Tuesday, July 15, 2008

california dreamin'

ever seen the movie 'chungking express' by wong kar wai?
i watched it like 2 weeks ago and i still cant get it out of my head
it rules
although i was pretty disappointed that there was no actual train in it
yeah, i know, you'd think there was from the title
and i was waiting FOREVER for the characters to get on board
literally
and eventually i thought to myself, 'it's never gunna happen, dude'
what a downer
still, the movie was greatya know what sucks?
%$&#ING KIDNEY INFECTIONS!!!!
they hurt
if you ever have a chance to get one, dont
they start out as a knockout fever (remember how ginny had a nasty one last week?)
and then it hurts to pee
then you pee blood
and pus
it is not a fairy tale by any means
my experience is as follows (and i'll try to not get too graphic):
wednesday evening i suddenly had a bad headache and had to urinate a LOT (by this i mean frequently) and there was the strange sensation of needing to go again right after i had already gone
then i quickly became cold as hell, shivering everywhere
after cooking hamburgers (not my first choice of rations for the evening, but ginny wanted 'em) things were not looking good
i physically forced the burger down my throat (thinking that i may not get any more food in my belly for a while and i better give my body some energy for the fever, right?)
this almost proved disastrous in the middle of the night...
i couldnt sleep and had to urinate like every half hour
my head was splitting and eventually i took some fever reducer pain killers around 7am
well my fever went down alright and i was sweating like a bandit
i figured it was best to let myself sweat the fever out (since that seemed to work with ginny)
i felt like i was gunna barf that burger, but i held on
eventually i fell asleep
and man, was i gone
i felt like i slept for 10 hours, but when i woke up, it was only 8:30am!
and i felt fit as a fiddle, as they say somewhere
i took it easy, patted myself on the back, and thought i was well through this ordeal
ha
ha
ha
no.
for the next couple days, i kept having to pee with excessive frequency
and it was getting more painful
and my urine was cloudy and smelled foul (like, worse than a cat's)
then it slowly dawned on me that it might just be a bladder infection i was dealing with
'no problem,' i thought, just up the fluids and down a ton of cranberry juice, right?
wrong.
friday night, my back started hurting
a deep pain, near the spine
i thought at first that this was due to the funny positions i had been sleeping in to prevent myself from wetting the bed (and i never did, by the way, to my credit)
saturday went fine, at first
i went to pioneer park again cuz my workplace, open arms, was celebrating their accreditation which happened a couple weeks ago
it was a beautiful day
i got to introduce ginny to a bunch of my coworkers and we played mini golf (i kicked ass, of course)
but when i got home, my bladder was hurting worse than ever
like someone was trying to tear it apart
and the pain in my back had gotten considerably worse
it was then that i suspected the infection had spread to my right kidney
due to my poverty, stubbornness, and lack of health insurance, i decided to try toughing it out
this was another mistake
the urgent care center closed for the day and i was left to settle down for a miserable night full of increasing pressure and pain in my kidney and bladder and the unrelenting urge to urinate (which i did, literally every 2 minutes)
i contemplated the fact that the mere $100 i had to my name would not cover medical expenses
fortunately my mom came to the rescue
she put $200 in my account and made me promise to see the doctor on sunday
this i promised, thankfully
but the whole sunday ordeal proved to be entirely frustrating and exhausting
first of all, the buses in fairbanks dont run on sundays
so i was left to traverse the 3+ miles to the clinic on my own
i decided to bike since it was faster
it was excruciating
every crack or odd-placed pebble in the road felt like a someone jumping me and knifing me in the side
finally i made it to find the doors to the clinic locked and nobody answering the doorbell
fortunately, the door just had some problem; someone let me in and got to wait 2+ hours for the doctor who met me only for a few minutes during which i told him to give me some antibiotics
with the $190 prescription in hand, i hobbled onto my bike once again and made it as best i could to fred meyer to fill out the prescription
eventually i somehow got my sweet pills (which i proceeded to take in the drinking fountain at freddies) and made it back home where i lay comatose for hours, waiting for the drugs to kick in
i wouldn't have made it without ginny showing me the way and providing emotional support
and that is the story
im mostly back to normal now
had to go to school today to take a test
but i called in sick at work
and now im spending the day at the public library trying to contact private english institutes in korea
cant wait to get there
even working in a crappy place, living in a seedy apartment, working for peanuts, and eating minimal amounts of nourishment, id be happy just being there
that's where i want to be
and what i want to be doing
ive found over the last few years, that as long as those two things are true, nothing else matters
i can survive
but im happy to stay here dreaming in fairbanks a little while longer...

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