Malaria pills gave me unbelievably vivid, terrifying nightmares. To the point where I thought one night, at 4 am, "Oh, I think I'll just get up now." And I started locking my door after those nightmares.

I really enjoy SOA, though I'm not going to advocate for it as the best show of all time or anything. Part of it is that I still keep wanting a motorcycle, despite every rational part of my brain and literally everyone I talk to dissuading me.

Jax's Britishness was especially funny because I'd just finished watching Undeclared when I started on SOA.

For a different kind of show that's not really arguably "good" but is very enjoyable, I like Nashville.

Also, the music supervisor on SOA is really good and an friendquaintance of the GF. A lot of vaguely California sound that suits the show well.

Dissuading you? What kind of caveman doesn't ride a motorcycle?!

Well, they're encouraging at the gym.

I was literally two days away from spending the money I'd saved up for a bike when a dad in my kid's preschool died in a crash, which has since put me off it for a few years.

5.2: Guy across the street from me hobbled himself for life from one earlier this year.

5: Get one. You'll have burned in some glorious Kodachrome memories that will last you the rest of your life, long or short.

2.last: Agreed. Plus who doesn't want to look at Connie Britton for an hour every week?

British, and the original underage love interest in the British 'Queer as Folk'.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM1H_OJkgEk&feature=relmfu

My wife says he is very attractive [beardy biker version].

He was incredibly attractive until he cut his hair off. Now he looks like hell.

I assume he must have cut his hair for another role, but I still can't fathom why the SOA show runners allowed him to do it (must have been in his contract, I suppose, but still, they should have tied him down or offered him more money or really whatever it took to keep him smoking hottt).

Wait until your kid is 30 and then go for it. I'll send you a Boot Hill bumper sticker for it. (Used to be my uncle's bar.)

VW, I'm limping too! For solidarity! And also infected fire ant bites!

14.2: Hott!

14: is your limp likely to be permanent? No? Then you're nothing but a cheap knock-off, a pretender to the orthopedic throne. That said, I'll have to find some fire ants to even the score on that front.

My dad got a motorbike when I was 18, and after his second spill my mother said Man, you are the main support of two minor kids, you shouldn't take the risk *now* -- give it to clew. Which he did. I could barely drive a car at the time, had some terrifying experiences learning, gave it up when I met the second ex-rider *in my coffehouse crew* who had a stammer and a stagger and a steel plate in his head.

This was probably a sad disappointment to my mother, who learned to ride a larger bike in flip-flops on shell roads. OTOH, the boyfriend I met in the process brought her goldfish and blew up a big ol' stump.

(Maybe I was 17? Or she let rhetoric in the way of facts? Or possibly she was referring to the perennial livestock.)

Acquiring/riding a motorcycle is pretty much the only thing about which I can say, as an adult, "My father won't let me,"* and mean it.

* There's a passage in one of Booth Tarkington's Penrod books about the difference, among young boys, between "My father won't let me" and "Your mother won't let you." Something patriarchy something.

16: Yeah, well I also have to deal with pus.

Is yours going to be permanent even after you were surgerized?

19: my grandmother, a Holocaust survivor*, only ever asked two things of me: don't go to U Edinburgh for undergrad (the Cossacks or the Nazis or maybe just the antisemitic Brits were waiting in the hills to kill me and any other Jew foolish enough to return from the safety of North America back across the Atlantic to the horrors of Europe**) and don't ever ride a motorcycle. The first one was a bit painful, but she really had never asked me for anything else at that point, so I agreed. I still sometimes wonder how different my life would be now if I had refused and packed my bags for Scotland. The second wasn't really that big a deal -- I had ridden motorcycles a bunch when she asked me to stop, and it didn't seem unreasonable at the time to give up a bad habit -- but now that i can't ride a bike, I have been thinking that a motorcycle would be lots of fun. Still, a promise is a promise.

* Noted to establish her credibility as a guilt-inducing force.

** The EP.

20.2: won't know for at least six months and maybe as much as a year. But probably, or so the surgeon thought after the procedure. Once he opened me up, it turned out to be a pretty big mess in there ("there" being my spine). Really, though, I got the most amazing orthopedic throne -- it's the chair equivalent of the shoes my aforementioned grandmother wore, very late in her life, for her bunions -- so there's that.

