I have a pair of tin ears, tinnitus aurium. I hear a symphony of crickets, katydids, hylas, and escaping steam
without intermission.
And this morning I am experiencing a tintinnabulation of
the tensor tympani in my left ear.

I was just thinking about the phrase "tin ear" on my way to work this morning. I was surprised to see it as the word of the day.

Dear Alex: I'm wondering what the proper word is to describe the rapid series of contractions of my tensor tympani. "Clonus" is close, but perhaps not the most accurate. Which reminds me of the mnemonic for epileptic
seizure:"The aura, the cry, the fall, the fit, the tonus, the clonus, the piss and the shit."

I don't know what the term is for that.

Last night I saw one of our cancer patients in the E.R. He had had seizures and his family brought him in. He'd had stage IV disease for a few months so this was the sort of thing I knew in the back of my mind would happen to him. When I saw him in the E.R. I felt like he would probably die within 12-24 hours, and in fact he did. :( He was a nice guy. At least he had his family with him when he died.