Braised Lambchop
a nurse trying to work while suffering with chronic pain - she rambles a bit

Currently playing in iTunes: Pinch Me by Barenaked Ladies

The most unbelievable thing happened to me Friday.

Several weeks ago, it was announced that Barenaked Ladies were to shoot a pilot for a television variety show, to (hopefully) be shown on FOX.

That pilot has now been taped and is in post-production. The band was in Los Angeles throughout January preparing and shooting. On January 25, the live portion of the pilot was taped, and Ladies Room members (the BNL fan club) were invited to attend.

There's another fan board for BNL, too, although it's unofficial. Barenaked.net is a large community of BNL fans, and I've been a lurker there for several months. Last summer, I finally joined because I saw a health-related question from a member and thought I could help. Since then I've become a more active member, and a few weeks ago I posted a link to my pain story there. My goal was to help myself, by maybe raising a little money to defray some of the travel expenses we're going to incur to, from, and in Minnesota at Mayo. I feel so useless most days, just sitting here watching the world go by, unable to earn a cent to pay for anything. It's the first time I've been dependent on others in my adult life.

I'm so very glad I said something there about my problem. I've been inundated with good wishes, and I've gained several new friends - wonderful friends who have given me far more than anything money could ever purchase. And therein comes the unbelievable thing.

In Friday's mail was a Priority Mail envelope, and inside that envelope was a small book.

I'll restate here what I wrote on barenaked.net, with a few minor edits:

It turns out that while some people (some great people, too) were in line for the pilot taping, they were doing other things as well - like passing around a little journal for everyone to write good thoughts and wishes in.

So many members (and lurkers and people who don't visit here and people who didn't know who I was until that afternoon) wrote so many nice things in this book, encouraging words, healing energy....I was so overwhelmed that I started crying, because it's really unexpected and so wonderful. You guys can't imagine what it's like sitting here, day after day, in pain with nothing to do but live vicariously through everyone else.

If I haven't expressed my feelings enough, I'll just say that I was thrilled. This little book oozes good karma from every page. I started reading, and crying, and weeping, and shaking, just taking it all in and thanking God that I came forward to tell people and ask for help. My life has not been good over the last several years, but now that I've started to share, realizing that I don't have to go through it alone, a great weight is starting to lift.

So I'm boo-hooing here, and wondering what I did to have such nice people do such a nice thing for me, when I get to the fourth page, where there is a get-well wish from Pierre (the manager for Barenaked Ladies).

(get where this is going yet?)

The next page has a get-well wish from Kara, the executive producer of the show.

(still don't get it?)

Then four pages later - where the bookmark ribbon was (like I'd miss it!) - was a message that says,

Delia - get well soon!! Best always, Steven Page

They got Barenaked Ladies to sign it too. All five of them.

On the back of Steve's page, Kevin (Hearn) says 'Best wishes from us. Keep smiling! and laughing! cheers, Kev

Two pages later: 'Barenaked wishes - HANG IN THERE!! - Ed (Robertson)

Several pages along.... 'Delia, keep dooking it out' - Jim C (Creeggan)

Still later....'Keep your head up, and your stick on the ice. You'll get through it Delia' - Tyler Stewart

Then....'Hope to see you at more BNL shows!! All the best - Tiny' (Rob, Tyler's drum tech - the guy who sweeps up all the macaroni, if you've ever seen a live BNL show)

I still can't believe it. I cried for two hours.

I'm thrilled with the autographs, because from what I've been told this was a very grueling process for the band, and they were absolutely exhausted at the end of the show, which was when these autographs were obtained. From what I can tell, Tyler (who, for the uninitiated, is the drummer and a huge hockey fan) signed his name and either told Steve what to write or Steve wrote it himself, because the message from Tyler and the message from Steve are in the same handwriting and blue ink while Tyler's signature is in black ink.

It is also the only autograph that Kevin gave at the show; I learned later that Pierre, their manager, took this book back to the dressing room so Kev could sign it. Kevin Hearn survived leukemia around the time I was having my third operation, and I know he knows how I'm feeling most of the time.

But the autographs are a bonus. The real treasure is the book itself. I'm serious when I say that good karma oozes from it; it's now one of my prized possessions because of its energy. I can't express it in words; it's like a warm blanket of comfort and softness. It's the most astounding gift I've received in many, many years.

