3325 Collection, Chobani, Sister

Monday, August 1, 2011

"Who understands does not preach;
Who preaches does not understand."
-- Tao Te Ching --

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Baby Sister, I know you read this. I missed your birthday! I'm so sorry. I say missed instead of forgot, because I didn't forget, but when the time came, I missed it! Blew right on by.

Well, I hope your day was great, and that your offspring were more attentive than I, and that the next year goes well for you. Happy birthday, Baby.

(She's baby sister because she's younger, but I can't call her Little Sister because she got the long legs, and can run faster and beat me up.)

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I'm not buying Chobani Greek low-fat yogurt any more. I'm done. Two containers in the past week went to alcohol, and one of those two absolutely didn't get warm - it went from the store refrigerator to my refrigerator within a half hour - and the container I opened yesterday had a spot of mold in it. The foil lid was tight - no open spots - but there was mold along the edge. I don't trust the crap anymore. And that stuff's expensive!

I used to pay about $.80 for the old 8-ounce Dannon. Then they went to 6-ounce containers, and the price went to like $.68. It's been creeping up since then, of course, but was never over $.89. Well, this stupid Chobani is something like $1.39 for 6 ounces. That's ridiculous!

Dannon has become too sweet-tasting, and the local stores don't seem to stock the fat-free Dannon in the right flavors (I don't want fruit-on-the-bottom). I need to find a new good clean live-culture low-fat or fat-free yogurt. I haven't had a yeast infection in nigh on 30 years, and I don't intend to, and I credit my once a day live yogurt for that.

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In other news, the urine collection has not gone well. I had TOLD them that one 3-litre container par day wasn't going to be enough. They patted me on the head and told me I was silly.

Well, Friday I started collecting in the acid-treated container. By 2 pm, it was already 2/3 full, and I knew the overnight collection would be most important because I take my vitamins and minerals in the evening, so I didn't drink anything from 2 pm until 8 pm. This is NOT my usual pattern. I filled the container to the top with the morning's deposit, and took it to the lab Saturday morning.

Then I started the plain container with the next piddle on Saturday. I curtailed my usual intake so it would all fit.

Don't know if you've ever done this, but they give you what is sometimes called a top hat. It looks like a plastic hat, with a brim around 3/4 of the top, and you set it in the toilet with the hat brim holding it in place in the front of the bowl, under the seat ring.

Well, when I went to bed Saturday night, I put the hat in the toilet upstairs. During the night, maybe about 2 am, I got up and filled the hat. Literally. It slightly passed the 30 ounce mark on the markings in the hat.

Sheesh! How big is my bladder? Anyway, note that that's 2 lbs of urine in the hat. I lifted the toilet seat ring to remove the hat, and the brim of the hat collapsed from the weight, dumping half the urine into the bowl, and splashing water into the hat.

I can't use that.

Now what?

I could dump out what I'd already collected from Saturday and start over on Sunday. Or I could shrug, keep what I've got so far up to 10 pm Saturday, and then start collecting Sunday night at 10 pm.

So that's what I did. Middle-of-the-night again, Sunday night, I exceeded even the previous night's. I not only passed the 30 ounce mark, but I passed the top of the hat and it overflowed into the toilet bowl. Sheesh! (Just for the heck of it, I measured how much it takes to overflow the hat. It was at least 45 ounces, not counting what got lost when it overflowed.) I tried to pour what was in the hat into the collection container, but it wouldn't all fit.

So the first deposit of the morning and the remainder of the night's had to go into a 1-quart Melamine storage container.

This is getting ridiculous. I spent much of Sunday out with Daughter and a friend, and then with Daughter until after 7 pm. They saw how much I drank during the day. From about 11 am until maybe 8 pm I had one large glass of restaurant water, no ice, and one large glass of iced coffee, half of which was ice and discarded. And then in the evening, maybe two or three 10-12 ounce glasses of water.

Where is this stuff coming from?!

Just how big IS my bladder? Actually, I suspect a lot of the overnight stuff was coming from the collection chambers in the kidneys.

Incidentally, I never used to get up in the night to piddle. That crap started in April when I had the stent. I'm not too happy with this new habit, but apparently the kidneys and bladder like it. And the doctors always tell you to piddle after sex, so if I ever have sex again (snork!), it might come in handy. (A little more TMI - I never could do it for two reasons - I get so congested and puffy there that it shuts off piddling, and, as I used to tell the doctors, "I can't piddle that many times in one night.")

So, anyhoo, I took the regular container and my storage container with the excess to the lab this morning. They were a little upset and told me that I should have asked for TWO collection bottles.

Then *I* got upset, and informed them that I DID request additional, and was refused since they were SURE I wouldn't need it. Regardless of the fact that I was sure I did.

I am so pissed.

...pun...

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Oh, hey, something else stupid. They didn't want to give me my storage container back, because it had had urine in it. Duh? It isn't soft plastic. It's 30 years old, and solid, and can be washed on the sani cycle in the dishwasher! Also, it was MY urine! I touch it all the time.
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