Discogram (This is NOT a "musical message from John Travolta" or some other clever word play, so no more jokes!)

Discogram: painful procedure in which needles containing a special dye are injected into discs in the spine in an effort to reproduce the patient's normal pain. The patient must be awake and aware for this procedure. And it sucks.

This is what I had performed yesterday morning--3 hours late. I was hungry; I was nervous; I was annoyed. I'd nearly cancelled the test several times in the days leading up to it because every source I'd read in trying to figure out more about it talked about the pain involved during and after the test. The pain, The Pain, THE PAIN!

I can say that it wasn't AS BAD as I had feared--no screaming out in pain on the table. We'll see what the results have to say in a week or so. Yesterday I felt pretty bad and stayed in bed most of the day (blessed sleep!), and today there's a lot of muscle pain--I realized this would be because they stuck three large needles through muscles in the bottom left quadrant of my back into the discs in my spine! Of course it still hurts! I've had so many tests done (X-rays, MRI, bone scan, CAT scan, and now Discogram), and there still isn't a solid diagnosis (or prognosis).

cats

Now, don't get me wrong, I love my cats. I really do, despite what you may have heard to the contrary. They're often big pains in the butt, but they're adorable and they're funny. This clip is one of the funniest things about cats that I've seen in a long time (besides clips of cats falling off t.v.s and such). It's about 6-7 minutes and it MUST be listened to, not just watched, so be armed with some time and speakers/headphones before you click the link. It's an engineer's guide to cats: http://www.youtube.com/user/klusmanp

I have a newfound love for my cats--even though they don't yodel.

# 2

I just killed snake # 2 in 2 days. Phew! This is nerve racking!

On being published....

Wow, searching for my book on Amazon just isn't getting old. Even Target.com has it for sale. It's published under Elizabeth Westbrook Shelley and the ISBN is: 3836493187. It even comes up if searching for Shakespeare Richard III. Jon keeps joking that I'm now an internationally recognized Shakespeare scholar. Sure wish I had the Ph.D. to back it up.

Day 5

It's a great day. It's day 5 in our new house, I found out yesterday that my book is now on Amazon.com, and I killed a snake in the back yard.

1.) Yes, we bought a house! After renting for almost 4 years, we've bought a house--about a mile from our last townhouse. We bought the house from our friends, Jeremy and Denise, who have recently outgrown the home they'd owned for about 10 years after the arrival of child # 3 in less than 3 1/2 years. We're still working on it and are still putting stuff away, but things are going well and we're making progress. I'll post pictures.

2.) My thesis advisor was contacted a few months ago by a German publishing house who was interested in speaking with me about publishing my thesis. I went through their process, and it was approved for publication! I checked yesterday, and it's now for sale! For $64. $64? Yep.

3.) I pulled weeds today and was taking a load to the backyard when I saw our snake. To say Jon is terrified of snakes would be an understatement. He's a wonderful man with many, many amazing qualities, but his fear of snakes is debilitating. He called our pest control guy who declined to come out here. Jerk. I was feeling brave (VERY brave), so I went out there, tracked it down and bludgeoned it with my newly christened snake-bludgeoning shovel. What does it feel like to be a hero? Well, I wouldn't call myself a hero... yes I would!!! And it feels pretty darn good!