Roller coaster

Last week was a long series of violent ups and downs, not unlike a 168 hour roller coaster ride.

It started with a phone call to my mother on Friday night. My grandfather was supposed to be going for angioplasty and I wanted to see how it went. It turns out that he actually had an angiogram (small uphill). IThe results were not good. His right coronary artery is 100% blocked (sharp drop), his left coronary artery is 70% blocked with 80% blockage of the offshoots (gradual downhill). Basically, he needs bypass surgery right freaking now (small lift) and even if they decide that he is a good candidate he is probably going to refuse surgery (severe drop). My aunt asked him if he wanted to be buried or to make an ash of himself. He answered that he would make an ash of himself just like he always had (small lift driven by slightly hysterical laughter).

On Saturday I got my cast off (small up), found out my wrist wasn't fractured (bigger up), but started to realize the extent of soft tissue damage (gradual drop).

Tuesday night Paul and I (and his parents) went to see The Arrogant Worms (comedic songwriters extraordinaire). We had fabulous seats: Winspeare Centre, floor, centre, row 4 (gradual up) and I laughed until I cried (nearing a peak).

Wednesday brought Paul's long awaited appointment with the hematologist to find out about his blood clot. We went in quite hopeful that the results would be good, he would be able to go off the blood thinners and never have a clot again. The results were not good (sudden plunging drop of doom). His antiphospholipid antigen levels had risen again, putting him at high risk for further clotting so he would have to stay on blood thinners for another year. At a single stroke the possibility that all of this trouble was caused by a pesky virus was eliminated. Now we know it's something else, likely something serious, but we have no idea what. They have ordered further tests over the next year, mostly in the area of auto-immune diseases, but we won't know anything at all until next February, if at all (bottom of the screaming drop-of-doom pit-of-despair).

That evening I went to the BareNaked Ladies concert at Rexall Place. It was fantastic, as expected. This is about the sixth time that I have seen them in concert and they are consistently the best I have ever seen. They are all just such amazing musicians and entertainers. They're geeky and fun and the music is fantastic and it doesn't hurt that Ed is so dreamy (triple loop-de-loop of joy). I cheered until I was hoarse and didn't care that I had no voice left and froze my butt off walking back to the car (and luckily survived the car ride, Ashley is a scary driver).

The next morning I was still on cloud nine over the fabulousness of the concert but it was (unfortunately) a thursday which is meeting day at work. By the end of the meeting I was so angry I was shaking. I'm tired of backhanded insults and power trips, micro-managing and iron-handed control. Work politics make me ill (sudden jerking stop at the end of the ride). Before I knew it I was back to the usual grind (coast to loading area).

Ride over. Please come again. (No, thank you. I think I'll be too short to ride next week.)