In case you were resting easy

Scanning the headlines this morning looking for cutting edge info for you, Dear Reader.  I am always on the alert for items to uplift you, to keep you safe and brighten your day.

And we are in luck:  From the TodayShow.com:  5 potentially deadly body pains you should never ignore. 

I figure the Today Show staff put this article together a while ago to use as filler on a slow news day – you know, a day where nothing truly awful happens in the world, but they must fulfill their mission of keeping us unnerved.

Or, maybe in their efforts to court the paranoid hypochondriac viewer, the Today Show has doomsday medical personnel on hand to develop a cache of items to stress about, just in case our days are filled with rational assessments and calibrated responses. 

For example, #1 on the list of You’d-better-worry-over-that-twinge-you-just-felt-because-everyday-things-are-just-waiting-to-kill-you! – Leg or calf pain could be: Deep vein thrombosis!

Deep vein thrombosis – A blood clot in a leg vein.  Yikes!  

“If you have a pain in your leg that feels different from a cramp, get to the emergency room!" admonishes emergency room physician Leigh Vinocur, with an urgent tone.

“We don’t want a clot to travel to your lungs and cause pulmonary embolism." 

No we don’t!  And thank you so much for putting me in a state of constant anxiety since I am now at a stage in life where everything hurts sometimes and leg cramps are the least of it!

Now we do not want to make light of a serious condition, but really?  That’s the progression of thought?  From, “Hey, this feels different from a leg cramp,” to “911!  Help!  Help!  My leg hurts!  I’m dying!  I’m dying!  Come get me!”

I’m just sayin’ there must be an interim step or two.

Because if you do go to the ER, it will require a sophisticated analysis of your leg pain.  You want to be sure that the pain you describe to the emergency room doctor is not confused with a garden variety charley horse.  So get your details in order before you pick up the phone:

“No!  This is not just any cramp.  I wouldn’t ask for a gurney for a common cramp!  This is totally different.  I would call this more of a contraction.  On the whole twinge–convulsion spectrum, this would probably rate somewhere in the realm of a spasm.  Not your typical spasm, though, or I would have just rubbed it like I usually do and begged off my Pilates class, like a normal person.”    

Deep vein thrombosis is sometimes called “economy class syndrome” because it affects car or plane travelers who sit long hours in cramped spaces, or people at work, or those who watch movies curled up on the couch or maybe a baseball game from the cheap seats. 

Great.  We’re in the ER, now what?

"They will do ultrasounds.  If it’s positive, they’ll give you blood thinners because we don’t want the clot to travel to your lungs and cause pulmonary embolism!" says the doc gleefully. 

OMG!!  Thank you so much for your dark warning!  What else should I be worried about?

#2. Upper back pain?  No!  I get that every day when I hunch over the computer to read this stuff!  Could be: Aortic dissection?!  You mean I could have a tiny tear in my aorta that allows the blood to create a false passage!  A false passage!  I hate that!  Not to mention the fact that all this screen time could lead to stroke, paralysis and kidney failure.  Holey Moley!

#3.  Dental pain?  Could be the popcorn hull that I couldn’t dislodge last night during our binge-watch of “House of Cards,” or: Ludwig's angina; a tooth abscess that has traveled down your neck causing swelling, your voice to sound funny and drooling.  Oh.  That. 

“It can actually track down to your airway and cause airway obstruction” Vinocur said, adding: "Don’t let a tooth ache get that bad.”  Thanks Mom.

Let’s see…#4.  Headache?  I’m afraid to ask…?  Sleeping funny?  “Downton Abbey” is unavailable to stream?!  No!  It could be: A bleeding stroke!  Aaauugh!

#5.  Abdominal pain?  Brace yourself…Could be: Ruptured ectopic pregnancy!? 

OK.  Well.  Some things don’t scare me.

Ann Curry and the Body Snatchers

I was thinking about Ann Curry the other day when I Googled “ageism.”  Came up with this link:  “Use ageism in a sentence!” offered at www.yourdictionary.com.  It turned up a list of headlines reflecting news articles about people over 55 (FIFTY-FIVE!) who fall victims to cold hearted, bloodthirsty predatory ratings seekers.   

