Dara had another followup appointment about her eye surgery this afternoon–and was informed, much to our dismay, that she had further retinal tearing. There had been a ten percent chance that this would happen, and apparently, she’s just managed to roll REALLY badly on her Luck roll.
This means another round of eye surgery tomorrow. And no going down to OryCon this weekend. AUGH. We’ve cancelled our hotel reservations and gotten our Amtrak points back for the train, and additionally, OryCon’s concom said oh god yes of COURSE we can have a membership refund; they’ll deal with that after the con is over.
So. Dara’s next round of eye surgery is tomorrow at 4pm. Which means I get to spend tomorrow morning writing a proper synopsis of Vengeance of the Hunter to hand over to my editor, and then I will take Dara to her procedure. She’ll have a post-op followup on Saturday as well.
This may make Monday more challenging. We’d already realized that oh shit Dara’s not cleared to drive yet, and had gotten Paul’s agreement to drive us to and from my surgery. However, now that Dara’s going to have to have another procedure of her own, this may make it difficult for her to go with me to the hospital at all. Much will depend upon whether she is still under position restrictions by Monday, since the first round of this fun required her to spend the next day or so constantly looking at her feet and having to sleep face down as well. Which would be PROBLEMATIC, trying to stay overnight with me at Evergreen. But we’ll see what happens with that as of Saturday.
Tonight Paul made us a tasty dinner, and there’s been cider, and I’m also having a shot of cake vodka, given that tonight pretty much took a hard turn into the land of Fuck Everything. The forecast of instruments being picked up later tonight is also very, very high.
Please keep us in your thoughts, folks. And if anybody finds the son of a bitch who decided to bump up our medical misfortune this year, let me know, okay? I have a heat ray and an itchy trigger finger. >:|
After this weekend kicking me in the teeth, I’m not feeling up to dealing with the Internet for the time being. I need some me time, people. So I’m going offline for a few days.
Anybody who needs to talk to me, please send email, text, or call. If you don’t have the means to get hold of me in any of those fashions, I’ll talk to you when I come back later this coming week.
Well, this was SUPPOSED to be the day I went with and down to Oregon to see Le Vent du Nord perform, and then to meet up with tomorrow afternoon for lunch and then an excursion to Powell’s.
But the travel gods had other plans. We made it safely down to Olympia–where we stopped for lunch and then found a little shop called Bonjour Cupcakes, which seemed like a fortuitous sign, because what BETTER place could there be to visit on the way to see a Francophone band? Plus, the cupcakes were super-tasty.
After we got out of Olympia, though, we ran face-first into a massive wall of Suck. :(
The car started making scary rattling noises and vibrations right around exit 39 on I-5, so we had to pull off, slowing down hard to try to get down to a safer speed in case we were suddenly unable to get anywhere. Dara turned on the emergency blinkers, and we limped into a Shell station to seek emergency help. The Shell station directed us to a nearby mall with a Sears with an auto service station in it, and once we got over there and let one of their guys test-drive the car, he was all “well, your front axles are screwed. They shouldn’t be this loose.”
The REALLY vexing part of this is that Dara just had the damn car looked at, and those axles had just been replaced. So either our usual mechanic chose extremely poorly with the new axles, or else our car is old enough at this point that it’s just fucked and we’re going to have to see about getting a new one.
And it was glaringly apparent that we weren’t going to make it to Forest Grove in time for the show. Moreover, there was no way we could get the car fixed before Monday. So while Dara and Jenny tried to tag team on getting the car towed to the nearest shop, I cancelled our reservation at the hotel near where Le Vent was playing tonight. I admit freely that I spent some time crying inside the mall, ’cause yeah, looking forward to this show for MONTHS. Missing this was a kick right in the heart, every bit as bad as missing a Great Big Sea show would have been. But I’ve suffered worse, and when the tow truck showed up to pick up the car, things seemed like they were looking up a bit. The driver got us to the nearby train station in plenty of time to get tickets for the next train back to Seattle. So at least, if nothing else, we’d be able to get home and spend the night in our own beds and let Jenny crash at our place before we got her home.
At the train station, though, was when Dara realized her backpack was gone.
We think she had it when we got into the cab of the tow truck. I’m pretty sure I remember asking her if she wanted to put it into the actual car, since we had to stick our suitcase in there anyway, given that there wasn’t room for that in the cab of the truck. I remember her saying no. And she remembers having the weight of the backpack on her shoulder when we got in.
What we don’t know is whether she left it behind the driver’s seat of the truck, or whether she might have left it on the bed of the truck when we got out at the train station. The driver says he couldn’t find it in the truck. So at this point we have no real idea what the hell happened to it.
Dara’s iPad and Nook were in that backpack, which sucks massively, given, y’know, expensive electronics and all. But what really hurts is that her very first bamboo piccolo was in that bag too. Popcorn, the first bamboo piccolo she made with her very own hands. On which she’s written a LOT of music. We’re talking huge sentimental value here, people, and an instrument that’s irreplaceable despite its comparatively small monetary value.
So yeah, I’m pretty upset about not getting to see Olivier Demers be awesome on the fiddle tonight–and particularly pissed off that axle trouble on a car that just had its axles replaced kept me from that. But Dara is shattered by the loss of Popcorn.
I suspect we’re going to have to spend some time just curled up together tomorrow and taking comfort in each other and possibly also snuggling the cats. Please keep your fingers crossed that we’ll get that backpack back, people. And if ANY of you know anybody in Longview or Kelso, please, please, PLEASE spread the word that we will pay a reward for its return, with its contents, no questions asked.
We take a small modicum of comfort in the knowledge that we were able to make it safely home again, and that if the car had to fail so spectacularly, at least it did it in a way that didn’t result in any of us being hurt. We’re also grateful that it broke down right at a freeway exit right in the middle of a town, where we had easily accessible people to get some level of assistance, and an easily accessible train station.
But we’re still pretty goddamn unhappy about the way today turned out. So again–please boost that signal, people. Dara has a post about it here. And now would also be a good time to share good news, or pics of cute puppies or kittens, or something. Thanks all.
