01.27.10
Posted in Portland at 4:35 pm by Bridget Zinn
Those of you who are friends with Barrett on facebook may have read a bit about our big break in last week. Why, you might ask, would anyone bother breaking into our little run down rental when we are surrounded by so many lovely homes that probably have things worth stealing in them?
One reason: because the other houses weren’t harboring an imaginary person named Trudi which apparently we were.
It happened like this — there I was doing the Very Important Work of healing from surgery (this involves a lot of sleeping) and some time around 12 in the morning or so, I was woken up by a violent banging sound. I poked Barrett. He mumbled something about the upstairs neighbors who work odd hours. More violent banging. I poked him again and said “I’m pretty sure it’s not the neighbors.”
Bravely standing two rooms away and around behind the door, I listened while Barrett hunted down the source of the sound.
“Um, hello?” Barrett, still half-asleep and befuddled, from our kitchen.
Bang, bang, bang, “I want Trudi. You’re hiding Trudi. Let me in to get Trudi.”
“Uh yeah, Trudi doesn’t live here. In fact, I don’t know anyone named Trudi. Hey, did you break the locks off the screen doors? You did, you broke the doors!”
“The guy upstairs told me to.”
“You need to leave.”
Some more back and forth about Trudi. Then, “Can I at least come in for a glass of water?”
“You broke two of our doors, I’m not giving you a glass of water.”
The guy wandered off our back porch and we called the police.
They asked us to look outside to see where the guy went.
Barrett checked out back, didn’t see anything, checked out front and THERE HE WAS, LOOKING BACK IN!!!
Eek!
So the cops came, talked to our upstairs neighbor who had not told the guy to break down our back door, ID’ed the guy and discovered that he was off his meds and had all sorts of other colorful incidences on record. “The guy upstairs” was a voice in his own head. Lovely. As the cops were doing their thing, our upstairs neighbor’s girlfriend came home from work just in time to be frightened by the sight of two squad cars in front of our place and to get cursed at by the crazy guy who’d tried to break in.
*sigh*
Life is not boring here.
In other news, I’m healing up fine. Bizarre how quickly I went from being held together just by glue and two stitches to having the skin grow together to give me three lovely scars in my mid-section.
And I still have eight and a half more days of chemo-less freedom!
Love to you all,
Bridget
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01.14.10
Posted in Portland at 9:28 pm by Bridget Zinn
My favorite quote of the year (so far): “You are seriously in danger of becoming normal.” Isn’t that awesome??? My SURGEON said that. And he would know. He was right in there looking at things up close and personal.
Wheeee!!! I never thought that the idea of being normal could be so exciting.
I seem to be recovering from this surgery almost alarmingly fast — there are three largish incisions across my belly, but they don’t seem so bad. Yes, there is some pain. Quite a lot actually. And some tiredness. But still I feel goodish for someone who just had surgery. Plus, I have almost a whole month before I have to start chemo again. Woo hoo! If I can just do some quick healing and get over the pain, this could be an exceptionally fun month.
For those of you worried about us being well fed during all of this turmoil, my dad and Diana made us a freezer full of dinners and Barrett’s parents sent us cookies from our favorite cookie company Pacific Cookies. Yum. I was sort of worried that I would lose weight with all of this fasting around surgery time, but I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.
The hospital wasn’t too bad either. I had a nice view of northwest Portland which you can sort of see behind Barrett. If you squint really hard. And use your imagination.
I had the perfect socks and shoes for sneaking out and ended up down in the gift shop in my hospital gown where I found this hedge hog pen that needed to come home with me and that I was sure I would want to use to write my next novel and even imagined him whispering advice in my ear. I was quite sure that Hedgey the hedge hog would be quite brilliant when given half a chance.
I was on a lot of morphine.
Some recommendations:
Shaina Noll’s CD Songs for the Inner Child is lovely and soothing. Perfect if you’re looking for something nice to listen to while you rest.
Relax Into Healing has great meditation CD’s. I’ve used the chemo one and the cancer one and liked them both quite a bit so I decided to try the surgery one and I think it’s helped me convince my brain to convince my body that healing is fun.
The wedge pillow. This thing is awesome. Barrett ran all over to find one for me when I got home from the hospital and I’m so glad he did. Upright it’s great for sitting in bed and reading, laid down it’s perfect for sleeping and getting up without hurting the old tummy muscles.
Thanks everyone who came to visit me in the hospital and everyone who wrote to me online. It’s highly distracting and wonderful to hear from you all.
Love,
Bridget
A blurry photo of Hedgey, my new muse:
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01.07.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 5:24 pm by Bridget Zinn
These are the pre-surgery meds they gave me.
What were they thinking?
Bridget
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01.05.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 11:35 am by Bridget Zinn
Coveralls. You know the kind that mechanics wear? I should have asked for some for Christmas. Then I could just pop them over my clothes and solve the dripping butter and/or soy sauce and/or chocolate issue that seems to come up around the holidays. Wouldn’t that be brilliant?
Besides the lack-of-coveralls problem, we had a fabulous holiday and spent a day in Seattle shopping at the amazing gigantic Asian grocery store Uwajimaya’s. 
We picked up all sorts of goodies and had to fit it all in one backpack. The burdock root didn’t quite fit and ended up poking out the top, as you can see in the photo of Barrett on the Bainbridge Island Ferry.
Good thing we had our fun times over the holidays, as it turns out I’m having surgery THIS WEEK! I just found out yesterday. Lots of mad scrambling — stocking up on fruit juice jels (aka fake “healthy-ish” jello), vegetable broth, and miso soup.
V. Important To Do List (to be completed before Thursday):
1) Figure out what to do with Needs a Haircut But Will Not Be Able to Get One Before Thursday hair (as it is a well known fact that hospital types take better care of the well groomed). I need a look that requires little to no effort and yet somehow says “I care”. Possibly pigtails?
2) Paint nails –sadly, they have been unpainted for months now as the neuropathy was so bad, I wasn’t all that steady with a brush. If you don’t know what neuropathy is, yay for you, because it is this completely annoying chemo side effect that causes tingling in your hands and feet, and makes everything you touch feel like gravel, except when you can’t feel anything at all. Don’t even get me started on the fear of clipping toenails — the combination of lack of coordination in the hands and the lack of feeling in the feet is the perfect setting for bloody disaster. I am so happy to say the neuropathy seems to be disappearing. Huzzah!
3) Make sure iPod is loaded with music. Also, don’t forget to pack iPod speaker stand thing to play music in room to add ambiance (and cover up the sound of patients down the hall yelling at nurses and/or puking).
4) Pack red mary janes to keep from slipping in horrid hospital slippers when sneaking out for adventures.
5) Find some books to read ASAP!!!
Whew! Okay, must get to it.
I hope you had a great holiday!
Love to you all,
Bridget
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