Geek Squad to the Rescue!

while in LA, one day i had sound on my laptop...then i get salmonella...get out of the hospital...logon to my laptop...update my system...things are working...then the next day i have NO sound. i can't listen to my iTunes, videos, Windows Media Player, or play any games. it was weird. i tried to figure out the problem but everything seemed fine and they were no viruses. i just had no sound. so, i took my laptop to the Geek Squad (GS) at Best Buy (BB) here in Hawaii.

i was reluctant to go to GS since my last trip to them in DC/Virginia ended up costing me over $100 for them to tell me to send it to Sony as they couldn't fix it. muthas!!!

so i drag myself to BB thinking i was gonna just leave my laptop there and come back a couple weeks later when it was "repaired." hopefully. i labeled everything on it with my name: the laptop...the battery on the laptop...the 2 cords. i didn't want no switcheroos! i also marked it with my invisible pen/powder so i can use my ultraviolet light to verify they didn't switch my stuff and just put my labels on the crap they switch my stuff with....OK....i didn't do that last one with the powder but i was tempted. where’s the trust?

i get to BB and there are 2 GS dudes. one was a talkative haole (white person) kid who had a tattoo of a star on his left temple but tried to cover it with make-up but that made it worse. i couldn't stop staring at it. it was just badly done. i'm thinking the dude does not have a girlfriend to help him. the other was an Asian (Aiea) dude that showed no emotions except 2: impatience and disinterest. i'm like PRAYING to get the haole guy. the customer he was working with was an old computer geek who looked like Woz. he was wearing short-shorts and a tight orange ti-shirt over his big belly...and he kept leaning on the counter...sort of bending over. yeeeeech!!! you couldn’t help but watch as the shorts kept rising and rising.

i totally started off wrong with the GS dudes by not signing in. there weren’t any other geek customers and i didn’t see the dang sign-in sheet, so i just sat down on the chair in front of the counter, trying to look friendly and not confrontational. but i could feel myself losing the friendly look as the old-computer-daisy-duke-geek kept manipulating the time of the haole GS. freakin’ Asian GS gets rid of his customer but then starts playing the "don't make eye contact with the customer and we can pretend she's not waiting especially since she didn't sign in" game. the Asian GS was playing that avoidance game real good. he was a frickin’ pro. Olympic caliber. finally...as the daisy-duke geek started wrapping up his dissertation on battery usage for Sony products...the the Asian GS calls me over. DANGNABIT!!! freakin' A! my luck sucks!

i'm totally thinking i'm gonna get the blow off from the Asian GS. his whole attitude was telling me that i was an idiot for even having an electronic. kind of like the car service guys when i go in for a check-up...i know they think i shouldn’t even have a vehicle since i’m ALWAYS late for my oil change.

since i was being presented with this attitude from the GS, i changed my approach in explaning what’s wrong with my laptop. i had all my notes and dates and was SO ready to launch into a detailed account of what happened and what was wrong and how i tried to fix it...yada yada yada. when he asked in his curt tone what was my issue, i went with “no sound” then i shut up. he didn’t say anything and proceeded to work on my computer.

as he didn’t seem to want to send my computer to geeks in the back and try to swindle me, i just stood there while he worked on it...right there in front of me. i was nervous and excited. a GS was actually working on my laptop and i was a witness. :-) yeah!

as he worked silently doing his thing, i just stood there trying not to look like an idiot. i started to listen to the customer/lady next to me who was trying to get a refund but sounded like she was trying to cheat BB. her explanation was long, confusing and stupid. the haole GS kept trying to get her focus and explain the actually reason for the refund but off she would go about the day she was born, how the world has turn to crap, etc. the GS kept asking “how is this relevant to you not needing spyware protection on your son’s laptop? and wasn’t the spyware automatically installed once your purchased it?”

it soon became apparent that my GS dude was the manager as he finally cut in on the 5^th stupid explanation about aliens, not illegal aliens, visiting her and her son, and told the other GS to give her the refund. i think he actually grunted and then said “give her the refund.” the other GS didn’t even question or try to argue that the woman was obviously trying to cheat the system...he just did it.

now...i was impressed with my GS and his powers but still wondering if he was just playing solitaire on my laptop while making me stand there and wait. in defense of the waiting and the loss of the entertaining but mentally challenged customer (who got her friggin' refund), i bust out my Sony portable reader system (PRS-505) to read one of the books i downloaded. my mom got me this device for my last birthday and it is awesome. especially if you are a reader. it is so easy to carry around and it holds over 160 books...more if you download to a memory card.

