Achmed’s Last Supper, Day Four

When I woke up on Saturday morning, at 5:00am, to fly Achmed’s skinny little ass to Winnipeg, one of my favourite bands was rocking on the radio. The shrill scream of Paul Stanley’s voice said, “I really love you baby, I love what you got…” then the thundering guitar and drums, rattling like a machine gun as the melodic harmonies of the rest of KISS chimed in with, “Love Gun, Love Gun, Love Gun…”. That song has nothing to do with any of this but it has been ringing in my mind since I got out of bed to go to the airport and I kind of found myself in a guitar store today trying, somewhat unsuccessfully, to play it.

Everyone has their method of relaxation, but relaxation is not something that I have ever been very good at. My life is a constant coming and going of work and play and until a few months ago, ‘relaxing’ was something I only did when I was too tired to do something real… so, ultimately relaxing to me was going to sleep, which I always thought was a waste of time. I used to think, if you never had to sleep, imagine all of the things that you could get done!

These days when I need to quiet my mind, I usually pull out a guitar and sit in my living room playing familiar tunes that I don’t have to put much effort into. Today I am in Winnipeg, with no living room and no guitar, so I did the next best thing. I went pretend guitar ‘shopping’. Well, if you have ever been in a music store you already know, when some dude takes a $3000 guitar off the wall to play it loud, he usually hammers out a few radical riffs and tries to impress everyone in the store, then if he doesn’t suitably impress the staff, one of them inevitably takes a guitar out and embarrasses the dude. Well, my guitar chops are certainly not up to par for trying to embarrass or show off, but they are good enough for me to have fun with. Whaling out some Eagles, Blue Rodeo and Johnny Cash didn’t even hit the threat bar of being a ‘musician’ in the guitar store, so when I noticed the looks I was getting, I turned it up with some KISS. But instead of picking a KISS tune that I actually knew, I tried to play the one that has been singing in my head for 4 days… I soon enough went back to Blue Rodeo and turned the amp down.

I didn’t really get the relaxing tunage I was hoping for, particularly now that I had drawn attention to myself, so I never did get to relax with my guitar. I did, however, stumble across a great deal on an Epiphone Dot Studio. It was glossy black instead of the worn cherry that I have been craving for a few years… but you know, it’s on sale, leftover from last year’s stock. If I am not passed out or heaving my guts up on Thursday, I may have to go back there and make an unexpected purchase. Life is way too short to wonder if you should do something, and if this week has not proven it to me, nothing ever will!

So, other than my playing expensive guitars to try to relax today, I also went fabric shopping with Mom. There is very little that I dislike more than shopping, but the truth is that Mom and me had a fun afternoon. We went to the Pancake house and I loaded up on carbs so I could store some energy for tomorrow, and eventually we ended up strolling though the homeless district of Winnipeg at about the same time that all of the vagrants were heading to the shelter. Mom looked at me and said, “I feel like I am at work.” For those of you who don’t know, Mom works at the mental hospital back home! I have been in worse places than that area, however, Mom has not and I found her nervousness a little bit amusing… I really hope that that doesn’t come back to bite me in the ass tomorrow while she is hanging out in a hospital (her second home) and I am literally pinned to a table and a complete bag of nerves. I am just guessing, but I don’t think she will find it any more amusing than I do.

Tomorrow my day will start at 4:30am, with a shower and a sip of water. At 5:15 I will get in the van to go to the hospital and at 6:00 they will stab me with an IV to keep me hydrated and drugged I guess. (If you are in Newfoundland, you can add 2-and-a-half hours to my times). From there on I have no idea how long things will take or what time any of it will actually start, but in order I will get:

1) four needles injected to my head to deaden the skin and nerves;
2) a halo-brace slide down over me;
3) four screws drilled into my skull to hold everything in place;
4) another MRI
5) then I lie down or sit for up to four hours waiting for the attack plan to be put together;
6) then I am laid out on a table and screwed in place so I can’t move;
7) then the surgical team gets the hell out of the room so they do not get hit with nuclear fallout;
8) then they blast me with a reactor, known affectionately as the Gamma Knife!

There is supposed to be valium or addivan in there somewhere… I hope it is before the needles… I hate needles!

Up until a few days ago I was looking at this trip as the end of my journey and I would be on to a new journey. I was wrong. It will be six months before they even know if this blast has worked or not, and a year before it is actually confirmed. In that amount of time things could get worse, or stay the same, or possibly get better. Because of the size and placement of Achmed, traditional surgery is not only going to cause severe side effects (of which I want no part of), but it is also dangerous. If the Gamma Knife fails (Dr. West has a 97% success rate), they will try to blast me again in a few years. We didn’t talk about anything past that.

I can’t even begin to tell you all how grateful I am for the positive energy, text messages, phone calls, e-mails, facebook posts and messages, my very own facebook group that Tina and Lisa set up for me and just general good wishes and concern I have received. I am very lucky for such a large circle of family and friends and I will eventually get back in touch with every one of you!

Tonight I am really hoping to get a good sleep and tomorrow, I really want everyone reading this to send good vibrations my way, I could use every one of them right now.

Thank-you!

From Achmed and Me… Live Life!