Oh.  Did that sound angry?  Too bad. 

Where is Ann Curry anyway?  One day it’s Ann.  Gracious, insightful, lovely Ann.  

Punching Matt.  Hugging Al.  Touching the knee of the Dalai Lama. 

Next day…Where is Ann?  What have they done with our Ann?   

I watched the Investigation Discovery channel expecting to hear her fate intoned by Bill Kurtis, that latter day Jack Friday on “Disappeared,” or even “Ghost Hunters.”  But no Ann. 

Then I remembered:  Ann’s on “special assignment!”  Right. 

“Special assignment.”  That’s network newspeak for their own particular corporate purgatory.  Ann’s no longer on the couch with Matt and Al.  Instead, after 16 years with NBC and barely one year as co-anchor of the Today Show, she’s circling the seventh rung of hell hoping to catch her breath after a sucker punch from NBC exec Jim Bell.  Rumor has it that Matt Lauer voted her off the fickle island of youthful ratings. 

 What’s wrong with Ann?  I love her in spite of her goofy wardrobe.  When I’m an old woman, I too shall wear big orange and fuchsia felt flowers appliqued on my tent dress.  That, and purple.  With a red hat.   

But I’m outside the 25 to 54 demographic so who really cares?  Certainly not the Today Show advertisers! 

Ann’s smart and beautiful.  And she’s a Duck.  A Fighting Duck!  You know, the University of Oregon.  The powerhouse Ducks!  (My husband’s also a Duck…that one’s for you, Honey.)  You’ve gotta love a Duck!  

Ann asserted her idiosyncratic self and resisted network pressure to conform to prescribed appearances.  Well, except for those torturous stilettos.   

In addition to her quirky clothing, she says she’s proud of her wrinkles.  They give her dignity and speak to the status she’s earned in her family.  Ok, the 14-year-old ratings analysts must have said.  She has the cheekbones to carry it off.   

But then, in a fateful act of martyrdom, she wouldn’t dye her hair either.  God love her, she may have gone too far beyond the shallow veneer of media mandates; the trapdoor opened. 

I know.  There’s nothing wrong with Savannah Guthrie.  

She’s cute and smart and socially adept.  She’s fine.  She’s more than fine, but I can’t trust her.  After all, she slipped onto Ann Curry’s warm spot on the Today Show sofa as smooth as a lounge lizard on Saturday night.  

And that’s just it.  The transition barely caused a ripple.  Oh sure.  There was a flutter of outrage right before the exit door bumped Ann’s butt.  Since then it’s just like nothing ever happened.  We’re chatting and laughing and punching each other’s shoulders all over again.  It’s eerily the same as it ever was.  Cue the Talking Heads.  Oh, the irony! 

Somehow, some way, I think the Stepford co-anchors are at work.  Face it; Savannah’s just a newer model year.  She’ll grow up to be Ann Curry herself one day, if she’s lucky.  And Matt will still be there to nudge her off the furniture. 

It’s “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” meets “Simone.”  (That’s the 2002 Al Pacino movie wherein he plays a producer whose film is endangered when his star walks off the set.  So he creates a digital actress to substitute for the star.  But then SHE becomes an overnight sensation that everyone thinks is a real person!)   

OMG.  I drifted. 

You can see it’s an emotional issue for me - Ann and ageism and Savannah and ducks.  Where’s a person in the 55-to-64-year-old dematerializing demographic to turn?  MacNeil Lehrer?! 

Sure, some readers get my rapidly-becoming-obscure references to rock and roll music and “senior” stars seeking roles for the mature.  But what about the new kids on the block?  (Sorry.) 

No really.  I’ve got broad appeal.  I’m still relevant.  I have something to say!  I will not go quietly into that superficial swamp of commercial polling! 

Where are you Ann?  Hold my hand!  I’m on your side.