Perhaps that should be "Ow! Canada!" My legs feel like I've been hiking for three straight days. Wait a minute...
I leave here tomorrow. So far I've hiked up a mountain and a half, soaked my feet in a very cold river and my body in very hot springs, eaten Alberta beef and drunk the local beer, and had interesting talks on neurology and computing with high-tech artist types.
Quick highlights:
The view from the top of Tunnel Mountain after Joey and Magda and I hiked it after a huge lunch my first day here.
The feeling that Myocardial Infarction Was Imminent during that hike. (4,600 feet is a bit different, oxygen-wise, than sea level.) Joey tried to distract me by asking questions about how, exactly, the body manufactures red blood cells.
Seeing a deer trying to cadge a treat from a diner at the outdoor cafe at the Centre.
The sound of Bow Falls and the feel of the Bow River on very hot, very achy feet. Going in more than ankle-deep means you really feel the current.
The Grumpy Texan Scale for hikes: A score of 1 means it's flat, shady, and free of mosquitoes, with a bar 200 metres away. A score of 10 means it's the hike that Joey and Magda and I took the second day I was here--at the end of that one, I was gasping and sobbing for breath, saying, "Guys, I am NOT HAVING FUN!"
Helping Joey buy hiking boots. "Don't you have anything more...fashionable?"
Jhave mentioning casually that the Northern Lights two nights ago weren't as good as they normally are. (I missed them, dammit.)
The discovery that a size 10 in Canada is larger than a size 10 in the States. Given that Tommy's Pub in downtown Banff has the best onion rings I have ever eaten (skip the elk burger, but definitely get the onion rings), this is a good thing.
Vincent's birthday drink last night, when Joey, Magda, Sue, Jhave, Vincent and I all sat on the roof of Lloyd and drank various adult beverages. At one point I tipped my head straight back and decided that they grow more stars here than they do anywhere else I've ever been.
If it weren't for the cat...
I would be here for another week. It's that good. So far this vacation has had everything: good food, cool nights, interesting conversations with attractive people, and great shopping (Christmas is pretty much done now). Joey and Magda and I are a two-thirds Polish Three Stooges: when we arrived at the halfway point at Tunnel Mountain, they looked out over the cliffs and river and Joey said, "Oh! It's so beautiful I will kill myself!" That is apparently some sort of Polish Inside Cultural Joke.
I have to decide today if I need another piece of luggage to haul home all the presents I bought. At some point, I'll go into Banff, but for now it's time for another cup of coffee.
Monday, July 26, 2004
Thursday, July 22, 2004
Sunday, July 18, 2004
Saturday, July 17, 2004
See Canada Next...
My arrival in Canada, the first time I visited, was inauspicious. I got
there with US$20 in my pocket and a backpack on my back to find the
woman who was supposed to meet me...not there.
After wandering for an hour or so through the airport in Toronto,
wondering what the hell I was going to do, I heard an overhead page
calling my name. When I went to the ticket counter I was confronted
with two guys in coveralls and wool caps who offered to take me to the
hospital. Turns out the woman who was supposed to pick me up had
wrecked her car just short of the airport, and these guys had stopped
to help. They were working and so had to hurry, but they figured that
the hospital wasn't too far out of their way.
So I went with them. Their names were Chris and Pete. Strangely, I
remember that and very little about the hospital. I certainly remember
what they drove: a refrigerated container truck hauling fish. I sat on
a milk crate between the bucket seats in the front and breathed fish
fumes the entire way to Guelph, or wherever the hell the hospital was.
The trip improved, I suppose, but just barely.
So this time I'm heading to Banff, Alberta. There's a wealth of
information on Banff all over the Web--everything except how to
pronounce the name without sounding like an idiot. Pal Joey, who
invited me, promises aboriginal dances and spa days and hiking and
caves and fine dining. "There's not a lot of shopping, though" she
said, as though shopping were something I'd want to be doing in a town
with caves and hot springs and ptarmigans. And elk and bears,
apparently. Erp.
I arrive at oh-dark-thirty p.m. and have an hour's wait before I have
to catch the Airporter in to town. It's a two-hour drive, so I'll get
there sometime just after midnight. If I miss that one, I *think*
there's another shuttle that leaves later, but I'm unsure. I may have
to see what sort of overnight accomodations Calgary International can
provide.
Or just look for a fish truck.
there with US$20 in my pocket and a backpack on my back to find the
woman who was supposed to meet me...not there.
After wandering for an hour or so through the airport in Toronto,
wondering what the hell I was going to do, I heard an overhead page
calling my name. When I went to the ticket counter I was confronted
with two guys in coveralls and wool caps who offered to take me to the
hospital. Turns out the woman who was supposed to pick me up had
wrecked her car just short of the airport, and these guys had stopped
to help. They were working and so had to hurry, but they figured that
the hospital wasn't too far out of their way.
So I went with them. Their names were Chris and Pete. Strangely, I
remember that and very little about the hospital. I certainly remember
what they drove: a refrigerated container truck hauling fish. I sat on
a milk crate between the bucket seats in the front and breathed fish
fumes the entire way to Guelph, or wherever the hell the hospital was.
The trip improved, I suppose, but just barely.
So this time I'm heading to Banff, Alberta. There's a wealth of
information on Banff all over the Web--everything except how to
pronounce the name without sounding like an idiot. Pal Joey, who
invited me, promises aboriginal dances and spa days and hiking and
caves and fine dining. "There's not a lot of shopping, though" she
said, as though shopping were something I'd want to be doing in a town
with caves and hot springs and ptarmigans. And elk and bears,
apparently. Erp.
I arrive at oh-dark-thirty p.m. and have an hour's wait before I have
to catch the Airporter in to town. It's a two-hour drive, so I'll get
there sometime just after midnight. If I miss that one, I *think*
there's another shuttle that leaves later, but I'm unsure. I may have
to see what sort of overnight accomodations Calgary International can
provide.
Or just look for a fish truck.
Friday, July 16, 2004
A very productive day off...
Man A. and I woke up about six, dozed for a bit, then got up and had coffee and laid around for a bit. It's too hot to do much else. Walking outside feels as though you're stepping into a blood-temperature sauna.
Then I went off to Planned Parenthood for the annual Twiddly Bits Exam.
The phrase I never, *ever* want to hear again, coming out of *anybody's* mouth, is the one that came from the NP who did my exam: "I'm really pretty aggressive when it comes to Pap smears."
Once I'd escaped there, I went grocery shopping. I then came home and made broccoli-rice casserole--the white-trash kind with Cheez Whiz and canned cream of mushroom soup and Minute Rice. I'm capable of making quite a nice one with real ingredients, but once in a while I'm in the mood for a good old-fashioned Methodist supper casserole.
Then off for a haircut, then to buy two pairs of shorts and a bag to take to Canada next week. My duffel bag was too large and my backpack too small, so I went looking for the perfect five-days-in-Banff bag--and found it, at 50% off.
I now have everything I need for this trip: sunscreen, two pairs of shorts, a pair of hiking boots, a pair of sandals, a crushable schwanky dress, some t-shirts, and a swimsuit. Anything else would be overkill.
Now it's two-thirty. I've drunk five pint glasses of water, a pint of limeade, several small cups of water at the hair salon, and a Pale Ale. I've sweated out everything I've drunk, I think. Just keeping up with hydration in this weather is a full-time job.
So it's time for a nap. I won't be drinking water, but at least I won't be sweating.
Then I went off to Planned Parenthood for the annual Twiddly Bits Exam.
The phrase I never, *ever* want to hear again, coming out of *anybody's* mouth, is the one that came from the NP who did my exam: "I'm really pretty aggressive when it comes to Pap smears."
