Nightmare Hall - Welcome to my nightmare

The mostly unexciting life and observations of an aging college educated Baby Boomer, military veteran, long term HIV survivor, friend of Bill W, amateur writer, techno-geek, seer, who sees clearly through all the BS, lies and corporate dogma. God help us all!

I have miles and miles of files,
Pretty files of your forefathers's fruit.
And now to suit our great computer,
You're magnetic ink...
-Moody Blues

Saturday, November 07, 2009

Rats in the main cable trunk

Rats have been gnawing away at the insulation in the main cable trunk and mice have built nests in the control console. Lights keep flickering on and off, there's a smell of burning insulation in the main lobby and power has been lost to the lower floors and basement.

That about sums up the state of my spine and nerves. I've been in unspeakable pain for over 2 months due to an undiagnosed nerve pinch in my right arm, which feels like the worst charlie horse I've ever had multiplied times 1000. I've been bounced between specialists, one claiming it smells like MS or polio, but then reversed his decision. The other specialist swears on her medical license it's either carpal tunnel or nerve pressure form the cervical spine, but I won't have a warm jello firm diagnosis until next week when I'm scheduled for a nerve conductivity test. I think they also use these tests as torture in Guantanamo. I've had two EMGs in the past and they are NOT pleasant by any stretch of the imagination.

One specialist suggested I try Methadone, my reply "what You want me to try synthetic heroin for pain management! I never have done drugs and am not about to become a heroin addict or drooling zombie to kill the pain. Why can't you people just fix the problem!" It seems Methadone is now a hot item for treating chronic intractable pain.......oh that's right the drug companies must have their profits, "profits before patients"....how silly of me to think that American medicine is in the business of curing/healing people. You keep them chronically miserable and willing customers of the multinational pharmaceutical drug cartel, a chronically ill patient insures a steady revenue stream. Of course as you grow older (as in once you begin getting junk mail from AARP) they consider healing old folks not financially profitable.

"We can perform the surgery and chances are he'll walk again."

"What's the alternative?"

"If we don't do surgery he'll wind up crippled."

"How much will surgery cost?"

"In total, about $60,000."

"How much for a wheelchair?"

"Around $200-300"

"We refuse to pay for the surgery but we will pay 50% for the wheelchair. He'll just have to cope with being a cripple."

I spent a couple of days visiting my friend Rob, who is also an unwilling victim of medical incompetence, facing a 5th hip replacement operation in a year due to doctors messing up the first one. And is anyone responsible?....hell no, shit happens and there's little recourse he has thanks to our elected and unelected officials protecting the elite, rich, corporate drones, etc at all costs from the angry masses. I've been encountering more and more people who have left hospitals in far worse shape than when they entered.

more later....

Some video and text links

posted by The Dreamer @ 4:43 PM   0 comments

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Maybe TV IS toxic

Something has happened to me over the past year or so that raises hell with my blood pressure. I first began noticing it about a year ago when I was living on a diet of Christian apocalyptic and tin foil helmet conspiracy news (those in the know, know that there is no conspiracy. The powers that be are right in the sheeple's faces, but nobody seems to notice or care).

A strange thing happens when my blood pressure gets into the red zone; the tinnitus in my ears becomes like a jet roar, my vision blurs and my throat and chest get tight. I normally have run low to normal 90/60 to 130/80, but in these isolated cases it shoots up to 160/90 to 220/130 and stays there. Now anxiety and stress jack it up, where they never did before. I have blood pressure medication but my doctor suggested I not use it regularly since pressure is usually normal, only when these spikes occur.

For some reason watching TV, anything longer than a half hour or so, gets my BP creeping up, up and away, even on shows that I enjoy like House MD, Bones, Fringe and the Simpsons the symptoms appear and if I check my BP it's very high. If I turn off the TV and read or go out for a walk, it drops back to normal. House, Bones and Fringe can get intense which studies have shown watching action or drama can elevate BP. I can't figure why the Simpsons have the same effect.

