Scheduling screwup and Chewbacca Mom

I really messed up with rescheduling my light therapy treatments, which I think will be my new shorthand for ECP.

After learning that they had extended the time between treatments too quickly, I booked my next ride for two weeks, instead of three, from my last appointment, meaning May 25.

But when I called as usual on my way in, they said I did not have an appointment. Luckily they took me anyway because I was almost there. And I needed it done. It is interesting how fast you can backtrack. My thighs had returned to the very attractive bubble-wrap dimpled look that I had noticed at the beginning of this about a year ago, my stomach looked and felt like it was harboring a small medicine ball, and my hands puffed up. The new schedule was apparently starting this week, so I kept that appointment because Ellen thought I could use two weeks in a row.

Nurse trying on watches

It had been emailed to me, but it was one of those cases where I saw what I thought it should be instead of what it actually said.

When calling MART to plan the rides for the new schedule, I made them according to the schedule that I thought I was on and forgot to correct it. This past Wednesday I had everything ready to go but in the morning realized I had not gotten the confirmation call the night before. When I called and actually got through (a minor miracle) they said I hadn't asked for a ride. So this week they were expecting me but I didn't go.

To summarize: Last week, ride but no appointment. This week, appointment but no ride. I am going to go for the next two weeks. I will need to call back and hopefully get through before my next birthday so that I can plan an extra ride.

It all worked out, though.

Chewbacca Mom

Everyone was in high spirits at the Kraft Family Blood Donor Center last week. A couple of nurses were laughing hysterically at the bed of the woman next to me. She was also laughing. I heard wild shrieking coming from inside a phone.

 My nurse brought the phone over and showed it to me. It was the now viral Chewbacca Mom laughing uncontrollably from the inside of a Chewbacca toy mask. You would not believe how many gifts she has received since then.

A while back at a picnic, some of us laid-off newspaper people were trying to think of some ways we could make money. Too bad we didn't think of something like that.

As previously mentioned, the nurses all love my Bev Bloomberg watch, leading to a domino effect of one after the other buying them. Last week one of the nurses couldn't decide, so she walked around asking for advice.

One laugh in which I did not share was when the needle went in easily but when the moment of truth came at which it needs to draw, nothing happened. Debbie, who was my nurse, called Esther over to investigate whether something was wrong with the machine. In the past when this has happened, the nurse has had to jiggle the needle around (not fun) or remove it to get a better connection with the vein.

Then she realized that for the second time that day, she had not opened up the clamp.

"It's clampie day!" she said, laughing like the Chewbacca Mom.

It wasn't the end of the world, but I didn't think it was as funny as she did.