Once I'd escaped there, I went grocery shopping. I then came home and made broccoli-rice casserole--the white-trash kind with Cheez Whiz and canned cream of mushroom soup and Minute Rice. I'm capable of making quite a nice one with real ingredients, but once in a while I'm in the mood for a good old-fashioned Methodist supper casserole.
Then off for a haircut, then to buy two pairs of shorts and a bag to take to Canada next week. My duffel bag was too large and my backpack too small, so I went looking for the perfect five-days-in-Banff bag--and found it, at 50% off.
I now have everything I need for this trip: sunscreen, two pairs of shorts, a pair of hiking boots, a pair of sandals, a crushable schwanky dress, some t-shirts, and a swimsuit. Anything else would be overkill.
Now it's two-thirty. I've drunk five pint glasses of water, a pint of limeade, several small cups of water at the hair salon, and a Pale Ale. I've sweated out everything I've drunk, I think. Just keeping up with hydration in this weather is a full-time job.
So it's time for a nap. I won't be drinking water, but at least I won't be sweating.
Thursday, July 15, 2004
...and this is why I love my outlaws...
The Erstwhile Hub has some of the best family in the world. His stepmother is a marvelous woman. His dad is the cerebral, hard-working type who can use a chainsaw without cutting off his fingers and design and build an aesthetically-pleasing and solid structure. His aunt and her partner are wonderful women.
This is why I called my ex-step-mother-in-law just now and spent an hour on the phone with her. My Outlaw Mam is one of those steel-ribbed, totally-no-bullshit women that this state grows now and then. I can let my accent come out with her like I can with nobody else. "I" turns into "Aaaahhh" and I use phrases like "bless his heart" that would make my Yankee parents cringe.
"My word!" she exclaimed when she answered the phone. "I have my toothbrush in my mouth--hang on a second."
Although it came out as "Maaaah worrrrrd! Igh hab mah toodbrdgh ib by boughth--hadgh ob a schlecogngh."
I told her quite frankly that the reason I hadn't called is that I had wanted the Erstwhile Hub/New Lover dyad to have a chance with them, without comparisons. After all, these people were my primary relationships for my adult life; it's only fair that she and Ex-FIL get to know them without my butting in.
And here's where she is *so cool*: She said *nothing* about them.
Not to me, not at all. She could've ripped on the both of them; I know that they've visited since The Debacle. She could've been gossipy and mean. She told me once that she liked me much better than she liked The Erstwhile Hub...but she was fair. And just. And refrained from commenting on them both.
This is why I love Mam. She's a better person, hands-down, than I am. She keeps her mouth shut even if it pains her. If there's something she has to say, she says it once and goes on.
That's something to aspire to.
This is why I called my ex-step-mother-in-law just now and spent an hour on the phone with her. My Outlaw Mam is one of those steel-ribbed, totally-no-bullshit women that this state grows now and then. I can let my accent come out with her like I can with nobody else. "I" turns into "Aaaahhh" and I use phrases like "bless his heart" that would make my Yankee parents cringe.
"My word!" she exclaimed when she answered the phone. "I have my toothbrush in my mouth--hang on a second."
Although it came out as "Maaaah worrrrrd! Igh hab mah toodbrdgh ib by boughth--hadgh ob a schlecogngh."
I told her quite frankly that the reason I hadn't called is that I had wanted the Erstwhile Hub/New Lover dyad to have a chance with them, without comparisons. After all, these people were my primary relationships for my adult life; it's only fair that she and Ex-FIL get to know them without my butting in.
And here's where she is *so cool*: She said *nothing* about them.
Not to me, not at all. She could've ripped on the both of them; I know that they've visited since The Debacle. She could've been gossipy and mean. She told me once that she liked me much better than she liked The Erstwhile Hub...but she was fair. And just. And refrained from commenting on them both.
This is why I love Mam. She's a better person, hands-down, than I am. She keeps her mouth shut even if it pains her. If there's something she has to say, she says it once and goes on.
That's something to aspire to.
Odds and Ends
Thirty-six hours at work in a row will make even the most gifted person nutso.
I'm not the most gifted person. Therefore I am absolutely exhausted and crazy at the moment.
I did, though, have four of the best patients *ever* yesterday: a back surgery, an implanted intrathecal pain pump, a brain tumor (benign), and a pituitary tumor (benign, but we didn't get all of it).
The back surgery patient reminded me of my ex-step-mother-in-law (the sane ex-MIL, that is). She and her husband and I just clicked immediately. When I found out that she'd had to put her beloved poodle down the day before she came in for surgery, I sent her a card and a flower from the gift shop. We can do that for free for patients who need it.
Her husband had a joke foot in a pants-leg that you could stick under the covers, in a drawer with the foot part hanging out, or (as I did) under your lab coat so only the foot hung out in view. We had a good time scaring the hell out of the residents with that foot.
The implanted pain pump patient was in his eighties, sharp as a tack, still living independently, and a generally fascinating man. He's what my dad will be in twenty years, God willing. He told me stories about being a cargo plane pilot in India in World War II, flying missions into Burma and China.
The benign brain tumor patient was my age with a wonderful family. She and her sisters and I sang songs in five-part harmony before she went to surgery.
The pit tumor patient was very young--20--and really scared, but I liked her immediately. She and I spent a lot of time talking about what her surgery meant and why her body was reacting the way it did and so on.
All in all, an emotionally exhausting but satisfying day.
I'm not the most gifted person. Therefore I am absolutely exhausted and crazy at the moment.
I did, though, have four of the best patients *ever* yesterday: a back surgery, an implanted intrathecal pain pump, a brain tumor (benign), and a pituitary tumor (benign, but we didn't get all of it).
The back surgery patient reminded me of my ex-step-mother-in-law (the sane ex-MIL, that is). She and her husband and I just clicked immediately. When I found out that she'd had to put her beloved poodle down the day before she came in for surgery, I sent her a card and a flower from the gift shop. We can do that for free for patients who need it.
Her husband had a joke foot in a pants-leg that you could stick under the covers, in a drawer with the foot part hanging out, or (as I did) under your lab coat so only the foot hung out in view. We had a good time scaring the hell out of the residents with that foot.
The implanted pain pump patient was in his eighties, sharp as a tack, still living independently, and a generally fascinating man. He's what my dad will be in twenty years, God willing. He told me stories about being a cargo plane pilot in India in World War II, flying missions into Burma and China.
The benign brain tumor patient was my age with a wonderful family. She and her sisters and I sang songs in five-part harmony before she went to surgery.
The pit tumor patient was very young--20--and really scared, but I liked her immediately. She and I spent a lot of time talking about what her surgery meant and why her body was reacting the way it did and so on.
All in all, an emotionally exhausting but satisfying day.
Sunday, July 11, 2004
Size matters
We have two people in this week who have major cranial defects. These are doctor-created cranial defects, and thus are better than the alternative. The alternative is having your cranium infected with nasty bugs or having your brain swell to the point that it squooshes up against the inside of your skull and dies.
When I say "major", I mean major. As in half of the top of your head is gone.
Bone flaps out bother me. The small ones I can handle without any problem, but the big ones still give me pause. There's just something about talking to someone who's perfectly rational and normal and happy but whose head slopes away into nothingness just west of midline that squicks me out.
I never realized until I started seeing this on a regular basis how much space there is between your brain and your skull. I always thought that the brain was packed in there, nice and neat, like a suitcase packed by someone more talented and patient than I. For the most part, that's true--there's not so much space there that you could swing a cat. But the difference between perception of "not a lot of space" and the reality is huge.
