Happy Thanksgiving To All

Interestingly, even though Thanksgiving is not a British holiday, the turkey sales are pretty prevalent and the Christmas decorations are up, so it's almost like home. We started the day with a nice brisk walk downtown where we picked up a Santa suit for Joe. He's doing a charity run for St Michael's Hospice Sunday and all of the runners are wearing Santa suits.

We stopped at an outdoor cafe to get a cup of hot chocolate, and it started pouring. Rick was a good sport about it - we actually did sit and finish the hot chocolate in the wind and rain before heading home to put the turkey in the oven.

I like the ritual of preparing the turkey and the familiar side dshes (you know we'll have olives!). I always think about all of my family members preparing for the same dinner all over the world, and it connects us somehow.

For everyone out there, I wish you a glorious day spent in the company of those you love, with the knowledge that you are loved and remembered by those of us who are not there as well1

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Feeling good

Well I'm home. After all the drama of trying to get admitted to the hospital I finally had my gallbladder ripped out by the roots. Everything went fine. I see the doctor for my follow-up visit on December the 9th. It took me a few days to get my energy back but today I feel 100% better. I still get tired if I do to much but the pain I constantly felt in my abdomen is gone.
The next step is to recover through December and then get the scar tissue in my left shoulder cut so I can get a full range of motion back,after the 1st of the year.
I'll keep everyone posted as things progress.
As far as the hospital goes, it was great. It was a private hospital. I had a private room with a private bath. If you needed pain medicine you got it in about 60 seconds after asking for it. This is compared to literally six hours in a National health hospital. When I could eat again, dinner consisted of hot tea followed by creme of mushroom soup, roast lamb with mint sauce and five scoops of lemon sorbet for desert. Since I missed my lunch of chicken salad and tea because I was in surgery, they brought me that too along with my dinner. At 1:00am after my surgery the nurse came in, saw that I was still awake and brought me a tray of hot tea.
It was great as far as hospitals go. The girl who helped me get my insurance approval even came up to my room to make sure everything went well.
That's about it for now.
Cheers!

Posted by rick at 6:29 PM 0 comments

Rick's Tales from the Front

As many of you know, Rick has been battling the hospital and the insurance company to get his gall bladder operation scheduled. Because he's going through a private hospital, not NHS (National Health Service), and because they can, the hospital wanted payment up front. They would accept a guarantee of payment from the insurance company, but the insurance company would not provide a guarantee of payment until he was admitted, and the hospital would not admit him until they got a guarantee. Classic catch-22.

So how to come up with 9,000.00? We went down several roads, and eventually got a loan, freeing him for surgery. We signed the papers, and called the hospital to see how they wanted the check made out and who to deliver it to.

Surprise! They had worked things out with the insurance company!

So we are good to go. No out of pocket for now, and pleased to know that our signature alone can buy us at least 9,000.00 on any given day.

Surgery tomorrow!