Visit the kelpforest....

John sent me this:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050919/hl_nm/novartis_dc

Glaxo's Advair and Serevent, known as salmeterol, carry a "black box" warning on their packaging about one study which showed people taking Serevent had a higher, albeit small, risk of life-threatening asthma attacks and deaths.

Not the main gist of the article, but John uses Advair. Every once in a while we run into a situation where his medication simply does not work, and he winds up in the emergency room. Nice when the drug you're taking to prevent something simply makes it worse. Would a once a day drug mean less risk?

Also a little disturbing to me is the mention in the article of how much money the drug companies stand to make from it when it's approved. I know they're not charities, and are in this to make a profit; however, it just makes me wonder how much vested interest they have in people staying sick and more people getting sick. Of course, I have no idea what proportion of their income this is, and I suppose it's there to attract investors for more research, but still, it's a niggling thought.

( article... )

It is pissing down outside. I had to go out on the patio a few minutes ago and move a plastic bin and a couple of toys from right under the eaves where the water was pouring off the roof onto them, and producing an extremely loud drumming noise. Goldie and Stimpy were waiting to go outside when I came back in, and I asked them both, "Are you sure about that?" No reasoning with a cat, although Goldie looked doubtful. She went anyway though.

The Trooper was finally done, and John tried to go get it himself. His friend Jerry gave him a ride to the mechanic's and after handing over the $1200 we had to borrow from my dad (again), drove it to Jerry's and sat there awhile to catch his breath before driving home. He told Jerry "I'm about to pass out from anoxia," and Jerry's wife said, "Oh yeah, that couch is real comfortable, isn't it." Huh?

Anyway, he almost died before he got home, and has been collapsed ever since. I hope the steroids kick in soon. I don't want to have to take him back to the hospital. I talked to his mom, and she can't understand why he doesn't see a specialist. He did get a referral to one last year, and he reminded me that the guy took a look at his long hair and his beard, and pretty much decided that he fit the profile of a drug user, and didn't believe him when told that he didn't use. Pretty much told him outright, he couldn't do anything for him. And when that's the guy your insurance refers you too, what do you do?

Crap. So the Trooper has no gas in it. I haven't been in to work yet this week, and I need to work on the CalCOFI presentation. I checked my email and my mandate coordinator sent me a bunch of comments and things to change. NOAA Fisheries needs a sardine update. We're supposed to take the pumpkin in to Gareth's and Angus's classrooms, but John has been too sick, and I can't pick it up. Angus has an appointment with a neurologist tomorrow at 1:30 - and I don't know if John's going to be able to go. I'll have only been at work for an hour or two then I'll have to come home. I know people understand, but I feel funny taking so much time off.

Dammit. Guess I should wash my hair and go to bed. I know I won't have enough time to do it in the morning, and I've been putting it off too long.

*grimaces*
I just now reread my last entry, and realized those of you who read it thought we had frosting on hot dogs for our evening meal. Blech. Entry has now been edited to make more sense.

A couple of people in gardening recommended spraying my pumpkin with a 9/1 mixture of nonfat milk (!) for the powdery mildew. So I tried it, and threw the baking soda in for good measure. Sounds like I'll have to keep doing it every day until it goes away and/or this spell of cloudy weather ends. I also cut back my crazy rosebush to canes about 18" long - hopefully it will rebloom again in time for my garden club's flower show. Then I'll at least one thing from my yard worth taking. I have a whole garbage can full of thorny rose canes - I wonder if I should warn the garbage collectors?

Nights have been trying this last week. John has been having trouble with his asthma, and side effects of his meds cause awful upset stomach and muscle cramps. He can't get comfortable and he can't sleep, thrashes around and gets more and more frustrated. Earlier this week he got in a horrible yelling match with my dad. My father has absolutely no social clue and butted right in when John was showing his latest project to his mom (a spoon holder Beth requested). Dad shoved right in between them with an air cleaner he thought Connie would like, and John just lost it. Partly it was lack of sleep and partly it was John just running out of patience with him, but there was a big yelling match right in the front yard. Wonderful. Plus I wake up every time he starts thrashing around, so I don't get a lot of sleep either.

I suppose my father must have felt a bit guilty. Of course he would never actually apologize, but when he went to a gun show this weekend (to get supplies for his SASS stuff), he bought us one of those sets of coupons for 4 days and 3 nights at the Edgewater in Laughlin NV. We can do anytime in the next year - we'll just need someone to watch the kids for 4 days. I don't know if John's mom will be up to it - it's only recently that Gareth was willing to spend the whole night, and Avalon isn't quite potty-trained yet. That would be fun though. I rather liked Laughlin last time we went there (a long time before Angus was born) - it's much more low key that Vegas, and a river to walk along too. Not to mention it's the only place I've every gotten a royal flush on a poker machine - only since I'm not a big gambler it was only on a nickel machine in the tiny non-smoking section of the casino. Still, I got $50 out of it, and paid for a couple of our meals, at least. It's also a little nifty to get tacky souvenirs with my surname on them - heh.

I'm enjoying The Venture Brothers lately. A lot of Jonny Quest parody, plus a bunch of others. I'm thinking Dr. Venture and the Monarch were seperated at birth. Patrick Warburton is sure been getting a lot of voice acting work lately. Did I mention I once won a giant Rice Krispie treat at Ed Debevic's for recognizing the theme song to Jonny Quest? Damn, I miss that place. I wish it were still there, near my brother's house.

I apologize for many boring entries lately...

Home this morning - John is not breathing well again. He has taken all his medication and is still lying there gasping. I'm worried - it seems like the meds are getting less and less effective as time goes on; although last time this happened he forgot he had to take two hits of Advair instead of just one because he was using a weaker prescription.

The doctor gave him samples because our insurance stopped covering that particular one. Damn them, anyway. Anytime we find something that works halfway decently, they stop covering it. "Oh this generic thing works just as well or this med does the same thing." Well, it doesn't, or it's a steroid compound that has major side effects.

He just told me he's going to take another round, and if they don't work within 1/2 an hour, we're going to have to go to the emergency room. At least when he goes there, they take him right away, even ahead of heart attacks; when you can't breathe, that's pretty much it. At least he's covered for that. Last time we had to go, several years ago now, when Angus was an infant still, we took of for the nearest one, only to find that the hospital had gone out of business. He about panicked when we found the doors locked, and told me later that as we were speeding to the next nearest, he was trying to say good-bye because he thought he was going to die.

I had to put that visit on my only credit card, and we are still paying it off. Luckily, I had a credit card at the time to put it on, because the hospital was having a special (can you imagine? a special on emergency room service!) that made it half-price.

I hope the meds work this time.