The past couple of months have been a tad hectic with all sorts of stuff going on for our family.
Firstly, as noted in my Spiramentum Ministries latest blog posts exploring the lesser known Christmas Carols / Songs contained within The Salvation Army Songbook, I mentioned about Annette losing her father to his battle with cancer and the subsequent celebration of life service in Geraldine which was held this week.
In between his passing and the service we travelled down to Invercargill for the week to support our eldest daughter as she’s had some relationship stuff going on, that culminated in us supporting her at a Family Court hearing.
Then you add my health into the mix which has been a bit up and down of late, as I’ve been battling a viral chest infection that keeps on coming and going. The antibiotics seem to have gotten me over the worst of it, but I’ve had this nagging niggly phlegmy cough that just about clears and then starts returning just to remind me that it’s there lurking deep down in my lungs. Every now and again I also develop a croaky voice if I’ve been talking too much or singing that takes a while to come right.
Anyhow, a couple of weeks ago in amongst all the travelling up and down the country that we’ve been doing, I had an appointment at Christchurch Hospital to get my infusion done. They checked all my vitals and did my bloods as I hadn’t been able to get them done the day before and everything was looking good, at least for the most part, so they hooked me up.
However, just prior to them starting the infusion the croakiness in my voice started and I had a few decent phlegmy coughs (although it wasn’t enough to get a sputum sample) so the nurse that was looking after me was not prepared to push play* 😒
You see, she was concerned that due to the fact that I had not long finished a course of antibiotics, and I had this persistent cough and the croakiness in my voice, I could potentially have a rebound episode of the viral chest infection after receiving the Tocilizumab
What’s more my bloods (especially the neutrophils and the white blood count were still quite high) based on the previous results (I wrote about having Neutrophilia in my last health update).
So, for my best interests they decided that it’d be prudent to put the infusion off for a couple of weeks to play it safe.
It’s not as if I’d have wanted to have another stay in hospital this side of Christmas with a bad case of Neutropenia, or Neutrophilia that’s for sure.
Anyhow, this week I got to go back in to have my infusion done at Christchurch Hospital (two months after my last one) even though my bloods were still out of whack due to the neutrophilia (which have only come down slightly from the previous blood tests). They checked my vitals, gave me the all clear, hooked me up and this time they got to push play*.
Although our grandson Jack wasn’t very happy leaving me behind at the hospital, balling his eyes out as he got back into the car.
As I start typing this I’m being offered a light lunch to see me through. My usual appointment time is mid-afternoon so I think I might have to get them to reschedule my next appointment so that I can get lunch again 🤪
In amongst all the not so good stuff that has been going on we have also had some kool things happening, as we traded in our old car for a new one although we’ve put a few kilometers on it in just a couple of weeks.
As the old adage goes ‘life goes on’ and we can’t linger too long or else other exciting (hopefully) stuff will pass us by. We certainly don’t want any other bad things to be a happening.
We now have only a few days to go ’til Christmas and this year the family is gathering at our place 🙂
So we’d better get on with some Christmas shopping and thankfully our children have already been told that they will be organising all of the food (well, a fair chunk of it) to help give their mum a break, as she managed to crack a couple of ribs (as noted on this post) while down in Invercargill 😦
Anyhow, from my family to yours I pray that you have a fantabulous Christmas and New Years and that nothing untoward happens that dampens the spirit of the festive season.
Blessings ’til next time 🙂
* So, what’s with the phrase push play?
Here in Aotearoa New Zealand back in the 90s there was a campaign encouraging Kiwis to get active for 30 minutes a day – the nurse that was taking my vitals had a bit of a giggle when I explained what had happened the last time I was in as I used the ‘push play’ phrase. He’d be about the same age as me and we were joking about the fact that a number of the other nurses wouldn’t have a clue what we were on about ‘push play’, even though the phrase did resurface a few years ago after the Covid pandemic.
But the phrase could just as easily relate to pushing play on the tape-deck, walkman, boombox, or vhs player – Guess you have to be a certain vintage 🙂
Another flashback is the the song “Push Play”, which was written by synthwave artist Cheap Talk (see below video). Despite its 1980s retro-pop aesthetic, the song and its parent album, Let’s Get Electric – 1987, were created by ‘modern’ musicians who intentionally styled the work to sound like a “lost” record from 1987. It was originally released in 2014, and the song gained widespread recognition after being featured in the 2016 video game Firewatch. In the game, players encounter a boombox left by teenagers at Jonesy Lake that plays the track, leading many players to search for the “mystery 80s song” online.
Hope you enjoy 🙂
The life and times of Perry... 