I am impressed that Kraab's uncle owners that bar. V-Dub, if your spine is fucked up anyway might as well get the bike. Maybe a fall will jostle everything back into place.*

*Have you considered Crossfit?

I've been having physics nightmares lately. I should stop working late at night.

22: If the Mormons posthumously baptize your grandmother, does that weaken her guilt-inducing powers? Like, maybe you could get a scooter.

(Joke made with all due respect to your grandmother.)

Last night I dremt I was directing a documentary about avantgarde chocolatiers.

I am impressed that Kraab's uncle owners that bar.

In our family, it's just called the Boot. My grandfather's wake was held there. My uncle -- who was a great guy -- sold off the bar several years before he died (due not to his bike but to liver cancer from some seriously hard livin').

Thats awesome!

And as long as I'm sort of name dropping, another uncle was an interior designer whose work was in the NYT Magazine a few times and who at least knew Warhol & his crowd, and the third performed with the Jewel Box Revue.

They were an interesting collection of uncles who came from a pretty traditional working class family.

And as long as I'm sort of name dropping, I had oudemia's namesake pizza tonight. I can only assume her family collects royalties for it.

Hey VW, despite our conflicts I'm genuinely sorry you're in agony. I would be satisfied if my comments were the only source of crippling pain in your life. Get well soon and in the meantime enjoy your drugs and your throne.

I can't stand SOA for some reason. It seems sentimental and dumb and overly romantic. In real life these guys would be a bunch of scumbags, right? But the highway motorcycle shots are cool.

Oudemia's real name is Papa John?

31: I'm not in agony, actually. I mean, I'm in considerable pain -- most of which seems to have resulted from the surgery, which required chiseling away for hours at my spine. But I'm a man of tremendous of physical courage, so I hardly notice. The issue is that my left foot is totally numb, which is more horrible than I would have guessed (had I guessed about such things, which I never did before now), and the leg it's attached to doesn't work properly (thus the limp). Honestly, none of this is the end of the world. Regardless, thanks. And if you really want to make me feel better, please FedEx me some fire ants.

Is there something about owning a national pizza chain that makes a person an asshole?

What about Little Caesars? Is Mike Ilitch a dick?

Mike Ilitch is one of only five people to receive the key to the city in Detroit! The other four? James Earl Jones, Benjamin Carson (look it up, lazy), Jerome Bettis, and Saddam Hussein.

Yes, of course I knew that off the top of my head.

Mike Ilitch has given money to an odd assortment of politicians. But it looks like he votes Republican in presidential elections. And he gave money to RUDY!, so I'm guessing that even if he's not a world-historical asshole like Herman Cain, John Schnatter, and Tom Monaghan, he's still might be an awful human being.

I'm playing to win today, people, limp or no limp.

the game done gone, Von Wafer.

I'm playing a game called "How Symmetrically Can You Walk?"

33: And your vision?

42: fucked. The neuro-ophthalmologist thinks it could be because I was under so long for the surgery or it could be something else entirely unrelated to the surgery (PGD has a VW voodoo doll). Regardless, the doc thinks it's probably/hopefully correctable. We'll see after the holidays!

I missed the eyes announcement. You came out of surgery and your eyes were fucked? That's awful.

I'll have to restructure my game to give more advantage to right-seers like myself.

43: Well, at least he narrowed it down to those two possibilities.

44: double and/or blurred vision. Again, not the biggest deal in the world, assuming it goes away eventually. But it's been a pain in the ass lately, as I have a deadline that's beginning to loom, and I really need to get some work done. While I'm bedridden would be an ideal time to do said work, but alas, I can't read books at the moment, so I'm out of luck and getting antsy (not fire antsy, though). Still, because of a quick exchange between Jetpack and Bave the other night, I've started watching Archer, and it's excellent. I do, though, wonder if one has to be on Vicodin to really appreciate it.

46: I've dealt with a lot of docs lately. Most of them, including my surgeon, have been at worst predictably dickish. This guy, though, was a true dickhead. I bet he owns a chain of pizza restaurants.

