State of the Emily

[dolari]

So, Monday morning, I got a quick phone call from Emily. She didn't have neough money to call me from the payphone, and our call lasted all of 45 seconds. In that 45 seconds I found out where she was, her room number and bed number. With all that info, and the fact that I had to know how she was, and was cut off, I vegan thinking of ways to get to Vancvouer with a critically damaged pickup.

The more I'd driven it, the more I thought to myself "She doesn't drive well when she starts up or slows down, but once she's on the freeway, she's okay." I decided to take a chance and Tuesday morning drove up to Canada. The drive was rough the first thirty minutes, but true to form, once she was cruiing on the freeway, she was fine.

Customs pulled me over again, probably for the Texas plates, but after about 45 minutes of poking at a monitor, they let me in. I'm hoping it's just the Texas plates getting me pegged. I need to buy a new truck or rent a car up next time.

Once I made it in, and got lost several times, I made it to the hospital and surprised the bajeezus out of her (in a good way! I didn't make her pop a stitch or anything). We spent about five hours together where I finally got an update as to how she's doing:

Ever since her emergency surgery, her infection has been draining, and she's been on a liquid diet, as well as IV antibiotic treatments every few hours to take care of any lingering infection issues. Starting about a day ago, she's back on solid foods, and off the morphine for pain (dropping down to "Tylenol 3" which is a tasty little concoction of Tylenol and a lot of codiene, and now down to "Tylenol 2" as of last night).

She's in very good spirits, and the pain is much more manageable. She's up and walking again, although it's more of a shuffle given everything that's happened in the last month. I went back to her place, picked up some essentials for her, and came back with dinner.

She's coming along incredibly well, and it's good to be in the know again as to what's going on. Plus, I've missed the hell out of her.

I'm going to take a quick (For me) shower, and head back to the hospital for the rest of the day, heading back home this evening. I hope US customs doesn't give me grief (and that the guy who waved me through that one time waves me through again). I may be updating from the hospital, but it'll be brief ($1 a MB for data in Canada on my Sidekick! O_O ), and exclusively on Twitter.

We're seeing a light at the end of the tunnel, folks. It's almost over.

Comments

good news!

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you for the update, was wondering what was going on when I read your twitter about our healthcare. I'm glad to hear Emily is on the mend, awesome news! *hugs*

[(Anonymous)]

oh jenn that was me paula with anonymous comment..oopsy

[nathan-r.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad to hear that she's on the mend, and that you were able to make it up to visit her. I've been worrying.

[red-pill.livejournal.com]

im glad shes ok

[hockeyfag.livejournal.com]

Have you thought about getting a nexus card for crossing the border? I have one and love it.. basically bypass customs going both directions. $50 for 5 years.

[jenndolari.livejournal.com]

I really considered it. The problem is, you have to register yourself AND the vehicle. The pickup, officially, isn't mine. It's my dad's. My dad, however, has my old name, which has been how I've been able to keep it all this time. If the government started digging around, found out it WASN'T really mine, that would have killed Nexus forever.

It's funny, moving up here, I actually had planned to be in Canada at least once or twice a month, get a Nexus card to do it. But then things fell apart, and I ended up going maybe once every few months. My trip up on Monday was the first I'd done in a YEAR.

Maybe if this AwesomeJob thing gets a little less precarious and more stable, I'll work towards it again.

[hockeyfag.livejournal.com]

they don't require you to register vehicles anymore. They dropped that recently. They decided they are more concerned with the people in the car than the car itself.

If trips become more frequent, its definitely worth it.. I've had it and before that, I had Canpass, which was good for canada entry only..

[jenndolari.livejournal.com]

Huh. I may just do that! My wish for more frequent trips might come true!

[kisai.livejournal.com]

The Texas plates are probably a red flag... (oh shi- Americans from that gun-happy state.)

If you rent a car, it would be cheaper than fixing your truck should it go kaput. At least I'd hope so.

It might be more convienent to use ZipCar if you need it occasionally, as the rate to rent it is somewhat close to renting any other car before mileage.

[jenndolari.livejournal.com]

The pickup has probably made her last trip to Vancouver. It may have one last trip up in her, but Emily and I want to save that for an emergency (we likened it to flying a shuttle into orbit knowing full well that she's missing a tile).

But yeah, the next trip up will either be a new pickup, or a rental car. Or the Blue Beastie is there's another emergency.

Zip cars are neat ideas. Wonder if they can be driven cross-border?

[hockeyfag.livejournal.com]

they can but you have to let them know.. they will email you a pdf to print out that the customs agent may ask for.. I have a zipcar account.

[kisai.livejournal.com]

From the US to Canada, yes, but requires a 3-day notice form, so it's not something you can do at the drop of a hat.
From Canada to US, yes, no form required.

There are Zipcars in Vancouver Downtown area, and many in Seattle, if you want to look into it.

Though I was kinda thinking back to the car vs truck comment earlier too, as larger vehicles are not really justified if you only need it for the heavy hauling once in a while. But Zipcar doesn't have any large trucks, just the Toyota Tacoma.

hmm looks likes there is a bug in the car location maps. You need to physically select the city the cars are in, not scroll the map to it, otherwise it doesn't show any (eg, scrolling from Vancouver to Seattle only shows one car, when there's a few dozen.)