And my sinus/throat/ear infection is back. Thank ALLAH I finally get to my ENT doctor on Monday. I’m going to recommend he amputate. I really hate these lingering things that come and go and come and go and eventually leave after you’ve been miserable for a month.
In the meantime, I have found the Advil with sudafed and chlor trimetron in one pill is working quite nicely to keep me somewhat alive.
debit
Somewhat alive? How very unique.
J.
What, no Hanukkah/Chanukah open thread? (Thank ALLAH?! Feh.) Guess I’ll have to start one. Well, to get this dreidel party started, check out these fabu Chanukah songs. They will light up your night. And they are totally kosher!
Oscar Leroy
Obama White House pressured Spain to drop Bush torture prosecution, leaked cable shows
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/12/obama-spain-bush-torture-prosecution/
Pathetic! This man is a disgrace.
debit
Is there any thread that can be designated an Obama hate free zone? I’m really, really getting tired of being beaten over the head with how much you all loathe him. I’m outta here for the night.
AnnaN
Still not flushing? Tsk tsk. (OOh yeah, holier than thou attitude AND a finger wag).
/dances off to WoW
Corner Stone
If you’re still looking for a new front pager I suggest you check this place out.
They’d fit right in.
Ella in New Mexico
John, just curious, but does this infection make your ears ring and feel like they are plugged–like you have water in them? I’ve had this particularly annoying symptom along with a cold/sinus infection, fatigue, and recently a sore throat for going on two weeks. It’s sucking big time.
djheru
Ah! I understand. So do you live in Canada or the UK? Obviously, we Americans never have to wait to see a specialist.
lamh32
I think I’m pretty much done with the lib blogosphere for the night. Heck, maybe I’m done for the week. I’m gonna start my weekend off early, but first I wanted to post a comment from another blog that I frequent from a commenter who put into words what I have tried to do, but they did it much better and they said I could share it, a little food for thought. What follows is the that comment, slightly abbreviated:
“A Primary Challenge of Obama from the left will be the Biggest Display of Liberal Racism Ever
If disgruntled liberals who talk about primarying Obama are really serious, they better be prepared for what a serious challenger to the president will have to do.
Said challenger will have to be white (notice all the names thrown around are white men and woman).
President Obama has an 89% approval rating among African Americans. That number has never dropped below 85% at any time during his presidency. Barring some cataclysmic event, any serious primary challenger of Obama from the left will have to realize that African Americans aren’t going anywhere.
So that serious challenger of Obama from the left will have no choice but to try to win over as many white liberals as possible, even if that mean marginalizing or even suppressing black voters. In other words, they will have to engage in the “Southern Strategy: Liberal Edition”. Such a run will make the racism that occur in the 2008 Democratic primary look like Sesame Street. Only this time, the racism will be condoned by Liberals.
And let’s all this occurs and the primary challenger ends up winning, the supporters of that challenger will want to go “Okay, now let’s put this behind us, let bygones be bygones, and come together to win the general”. It will be at this point where you will find out what the loudest “Fuck You” ever heard sounds like. It will also be at this point where Liberal will be reminded that they can’t win a fucking pie-eating contest without African American support.
So when the Republican Candidate wins… white liberals will blame blacks for costing them the electing. It will be at this point they will find out what the second-loudest “Fuck You” sounds like.
SO it’s time to ask these disgruntled liberals if this is the road they want to take. “
gwangung
@debit: Meh. They’d be useful if they had more of an operational clue. Since they’re useless in actually getting anything done, they can be, and are, ignored.
lamh32
@Ella in New Mexico:
that sounds like an ear infection to me. Usually starts off as a throat infection that goes untreated, and eventually migrates to the ears (that whole ENT inter-connection). Happened to me once, I had a sore throat, left it untreated, and ended up with a ear infection in both ears. One was worse than the other!
Tom
Is there some snark out there about Friedman’s moronic WikiChina op-ed that I’m missing?
4tehlulz
@lamh32: Well, the blacks did do Prop 8 after all, so it is all their fault.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@debit:
Dood, that’s like five preening DQs. Ignore.
Anybody know why Jim Moran voted with the R’s today? I thought he was one of the good guys?
S. cerevisiae
@lamh32: Oh that’s gooood.
John Cole
@AnnaN: I use a neti pot daily. When I can. This morning nothing was getting through my left nostril short of tnt.
