Something Random

[time]

Demerol's official name is Pethidine. It proved to be a poor painkiller with undue side effects for many people and is no longer a preferred drug. Anecdotally, some people experienced a feeling of well-being the first time they received it, but not afterwards. This did not stop addicts trying to get their hands on it.

AFAIK, available painkillers boil down to codeine and morphine and their various derivatives. For many years, morphine was considered too addictive to be a first-line painkiller. Now, it's preferred against pethidine and other derivatives.

The two main codeine derivatives are hydrocodone and oxycodone. Oxycodone is considered more powerful and is popularly available under the brand Oxycontin. It's also highly likely to be abused and is generally a controlled substance.

My family has some experience with painkillers. It's a misconception that they get rid of pain - by the time doctors are handing out oxycodone, it's only going to partially alleviate suffering, if at all.

 

[mubs]

I absolutely agree with Tannin. These kinds of cocktails can be really dangerous.

 

[jtr1962]

My family has some experience with painkillers. It's a misconception that they get rid of pain - by the time doctors are handing out oxycodone, it's only going to partially alleviate suffering, if at all.

Based on the experience in my family, we seem to suffer only the side effects of pain killers but not the relief. About the only thing which works for me much of the time is drinking myself into a stupor. I obviously can't do that on a regular basis without risking liver damage plus loss of my livelihood. Fortunately, I don't need to. I usually have episodes of pain too severe to deal with sober once a month or less. The rest of the time, I've seemed to learn to live with it.

 

[ddrueding]

Those cocktails are fine, but the people that frequently order them are a menace. It is true that holding one of these drinks is a strong indicator of idiocy, but don't blame the drink

 

[Mercutio]

As I was driving to work this morning, I realized that I was seeing double. Closing my right eye fixed it. I called around, hoping to use my shiny new medical insurance to get in to see a GP and found no one could see me on less than two weeks of lead time.

I walked in the vision clinic at my local Walmart and was able to get help right away after not being able to find care using the facility provided by my insurances. The
Optometrist spent about a half hour doing his thing and at the end of his tests he told me that my prescription has actually gotten substantially less bad but that my eye is crossing, and both of those are things that should not be. So now I have a reference to an ophthalmologist tomorrow, which appears to be based in part on the fact that this physician owed the optometrist a favor rather than because of any normal scheduling process.

Anyway, I have no idea what's wrong and I've been advised to wear an eyepatch, so as of now I am the Dread Pirate Mercutio.

 

[timwhit]

It's not even international talk like a pirate day.

 

[Chewy509]

Re: Red Bull + mixers. I've never understood the whole Red Bull / Energy Drink thing, they taste horrible, leave a bad odor on my breath and I didn't feel any buzz after trying them... I've seen many people drink the Red Bill + vodka at pubs/nightclubs and the general feeling I got was people wanting to avoid the hangover the next day and be able to party all night... Little do they realize what these chemicals are doing to their bodies in the long term.

Re: Painkillers. My experience matches Time's. My wife has just finished the initial radiation treatment for breast cancer, and is waiting on results on the latest round of tests (early next week are the expected results), and will decide if double mastectomy or 6mths of chemo is the next step. She's currently takes high doss of codeine twice daily and according to her they do little to relieve the pain.

 

[P5-133XL]

All I can say is that Demerol certainly worked for me as a pain killer without any side effects other than I was feeling really fine.

I only wish they had given it to me much sooner. For some reason they would not give me any pain killer till after the X-rays which required that they manipulate and repeatedly move around the arm as they took various shots to see what was actually broken (The socket had shattered into 6+ pieces). To me, giving pain medication before they knowingly cause massive amounts of pain makes much more sense than supplying it after the fact.

Afterwards, for long-term pain relief. I was supplied with a prescription to Vicodin which as I said earlier does nothing.

The only good thing was I walked into the emergency room and was immediately ushered in without even having to fill out the paperwork beforehand. I'm told that 4-6 hours wait is normal and immediate doesn't happen unless you are dying which I wasn't.

 

[Clocker]

Talk about pain, my Dad has been suffering from postherpetic neuralgia from a severe case of the shingles he had for the past 4 years or so. My Dad is allergic to opoids and basically nothing helps the to stop flairups he still has, which are quite regular, but never on a schedule. You basically feel like you are on fire in the effected areas. It's depressing.

I had shingles for about 10 days in 2008. No after effects like my Dad though, thank goodness. Never want to go through that again. It was a stressful time in my life.

My wife recently passed a kidney stone. She said it was worse than child-birth. Vicoden helped her though.

 

[Tannin]

It seems that individual responses to painkillers vary greatly. I have never experienced even the mildest relief from paracetamol, aspirin works a bit, codeine + aspirin is generally very effective. I am wary of using it often, typically just a handful of times in a year, though when I was very ill with some weird tropical thing a little while back I took it several times a day for a week or more. At that time I was very pleased not to have given in to every little ache or pain and to have preserved my sensitivity to the drug for when I really needed it.