The reason having half your head gone is disturbing on an aesthetic level is that most of the stuff that shapes our skulls is on the outside of the bone. Think about the top of your head for a minute: you think of hair and bone, right? You've forgotten about all the muscles in your scalp, all the tendons and ligaments that connect this to that, all the padding that goes on top of your brain-case. If you take that away, you end up with somebody who looks fine in profile (from one side, anyhow) and who looks like a scooped-out melon from the front.
Plus, you can see the pulse of the brain through the skin. Yes, the brain pulses. It doesn't just sit there in your skull humming popular songs to itself; it has arteries and great big ol' veins that feed and drain it. Cut a hole in the skull to take a look at the brain and the whole thing is pulsing quietly away. I'm sure that sometimes it's humming popular songs in time to the pulse, but I can't hear them from the outside. Take the protective bone away, though, and the whole shooting match becomes quite clear: this lump of cholesterol and nerves is jammin' away inside your skull.
Speaking of major defects
We have one orthopedic surgeon who's quite fond of narcotics. For his patients, that is, not personally. The people he operates on get a scheduled list of huge doses of things like OxyContin and Lortab. This makes them, since they're usually older and not equipped to handle drugs like that, prone to going nuts.
I had one of his patients yesterday. The previous day she'd been fine, if a little focused on her bowels. Yesterday, though, she was confused and impulsive, trying to get out of bed and wander down the hallway. After a number of phone calls and various tests, we discovered that she didn't have a pulmonary embolism, didn't have blood clots in her brain, and was probably suffering from narcotic overload.
Which is a comforting thought--stop the narcotics, and eventually you'll stop the problem--but meanwhile, I had to keep running hither and yon to keep her from hurting herself.
With confused patients I can usually take anything in stride. This woman yesterday, though, had me longing for a drug I could abuse. For some strange reason, she frustrated me no end. I was at the point of losing my temper with her, though what was happening wasn't her fault at all.
That makes you feel bad. I don't expect to like every patient I have simply because they're sick, but I still feel bad when one of them makes me want to scream.
Plus, there's the worry that they won't ever get better. Most of 'em do, of course, but you still wonder.
Tomorrow I start a three-day run. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday is generally the hardest thirty-six hour stretch at work, given that we have surgeries galore on those days. I am not looking forward to this at all. I do, however, have four days off in a row just after this run, so I can look forward to *that* instead.
When I say "major", I mean major. As in half of the top of your head is gone.
Bone flaps out bother me. The small ones I can handle without any problem, but the big ones still give me pause. There's just something about talking to someone who's perfectly rational and normal and happy but whose head slopes away into nothingness just west of midline that squicks me out.
I never realized until I started seeing this on a regular basis how much space there is between your brain and your skull. I always thought that the brain was packed in there, nice and neat, like a suitcase packed by someone more talented and patient than I. For the most part, that's true--there's not so much space there that you could swing a cat. But the difference between perception of "not a lot of space" and the reality is huge.
The reason having half your head gone is disturbing on an aesthetic level is that most of the stuff that shapes our skulls is on the outside of the bone. Think about the top of your head for a minute: you think of hair and bone, right? You've forgotten about all the muscles in your scalp, all the tendons and ligaments that connect this to that, all the padding that goes on top of your brain-case. If you take that away, you end up with somebody who looks fine in profile (from one side, anyhow) and who looks like a scooped-out melon from the front.
Plus, you can see the pulse of the brain through the skin. Yes, the brain pulses. It doesn't just sit there in your skull humming popular songs to itself; it has arteries and great big ol' veins that feed and drain it. Cut a hole in the skull to take a look at the brain and the whole thing is pulsing quietly away. I'm sure that sometimes it's humming popular songs in time to the pulse, but I can't hear them from the outside. Take the protective bone away, though, and the whole shooting match becomes quite clear: this lump of cholesterol and nerves is jammin' away inside your skull.
Speaking of major defects
We have one orthopedic surgeon who's quite fond of narcotics. For his patients, that is, not personally. The people he operates on get a scheduled list of huge doses of things like OxyContin and Lortab. This makes them, since they're usually older and not equipped to handle drugs like that, prone to going nuts.
I had one of his patients yesterday. The previous day she'd been fine, if a little focused on her bowels. Yesterday, though, she was confused and impulsive, trying to get out of bed and wander down the hallway. After a number of phone calls and various tests, we discovered that she didn't have a pulmonary embolism, didn't have blood clots in her brain, and was probably suffering from narcotic overload.
Which is a comforting thought--stop the narcotics, and eventually you'll stop the problem--but meanwhile, I had to keep running hither and yon to keep her from hurting herself.
With confused patients I can usually take anything in stride. This woman yesterday, though, had me longing for a drug I could abuse. For some strange reason, she frustrated me no end. I was at the point of losing my temper with her, though what was happening wasn't her fault at all.
That makes you feel bad. I don't expect to like every patient I have simply because they're sick, but I still feel bad when one of them makes me want to scream.
Plus, there's the worry that they won't ever get better. Most of 'em do, of course, but you still wonder.
Tomorrow I start a three-day run. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday is generally the hardest thirty-six hour stretch at work, given that we have surgeries galore on those days. I am not looking forward to this at all. I do, however, have four days off in a row just after this run, so I can look forward to *that* instead.
Wednesday, July 07, 2004
At work, even when I'm not at work.
As virtuous men pass mildly away,
And whisper to their souls to go,
Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
"Now his breath goes," and some say, "No."
Manny died last week. Manny was one of those guys you saw everywhere and knew well enough to shoot tequila with, even if you didn't ever have dinner with him.
He was short and had very long hair. After three shots of tequila a couple of Hallowe'ens ago, I told him he was the second long-haired Mexican I'd fallen instantly in love with in my life. He laughed and laughed at that.
He drummed. He was on *fire*. And he sang and boogied and generally made parties more fun and boring nights at the bar interesting.
Wouldn't you know he had a brain tumor. It killed him eventually, the way glios always do. He was 45.
And whisper to their souls to go,
Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
"Now his breath goes," and some say, "No."
Manny died last week. Manny was one of those guys you saw everywhere and knew well enough to shoot tequila with, even if you didn't ever have dinner with him.
He was short and had very long hair. After three shots of tequila a couple of Hallowe'ens ago, I told him he was the second long-haired Mexican I'd fallen instantly in love with in my life. He laughed and laughed at that.
He drummed. He was on *fire*. And he sang and boogied and generally made parties more fun and boring nights at the bar interesting.
Wouldn't you know he had a brain tumor. It killed him eventually, the way glios always do. He was 45.
Tuesday, July 06, 2004
Yeah, well, fuck you too.
I've been on one of the receiving ends of some rather nasty commentary today.
A friend of mine is trying to leave her husband.
Unfortunately for her, the husband in question is a control freak who's torn her down bit by bit over the years until she lacks the spine to get the hell out. He says she's too fat, not fertile enough, stupid (rocket scientist, anyone? I ask you), not perfect enough, whatever.
He's an arrogant bastard. If ever I get the opportunity to meet him, I'll happily push his teeth out the back of his head.
Apparently, some mutual buddies of ours see my advice, and others' advice to Friend Who's Trying To Leave, as "shrill." As in, "you're self-appointed experts, so shut up and just sit there." Thank God I'm not the only one that the Perfect Crew has bitched at today.
I'll show you shrill.
Shrill is the feeling you get when you've turned yourself into an acrobat trying to make another person happy and he still fucks around on you.
Shrill is the noise you make when you finally discover that no, you're not a mean person or a bad person and yes, people actually do like you for yourself.
