!” is the lesser known work of musical theater great and “Rent’ creator Jonathan Larson.  Dubbed as an autobiographical work of Larson’s life, it’s a great rock opera that highlights a pure genius’s life.  For all musical theater lovers out there, I do wonder how the state of theater would be different if Jonathan was still around today.

Wow, I did not really intend to to end things on such a somber note.  I guess that is just the magic of iTunes!

People’s Republic of MOZAMBIQUE

stamp: 3 metical

year: 1980

insect:  tick - Amblyomma pomposum

One of my favorite lyric of all TIME…

“Yes, I am the inescapable, the irresistable,
The unnegotiable, the unchallenged
I scroll in measurements, control the elements,
I hold the evidence, I tell the story
I know no prejudice, I bare no sentiments
For wealth or settlement, I move forward
You can’t recover me, conceal or smuggle me,
Retreat or run from me, crawl up or under me,
You can’t do much for me besides serve
Me well and have good dividends returned to you
Or attempt to kill me off and have me murder you
Many have wasted me but now they are facing me,
Treated me unfaithfully and now endure me painfully
Plaintively, I wait to see what history will shape to be,
Whose hearts will never die inside the sake of me
Angel’s scribe the page for me,
Keep a full account of all the names for me”

[Mos Def's verse in "Hurricane"]

Tick tock…
Chetna

Desde Nueva Zelanda, aquí tenemos la saga de spots para la marca de cereales Hubbards, con cuatro de sus productos más importantes: Balloon Mix2, BB Mix, Power 8 y Tick.

A doctor’s wife is a special kind of person. Since she knows her husband has so much valuable expertise, she takes it upon herself to disburse her husband’s wealth of information generously. That way he’s constantly employed, dispensing dinner-table consultations and over-the-phone prescriptions, even when there’s not a stethoscope in reach.

My aunt is such a woman, so proud of her husband’s abilities that she considers them her own and gives them away as freely as if they were the neighbor’s.

Therefore, when I woke up with bed bugs two nights in a row, my aunt had no sooner seen my face than she had urged her husband to have a look. (If my aunt is the fizzy soda, sugar-sweet and caffeinating, her husband is the pH-neutral ice that, all too often, wonders how he got mixed up in all this action. Beneath that cool composure, however, you know he enjoys the buoyancy his bubbly wife lends him.)

“Is it an allergy? A rash?” She asks, genuinely preoccupied about the patient who, apart from a little itching and a few eyesores, feels fine.

Her husband gives the red hill on my elbow the squinting doctor-eye that, I believe, makes germs shrink with fear. “It looks like a bug bite.” I pull down my sleeve, embarrassed. I could have said as much.

“We don’t know that for sure, Baba.” (They endearingly call each other Mama and Baba. I love them.)

After inquiring after my habits and recent changes in comforters and such, my aunt decides that the culprit may be a bedbug. Since she doesn’t believe in due process with respect to pests, my aunt immediately pronounces the sentence: Everything will be cleaned with laundry detergent, heavy-duty chemical disinfectant and, my personal favorite, the sun. Her husband will, at his earliest opportunity, spray the bed and neighboring wood furniture that may be harboring fugitive ticks.

So, on his only day off from doctoring, my aunt’s husband goes to several stores in hot pursuit of tick poison. As soon as he finds an exterminating product, he gets down to work.

“Spray here, Baba.” My aunt holds a scarf over her mouth. Her husband wields the aerosol can, like a man welcoming battle with open arms.

“They’re not germs, Mama. We would have seen them. They’re not microscopic.” Characteristically, even as he contradicts her, he does exactly what she asks.

“Ah-sant.” She commends his progress. “Nicely done.”

For the next couple days, my windows stay wide open (to hell with safety when the deadly criminal smells are inside) and the fan works non-stop. My mattress gets a tan (or, more accurately, it pales) on the porch table in the backyard, and I cozy up on the couch at night, feeling hopeful that my pest narrative has passed its climax and is nearing a resolution.

