Nom de Plume

So this afternoon, I’m heading down Rainier Ave into Renton. Traffic is awful, all backed up because of Seafair, and of course, there’s the idiot who decides that he needs to head down the center turn lane and bypass the traffic. The rest of us mere mortals just inch along.

Finally, I see the erring minivan pull over into a parking lot. I briefly indulge that fantasy that we all of have, you know, the one where we pull over and let the person have it, thus changing their ways forever. I float in a reverie of changing drivers around the world–traffic bypassers, humvees squeezed in compact parking spots … okay, let’s be honest, I really want to take out my Seafair anger on someone. And maybe he has his pregnant, about-to-deliver wife in the car. Or some other emergency.

And of course, I do nothing. But, as I am stuck in a long line of slow-moving cars, I get a good glimpse of the person. He’s standing in front of the open hood, which is unfurling great plumes of smoke. Oh, I think. It was an emergency.

And then I see he’s not wearing pants.

And then I see that his pants are around his ankles.

And then I see that he’s fumbling with his tightie whities.

And then …

And then …

And then, he pees on the engine.

What?

WHAT?

I can’t hear you!

No, I’m not deaf.

Well, not YET.

I can’t hear over the freaking PLANES.

I loathe, despise, and abominate Seafair. You wouldn’t believe the noise of the planes. It seriously hurts your ears, it’s that loud.

The sad thing is, Seafair hasn’t even started yet. This is what we have in store:

Friday
11:00 a.m. KeyBank Air Show presented by Boeing

1:00 p.m. American Family Insurance presents the Patriots Jet Demonstration Team

1:20 p.m. Fat Albert C-130 Demo

1:30 p.m. U.S. Navy Blue Angels Practice

2:40 p.m. KeyBank Air Show presented by Boeing

Saturday

12:35 p.m. KeyBank Air Show presented by Boeing

1:00 p.m. American Family Insurance presents the Patriots Jet Demonstration Team

1:20 p.m. Fat Albert C-130 Demo

1:30 p.m. U.S. Navy Blue Angels Demonstration

3:25 p.m. KeyBank Air Show presented by Boeing

Sunday

10:00 a.m. KeyBank Air Show presented by Boeing

11:20 a.m. KeyBank Air Show presented by Boeing

1:00 p.m. American Family Insurance presents the Patriots Jet Demonstration Team

1:20 p.m. Fat Albert C-130 Demo

1:30 p.m. U.S. Navy Blue Angels Demonstration

2:55 p.m. KeyBank Air Show presented by Boeing

AHHHH.

My bleeding ears aside, isn’t this a tad excessive? Oh, no, not at all. Let’s burn through all those fossil fuels. So much for Seattle trying to be a green city.

I despise Seafair. It’s fine if you can get away from it, but when you live in south Seattle, you can’t. The traffic. The crowds. And those infernal air shows. Which are loud, and distracting, and set all the dogs in the neighborhood off in a frenzy of barking.

I wanted a vegetable jungle; I got a vegetable jungle. I have corn, more lettuces than we can eat (they’re bolting), kale, regular cucumbers and round cucumbers, eggplant, pumpkin, zucchini, and the about 10 tomato plants, all marching down the walkway. You don’t really get an idea of how insane and overgrown this is from the pictures.

Looking down the path:

The other way:

Pumpkins!

Cucumbers:

Kale garden:

“Cost is no object,” Steve said grandly. “We’ll get whatever we like the best.”

Well, alrighty then. If you twist my arm.

So we’re getting slate:

link

Which is how the pigment starts coming back in vitiliginous spots. Freckles appear until they form islands of color, which then all hopefully connect. The good news is that after starting the sun exposure, my face is really freckling in. The first week or so of getting sun (10-20 minutes a day, three or four times a week), I would come inside and want to cry because the darkening regular skin really highlights the white bits. But I’ve stuck with it, and it’s really working–and working fast. I no longer feel weird about going outside without makeup on. I look blotchy, but then, I’ve always been blotchy.

The bad news is that I’m still in the active progression stage. It’s getting worse on my shins and underarms. I also have spots on my inner forearms that first started appearing a little over a month ago and are pretty much growing every day. And of course, it’s hard to tell what’s new and growing, and what is just more obvious because I’m getting tanner. It’s a bit of both–but the sad fact is that it is spreading. Strangely, it seems to get worse faster on the areas I’m applying Protopic. I don’t know whether it’s coincidental or not. On www.vitiligosupport.com–a great, great site–many people say that the think it gets worse with Protopic before it gets better. So, as of three days ago, I’m conducting an experiment. I have a tube of Dovonax–a topical vitamin D analogue that works in conjunction with sun exposure–that I’m using on my shins and underarms. We’ll see.

I’m also in the process of getting a home narrowband UVB thing, so I can continue with the phototherapy over the winter. Dealing with insurance is a nightmare, and I will spare you the horrors, particularly as it seems that my last many posts have been incredibly negative. Well, I’ve been feeling pretty negative, so there you have it. But I just keep reminding myself that my face IS repigmenting and that’s a really, really good thing.

By the way, I also ordered a book called Vitiligo, Current Knowledge and Nutritional Therapy, written by an Argentinian doctor who has seen incredible results using a combination of b12, folic acid, and vitamin c. I’ve upped my dose of folic acid to his recommended levels–5 mg a day (his minimum). His treatment takes a really long time, but it is used without sun exposure. That german clinic I mentioned before uses a similar approach.