Yesterday I saw our former State Representative, Chris Beck, and I was thinking there’s a lot of things I do for friends that I wouldn’t do otherwise. I hate cold-calling, and I don’t really like getting anonymous phone calls, but I sat in a call center and made campaign calls for Chris. Why? Because he’s a friend (though not a really close friend) and he asked me to. I’ve worked on a yacht’s “sewage” system, sat in hospital waiting rooms, and driven around the airport for an hour all for friends. I certainly wouldn’t want to do those things for myself.

So, here’s something funny. My sister got a letter in Japanese, and wanted to see if I could read more of it than she could. I had my mom read it, but then I tried cutting and pasting it into “Sherlock’s” translator, Chinese characters and all. Here’s what it came up with:

It is dense, it is, it is, the impoliteness it does suddenly, it is Trico. Some days ago, message was done it was in my blog, is to be, every the ?, the reply without being the impoliteness, (only the impoliteness repeatedly it is, &) even from time before the that, being to have become coming, it does supereggplant somewhere viewing to, but it became present place first favorite blog, inserted in this day favorite finally and the stripe was. When so why you see carefully, you transfer and has entered even into there, is delightful you are surprised is. Thank you.

As for circumstance whether knowing you think, but somehow being able to return to knitting and blog, finally be able to communicate, it was on the ? body. Mutual 2003 was blog first year, but when I am lazy and the thing can keep continuing also next year, it is well and with thinks. Each time also supereggplant PC is initialized because you read in the pleasure, it may by all means and don’t you think? the insulator increases. If by the way it does not become inconvenient, as for Mariko being the house in either one you apply, also the ? ? is good, is? Is not Japan, is, don’t you think?.

So your good year!

I’m doing nothing but sit at home all day watching TV. It’s rainy and cold outside. I realized that this is NORMAL. It isn’t because I’m sick, it’s because it’s the holidays and it’s miserable outside. Everyone is out with their families and I’m just hanging out. I’d go down to the pub for a beer, but it’s POURING outside.

Ah, yes. I remember the last time I was unemployed in the winter. I’d only go outside to get a cup of coffee every day. So this is normal. Boring, but normal.

My friend called right after I got up this morning and dragged me out for a walk in the woods with his 6-month-old daughter. She was quite fussy towards the end of the walk, and it was because she was gassy. It made me wonder how old we were when we decided that passing gas is funny. I’m glad gas doesn’t upset me as much as little Thea, because my friend bought me dinner tonight that included garlic mashed potatoes. Garlic anything pretty much gets me going.

I spent most of the day helping my friend increase his couch-potato-ness by hooking up a dual-LNB to his new DirectTV converter/TiVo. There was some work involved, but now he’s probably going to be attached to his La-z-boy chair for good.

Merry Christmas to whoever is reading this, and I hope your holidays are going well. But it isn’t going all that well for everyone. My neighbor passed away this morning. My friend’s sister is in the hospital with the ‘flu and possible heart problems. There isn’t much I can do but try to be supportive.

But today, all I did was watch movies, movies, movies. Scrooge again, A Christmas Story, Vertigo, Arthur’s Perfect Christmas, and parts of something that seemed like a Korean kung-fu movie called Volcano High that was on MTV. I’ll get away from the TV tomorrow. (I have to help a friend fix his DishTV installation.)

I had the choice of watching A Christmas Story that added 38 minutes to a 82 minute movie, or It’s A Wonderful Life where they added 49 minutes to a 131 minute movie. Basically, it came down to watching the movie that they only show once a season instead of the movie that that’ll show repeatedly for 24 hours. And I already watched Scrooge from 1951, which is my favorite version of that story.

Yay for all the movies I’ve been watching. Parts of You Only Live Twice, and Thunderball, and even Diamonds are Forever.

And I kind of want to see Love, Actually, tomorrow.

I forgot to mention yesterday that my sister lives in Paso Robles, CA, where all the earthquake damage occurred and, sadly, two people died when a building collapsed. Fortunately, she’s fine.

