I mowed the lawn yesterday. Spring has officially begun!

We finally all got covid. Cabin fever is really setting in.

In Seoul right now, and wow is it a pleasure to deal with the medical system here. This morning M had an asthma attack. We looked up nearby clinics, found one a block away, and within about ten minutes of arrival he was being examined by a doctor. The clinic waiting room was clean and quiet and everyone was kind and helpful. The check-in staff, the doctor and the pharmacist all fussed that we did not have national insurance and would have to pay out of pocket, but the doctor's visit plus the medication ended up costing about twenty US dollars total.

2, 3: hoping all are recovered quickly!

I'm recovering pretty well from covid but am not recovered from reading comment 3.

$20 didn't include the tip.

What have I ever done to you?

Having Covid and needing to do the usual grim and tedious runaround with pharmacies and our largely useless insurance company, on the heels of all our other medical runaround in the past year (after multiple appeals the insurer finally agreed that my face surgery was medically necessary and will reimburse about 5 percent of the surgeon's fee, owing to out-of-network caps based on a wholly fictitious idea of what such procedures should cost), as against the experience described in 3, is making me worried about getting old in this country.

I need to buy long term care insurance.

But asserting that I'm 100% immune to covid and not taking any precautions beyond vaccination is working great and I'll never get my comeuppance for it.

Alive and well. My wife went to a convention two weeks ago and returned with sniffles that wound up being Covid. She successfully avoided passing the bug to me, which was important mostly because I had one of my first meet-in-person business trips in years on Thursday. (Most of the time I go out so little that having Covid wouldn't be a big deal as long as the symptoms were minor enough for work-from-home to still be an option.)

In between the two - attending the convention and finding out she had Covid, she performed with her band on Saturday, publicly for the first time. They enjoyed it and did a good job; it was very low key (our city's porchfest on a friend's porch in the right area).

Three of us have Senchi hoodies now and it's your fault heebie.

Wasn't it Moby who got one? I think I'd never heard of them.

Plus I'm really much more of a grandpa cardigan kinda person than a performance tech fleece person. Plus I live somewhere where we already have fucking mosquitoes in the house and it's pissing me off, but warm clothes won't help.

No. It was snarkout, I think. I want one and was talking about it, but haven't gotten one because I've got too many fleeces.

I made it through my week-long work trip without getting Covid and then had a nice vacation. My boss got Covid and ended up missing all of the meetings, which was nicer than showing up and infecting people, for sure.

Unfortunately, I have other medical problems that are as yet unexplained, with diagnostic procedures of increasing levels of invasiveness getting scheduled in the future. Those problems didn't prevent my vacation and currently seem unrelated to "general health" as measured in energy levels with respect to hiking and other outdoor activities. But the potential is there that something serious is wrong that will eventually reach a point where it does start seriously affecting my life. The worst period, which sent me to doctors in the first place, was February and that did lead me to not do very much expect get through the work day. I find it very concerning that doctors keep telling me not to eat or drink or smoke things that I've never eaten, drank, or smoked. It would be much nicer if common causes of most of my symptoms were a clear and easy explanation.

I'm sorry about your medical issues, fa. Unexplained health problems are so stressful; I hope you find a straightforward and resolvable cause soon. Good luck with the covid and the cabin fever and the fancy hoodie habits, everyone.

Also, I think that after three shots and two bouts of illness I might be immune to covid? I've had three very close exposures in the past few months: 1) spoke on a panel and shared a microphone with a co-panelist who tested positive the next day (I was masked, she was not); 2) ate dinner with friends (all unmasked), one of whom tested positive the next day; and 3) played music with a group of people (all unmasked) and sat directly in front of a person who was mostly playing guitar but also sang sometimes, and who tested positive the next day. This means I'm immortal, right?

Huh, maybe I just assigned general blame due to the existence of the thread. They are impressively warm for the small amount of material and we're going on a week long hike in the alps this summer so seem useful.
Sorry fa- mystery illnesses suck with all the rounds of testing and waiting.

We spent the weekend in a yurt with three other families (separate yurts) with wood fired hot tubs and barbecues. That was pretty good, although wrangling eight kids and the various points of friction between them wasn't always, not helped by some parents who have a very laissez-faire attitude to parental discipline.