Then, I find an ant on my person. Well, that could have done it, I think. Naturally, I keep this observation to myself. It wouldn’t do to undermine the war effort, not this late in the game. No, no.

Then, I discover an adamant mini-mosquito. It has the familiar prowling posture and all the angled legs — only it is ten times smaller than the ones I’m used to. (It makes sense that we, in California, have a super-sized mosquitoes, what with our super-sized meals and all. The Jordanian roach had puzzled me, until I saw globalization personified in the Burger Kings at every turn.)

Back to the tick story.

In defense of my aunt’s original tick theory, I think to myself that perhaps these new fellas — the ant and mini-mosquito — arrived in postdiluvian fashion, after the flood of aerosol intoxicant, when the open windows made my place a hostel for any and all traveling critters.

Nevertheless, I casually mentioned an ant and mosquito to my aunt and her husband tonight. He had been pouring himself a glass of water from the Arrowhead-like water dispenser. At my revelation, the water stopped running and a wicked smile shaped itself on his face, a smile of triumph — one designed especially for my aunt’s enjoyment.

“Just because there’s a mosquito, it doesn’t mean it was a mosquito–” She answered his wordless accusation.

But his self-contented smile rebuffed all proof and explanation. I was a little surprised. Wasn’t he a little resentful that she had put him to all that trouble? If he was, he certainly didn’t show it. His seemed to be a very satisfying glass of water.

As my aunt and her husband continue to flirt about who’s in the right, my mattress sits outside, basking in sun and moonlight.

The reasons for this are twofold. First, I’ve developed a taste for couch-surfing, albeit at my own place and, second, some orphaned stray kittens have massaged my mattress with their dirty little paws and, like baby possums have made a sort of foster mother of it. And, like any good mother, a warm something they can cling to.

I therefore have reason to suspect that my mattress has not only adopted the kittens as a pet project, but also the kitten’s jumpy, blood-sucking little friends.

If the mattress is now the kitten’s mother, it is also my reprobate child, gone away to improve himself, only to return a wasted, errant fool. I’ll see him rot before he lives under my roof again. Or, alternately, I’ll see to it that he’s washed, tidied up and made presentable again — yes, that’s probably what sane people — no, parents — would do.

Sitter här i skymningen 11.30. Och i morgon blir det vintertid. Tillbaka en timme med klockan. Fast hemmets stöttepelare, braumschweigeländet, blir lite kinkig i skiftet. Den vägrar anpassa sig och kan visa vad som helst ett tag. Förra gången blev jag så desperat att jag köpte en ny klocka till badrummet, men så dog köksklockan och då hade lagom braunschweig piggnat till igen, så nu hänger den i köket. Jo, vi har klockor i alla rum. Flera stycken faktiskt. Maken gillar klockor. Alla går, utom väggklockan i rummet med datorn. Det är en gammal eight day clock, den kan slå timslag också, men det tycker t o m maken blir för mycket. Där är vi helt överens.

Picked up two months (7 weeks worth) this week so going to give you a quick summary of the ones I’ve read so far (whole pile of Wednesday Comics waiting, yippee!), in order of excellence.

Adventure Comics (#1-3) — yes, top o’ the list and in the back of the book, Long Live The Legion. And it’s a Legion that includes every character from my wish list, I think — Dawnstar, Wildfire, XS — plus the usual favorites of the core three, Violet + Lightning Lass. Nice little snippets of story; I’m intrigued. And picking up my comics a lot sooner next time. The front of book story involving Superboy is also hitting all the right points — he mostly interacts w/ Krypto at the moment, but the competing list of things Superman and Lex Luthor have done manages to be both humorous + suspenseful. Good job.

Mangalicious Tick (#2,3) — not as funny as I was hoping but I am getting involved with the characters and the story — or maybe I’m just strangely attracted by ninjas…SPOON.