@Ella in New Mexico: Sort of. One side of my throat seems swollen, and every morning when I wake up I have all sorts of crap in my throat. Basically I have flu symptoms, it feels like there is wax moving in my ears, and my head hurts and throat hurts plus I am either clogged up on having sinus drainage. It blows.
SIA
There are alternatives to the junk OTC medicine and big medical bills. I’ve had a lot of success with some of the home remedies on that site. Great for pet health too.
beltane
Don’t complain. I spent Thanksgiving in the ER with acute vertigo and uncontrollable vomiting caused by some kind of inner ear inflammation. This is the first day since then that I’m not too dizzy to read the computer screen.
South of I-10
Little South has strep throat. Again. I hope you are in a better mood than she is.
SIA
@debit: OK. I’m just going to say it. I LOVE Barack Hussein Obama. *
*in spite of his flaws & errors
cleek
i got my sinus thing goin, too.
hi-five!
lamh32
@4tehlulz:
actually, the commenter did mention the prop 8 fiasco, but I ommitted that so as to not have to re-fight the prop 8/blacks hate gays prize fights
Jay C
John, while the thought has probably occurred to you (and/or your medical advisors (if any); but there are these newfangled drugs they have nowadays called “antibiotics” which might be just the thing for a persistent infection. Not that they’re the be-all and end-all: I resorted to them after being debilitated by the virulent cold that has been sweeping the City since last month – and I’m still dealing with a persistent cough for three weeks; but maybe you’ll have better luck.
An speaking of luck: you might have gotten one of these suckers; at least you still have your nose….
mikefromArlington
hydrogen pyroxide cures all that. gargle it, and clean your ears out.
i use it for everything. :)
Just Some Fuckhead
I’m only having trouble with one sinu, the big one at the top.
Calouste
Serious fall out from the cables is starting (from der Spiegel (English):
The chief of staff of Guido Westerwelle, the German Foreign Minister and leader of junior coalition partner FDP, has admitted that he was the one that took internal papers from last year’s coalition negotiations between the FDP and the CDU/CSU to the American embassy. He “has been released of his current duties”.
Curiously, der Spiegel only refers to him by his first name and the initial of his last name, Helmut M., a treatment usually reserved for suspects and accused in criminal cases. It can’t be hard to find out the surname of the most senior aide to a cabinet minister.
soonergrunt
Been waking up in the middle of the night with itching, burning throat, drainage, stuffed ear, hard dry coughing.
Must be something going around. One of ya’ll needs to sanitize your keyboard and wash hands before sitting down at the internets. You’re fucking us up.
Oh, and Oscar Leroy at cornholegas.com–kindly fuck yourself with a hot poker and then cut your dick off. Thanks.
soonergrunt
hmm. moderation. I can haz a telling what I done pleez?
Bnut
For all you WOW people out there. I don’t like the game, but i do know how hard it must have been to coordinate this. And it’s Billy Joel.
Southern Beale
And today in Death Panels, Arizona cuts financing for transplants, in effect issuing a death warrant for some low-income patients.
But our system works SO WELL!
Omnes Omnibus
@lamh32: My guess is it is complaining whiners. No real challenge will happen.
Corner Stone
If I were a member of the GLBT community I would be curious about something. I’d be wondering why when another block of voters say they wouldn’t vote for the party candidate in a set of given conditions, it seems to pass by with a nod and a “Damn right!”.
donnah
John Cole, do you still have your tonsils? My 23 year old son has had repeated sinus and throat problems and finally a doctor took a good look and did some blood work. He had tonsillitis, big time. And his doctor said thy have to come out, so my son saw a throat specialist yesterday, who said his tonsils were scarred and basically a catch-all for bacteria and other nasties. He is scheduled for surgery in late January.
4tehlulz
>I’m going to recommend he amputate.
I think the ENT crowd refers to that as a “tonsillectomy”.
Southern Beale
Arizona cuts financing for transplants, in effect issuing a death warrant for some low-income patients.
But our system works SO WELL!
MeDrewNotYou
Let me vent over Sudafed.
When I have sinus problems, I absolutely love the stuff. It clears things up, lets me breathe, and generally makes the illness tolerable instead of a cruel instance of torture. For a really bad cold/infection/whatever, there simply is no substitute.
