Modern Vespa

How about when your package from SIP gets shipped to four different countries then gets delayed? At least FedEx is consistent.

at least they used fedex for you. i selected it and they still decided DHL was the proper choice, despite taking 2x as long and the box being completely destroyed when it arrived--and they STILL refuse to attempt to help with recovery of items missing from the box as a result. they say it's my responsibility to file the claim, and dhl says THEY have to because THEY are dhl's customer.

gotta love that german efficiency. "i have placed all items inside der kasten now it is no longer my problem."

You just humbled me. 🙂

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Kidney stones. 6mm.

That's BIG! Mine was only 4mm, and that was nasty enough. 6mm?

That's what the CT scan says. They're not sure if it's one big one or multiple small ones, though.

All I know is that it's currently quite painful and medical intervention will likely be required.

Good luck with whatever they do! I'd concentrate on how good it will feel afterwards. I would spell relief in BIG letters.

Ouch!

Been there, done that.

You have my sympathy.

Oh no. And it's particularly shitty that you have the worst kind of kidney stones. Metric kidney stones.

The CT scan evaluation actually specified it in hogsheads, but I converted for the sake of our international audience.

What is the conversion factor to go from (cubic) volume to diameter? Is it (π x ∞) + 1 pint? Asking for a friend.

I've been to hospital 3 times for kidney stones. Morphine is great.

At least you're not in Texas where everything is bigger

*Especially alaska. It's a LOT bigger....

I actually turned down narcotics at my follow-up visit to the Dr today. I was in excruciating pain last night (in the ER, no less) but am managing today with just ibuprofen.

A good friend of mine has to put his beloved dog Lola to sleep this Saturday. I know exactly how he feels, to the point that I'm crying now too.

(This is not exactly pissing me off, just making me very sad).

I had to put down my buddy, my pal, my friend late last year. Worst thing I've ever had to do but the last kind thing I could do for him.

OFG

So sad. I totally empathize.

Poor sweet pup! Even though we know it's time and to not prolong their suffering, it never seems to get any easier.

My pup is seven this year and is getting a bit white in the face. She's finally outpacing me with her darn dog years. I occasionally wonder when that time will come and it gives me pause...then I sit and give her scratches and pets so she knows she's always loved.

Kidney Stone update required.

Happy 2024 Everyone.

I had to put down a cat I didn't care for, but still cried like a baby. My thoughts for your friend.

Ouch. My sympathies.

Edit- Letting go of animals that are part of your family is so hard. I have had to say goodbye to 3 amazing cats since 2020. The convergence of them getting old and covid isolation was incredibly hard.

I appear to have been banned from Whatsapp.

Which is odd because the last time I used it was February 2023.

Maybe they were mad I didn't use the app much (only when we travel internationally). No idea.

Not really pissing me off. But it did make me wonder wtf happened that i was somehow violating their TOS by not using the app. le shrug.

It is tough saying goodbye to our animal companions that bring such joy to out lives. I was fortunate to have had long lives with all my previous pets. The mute mix I grew up with lasted 18 years. Since sharing our lives together, my blushing bride has been all cats. Our current tuxedo turned 13 this last year.

Jess, sorry about your stones. Everyone else - long live our furry companions.

Bob Copeland
Snowed here Yesterday

The fact that Daihatsu have been lying through their teeth about the results of their crash tests for the past 30 years.

During the test a strengthening bar was fitted to the inner part of the door but during production they omitted to fit one.

Pants on Fire.

My Dad just had one removed that was 12mm (roughly 15/32" or 6.42886069e-6 nautical miles).

He spent a week on our couch in November. It was pretty brutal.

Ooof!

When I was in the hospital with my kidney stone both of the urologists who were treating me said that they had kidney stones when they were teenagers.

Neither of them made the connection.

Hah! I just spoke to my urologist an hour ago. Wish I had read this first, because I certainly would have asked him.

2010 I had to have a 4mm stone surgically removed from the tube that connects the kidney to the bladder(left). 2011 a 3mm stone finally passed the day before surgery(right).
My theory is that I was eating too much dried fruit. Gave it up. Now i'm clear. Morphine made my nose itch bad.

TMI alert! TMI alert! TMI alert! TMI alert! TMI alert!

