Update to the XBox post: With the recent addition of the Messenger Kit and the 120 GB hard drive
XBox Grand total: $962.50
In addition Jeff Atwood, apparently in much the same boat as me, recently upgraded from the Playstation 2 to the XBox 360. He discovered something I haven't yet about the DRM built into the XBox: downloaded content is not tranferrable. That's a little creepy since I've already bought a few games online, and was planning to buy more when they came available. Microsoft's official answer is to get a memory card and store your XBox Live Id on it, allowing you to take it to another console and download the same content there, as long as it's still available. This approach will probably work fine for me considering I don't have the kind of job that allows me to have an XBox 360 at work as his apparently does. The fact that your downloaded content becomes unusable if your XBox crashes sounds exceptionally annoying, but I'll save that for an angry blog post when it happens.
Anyway, back to what I'm here to talk about today. I've spent the last week sicker than I've been since I was a kid. I caught "something", and now my 7 year old seems to have caught it as well, just as I'm getting over it. I was more or less out from work for nearly the entire week. I had a severe sore throat and a fever of over 101 for days. And a bunch of other crap too. On Monday I went to the Urgent Care center, hoping to try to head it off. I was pretty sure it was strep throat. My wife knew somebody having nearly identical symptoms and was diagnosed with the flu. I haven't had strep throat since high school, and as I understand, it can re-occur. I also hadn't had a flu shot this year, and even getting the flu shot doesn't guarantee a flu-free winter, so either theory sounded plausible. The urgent care doctor did a strep test and passed on the flu test since it didn't seem to match the flu at that point. The strep test came back negative, but she gave me some anti-biotic anyway since it appeared to be definitely "something."
On Wednesday, I had actually gotten worse. In fact Wednesday night was the absolute peak of the whole ordeal. For a few moments, death seemed a preferable alternative than this kind of suffering. So I called my regular doctor and managed to get in on Thursday morning. Again, they weren't really sure what it was, but prescribed some more medicine to help out with recovery. Okay, they're the doctor, I have to trust their opinion because I have no idea about this stuff.
I learned early on in my life that while I may be pretty good at a fairly wide range of things, the medical profession was completely closed to me. I simply am not cut out to be a doctor. I once saw a public television program documenting an open heart surgery and just about puked on myself. I never even considered applying to medical school. It just wasn't happening.
Yesterday my seven year old started showing symptoms of the same thing. At my insistence my wife finally agreed that taking him to the doctor would be a good thing to do. Actually it was more like "You can if you want to, but you're taking him." Whatever. Apparently she grew up in a family with disdain for the medical profession. Maybe they were on to something.
About three hours later I'm finally leaving the pediatrician's with my son, with the following diagnosis. Both the strep test and the flu test came back negative for him. So the doctor said "this falls into the 'other' category" and recommended lots of rest and fluids. This seemed like sound advice, but later on, as I contemplated my lost morning, I though: "I accomplished absolutely jack with that." It' contagious, it's working it's way through my family, and nobody knows what the hell it is. I really could have given that diagnosis myself.
How exactly do they not know what it is? I know there's a lot about medical science that's still unknown, but if this is as common as it sounds, how is it nobody seems to know what it is? Working in IT, we often have to diagnose problems, and while comparing computers to people doesn't hold a lot of water, the "I don't know what the hell that was" explanation doesn't come up all that often. If something is going on and it's widespread and we don't know what it is, dammit we're going to find out!
This is not a condemnation of any of the doctors I've worked with this week. I respect all of them, I'm just confused as to how I can lose a week to an illness, visit three doctors, and still not have an answer for "what did you have" when I get back to work. Comments appreciated 
Consider this: even if they could tell you what you and your son had, wouldn't they likely still just tell you to get plenty of fluids, rest, and possibly give you some antibiotics? Once in a while I get sick. When people ask me what I had, I say, "The little bugger forgot to tell me". I'm not saying don't go to the doctor- sometimes serious things masquerade as innocent sicknesses. Sometimes they can even let you know. :) I was in the hospital for something flu-like last year. I had pains in my stomach that made me literally scream. I've broken bones, and this was way more intense. They had no idea what it was. They made me lay in a room for many hours, finally gave me morphine. I got sent home with vicodin and anti-nausea medication and got told not to eat anything more substantial than jello for a few days, rest, and drink only really cold beverages that preferably have calories. Sure, I felt a better with the pain killers, but WTF? I guess I should just be thankful it went away on its own and I got something to reduce the pain. Glad you're feeling better. Sorry to hear that you gave Microsoft 10 pints of blood and your right arm, but hopefully it's worth it.
