Saturday, February 22, 2014

How green was my valley?

Blogger uses a map like the one below to show you your/one one’s readership. The more readers you have/one has from a particular country, the darker green the country appears on the map:


And even though my Feedjit Recent Visitors thingy over there in the sidebar shows that I do indeed have readers from Brazil, Argentina, South Africa, Nigeria, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia, and New Zealand, apparently there are not enough of you to make a difference on the green map. In spite of comments left frequently on my posts by the likes of Katherine de Chevalle, Carol in Cairns, Helsie, and Elephant’s Child, according to Blogger’s green map nothing much is happening down under.

Which brings me to yesterday and my long-awaited enteroscopy.

Smooth segue, huh?

I had been told that the entereroscopy (which turned out to be of the single-balloon variety rather than double-balloon or spiral) was like a “long colonoscopy.” Instead, the good doctor decided to go in from above first (a “long endoscopy”) and enter from the other direction only if he couldn't reach the ilium from above. Turns out the “from above” approach was successful, so even though the previous evening I had prepped diligently for a colonoscopy, no colonoscopy was necessary.

Afterward, the good doctor showed me lots of pictures of my innards (esophagus, stomach, duodenum, jejunum, ilium -- I won’t make you look) including a mass (2 cm) in the ilium that he said could be a lipoma. They tattooed it so that they can find it again easily in case they need to go back in and remove it at some point in the future. A biopsy was performed to be sent to the lab for analysis, but for now the good doctor believes the mass/lipoma/tumor/whatever-the-heck-it-is is benign.

Snow and others of his persuasion should stop reading now. The rest of you may continue.

Thanks be to God.

11 comments:

  1. May you get good news on the biopsy. As a 30+years survivor of colon cancer, I can't stress enough how important it is to keep close watch on this alien residing in your gut.

    Live long and prosper!

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  2. An interesting post that I enjoyed reading.

    Thank you. Love love, Andrew. Bye.

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  3. Thanks indeed. I'm so pleased for you, and it must be a relief for your dear Mrs rhymes too. So glad the rotten test is over and hopefully you can breathe out and relax a bit re your health.

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  4. Hooray for benignity. And if that isn't a word it should be.

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  5. Sounds like a good result. Now go off and have some fun !

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  6. I'm glad to hear all is fine or as fine as things can be with folk poking about in ones innards.

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  7. Tattoo ~ what design did you choose?

    Now that green shady bit that is not showing up ~ are you clicking on the options of Now, Today, This Week or All Time. Top right hand corner of your Blogger Dashboard.

    So happy that your visitor was benign. I didn't even know we had an ilium. Hmmm ~ I wonder what it does?

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  8. Thanks to all seven of you -- 1 from the U.S., 3 from the U.K., and 3 from Australia -- for your good wishes.

    Ah, yes, Carol, I see what you mean. The green map can show "Now" (past two hours), "Day" (past 23 hours), "Week" (past seven days), "Month" (from same day last month) and "All Time" (from May 2007, although my blog didn't start until September 2007). Strange that I never noticed that before. Thank you. It makes quite a difference in the green-ness of countries, I can tell you.

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  9. "Snow and others of his persuasion should stop reading now."

    I expected porn, so naturally I continued, only to be disappointed.

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  10. Jolly good show. You'll be Jake.

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  11. Hmmm. so my readership is akin to a rather invasive procedure. go the kiwis :P

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<b>Always true to you, darlin’, in my fashion</b>

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