Usually.
::Sidebar::
To explain — no, to barely skim the surface — death, permanent or not, is a consequence of the fundamentals of the universe best described in the philosophy and physics of so-called "Poetic Naturalism."[Footnote]
This vastly inclusive view regards everything "above" quantum field descriptions of the universe as "emergent" descriptions of reality. It is, for example, more convenient to refer to and apprehend a particular collection of field values as a "chair" rather than as an exhaustive description of the precise present states of each of the fields at this exact instance of the evolution of the universal Schroedinger wave state. Both descriptions are 100% valid but one is obviously more useful on our scale.
Applying this concept of emergence to the experience of "consciousness/self" and the attendant notions of "alive/dead" is a tricky bit of business I've already discussed on another blog I own. The short version is that when the cross-chatter communications and connections in your brain fall below the level at which "consciousness/self" emerges, you no longer exist, which is a pretty good definition of "dead" however you cut it up. Incidentally, that discussion also came up because of yet another run-in with Propofol. Some of you have already read it, but I've included it for your edification if you're interested. Scroll down to the next entry or click here to read it.
Anyhow, back to the Doc killing me: There was only one route to fixing me that didn't involve slicing and dicing things. After a description of what he planned to do to get to it instead, being dead on an O.R. table for an hour or so suddenly seemed like a damned fine idea.
It seems the best way to manage this sort of thing is to whack at it with a laser, which is evidently a lot more effective than hitting it with sonic waves, not to mention which someone shooting shit with a laser deep in my game-space appealed to the nerd in me.
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| Laser-Based Surgery -- Coolest O.R. Tools Ever |
In either case, it involves driving a weapon long distances through narrow interior pathways to arrive at the battlefront, and then extensive work to hammer the enemy into submission, then cleanup, installing and leaving equipment in place to monitor recovery, and all sort of other monkey motion that are the unfortunate pre-Star Trek methods of dealing with medical stuff.
Dr. McCoy would be horrified.
In any event, none of this excitement seems to be the sort of thing I really wanted to be around for, and since Death and I have a lifelong, varied, and intimate association which has pretty much eliminated the mystery and fear of it, dead it is, and without hesitation, too.
So, accompanied by The Beneficiary, I checked in to the surgery center at zero-dark-thirty since I have one of those "knock the surgery schedule out before breakfast" docs. It turned out during the paperwork phase that I'd failed to file DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) orders with this particular medical facility, although I have them scattered around practically everywhere else. The Beneficiary said to not worry about it — she knows how I feel, and would drop the hammer on me in a heartbeat if it came up. Yet again, I find how perfect we are together.
"If you can't trust the one you're with to grease the rails and get out of the way when it's time to shuffle off this mortal coil, you're with the wrong person."©
Catchy. I'm thinking tshirt or a cutsie-pie Grandma's kitchen homily plaque here.
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| Like This, Except "Grease The Rails" |
So, once we had that sorted out, they got me nekkid and surgery-clothed, stuck an intake port into the big vein on my right hand, and began rolling me down the hall to the O.R. Fifteen seconds — that's how long it took last time before the Propofol flattened the brain-waves. I decided to see if I could make twenty this time.
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| The Good Shit |
Through the doors into the O.R., and my anesthesiologist was standing there. I glanced over at the operating table and considered for a second just how they were going to get my fat ass up on that thing and then instantly, with zero break, I was back at the nurses' station with The Beneficiary explaining to the nurse how fast I shake off anesthesia. These guys are really good.
"Yeah," I said, "like for example right now what I want is a drink of water," which made the nurse jump.
"Jesus," she said, "he really DOES snap out, doesn't he? Most aren't making any sense for another 10 or 20 minutes."
It all worked. Or seems to have. The Beneficiary spoke to the Doc, and he says everything is wonderful. He hasn't spoken to me yet, mostly, I suspect, because for that first day he wanted to stay out of reach, since the stuff he did to my corpse apparently involved a previously unannounced wire bore brush and a couple of gallons of battery acid, although everyone denies it. This resulted in all kinds of weirdness, the least of which involved me gritting my teeth and weeping like a little girl and expressing horrifyingly creative and florid death threats involving the Doc every time — ah — nature called for an entire day and part of the next.
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| What Apparently Actually Happened |
Today, I'm nearly 100% back, the main side effect being minor aches of zero importance, and a frankly astonishing (and rather embarrassingly entertaining) side effect of some of the meds which results in a dark, but nearly fluorescent, cartoon-orange color stream every time I take a piss. Hell, he didn't tell me it would do that, or I'd have done it sooner.
In Our Next Episode: New money-making idea -- Chroma-Whiz! Now take your art with you everywhere you go! (And they thought they had problems with graffitti before....)
[Footnote] A full discussion of Poetic Naturalism is more than I want to do here, at least today. If you're curious, here's a good place to start: https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/poetic-naturalism/↩
Heh. Very entertaining! Glad you're on this side for a while longer.
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