But because of the bullshit War on Drugs, I have to jump through hoops and beg the pharmacist to sell a single box to me. “A nasal spray or some Benadryl will work just fine. You don’t need to use this stuff.” I don’t want it for making meth, and even if I did, it would be trivially easy for anyone to get some anyways. It just makes for a total hassle when I least feel like dealing with it.
Linda Featheringill
@beltane:
Oh, no! Don’t tell me that is coming around again! I hope I miss it this time. It was awful!
Take care of yourself and don’t get out of your safety zone until you are all better.
And may delay driving for a while.
SIA
Reflexology is very, very effective. So, are you a DFH, or not?
Southern Beale
@Jay C:
Some persistent infections are fungal in nature. John needs to see a doctor to be sure.
That said, around here there’s been some awful, persistent sinusy thing going around. I came down sick on Halloween night and am ony now beginning to shake it. It may have migrated east.
beltane
@Linda Featheringill: Thanks. In all my 42 years this has been the worst experience ever, though I have enjoyed having my husband do all the laundry.
jeffreyw
Take one of these every day until you are feeling better.
Linda Featheringill
@beltane:
Did you have to crawl on hands and knees to the bathroom in order to throw up but keep falling over anyway?
Which way? I always fell to the right.
freelancer
@lamh32:
Why do black hate gays?
/ducks, runs
Southern Beale
@MeDrewNotYou:
I hear you but those of us who live in Meth Central have seen a noted drop in Hillbilly Heroin since these Draconian rules were enacted, so while it’s a hassle for the law abiding folks, we appreciate your tolerance until they can think of a better idea for tackling the scourge of rural America.
Jay C
@MeDrewNotYou:
What you said about Sudafed: handiest stuff around; and the BS you have to go through to get it is a national disgrace to say the least….
Dunno where you live, but at least you can FIND Sudafed; here in New York (not exactly a retail backwater) stores have been running short on it for no discernible reason (they SAY it’s the “manufacturer”).
Riiiight….
Anya
John McCain is a douchpag. He is the douchest of the worst douchebags. He inflicted that nasty dimwit on us because her nomination played to identity politics. She will continue to pollute our lives because that mean asshole was not thinking about his country. But worst of all, he has no principles or shame. He’s fighting tooth and nail to maintain a discriminatory policy that does not serve any purpose because he’s a sore loser who cannot get over the fact that he lost the election to a half muslim uppity colored with a funny name. Yet no one in the media is calling him on all of his changing stands on issues or his ridiculous excuse for opposing DADT.
SiubhanDuinne
@SIA: Thank you for saying what I feel and think every day. I am so grateful that this brilliant and compassionate (yes, and flawed) man is our president. Why he or anybody would want the job in the face of such chronic ugliness and obstruction is another question entirely.
/oh oh obot
khead
This game is very crack-like. Snagged it out of the bargain bin at Walmart.
Really. Like crack.
MeDrewNotYou
@Southern Beale:
Yet another way red states are making things miserable for the rest of us…
Seriously, though, here in central IN, I’ve noticed fewer meth busts in the news, but in my experience, usage is at least steady, if not up. (Aren’t white trash relatives great?) I forget where I read it, but IIRC, Mexico seems to be eagerly picking up the slack in our production.
Mumphrey
I’m taking my dog in to the vet tomorrow, so they can find out whether she has cancer or not. I feel pretty shitty right now, knowing that tomorrow could be a vile day. I’m hoping for the best, but I’m pretty scared right now…
MsSkwEsq
Oscar Leroy: Just go away.
John: I have suffered terribly for years with sinus/ear infections,allergies – the whole gammit. I’ve been on every drug, nettipot with little relief. But then this past Spring I was in the doctors waiting room reading a Readers Digest article on chronic sinus problems. It said that the combination of Astepro (astelin spray) and a spray like Rhinocort or Flonase works wonders. Well, I took that magazine into the exam room and asked to give that combo a try (I already was on Rhinocort). I can report that I have felt better than I have in 10 years. I still do the nettipot and mostly just use the Astepro daily with the Rhinocort a couple times a week. I sleep much better and haven’t had a terrible headache in long time. Astepro is a God send!
MeDrewNotYou
@Jay C: Central Indiana here.
I haven’t had a problem actually getting it when needed; the CVS/Walgreen/etc. always have some. My beef is being told something weaker will do just fine, telling and retelling my symptoms, and repeatedly saying I’ve tried the weaker medicine with no luck and that’s why I want the Sudafed. Being treated like I’m an idiot to get a legal and necessary product pisses me off.
