Okay, you’ve probably all been waiting with bated breath (all 2.5 of you) for an update on my ear situation. Well, the stuffiness has gone down a slight bit — I do think that part of the problem with my ear is it’s swollen inside the ear canal from some sort of irritation (like from me pouring gunk down it and sticking Q-tips in it, or allergies or an infection of some sort) as much as a wax buildup. The decongestants did help a little. Of course, now that my ear isn’t bothering meas much I am getting a swelling in my left eyelid. It’s on the same side of my face as the problem ear, hmm. It could be from the soap I’ve been using — I started using a different soap, one of those hard herbal bars. Bar soap seems to be harsher than liquid soap, at least where my face is concerned.
That reminds me, one question about the St. Louis, Missouri area I keep forgetting to ask is what is the water quality like? I’m used to Florida’s mineral-heavy gunk, which creates kidney stones, and it takes me ages to rinse off soap and shampoo.
Today I woke up late, due to a peculiar silence which I realized meant the power had gone out and none of those little humming sounds I take for granted (refrigerator, DVR, a/c going on and off) were present. So the power was off, which meant no coffee, so I fed the cats and went back to sleep. (When I move up north I’m going to try to get an apartment with a gas range, so if the power goes out I can at least make some coffee.) The power came back on about two and a half hours later, but the day was shot by then. Oh well, it’s Columbus Day (or as it will be known after Obama takes power*, “Evil White Oppressor Day”), so a lot of people are off.
I will go to the doctor for my ear some day this week, I promise.
*What, you don’t think he, or rather, his followers, are just going to roll over and accept a loss, do you?
10 Responses to “Health update”
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October 13th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
You should indeed have that ear examined by a reputable physician.
Florida water is going to cause me kidney stones?
October 13th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Yeah — the heavy calcium content causes a lot of kidney stones. Especially if you drink a lot of sodas like I used to. That’s what my doctor told me when I had a kidney stone back in 1995. Damn that thing hurt.
Basically the thing to do is to drink sufficient water (yeah, even Florida tap, though distilled is best — though it has no taste, bleah), avoid imbibing gallons of Cokes like I did for years and years, and just hope your system flushes properly. I think just about everyone gets a kidney stone sooner or later. (I also got this long list of foods to avoid, such as asparagus, tomatoes, citrus fruits — just about everything in my regular diet except asparagus when is okay fresh but I only eat once or twice a year; I just decided to eat whatever I wanted. After all, it took about thirty-odd years for the first stone to develop.)
October 13th, 2008 at 7:18 pm
The drinking water should taste pretty good, St. Louis won the award for ‘best tasting city water’ in 2007,
http://www.usmayors.org/usmayornewspaper/documents/09_24_07/pg10_St_Louis_water.asp
After my kidney stone, they advised me to drink as much lemonade and/or lemon water as possible, as various ‘citrates’ seems to prevent kidney stone formation. So I drink lemon in my (good tasting Kansas City) drinking water, or drink crystal light full of man-made citrate-y goodness. When it comes to kidney stones, better living thru chemistry. Hell, better living thru voodoo, whatever. To hell with kidney stones.
October 13th, 2008 at 7:30 pm
My father had a kidney removed and he told me his doctor told him to drink beer as it would help keep his remaining kidney flushed. My father followed the doctor’s instructions to the max.
October 13th, 2008 at 11:26 pm
PS: good to know about the water. Water in South Florida (Miami, where I used to live) tastes like chlorine, and it’s often yellowish — supposedly from tannins from the foliage above the aquifer, but we all have our own theories. And water in the Orlando area, where I live now, smells like rotten eggs — this is from minerals in the ground. My theory is that Disney is on a Hellmouth and so everything tastes like sulfur.
October 13th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Is that really what his doctor told him, or just what your father told you his doctor told him?
October 14th, 2008 at 5:06 am
Water, lemonade and beer in large quantities, hmm; think I’ll manage with the first two. Water here in Cape Coral tastes not bad, although it is mineralish somehow: the odor–if e.g. it sits in a pot before being used–is much worse than the taste of it right out of the spigot.
“… (J)ust about everything in my regular diet… such as asparagus, tomatoes, citrus fruits…: I wonder if people in the professions are more often idiots than the rest of us are or if it only seems like that sometimes.
October 14th, 2008 at 9:26 am
Brett: with my father you never knew.
Marc: yeah, you can’t let water sit too long here either. Then the chlorine smell starts to come out.
October 14th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
Beer is a pretty good preventative for kidney stones, actually, but I’m diabetic so it’s no longer my drink of choice. I still have a brew now and then, purely for medicinal purposes, but I’m officially a spirits drinker now. I’ve left Hogarth’s Beer Alley for Gin Lane. Which leads to Red Wine Parkway, Green Tea Boulevard and Lemonade Lane. Eh, I will say for 25 years…lots of beer, no kidney stones. I was a little too tipsy to do the math, but I think there’s a corelation.
October 15th, 2008 at 11:12 am
My grandmother lives in South Daytona. The smell of sulfur in the air–everywhere–is horrible. I don’t remember that in Tampa, altho it seems like it was there in Fort Lauderdale.