Sure do hope your surgeon has some good and reassuring plans to share with you tomorrow. Hang tough, there!

It's absolutely fantastic that your girlfriend is willing to help with some notation. I expect she also recognizes the therapeutic value of helping keep your mind off the medical challenges as much as possible. She may even succeed in passing on some notation skills. Like most musical skills, it's a matter of understanding some fundamentals and then practicing the art. The beauty of doing notation within music software is you don't have to just hear it in your head. You can get immediate feedback to know if you got it right or not. Plus, the software helps enforce the musical rules (unless you intend to break them on purpose - that can be a whole new set of challenges).

Best wishes.

John R. Whitney
East Aurora, New York
"Music is a Life Skill"
http://www.soundclick.com/johnrobertwhitney