Shrill is the sound of your own voice when you hear the person on whom you've built your life suggesting that it might be nice to turn your twosome into a threesome.
I take that last one back. Shrill is the sound your car tires should be making as you leave that sorry ratbastard.
This is not an apology
I have a great idea for anybody who thinks I'm too "shrill": *You* come home sick from work to find your husband and your best friend of 16 years just out of the sack. *You* move out of your house in four days--or better, do what I did: Have your husband be so anxious to be rid of you that he moves you out.
You spend an immense amount of energy and time trying to make somebody else happy, just to watch it crumble in the face of something new and different.
I will lay you even money that you couldn't do it. I would happily lay you double-to-nothing that you couldn't come out of it as well as I have.
And you know what made it possible?
The memory of all the shrill voices of my friends. They screamed at me for years that The Erstwhile Husband was a jerk, not treating me right, taking advantage. They wondered out loud, shrill-ly, why I was putting up with the passive-aggressive bullshit he laid out. It was those echoes that made me tough enough to leave.
When somebody you love is being hurt by someone not fit to black their boots, you must be shrill.
At the end of the day
When it's all said and done, I'm not bitter about what happened. I am extremely bitter, though, about people who discount the passion that fondness for one person can make a group of people exhibit. I'm quite jaded about the folks who sit back when they know somebody's being hurt and abused and say, "Oh, well, it'll all happen as it's supposed to; just let it ride."
Sometimes you need an intervention.
And, had this not already been an extremely weird and unpleasant day, I'd be staging one right now. Me and my anodized pink practice bat.
A friend of mine is trying to leave her husband.
Unfortunately for her, the husband in question is a control freak who's torn her down bit by bit over the years until she lacks the spine to get the hell out. He says she's too fat, not fertile enough, stupid (rocket scientist, anyone? I ask you), not perfect enough, whatever.
He's an arrogant bastard. If ever I get the opportunity to meet him, I'll happily push his teeth out the back of his head.
Apparently, some mutual buddies of ours see my advice, and others' advice to Friend Who's Trying To Leave, as "shrill." As in, "you're self-appointed experts, so shut up and just sit there." Thank God I'm not the only one that the Perfect Crew has bitched at today.
I'll show you shrill.
Shrill is the feeling you get when you've turned yourself into an acrobat trying to make another person happy and he still fucks around on you.
Shrill is the noise you make when you finally discover that no, you're not a mean person or a bad person and yes, people actually do like you for yourself.
Shrill is the sound of your own voice when you hear the person on whom you've built your life suggesting that it might be nice to turn your twosome into a threesome.
I take that last one back. Shrill is the sound your car tires should be making as you leave that sorry ratbastard.
This is not an apology
I have a great idea for anybody who thinks I'm too "shrill": *You* come home sick from work to find your husband and your best friend of 16 years just out of the sack. *You* move out of your house in four days--or better, do what I did: Have your husband be so anxious to be rid of you that he moves you out.
You spend an immense amount of energy and time trying to make somebody else happy, just to watch it crumble in the face of something new and different.
I will lay you even money that you couldn't do it. I would happily lay you double-to-nothing that you couldn't come out of it as well as I have.
And you know what made it possible?
The memory of all the shrill voices of my friends. They screamed at me for years that The Erstwhile Husband was a jerk, not treating me right, taking advantage. They wondered out loud, shrill-ly, why I was putting up with the passive-aggressive bullshit he laid out. It was those echoes that made me tough enough to leave.
When somebody you love is being hurt by someone not fit to black their boots, you must be shrill.
At the end of the day
When it's all said and done, I'm not bitter about what happened. I am extremely bitter, though, about people who discount the passion that fondness for one person can make a group of people exhibit. I'm quite jaded about the folks who sit back when they know somebody's being hurt and abused and say, "Oh, well, it'll all happen as it's supposed to; just let it ride."
Sometimes you need an intervention.
And, had this not already been an extremely weird and unpleasant day, I'd be staging one right now. Me and my anodized pink practice bat.
Saturday, July 03, 2004
Yesterday
Earlier
"My husband needs help scooting up in bed" the woman said.
Her husband had just walked 75 feet without help, two days after very minor surgery.
But I went into the room anyhow. Sure enough, he was lying in bed, all six feet two inches of his college-football-player self, with his feet pressed against the footboard.
"I need to move up in bed." he said.
I replied, "Then I suggest you get out of bed, take two steps toward the head of the bed, sit down on the edge of the bed, and lie down again."
"But I've been moving myself *all day*!" he protested.
"Tough," I said. "No way in blazes am I going to lift you in that bed. You're a foot taller than I am, a hundred pounds heavier, five years younger, and in good shape. You'll have to do it yourself."
Later he complained that I had embarrassed him in front of his friends. "Son," I said, "you're lucky I wasn't trying to embarrass you. Weren't you ashamed to have to ask me to do something you knew damn well you could do yourself?"
Later
Merging onto the highway on the way home from work, I got behind one of those people you just know are going to be trouble.
Sure enough, she merged on to a six-lane, busy highway at 35 mph.
She then proceeded to cross two lanes (with signal; I'll give her that) at 40 mph.
This in an area where traffic in the slow lane routinely moves at 60.
I lost sight of her as I strained my poor car's engine to get out of her way.
Even Later
Getting *off* the highway to come home, I almost died.
The exit that I take is short and uphill. At the end of the uphill bit, there's a quick swing to the left, a double white line (DO NOT CROSS DOUBLE WHITE LINE), and then a stoplight about a hundred yards downhill.
The person in front of me stopped. Dead. Just on the other side of the hill. Apparently they don't have merge lanes on service roads in Tennessee. That's the only reason I could think of as to why Mister Tennessee Plates On The Minivan Man would simply...stop. In a lane of traffic where everybody's coming off the highway like bats out of hell.
Which left my ass hanging out behind his, vulnerable to the next lifted Dodge pickemup that barreled over the hill. I beeped, quickly and politely, to remind him that he needed to get out of the way, and that it was possible to do so without CROSSING DOUBLE WHITE LINE.
Oy. He did, thank God, get out of the way. And I got home alive, just barely.
"My husband needs help scooting up in bed" the woman said.
Her husband had just walked 75 feet without help, two days after very minor surgery.
But I went into the room anyhow. Sure enough, he was lying in bed, all six feet two inches of his college-football-player self, with his feet pressed against the footboard.
"I need to move up in bed." he said.
I replied, "Then I suggest you get out of bed, take two steps toward the head of the bed, sit down on the edge of the bed, and lie down again."
"But I've been moving myself *all day*!" he protested.
"Tough," I said. "No way in blazes am I going to lift you in that bed. You're a foot taller than I am, a hundred pounds heavier, five years younger, and in good shape. You'll have to do it yourself."
Later he complained that I had embarrassed him in front of his friends. "Son," I said, "you're lucky I wasn't trying to embarrass you. Weren't you ashamed to have to ask me to do something you knew damn well you could do yourself?"
Later
Merging onto the highway on the way home from work, I got behind one of those people you just know are going to be trouble.
Sure enough, she merged on to a six-lane, busy highway at 35 mph.
She then proceeded to cross two lanes (with signal; I'll give her that) at 40 mph.
This in an area where traffic in the slow lane routinely moves at 60.
I lost sight of her as I strained my poor car's engine to get out of her way.
Even Later
Getting *off* the highway to come home, I almost died.
The exit that I take is short and uphill. At the end of the uphill bit, there's a quick swing to the left, a double white line (DO NOT CROSS DOUBLE WHITE LINE), and then a stoplight about a hundred yards downhill.
