"This Job is for Young Men"

As some of you know, way back in 2007 when I re-enlisted I thought I would join a WMD detection team as some kind of chemical weapons detection specialist.  It never worked out at the time, but when I got back from Iraq, I started getting weekly listings of full-time jobs available at Fort Indiantown Gap.  One of those jobs was the job I was looking for four years ago.

I looked at that job every week and thought 'Do I really want to be full time?'  It turns out that the team members have to be full time, which makes sense.  I called the office last week and talked to a senior officer in the unit.  He told me that the job involved a lot of travel, a lot of chemistry and was physically demanding.  He asked how old I am.  When I told him he said I could apply if I wanted to, but almost everyone else on the team was in their 20s.

I suppose I could apply anyway, but the unit gets to decide who they interview from the applicant pool.  And when I joined, I was thinking I could do this kind of thing part time.  Since that's not the case, I'll sty where I am.

Infection is Getting Better

At least that's what the doctor said tonight.  It is still more swollen than two days ago, but is less swollen than last night.  He took a culture so in a couple of days I should know what kind of bacteria were swelling my arm up.

They switched antibiotics and the second one seems to be working.  They gave me the first one because I had a MRSA infection in June.  But this one is likely to be a strep infection for which Clindamycin works better--which is what I have now.

For the last two months I have been writing the Friday post in the blog at the museum where I work.  Up to know the posts have mostly been about events.  They are a complete pain in the ass to write because our company uses a CMS system for posts.  They take 15 minutes to write and another hour to do all the crap necessary to enter the post into the system.

YUK!

But starting Friday, my posts will be under the new heading "How I Would Have Died if I Was Alive 100 Years Ago."  Breaking my neck, shrapnel in my eyes, seeing inside my knees after a motorcycle accident and all of the infections that go with my less-than-safe lifestyle mean I would have been dead at least a half dozen times if I did not have the good fortune to be alive today in America.  I send links.  My doctor thinks I am the perfect candidate to write these blog posts.

It may even make CMS easier to deal with.

The Model Scientist? | Books and Culture

I just had a review published in Books and Culture

The Model Scientist? | Books and Culture

Infection Gets Worse

I got a different antibiotic this morning, but now my arm is more swollen than ever.   The nurse on call at my family doctor said I should wait until tomorrow before going back to the doctor.  So I will wait till morning and see if the swelling goes down.  If not, I'll get an appointment and try to get this infection under control.

More tomorrow. . .

Back to the Emergency Room Again

Yesterday, the MRSA infection seemed like it was going away.  This morning I woke up with my arm swollen so much I had no wrinkles--not easy at 57 years old.  The cut they made Thursday night to drain the would had opened and blood and pus were coming out.  The MRSA is back.  I called my doctor and they said to go back to the emergency room.  I got a different antibiotic which is already giving me a weird taste in my mouth.  They said to soak my arm in hot water.

At the hospital Jacari was hoping they would do something he could watch, like cutting and squeezing pus out of my arm.  Nigel was happy when they did not do anything visual.

Looks like I am going to be a lab rat for infectious bacteria.  

My First Blister!!!!

Today I got a half-dollar-sized blister on my right heel.  I ran three miles in combat boots--clearly not a good plan.  But when I took off my boot I realized it was the first foot blister I have had since rejoining the Army.

I felt the blister coming on at the end of the first mile, but my son Jacari was running with me and this would be the first time he ran more than a mile without stopping.  He usually sprints, stops and sprints again.  He's a boy.

So we ran up a hill at the beginning of the second mile and my foot felt a little better, but down the other side it was worse.  But Jacari was still running and I did not want to be the reason he stopped.  So I kept on running.  Jacari made the whole three miles.  So it was worth a blister.

It shouldn't be too bad since it is on the back of my heel, not the bottom.  I rode the bike thirteen miles after I got the blister and that's no problem at all.  Nigel rode with us.  He was encouraging us and not at all interested in a three-mile run.

Nigel and Jacari

Back to the Emergency Room for an Infection

Yesterday a bug bie on my arm swelled from an inch to four inches long in one day.  I made a doctor's appointment for Saturday, but the last time I waited with a fast-swelling infection, I had to get about a square-inch of skin cut out.  So at 11pm I went to the emergency room.

When I got there, one of the nurses walked up and asked me how I was doing.  She had taken care of me in May of 2007, the last time I was in the ER at Lancaster General Hospital.  I broke ten bones and spent 9 days in LGH on that visit.  This visit was over and I was on the way to the pharmacy by 1:15 am.  They did cut the skin and drain some of the swelling, but nothing like last time.  I'm glad I went early.  The MRSA bacteria work fast.

Now I am climbing onto my soap box.  I joined the Air Force in 1972 when I was 18.  After eight months of training I went to my first permanent base, Hill AF Base in Ogden, Utah.  At hill as an airman I got a two-man room.  Our chow hall served five meals a day.  The food was great.  We had almost every weekend off, extra duty maybe once a quarter.  And everybody bitched.

Four years later I was in the Army.  The food was bad and there was not that much when we were out in the field.  We trained on weekends.  We slept on the ground.  The soldiers I served with bitched much less than the Air Force guys.

I learned then one of the weird rules of human life:  the better a person has it, the more that person will bitch.  Who is most like to sue their doctor--the higher the family income, the more likely they are to sue.  Who sends their food back at restaurants, bitches about coffee temperature at Starbucks, people who have a great life.

So now I come home to people bitching about the government, the economy, health care, Hollywood, TV, and who knows what else.  People in America bitch about everything and live better than kings did two hundred years ago.  Clean water from the tap, medicines that really cure disease, safe food, surgery with anesthesia (versus none), vaccines against disease, effective dental care, antibiotics, and lifesaving surgery of many kinds--I have had several myself.

We have all this and an epidemic of bitching.  And those who cannot bitch enough themselves listen to professional whiners bitch for three hours at a time on the radio.

I am so thankful to be alive at time when I can break my neck and nine other bones and join the Army three months later.  A decade early I would have spent a year in a halo cast.  A few decades ago I may have been paraplegic.  I ate better in Iraq than 90% of the people in the world.  I flushed better water than a third of the world drinks.

This really is a great country.  I wish the whiners could see it.