In Saturday's mail, I received a CD - a wonderful 'Mayo Mix' with 13 hours of music from another barenaked.net friend. The love and support I've received from people who just want to help is mind-boggling. I'm so incredibly grateful that I don't know what to say or how to say it. It's very humbling to know - not think, but know - that hundreds of people are thinking of me and really wishing the best for me, and want to do everything they can to help.

Thanks again, guys - I don't know how I'm going to repay this favor. But I'll think of something.

Currently playing in iTunes: Smoothie Song by Nickel Creek

Mark Morford of the San Francisco Chronicle nicely sums up what must be a gut-wrenching online experience for Windows users:

Here is your brand new car, sir. Drive it off the lot. Yay yay new car. Suddenly, new car shuts off. New car barely starts again and then only goes about 6 miles per hour and it belches smoke and every warning light on the dashboard is blinking on and off and the tires are screaming and the heater is blasting your feet and something smells like burned hair. You hobble back to the dealer, who only says, gosh, sorry, we thought you knew -- that's they way they all run. Enjoy!

When I worked for Phillips, I used a Mac for the first two years I was there. This worked well with the Mac I had here at home, so I could bring files to and fro and work at home with ease. Because I worked at a research center there were many Macs around; the chemists preferred Macs for their ease of use and their flexibility.

Then, for some reason only he understood, my boss decided that everyone in his department should change over to PCs. I was forced, for no good reason, to give up my Mac and trudge along on a beige box. I didn't get a new beige box - I got a hand-me-down, crappy, 486 beige box from one of the men in my department who had 'real work' to do and therefore needed a new one. (Coincidentally, this 'real work' included fudging purchase orders to obtain personal clothing from vendors for my boss. But I digress.) When the PC I inherited finally broke (I say 'finally,' but in reality it was about eight months later), I got a new, faster, 300mHz PC. (My boss wanted me to write a thank-you note to the IT people for 'allowing' me to get a computer to replace the ancient one that gave up the ghost - as if I was undeserving of support unless I begged, or I was somehow a less-than-worthy employee that didn't really need a computer at all. I wonder how many of the men in his department were forced to send thank-you notes when their computers broke. But again, I digress.)

I had that PC for three years. Every month, I had to have an IT person come over and fix something. I wasn't even allowed to install software - like Filemaker Pro - without assistance, because they had to make sure it was done 'correctly.' (Like installing Filemaker Pro is a Herculean task or something.) The main reason they kept visiting, though, was because the damn thing wouldn't work right. It would freeze, and I'd get that blue screen telling me some .ufo3897fe file had crashed and I was terminally screwed over. I hated the damn thing. I was almost relieved to leave Phillips because I didn't have to put up with the PC From Hell anymore.

That PC experience was the last I've had with the Windows OS. Since then, I've had iMacs and the PowerBook I'm typing on now. And I can't understand why, for the love of God, Windows users tolerate the utter contempt that Microsoft has for them.

I can't claim to understand why the Windows OS is as buggy and insecure as it is. I have my theories - underlying all their security talk, Microsoft wants to retain the ability, if not the right, to hack into their PCs at will; Microsoft is too lazy to make a secure operating system; or maybe they just don't give a damn. I don't know.

I do know that I don't have a problem with spyware. I don't have a problem with viruses. I don't have a problem with ads constantly showing up in programs that have no business showing ads at all. I don't know what it's like to have to run those scans all the time, or have my machines clogged up with so much junk that it's unusable without a wipe and restore. I have had one - one - macro virus in the last six years (a Word macro virus that said some stupid saying every time Word was launched), and I was able to find it and delete it on my own, without help from McAfee or Norton or any other anti-virus program.

I don't know how long our freedom from malware is going to last. I know that the FreeBSD/Mac OS X platform is the most secure computing platform on the planet right now. Is it secure because Apple's market share is so small and hackers just don't care? Probably not - I think it's secure because it's a clean, open-source, robust platform. As Morford says later in the article:

Sometime in the later '90s, a Mac org whose name I forget ran a rather amazing hacker competition: they offered a $13,000 cash prize to anyone in the world who could hack into the company's unprotected Mac server and alter the contest's home page in any way. Needless to say, no one ever could.

I think hackers attack Windows and Linux because they can. And as long as people - stupid people - are willing to tolerate outrageous conditions, which is what they're really doing, Microsoft won't do a damn thing about it. It may even be too late to do anything about it.

When it all comes down to it, though, I don't really care. I have a PowerBook, I have a really good guy who helps me with it, and I'm happy.

If you want to be happy too, get yourself a Mac. You're missing all the fun - and we're missing all the spyware.