31.2: I liked the 2 or 3 episodes I saw, esp. Henry Rollins' performance as the over-anxious Nazi. But yeah, those guys would probably be much huger assholes IRL. This guy, for instance, doesn't even seem to be much of a racist, but still not very nice.

Von Wafer is becoming Francis Parkman.

The show, while excellent, seems to be inducing really weird, violent dreams. I'm never involved in the violence--just standing there observing it.

The job does this to me with the added value that I'm never just observing. Sometimes very detailed. I had one a few weeks back where I was shot in the neck with a snub nose revolver. I felt it rip through the left side in slow motion and had the distinct thought "that hit my jugular, I'm fucked."

Perhaps predictably, I love Archer.

Danger Zone!

I've been having physics nightmares lately.

Would these be like 'uhoh, the universe is made of actual string', or are they expressed as equations, or what?

In real life these guys would be a bunch of scumbags, right? But the highway motorcycle shots are cool.

Not really. It's a mixed bag. Some real scumbags and some amazing people. Nobody who really fits in. Otoh I'm decades out of date on the 1%.

I spent most of my teens on and around bikes, worked as a mechanic for a while. When I was 17 or so I got an old sportster in pieces and rebuilt it from the frame up. Put about 40000 miles on it the next year. Didn't do much else.

Something I thought I'd left behind a long time ago, but bought one last year after many years away. It's so much fun. I can't believe I forgot that.

(Also, the tech has come a long way. I bought something to fit two for touring but still be fun, it's pretty big but still has a 1/4 mile below 4s. Crazy.)

I'm pretty sure I've been to the bar linked above.

Recent political rhetoric notwithstanding, in 55 I meant "the 1%'ers"

VW, if it's any comfort, I had emergency brain surgery a couple of weeks ago and when I came round I thought my eyes were fucked too, in much the way you describe. But two weeks on and they're back close enough to normal that I can type this, if a bit slowly. So don't panic (yet). It's a bitch about the deadline though.

36: seven, according to Wiki, but the other two are Santa Claus and Elmo.

The world is waiting for an ensemble heist movie starring all seven.

Seven people have been awarded the key to the city of Detroit: Santa Claus (given annually at the city's Thanksgiving Day Parade), actor James Earl Jones, Sesame Street character Elmo, neurosurgeon Benjamin Carson, football star Jerome Bettis, businessman and sports team owner Mike Ilitch, and -- in 1980, in recognition of large donations to a church -- former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.[20][39][40][43]

emergency brain surgery

Yikes! Glad you're (based on the rest of your comment) on the mend.

That's just what Dr Hfuhruhurr wants you to think.

But, obviously, best wishes and swift recoveries to both Von Wafer and Chris Y

57: Aieeeee! Very glad to hear you are on the mend. I was starting to worry about your absence!

59, 60. Thanks, both. Everybody tells me the procedure was totally routine. Basically I cracked my head and had a slow bleed into my brain pan, which had the effect of a sort of slow motion stroke over a couple of weeks. So they sort of trepanned me and cleaned it out. I seem to be a lot better, although there are a few hurdles to jump yet, but it's looking good so far.

Happy turkey, those who are eating it.

61. Thanks too. Should have previewed.

So they sort of trepanned me

First paleo diets, now paleo medicine. Next it will be "natural" childbirth or something nuts like that.

64: that's some quadratic equation shit right there.

emergency brain surgery

Wha?! I am thankful that it went well and you are recovering.

Whenever I think of trepanning , I think of Maturin using a flattened silver-piece to cover the hole in the skull.

65: Since the beginning of time there have been common denominators in the world even though the denominator had not yet been invented.

Glad you're recovering, chris y.

We are actually procuring Thanksgiving dinner, the main parts, pre-cooked from the [small Ohio city] Women's City Club. But don't worry, we have a good reason. (And are augmenting with a number of homemade accessories, including at least two of the cranberry persuasion.) Will actually be a bit of an emotional* thing since my folks are moving to a retirement community in a couple of weeks.

*Although in our Midwestern reserve we don't actually have externally recognizable emotions.

