edit: How does air get out of the lung into the cavity? Does the lung spring a leak?

It can. That's the weird part about this: NO IDEA why it happened. I have to double check and see if his lung sprung a leak or what.

I ate some dinner and took ibuprofen, because as it turns out, Hulking out in the waiting room gives me a headache. Now I'm going to pack Tim a bag and head back over. I would smuggle in a cat if I could, but they're not very stealthy. (For real, though, when my brother was in the hospital for detox when he quit drinking, they allowed dogs to visit. Not just therapy dogs, but the patients' pets. They kept a bowl of treats at the information desk. That's so awesome. I would totally take Kato over if I was allowed.)

I was standing next to a dog on the subway tonight, and I don't think it was a service dog. If it was, it was poorly trained. It ended up laying its head on my foot, which I actually thought was kind of sweet, but can imagine many MANY people not appreciating!

I see "service" dogs at the supermarket and such, but they've generally been tiny things sitting up in their person's purse/bag and behaving themselves. I actually don't mind it, they're generally cleaner than the hordes of shrieking, sticky, grabby children swarming around.

Eeek, Steph, and much fast-healing~ma to Tim, many hairpats to you.

Lung~ma for Tim! That does sound pretty bizarre. I've always heard of pneumothoraces as caused by stab and gun shot wounds. No idea they could be spontaneous.

I am currently doing laundry and it is not fucking great. I locked myself out of my condo for the second time in a week. Good thing my roommate sleeps with her window open. Oh, and I wash everything in warm separated by light/dark, line dry anything that says it needs it.

I was standing next to a dog on the subway tonight, and I don't think it was a service dog. If it was, it was poorly trained. It ended up laying its head on my foot, which I actually thought was kind of sweet, but can imagine many MANY people not appreciating!

My neighbour has a service dog, and he likes to jump up on me. That may be mainly when he's off duty, but it's happened a couple of times at the bus stop. He is a lab, so it's not like I was surprised.

Steph, almost every time I have an anxiety/stress situation, I crash and get terrible headache. Take care.

Yeah, this was maybe a lab or something. Some kind of shaggy big dog. Hard to tell because we were so jammed together in the subway! And also I'm not that crazy about dogs.

Service dogs can be for spotting seizures or other things that unlike guide dogs don't necessarily require that kind of total focus. For everyone's sake they should be well trained, but do sometimes act more like pets.

How does air get out of the lung into the cavity? Does the lung spring a leak?

The lung does spring a leak. According to Dr Google, small air blisters with the unlikely name of blebs can form on the lung, and sometimes they burst, allowing air to leak. This doesn't sound like intelligent design to me.

Hil, my arthritis sometimes attacks fingers that way. Do the joints feel warm?

Mr Peabody would be an excellent service dog, if the service was to keep people away from me by biting them on the ankles. I understand nipping at the ankles is a corgi trait, and I have a friend who likes to imagine the Queen's herd of corgis nipping at all available ankles, while the possessors of said ankles try to pretend that nothing happened.

The official medical term for Tim's collapsed lung is "spontaneous pneumothorax," which is metal as HELL.

tell him next time to go for exploding into blue confetti instead. Less traumatizing / more amusing to loved ones.

Love to you both and much ~ma for continued re-inflation.