Watching YouTube and Google videos online, using my TV as a big monitor, doesn't seem to have the same effect, except a couple of nights ago when I watched Alex Jones's latest film "Fall of the Republic" which sent BP through the roof. Actually Alex's latest film is very well made and researched, a far cry from his early documentaries. Watching any major network news is almost certain to be stroke inducing.

There have been a number of worthwhile TV shows during the past decades, educational and informative programs, mostly on PBS, but one of my all time favorite classic network shows is the Twilight Zone. Rod Serling was a masterful story teller and his stories always had some sort of moral or gotcha to them.

About 3.5 years ago I gave away my old 27" Sony CRT set and got a 32" HD LCD TV.
I regularly chat on the phone with an online Christian friend from the Midwest and we usually get into long winded conversations about current events, NWO, technology and spiritual issues. She brought up a good point, maybe since the digital conversion there's more being broadcast than meets the eye and ear.

Maybe I've developed an allergy to TV, even PBS affects me now. Reading is also healthier for the brain. A neighborhood shop keeper told me about a great used and overstock book store in Burlington which I visited and came home with a bag full of books for under $10. A nice thing about books is they are recyclable. I either pass them on to others that might find them informative, donate them to the local library, senior center, AIDS drop in center, the leave a book take a book counter at a local market, trade them at a used book store after I've read them.

I also do a lot of reading online (there are thousands of talented writers online), but it's not the same as sitting back in my easy chair with a book. I can't sit there and read or concentrate as well staring at a screen as I scroll the text, despite the benefit of being able to change font face and size.

I can thank my mom for instilling in me a love of reading. I was a wee lad, 3 to 4 year old when my mother began taking me to the library with her (back in the early 50's). We didn't have much money and the TV only got turned on occasionally (3 channels all in glorious black and white) so Mom would check out books at the library to read. She once told me, "when you know how to read you're never alone. Books can take to amazing places. Reading is good for the mind." By the time I was in Kindergarten I was reading at a third grade reading level. Even in the Navy I passed idle time at the base or ship's library.

I found an interesting article in a Druid website outlining why TV is evil, 8 Reasons TV is Evil

A couple of TV links


Some other links

posted by The Dreamer @ 5:45 PM   0 comments

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Crash and bleed out

I have grown to dread hospitals and the medical industry in general "and it is an industry". Medical care has become a joke in this country, even in some of the best hospitals which are under staffed, over worked, unprepared and chaotic. Insurance and drug companies, plus other bean counters dictate what, when, how and who gets treated and who gets sent away. A lot of the under staffing and overworking of hospital and clinic staff comes from mandates in hospital admin (bean counters) and from HMO's and insurance companies.

Over the past 10 years I have been rushed to the ER more times than I'd like to remember. In all but one or two cases I sat in the waiting area for between 4 and 12 hours before I was seen seen....the result, no clear diagnosis, sent home with pain killers or antibiotics. Being a big city teaching hospital, the one my doctor is affiliated with is like a Chinese fire drill. When my doctor had forwarded tests he wanted them to run, in every case they ignored the request.

I've also noticed as the medical bean counters continually aim at zero cost, get rid of downsize registered nurses and hire people fresh of the banana boat who don't speak a word of English. I think their total training is how to take vitals, jabbing an orange with a hypodermic needle in preparation for jabbing live patients. In one case a woman (I think her name was Mugumba or something like that) came in to hook me up for an EKG, and just stood there like a deer in the headlights, not knowing where to attach the electrodes, mumbling something and looking very nervous. I looked at her and said, "give me the wires I'll do it myself" which I did. She left, returning with a real nurse who looked at the job and nodded 'good'. I told the nurse I was the one who hooked myself up. Mugumba left and I chatted with the nurse who said that they're squeezing every penny they can. She was just starting her 3rd shift, telling me she has not seen her own bed for 36 hours.

I don't know if it was coincidence, but 90% of the times I was rushed in to the ER was on a Friday or Saturday night under a full moon. A major hospital ER is very weird and chaotic on a weekend night during a full moon.

