Ouch

Listen to old man Pearce, kids: Septoplasty hurts...

Back on 11 December I had one of my own. The procedure was done under conscious sedation - the type where you are physically conscious, but mentally asleep. Talk about a trip! One minute, I'm chewing on a nasal canula commenting on how it seems they're pushing gas because I'm feeling a bit lightheaded, and the next thing I know, I realize that there is someone inside my nose - cracking, breaking - and I'm saying to the doc "heyyy, that hurts" (yes, I said it like that... it'll be a while before I forget that moment).

Anyway, procedure done, I find out I talked like a leaky faucet... unstoppable. Not really about anything as I found out a week later, but non-stop nonetheless.

Throughout the following week, I was to experience a level of misery unknown since my days living with my ex. Physical pain on top of emotional pain compounded by a weakness in the spirit that could only be attributed to having a portion of oneself carved out.

I found out after about the second day (13 Dec) that I actually could not smell. Guess what other sense is made up with mostly smell... that's right kids, I couldn't taste a damn thing. I was faced with a week of no scents, no tastes, pain, misery, and crusty boogers.

BRING IT ON!!

I ended up in the hospital over the first weekend with an infection. This was cleared up very quickly by getting a different antibiotic. No big story here.

Come Friday, 19 Dec It was time to take out my tubes. Oh, did I fail to mention that there were 1/2-inch diameter tubes up my nose and that the tubes were about 4 inches long? Talk about a freaky feeling... having this huge tube pulled out of your nose... wow.

Since that date, I have been so happy. I can smell again, I can taste, I can breathe... oh, man, it's wonderful. I know that it is still within recovery time right now, but the passages are so clear. I can breathe through both nostrils. Of course, the boogies as big as streetcars are a little annoying, but I'll get over it.

I only have two pictures of the whole thing and they are out of focus, but I'll try to get one of them up here before long... not that anyone reads this, but...

Don't buy HP

Looks like if it's going to happen to someone, it's going to happen to me.

On 1 Dec, my six-month old laptop, my dearest possession, became a statistic. I shut it down that morning, took it to work, booted it, and was met with a HDD failure notification.

Well, shit...

So, I got on the phone with HP "technical support", spoke to some very nice people who couldn't speak a lick of English, and was told that I would have to supply a credit card before they would ship my replacement HDD.

Well, after two days of escalating, talking to supervisors, and beating the dead horse, I gave up a credit card number. Well, there was no money available on it and they told me they couldn't use it - even though they said they weren't going to charge anything to it unless I failed to return the bad HDD.

Well, I begged, pleaded, and yelled at them and they finally said that they would waive the card requirement and would ship my HDD. This was 3 Dec and my drive was to be here 9 Dec.

Days go by... I check daily on the status of my shipment and each day the web site tells me that it has not shipped, but will be next-day FEDEX'd to me and arrive by 9 DEC. Until today.

This morning I opened the site for my daily check and it said the order was canceled. WTF?! Another call to tech support reveals that it was canceled due to a credit card with not enough funds available. I ask how much is needed and they tell me $3-400. WTF again!

More yelling, screaming, and telling them that I wanted to speak to someone I could understand got nowhere FAST. I ended up calling the regional offices for the US and spoke to a very nice (English speaking) case manager by the name of Christine. She waived the card requirement and my drive should be here by 12 Dec - just in time for me to work on my computer while recovering from surgery.

We'll see if it makes it this time.

So, again: Don't buy HP. Their tech support can't communicate with their largest market, they are rather unwilling to make reasonable considerations to repair their defective products, and...

They suck ;)