I started experiencing those burning bladder spasms again, once or twice every hour.

Happy Friday to y’all from your favorite bedridden blogger … me! It’s 9:30 a.m. and I’m killing a few minutes before my C.N.A. shows up for bath-time. She’s usually here at 10:30. Let’s see how far I can get with this in an hour!

I wish the Texas legislature would stop fucking around with legitimate prescriptions for opioids.

It’s a cold (48°), rainy, foggy, and generally nasty morning here in the Dallas metro area. I’m shivering in bed under two afghans and Sam just left for his daily pre-dawn hike in the woods, this time in a down jacket, gloves and knit beanie. Seriously. It’s supposed to warm up later today (68° according to Weather.com) so I’m always amazed that Sam wants to walk at 5:30 a.m. when it’s still cold and dark.

I have to wreck some truly excellent progress by confessing to a few stupid setbacks.

After spending eight productive hours last night sitting at my computer workstation, I have to wreck some truly excellent progress — finally making headway against my latest urinary tract infection; inventing a new recipe even though I’m practically bedridden; eliminating all the horrible, dry “alligator” skin from my feet and shins — by confessing to a few stupid setbacks. I’ll begin, therefore, by discussing the aforementioned setbacks in question. They are: 1) my skin is splitting; 2) my nose is dried out from wearing a cannula all the damn time; and 3) at the moment I can’t think of anything else. However, the “splitting skin” mentioned in item #1 is probably about an inch long on the left side of my body … located parallel to my waistline, below my rib cage and slightly around towards my back. (Got that? There’s a biology quiz on Wednesday.) To me, it feels like a giant paper cut, and when I asked Sam to take a look at it last night with a flashlight, he said it looked like a giant paper cut ... and he said it’s been bleeding, too.