One Friday evening after I was taken into the maelstrom (the core) I had been laying on a gurney for a few hours waiting to be seen, listening to all the hustle and bustle going outside the drawn curtain that separated me from the corridor. A couple of cubicles down a man (sounding definitely drunk) was hollering "NURSE! NURSE! I NEED A DRINK! SOMEONE GET THE SNAKES OFF OF ME! NURSE NURSE!" Then I heard a loud crash and a commotion. Seems the dunk got up, pulling over the IV pole that he was connected to and was staggering around in the hall buck naked bumping into things.

During the same evening I heard another commotion when some guy drunk or stoned decided to take on the entire ER staff to spring his friend who he thought had waited way too long to be seen. They had to call security in.

In another cubicle I heard soft sobbing as a doctor came to a patient with the bad news.

As the evening wore on, there were random bursts of activity as stabbing, gunshot, car crash and other crises arrived by ambulance.

I have to say the doctors and nurses who work the ER probably put up with more BS in one evening than other people deal with in a year.

In some cases I left the ER in worse condition than I entered "next"

this is currently a placeholder
much more to follow......

Some links to read and watch while you sit in the ER waiting room

posted by The Dreamer @ 12:54 PM   0 comments

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Down for the count

There's a lot I have wanted to write about but...alas...my medical condition is sliding, especially the degenerative spinal/neural/muscle issues. I've been living with pain that only a Guantanamo tortured prisoner, spinal injury or cancer patient can appreciate. In the case of neurological conditions doctors claim there's not much they can do except sit an enjoy the show.

I have not "literally" slept for over 3 weeks (maube 15-30 minutes a night total) due to intractable nerve pain, so my keel isn't to even, nor is my mental state.

Strange but the thought has kept invading my mind that I won't be around next year, been sorting through my possessions and getting rid of a lot of stuff.

Here's a buncha fucking links.

posted by The Dreamer @ 6:17 PM   0 comments

Friday, September 25, 2009

Tweet Tweet Tweet

A bunch of short rant bursts

Although I have always been a big advocate of technology (hell knows I was a systems analyst for 30 years), the national and world obsession with having the latest gadgets borders on the neurotic. I carry a cell phone, It remains off and used only in emergencies, In general I find cell phones a dangerous nuisance like drunk drivers. And no, I don't have a facebook or myspace page, and "twitter?"...the perfect medium of communication for a society with the attention span of crack babies.

Yes there is a certified baby boomlet, especially among the upscale yuppies here. I was trying to walk along the sidewalk on Mass Ave in Cambridge, and ran into one baby stroller convoy after another; 3 to 4 across and 2-6 deep blocking the entire sidewalk, half the yuppie future soccer moms texting or yakking away on cell phones. It seems there are traffic jams of baby strollers everywhere in upscale towns; double wides, 4 seaters, double deckers and baby buses that seat 8-12 whining cabbage patch kids. I hope the 8-12 seaters are for day care centers. And they're not the austere strollers from my youth, but $700-$2000 plus jobs, tubular titanium and steel frames, roll bars, equipped with front and side air bags, climate controlled, flat screen dvd players with 5:1 surround sound, iPod docks, Wi-Fi ready.

When I was a wee lad, as soon as you were old enough to scamper around on your own, you got dumped from the stroller "hey you got legs kid, use'em." Some of the kids I see being chauffered around today look old enough to be in kindergarten or grade school.

Medical issues for me have been rapidly going downhill, which is one reason I seldom make entries in here, too numerous to go into detail over, plus the only two living friends I have are not doing well at all. To anyone reading this, if you are a US citizen and have never had any serious chronic medical problems....pray...PRAY as if your life depends on it that you never DO get sick in this once great but now God forsaken country, dedicated to the haves and have mores. The rest of us are tolerated and just cannon fodder along for the ride.

Another bizarre thing is my mental state if going South fast. I can't even watch a favorite TV show without my blood pressure spiking to 200-230/110 and out of nowhere anxiety attacks. Maybe TV is cumulatively toxic to people. The ads get more and more annoying and dominated by car, drug "ask your doctor" and telecommunications "who's in your fave 5" ads.