ETA- Just re-read that and realized the parallels to abortion. Of course the BS in getting that legal medical procedure it a million times worse, but it does give me the tiniest inkling of what a woman has to put up with.
Anya
@lamh32: According to this TNR post “Why Obama won’t face a primary challenge” the President’s approval among liberals is very hight (85%). I think the virulent hate is coming from a very small group, mainly limited to the ‘netroots’.
Anne Laurie
@beltane:
__
First time I developed labyrintitis (many years ago), the doctor said that was thought to be the disease that made Beethoven deaf… and cranky. I totally sympathized.
One thing I’ve learned to do, in the intervening years, is carry some OTC chewable meclazine hydrochloride with me. (From the ‘motion sickness’ shelf, brand name is Bonine.) If I chew a tablet at the first intimations of spindizzy-ringing, I can usually forestall most of the puking and just-let-me-die feelings. Of course the drugs make me feel like I’m on the other side of a plate of slow glass, but it beats the alternative.
Odie Hugh Manatee
Lately I often find myself writing a comment in a thread and then deleting it when I read it prior to posting. Why? Because it just doesn’t matter and it’s a waste of my time. I know that I support Obama and and the Democrats because right now any other alternative is far worse. Barring his being caught in a compromising position with a dead girl or a live boy, I will vote for him in 2012. Despite the crap at so-called Democratic supporting sites like Kos, I will still vote for him and any other Democrats that I can.
I have to say that lately I’m getting pretty good at tuning out the constant Obama/Dem outrage so I have to thank the shrill whiners out there for providing the din for me to tune out. As much as the manic progressives bitch and whine about this or that FAIL, they have no solutions for the reality of what our government is and what Obama or any good Democrat faces. They have a vision of the Perfect Progressive President, a Democratic version of George Bush, who will lead us to a Perfect Union by pounding the Bully Pulpit to Get Stuff Done. A person who leads and everyone will follow like the Pied Piper. Whose ideas and arguments are so persuasive, brilliant and good for all that there are no alternatives nor arguments against them.
This perfect progressive president does not exist and never will. Even if this person did exist they still wouldn’t be able to get a damned thing done with the current congress, nor any past congress. Even if there were some successes, the manic progressives would dismiss them out of hand and angrily focus in on their pet peeve with a laser-like intensity.
The manic progressives can keep wanking away at it because that is all they want to do and will ever do. Every outrage allows them to scream OUTRAGE, but it really doesn’t matter. They aren’t effective, all they do is “YELL LOUDER!” to drown out everyone else and turn everyone else off. When crazy groups like the teabaggers are better organized than their opposition, you know things are really fucked up on the left. Like I have said before, it’s hard to believe that stupid is beating smart but that’s the way it is.
In the end, it just doesn’t matter. All there is left to do is to mock and laugh at their ineffective antics and ‘skipping record-like ability’ to repeat the same shit over and over again. For them, every failure is either the fault of Obama and/or the Democrats, and every win is because of their Tremendous Progressive Efforts. Much like the opinion that the right has of themselves, they never, ever fail.
Everyone else does.
frosty
@Anne Laurie: Spindizzies? Cities in Flight novels? Slow glass? You weren’t reading sci-fi in the 60s, were you?
SIA
@SiubhanDuinne: Hi SD! Good to ‘see’ you! Yes, BO is very fine in many ways, and it is very, very ugly out there.
SIA
@Mumphrey: Oh man. That’s rough. Hoping for good news at the vet.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Anya:
Fix’t.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Mumphrey:
That’s rough. Best wishes and I hope you get some good news tomorrow.
Kristine
@Ella in New Mexico: I think I’m fighting the same thing. I was blaming it on a recently diagnosed thyroid condition because sinus conditions and thyroid issues often go hand in hand.
SIA
@soonergrunt:
O, Sooner! I lurve the way yew tawk! :)
ETA: In Moderation?? “What did I do?! What did I say?!” (Katharine Hepburn, “Bringing up Baby”.)
Kristine
@Mumphrey: Hopes for the best possible news. Been there. It sucks.
MobiusKlein
@MsSkwEsq: John needs to find out what he’s allergic to, and deal with that too.
