Life is a drab cliche old friends…

Out of sight is out of mind… and never has a more true idiom crossed my path.

A few months ago I filled out the paperwork to transfer the 10 little embryos (sitting on the wall) to our specialist’s new clinic and then promptly forgot about it.  So today I get a phone call from the embryologist (fancy pants reproductive technology scientists) to discuss what else they needed to effect the transfer.  Apparently even though I signed everything all proper and legal like at the transfering clinic’s end I was supposed to do the same at the recipient clinic’s end.  Would have been nice to have been informed of this at the outset but… sigh… shit happens and often to me.


This is an actual picture of one of my embryos (befcre I went silly with the colour balance – below)
Apparently this is exactly what they hope a good healthy embryo should look like

So the lovely embryologist Liz the LabRat tells me that I will have to come in and have all the bloodwork done and legal documents all signed before they can send their collection agent to pick up the embryos and take them to the new clinic.  I’m not quite sure how that is physically accomplished given they’re frozen in liquid nitrogen and I imagine need to remain so.  But honest don’t really care so long as procedures are in place to a) make sure they get to their new storage facility still frozen and intact and b) they transfer the right ones.

Pfaffing around in photoshop with a pic of one of my embryos that Adnan emailed her in 2004.
Pretty huh?  Mind you they kinda remind me of a Gay Pride rainbow now…

As for going off to have the bloodwork done with a view to having an FET in the near future?  Why the concept seems laughable.  What about all the drugs?  How can I think about doing and FET when I’m on so many drugs – considering that at the outset of any assisted reproductive treatment they advise you to stop smoking,  cease any receational drugs, reduce coffee, coke and alcohol consumption as well as avoid exposure to potentially harmful toxins and chemical such as paints, pesticides, herbicides and a tonne of other shit.  So coke and wine is a big no-no… but valium, analgesics, neuropathic pain blockers and anti-depressants are okay?  Ahuh… sounds sensible.   :S

But on the plus side usually the story of the ten little embryos (sitting on the wall) dredges up my veritable plethora of emotional baggage (complete with matching Olga Berg hatbag) related to the whole IVF she-bang in general but today… I was actually chatting with Liz the LabRat about donating them to a some other poor bastards who couldn’t even get good embryos and if that was going to happen then I wanted them in Glenn’s very capable and circumspect hands as to whom they would be donated to. 

So no emotional disquiet from the conversation about donating them…. Weird.  Does that mean maybe I’m actually in a healthy headspace to use them after all?

Too much to do… too little time to do it in.

Got the time.

Wake up, got another day to get through now
Got another man to see
Got to call him on the telephone
Got to find a piece of paper

Sit down, got another letter to write
Think Ill got to get the letter just right
Theres a ringing on the telephone
Oh no, got to write a little later
No such day as tomorrow, only one two three go!

Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Tickin in my head, tickin in my head, tickin in my head

If I tell you what Im doing today
Will you shut up and get out of my way?
Someone asked me what the time is,
I dont know
Only know I gotta go now

No time – trying to get a watch repaired
No time – never got a thing to wear
Hear the ringin of the telephone no no
Hear a ringin in my head now
No such thing as tomorrow, only one two three go!

Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Tickin in my head, tickin in my head, tickin in my head

Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Time – got the time tick-tick-tickin in my head
Tickin in my head, tickin in my head, tickin in my head

Actually, no I think it’s the Anthrax version that won’t leave me alone at the moment… and I have to admit it is way cooler than Joe Jacksons.  :P.

Got wood?

I’ve been shopping for timber planks.  Nothing fancy just plain dressed pine planks of furniture grade suitable to make bookcases out of so a few knots here or there is okay but doesn’t have to be perfect.  But do you think I can find anywhere to buy bulk pine?  For some reason all the major timber suppliers in the BrisVegas metro area mostly sell structural timber only.  So where do all the dudes making furniture buy their all their good wood? (enough with the giggles from the peanut gallery please).

So far I haven’t got a lot of faith in the industry with quotes coming from Finlaysons for 290mm x 19mm planks of various lengths at $31.58/meter and the only other quote I’ve managed to obtrain was from John Gill (yep _that_ John Gill the Timber Man) for the same size 290mm x 19mm planks at $9.60/meter.  Which means either Finlaysons are charging their customers sandy lube prices or the quality of this stuff varies enormously…. and while I want good quality timber – the rather ambitious scope of my little L-shaped bookcase would probably rendered the project as prohibitively expensive if I have to pay anywhere near $31/meter.

Hmmm… I definitely need more wood…. Quotes.


Elevation A


Elevation B

Bookworm … we love you!

Being a poncy sort of pretentious eejit who hates Sudoku puzzles but loves word puzzles, I many years ago fell in love with Bookworm.  They used to have a free trial you could download off their website and you could play six games at the end of which you’d get a prompt saying your free trial is over and click here if you wish to purchase it.

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Well a free trial game of Bookworm would last me for months so I never ended up buying it.  I’d play my six games over several months and then forget about it for a while and then DL another trial copy some other time and remember how much I liked it.

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And just when I thought I couldn’t love my iPhone any more than I already do… I now have Bookworm on my iPhone!   It’s probably been available for donkey’s years but I am not in the habit of trolling for games and applications for my iPhone so it went under my (not overly keen) radar until just recently.  Vee now haz zee teknolllagee unt all for zee bargan pwrice of $5.99!  No more wasting an hour in the doctor’s waiting room reading old copies of National Geographic and no more actually having to wait bored in the line to pick up the Small Child… because I have Bookworm to keep me company now  🙂  And it’s bigger and better than before with extra ‘stuff’ to do/collect.  So very small win for the small blonde this week.

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It really is the simple things in my life that bring me rare moments of fleeting enjoyment atm …. but I think that’s mostly because the big important and complex things are still under continually increasing, multicoloured pile of steaming crap.

Eye Vee Eff – (The “Eff” stands for ‘Fuckin’ expensive)

Was clambouring around in my closets this afternoon getting ready for the electrician dude to come install a new sensor to the security system in the morning and found a small box shoved in the top of my wardrobe that’s been sitting there for oh… about four years now? 

It was half full with the little plastic twisty top bit that comes on a Crinone Progesterone Gel package (which for those of you who are fortunate enough to have no fucking idea what that is – it’s a progesterone supplement that they give you during the luteal hormone support phase of an IVF cycle). 

I’m not sure what compelled me to keep throwing the little twist off bit into a box the whole time I was using them – but I have vague recollections of thinking I’d make some sort of artwork out of them or something… dunno.  Who knows what goes through your head when your hormonal and psychotic.  Anyway I thought I’d count them and see how many were in there…. and the answer was (drum roll please) and thanks to the Small Child for counting them….

251 progesterone pessaries!
Ah ha ha!
said the Count.

So what?  Well yes I guess it doesn’t signify anything until I mention that they cost (at the time) $12 each and were taken one a day for 10 days after an embryo transfer.   Exactly $12.85 in fact (I just looked it up) which means that we spent how much on ultimately useless progesterone pessaries??

$3,225.35.
Now that just pisses me off…
 

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