25 June 1999: Percocet good, alertness bad

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Let me introduce you to my lunch (since what a journaler had for lunch is supposed to be the biggest turn-off for readers, not that I wasn't pleased that Anita linked to me). One peach, cut into bites (which I'm sharing with Blake). One banana, which I hope I can bite myself. One tablet of penicillin, one of Percocet. I thought I'd take one Percocet this morning and that would be the end of it. Four hours later, all of them on-line (because I can't get up), I want another. I'm a junkie!

Speaking of junkie-hood, RDC said I was lots of fun to watch yesterday. Understand he has never seen me drunk or high or stoned or anything because I have never been drunk or high or stoned or anything. Slap-happy giggly, yes, but never on anything stronger than water.

First the dentist came out and asked RDC to come back with him. He led him into an office and asked him to sit down and finally looked at my husband's face. So the first thing he said was, "She's fine." Then he told him he was against extracting the other tooth and why, and RDC thought that was fine.

A little while later RDC was brought back into my recovery room, and there he had a sight to see. Not only my voice, inarticulate with an immobile tongue, but my mouth slagging open, my eyes rolling ("Really?" I asked), absolutely not in control. I was really glad I peed before the surgery.

Also I'm really glad Dot Org is so generous with its sick time. I absolutely could not have worked yesterday afternoon and I'm grateful not to have to work today as well. Unfortunately, with the prophylactic antibiotics, I have zero sun tolerance and cannot go outside. I wanted to go out under a tree to read with Blake but RDC reminded me how deeply I sleep and especially if I zonked on Percocet and something threatened our little buddy...so I'm inside. Besides, showing up on Monday with freshly baked melanin after a four-day weekend wouldn't be too subtle.

With a stomachful of fruit, I took both tablets, which is supposed to nauseate me. Anything to distract me from my jaw, I say. I did so for my first dose yesterday (RDC said the dentist told me not to but telling me anything while I was that groggy doesn't count) to no ill effect and again in the evening.

I wonder about prophylactic antibiotics. Doesn't taken them strengthen bacteria's growing resistance to our arsenal of medicine, or is preventing possible infection better because if infected I'd need stronger drugs?

I absolutely cannot think. A large chunk of my on-line time this morning I spent going over recent entries--principle as a noun is -ple, you tame galoot! (Only your school principal noun is a -pal.) I do enjoy having time all to myself though. Today RDC is at CU-Boulder learning about a company that wants to digitize college libraries. (That sounds really intriguing.) Also today Blake is being a very good boy--I swear he's canine enough that, selfish though he be inherently as a parrot and more so with us as companions, he responds to your needs. And I love Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, which the library had for me on Wednesday. A blissfully relaxing day.

Wednesday evening I talked to RRP for an hour and a half. She had as many funny family stories as I had. I was glad I could talk to her, because Monday we made a phone date for Tuesday that I blew off because RDC suggested going out for dinner for our anniversary then, while I could still chew and be coherent. I did leave her a message when I got home Tuesday but wasn't home at the appointed time, and I could tell she was fed up in the message she left me, but all is well.

Before the call I managed a half-mile swim, and afterward I rented yesterday's movies from Blockbuster and picked up bananas and oj and chocolate sorbet and RDC's card from Safeway. Those movies were in addition those I'd borrowed from the 'brary--"A Room with a View," which I still don't own but should watch again to make sure the quotes on my index page are right and "The Bad Seed," so I can finally see my namesake (whose name is Rhoda--don't get technical).

I am firmly aware I am rambling and tangenting worse than usual. Tune in soon to read about my joining Narcotics Anonymous.

