Tag Archives: careers

Back from Surgery

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What a pain!

Most folks didn’t know I had surgery scheduled for last Wednesday. Although you might think I write in this blog about every aspect of my life as it unfolds, I don’t.

I didn’t want to write about it. There were too many unknowns. The huge lump in my abdomen could have been anything from a fibrous growth to a nasty bit of cancer. Surgery could have required removal of just the growth or removal of some important stuff it might have been attached to, with all kinds of reconstruction within. I could have come out of surgery and been back to normal in a week or two or the surgery might have been the first awful step in a slow spiral down to a painful death.

So I guess you can see why I didn’t want to write about it.

Surgery was Wednesday and it was the best case scenario all around. The growth was a hefty six pounds in weight, but it wasn’t attached to anything important. They took it out and, while they were in there, they took out a bunch of female parts a 44-year-old woman doesn’t really need anymore.

I was in the hospital for two nights and three days. I shared a room with a woman who was going through pretty much the same thing I was — but worse. I think she lost more parts.

The worse thing about the experience was the pain. We’re talking pain that just won’t go away. Pain when you move. Pain when you think about moving. I was screaming when I regained consciousness in post-op. They asked me, on a scale of one to ten with ten being the worse, what was my pain? Ten! I screamed at them. It was a question I’d hear over and over during my hospital stay. The answer ranged from four to eight after that initial ten.

They had me on three different pain killers. One was a device literally stitched into my wound area. It leaked out a novacaine-like substance to deaden the pain on contact. The other was morphine attached to an IV going into the inside of my elbow. I had a pain button and when I was in pain, I’d push the button. A bit of morphine would go into the drip. Of course, this was limited to one little bit every six minutes. If I pressed it every minute, I’d still get it just every six minutes. It made a reassuring beep-beep-beep sound every time I pushed the button, whether morphine went in or not. The third painkiller was oral and although it had a different name, it was based on morphine, too.

So it’s no wonder I couldn’t keep my eyes open in the hospital. I was doped up with morphine for three days straight. I felt pretty stupid bringing an overnight bag with two books and notebook in it. I couldn’t focus my eyes on anything long enough to see it, let alone read it. I listened to podcasts for a while, but even those put me to sleep.

Days and nights blended into each other. The clock on the wall showed five minutes later every time I looked at it, no matter what time I looked at it. The night nurse must have been bored the first night because she came in to do a survey at 2 AM and tried taking me for a walk at 4 AM. (I was too nauseous for the walk.) To make matters worse, the pre-op nurse had screwed up my IV by putting it in my elbow instead of my hand and the IV machine required a reset every 2 to 45 minutes. All day and all night. Every time it needed the reset, it would emit a loud beep-beeeep. I quickly learned how to reset it myself so I wouldn’t have to wait for the nurse. Not only did it keep me up, but it kept the woman on the other side of the curtain awake, too. When the nurses caught me resetting it, they weren’t happy. But I wasn’t happy listening to that thing beep for ten minutes while I was waiting for one of them to show up. Besides, the pain button didn’t work unless the IV machine was working.

Anyway, I’m home now. I dosed up with some morphine before leaving the hospital (I’m not an idiot, you know) and spent most of the ride from Banner Good Samaritan Hospital to Wickenburg in a state of semi-consciousness where my only thought was, are we there yet? I managed to throw up nothing — it’s when you go through the motions but nothing comes out — after a nice hot shower. Safeway brand Tums and Sea-bands (which I’m still wearing) helped out there. Yesterday afternoon was a drug-induced confusion of watching television through out-of-focus eyes and drifting off to sleep. Finally, I could stand it no longer. At 8 PM, I took the heavy-duty pain killers and went to sleep. I was up again when those wore off at midnight and managed to stick it out until 2 AM before taking another dose. Then slumber until 6 AM, our normal wake up time.

This morning, my coffee wasn’t very good so I switched to tea with some lightly toasted and buttered bread. It’s my first piece of really solid food since Tuesday night. Now my job is to get into some kind of ritual that’ll let me get on with my life while I recover.

The Immigration Crisis

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Some thoughts on a topic I can’t seem to make a decision about.

I live in Arizona, where Mexican workers are common. They do landscaping work, house cleaning, and construction work. They work hard and they do jobs most Americans don’t want to do — for less pay than most Americans are willing to accept.

I used to think that letting in a lot of foreigners wasn’t a good thing because Americans were losing jobs. But I don’t think that’s the case anymore. I think foreigners are willing and able to do certain jobs better than their American counterparts. (The other jobs are just being sent out to India.)

Arizona has a terrible problem with illegal immigrants. It’s not just that they’re coming over the border all the time. It’s that there is a market for people to move them, people who don’t really care about their human cargo. They take the money and all to often, get these people hurt or even killed. Crossing the desert without enough water. Locked in the back of abandoned trucks. The Mexican people are so desperate to come to this country that they put their trust in people who don’t deserve it and a lot of them die.

