Filed November 29, 2006 at 12:33 am under Family by TJ

Well, I made it one week post neck surgery.  The pain and numbness in my extremities is gone, which means the surgery was successful, I think…   I do I have TONS of pain in my neck still.  On a 1-10 pain scale the doctors use, my neck pain is a 40.

Thanksgiving AM, I decided it would be a fun thing to try to do a summersault down the steps.  It’s actually hard to go up and down steps when you have a neck collar on and can’t look down.  Nothing broke, and I was just a little bruised, and scared I had just paralized myself. I was laying down on the floor wiggling my toes and hands and trying to make sure I really didn’t hurt myself too bad.  My doctors office said I can be pretty sure that I didn’t damage anything, or I’d still be laying on the floor at the bottom of the steps.  I’ve decided to really hold onto the rails going up/down steps for a little while…

Sunday morning, I woke up in tears from pain from the incision.  Apparently, I’m alergic to the steri-strips they used to close the incision.  I ended up taking the steri-strips off Sunday AM, and found out that everything under them is raw (think poison ivy rash).  Cortizone to stop the reaction, and covered with gauze and neosporin, and it is starting to look better fortunatly a couple of days later.

I was told that things will get better every day from here on out, but, at this point in time, I have not seen any improvement in neck pain. If I don’t get up in the middle of the night and take my pain pills, I wake up in the morning with tears in my eyes from the pain.  Jaymie has been really good about waking me up with Thomas’ 5am feeding to make sure I take my pain medicine.  If I don’t, I end up spending half the morning laying down, trying to get “caught back up”.  And, it makes me grouchy.  To everyone.

And I feel bad, as I can’t tell Tanner that daddy can’t pick her up.  And when TBear was here for Thanksgiving, I ended up spending a large chunk of time in bed, flat on my back.  I know that TBear had to have been bored. The timing of everything just sucks, but I guess there just is no good time for stuff like this.

Jaymie is doing good after her surgeries as well.  Just to catch people up, here’s the last month.

10/4 – Jaymie had  a C-Section, and Thomas was born
10/30 – Jaymie had her Gall Bladder removed (laproscopy)
10/31 – Jaymie came home from the hospital
11/1 – Jaymie goes back to the hospital for abdominal pains
11/5 – Jaymie has 2 surgeries.  One to put in 2 stints (endoscopy), and the second to suck excess fluid out (laproscopy) of her belly
11/20 – TJ has his neck surgery
11/21 – Jaymie has surgery to remove 1 of the 2 stints (second one comes out mid-December
11/28 – TJ has the “Big V”  (Boy does that suck…)

So, it’s been a busy couple of months and the current score, I feel like someone stabbed me in the back/neck, and then kicked me in the crotch.

The next couple of days are supposed to be nice outside.  Maybe I’ll try to get out for a walk around the block for some fresh air.

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Ta-Da!

Filed November 5, 2006 at 2:31 pm under Parrotheads by TJ

Cut and paste from one of the news sites.  We’ve seen this guy several times, and Jaymie’s Key West boyfriend, Silverman, was listed on this article.

 

KEY WEST – Patrick the Escape Artist entertains crowds at Mallory Square’s nightly Sunset Celebration by hanging upside-down from a 10-foot tripod and freeing himself from chains and straitjackets.

But at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday — after reminding the crowd that Halloween was the 80th anniversary of Harry Houdini’s death — Michael Patrick drastically altered his routine: Tightly wrapped in a straitjacket, he did a back-flip off a ledge and plunged into the fast-moving Key West Harbor waters, 35-feet deep.

He didn’t resurface.

The unsuspecting tourists thought it was part of the act. But for those who knew Patrick, 55, who has worked at Mallory Square for 15 years, the plunge was so unusual they feared the worst.

Two fellow performers and three police officers dove into the strong current. When they failed to find Patrick, four agencies launched an all-out search-and-rescue mission. The U.S. Coast Guard sent in a helicopter from Miami.

Three hours later, the search was suspended with Patrick’s plight a mystery. Was he dead from a tragic accident? Was it suicide? Or something else?

”I was not able to sleep, thinking he might be dead,” said Patrick’s friend and fellow performer, Joseph Burai, who jumped into the water without concern that his shiny Silver Man makeup could lure barracudas.

Wednesday morning, hours after search efforts began again, Key West police found Patrick hiding at a Key West guesthouse.

Now, Patrick the Escape Artist is jailed at the Monroe County Detention Center, charged with culpable negligence. Police say he endangered the lives of those who dove in to rescue him.

”His actions placed concerned citizens and members of the Key West police and fire department’s dive teams in jeopardy, and that is not something that we take lightly,” Key West Police Chief Bill Mauldin said in a statement.

Patrick told police he was planning a press conference to reveal his hoax when they found him too soon and ruined his big “ta-da.”

Despite the havoc Patrick caused, including putting his pal Burai’s life in danger, Burai was forgiving. ”It was a good trick,” he said. “He’s still my friend. And it’s better they found him alive than dead.”

One mystery remains. How did Patrick pull off the disappearance? Even under good conditions it takes about three minutes for him to escape from the straitjacket.

Patrick would not reveal his ”magician secrets,” police said.

If cops have their way, Patrick the Escape Artist will need to escape from debt: Police say they will seek restitution — to the tune of $25,000 — for the cost of the search-and-rescue efforts.

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