The person in front of me stopped. Dead. Just on the other side of the hill. Apparently they don't have merge lanes on service roads in Tennessee. That's the only reason I could think of as to why Mister Tennessee Plates On The Minivan Man would simply...stop. In a lane of traffic where everybody's coming off the highway like bats out of hell.
Which left my ass hanging out behind his, vulnerable to the next lifted Dodge pickemup that barreled over the hill. I beeped, quickly and politely, to remind him that he needed to get out of the way, and that it was possible to do so without CROSSING DOUBLE WHITE LINE.
Oy. He did, thank God, get out of the way. And I got home alive, just barely.
Sunday, June 27, 2004
The things you learn watching TV...
I rarely watch TV. Therefore, on the days when I work out in the weight room, I make it a point to find the baddest TV possible and really immerse myself in it.
Today it was three miles' worth of treadmilling to a movie on the Sci-Fi channel called "Arachnid." Arachnid is apparently Latin for "movie so bad it'll make you giggle and almost sprain your ankle."
Here's What I Learned
Spiders large enough to kill people are bulletproof.
They therefore must be killed by a man with a machete.
Not just *any* man with a machete, however. The machetes of Loyal Amazonian Natives Who Guide The White Folks Through The Jungle are apparently not good enough.
Further, spiders large enough to kill people spit poison and have nasty screams and icky bitey parts.
The poison, however, has no apparent effect on Our Hero. Even though a loogieful of poison is enough to knock a Loyal Native Guide and The Friendly Acceptable Black Guy In Fatigues out of the action for twenty minutes, it does not affect the hero.
Nor do the icky bitey parts. A love tap on the throat with said parts is enough to kill the Learned Spanish-Accented Entemologist but the same bitey bits won't penetrate Our Hero's neck.
A Learned Spanish-Accented Entemologist can produce a surprising variety of agonized cries even after a Big Spider has eaten eaten his throat out.
The Cute, Busty Curly-Haired Nurse will get it first (after all the natives have been eradicated, that is, and just before the Acceptable Black Guy bites the dust). This makes me wonder about my idea of doing medical missions.
Today it was three miles' worth of treadmilling to a movie on the Sci-Fi channel called "Arachnid." Arachnid is apparently Latin for "movie so bad it'll make you giggle and almost sprain your ankle."
Here's What I Learned
Spiders large enough to kill people are bulletproof.
They therefore must be killed by a man with a machete.
Not just *any* man with a machete, however. The machetes of Loyal Amazonian Natives Who Guide The White Folks Through The Jungle are apparently not good enough.
Further, spiders large enough to kill people spit poison and have nasty screams and icky bitey parts.
The poison, however, has no apparent effect on Our Hero. Even though a loogieful of poison is enough to knock a Loyal Native Guide and The Friendly Acceptable Black Guy In Fatigues out of the action for twenty minutes, it does not affect the hero.
Nor do the icky bitey parts. A love tap on the throat with said parts is enough to kill the Learned Spanish-Accented Entemologist but the same bitey bits won't penetrate Our Hero's neck.
A Learned Spanish-Accented Entemologist can produce a surprising variety of agonized cries even after a Big Spider has eaten eaten his throat out.
The Cute, Busty Curly-Haired Nurse will get it first (after all the natives have been eradicated, that is, and just before the Acceptable Black Guy bites the dust). This makes me wonder about my idea of doing medical missions.
Saturday, June 26, 2004
A public service announcement from your friendly neighborhood nurse
Several years ago, while chatting with my sister on the phone, I learned that she didn't have a first-aid kit at home. I was shocked. Even though I don't have one myself, I strongly believe that everybody *else* should have one, just so they don't call me at 3 am for advice on what to do with a bleeding finger.
Here's a list of what I keep in the ol' casa, even if it's not all in the same place:
The Ideal First-Aid Kit
1. Band-Aids of various sizes, including a box of those hideously-expensive clear ones that you can leave on through a shower or two. I don't use any sort of Band-Aid very often, but the minute I run out you can guarantee that I'll slice a finger wide open somehow.
2. An elastic bandage, two inches across. You only need one. If you sprain an ankle falling over the cat, it's nice not to have to hop down three flights of stairs, hop into the car, and try to drive a standard transmission vehicle to the store to pick up something with which to wrap said ankle.
3. A bag of frozen peas or corn, for ice-packing.
4. Gatorade powder, Dramamine or Bonine, and maybe some Pedialyte frozen popsicles. Nothing's better to combat a case of the stomach flu or a really toxic hangover than Bonine/Dramamine and Gatorade or Pedialye. Mix the Gatorade half-strength; drink the Pedialyte or eat the pops straight. This will help you not get too dehydrated when you're garking up every meal you've eaten in the last two weeks.
You might notice that there's no Immodium or similar anti-diarrheal there. That's because, if I have the runs, I'm not going anywhere anyhow. Besides that, if there's something irritating your intestines to the point that your body's trying to expel it, you really *need* to get rid of it, not let whatever-it-is sit around in your gut doing more damage.
5. Aspirin. I don't take Tylenol or acetaminophen-containing things because I challenge my liver quite enough as it is, thank you. If you have more than two drinks a week, you probably shouldn't take acetaminophen, either. It's tough on your liver, and you need your liver.
6. Sharp-pointed tweezers, a pair of bandage scissors, and strong medical tape. You can fix almost any problem with those things.
7. A hot-water bottle. Champion for cramps and muscle strains.
8. Hydrogen peroxide and alcohol, bought in bitty bottles and replaced every few months (the peroxide, that is; the alcohol will keep forever). Buy 70% rubbing alcohol--stronger is not better when it comes to topically-applied alcohol. In a pinch, you can use at least forty-proof liquor for disinfecting cuts, though I'd personally stay away from rum or anything flavored.
9. Double- or triple-antibiotic ointment. Yes, you really ought to have some of this lying around, just in case.
10. A bottle of el-cheapo saline solution, the sort used for contact lenses. I'm not talking about the protein-removing no-rub solution, but the plain old 0.9% saline. It's handy-dandy for washing out cuts or open blisters. Back when I had dogs who were clumsy and/or enthusiastic about running into sharp things, I went through a big bottle every month. It's only 99 cents at the drugstore, if you get the store brand, and when you have a cut that has ook embedded in it, nothing's better for getting the ook out.
There you go. Aside from the Gatorade, hot water bottle, and frozen peas, you can stick all of this stuff on one shelf in your bathroom or kitchen and be prepared in case you end up as ungraceful as I am.
Here's a list of what I keep in the ol' casa, even if it's not all in the same place:
The Ideal First-Aid Kit
1. Band-Aids of various sizes, including a box of those hideously-expensive clear ones that you can leave on through a shower or two. I don't use any sort of Band-Aid very often, but the minute I run out you can guarantee that I'll slice a finger wide open somehow.
2. An elastic bandage, two inches across. You only need one. If you sprain an ankle falling over the cat, it's nice not to have to hop down three flights of stairs, hop into the car, and try to drive a standard transmission vehicle to the store to pick up something with which to wrap said ankle.
3. A bag of frozen peas or corn, for ice-packing.
4. Gatorade powder, Dramamine or Bonine, and maybe some Pedialyte frozen popsicles. Nothing's better to combat a case of the stomach flu or a really toxic hangover than Bonine/Dramamine and Gatorade or Pedialye. Mix the Gatorade half-strength; drink the Pedialyte or eat the pops straight. This will help you not get too dehydrated when you're garking up every meal you've eaten in the last two weeks.