Captain America Reborn (#3) — great to see Namor; I think if they reboot the Fantastic Four movie franchise, they should find a way to involve him. Not sure I’m going to keep reading Cap after the mini series, but it is well written.

Question — back up story in Detective Comics (#856, 857, Annual #11) I wasn’t thrilled with the art in the first one, but I really like the Renee Montoya character. The shorter, snappier back of the book stories seem to be turning out well. Nice work, DC and the creative teams involved.

Nomad (#1-2) Nicely voiced title character, but I think the brainwashing of the high school student body by smooth talkers angle is laid on with too heavy a hand. Great to see The Falcon though. Always liked him.

Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers (#4) — started out fun, totally tanked. Pets never really became anything more than differing styles of dialogue. Lockjaw will always rock, but I won’t be picking up the sequel.

Batwoman (Detective Comics #856, 857 and left out of Annual #11)…ok, the slamming fight scenes covered up for a few issues that people in non fighting poses are ugly or blocky or just don’t look right…there’s no flow without masks and/or hallucinogens and/or cover of darkness. And it’s a shame too because Maggie Sawyer dashed in for an appearance and it’s always good to see her. But especially contrasted with the Question, Batwoman aka Kate Kane seems to be both acting and looking childishly pouty. I don’t like it.

What I’m adding to my pull list: Keith Giffen’s take on The Doom Patrol with the added bonus of the Metal Men back up feature. We can hope it reaches Justice League Europe levels of excellent fun.

my clock is ticking

hours turn into days

days into weeks

time is passing by quick

and i’m sitting here waiting

don’t know if tomorro’ll come

my clock is ticking,

time is running out

took life for granted

waisted precious moments in sadness

in tears and sorrow..

enjoy the day while it lasted I didn’t

but never more..

gonna make the best of what’s left

make it even better than what went..

my clock is ticking

and time is running out

haven’t made a change yet..

when i’m gone, what will ppl remember me by?

just a girl who crossed their way?

or maybe a pain that just washed away?

nothing special about me..

nothing worth remembering..

my clock is ticking,

time is running out..

better start making a change..

to leave my mark..

will spend my last breath trying..

so that when i’m gone,,

i’ll be remembered as the girl who TRIED..

my clock is ticking

my time is running out..

will I be remembered??!

___________

this is a shout out for everyone who’s taking life for granted

start making a change..

make ur life better..

you never know what tomorro holds for you..

start making a change..

so that you’ll live life with no regrets..

Part III of the Tick Bite Fiasco

Back in the drizzly UK, tired from our 1 hour flight delay and 4am return home, I dragged myself out of bed early and phoned the doctors. Keeping out of sun and sea for 12 hours meant that my ankle was no longer swollen and tender, but it was still an angry shade of mauve taupe.  I made an appointment to once again see Doc Bone.

“Been attacked by anymore wild hedges or creepy crawlies?” he jovially asked. “No, but look what happened to that tick bite” I said, hoiking up my jeans leg and showing off my gruesome flesh. “Wow!” he exclaimed “it’s really gone to town on you hasn’t it?!”

Unsure about what exactly had gone to town on me; I explained my Tenerife Doctor ordeal and showed him the drugs I’d been on. As it turns out the antibiotics I’d been taking, Cloxacillin, aren’t usually prescribed in the UK, and wouldn’t be any good against Lyme disease anyway. But Doc B still didn’t think it was anything to worry about. He figured the redness would just go after a few days and we needn’t do anything.

I guess I put up too much resistance or just looked like a terrified little girl, because he eventually promised me he’d look into Lyme disease and check there was nothing he was missing, though he was pretty certain that it wasn’t an issue in the Lake District, or anywhere else in the UK for that matter. I remained sceptical. I had read this.

Two days later he called me on my mobile whilst I was shopping for girlie accessories for my Mother’s 60th Masked Birthday Party. I had a purple mask and, since my ankle was going to match, I darn well wanted earrings, necklace, hair accessories and a belt to match too.