ReplyDelete@Celes "Consider this: even if they could tell you what you and your son had, wouldn't they likely still just tell you to get plenty of fluids, rest, and possibly give you some antibiotics?"
ReplyDeleteOne always hopes that the doctor has the magic answer. I suppose that's why the doctor's office is always crowded. The answer is "Probably" but I have a few criteria for determining when I should go to the doctor as a just in case.
1. It lasts more than a couple of days.
2. It's more severe than just a simple cold.
3. I'm fairly sure I'm dying.
Admittedly, I have a few conditions which dictate that I should probably always go to the doctor, even for simple colds, but I usually don't.
"The little bugger forgot to tell me".
That's good. I'm gonna use that :D
"I got sent home with vicodin and anti-nausea medication"
I'm truly sorry to hear that, but doesn't it bother you that nobody really knows what it was doing that to you?
"Sorry to hear that you gave Microsoft 10 pints of blood and your right arm, but hopefully it's worth it."
Heh, when you put it that way it sounds like they came after it. It's an exceptional marketing ploy and I fell for it hook line and sinker. I have to give them credit for getting me to shell out that kind of cash for what amounts to a recreational toy. That's a hell of a lot of quarters. On the other hand, many people spend more on other kinds of toys (jet skis, boats, race cars, three/four wheelers, dirt bikes). At least this one allows me to play with my old dream of becoming a video game developer. I'm impressed with their skill at parting me with my money and am totally convinced I'm in the wrong business.
""I got sent home with vicodin and anti-nausea medication"
ReplyDeleteI'm truly sorry to hear that, but doesn't it bother you that nobody really knows what it was doing that to you?"
This was from when I was living in a tent. I didn't even get to recover indoors or in a bed. I was insured, but the hospital misplaced my insurance info I think 4 times. Many things about that experience bother me.
"Heh, when you put it that way it sounds like they came after it. It's an exceptional marketing ploy and I fell for it hook line and sinker. I have to give them credit"
If you like giving credit to poor moneyless Microsoft for nickel and diming you, okay. I personally would replace (or amend) "clever" with "nasty". I think they cross the line sometimes with their catches. I remember reading about this stuff with the Xbox long ago and thinking that. You've given me some hard evidence.
And for the record, the ten pints of blood bit is what my IT teacher says when he goes through the license agreement page (and hits agree) for any microsoft product :D
@Celes
ReplyDelete"This was from when I was living in a tent. "
Enough said :)
"I think they cross the line sometimes with their catches. I remember reading about this stuff with the Xbox long ago and thinking that. You've given me some hard evidence."
That's true, and if you need any more evidence I'm happy to provide it. Still, every step of the way I made a decision to spend the money, so while I can gripe about how they're nickel and diming me, I'm still letting them do it to me. And it's not like I get nothing for all this money I spent, I just think it's (way) over-priced.
"And for the record, the ten pints of blood bit is what my IT teacher says when he goes through the license agreement page (and hits agree) for any microsoft product :D"
I like that. I'm going to keep it :D I personally like the Dilbert comic where the license agreement he agreed to by opening the package included possesion of his first born child. If I had a link to it I'd put it here...
I completely agree; I'm so over going to a doctor for anything because (a) it's either A Virus or Something Else, (b) it costs me $50 a pop to go in, and (c) the medicine never does anything and is full of crud.
ReplyDeleteWhen I get ill, I just go with it, take time off work and leave it at that. Fortunately I don't get ill too often; a fact which I put down to not having any antibiotics in my system for a good 3 years and eating organic vegetarian foods. Oh, and Bikram Yoga...
The medical profession professes to know all but actually knows very little. Go see a naturopath, it'll be at least as effective, and you might learn something to your advantage.
@gotheek
ReplyDelete"I completely agree; I'm so over going to a doctor for anything because (a) it's either A Virus or Something Else, (b) it costs me $50 a pop to go in, and (c) the medicine never does anything and is full of crud."
What usually seems to happen is I pay the $50, they may or may not give me medicine, and I end up just getting over it naturally anyway. I still tend to go to the doctor because I have a condition which makes these things much worse than for other people, but even so they can't do anything. I just have to sweat it out. I guess it's just the piece of mind of having somebody with a medical degree saying "you're not going to die from this", but that's an expensive piece of mind.
"Oh, and Bikram Yoga... "
I keep hearing about Bikram Yoga. I'm going to have to find out what this is.
"Go see a naturopath, it'll be at least as effective, and you might learn something to your advantage."
Honestly, I have no idea what a naturopath is, but I'll check it out. Could be interesting.