Hi Folks:
A few of you know all of this story, some of you know pieces of it, and many of you have no idea what I'm talking about. I'll start a couple of months ago.....
After some significant life events with friends and family, Laura and I decided that we should take some extended time off.
I spoke with my boss in mid-April and asked for a 6-month leave-of-absence, my last day of work being June 9th. He agreed, and when this was added to the vacation I had accrued, it would be a total of about 8 months off. Because this was an extended period of time, Agilent hired another manager to do my job, and when I come back I'll have to apply for a new position somewhere. Laura resigned from her job at Valley West Transport effective June 9th as well.
We also decided to sell the house. It was big and lonely for Laura, especially considering the amount of business travel I was doing. Real estate prices in Vancouver are crazy, and we figured we could rent for a while until we determined exactly where and what we'd like to live in (another townhouse, apartment, cardboard box under a bridge, etc). We've had a lady interested in our place for about 6 years, and she's been very diligent in making sure that if we ever sold she'd get first crack. We negotiated a private deal, and the house closes on June 13.
Both David and Kathryn will be going to school in Vancouver this fall (Kath is in 4th year at UBC and Dave is in 2nd year at Emily Carr - transferred from UVic). They've rented a basement suite together in a heritage home in Vancouver-Kerrisdale (41st and Granville). Kath is working downtown this summer at Harbour Center, and Dave is employed with every other Arts student in N.America - at Starbucks.
Laura and I had also bought a new trailer (25' Airstream) last fall, and planned to live in this for the 8-month vacation. Our plan was to attend an Airstream Rally in Salem Oregon from June 15 thru July 5 (with 1500 other Airstreamers), and then spend the rest of the summer bouncing back and forth between BC and Alberta. In the fall we were going to head south ... Oregon Coast, California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico. I had been invited to an Agilent Management Meeting in Phoenix on November 8th, so that was really the only fixed date we had (with the exception of the Victoria Marathon in October - Dave plans on running in it!!).
So ... the plan was fully in motion, and we were both wrapping up our jobs. Good so far?
I was on a hike with a close friend, John Diack, in mid-May when I felt "strange" in my chest and arms going up a steep hill. Same thing a couple of days later when I did the identical hike with Kathryn and some of her friends. I was playing ball hockey on Sunday May 28, and complained that I had no wind/stamina. The guys at hockey said they noticed too, but since they're always ragging me about never playing defense I didn't think it was that noticeable.
On Tuesday May 30th I was at the dentist in the late afternoon. When I was done with the appointment, I decided to take a drive over to Eagle Ridge Hospital to see how busy emergency was - thinking that if it wasn't all stacked up, I'd get myself checked out with an ECG and a blood test. I really wanted to have them tell me "go home, you've got the flu". Turns out when you talk to the Emergency Triage Nurse, and you're a guy who mentions anything about "chest discomfort", they take it seriously.
My ECG was normal, but I had slightly elevated heart enzyme levels that had the ER folks a bit puzzled. I spent overnight in ER, and the moved me up to the cardiac ward on Wednesday morning (May 31). While I was there getting settled, I had a shot of morphine followed by a drop in blood pressure/pulse/etc. The cardiologist was called and she put me on the list for an angiogram ASAP. I had the angiogram on Friday morning, June 2. Everybody suspected that I had a small blockage somewhere that I only noticed under intense exercise. I've been pretty focused on a diet/exercise regime for the last ten years (I'm vegetarian) as my dad and grandfather both had heart attacks in their 60's and I wanted to avoid that fate. Turns out that I have a couple of blockages, one of which would be impossible for angioplasty ... it's in a particularly nasty location at the intersection of two major arteries. So much for all my lifestyle efforts....
Dr. Bonet (my cardiologist - I never thought I'd have one) talked with Dr. Karim (the heart surgeon at Royal Columbian Hospital in New Westminster - suburb of Vancouver) and they were trying to fit me in sometime this week for heart bypass surgery (another term I never thought I'd say/have). Unfortunately, Karim got backed up with emergency cases (mine is short-term-stable), and he couldn't get to me this week. The option I had was to stay in hospital and wait for an opening with one of the other two cardiac surgeons (there are three working out of RCH) or to wait for a few weeks and get a scheduled surgery date. When Laura and I talked with Dr. Bonet , his preference was for me to wait ... I understood that he really liked Karim. If the heart surgery business is anything like the technology business, much is based on relationships. I trust Bonet, so I'll trust his relationship with Karim. I'm scheduled for bypass surgery on July 6th .... which also happens to be Kathryn's 21st birthday. July 6th was very lucky for Laura and me in 1985, so I know it will be lucky for me in 2006!
Funny thing as I was discharged from the hospital on June 6. Laura and I walked thru Emergency on the way out ... it was crazy busy. I commented to Laura that if it was that busy when I came by on May 30th, I probably wouldn't have gone in. Stupid.
I visited with my GP this morning, and got the disability insurance paperwork all done. I'm now officially in a holding pattern until July 5th, under orders to do nothing but read books, watch TV, and get a little bit of light exercise. No caffeine, no hot fudge sundaes, and no ball hockey.
As you can imagine, our vacation plans are now on hold. The recovery time from surgery will be a couple of months, at which time we'll try to pick up where we left off. For now, we're surrounded by great friends and family. They've all offered to help (especially with the move - all our stuff is going into storage this weekend), and we've accepted! We're going to park the trailer at a quiet campground in Anmore - near two beaches and about 10 minutes from Port Coquitlam. We've also got offers from many of our friends to stay at their place. I think a mix of the two will be reality for the next 60-90 days.
So ... there you have it. Some fun, huh?
Drop me a line sometime ... I've got a lot of time to kill over the next few months!!
Cheers!
Doug