Oh god, Chris! I'm glad to hear you're on the mend.

That's really scary chris y, I'm wishing you a complete recovery and clearing of every last remaining hurdles. And the same to Von Wafer as well.

Good God, Chris, that is frightening. I was going to complain about the crippling food poisoning that has made me a pale, sweaty ghost for Thnxgvn, but damn.

57/62: Yes, add my voice to the chorus wishing you the fastest possible recovery! Take it easy, but take it!

Very glad to hear from 62 that all is going well.

Going well enough to make jokes about, which is particularly impressive. "Hey, they just bored a hole in my skull and hosed a load of stuff out. But enough about me. Bon appetit, everyone!... what, no one's hungry?"

Yes, hope the healing goes well, Chris.

Chris did hold up the British tradition of understatement.

Monday: Tea with the vicar, trimmed the hedge. Dinner with the Bowles-Simpsons. Cracked my head on a curb on the way home.
Tuesday: A small bit of emergency brain surgery in the morning. Saw a blue tit and several chaffinches on the hospital grounds. Returned Mr. Chuffney's copy of Burton that I had borrowed.
Wednesday: Heavy frost. Intermittent bleeding from the ear. Delightful tea with the Stokes-Barnleys.

Ghosts are for Christmas, Flip.

(Hmm, maybe some flip will help?)

Yikes! Best wishes to Chris and Von Wafer for rapid recoveries.

78: And Flippanter too!
What is going on here?

74. I don't think they actually used a Black & Decker. They offered me the option of a local anaesthetic, but the surgeon admitted he wouldn't have the bottle for it either.

Best wishes recovering.

72. That's terrible timing, Flip. Can you celebrate Canadian thanksgiving instead?

I think it's too late for that. Unless he waits until next year.

Greek Orthodox Thanksgiving, then.

Speedy recoveries to all who need them!

The Canadians sneak it in around Columbus Day, thinking no one will notice.

Best wishes to all, thankful not to be among the recovering.

The best part was vomiting in a northbound Megabus toilet yesterday afternoon. I hadn't vomited for some years and had forgotten how unpleasant it is. I think my Thanksgiving intake will be Gatorade and saltines.

Oh, Jessica Chastain, I will kill for you.

Chris y, are you feeling particularly enlightened?

Chris y is now Homo Sapiens Correctus

88: "Egon, this reminds me of that time you tried to drill a hole in your head. Do you remember?"
"That would have worked if you hadn't stopped me."

They offered me the option of a local anaesthetic, but the surgeon admitted he wouldn't have the bottle for it either.

I presume that the other option was "general anaesthetic", but my first impression was that it was "bite down hard on this stick".

Oh, man, Chris. Very glad to hear you're okay.

Flip -- I figure you can get the most fun out of the food poisoning by attending dinner, sipping a glass of ginger ale, and describing in vivid detail to everyone else exactly how the sight and smell of all the food is making you feel. As a bonus, if you do it right there should be more leftovers for when you're feeling better.

I seem to remember that brain surgery is often done with a local, because it can be useful to find out if the patient has suddenly forgotten all the words they know relating to fruit mid-surgery.

92: determining whether this has happened can now be crowdsourced by having the patient liveblog the surgery and respond to comments.

93. This only works if the commenters are primed to discuss pawpaws and durian. It's not helpful if they're simply supplying an endless stream of cock jokes (unless they involve melons).

62 --Oh wow that sounds awful, Chris -- glad to hear that you are OK and feeling better, and good luck to you.

"After chris y's tragic accident, he can now reach only extremely low-hanging fruit".

Flippanter, though, I feel no sympathy for, since he was probably eating grains.

I seem to remember that brain surgery is often done with a local, because it can be useful to find out if the patient has suddenly forgotten all the words they know relating to fruit mid-surgery.

Indeed. A documentary on neuroscience I was watching showed this in action - basically the surgeon judges when to stop removing brain tissue by how slurred/nonsensical the patient's speech is getting.

94 Well there is the one about the boy across the river but I don't think that's to your taste.

Off to see the folks on LI, have a happy thanksgiving all those who are celebrating. Everyone else just have a happy.

