SnOMGeddon

Hospital operations have been pared down to essential staff. The nurses, doctors, techs, and others whose shifts were ending around 8:00 last night got to work extra-long shifts and then spend the night. The outpatient clinic is closed. My lunch, which normally I could expect to receive within 45 minutes of ordering, is coming up on 90 minutes.

At the storm's daytime snowfall peak, visibility was less than half a block.

There were times last night when the building was creaking, and the lights flickered from time to time. Fortunately, we never had to switch to backup power.

Not much to report on the medical front. I'm in the chemo recovery phase. Platelets need replenishing every couple of days. Hemoglobin is holding steady, so I haven't had a red blood transfusion in a while. (And I ran 3 miles yesterday, easily.) Neutrophils are close to zero. The neutrophils are the limiting factor with respect to leaving the hospital. Without them, I am close to defenseless against bacterial infection. Sometime in the next two or three weeks, the doctors expect them to rebound sufficiently. What happens after that is still unclear, in particular how quickly we move to the transplant phase. I hope to learn more this week, when the hospital and clinic are back up and running at full strength and can answer questions.

Update: As was true for many, the storm interfered with my workout plans. Stranded nurses used the lounge with the treadmill as a dormitory, so I had to walk the corridor instead. 35 lengths per mile. 3 miles. Running on a treadmill never looked so good.