Eric Hanson

I gotta agree with everything John has said in both his posts.  Treating pain is a serious but totally legitimate aspect of any surgery.

I of course don’t know what your pain prescriptions are, but a reasonable guess is that you will be on Norco 10 for pain.  Norco 10 isn’t a pain medication—it’s two.  The narcotic part is hydrocodone, a very strong oral narcotic pain medication (10mg, a large dose).  It is mixed with acetaminophen, the generic chemical in Tylenol, at 325 mg which is a single pill of regular Tylenol.  Hydrocodone targets endorphins which partially reduce pain, but are actually better at changing our emotional reactions to pain, or put another way, we still feel the pain, but the pain doesn’t feel so bad.  Acetaminophen bonds to substances P receptors, the receptors responsible for transmitting pain signals.  Acetaminophen (and aspirin, ibuprofen, others) actually block the pain itself through the effect is limited.  Together they make a very effective 1-2 punch against pain.


Having dealt with my share of pain in the past (thank you kidney stones!), my perspective is that Norco 10 is very good at stopping pain, or intercepting pain in progress.  But pain is like a fire—if you can catch a forest fire when the first spark ejects from a camp fire and causes a candle-sized flame in dry tinder, it can be put out very easily.  But if that candle sized flame is allowed to grow, the flame gets out of control and you need a much stronger “flame killer” to put it out—that’s what Norco 10 is for.

But if a couple of days have gone by and your pain is not gone but controlled, I personally don’t like Norco at this point—it’s too strong, hits too fast and tends to conk out too early.

I have been known to ask for a prescription of Tylenol 3 (or actually, I prefer Tylenol 4, a much less common formulation).  Here is my reason:

We have the big, serious pain under control.  We still need something to control pain, but we have put out the big fires and now Norco is just too strong, hits too fast and doesn’t last all that long.  Instead, if my doctor agrees, I prefer Tylenol 3 (or 4).  Tylenol 3 is 300 mg of acetaminophen plus 30 mg of codeine, a much less potent narcotic. (5-10 times less potent).  Codeine takes a little longer for peak onset, but lasts a longer duration.  I think it is great to control pain once the big pain Forest Fire gets put out.  And for reference, Tylenol 4 is 60 mg of codeine and I think really lasts well.

This is all long-winded, but in drug addiction, the most dangerous, addictive aspect of a drug isn’t how intoxicated it is, but how fast it has its main onset.  I would bet that codeine has about twice the time from swallowing to peak onset compared to Norco.  And my experience is that doctors are very willing to write another prescription for a generally weaker narcotic than a stronger one.  Also, codeine tends to not knock a person silly the way hydrocodone does.


I AM NOT GIVING ANYONE MEDICAL ADVICE!!  But I have had a fair amount of experience dealing with pain and I much prefer codeine over hydrocodone is codeine will work.  It might be worth considering, but of course talk to your doctor and see what she/he says.


I hope you have minimal pain, but if you need narcotic pain medication, maybe consider looking at this route—going with the weakest med that works.



Eric

If you can see them, they are amazing!  My house got bullseyed by two in 7 years!  Absolutely jaw-dropping!  The last on lasted about 4 minutes.

I might have to post my video of the skyline going dark.



Eric

I have had this latent idea for some time.  I have wondered if there could possibly be a market for a 100% Permie approved (meaning better than organic!) mulch that is boosted with some sort of natural fertilizer.  Here is my idea, critique the hell out of it!

Being one of my ideas, it starts with wine cap mulch that breaks down the numerous types of wood growing along my fence line.  The majority is Autumn Olive.

After that sets for a year, I add a batch of shredded comfrey and add rabbit pellets.  We have a rabbit and it is a little poop-making machine!  Nice little hardish pellets that are easy to handle, not messy at all and are apparently very hot.

I could also include his litter which is urine soaked wood shavings.