Today I spent the day waiting for a friend to get out of day surgery. She was scheduled for a 2 or 3PM, but she didn’t get in until much later. The recovery time kept getting pushed out, and she finally got out after 9PM. I was hanging out with her husband (my buddy Greg) and her daughter Bridget and we were running out of ways to kill time. I hope those two don’t drive her crazy, since she has to stay off her feet for a couple of days.

Oh, and check out the online comic Achewood if you have some time. It takes a bit to get into (you’ll have to read a lot of strips before you get what’s going on) and it’s certainly not for kids, but I’m really enjoying it. For a simpler funny geek comic, I’d suggest Hackles.

I suppose the worst part is not knowing. Since I never made it into med school, I don’t know if my problems are unique. This latest thing about my kidney function was really freaking me out until my buddy Greg told me he had the same diagnosis once. He didn’t drink water for a couple of days before a urine test, and they didn’t want to hire him because they thought his kidneys were failing. On a drug test, he tested positive for salt. He rehydrated himself and they haven’t found any problems since. That was about seven years ago or maybe more.

I’ve been waking up early and don’t feel tired during the day. I’m hoping this is a good thing. We’ll see.

I went running today, and it was at a pretty slow pace since I’ve been slacking for several weeks. I had to take it easy because my back still hurts and my knees started to hurt. I’m guessing my back hurts because I’ve been sitting in front of my computer screen for a couple weeks, avoiding the world.

But I’m not that tired, and I feel good. The worst part is that I probably am not that much slower than I was before. Andiamo.

I really haven’t been doing much. Seasonal depression and all the good news I’ve been getting lately are contributing to my lethargy. However, it does seem like I was dehydrated. I stopped running a few weeks ago because of the weather and because my doctor was stressing me out, and I haven’t been as thirsty. For that reason, I haven’t been drinking as much water. I wonder if 12 glasses a day is overdoing it. At least I’m going to the bathroom more regularly again.

And other than that I have nothing. My back is sore from the bone marrow biopsy. I’m still pretending that the doctor is wrong and I have something simple, like Lyme disease. I’m still a little freaked out about the whole thing. And life goes on. I know it’s not much of a life, but I’d like it to last as long as possible.

When I got home last night, I had a call on my answering machine from the hematologist’s office asking me to call back regarding my most recent blood test. The last dream I had this morning was about trying to call them back on my cell phone, having the lab tell me I needed a lumbar puncture, me complaining, the lab hanging up in the middle of my sentence, me trying to call back but getting an after hours message, and then a giant poodle peeing on my leg.

Well, I got up and called. My kidney function tests are off and I’m probably dehydrated. I’m supposed to drink a lot of water and then go for yet another blood test on Monday morning.

My friend Greg helped distract me today, for which I am grateful. As we were looking for a place to get breakfast, I got a call from the hematologist’s office, asking for another blood sample. They also needed it before 10AM. My guess is that my insurance requires the lab at Providence to do the processing and so the hematologist’s office can’t do it on site. I’m also guessing that the courier comes at 10AM and otherwise my blood can sit and go bad. This is all just a guess.

We hit the Overlook for breakfast, an old-time diner with a huge bar. They were playing loud 80’s music, and the bar looked full of customers even at breakfast-time. It was all a bit surreal.

I spent quite some time watching Return of the King because the movie was at least 3 hours long and there were two babies crying in the row behind me. I’d recommend the movie to anyone. Well, I’d suggest seeing the first two movies first and trying to avoid movies with babies in the audience, but you know what I mean.

I used my limited background in Bioinformatics to search the web and Medline, and I don’t like the outcomes (i.e. survival rates) I saw. I’ve read enough papers in chemistry and molecular genetics to know where to look for the bad news. I’m going to ignore them for now.

I’m still hoping that they’re mistaken even after three blood tests and I just have Lyme disease. Or syphilis. OK, not syphilis. How about Lyme disease?