You might notice that there's no Immodium or similar anti-diarrheal there. That's because, if I have the runs, I'm not going anywhere anyhow. Besides that, if there's something irritating your intestines to the point that your body's trying to expel it, you really *need* to get rid of it, not let whatever-it-is sit around in your gut doing more damage.
5. Aspirin. I don't take Tylenol or acetaminophen-containing things because I challenge my liver quite enough as it is, thank you. If you have more than two drinks a week, you probably shouldn't take acetaminophen, either. It's tough on your liver, and you need your liver.
6. Sharp-pointed tweezers, a pair of bandage scissors, and strong medical tape. You can fix almost any problem with those things.
7. A hot-water bottle. Champion for cramps and muscle strains.
8. Hydrogen peroxide and alcohol, bought in bitty bottles and replaced every few months (the peroxide, that is; the alcohol will keep forever). Buy 70% rubbing alcohol--stronger is not better when it comes to topically-applied alcohol. In a pinch, you can use at least forty-proof liquor for disinfecting cuts, though I'd personally stay away from rum or anything flavored.
9. Double- or triple-antibiotic ointment. Yes, you really ought to have some of this lying around, just in case.
10. A bottle of el-cheapo saline solution, the sort used for contact lenses. I'm not talking about the protein-removing no-rub solution, but the plain old 0.9% saline. It's handy-dandy for washing out cuts or open blisters. Back when I had dogs who were clumsy and/or enthusiastic about running into sharp things, I went through a big bottle every month. It's only 99 cents at the drugstore, if you get the store brand, and when you have a cut that has ook embedded in it, nothing's better for getting the ook out.
There you go. Aside from the Gatorade, hot water bottle, and frozen peas, you can stick all of this stuff on one shelf in your bathroom or kitchen and be prepared in case you end up as ungraceful as I am.
Friday, June 25, 2004
This is how it goes.
The pediatric patient I wrote about a couple of days ago? She smiled at me today.
Made my entire *week*.
I also had a great conversation with an 88-year-old woman who'd left college when her mom died to raise her two younger brothers...just before WWII started. Amazing.
And a third patient, a woman whom I'd admitted a few days ago, said "Don't tell any of the other nurses, but I think you're better than any of them. I like you."
Some days are just great, and then there's the gravy....
Like pulling up to the local drive-in burger place and seeing a woman who used to be an old patient of mine from Planned Parenthood, some six years ago. She has three kids now and is about to go back to school and looks happy and well and healthy.
Made my entire *week*.
I also had a great conversation with an 88-year-old woman who'd left college when her mom died to raise her two younger brothers...just before WWII started. Amazing.
And a third patient, a woman whom I'd admitted a few days ago, said "Don't tell any of the other nurses, but I think you're better than any of them. I like you."
Some days are just great, and then there's the gravy....
Like pulling up to the local drive-in burger place and seeing a woman who used to be an old patient of mine from Planned Parenthood, some six years ago. She has three kids now and is about to go back to school and looks happy and well and healthy.
Thursday, June 24, 2004
Good things about being single
1. You can clean the entire place and an hour later, it will still be as you left it.
2. You can clean the entire place in an hour, since you don't have to have a place big enough to house multiple people.
3. Ordering pizza with what you like on it, not what somebody else likes on it.
4. Two beers is enough.
5. Never finding your toothbrush inexplicably wet.
6. The seat *stays* down.
7. Laundry. Not as much of it, that is.
8. Walking around naked in your place without having somebody else grabbing you, snickering at your butt, or commenting on your cellulite.
9. Dates. (this might also go on a "bad things about being single" list)
10. Not having to wake up next to anybody unless you want to.
2. You can clean the entire place in an hour, since you don't have to have a place big enough to house multiple people.
3. Ordering pizza with what you like on it, not what somebody else likes on it.
4. Two beers is enough.
5. Never finding your toothbrush inexplicably wet.
6. The seat *stays* down.
7. Laundry. Not as much of it, that is.
8. Walking around naked in your place without having somebody else grabbing you, snickering at your butt, or commenting on your cellulite.
9. Dates. (this might also go on a "bad things about being single" list)
10. Not having to wake up next to anybody unless you want to.
Oh, my freaking God.
This is going to be another one of those hard things to talk about. I will, however, provide happy snippets for those willing to slog through the difficult stuff. They'll be down at the bottom, so be patient.
Background
We are not an all-purpose hospital. There is no obstetrical or labor and delivery unit, there is no dedicated cardiology unit, there's no pediatric unit. We work with several other fine hospitals within spitting distance with those things, so we don't do 'em. We do neurology and plastic surgery and tricky cancer treatments. Specialization means quality care in some cases.
However, once in a while we get a pediatric patient with something that the kid-doctors across the street don't feel comfortable treating. That was the case this week, when I got a teenager from the ICU.
She has a fairly rare blood disorder that can cause problems with clotting and hemoglobin levels and so on. She'd stroked out once as a child, and we'd done some stuff in concert with the child specialists to try to keep her from stroking again.
Unfortunately, the things we did didn't work. Worse, they screwed her up royally. This happens once in a while; you can't predict if or when a coil or clip or stent is going to come loose or migrate. You can't tell which patient is going to bleed suddenly and require emergency surgery. She ended up in the operating room getting a frontal lobectomy (chopping out a piece of brain to save the rest) after a major bleed and uncontrollable swelling put her life in danger.
Foreground
She came back to me two days ago. A month before she had left our floor on her way to the OR talking, laughing, walking, and with a wicked sense of humor. She returned with a dent in her skull, eyes that won't go to the right, and no use of most of her body. She's got a tube in her stomach, a tube to breathe through, a tube in her bladder, and a vacant expression. She knows what's going on, to a large extent, but is trapped behind the wall that repeated brain injury puts up.
They'd kept her in the ICU for a month to make sure she was stable. During that time, her hair matted and her skin got ashy and yeasty, nobody really talked to her...it sounds horrible, but it's the way of intensive care: you're more concerned with keeping your dying patient alive than with making sure they're clean and stimulated.
Still. I scrubbed her down yesterday and the washcloths came out black. Not the usual caramel-brown coloring that you see when a dark-skinned patient sheds skin cells, but black. With dirt. And sweat. And old shed skin. I cut the mats out of her hair and noticed that in some places she was bald--the matting had gotten bad enough that the hair had been pulled out by the roots. I rubbed her down with cocoa butter from head to foot in an attempt to soften some of the dead skin on her scalp, her back, her arms. I used a pick on her hair until I got the worst of the tangles out. During the entire process, she didn't grimace or fight me; she just laid there, occasionally closing her eyes and moving slightly into my hands as I rubbed her down.
Her mother was amazed at the change. Her pediatrician and I were furious at the state she'd gotten into. Most of the nurses at our hospital are white, and this kid was black. It's not that nobody took care of her *because* she was black, just that white folks don't generally know what sort of special care black skin and hair requires. Frankly, at a certain point, you have to get over your own fear of looking like some sort of ignorant cracker and *ask* how to take care of hair and skin that's different from your own. If you don't, your patient will end up with bedsores and broken skin and compromised health.
It wasn't just that she was dirty. It was that nobody had thought for a minute that she might need different care than they would, if they were lying intubated for a month in a bed.
A rare occurance
I almost broke down, talking over her case with the pediatrician. We ranged over social issues to personal issues to family issues, and I just got more and more frustrated with how my patient and her family had been treated. There was much more to it than her cleanliness, believe me. It was like her family, because they're quiet and shy, had just been forgotten.
But dammit, things will be different now. They *will* be. This girl will be clean and comfortable and happy. And someday, if I do a good enough job, she'll recognize me and smile at me like she does at her doctors and her mother.