You can always get the kids ponies and recurved composite bows and let the loose on the neighbors

They would have totally been up for that. They'd rate that the best weekend ever.

Good luck, fa.

Yes, I hope you can figure it out and treat it soon. Be careful hiking. Julian Sands might still be up there waiting to pounce.

18: I still haven't caught Covid, nor have either of my teenagers who are in a big public high school, work retail, and have traveled internationally. My mother caught it in the pre-vaccine era but not since, and my brother hasn't had it.

We're all vaccinated to the hilt of course, but still. My oldest (25, in DC now) had remained uninfected even through his (same apartment) girlfriend catching it, but then he ended up testing positive in January and ruined everything. Thiiiis close to being the new master race.

Take care, fa.

My mystery illness was unfortunate because the doctors didn't think it was a mystery and spent four months treating me for the wrong thing. But now that we have it all sorted out, I'm nearing the end of a six-week course of intravenous antibiotics (which is more fun than it sounds) and I'm feeling much better.

The doctors insist that I'm such a strange case that diagnosis was more-or-less impossible. Even the doctor who figured it out had been apologetic for asking me to do another MRI, given the sensible diagnosis I already had from two other doctors. And the hospital he sent me to did an x-ray, a CAT scan and another MRI to convince themselves that I really had an infection in my spine.

I've never had an MRI, but I've heard they are the new frontier of 2nd amendment activism. Brave men and women, but probably just men, are insisting doctors stop repressing freedom and let them keep their guns on when they get an MRI.

Yes, fake accent, I didn't have time to write earlier, but I hope you figure everything out and it's treatable.

Best wishes fa, hope you find out soon and it's nothing serious

Thanks, all. I still have some optimism that the initial advice to change my diet and check back in six weeks because it will clear up that way will turn out to have been correct, except for the estimate of six weeks.

, but I've heard they are the new frontier of 2nd amendment activism. Brave men and women, but probably just men, are insisting doctors stop repressing freedom and let them keep their guns on when they get an MRI.

What's the word for when something is so rightwing that you can't tell if it's satire or real? I'm having that.

America.

32: Poe's law

In America's defense, it was a Brazilian who died from sneaking his gun into the MRI earlier this year.

Think of the view you could get of someone shooting themself in the foot!

This is as good a thread as any to ask for recommendations on resources for quickly reviewing algebra/trigonometry/precalculus. I need to pass a math placement exam for a CS program and from the description they're looking for something like what a college freshman is supposed to know if they haven't taken calculus yet.

It's been almost thirty years since I knew these things. I just need to know enough to get by the placement in the next couple weeks, then I have more time to be thorough and review more advanced stuff.

This is as good a thread as any to ask for recommendations on resources for quickly reviewing algebra/trigonometry/precalculus. I need to pass a math placement exam for a CS program and from the description they're looking for something like what a college freshman is supposed to know if they haven't taken calculus yet.

It's been almost thirty years since I knew these things. I just need to know enough to get by the placement in the next couple weeks, then I have more time to be thorough and review more advanced stuff.

I'm glad I'm not being tested on ability to avoid double posting while just trying to uncheck the "remember personal info" box.

Khan Academy? I haven't looked at the materials myself, but I think they've got good online stuff for any kind of high school math.

Here's their precalc course: https://www.khanacademy.org/math/precalculus

My son is taking precalc right now and honestly it doesn't seem fun.

34: But which way does 28 tip on the Poe teeter totter?

ANSWER CAREFULLY, NOW.

Khan Academy does seem to be the best thing out there for my purposes.

Khan Noonien Singh Academy.

Supposedly, there's a lawsuit from a person who bought a butt plug that was advertised as being silicone and wore it in the MRI thinking it safe (and I guessa fun way to shocka radiologist). But it had a ferrous metal core. I can't find s source that looks authentic, but you can find it searching for "anal rail gun."

47. An X-ray was apparently posted and then deleted, but a skim of the extensive commentary in the radiology forum turns up 0 skepticism about a faked image.

I think that I am officially old now, the episode seems really sad to me, what a horrible and unnecessary injury.

you can find it searching for "anal rail gun."

No thanks.

47 saw it on Bluesky

"Do you have anything in your butt?" is probably going to be added to the really long series of pre-MRI screening questions.