i start reading and then all of the sudden my GS guy comes alive and animated. he starts asking me a gazillion questions about the Sony PRS. it was like someone plugged him in or something. i couldn’t answer him fast enough. then the other GS dude gets involved with the conversation. after 20 minutes of them discussing the PRS, the haole GS dude asks my guys “do you read alot?” and he answers, “no.” i couldn’t believe it. no? NO? what the hell is he so excited about then if you don’t frickin’ read?!!!

the next thing i knew, my former non-talkative-samurai-Geek-Squad-assister-now-turned-best-friend is telling me that he fixed my laptop and starts playing Brother Iz from my Windows Media Player. i was so happy. i’m not even gonna tell you what he did to fix it as it was such an easy solution...ok....i’ll tell so you have the solution if you ever have the problem. he didn’t say what actually happened for me to lose sound but he uninstalled and then reinstalled my sound device. friggin’ duh, yeah?! i almost reached over to kiss his Buddha face but held myself back. when i asked how much for the work...he said no charge. i couldn’t believe my luck! i guess i can go back to my bank and return the loan i took out. :-D

shake shake shake! shake shake shake! shake your booty!

i can now say i have survived an earthquake. who would’ve predicted that Chino Hills would be the epi-center of a 5.6 earthquake? what the heck is going on? and why do i always seem to be SO lucky to have experienced such a thing?! wtf?!!

let me break the quake moments i experienced down for you:

the quake started out slowly. i was on my way to the post office (p.o.) in my friends Toyota Tundra (big a** truck). as i was drove by a construction site near the p.o., i felt the truck shake and heard a rumble. at first, i thought something was up with the truck engine but the truck didn’t stall. then, i thought it was the constructions dudes that might’ve hit the truck or something. when i looked around the truck during a red light, i didn’t see any damage to the it.

so onward i go.

i get there, park in my handi-cap spot, and mail my package. i head back to the truck and slide into the driver’s seat. as i turn the key to start the truck, it starts rockin’ like the craziest ride at Disneyland (“wildest ride in wilderness!!!” – Big Thunder Mountain http://gocalifornia.about.com/od/toppicturegallery/ig/Disneyland-Rides-Frontierland/Big-Thunder-Mountain-Railroad.htm). my head was whipping back and forth and i was trying to hang on to anything in that cab.

now, i’m not sure why...but my immediate thought while all the rumbling and shaking was going on was that the engine was gonna blow! really. the engine was on it’s way to exploding with me in the truck. either from a bomb that was placed under the truck (by those bastard Chino Hills groundhogs in retaliation for my murdering their brethren in my friends yard last summer) or because i somehow put the wrong gasoline in when i filled up the day before. i just knew that i had to get out of that truck immediately.

so, i bolt out of the cab and head for the palm tree (thank goodness a car wasn’t parked next to me or i would’ve had to somehow jump and roll over the hood to get to the tree!). not noticing until later that i’m barefoot, i’m trying to hide my body behind the tree (‘cause that’s what they always do on CSI when a car blows and they survive); but the friggin’ tree is shaking like it was in a category 4 hurricane (i know hurricanes...let me tell ya). now i’m looking up at the tree thinking what the hell is wrong with it as it’s a clear blue sky day with no wind.

that’s when i noticed the grandma-lady.

she’s standing a little ways from the truck with her armed crooked to hold her handbag. she is a stylish california grandma with that look of superiority (you KNOW she lives in a gated community somewhere in Chino Hills). anyway, i glance over at her and she is staring at me. i'm not sure if she’s upset ‘cause she heard me swearing on my way out of the truck and at the friggin’ tree, or if she's worried about some hispanic-looking chick (i'm portuguese not mexican, lady!) acting crazy; but she tells me, “honey, it’s only an earthquake” in that tone that convey's what an idiot she thinks i am.

it took me a moment or 2 to process what she said as i was worried about her getting blown up since she was in blast range. then it dawned on me what she said...and that i might've over-reacted. just a bit.

since i was out of breath (my lungs aren’t quite up to speed yet from all the operations), i just kind of waved at her and threw a grin at her although it was shaky. i shuffled my way back to the truck and watched as the grandma-lady shake her head and make her way into the p.o., which i thought was more stupid than me running around and ducking behind trees. hello! big earthquake...building might be unstable....???!!!! friggin’ californians think they know it all and are invincible. like...what-ev-er.

