The Johnson Blog

Ramblings of a geek with a few hobbies…

  • Here we are again..

    This morning, Ana had a scheduled blood test (due to our last hospital stay) that came back quite unfavorably with her platelet counts at 7,000.  So they had her come into the hospital to get another platelet transfusion as well as a dosage of IVIG.

    This is the outpatient floor of the hostpital so they are insisting that we’ll be out of here tonight.  It’ll be a while though – she’s currently getting her platelets infused at a rate that will take 2 hours; following that will be the IVIG that will take another 3 hours.

    We haven’t really spoken to any doctors, which is pretty annoying.  This has all been handed down by one, obviously, through the various nurses.

    She’s not in the comfortable Carol Jo Vecchie center, so the rooms aren’t nearly as comfortable and she’s got a roommate.  Keep checking back for updates, I have a nice broadband connection here in the room thanks to Jay.

  • Depth of Field

    F1.4 – a pretty good example of a very shallow depth of field.  It’s probably around 1″ or so, try doing that with a Point-n-Shoot camera!

    SpoonRiverDrive-19.jpg

  • Canon 30D

    I’m bored, so I decided to post a small, 100% crop from my 30D.  This guy passed us in a semi going the opposite direction on a rural highway, both of us going probably 65 or so.  This is a testament to the awesome focusing capabilities of the 30D in AI mode.
    CanonCrop.jpg

    Yeah, I love my camera.

  • :)

    Geek

  • Scanner

    A couple months ago I purchased a new color scanner (thanks, Vista) – a Canon LiDE70.  I noticed a few weeks ago that I was having problems scanning color images, and it popped up again this weekend.  I would get these very odd colored, horizontal lines through the image, most visible on black and dark colors.

    Since I actually needed color this time, I had to figure out what was going wrong.  I did a half dozen scans, each time playing with a few settings to see if it would resolve itself.  I looked for new drivers – none.  As a last ditch effort, I changed which USB hub it was plugged into and it worked!

    Never would have guessed that would have been a problem.  I hate USB hubs.

  • Home!

    We actually got home last night, around 7pm.  Friday morning, Ana was told her platelet count was up to 14,000 (still abysmal) and that she’d be staying another day.   After some begging the doctor said she could get another test in the afternoon and if that looked good, that decision would be reconsidered.

    They came around and tested in the afternoon and she was up to 33,000 and we were given the ok to go home!  It still took several hours to actually leave the hospital but that was expected.

    Thanks again to everyone for their thoughts and prayers this week.  It was nerve racking for a while there and it really helped.

  • Another day… at least.

    This morning Ana was tested and her counts were at 13,000.  A decrease from the previous day.  Come to find out, the nurses messed up and only gave her 1/3 of the dose of steroids she should have had; even after questioning them about it.

    So today she received the correct dosage but has to stay in the hospital for at least another day 😦

  • Hospital Visit Update

    Just an update, we talked with the hematologist this morning and found that Ana’s platelet count has gone from 11,000 to 19,000; a major relief since the miniscule jump from 10,000 to 11,000 the night before.  He seemed very happy with that improvement, even though it’s still technically considered low.

  • Hospital Visit

    Ana had to be admitted to the hospital this evening because a blood test earlier in the morning indicated she had dangerously low platelet levels in her blood, meaning she’d be unable to clot effectively.  They’ve checked out the baby and everything is safe and sound there, but we’re waiting for them to start a blood transfusion to get some more platelets into her body.  Hopefully it’ll be done by midnight so she can get some rest.  The doctors are saying she’ll be here at least 2 days.  I’ll post frequently to keep everyone updated.

     

    Thanks to everyone for your prayers, we appreciate it.

     

     

     

  • Flash Drive… what would you do?

    Due to events I don’t care to explain, I am now the owner of an 8GB flash drive.  I’m trying to find a use for it.  I really haven’t been able to find a good use for these things in the past due to how I’m usually connected to home most of the time I’m not at home.

    So I’m looking for some good, cool uses for it.  Ideas?