**tick tick tick** Is this thing on?

Hmmm...maybe I really AM part bear;  all the other ursine members of the family are emerging now too!

PRIMO:  heart-deep thanks for all the lovely thoughts, prayers and nice greetings.  My current status is as follows (imagine doctor raising eyebrows and shrugging).  I've had blood tests for everything under the sun and CAN report that I do not have beri-beri or Lymes' or Mongol Trots or anything else that could be determined.  I had the alimentary x-ray deal which revealed nothing unusual.  NOTE:  My stomach is weird anyway - most people's stomachs like horizontally;  mine is sort of vertical.  Say WOT??

I also did have the heart ultrasound.   I found it intriguing, watching my heart on the monitor.  Fortunately that was fine too - the technician said, when I arrived, that it would be "just like the ultrasounds I'd had when I was pregnant".  I explained that - in the days when I was pregnant they just candled us like eggs - holding a candle behind of us.

In the meantime, I did begin to feel better.  Wouldn't you know it?  My appetite was the first thing back, so any weight I might have lost didn't stay away long.  I'm taking some prozac-oid stuff which seems to have worked on what might have been my depression -- remember, "better living through chemistry". 

HOWEVER!  My perpetual benign tremor (a slight shaking of my hands, slightly worse if I'm very tired) took advantage of my Blarg and became anything BUT benign.  I refer to it as "Jazz Hands".... it had become a veritable palsy.  Stop for a moment and think about the myriad little things you do all day that require fine-motor control.   (Eating soup;  writing with a pencil, typing (!) knitting -- imagine trying to put a nice line of tooth glue in the dentures!!)

I found myself feeling better - but literally physically inCAPABL:E of doing any of those things.  No writing with a pencil?  There goes taking notes, jotting down story ideas, marking passages in  a book - highlighting!  No knitting?  That's just foul, but I couldn't even manage garter stitch with #15 needles.
No TYPING?  Oy vey iz mere!!  Serious palsy effectively removes the possibility of typing.  (No chats, no Facebook -- no BLOG....blarg!)

To tell the truth I found it a real embarrassment too, and was happiest at occasions where I could keep my hands in my pockets or tucked into my armpits.  "Why Dale-Harriet, don't you think you should perhaps see a Neorologist?"  Matter o' fact YES!  In fact, in mid-February I called, and GOT an appointment in Neurology.  April 5th.  Having pretty much spent 2.5 months on the couch, the thought of making it a solid four months on the couch about did me in. 

So I emailed the doctor requesting a prescription for muscle relaxers.  She phoned one in and I got them -- and get this:  IT WORKS!  Mostly.  Generally.  Basically.  I'm still keeping that appointment, but I'm gradually relearning how to blog and knit and jot down notes. 

I will, ere long, set out to describe the effect of 14 hours' daily of Animal Planet;  what I have learned from Criminal Minds and the various CSIs -- and what I think of the Miami Housewives. (And Orange County wives and so on.) 

I went to the Knit-In last Saturday, and signed up and paid for a class in "beginning Victorian Knitting", which I was pretty pumped for.  I stayed for the morning session but did NOT go back after lunch, because even with the medication, lace-weight yarn and "0" needles just weren't working - however, the syllabus, samples of some eight yarns and the information on deciphering Victorian patterns are sufficient that I feel as though I got my two sous' worth.

Soooo -- after four months of downright Inability - I believe I'm on the mend.  I'm gradually getting back to work -- imagine this scenario:  there I am, with my mandatory pointing-tool (a mouse-shaped laser pointer I purloined from the cats) and jazz hands!  MIght shorten the tour, being as I'd be pointing at everything, up to and including my own shoes....  So I haven't actually been to work since the end of November either.

So at least I can finally enjoy some of my daily chazerai (Yiddish, look it up) and will report next on The Effects of Modern TeeVee on the temporarily-disabled Yenta.  Oh, and again, THANKS -- unless you've been in my position (and I earnestly hope you NEVER are!) you can only imagine what your little notes have meant to me.  Suffice it to say -- just thinking about it makes me all over verklempt!