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MY TRIP TO COMIC-CON 2008……. AND TWO HOSPITALS
The trip started out well enough. We left about 6am and made good time all the way to
Our first stop was about 15min in the dealer room then off to the “Red Sonja” panel with Robert Rodriguez and Rose McGowan. It was a real hoot. Robert and Rose were great… and funny. Funniest was when an 11 yr old girl came up to the mic to ask a question. It was about The GrindHouse movie she saw in the theater with her parents. Rose had to clarify, “so your parents took you to see GrindHouse when you were what, 9?” Many in the audience were thinking the same thing. But a great panel. Go Sonja! Go Machete!
The next panel had some of the great comics men of the silver and golden age. This is where it started to go bad. Good panel but, I had to leave towards the end because I started t get dizzy and nauseous. I thought it was just low blood sugar. I skipped lunch; I’m a naughty diabetic. Got a pretzel and OJ from a vending cart (only $7.75!!) and sat down to munch. Feeling slightly better I went to my third and final panel of the convention. It was how to pitch ideas to different venues (publishers, TV, movies, etc.). There were quite a few useful tidbits in this one. Usually it contains people who did their pitch work in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s. Not a whole lot of use today. This panel however had people who currently pitched and sold or are in the process of contracting their ideas. There was also an agent, publisher and lawyer on the panel. Big change; and a welcome one. Hopefully, my friend will send me his notes since I was having a bit of trouble concentrating. This is one of the big ones I came to see too.
Well, after making it through that entire one, we hooked up with our other friends and proceeded to Joe’s Crab Shack for some “real” food. It was quite tasty and for a little while (about and hour) I felt somewhat better. Then about 8pm in the room, discussing our 9:30pm trek to the convention center (only 1.5 blocks away but, by this time, it seemed in my head more like 1.5 miles) I had my first attack. As I said, we were in the room hanging out when my left hand started to shake uncontrollably. This was followed by my right, then my legs and finally my jaw as I started to have a difficult time getting my breathing to slow down. Not, convulsions mind you, just really, really shaking. Finally one of the teachers who had some training got me to sloe down my breathing and the episode stopped. I was completely wiped. I checked my temp and it was 102.8.
I thought I was having a reaction to dinner as, over the last several years, I’m finding that I have started to develop and allergy to some seafood I’ve always eaten in the past. I didn’t have any of that at dinner. I decided to hang in the room and rest.
At 6am I awoke suddenly, had my first, as George Carlin called it “involuntary personal protein spill” (I’ll call them IPPS from here) and proceeded to have another of the “shake attacks”. Somehow I was able to take my temp without the thermometer going through the back of my neck in the process and it read 103.8. By this time my friends were awake and I said “hospital”. As one friend tries in vain to get me to calm down my breathing the Security people mentioned earlier show up with an oxygen tank and to let me know an ambulance is on the way. Now I gotta say, they were really cool. They even gave us a cab voucher so we would have a free ride back from the hospital. So, the ambulance shows up in about 7 minutes and it takes about 15 minutes to get to the hospital a few miles away. This may seem like a long time however, with Comic-Con’s 120,000+ visitors traffic, even at 6am, sucks; as do drivers who do not get the hell out of the way. Fortunately, it wasn’t in the later morning or afternoon because I was told it can sometimes take almost half an hour to get an ambulance and another half hour to get to a hospital. The paramedics, also totally awesome, are very friendly…. even the one who shaved the three patches out of my chest hair so it now looks like aliens made some crop circles there.
The emergency room was not yet bustling and after answering the same line of medical questioning to the paramedics, nurse and doctor (with the high fever, 104.7, I was also confused and delirious) I got treated for a food allergy. The ER nurse said she didn’t think it was an allergy and was more like an infection. She was right.
I got back to the room about noon-ish and sent the friend who came with me off to the con. I didn’t want my friends to miss any of their experience because I was sick. There was nothing they could do anyway, two of them had never been to Comic-con before and we all paid a crap load of money to be there. The hospital gave me some instructions to keep cool (temperature) and it will pass. Wrongo. At about 4:30pm my friends came back from “lunch” at Dick’s Last Resort. One of the best restaurants ever created. People have real attitudes there. If you want napkins they will literally throw a huge handful at you. The floor is littered with them. The “rude tude”, part of the act, it what gives it that uniqueness. Don’t complain or be stupid or there may be an announcement over the loud speaker and/or you will be required to wear one of the paper hats they will make for you with whatever comment that want.
Anyway, back to my story. Another attack of IPPS, shakes, delirium and friend helping me get my breathing under control and that ended my Con-Friday. Con-Saturday was pretty much the same; two episodes of IPPS’s, shakes, delirium, breath calming and temps ranging from 102-104 degrees. Unfortunately, two of our party (the couple) had an emergency of their own and had to leave Sat afternoon. They got to see most of the con, though so I’m glad they made it. Plus, my friend was able to sleep in a bed the final night instead of on the floor which supposed to be my place.
So, through the night I shivered (had to stay in shorts and t-shirt with room set to 65 degrees just to keep my temp in the 101-102 range). Fortunately, during the night and that morning there were no more attacks. Since I was still weak aching and feverish, we decided it would be best to skip the panels and final look at the dealer room and just head back. Now begins the next “ordeal”.
We left for AZ at around 6am. Everything was going smoothly, I had my IPPS bag in my lap “just in case” and my friend agreed to keep the radio off so I could concentrate on my breathing and hopefully prevent another attack. Several hours in and 30 miles outside
Thus ends Comic-Con Sunday, my 6th annual trip to the con and the reason I have no pictures of the event to post. However, this doesn’t end my sad little tale.
On long, sleepless night later and after four days I’m still running a high fever so, On Monday, I head to my Doctor’s office, where he looks at me, does a bit of poking and tells me to get my butt to the ER down the street. He thinks it’s either Appendicitis or Diverticulitis. After a short while in the ER with a couple chest x-rays and a cat scan they decide on Diverticulitis. Now, this is a fairly common affliction that occurs in about 50% of adults who mostly only suffer mild symptoms and needs only some antibiotics. That’s not dramatic enough for me though. I need a “full on” case which can lead to a ruptured colon, but mine didn’t progress that far. One more day and it may have. If the San Diego ER had caught it, it may not have been any way near as bad and I may have gotten a few hours of con time in. Don’t know if there’s a fault in their system. I’ll have to look into it later. Anyway, the ER promptly admits me to the hospital and begins with the IV antibiotic treatments as well as ones to fix my dehydration. Of course since I didn’t go all the way and perforate the colon I had to do something else to worsen it so, while they did an ultrasound, they found what is either a cyst or a tumor on my kidney; we’re not sure about that yet and some fatty tissue around the liver. Neither is life threatening unless untreated and had this not happened neither may have caught.
So, 3 days later I’m out of the hospital (Scottsdale Shea is great) have my flower arrangement the people at my Library dept sent me while I was there (really brightened the room and my mood) and I’m home recovering. Of course I’m totally wiped out but, I’m anxious to get back to the Library on Monday. I really miss it. I have four follow-up Dr appointments and two tests (I hope they turn out well). But just to add to the suck factor just a bit more, I had a vacation scheduled in
So ends my sad little story of the past week. Another brush with the grim reaper. I’m tired and need to rest. I am on the mends though.
Talk to you all later.
Michael (2.1)
