Sunday, July 31, 2016

j reacts to the rug being pulled out from under bernie-or-bust

i've got some good news for hillary.

the logic underlying bernie or bust - that we're better off abstaining, under the hope that trump leads to collapse - appears to be disintegrating.

clinton increasingly looks like the better bet for collapse.

if you want a system of rationing and austerity, markets are far more effective than centralized governments at restricting access to goods.
i wasn't able to get a straight answer out of anybody at the radiology department regarding why the second mri was requested, so i've cancelled it. i was specific: do you think you might see a tumour? do you think you might see a lesion? all i could get was "the doctor is requesting a second mri". an appeal to authority is simply not convincing to me.

i have verified at least that the information was sent to the referring doctor, so i will call them on tuesday for further exploration of the issue.

while it is possible that the radiologist was just incompetent with his notes - that he has a good reason that he didn't specify because he's lazy - my reading of the situation is that he's just looking for a way to bill me twice, and that that's actually probably a good sign because it probably at least rules out the tumour.

as mentioned previously, i'm leaning more towards lyme disease at this point. but, i'm going to need to see the scans myself....
ok, i just woke up. i had checked my inbox, half asleep, during a mid-morning urination awakening and they want to inject me with some isotope of something...?

what it does is make the tumor or lesion more visible in the scan. that seems to indicate that there is a tumor or lesion. but, i need to know what it is, first, before i make any decisions. injecting me with some kind of metal seems kind of reckless, unless it's a mitigating factor. harm reduction. i'm not there yet.

are they lesions? if so, i'd rather get a blood test for lyme disease. and, i mean, there's not really any treatment for ms, anyways. i'll just take the diagnosis to my nearest odsp office and otherwise forget about it. no, really. so, i have ms. what does injecting me with a heavy metal for an mri accomplish? but, what if i only have lyme disease? there's safer ways to determine this.

do they think they found a tumour? how aggressive do they think it is? this is the one situation where i may consent to this...

....but i also need to see the existing scans first. apparently, it was the radiologist that requested the second scan. who is what? a technician?

"oh, i'm not a doctor."

 two things i'm worried about.

1) all industry exists for the purpose of maximizing profit. even in canada, people get paid. and, what that actually means is that we have a lot of unnecessary procedures done because somebody gets paid. on first glance, too much health care might seem better than not enough. but, this is one of those circumstances where too much may be worse. i'm not ruling the procedure out on principle, i just want to make sure that we've gone through the safer - less expensive - options first.

2) i talk a lot of shit in a lot of places. i keep pointing out that i'm harmless, but i'm not sure i'm winning that argument. would somebody go out of their way to get rid of me? it's not impossible. it *is* outrageous. it *is* ridiculous. but, the world we live in is outrageous and ridiculous. i just need to be a little bit more careful than the average bear, i think.

so, i'm going to go call them back and tentatively cancel the appointment. i need to have them articulate exactly what they're looking for, and confirm that they've actually sent the results to the doctor that referred me. i also want to know when i can see the scans, myself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadolinium

i'm not sure i'll consent to this.

30-07-2016: trying to close inri014 amidst political distraction and mri drama

tracks worked on in this vlog:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/schizoid-terrorist-2
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/period-1

left a message...

i'm sleeping mornings this week. we'll see if there's something in my inbox when i wake up.

if i can sleep...
i initially noticed facial tics around my left ear some time around ten years ago. i had an mri done but i didn't hear anything back and i forgot about it. it was kind of just a mild annoyance. at the time, i was thinking something more along the lines of heavy metal poisoning from living on a busy street with a lot of truck traffic (bronson avenue) than anything else.

the issue of the facial tics would come and go, but never really got out of hand as anything more than an annoyance until a little over a yea ago when i noticed i was having an extended period of difficulty swallowing (dysphagia) that has yet to really resolve itself. i initially brought this up with a nurse at the camh here, who did not take me seriously. i asked several times for an mri, and he kept telling me we'll talk about it later. it never happened.

the first few years i was here, i was struggling to find a doctor willing to prescribe me hormones. i was able to finally find a family doctor last fall that was willing to not just prescribe but also to increase my dosage, and that has had some positive effects. he has also finally taken my concerns about dysphagia seriously. while he suggested i should see a neurologist, i insisted on seeing an ear doctor to start and then graduating to a neurologist as the issue resolved or complicated itself.

the ear doctor initially did not take me seriously, either. however, i pushed for a hearing test - which discovered some loss in the affected ear. she still refused to take the situation seriously, suggested that the test was just error and insisted that i take it again. i instead pushed for an mri - which i had on monday.

i felt the mri would be the best idea because it could determine three things:

1) is my jaw crooked? in 2006, i fell of my bike and landed terribly on my face. the tic and resulting dysphagia could be the result of a skeletal abnormality, which could either be broken back in place or just dealt with. it would be useful to know, one way or the other.

2) do i have brain lesions? if i do, are those lesions more consistent with something like ms or more indicative of something like lyme disease?

3) is there maybe a tumor in there? i'm considering this possibility to be extremely remote due to how long i've had the issue for. one does not have a malignant tumor in their head for over ten years. i'd be dead by now.

i just checked my email and realized that somebody called me on the saturday of the long weekend to book a second mri. while i will not know the reasons for this request until i call back, i'm considering this to be somewhat ominous. it is possible that there was some error and they need to redo it, but i would think that a request for a second mri indicates that they found something that shouldn't be there. is it a lesion or a tumor?

i think they open at 6:00 am.
i was very young when i decided not to have children. a child, myself, really. 12. 13. of course, you don't want to rule the idea out entirely. there's always that possibility. but, i'd already made up my mind before i got to high school. there was never really any doubt about it.

i think i made the right choice.

j reacts to this cycle's electoral map (the key state is...missouri?)

my take on things.


i just want to point out that with ohio, i don't think it's about trade or about abortion, i think it's more about nascar - it's cultural. that's why bush won twice. most of ohio is really a southern state. this is where mccain and romney coming across as out of touch elitists hurt them, and where clinton's status as an elite hurts her.

if anything, the abortion thing is going to make what should be a walk for trump a lot closer as it's going to get the vote out in the northern part of the state. but, trump wins here for the same reasons that bush did.

she has a better chance in florida. but, i think you'll see the same basic dynamic assert itself on a slightly lower level. the north of florida is the south; while anti-trump feeling will likely increase turnout in the south, it's cultural affinities will overpower in ways that romney and mccain couldn't orchestrate. again: bush won florida. twice.

due to recent demographic changes, north carolina is maybe a wildcard. but, i think it's a stretch to argue it's a swing state. one win in the modern era does not a swing state make. indiana is not a swing state, either.

the map technically has her less than 270, but that doesn't really put the election in play. if she wins virginia, she wins. if she wins missouri, she wins. if she wins both iowa and nevada, she wins. what are the chances of none of that happening? of trump carrying 3 of those 4 states? they're not very high.