My son, it was dust mites. Get rid of as much dust as possible, and his nose gets better. Along with the other anti-allergy bits. And heavy duty antibiotics when needed.
Anya
@Odie Hugh Manatee: I like your fix!
Anne Laurie
@Mumphrey:
__
I’m so sorry to hear that, and you’ll be in my prayers. One tiny note of hope — the available treatments, if it does turn out to be cancer, have improved right along with the human equivalents. (Yeah, not really surprising, since so much of the human stuff was originally tested on other animals, including dogs.) Surgery to remove the tumor ‘and a foot of her colon’ gave my Spousal Unit another 18 months with his beloved Flicker, a 12lb, 14-year-old dog with an enlarged heart and drug allergies. (She eventually succumbed to pulmonary hypotension, still tumor-free). In fact, it amazed me how quickly Flicker rebounded… within 36 hours, she was demanding MOAR FUD NAOW, and within a week she was more active than she’d been in months. Dogs don’t dwell the way us primates do — Flicker didn’t waste time thinking about how miserable she’d been earlier, or worrying that she might be miserable again in the future.
Anne Laurie
@frosty:
Busted. Started stealing my dad’s paperbacks as soon as I could read, and kept it up for another 30 years or so. In my day, I was as big a magpie as Matoko-chan, but hopefully slightly less obnoxious to those around me…
LiberalTarian
@MobiusKlein:
He could well be allergic to milk. Simple test: cut out all dairy for a month then eat some. It probably won’t be instant, but you’ll get congested and your nose will close up within a couple hours. I cut out milk and didn’t need allergy meds anymore.
Or, could be soy, corn, wheat, or who knows. Best way to figure out food allergies is to go on an elimination diet, then slowly introduce foods back and see if you react. I had eczema, a common food-allergy symptom/nightmare, and it got much better when I cut out milk, but it didn’t go away completely until I cut out wheat, too.
I’m allergic to milk and wheat. No ice cream, sour cream, cheese or any products with dairy in it. No beer, bread, pasta, cookies, cake, coatings on most of the snack chips in existence.
Yeah, it’s a bitch, but it’s better than being sick all the time.
tesslibrarian
I’m also fighting with some sort of throat-ear thing right now; I’d fought it off, and have found the primary difference between feeling sorta crappy and really terrible is Mucinex. It makes a huge difference, especially if you’re like me and have problems with taking real sudafed.
Morbo
POST REQUEST: Randinho post on the latest host countries. Looks like it could be a boondoggle, but the level of butthurt I’ve seen has been hilarious.
frosty
@Anne Laurie:
Hah!
I loved the slow glass story; have no idea who wrote it. The ending, where the guy sat outside his house so he could watch through the glass back in time at his now-dead family was a real tear-jerker.
As for Cities, I can still hear Mayor Amalfi saying (in my mind) “What city has two names twice?”
JGabriel
John Cole:
John Cole, when you say “sudafed”, do you mean pseudoephedrine or phenylephrine?
The reason I ask is that phenylephrine usually isn’t very effective, except as a nose spray.
So, if it’s phenylephrine, that probably means the chlor-trimiton (the anti-histamine) is doing all of the sinus-clearing work and you have an allergy, rather than an infection.
Obviously, if your doctor has done a throat culture and says it’s an infection, then that’s what it is. But if you haven’t had a throat culture, then you should get that done, and if it’s negative, then start looking into allergies.
.
Rainy Day
Chronic sinus problems could be a symptom of congestive heart failure. Make sure the docs are looking at your WHOLE body.
It’s also possible you entire sinus cavities are clogged with years of mucus build-up. You might need to get the Roter Rooter procedure where they go in and scrape out everything.
susteph
dude. gargle with salt water and use a neti pot.
or ask abl where the booze faucet hotel is. it wouldn’t cure you, but you won’t care anymore.
debbie
@tesslibrarian:
Horrible name, but Mucinex is definitely a miracle drug when it comes to sinus infections. Not the combined version, but the one with the straight guaffenisen. It keeps you from getting plugged up in the first place, which is what causes most sinus infections.
I’ve used this stuff many, many times — even before it went OTC, and I was a chain smoker with multiple sinus infections every year. What a difference it made!
Drink lots of water and pee profusely, but at least you’ll spare yourself a lot of pain. If you’re on blood thinners, you do need to be cautious, however. Mucinex thins every fluid in your body.