My stone got stuck in the urethra (the tube between the kidney and the bladder). Since it was moving (slowly!) they decided to keep me on a continuous IV drip and just wait it out.

Easy for them.

Percocet or demerol (my choice) every three hours day and night for the pain. The worst pain I have experienced in my life. Literally blinding.

Eight days in the hospital until it finally made it to my bladder.

I was dreading its final passage, but when it did come out (painlessly) it was the size, shape, and color of a lentil.

I was 32, teaching full time, going to graduate school full time, and starting to see therapy patients. I was living on coffee and was undoubtedly quite dehydrated.

I never became a fanatical water drinker, but I certainly learned to monitor the color of my urine and hydrate much more.

Prior to posting about the 6mm stone, I spent the better part of the previous evening and well into the wee hours of the morning in the emergency room in agony. Worst pain I've ever felt, as others have agreed. A solid 10 on a scale of 1-10.

The ER was slammed that night. Lots of people waiting to be seen, lots more who had been seen but couldn't be treated until a bed was available, of which there were none. To their credit, the staff got me into a CT scan on short notice, along with a battery of blood and urine tests. And then they sent me back out to the waiting room, without further treatment. No bed, no treatment. There were people who had been waiting for as long as 7 hours. I was not hopeful, and couldn't get comfortable, and was largely stuck sitting in an uncomfortable chair in the ER and in pain.

All my test results started trickling in, the app notifying me one by one. The CT scan came in fairly early, with the radiologist's report. Kidney stone, 6mm. Everything else on the CT scan looked good. At least I had a diagnosis.

I did a quick perusal of the literature on kidney stones, trying hard to breathe through the intense pain. NSAIDs were called for as a first line against pain, and staying hydrated was critical. The ER staff wasn't allowed to give me anything for the pain yet, and weren't even able to give me water.

So after a total of about 3 or 4 hours (start to finish) I walked out. Went home. Took 600mg of ibuprofen, drank a bunch of water, and went to bed.

Next day I woke up (I had been asleep! How awesome is that?!?) and felt only minor pain -- maybe a 3 on a scale of 10. I immediately called to see if I could get seen by a (regular) dr -- mine was out of town (it was still the middle of the holidays) but they got me an appointment for that afternoon with one of her colleagues.

Pain was starting to creep up that morning. I took 400mg more ibuprofen, and then 400mg more a few hours later. And then the pain was gone altogether. I haven't taken any ibuprofen since then.

On New Years Eve (actually earlier) I passed it. Uneventfully. I retrieved it and measured it and photographed it and put it in a specimen jar, which I turned in earlier today for analysis.

My urologist (apparently I have a urologist now) says I have no more stones, as per the CT scan. I guess I'll choose to be grateful for that.

First time with a stone i took a taxi (5-10mins) to the er and signed in. Then i frantically paced around the waiting room as i couldn't sit and wait. This seemed to have resulted in a queue jump. Then the morphine.

The doctor told me next time to call the ambulance so i could get the morphine quickly.

Second and third times i did call an ambo but as i wasn't bleeding to death i was low on the ambo list and took about 45-50mins. Then the sweet morphine.

Next time ...

Beer consumption was inversely associated with risk of kidney stones; each bottle of beer consumed per day was estimated to reduce risk by 40% (RR = 0.60, 95% CI 0.47-0.76).

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10412964/

I don't know if these are metric or imperial bottles, let's go with pint bottles just to be safe.

In a follow up with a urologist after an extensive ultrasound in which more small stones were found he did say there's not much i can do but make sure i drink a lot of water.

I did naturally ask if beer counted and got one of those looks in reply

This post written while drinking beer

The rule about posting pics of your first scooter also applies to kidney stones..

My ambulance ride cost $500. That's some expensive Morphine.
A nurse was telling me that some women would go through child birth again opposed to a kidney stone.
So now if a woman tells me I don't know how painful child birth is, they're wrong.

You said "wee hours".

That's cheap for an ambulance ride. There are a lot of horror stories around the US about people ending up with $10,000 ambulance rides due to the ambulance company being out-of-network.

It's gotten to the point where people fear ambulance rides more than whatever causes them to need an ambulance ride.

(For our international audience, yes, US health care is completely broken and a human tragedy).