Happy moments from the past week
1. A charming older man calling me an angel simply because I brought him a cup of coffee.
2. Hugs from the biker couple who'd dreaded coming in to our facility, thinking that nobody would respect them or treat them well because they both have multiple tattoos and leather vests.
3. The response from my patient's pediatrician when she saw the care I had given her patient.
4. Seeing some of our residents circulating back in after a rotation at a different hospital.
5. Flirting madly with an 89-year-old patient with myasthenia gravis and seeing him smile.
Background
We are not an all-purpose hospital. There is no obstetrical or labor and delivery unit, there is no dedicated cardiology unit, there's no pediatric unit. We work with several other fine hospitals within spitting distance with those things, so we don't do 'em. We do neurology and plastic surgery and tricky cancer treatments. Specialization means quality care in some cases.
However, once in a while we get a pediatric patient with something that the kid-doctors across the street don't feel comfortable treating. That was the case this week, when I got a teenager from the ICU.
She has a fairly rare blood disorder that can cause problems with clotting and hemoglobin levels and so on. She'd stroked out once as a child, and we'd done some stuff in concert with the child specialists to try to keep her from stroking again.
Unfortunately, the things we did didn't work. Worse, they screwed her up royally. This happens once in a while; you can't predict if or when a coil or clip or stent is going to come loose or migrate. You can't tell which patient is going to bleed suddenly and require emergency surgery. She ended up in the operating room getting a frontal lobectomy (chopping out a piece of brain to save the rest) after a major bleed and uncontrollable swelling put her life in danger.
Foreground
She came back to me two days ago. A month before she had left our floor on her way to the OR talking, laughing, walking, and with a wicked sense of humor. She returned with a dent in her skull, eyes that won't go to the right, and no use of most of her body. She's got a tube in her stomach, a tube to breathe through, a tube in her bladder, and a vacant expression. She knows what's going on, to a large extent, but is trapped behind the wall that repeated brain injury puts up.
They'd kept her in the ICU for a month to make sure she was stable. During that time, her hair matted and her skin got ashy and yeasty, nobody really talked to her...it sounds horrible, but it's the way of intensive care: you're more concerned with keeping your dying patient alive than with making sure they're clean and stimulated.
Still. I scrubbed her down yesterday and the washcloths came out black. Not the usual caramel-brown coloring that you see when a dark-skinned patient sheds skin cells, but black. With dirt. And sweat. And old shed skin. I cut the mats out of her hair and noticed that in some places she was bald--the matting had gotten bad enough that the hair had been pulled out by the roots. I rubbed her down with cocoa butter from head to foot in an attempt to soften some of the dead skin on her scalp, her back, her arms. I used a pick on her hair until I got the worst of the tangles out. During the entire process, she didn't grimace or fight me; she just laid there, occasionally closing her eyes and moving slightly into my hands as I rubbed her down.
Her mother was amazed at the change. Her pediatrician and I were furious at the state she'd gotten into. Most of the nurses at our hospital are white, and this kid was black. It's not that nobody took care of her *because* she was black, just that white folks don't generally know what sort of special care black skin and hair requires. Frankly, at a certain point, you have to get over your own fear of looking like some sort of ignorant cracker and *ask* how to take care of hair and skin that's different from your own. If you don't, your patient will end up with bedsores and broken skin and compromised health.
It wasn't just that she was dirty. It was that nobody had thought for a minute that she might need different care than they would, if they were lying intubated for a month in a bed.
A rare occurance
I almost broke down, talking over her case with the pediatrician. We ranged over social issues to personal issues to family issues, and I just got more and more frustrated with how my patient and her family had been treated. There was much more to it than her cleanliness, believe me. It was like her family, because they're quiet and shy, had just been forgotten.
But dammit, things will be different now. They *will* be. This girl will be clean and comfortable and happy. And someday, if I do a good enough job, she'll recognize me and smile at me like she does at her doctors and her mother.
Happy moments from the past week
1. A charming older man calling me an angel simply because I brought him a cup of coffee.
2. Hugs from the biker couple who'd dreaded coming in to our facility, thinking that nobody would respect them or treat them well because they both have multiple tattoos and leather vests.
3. The response from my patient's pediatrician when she saw the care I had given her patient.
4. Seeing some of our residents circulating back in after a rotation at a different hospital.
5. Flirting madly with an 89-year-old patient with myasthenia gravis and seeing him smile.
Saturday, June 19, 2004
Unscheduled non-job fluff
Today's Phone Conversation From Weirdland
*ring* *ring*
Me: Hello?
Voice: Diane?
Me: Beg pardon?
Voice: Is this Diane Wilson?
Me: Nope, sorry. Wrong number.
Voice: But your name is Wilson, right?
Me: Yep, but I'm not Diane.
Voice: Oh. Um...do you happen to *know* Diane, or where I could get in touch with her?
A Stupid Thing To Say
At the convenience store this morning I was faced with a thin young man with dark wavy hair brushed ever-so-slightly forward and a pair of wide clear grey eyes. Heavy eyebrows, well-shaped lips. Slight gap between his front teeth. Entirely too young to be away from his mama, but cute as a collie pup.
He let me buy Certain Restricted Items after I rattled off my birthdate (my ID was in the car) and assured him that I wasn't the ABC in disguise.
Then I asked, "D'you ever get sick of people telling you you look just like Frodo?"
"After I did that nice thing for you!" he protested.
"No, no," I said, "I meant it in a commiserating, I-look-like-Molly-Ringwald way. Really."
He said, "Yeah, I do, kinda."
Fuck this shit, man.
After three weeks of diet and exercise, watching my fat intake and cutting out alcohol, running on the treadmill, lifting until my shoulders groan, and generally being miserably hungry and sore all the time, I discovered this morning that I am now too large to fit into the clothing that fit three weeks ago.
From here on out I'm going to live on Whoppers and Bud.
Pity my poor sister
My sister and her boyfriend just adopted a new dog. He's an American Bull Terrier cross (that's Pit Bull to all you non-technical readers) who is dignified, calm, affectionate, and watchful. He has only one apparent fault so far, and that's a certain exuberance around pups of the opposite sex. This wouldn't be a problem, except that he weighs sixty-five pounds and is solid muscle. Exuberant muscle is hard to deal with.
Beloved Sis and Lucky Man have decided to give him a few weeks to make sure that he's trainable--or rather, that they can train him out of lunging, enthusiastically and affectionately, at female dogs. If they can't, they'll return him to the adoption service. I have no doubt that he'll do fine.
So I'm going to sally out tomorrow and buy them a selection of the finest noisemaking dog toys available on the market today. Beloved Sis sent my old Greyhound a Screaming Monkey toy (bite it and it screams "ayaaaa ayaaaa ayaaa aiiiiii aiiii aiiii aiiiii") that the dog loved. Her dog is getting two. And some Kongs with holes for treats. And squeaky things. And jingly things. And, if I can find it, something noisy that glows in the dark.
I owe my sister a lot.
*ring* *ring*
Me: Hello?
Voice: Diane?
Me: Beg pardon?
Voice: Is this Diane Wilson?
Me: Nope, sorry. Wrong number.
Voice: But your name is Wilson, right?
Me: Yep, but I'm not Diane.
Voice: Oh. Um...do you happen to *know* Diane, or where I could get in touch with her?
A Stupid Thing To Say
At the convenience store this morning I was faced with a thin young man with dark wavy hair brushed ever-so-slightly forward and a pair of wide clear grey eyes. Heavy eyebrows, well-shaped lips. Slight gap between his front teeth. Entirely too young to be away from his mama, but cute as a collie pup.
