Hippo, birdie, two ewes...

... to the katster!!! Have a great one!!

Dairy/egg/nut/gluten-free goodies!

Pig in the Kitchen

My recipe blog is in response to my daughter's dairy, egg and nut allergies. As there is gluten intolerance in my extended family, I've made the recipes gluten-free as well. Sounds awful? Ah, but the food tastes good and the pictures are pretty, come on in!

Colleen[5] Getting connected

Colleen's room at Kaiser has good cell phone reception, thankfully (number on the Starport web page, but no Wi-Fi.

I was thinking seriously about getting her an Amazon Kindle (using the money saved by not needing a second room for Loscon), but it doesn't appear to have a general-purpose web browser (you can download pages and email them...), and they quote a delivery time of 3-4 weeks. Scratch that idea.

A smartphone is really tempting. There are two possibilities there: add data to our current AT&T family plan -- really only an option if I'd be able to switch it from her number to mine after she's out of the hoosegow hospital. Or that G1 I've been lusting after... Still an expensive committment.

Actually, the price on a T-Mobile WiFi router looks really attractive. Except that as asavitzk points out, it's bridging in the wrong direction: VoIP-phone to DSL rather than a cell-to-WiFi bridge. Foo. I've seen the other kind, but neither T-Mobile nor AT&T is selling them.

Colleen[6]: WTF??!

Colleen was doing fairly well when I saw her this evening: bored, but getting resigned to a long stay. But now, it seems, they are getting ready to send her home with some kind of portable IV pump. WTF??!

Update: 11/22 2pm She'll be moving to a skilled nursing facility, no earlier than Monday or Tuesday, and will stay until it's safe for her to be at home with less than 24-hour care.

OK, I know it's possible, in theory. People do it -- I've seen people walking around with PICC lines, now that I know what to look for. BUT: she can't care for herself at home -- she isn't even able to walk the distance from the front door to the bedroom by herself at this point -- and there isn't going to be anyone home during the day to care for her. We're going to be gone during Thanksgiving weekend. The bed's too high for her to get in and out of safely. She needs a walker when she's this weak, and she can't handle both that and the IV pump.

And when something inevitably goes wrong, it's an ER visit.

They don't even know at this point whether it's going to start healing or whether she's going to need surgery. I have no idea how long this is likely to go on. Or what to look for to see whether anything is going wrong.

The last time they sent her home too early it was a freaking disaster. The time before that it was merely a nightmare.

NOT a happy Bear.

Update: Saturday 08:30 It looks as though they're going to send her home tomorrow. It's probably going to be impossible to fight it, so my plan now is to ensure that she can use a walker or a wheelchair without having to also deal with a pole full of IV crap, make sure it's safe for her to be home alone for most of the day. We'll either have to cancel LOSCON or arrange for someone to stay with her. She may have to stay in the sewing room for a while if the bed is too high.