It seems watching TV is bad for your health in more ways then one. I was reading a couple of articles where test subjects were wired up while watching various TV shows. News, sports and shows with lots of action, violence, drama rose the viewer's blood pressure, sometimes to dangerous levels. This was especially evident in children, "50,000 people dropped dead from massive coronaries last Sunday during the Super Bowl." Now there would be an eye catching news headline. I bet the tinfoil helmet crowd would have a field day with that one, especially now that TV has gone digital.

I'm trying to read more but avoiding the heavy doom'n'gloom tinfoil helmet stuff, moving more toward George Carlin, Bill Hicks, Lewis Black, David Sedaris and other essayists and comedians. Reading a book does engage the brain much more than watching TV.

I can remember back in the 90's pundits proclaiming that the web would make libraries, book stores and reading traditional books obsolete. I actually read more books now as I find interesting book reviews and excerpts online that prompt me to go out and either buy a copy or borrow it from the local library. Every time I browse at Harvard Books, Harvard COOP or Barnes and Noble, the stores are usually very busy as are the checkout lines, but that's here in Boston/Cambridge so I can't comment on other parts of the country.

more to come...


Just a bunch of links

posted by The Dreamer @ 4:59 PM   0 comments

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Weird Massachusetts

I spent a few days out in Worcester visiting and keeping my friend Rob company. He's still not doing well after a botched hip replacement surgery last February. It felt good to have someone to talk to seeing I'm alone 100% of the time normally. I took him out on a few errands and while we were at BJ's I picked up an interesting book which I've almost finished "Weird Massachusetts", a fun and informative collection of Massachusetts folk takes, urban legends as well as facts. This week on the news they stated that Boston is the eighth most stressful city to live in. Chicago gained the number one spot.

I've lived here all my life except for the 4 years I was away in the military. I came close twice to moving to the West Coast long ago and am glad I aborted those plans. For all the congestion, bad weather and severe Winters and other problems we have, Massachusetts is my home and there is a ton of interesting places to see stuffed into our six state region. I'm close to the ocean and less than 2 hours away from 2 mountain ranges, The Berkshires in Western Mass and the White Mountains in New Hampshire, plus the many quaint towns that are scattered around. I'm also about 2 hours from the once fabulous lower Cape, now financially beyond the reach of mere mortals. Provincetown exists in a parallel universe and it still has an alternative reality spirit to it.

Actually the Pilgrims landed in P-Town before heading to Plymouth, giving up on the tip of the Cape as a worthless stretch of land not suitable for farming. Massachusetts is also rich in history as it was one of the original colonies, adding to the wealth of folklore.

Boston itself is 100 pounds of shit crammed into a 5 pound bag, having a high concentration of major colleges and universities, plus it's a medical research and fringe science mecca. Boston is also one of the most expensive cities in the US to live in, adding to the stress factor plus there are large concentrations of wealth (myself excluded from the wealth part)

Boston also has the oldest mass transit system in the US, affectionately referred to as the "T". Overall there's a lot to see in a relatively small space; the fishing villages that dot the North Shore and Cape, plus a lot of funky towns in the Western part of the state. The town motto of Wendell out toward Amherst is "We're all here because we're not quite all there". Having spent a long weekend in Wendell some years ago I can attest to their claim.

I had a doctor appointment in town today and now that all the colleges are back in session it seems like the population of Boston/Cambridge has doubled; now it's 200 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag.

A lot of people, tourists and others don't think I'm from around here as I lost my Bahstan accent decades ago.

Boston is referred to as the hub since many state roads and highways radiate out to the inner rim of the 128 beltway and further out the 495 beltway, both arcing from the North to South Shores and always crammed with traffic.