And while I can plead WUI (writing under the influence), can I wax smarmier and say a few things about Blake? I usually leave before RDC gets dressed so while I well believe that Blake gets angry seeing RDC in work clothes (which the bird easily distinguishes from stay-at-home-and-pet-my-head clothes), I seldom see it. In the winter, I know to cage him before I put on a coat, and coming home on my bike I know to take off my gloves before stepping him up, but this morning was much funnier (because he wasn't attacking me). Blake happily shaved with his daddy, shared his breakfast, whistled at this and that, and then stayed in the living room with me (I watched network morning news: I'm completely wasted) while RDC dressed. As soon as RDC came around the corner buttoning a starched shirt, Blake flung out his wings, flapped furiously, darted and wove his head like a cobra, and in every possible way (did I mention the shrieking?) communicated his displeasure. All this means is that on regular mornings Blake has to be in cage before RDC dresses--his anger denies him those several minutes of freedom. But he is sweet with me now, chewing up conveniently placed post-its (convenient for me that they stay in place and he can't throw them on the floor for me to fetch) and dozing on my knee. The dufflepud cockatiel. Oops--that's a one-footed critter in Voyage of the Dawn Treader, whose renumbered publication I will not acknowledge (thank you, CLH, for buying me a boxed set of the Chronicles of Narnia before that happened.)

And while you're here, would you go get me a fresh glass of water? i don' wanna get u...

3:43 p.m. and the second Percocet is wearing off and I am scared by how much I enjoyed the day-long zone-fest. I shall not take another, not unless the pain interferes with my sleep. I always liked nitrous oxide at the dentist and how tingly I got--even when I was 14 and didn't know tingly from nothing--and despite how jumpy and paranoid these Percocets rendered me, I did enjoy the floating netherworld sensation. Which, as I said, scares me. I've got enough genetic predisposition to addiction (as well as setback) that I might as well stay away from painkillers as well as alcohol.

An example of paranoia: RDC usually hangs his drycleaning on his open closet door. It is swathed in plastic and accessible to any cockatiel on his playpen who happens to enjoy a good beakful of plastic (he hasn't understood my serious lectures about sea turtles eating jellyfish that turn out to be plastic bags) so I moved the drycleaning to the study door. There, it is partially reflected in RDC's bathroom mirror. Every time a draft moves the bag--every time on this breezy day--I start at the motion, thinking there's Someone In The Bathroom.

An example of zoning: I have spent the past seven hours at this desk, surfing, making minor edits to my own pages, not able to concentrate on my book.

An example of floating: sometimes when I turned to look at Blake, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to stop turning before my head snapped off.

This might have been stressful on my body but I figure my metabolism slowed more on drugs than it speeded up on trauma. I don't care. I am nibbling a large block of Parmisian (chewing it with my left teeth) and enjoying it thoroughly.

Blake has been good either on my shoulder or the seat of the chair or (when he gets antsy) on the windowsill where I put him for snacks. For a while he'd been on the top of his cage (which I brought into the study so I could keep him near me even if I was too zoned to allow him out in my stupor) preening, and then he just launched and flew to the windowsill, timing his braking and perching exactly right. He wouldn't've'd his close call Sunday if he'd been properly clipped. For his first 2.5 years, we clipped all his primaries, but for the past year we've left the two outermost on each wing alone. In a nightmare a few months back, he had such a flappery panic that he beat out a few other primaries, and we haven't yet clipped them. Now he has four and five and can fly; he just hasn't known the mechanics of flight--but he's learning. We'll clip him this weekend back to two on each side, enough to keep him from dropping like a Warner Bros. anvil but not so much that he can zoom off in his harness (which was still my fault for dropping). He's a tough little bugger--I bet he'll still be able to chase an enticing pair of patterned shorts if RDC and I decide to play catch with them (which we do just for our own fun, laughing at his dementia), or to fly from desk to windowsill in the study. I hope.

Hmm. Maybe he's not being so good. He's moving his dish of pellets and seeds around, seeing how to dump it off the windowsill. Wow, gravity! Little messmaker. I moved it to the tray on his playpen, which is on top of a bookcase a hop down from the windowsill and told him if he dumped it on the floor I'd beat his little yellow head into a pulp. Me, the pacifist--another good reason for me not to parent anything that understands English.

5:34 RDC has come home with soft buffalo mozzarella, garlic, and a loaf of that wonderful sesame French bread. And basil. That means that Blake will have sweet little birdie basil breath this evening. I hope if I let the bread soak in tomato juices, oil, and vinegar, I can eat the crust as well as the middle.

 

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Last modified 26 June 1999

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