I have no idea why different painkillers work so differently on different people, but I have observed similar variation with insect bites. Some people have quite severe pain and angry red swellings for days in response to a bee sting (and some of course are allergic and need medical help, though this is rare), most people find them quite painful, I am blessed with a very mild response of a little localised pain for a short while (a few seconds) and no lasting effect. It's the same with ant bites (which we can't compare readily as there are so many different ant species but only one honeybee, which is the same in Geneva or Pretoria). Sandflies, on the other hand, which many people find of little account, bring me up in puss-filled blisters which itch like crazy and don't heal for weeks. (This makes bird photography in mangrove swamps an exercise in prior determination, and subsequent regret!) Why the huge differences between people?

 

[ddrueding]

Random enough:

http://youtu.be/UWGIc68aDls

 

[Clocker]

Adorable. Reminds me of good times... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrkvC4Gv0dY

 

[mubs]

Why the huge differences between people?

Individual body chemistry + specific allergies that are different from person to person.

Ibuprofen does nothing for my wife and daughter; they prefer acetaminophen. Aceto does nothing for me, Ibu works. I'm severely allergic to mosquito bites; the bite area will itch uncontrollably for hours and there is nothing I can do to get relief. Time is the only healer. Likewise, there are bites that itch badly for several days; I presume these are spider bites, for no insects are around.

I once was disabled with a spine problem so much that I couldn't even stand up. The doc gave me Vicodin at a dose that was supposed to knock me out. All it did was provide mild relief.

On a subtle level, I guess each of us is unique!

 

[ddrueding]

Adorable. Reminds me of good times... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrkvC4Gv0dY

Private

 

[CougTek]

Random enough:

http://youtu.be/UWGIc68aDls

Well, my English is far from being as good as I thought it was because I can understand a single word of what the woman said.

 

[Mercutio]

Today I saw an Opthamologist. Tomorrow I see a neurologist. Awesome.

 

[CougTek]

It must be a brain tumor. You shouldn't suffer long.

 

[ddrueding]

Well, my English is far from being as good as I thought it was because I can understand a single word of what the woman said.

That just means that your Russian needs some work. Guard dogs react to German, babies to Russian.

 

[Mercutio]

It must be a brain tumor. You shouldn't suffer long.

I have sixth nerve palsy. I'm told that if I go to the neurologist, he's going to order as much medical imaging as I will pay for and do an extended test to confirm that I do or don't have any other nerve damage. The wiser thing to do is go to a GP first, but that means that I actually have to get one to set an appointment with me. High BP and massively uncontrolled diabetes are both strongly correlated with this. I DO have slightly elevated blood pressure but my blood sugar readings are in the normal range unless I don't know how to work a glucometer.

 

[mubs]

Well, whatever it is, get it looked into asap. Your glucometer and / or the strips could be faulty. You don't want to sit on this kind of thing.

 

[LunarMist]

I have sixth nerve palsy. I'm told that if I go to the neurologist, he's going to order as much medical imaging as I will pay for and do an extended test to confirm that I do or don't have any other nerve damage. The wiser thing to do is go to a GP first, but that means that I actually have to get one to set an appointment with me. High BP and massively uncontrolled diabetes are both strongly correlated with this. I DO have slightly elevated blood pressure but my blood sugar readings are in the normal range unless I don't know how to work a glucometer.

That's awful. When was the last time you had a general physical, full blood work, etc.?

 

[Mercutio]

I have my friend do one once a year. She's not a GP but she checks my BP and does the usual cheeks. I haven't had an official visit with a GP since I was maybe 23.

 

[LunarMist]

I have my friend do one once a year. She's not a GP but she checks my BP and does the usual cheeks. I haven't had an official visit with a GP since I was maybe 23.

Go to the doc and also have the lab work done! Don't be like me and wait until you are too old and it is too late.

 

[P5-133XL]

I needed to get a copy of my father's death certificate and the state of Oregon sent me some random 12 year old girls birth certificate. I returned it, in person, and they gave me the correct document.

Now, I curious how much a real certified birth certificate brings on the black market. After all they would be very useful for identity theft.

 

[ddrueding]

From what I understand, the identity theft market is so flooded with documents and CC#s that the price is remarkably low.

 

[Mercutio]

Go to the doc and also have the lab work done! Don't be like me and wait until you are too old and it is too late.

My friend got me an appointment with a GP who only charged me for lab work. I'm waiting on an A1C but I'm not hypertensive and all my other vitals are really good. Assuming my blood work is OK, I need to go get a CT scan to show to a neurologist to rule out cancer and/or the world's worst sinus infection. Diabetes was and remains a huge concern for me since I'm almost positive it's more a matter of when than if for me.