Bartenders should go into brain surgery consulting. Sounds like the same thing they do to decide about when to cut somebody off.

98 is terrifying.

Good lord. Now I'm even more scared of emergency brain surgery.

Yikes! I'm late for all the medical nightmares. Feel better, y'all, and be thankful the standard treatment for everything isn't still "Pour the black powder from this cartridge in and ignite it".

91.2: I suspect the Flip-Pater would not put up with much of that; he's pretty squeamish. I think I'll work the "pale and wasting away with consumption" angle.

97: The woman you reprobates call Lunchy and I went out for Thai food but she's fine.

Good lord. Now I'm even more scared of emergency brain surgery.

To be fair, I'm pretty sure the surgery in question was tumour removal, not trauma-related. Though I imagine the same sort of thing would apply for some trauma surgery.

I hope you recover quickly, Chris. And a Happy Thanksgiving to the rest of you.

Christ. a bang on the head, and it's into the neuro ward. good luck.

The word "trepanning" in the 18th century meant "kidnapping," which always throws me when I read books that use it. Holy fuck, they cut a hole in his SKULL? No, they just snared him into working on their ship for a while.

I'm so glad they caught it, Chris, and hope you feel back to normal soon!

107. And isn't the neuro ward depressing? Mrs y said it was like a play by Alan Bennet only without the funny bits.

108. I did not know that. How the hell did it change its meaning like that?

Yeah, Collins has it as "to entice, ensnare, swindle or cheat" with the variant spelling "trapan", origin uncertain. It may be completely unrelated: surgical trepan is from Latin trepanum, and the other sense may be an obsolete form of "trap" (cf: eat/eaten, drink/drunken, hap/happen).

Thanks, ajay -- I kept finding attestations of one or the other, but not both. It may be coincidence. It is tempting to think that boring a hole and luring a mark are connected, but perhaps not.

110,111: OED says name of surgical procedure derives from tool used to do it, and that goes back to the 14th century. The kidnapping sense is several centuries older, and they speculate is etymologically unrelated to the surgical sense, probably deriving from 'trap', though it's change of spelling may have had to do with the gravitational pull of surgical 'trepan', as it were.

109: Neuro wards depressing? Totally, and scary too. I spent a few days up there at Cedars-Sinai while the docs were trying to run the bill up for that little stroke I had several years ago. I kept thinking "No Exit".

My dad spent months on a neuro ward but I didn't find it so bad. I remember the doctor explaining to one family, re their father who had fallen & been in a coma for a fortnight, and who was now awake and giving out to them all to the point of shouting, that anger/ bad temper were common side effects of brain injury. Family said "oh, he's always been like that!".

114: The good part (aside from their tests showing my "negligible" arterial plaque accumulation) was being so far away from any place to buy cigarrettes and smoke them that I managed to get past the hyper-twitchy stage while up there.

100: One of my bartender friends has a test for whether someone is intoxicated: If they ask for a beer, and she serves them a non-alcoholic one, and they don't complain, they're cut off. I'm not sure how well that would work in the OR though. Those pickypants busybodies at the Joint Commission would probably start whining that the near-beer wasn't sterile or something.

Why are they cut off if they're no longer drinking alcohol?

This thread wore me down, and I finally watched some Archer. I already find myself thinking "What the shit!"

92: strangely enough, I have been recently been watching neurosurgery on awake patients. Ironically the worst bit is the immobilization for many of them. Best wishes on your recovery, Chris.

It's an exciting time in neuro.

Chris, I thought my message had gone through this morning but I'd noticed your absence and am very glad you're back. Plus trepanning is totes hot. (Lee and I were just discussing how Nia only talks to me about how much she hates her facial scar and Lee said, "Maybe I should just tell her how hot you think scars are!" but no.)

118: They're cut off because they are no longer drinking alcohol. If they were still drinking alcohol, they would not be cut off.

I have a bartender friend who deals with people being dicks about getting cut off by giving them gin-free G&Ts. Works like a charm, apparently (in that they calm down because they think they got more booze, but really it's just tonic).

When I get really drunk in a bar, I'm going to only drink bottled beer and straight bourbon.

One or the other, that is.