He said that as it turns out the Lake District does have Lyme Disease (le gasp), and while my ankle wasn’t showing the typical bulls eye rash of Lyme Disease, his clever Doctor sites (that us normal folk can’t access – we are just stuck with WORSTPOSSIBLESCENARIO.com) said it’s best to treat any reaction. He suggested that it was ‘just in case’, I wonder if it’s more just to ’shut her up’.

So here I am, currently being treated for Lyme Disease. I’m on a two week course of Doxycycline (not forgetting self-prescribed yoghurts). As if to be sympathetic, or to just Join In The Fun, my little Hamster, Flump, has now come down with a respiratory infection and is also on antibiotics. Poor little mite.

As worried as I was about my own health, I find myself immeasurably more worried about hers. Being a parent is hard.

Part II of the Tick Bite Fiasco

The trip to the doc’s should have been the last of it. Except about a week later, just before my trip to Tenerife, my right ankle – where the Doc had removed Tick #2 – started to itch. Then it started to get red.

I ignored it because I was far too excited about flying out the next day, and couldn’t be arsed to piss about with a trip to the Doctor’s just to be told I had nothing to worry about and be treated like the insane worrier that I am. But then the second day of the trip the redness started going purple and speckly and tender and sore. Panic Stations!

That isn't sunburn.

As soon as they opened the next morning, I went to the local Farmacia. Unfortunately the usual guy who I had been told spoke really good English was not working that day, and instead I had to try to explain the situation to a woman who spoke very little English. Being an ignorant Englishwoman I speak even less Spanish, so this was never going to be a very productive conversation. “Bite”, “itch”, “infection” and “not mosquito” managed to get me a tube of ointment (9 Euros worth) which I was told to apply whenever I felt the need.

Unconvinced by this solution I decided to visit the Doctor when it opened an hour later. So at 10am I, with my 4 friends in tow, I entered the waiting room of the “24 hour” Doctor’s.

It is actually very hard to explain to a person what a tick actually is. To an English speaker, you might say “it is a tiny bug that lives in long grass that bites you and sucks your blood”, but even then most people will assume you mean some kind of mosquito. This is indeed what the Doc thought when I first tried to explain it to her, and she actually told me just wash it with soap. It wasn’t until after we established that the bite was a week old, did she take me into her office to get a closer look.

“You have a bascular reaction,” she kept repeating to me, while shining a tiny torch at the expanding red blotch on my ankle. “Because bite one week old, I prescribe for you antibiotics. Take every 8 hours for three day. If it is no better on Monday, you come see me again. Do not apply any crem – not even suncrem I think. Oh and take one yoghurt every day – antibiotics can give diarrhoea, so take one yoghurt every day”.

I went to purchase the prescription and return the unopened ointment to a rather bemused pharmacist, to the shop to pick up some yoghurt, then went back to the car to take the first of the huge, bitter, red capsules. Mike joked that maybe it was a suppository. From the taste, I briefly worried that it might be.

Safe in the knowledge that I was antibiotics now and that things were sure to improve, I started being a lot less worried about my ankle. Actually some might argue that I started to downright mistreat it. On the Saturday we took a trip up the mountain and I accidently let a large rock fall right on it, then the next day, following instructions not to put suncream on it, I accidently kept it in the sun for a 3 and a half hour boat trip, giving it sunburn. Followed nicely by two stints swimming in the salty and bacteria ridden sea.

Unsurprisingly then, there was no improvement by Monday, and I started wondering whether I should go back to the doctors for another 20 Euro consultation on a subject that the Doctor seemed clueless about, or take the rest of the antibiotics and just wait to see my own Doctor on Wednesday. I took the second option. After all, my holiday photos were already ruined.

Ok - maybe not ruined. But people did keep staring.

Read part three to find out what he said! Coming soon…