The eye patch got really old, really fast. Nothing makes you feel the love like having three year olds point at you while you're in the grocery store.

 

[Mercutio]

From what I understand, the identity theft market is so flooded with documents and CC#s that the price is remarkably low.

It's more valuable the more information you have about a person and the more specifically valuable demographics the individual provably belongs to. A mass dump of just valid credit card numbers is worth pennies on a per-name basis since banks have actually gotten really good at clamping down on test transactions.

 

[snowhiker]

A sad night for me.

I have been buying all the parts for a new PC for mom, probably the last PC she'll ever need, and I pulled a boner move before I even got started building it.

I photograph all the parts, S/N, etc. I also photograph the CPU socket. All is well. Then, for a split second of dumb-fuck-ness, I put the plastic CPU cover UNDER the metal retention bracket of the socket to re-socket it. I hear a tiny metallic sound and stop immediately. Too late. I bent some CPU pins! I'm screwed. Even with reading glasses I can barely even see the pins. I don't think I'll be able to fix them. $188 in the toilet.

Sigh. The worst part is she's out of town this weekend visiting my sister and I was going to have the whole thing built and up and running when she gets back Monday afternoon. Guess I'll have make the two hour round trip to Fry's (a store I HATE giving money to) to buy another board.

:sad: :crap:

 

[ddrueding]

Ugh. Done that. Don't know of a fix. Sucks.

 

[CougTek]

I've successfully replaced bent LGA pins quite often, but I have a very good close range vision, despite my age. An exacto is the best tool for the job. A magnifying glass is cheaper than a new motherboard. I know you mentioned that reading glasses aren't enough, but I expect a magnifying glass to be more useful for this. I admit that I don't know much regarding reading glasses, not needing those myself.

 

[snowhiker]

Ugh. Done that. Don't know of a fix. Sucks.

Thanks for the quick reply. I know my bent socket pins pale in comparison to the medical problems people are having and I wish everybody the best. Didn't intend to gloss over the REAL problems of others with my stoopid bullshite. Sorry, just had to vent. I'm calmer now.

Gonna buy a magnifying glass or electron microscope so I can see the damn pins and try to bend them back into place. It looks like only one is bad the other 2-4 only need to be nudged back into place...................................I hope.



^^ Bonehead move of the week.

 

[mubs]

My new Asus board model (P8Z77-V) was known for being shipped with bent pins out of the factory. Sure enough mine had a few. I took it to the Asus warranty center, and they offered to correct it (a replacement would have taken a week). I agreed, subject to them sticking in their own CPU, booting it, and showing it to me. They did, and I haven't had a problem in the year and a half I've been using it.

If your board is toast anyway, you have nothing to lose. As suggested, try to do it gently; patience is essential. If it still hosed, at least you tried.

Good luck!

 

[LunarMist]

My friend got me an appointment with a GP who only charged me for lab work. I'm waiting on an A1C but I'm not hypertensive and all my other vitals are really good. Assuming my blood work is OK, I need to go get a CT scan to show to a neurologist to rule out cancer and/or the world's worst sinus infection. Diabetes was and remains a huge concern for me since I'm almost positive it's more a matter of when than if for me.

The eye patch got really old, really fast. Nothing makes you feel the love like having three year olds point at you while you're in the grocery store.

I hate wearing eye patches, too, though I tend to scare small children anyway.
Can you use some of the special glasses to correct your vision, or is it totally out of whack?

 

[Howell]

I hate wearing eye patches, too, though I tend to scare small children anyway.

Do you also have a hook-hand and rational fear of clocks?

 

[Stereodude]

The eye patch got really old, really fast. Nothing makes you feel the love like having three year olds point at you while you're in the grocery store.

You just need to complete the Jack Sparrow outfit and you'll be rather popular.

 

[LunarMist]

Do you also have a hook-hand and rational fear of clocks?

No. What do you mean by rational fear of clocks?

 

[ddrueding]

No. What do you mean by rational fear of clocks?

Cpt. Hook from Peter Pan

 

[LunarMist]

Cpt. Hook from Peter Pan

I think I missed that one or saw it as a pre-schooner.
Fear of clocks seems pathologic rather than rational.
Was it used to trigger an explosion?

 

[P5-133XL]

I think I missed that one or saw it as a pre-schooner.
Fear of clocks seems pathologic rather than rational.
Was it used to trigger an explosion?

As I remember the story, the same crocodile that ate the hand also ate an alarm clock, so it ticks and thereby gives warning when near which produces the fear.

 

[Howell]

I think I missed that one or saw it as a pre-schooner.
Fear of clocks seems pathologic rather than rational.
Was it used to trigger an explosion?

P5 has it. The sorry was written in the early 1900s. Perhaps even your pre-dinghy days.