There's an old joke about two blind men who, having never before encountered an elephant, are asked to describe it based on what they can touch of it. The one man, brought to the elephant's trunk, has a completely different description from the other, who was brought to its hind leg.

There's a famous experiment, proposed as a test for artificial intelligence, in which a person queries two entities about themselves and tries to determine which of the two is a man, and which is a machine.

And then there's the famous "black box" which, in theory, creates solutions from inputs, without any single entity knowing what it does to "create order from chaos". The black box is, in other words, magick.

Each of these requires that someone (or some thing) create a definition and a solution to a problem based on insufficient, empirical data.

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When the phone rang Thursday afternoon and the caller ID said "SonoraQuest" I really thought they would be looking for The Mr. Sure, I'd had labwork done not that long ago, but I had honestly forgotten.

Anyway, so the nurse gave this hideously long-winded explanation of why she was calling. Yeah, she had to get all that information out, but I almost nodded off! OK not really, but I did find myself screaming in my head "Get to the point woman!"

Looking back I guess I should have known there would be an issue. When I walked into the lab and handed the phlebotomist (who eerily reminded me of my step mother and made me wonder when she was going to yell at me) my paperwork she casually said that the order they had for me was different than the one in their system but that she was going to use the paperwork I came with.

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Caller ID said "Chandler Primar" and in that moment "Primar" equalled "primary" which equalled "kids school" which equalled "oh crap what's wrong with the kids?" Didn't matter that the school's actual caller ID says the school's name.

"Hello?" I said.

"Hi this is garblegarblegarble from Dr. D's office," she said.

Dr. D? Is this one of the kids' doctors? No, that's Dr. N. Oh, wait, I'm coming to my senses now: Dr. D is my new primary care physician. OK, I got it.

"Oh, hi," I said.

She stumbled on her words as she began: "Dr. D got your recent bloodwork back and everything looks fine. Your clotting numbers all look good."

"OK good," I said, relieved.

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I must admit that when I went to bed Monday night I was a little nervous, a little anxious, a little excited about my endo appointment Tuesday morning. In fact, when my fasting was well above 200 on Tuesday I wondered if my nerves had anything to do with it. 

Tuesday's appointment was a follow up for labwork and an ultrasound on my thyroid that I had about 10 days ago. I was pretty sure the lab work (much of which was antibody tests to determine if I am truly type 1 or type 2) would show that I am type 1, but there was still a little part of me that doubted I was right.

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The trouble with good intentions is that quite often the result doesn't turn out the way we planned.

Since I was teleworking today I decided to get my labwork done for my next endo appointment in less than two weeks. The lab down the street allows patients to make appointments, which is simply wonderful. Their earliest available today was 8:30, which was actually pretty convenient for me since I had to shuttle the kids to camp.

I've been working really hard to make sure my fastings are low enough that I can walk in the mornings, but I wanted to be a little higher than usual today so I could make it to the 8:30 (fasting) appointment without bottoming out. Well, I completely screwed it up and woke up to 225 mg/dL. I was really close to going back to sleep because I've tried to walk off a high before and made things worse. I decided to go for a shorter, slower walk this morning.

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In anticipation of my end of the month endo appointment, I have to go for fasting blood work this week. I'm dreading it. To me, this one of the most inconvenient things in the world for several reasons.

First off, it has taken years for me to get into the habit of eating breakfast. Now that I'm a regular at the breakfast table, I'm completely hooked on the most important meal of the day. I can't leave home without it.

Second, I don't think its safe for me to drive on an empty stomach. It's kind of like not drinking liquor on an empty stomach. It's just a bad idea. I'm low, I'm shakey, I can't see straight. I'm liable to curse at anyone who crosses my path, even if they do have the right of way. Granted, the doctors office is down the hill and around the bend, literally 3 minutes away. But still, I'm not fond of driving before eating. (READ MORE)