AIMHOBIT, I once got a tour of the big MRI machine. My keys were shaking in my pocket when I was in the room where the operator was.

pocket

53: He was just happy to see it.

50: Unsurprisingly, three different people immediately forwarded that to me when it hit the internet.

I'm surprised you weren't the first to know.

I'm just relieved it wasn't you.

Any of you.

What makes you so sure?

No flared base.

Do MRI machines differ? I recently had one and I didn't need to worry much about any metal that wasn't directly in the machine. My legs were in the machine, but my arms and torso weren't, and I wore rings, a watch, a bra, and the metal leg brace just sat on the floor next to the machine. Nothing rattled.

Yes, the stronger the magnet the better the image. And it's different when you are in the machine or just have a limb stuck through a coil.

Interesting! That makes sense - I'd sort of assumed it was either that or that TV lied about MRI machines and magnets. I was at a budget place because $2000 to determine that my ACL was gone seemed too steep. Not hard to visualize a lack of ACL.

Yeah. The magnetic field is mostly in the coil, so if only your knee is there, the rest of you is pretty safe with a small magnet (1.5T probably). I was looking at a 7T machine. I'm told they now go to 11.

I don't want to brag, but I've had four MRIs, two x-rays and a CAT scan in the last six months.

I once reviewed a clinical trial where the researchers were using an MRI and the screening form included a check-box for "history of bullets."
That's an interesting way of asking someone if they've ever been shot.

I've been in the full-body machine a couple times as a clinical trial subject. They also ask if you've ever done metalwork or been a jeweler since a tiny fleck of metal embedded somewhere in you (like, say, near an eye but really anywhere) could act like a blender. They also asked specifically about genital piercings.

In the olds who worked in the mill for long time, there have been issues with MRI and long-forgotten metal fragments in the eye or elsewhere.

Anyway, I did the statistics for a clinical trial that used MRIs and other imaging, but I've never had one.

I've had three that I can remember. Two for breast imaging - one as a baseline at age 20 or so, and then one before my mastectomy. One because I was having a lot of headaches from some meds, and the doc wanted to rule out anything serious. I vaguely think I might have had one as a child for headaches as well.

I found that siblings were the best bet for a headache when I was a child.

I saw a product recall recently for a container that uses magnets to hold the lid closed. The problem seemed to be that the magnets could become loose and someone could ingest one and then get too close to metal.

You just need to check your poops until you pass the loadstone.

I should add to 65 that when they knocked me out for my biopsy, I was on the MRI table, and they planned to use the MRI to guide the process. But I wasn't conscious for that one.

73: Until it does though, it's kind of annoying that you keep turning to the north whenever you stop paying attention.

If we were having a contest to see who had had the most CT scans and MRIs, I bet I would be a contender.

I've ALSO had a lot of PET scans which are even more of a stupid ordeal.

And a video swallowing study which was something I didn't really know existed- like a live action x-ray from the side. (It turns out my body regularly forgets how to swallow, which you can tell when the radioactive snack gets stuck on the way down. Mmmm radioactive snacks)

If we were having a different contest to see who had had the weirdest medical tests done I bet I'd be a contender for that too. I'd open with the balance test where you get strapped into a harness and try to stand still in a little pretend house where the walls and floor move and tilt independently.

I may be headed for a radioactive snack test but they don't seem to think I'm at that point. But since my next tests are two months out I don't really know what's in store. Of my problems, the esophagus ones seem less better (hard to say, I tend to think it's same or worse but every week is different) than two months ago, other problems are better.

The doctors seem more interested in the things that are better, and my suspicion is that those line up more closely with things that get routine screenings at my age so there are fewer reasons to push back on tests I would have gotten anyway. I had to argue that no, I don't think waking up with a burning sensation every day for a week last week but not this one is a sign that things have improved, given that I hadn't had a week like that before.

ugh :(

I've only had a CT scan and the live-action x-ray, but PET scans are the coolest because they use antimatter! You can only do them if you have a particle accelerator nearby. It's science fiction stuff.

Here, the PET scanner lives in a trailer that makes rounds between hospitals in three different cities on a weekly schedule. You have to go out the service door in the back and use a frieght elevator to go in. Also they always make me drink a very gross "milkshake" and test my blood sugar but I'm not sure if that's a standard part of it or just for some specific reason related to me.

