The weather was absolutely perfect New England fall up here. The sun was out, there was a nice breeze. At first, I needed my jacket and sweater and then after I got walking, I could take off my jacket, keep the sweater. There were lots of birds and squirrels out, making all kinds of cute little noises. There were no other people out because the campus empties out on weekends, especially Sundays. I enjoyed my walk very much which was good because I had to work for it a bit.
I woke this morning, beautifully rested. One of my doctors evidently took pity on me and wrote an order for vitals while awake only so I slept through without interruption, then napped when I woke up. Yum! Eight hours of uninterrupted sleep with a two hour nap tacked on, what a dream. I am not sure how to write up the rest of today without making it sound like complaining (especially whining) which I really don't want to do. I mean it to be observation.
So, I woke and ate breakfast. (The nutrition people gave me a default breakfast because for some reason they couldn't get my order straight. I didn't want to waste perfectly good food so I ate it; I don't really like french toast when I'm feeling well and it's good french toast. Ah, well, live and learn--perhaps.) Then I wanted to take a shower and go for a walk. I couldn't take my shower until my port was taped up. Wait for the aid to have some spare time. Shower. Dress.
Ready to go on walk, but Dr. Meehan is rounding. I'm not sure how long he'll be here and don't want to inconvenience him so I wait a while. Then the nurses tell me he seems to have disappeared so I go for my walk. Halfway through I get called back because he's back on the floor. He evidently told them that he would be here for hours and they didn't have to call me which they interpretted as he was leaving imminently and I should come back pretty soon. So I did. Lunch was here (what I ordered--tasty portobello mushroom stuffed with barley). Ate, was rounded upon--I'm doing fine. Talked on phone with Terry, dietary person comes in for tomorrow's choices (unless I want french toast again, I better talk with him--I asked him to return in 5 minutes so I could finish talking with Terry, he returned in 15). Finally, I get to finish my walk which was worth the wait because it had warmed up beautifully and I could take off my jacket after a few minutes and bring it in.
These are not really complaints, but the point is that I am so dependent on other people here that I cannot go for a walk without a half dozen stays and interruptions. I am probably one of the most independent patients in the hospital. I wonder what it is like for the ones who are bedbound, very disabled, have more than one wound that needs to be tended to, multiple doctors who need to round on them, etc. Yikes! Of course, the people who work here have their jobs and are probably just as frustrated by the intersecting needs of the other disciplines and the patients as I am. As a worker, however, I have several tasks to do and if patient one is not available, I can move on to patient two and then circle back to patient one so it's not quite the same as for a patient who really just has one agenda.
Speaking of agendas, for a while today, I thought of nothing but the peanut butter cookies at Au Bon Pain. I was positive they would taste great despite the fact that nothing sweet has tasted great in months. I bought one and, guess what? not delicious. We did stop at the coop on the way in Friday and bought a big bag of salted roasted nuts. These still taste delicious.
Other activities for today have been sudoku, email, reading and chatting on the phone. That's about it for today. Chemo tonight and tomorrow morning.
I hope your interruptions and delays turn out to be useful today and that you have perfect weather for whatever you are wanting to be doing.
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