Not a bad day

Not as productive as I'd have liked, but I've done some shopping, some bill-paying, and some work on both the Tres Gique songbook stylesheet and the lead sheets for my gig as stunt guitarist for pocketnaomi at Conflikt a week (URK!) from today.

I also got in a walk. The morning was cold, so I set off at a good pace and kept it up for the whole, what? 45 minutes? My left ankle is still commplaining a little, but I'm not. I didn't make any calls, though. Don't know whether it was actual failure of nerve, or just having other things to think about. Probably the former, as the latter is usually just an excuse, albeit a largely unconscious and automatic one.

Mostly Colleen: Not much better.

Colleen's physical condition continues to improve: the fistula is shrinking (though not gone yet), and there doesn't appear to be any active infection at the moment (at least on the outside). Still occasional sharp pain in that area -- that's a bit worrisome. Psychologically, she's having a lot of trouble: she's missed two out of the last three holidays, her own anniversary party, Loscon, Conflikt next week... She breaks down more often, and one can't blame her.

Part of the problem is not knowing how long she's going to have to stay on TPN. At least she does have a date for the surgery, but it's four weeks out at this point. And it looks as though she and her doctor are willing to try Remicade to try and hurry the healing process along.

We're both a bit worried about me being away for six days around Conflikt. I guess we both expected things to be moving faster, back when I made my plane reservations -- either she'd be off the IV by then, or she'd be in surgery. And it seemed like a long way away. And Emmy would be riding her bike to school.

Well, the best-laid plans of bears and cats...

Odd; as the routine of the household settles down and I become better at doing the nursing tasks, there's more to worry about, and more anger and frustration and fear to deal with. Can't win, I guess.

Colleen: of caps and crescents

Finally was able to remove the recalcitrant FloLock cap from Colleen's PICC line -- it's supposed to be changed every day, and it's been jammed ever since I overtightened it on Thursday.

The tool that finally worked was an 8" Crescent wrench (based on Colleen's original idea of using an open-end wrench, but the Crescent's longer jaws and adjustability were essential). The port on the PICC line has a narrow neck with two little wings - you can sort of get a grip on it, but not if the cap is stuck. Puttiing the wings against the wrench jaws lets you hold it firmly while turning the cap, which has a large enough diameter to let you apply enough torque with your fingers.

I am vastly relieved.