la la town aka hell

i finally arrive in LA a week and half ago when a few days later BAM!!! i’m so sick (fever, nausea, pain-to-the-point-of-cutting-my-stomach-open cramping, vomiting, diarrhea, headache from hell, body aches) that i can't even keep water down let alone take my life-saving medications. having to take 40+ pills is daunting as it is but try doing it while nauseous and you are seriously praying to every god there is while bent over the porcelain-"thrown" (as i was "throwing" EVERYTHING up including my reproductive system). i even promised to stop swearing if the pain went away....unluckily (or luckily) the pain continued so i can still friggin’ swear all the hell i want…especially while i’m in pain. :-)

i finally gave in after a day of hell and went to the ER of my hospital (cedars sinai). you know that you’ve been to a hospital too often when as i roll into the ER unit and the docs and nurses call me out like Norm on Cheers. JayLOoooo!! for once the JLO worked to my advantage as it got me an ER bed almost immediately. my moaning, rocking and the gray cast to my face might've helped as well.

after stabbing me repeatedly trying to find a vein to get the IV started, the ER folks finally got the nausea and cramping under control. next, they send me to ICU as my immune system had been severely compromised by not being able to take my meds for over a day…and there were WAY too many sick people around me.

ok….next i have 1001 docs checking me out (not THAT way) asking me the same frickin’ questions over and over (have you visited any foreign countries? did you eat any tomatoes or raw fish? na-duh! hello! isn’t in my chart that i’m anal and follow the rules as the nuns of sacred hearts academy taught me! i know i can no longer eat raw fish or meat and have to wash all fruits and veggies. it’s ingrained in my brain now, med-folks.). they all wanted to test me (kidney doc, spleen doc, cardiac doc, intestinal doc, center for disease and control doc, hair doc, doc for my big toe, etc) but were vague on the details of the actual tests. they would say “we wanna do a CT scan and take some samples” and my interpretation to this was a basic CT scan where i lie down and get scanned with a big machine which would take 15 minutes max; and then take some blood samples. BUT NOOOOOOOO!!! i assumed incorrectly. bad jen….bad bad jen.

by now i’m severely dehydrated from the past day and half of losing liquid from all open orifices of my body. i was not allowed to drink anything at the hospital 'cause they weren't sure what was causing my issues. BUT i was given an orange solution with ice to drink that was "contrast" so when they did the CT scan my innards would light up. i was grateful for finally getting something to drink even though it tasted like crap, as the IV fluids were doing nothing for my dry mouth and throat.

i get wheeled into the CT scan room and proceed to switch myself from my rolling bed to the scanning bed. i’ve done this so many times that i practically levitate myself from bed to bed with no effort at all and no loss of gown either. once i got situated the voice from above (intercom dude who gives you directions on breathing and such during the scan) tells me to please turn on to my left side. wow….that's different from my usual chest scans but thought maybe they wanna see my intestines from all sides.

all i can say is that i was thankful for the morphine they had given me to prior to the scan ‘cause the next thing that i knew some asian dude nurse with no sense of humor tells me not to push out. i’m like “push what out?” and then the next thing i know i’m getting something shoved into my rectum…yep…my rectum. so, of course not being prepared for this i start pushing out and the dude-nurse is yelling at me in a heavy vietnamese accent not to push out. i tell him “sorry but it sort of hurts and i wasn’t prepared.” he tells me “good.”

good? good??!! what the hell does that mean? then he tells me i’ll start feeling some discomfort as the enema starts up. WHAT?!! WHAT FRIGGIN’ ENEMA??!!!!!!! before i could even ask what the hell he was talking about…the enema starts and the “some discomfort” was majorly understated. i couldn’t even breathe. i started panting like i was in labor…and then the cramping started. it was so bad that the morphine was wiped out of my system immediately. i mention to whoever could hear me that i’m cramping painfully…and again i get the “good” as well as “it won’t be long. about 5-10 minutes” (use heavy vietnamese accent at those quotes). bullsh*t! not long is 1-2 minutes. then they tell me i can lie on my back. AND PUSH THE BIG-ASS DEVICE FURTHER IN ME?! nuh-uh!!! i tell them i don’t think that’s gonna happen but asian nurse-dude is persistent and pushes me on my back. ooooooh, I would’ve smacked his vietnamese a** back to vietnam if i wasn’t stuck with the telephone pole up my butt.

and then the scan begins…and ends eons later. i was actually grateful to the nurse dude by then for removing the item from my behind. as they wheeled me out i suggested they should warn a person before violating them….or at least give them a higher dosage of pain meds.

the wait for the results now begins. the docs had no idea what was wrong with me but there was talk of removing my appendix, which thankfully i had a scar to prove that it was removed since they had no record of it at this hospital (got it done in Hawaii) and they wanted to proceed with that operation anyway...until I whipped out that scar. whatev.

