{"id":4968,"date":"2010-10-23T23:52:36","date_gmt":"2010-10-24T03:52:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=4968"},"modified":"2010-10-23T23:52:36","modified_gmt":"2010-10-24T03:52:36","slug":"a-scanner-darkly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=4968","title":{"rendered":"A scanner darkly"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

I woke up dark and early this morning to do that thing everybody loves to do on their weekend: go get an lower lumbar MRI. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve been having some increased discomfort and referring pain that might be a result of my herniated disc, but before we do anything else we need to take a look at a new scan and see if that really does look to be the cause.<\/p>\n

So I woke up, showered, and drove over to the radiology place five minutes away. The one good thing about going out before 7 a.m. on a Saturday is that there’s practically no traffic. I was the first patient of the day, and I actually had to ring the buzzer to be let in.<\/p>\n

The scan itself went smoothly. I didn’t luck out with an open MRI, but this is a different place than where I went before, and the machine was a little more comfortable. I’m not especially claustrophobic, though the MRI does seem designed to take you right up to that edge. Both times before, I’ve found that my arms get pinned a little uncomfortably, the chute down the middle being a little too narrow for them to rest comfortably at my side. That wasn’t so much an issue today, thankfully, and the scans themselves were a lot quicker. I’m not entirely sure why that<\/i> is — a different machine, more specific prescription, better operator? — but I’m hoping whatever they show will suggest our next course of action. <\/p>\n

I think I’d prefer it to be the disc, just since that’s a known quantity, and the alternatives that leap immediately to mind are a lot less appealing, but we’ll see what the doctor says on Tuesday. I have a CD of the scans to bring with me, since they weren’t going to make it to him if sent by mail. (I’m glad I asked on my way out.)<\/p>\n

I came home and watched a little television, then caught up on a little sleeping. I tried to do some writing today, too — for most of the day, actually — but this particular story I’m working on has me kind of in the weeds, trying to figure it out. I like it, although it still feels kind of directionless, and I’m not really sure how to end it. The submission deadline is in a little over a week; I could probably rework it for something else if I miss that deadline, but I’d really like to try it there first. We’ll see. More writing this week, I expect.<\/p>\n

Then this evening, I watched Temple Grandin<\/a>, which I missed when it was on HBO. It really is a terrific movie, most of all for Claire Danes’ astounding performance. I have no great familiarity with autism, although I’ve read many raves from people who do — including my sister, who works with autistic children all the time. All I know is, Danes is captivating, and her performance never feels like a cheap gimmick, like “hey look at me! I’m playing disabled!” It’s an inspiring story, and Danes’ portrait of Grandin is fearless.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I woke up dark and early this morning to do that thing everybody loves to do on their weekend: go get an lower lumbar MRI. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve been having some increased discomfort and referring pain that might be a result of my herniated disc, but before we do anything else we need … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[5,14,28,12],"class_list":["post-4968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-health","tag-movies","tag-personal","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4968"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4968"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4968\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}