there & back again.

Saturday afternoon to the same time next day -- it was a grueling ordeal that took me halfway across the state & back, & left me no better off than before.

Seeing as how I'm resuming work on _Noc-Lar_, which I'm trying to sell as sword-&-sorcery, simply for convenience of packaging, & no longer being able to read print, I put on Trish's old Conan the Barbarian movie.

I noticed a small hole in my vision, in the upper, lefthand corner of my vision, just before the top, blind part of my vision begins. I called the ER, thinking that my retina may've started to come detached once again. They said to come right in, that it couldn't wait until Monday. Fred managed to drive us up there, with a snowstorm coming in from the west.

The ER doctor phoned Dr. Beardsley, the local yokel eye doctor, who simply said, "I'm not qualified." (Because of my rare form of glaucoma.) "Because of his history -- 11 eye surgeries -- you're best off sending him to Great Falls."

--Yeah, but I've got no way to get there -- & what am I supposed to do about getting back?

--We'll figure that out when you get there.

--But can't Dr. Beardsley give me an indirect ophthalmic exam, to rule out the possibility of retinal detachment?

--No.

So they stuck me on the ambulance, after I ate some roast beast that the kitchen brought down.

When we arrived in the City of Electric Light, after waiting half an hour, I saw the ophthalmologist on-call. He declared it "retinal traction", saying that a portion of my retina's sliding around, causing me to see colored sparkles, but "the retina's frozen in place from the surgery, & I wonder why Dr. Beardsley didn't do this [indirect ophthalmic] himself?" He simply told me, "Come back & see Dr. Boes in a week or 2."

So I was stranded in Great Falls with nowhere to stay, & no way to return home; none of my medicine, either, for that matter.

We finally got a hold of Karen, my case manager, who put a room in a nearby motel on her credit card. I woke up at 2:12, because I didn't have any of my medicine, & napped off-&-on for the rest of the night.

Jeff "Eldritch" Palmer, a friend of mine in Great Falls, agreed to take me home, in exchange for gas money. The roads were clear up to Big Sandy, then they became worse. We finally got home around 11:00.

I'll be making an appointment with Dr. Boes this morning. I'll try to make it a day that Trish has off. I'll try to let everybody know what's happening then.

Jim