A couple of dwindling cultural bits

A "Spa" traditionally does not refer to a salon of place to get massage, but to the local corner store. At one time many Mass cities and towns had a number of neighborhood Spas, carrying basic grocery and toiletry needs, candy, soft drinks, deli meats and sandwiches

A milk shake is a "Frappe" in Mass

"Tonic" does not refer to hair tonic or anything medicinal, but soft drinks like Coke and Pepsi

The area also has a lot of traffic rotaries or as they call then in England, Roundabouts, where automotive anarchy reigns supreme. They are also very confusing to out of state visitors, especially rotaries that have 4-6-8 or more roads dumping into them.

A lot of cities and towns are made up of squares, but there's nothing square to be found. They are basically hubs of local business. Cambridge alone has Porter, Harvard, Central, Kendall and Innman Square (I think I got most of them)

While I was visiting Rob I picked up a copy of season one of "Fringe". I seldom buy videos any more, but I find Fringe fascinating, plus it supposedly takes place in the Boston/Cambridge area. Bostons becoming a bit of a satellite for Hollywood as more movies seem to be filmed here.

I enjoyed my visits to the left coast San Diego, Berkeley and San Francisco but there was something temporary feeling about California, like the circus, it's here today but could be gone nest week, where Massachusetts like the bedrock it sits on seems more permanent. People I talked with in San Francisco said they considered Boston almost a sister city with Berkeley sitting across the bay from San Francisco and Cambridge across the Charles River from Boston.

Boston is a city of neighborhoods, The West End, South End ($$$$$), North End (great Italian food), Fenway, Back Bay ($$$$$), Bay Village, Beacon Hill ($$$$$), Chinatown, Charlstown, East Boston (or Eastie), South Boston (or Southie), Roxbury, Mission Hill, Dorchester, Jamaica Plain, plus a few others. In some ways anything inside the 128 belt is an extension of Boston. You can walk from one end of Boston proper to the other in less than 2 hours depending on your walking speed, but the T, either by bus or subway will take you to most destinations.

more to come...


Some article and video links for your viewing displeasure.

posted by The Dreamer @ 4:43 PM   0 comments

Friday, September 04, 2009

Summer's and America's End

Medically I have not been doing well, which is one reason I have not been keeping up with writing in here, and I don't feel like sharing the gory details for the vicarious entertainment of the masses.

I was riding the bus last week and this upscale yuppy mom and two podlings were sitting acrfoss from me. She kept looking at my leg and grimacing. So all right, my left leg is rather skinny with no calf muscle left

"What's wrong with your leg?"

"I have a degenerative neuro-spinal condition."

"You really shouldn't wear shorts, it really looks disgusting."

"Well noone is forcing you to state."

"Well it's hard not to....ewww"

I was half tempted in my imagination to act out the following, taking off my calf brace and whacking her repeatedly over the head with it, "You smarmy self righteous yuppy cunt! There but for the grace of whatever household deity you bow down to go you. And what are you two little peckerheads looking at, it would happen to you. Didn't yo mamma teach you any manners.".....I'm too much of a gentelment to act out like that, letting these upscale prigs get away with their slush dumping.

Whether people want to admit it or not, intolerance toward the less fortunate is growing; targeting the homeless, the poor, the sick, disabled, elderly. I see it every day in the conversations I overhear and people's actions in public. We are a society that demands perfection in all, while everywhere around us the opposite is true. Money, status, looks are all that matter and the idiot box along with other mass media beat this drum 24X7. Of course the masses don't want to be exposed to the ugliness of misfortune, except for maybe TV and movie dramas, where they can change the channel or leave the theater if it becomes too much for their sanitized minds to bear.....not in my back yard. What frightens them the most is the remote possability something similar could happen to them.

That aside, September is shaping up to be what June and July should have been so far, perfect weather. Too bad I'm not up to enjoying it fully.

I've been having a slew of really weird dreams every night which are more like short YouTube videos. None of them make much sense, but it could be one of the many possible side effects of the antidepressant I'm on.

Nothing much else to say except here are a bunch of mostly video links I had hanging around in a bookmark folder.

posted by The Dreamer @ 4:08 PM   0 comments