then there was talk of removing my spleen or maybe the top half of my colon. wtf!!! i was trying not to freak out as they still hadn't finished all the tests yet. how the hell can they even think about operating when they have no idea where to go. i blame the bad economic situation that has made these docs desperate for income. compared to 2^nd and 3^rd world countries…americans are pretty healthy. so any operation they can get away with...i guess they'll try to do. i say this only because there really was no reason for the removal of my appendix when it was removed; and because i've received bills from doctors i have never seen but apparenly have read my chart and wrote it in. thank goodness my regular docs and specialists (raissi, czar, shirvani and schwartz) aren't money-grabbing medical whores (MGMW) and at least come to visit me or answer my call for help IMMEDIATELY. i at least wanna see the docs to know whose kids i'm putting through college.

now after the MGMW visit, in comes a bunch of nurses who are now gonna take some samples that the MGMW ordered. i get my arms ready (it helps to flex your muscles just before they attempt to draw blood. makes your veins stand out and makes it easier for the nurses to not jab you a gazillion times.). they take my blood and the next thing i know they are asking me to turn on my side. HUH? WHAH? hamadahamda. flash back to paragraph 5. what the hell is going on? i’ve learned my lesson and asked them why they want me to turn. they cheerful said they need an anal swab. freakin’ great. whimpering quietly to myself, i turn to my side...and i can’t even describe that bit of fun. so onward.

two days go by with negative results from most of the tests when finally i got a positive hit: salmonella poisoning. See this site for further info: http://www.cdc.gov/nczved/dfbmd/disease_listing%20/salmonellosis_gi.html

at least we had an answer and now they can focus on giving me one antibiotic instead of the 50+ they were dosing me with by the hour. they don’t have clue on how i got this infection but it warrant severe treatment since my immune system is so compromised. if the infection had gotten into my blood stream it would have caused my new heart to start rejecting and i would need another transplant. the docs and i went round and round on what i ate since i arrived in LA and what i had in Hawaii prior to my flight here. the only thing they can see as a possibility is possible fruits or veggies that weren’t washed well in a restaurant or when i made lasagna 2 nights prior although my housemates were fine.

they move me down to the cardiac unit so that MY docs (raissi, czar, shirvani and schwartz) can have more control over my care rather than the ICU MGMW. apparently, hospitals work just like the government. my docs would have to get permission with the supervisors of the ICU before they can do anything to help me which caused a lot of delays. the nurses really understood my frustration as well as my docs since the residents were all brand new in ICU and were writing up tests for me that i was not allowed to have because of my dissection. AND they wanted to put more IV lines in me that would hinder any further cardiac exam in the next month. not good.

oooohhhhh…those dumba** residents (DAR) were asking for a smack down. they would come into my room and would say “tell me your story.” i would look at them and say where do you want me to start. their response would be from the beginning. i was so tempted to pull a "Goonies" and the "Jerk", and respond with “i was born in 1970 to a poor portagee family in Hawaii…” but I knew i couldn’t keep a straight face while saying it since i was so loopy. so for the next hour i stump their a**es with 2003 dissection all the way to current. i could tell they had wanted only info from the past few days but hey, they left it wide open and i figured it would help them to know my background so they don’t screw up and order tests and such that would kill me………well, i was soooo wrong on thinking they would take the info i gave them and use it wisely. i became very leary of these residents but tried to be helpful and pleasant since i still wanted to get pain meds and they authorized them. i was SO lucky to have my friend sam and my cousin tasha to act as my advocates when I got so bleary from the dumba** questions. the residents could’ve answer their own questions themselves if they just read my friggin' chart like the nurses did. the nurses also helped to run interference since they did read my chart and knew to double check all orders from the DAR with MY docs after the debacle of the DAR trying to order tests that would kill me. NURSES ROCK!!!!!

i finally get on the cardiac unit floor which reunited me with nurses that took care of me during my recover post-transplant. talk about PAR-TAY!!! not really but it was good to see them and be able to thank them for all their hard work last year. one of the nurses fell in love with my PEBL cell phone last year, she had her hubby get a pink one for her. she had fun showing it to me.

it was even good to see the filipina nurse i had last year that i could never understand. she has a really really heavy accent and i grew up in Kalihi where tagalog and ilicano was the first language. thankfully, she understood me when i said i was in pain...and that's all that mattered.

i am now back in chino hills at my friend's home recuperating. talk about wipe-out. this is NOT a diet plan i would recommend. i would rather have my chest reopened than have salmonella again. so...wash your fruits and veggies and cook your food thoroughly!