Not certain how to sell—particularly how to package—and I have no idea about legalities aside from the high probability that they exist in high numbers.

Not planning on getting rich, but it seems like a productive way to utilize a waste stream and some skills I already have.  Maybe a little retirement project.

I also figure that I make a shallow pit (or two) so the Wine Caps have good soil contact.  Also, the more I use the same spot, the better the soil biology gets and that gets into the chips as well.


Fire away!



Eric

Oh, the overcast—-


Those clouds were probably sitting just above the boundary layer.



Eric.

Jay,

It doesn’t surprise me that the sound reflects from a boundary layer.  It might be a temperature inversion.

Normally, as one goes up, temperature goes down, but under the right circumstances going up can actually increase temperature.  It takes VERY stable air.  This effect can only happen so far from the surface.

When this happens far enough up, there is a little density layer that forms and the transition point is surprisingly narrow.  

So as sound rises, it does indeed reflect back down, an effect that is best observed some distance (miles) from the source.

Thanks for reminding me about the why to this question!


Eric

John, that’s interesting that you mention specific example.  Many years ago, the couple who owned the house across from us unexpectedly had the wife check in to the hospital for what appeared to be a minor reason and three days later she was dead.  Her husband was, as you might imagine, struck with grief.  

My wife, being who she is, made up a whole container (a great big disposable aluminum dish) full of some food (I can’t remember what it was specifically, but chicken dumplings sounds like something that she would have done).  There were days, perhaps a week of meals in that container.  We headed over just to make certain that he got it personally (didn’t want to let it just sit!) and let him know that if he needed anything, just ask.

I don’t know if this is generational, she and I are Gen X, but it definitely is the sort of thing that she just does out of the kindness of her heart.


Eric

Great question, but it depends mightily on elevation, ground cover, and even weather conditions.


Growing up, there was an interstate about 4 miles from my house.  Normally, there was no indication it was there, not a simple peep. And though it could never be seen, there are times when it hummed.  Strangely, the only time I ever remember it being audible was when the sky was overcast.


I wish I could give a more specific answer.



Eric

Gray,  the time, miles and money spent on my car were never far from my mind, especially as I was going to school, working part (almost full) time and paying for every penny.  My car was getting to what I thought was up there in miles and I was mildly terrified of a breakdown (turns out the car had plenty miles left but I didn’t know that).

But just knowing that I liked what I was going to be doing made the morning drive a sort of calming pick-me-up.


Eric

Ryan, regarding butchering…..

I live in serious deer country and during deer season the area floods with people headed in to get their deer.

I know of a couple of school janitors who take a break from being a janitor during deer season to dress deer.  It’s a crazy couple of weeks, but it’s also serious money.  One guy made over $100k during deer season.  He went back to being a janitor mostly for something to do but also for the benefits of working at a school district.


I don’t know about licensure, but he didn’t have a ton of infrastructure.

Maybe worth a thought.



Eric

Right now is the shortest commute I have ever had—5 minutes on a good day!  Does that even count as a commute?  And even though I live so, my house seems to live far away from school, over twisting roads and up & down hills.  It’s pretty nice.

For a seven month period back in 1995 I drove 45 minutes over the flat, flat plains of Central Illinois to and from a job in retail management—a job I hated, the color of my dreams literally faded from bright technicolor to what looked like a faded color picture from the 70s to eventually black and white.  It felt like my soul was dripping away on every single one of those minutes that I drove to work.  And instead of feeling relieved on my way home, I was consumed by the fact that I just had to do it again the next day.  That 45 minutes felt like it was killing me slowly.

From there I went back to school and my commute to school/work was about 20-25 minutes.  Even though that was a chunk of the time that I was driving to retail management just months prior, I looked forward to it, the drive focused my thoughts and I generally enjoyed the drive.

I suppose that 45 minutes was too much, but that is highly contingent on my destination.  If I was looking forward to being at work, I liked the drive time.


Eric