I assume the milkshake has the radioactive material that emits the antiparticles (the titular positron in PET)?

I've had 2 brain MRIs. They used to make folks with pituitary issues do them annually. They wouldn't even let me wear my own sweatpants because they might have some metal somewhere.

76: My dad had one of those done. They wanted him to drink "thickened water" after that, but it was really not something he took to.

My office used to be below the floor where they tripped old people for science.

Let's all talk about my upcoming colonoscopy.

I haven't had a colonoscopy, but I have had an esophagogastroduodenoscopy and a flexible sigmoidoscopy.

I have a calendar notice that says "schedule a colonoscopy". It will chime tomorrow at 10:00 and I'll move it to the next working day, like I have for the past five weeks. It's a process.

80: The scanner-in-trailer model is pretty common, actually! The radioactive material is most often a fluorinated analog of glucose. Cancer cells have much higher rate of metabolism than healthy cells (like 20x) so they take up glucose (and its radiolabeled F-18 analog) more than healthy cells, so you can image cancer pretty effectively. It's very common to have patients fast before. However, having high blood sugar (even if you do fast as instructed) can interfere with results because it means cells won't have very good uptake of the tracer.

Usually, a milkshake contains a CT contrast agent (some kind of metal). If you're getting a PET/CT, that's the most likely possibility.

79: You only need a local neighborhood cyclotron for short-lived isotopes. You can get others via FedEx. FedEx is frequently the bane of my professional existence.

Radioactive material for PET scans on people is almost always dosed IV.

At McDonald's, they call it a Shamrock Shake.

Thanks! Does the flourinated glucose go in by injection then instead of swallowing?

91: Yep! Right to bloodstream. Half-life is just under 2 h, so hard to wait for something ingested to hit bloodstream and also you don't get as high a peak concentration.

Thanks! I knew the half-life is remarkably short, which is why you need a cyclotron somewhat nearby.

85: I get violated in September.

I've never had an IV at a PET scan! They make me come way early and drink the beverage in a couple of stages (half now in the waiting room, the rest in the weird waiting chamber recliner in the trailer).

Never the same appointment as a CT, where I often get contrast pumped in via IV partway through the scanning.

Montana has a hard time following rules or keeping up with the rest of the union.

95: That's really interesting! Thanks! I went to look up whether that is common/new, and I guess it's a newer option. Interesting to know. From a 2019 paper, this made me laugh a little:

Clearly, an orally administered 18F- FDG dose followed by PET /CT imaging has a higher probability of imaging tumor foci than does a scan which was cancelled due to lack of venous access. Indeed, oral 18F-FDG might be considered as "any port in a storm", even if there is not a port.

https://jnm.snmjournals.org/content/jnumed/early/2019/10/17/jnumed.119.233288.full.pdf

Had no idea radiologists were so funny.

94 to 96.2.

If I had stayed at the San Carlo Cicchetti in Riyadh, would I have enjoyed it? I can't get this Irish guy to stop giving my email instead of his own.

Whoever San Carlo is, I bet he isn't comfortable at all.

I've never even been to Asia.

Very little of it is comfortable. Even by Nebraska standards.

I would like to see the steppe.

But the only thing I remember about horses is don't stand behind them and that there's a specific side you need to be on to get in the saddle.

98: Seems to be a restaurant not a hotel.

https://www.sancarlocicchetti.sa/

There's probably rooms in the back.

|| She could write after a glib, common-place, sprightly fashion, and had already acquired the knack of spreading all she knew very thin, so that it might cover a vast surface. ||

That's a great line.

Lady Carbury, or am I in the wrong author entirely?

108: Precisely correct!

The first THC study I got paid for way back in the 90s had me lie in a PET scan for a couple hours or so, which was pretty calm and relaxing. But also had an artery line placed in my wrist to measure arterial blood gas levels, which was less pleasant.

Here's a fun update, RWM has some exciting news today: https://twitter.com/isabellepoppHEA/status/1658143383473340417

I feel like Twitter discourse in the smarty-pants set has been significantly elevated by the recent conversion of more complex logical fallacies to memes, like motte and bailey and survivorship bias.

That was meant to have a || |>.

111: That's great. Congratulations.