Part of me says to shut down the borders, build walls or fences, and send back all the illegals. Another part of me feels bad for these people, who just want to make a better life for themselves and can’t afford the paperwork or legal fees to get it done on the fast track. But I don’t believe in amnesty; I believe in following the rules that exist.

Why do we have this problem? Why can’t we enforce our own rules?

And then again, I do have a sneaking suspicion that the only reason this “crisis” is taking up so much of the news these days is because the current administration is trying to get our minds off the bigger problem — Iraq. Smoke and mirrors.

What do you think? Use the comments link. I’d like some feedback to help clear my mind. immigration

Outsourcing — or “Offshoring” — Revisited (Again)

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An interesting document exposed by Slate.com.

First, I need to correct myself. I’ve been using the word “outsourcing” to refer to jobs sent overseas. The correct term for that is “offshoring.” Outsourcing is the same thing, but it doesn’t necessarily mean the job has gone overseas. Jobs can be outsourced to other companies in the same country.

That said, Slate.com has published a document that details the following sad little fact:

According to a study released in March by the Government Accountability Office, 48 states “offshore” at least some administration of federally funded, state-administered government programs, most of it in India and most of it involving welfare benefits. The GAO also found that states were offshoring some administration of child support enforcement and — in what seems like a cruel joke at the expense of American workers displaced by cheap foreign labor — unemployment insurance!

Read it (and weep) here: “Hello, Bangalore? Where’s My Unemployment Check?” by Timothy Noah.

Outsourcing, Continued

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Visitors start a lively discussion, but may be missing my point.

My “Just Say No to Outsourcing” piece has gotten a little discussion going in its comments. It appears that some readers are confusing “employ America” with “buy American.”

I’m all for the first, but have limits on the second. While I’d rather buy American-made products, I do have to spend my money where I’ll get the best value for my dollar. Nowhere is this more important than when making a major expenditure, like one for a car.

As I was growing up, my aunt was vehemently opposed to buying anything not made in the US. While that was possible back in the 1950s and 1960s, it soon became very difficult. She stubbornly stuck to her guns for a very long time, buying US-branded televisions and cameras and cars when she could have gotten better quality products, often at a lower price, from Japanese or German manufacturers. In the end, she had to give in, at least on the electronics stuff.

There was a time when the US was at the top of the game, when US-made products were technologically advanced and of better quality than you could get anywhere else in the world. But with some exceptions, that’s changed. For years, people have been recognizing that they can get more value for their hard-earned money by buying products made and marketed by overseas companies.

Personally, I think it’s tragic. I believe that America’s failure to stay at the top of the product manufacturing game is a result of laziness on the part of R&D teams and cost-cutting measures on the part of management. It also has a lot to do with pay levels, benefit packages (often required by unions), and the cost of living in this country. Even if we could make the best product in a given category — say, digital cameras — we couldn’t afford to make it or sell it. All these things combined — not to mention our smug “America is the greatest country in the world” attitude — have led to our manufacturing downfall. After all, it’s hard to make yourself better if you already think you’re the best you can be.

And things are getting worse, as goods mass-produced in China and Korea at rock bottom prices flood the marketplace, replacing quality with items so inexpensive that we can buy with the atittude that when it breaks, we can just throw it away and get another one.

I tried to buy a leather wallet in a leather goods store about a month ago and couldn’t find a single one that wasn’t made in China. It scares me when we get to the point that we simply don’t have a choice. I know now how my aunt felt when she bough her first Canon camera. But at least she was getting a quality product from an established and respected manufacturer.

Anyway, before I alienate any other readers with what will likely be taken as an unpatiotic attitude (a dangerous position to be in these days), I just want to remind readers that if they love America, they should support it any way they feel comfortable supporting it.

Although I’m not comfortable enough to buy a Ford, I’m very happy to avoid doing business with US companies that send customer service jobs overseas. And I’m not afraid to speak out against overseas outsourcing.

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I Never Thought…

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…I’d ever have to complain about too much flying.

I am exhausted. During the past three days, I flew 11.5 hours of revenue time. That’s time that people are actually paying me to fly. I flew 6 hours just today.

All of a sudden, everyone wants to go flying. I’ve done charters to the Grand Canyon, Scottsdale, Sedona, and Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix. I’ve done real estate developer land tours, tours around Mesa, and tours around Wickenburg. And that’s after last week’s two photo shoots, a Grand Canyon charter, a Sedona charter, and an ash scattering. Where are these people coming from? And where were they in January and February when I was wondering where my next payment was going to come from?

I made my next payment. And the payment after that. Heck, I might even have June’s payment lined up — I have another tour tomorrow and a 2-day outdoor gig next weekend.

I need a rest. This helicopter charter business is starting to get like a job.