He let me buy Certain Restricted Items after I rattled off my birthdate (my ID was in the car) and assured him that I wasn't the ABC in disguise.
Then I asked, "D'you ever get sick of people telling you you look just like Frodo?"
"After I did that nice thing for you!" he protested.
"No, no," I said, "I meant it in a commiserating, I-look-like-Molly-Ringwald way. Really."
He said, "Yeah, I do, kinda."
Fuck this shit, man.
After three weeks of diet and exercise, watching my fat intake and cutting out alcohol, running on the treadmill, lifting until my shoulders groan, and generally being miserably hungry and sore all the time, I discovered this morning that I am now too large to fit into the clothing that fit three weeks ago.
From here on out I'm going to live on Whoppers and Bud.
Pity my poor sister
My sister and her boyfriend just adopted a new dog. He's an American Bull Terrier cross (that's Pit Bull to all you non-technical readers) who is dignified, calm, affectionate, and watchful. He has only one apparent fault so far, and that's a certain exuberance around pups of the opposite sex. This wouldn't be a problem, except that he weighs sixty-five pounds and is solid muscle. Exuberant muscle is hard to deal with.
Beloved Sis and Lucky Man have decided to give him a few weeks to make sure that he's trainable--or rather, that they can train him out of lunging, enthusiastically and affectionately, at female dogs. If they can't, they'll return him to the adoption service. I have no doubt that he'll do fine.
So I'm going to sally out tomorrow and buy them a selection of the finest noisemaking dog toys available on the market today. Beloved Sis sent my old Greyhound a Screaming Monkey toy (bite it and it screams "ayaaaa ayaaaa ayaaa aiiiiii aiiii aiiii aiiiii") that the dog loved. Her dog is getting two. And some Kongs with holes for treats. And squeaky things. And jingly things. And, if I can find it, something noisy that glows in the dark.
I owe my sister a lot.
Wednesday, June 16, 2004
Pity my poor downstairs neighbor.
Last night I stayed up until well past midnight, cleaning and lecturing myself on not being a dickhead (see previous post). At about midnight-thirty, I opened the door to the porch, intending to let in some fresh air.
Instead, I disturbed a sizable red wasp that had been perching there.
Cue thumps, bumps, and "EUGH! BLAR!" noises as I knocked it off my shoulder onto my foot, off my foot onto my shirt, and off my shirt onto the wall.
Quick cut to me panting, retreating across the suddenly-very-small apartment, searching for something with which to whack the wasp.
I ended up killing it with a rolled-up copy of my Advanced Cardiac Life Support review text. It took a lot of whacking and much dancing around to avoid the dying, drunken, broken wasp as it attempted to take its revenge.
Eugh. Blar. Yuck. |||shudder|||
Instead, I disturbed a sizable red wasp that had been perching there.
Cue thumps, bumps, and "EUGH! BLAR!" noises as I knocked it off my shoulder onto my foot, off my foot onto my shirt, and off my shirt onto the wall.
Quick cut to me panting, retreating across the suddenly-very-small apartment, searching for something with which to whack the wasp.
I ended up killing it with a rolled-up copy of my Advanced Cardiac Life Support review text. It took a lot of whacking and much dancing around to avoid the dying, drunken, broken wasp as it attempted to take its revenge.
Eugh. Blar. Yuck. |||shudder|||
Tuesday, June 15, 2004
Land Mines
Just after I got divorced (well, actually about five months afterwards), friend Juliet told me that I should watch for land mines. "Land Mines" being defined as "canalized ways of thinking that worked for you in the past but now will throw a monkey wrench into your life."
Background
The man I was married to had a crazy mother. I don't mean Collected Precious Moments Figurines crazy; I mean Threatened to Shoot Us On Our Wedding Day And Never Really Improved crazy. I was probably the only bride in recent local history who chose her wedding dress with an eye to how well it would hide a flak vest.
Looking back, I think that probably should've been a clue.
Anyway.
TMIWMT went crazy, slowly, over the nine years of our marriage. Part of that was very likely my fault--I made demands on him that, had he had fewer stresses or a less-nutso family, he could've probably handled. I couldn't see that, though, and so kept pushing and pulling and yelling and generally making his life harder and harder until he couldn't see any way out besides fucking around on me. For him to do that means that he must've been miserable beyond expressing. I know I was.
So. Crazy mother who makes crazy demands, like "come over this very minute and clean my house, which means taking a shovel to the piles of rotten food all over and the dead rats and so on". Crazy schedule trying to start a variety of small businesses over the years and keep them going. Craziness in that he went to California and ended up working for another crazy person and staying away for better than a year.
Given that this was the first significant relationship of my adult life, and given that it lasted twelve years, you can see what I'm up against in the Land Mine department.
Foreground
Pal Keith can probably attest to the fact that when somebody gradually goes nuts, you don't notice right away. Instead, if you love them, you try to make them saner by changing your behavior and your reactions. (Parenthetical note: this is why the saying, "You can't change a person, but you can change your reaction to them" is so damning. It ought to be "You can't change a person, so run the hell away if they're nuts.")
Everything will eventually, if you're involved with a real nutcase, become your fault. Note here that I'm not talking about abusive relationships; that's a whole different kettle of fish. Abuse, be it emotional or physical or both, involves one person purposefully destroying another person's sense of self in order to gain and maintain control of them.
Being involved with a nutcase involves a person pushing aside their own ideas of what's sane and second-guessing their reactions in order to try to make things normal. Eventually this becomes second nature. Then you're really screwed.
Where I am now is screwed
Man A. and I reconciled a couple of weeks ago. I like him. A lot.
Tonight he's over at his mother's house, fixing some stuff she can't fix and doing a couple of quickie remodeling jobs. I'd like to see him Friday, but he's not sure how work is going to be, so I might not get to.
Work. Mother. Work. Mother. Work. Mother.
You can see the land mines here, right? Thought you could.
A normal person would say, "Gosh, what a nice guy Man A. is. He's helping his mom out, his nice, sane, normal, charming mom..." (I've met her and know this for the truth) "...and isn't that responsible and caring of him? Isn't it nice that he comes from such a close-knit family?" A normal person would understand that occasionally work is crazy-making, especially when you cook for a living.
Unfortunately, I am not normal. I am canalized to believe that Mother and Work equal Abuse and Desertion.
So I've been cleaning the apartment for the last two hours, talking out loud to myself in an attempt to defuse these particular land mines.
1. I get frightened when Man A. doesn't want to see me right now or can't drop everything to do so. This is totally unreasonable on my part. For God's sake, he's a grown man with a family and so on. Besides that, if he were clingy and remora-like, I would be flipped out by *that*.
2. But there's still a little, irritating part of me that curls up into a ball and rocks back and forth when he says we might not see each other this week. That's the part of me that spent fifteen months asking her husband when he would come home, and another seven years keeping dinner warm for him when he worked late.
3. If I could cut that whimpering part of me out and throw it away, I would. In a second. Because that's the part of me that's scared of everything, and being afraid makes me treat people unfairly and illogically.
4. Unfortunately, you can't cut tumors out of your soul as easily as you can cut them out of your body. So that whimpering bit is staying for now, and I'm not really sure how to deal with it, other than by making very sure that I treat Man A. well, without the whimpering bit's influence. Or with as little of it as I can manage, at any rate.
These are land mines. Clearing a field of land mines, especially when it's your entire life, pretty much, is hard.
Do they sell special boots for this?
Background
The man I was married to had a crazy mother. I don't mean Collected Precious Moments Figurines crazy; I mean Threatened to Shoot Us On Our Wedding Day And Never Really Improved crazy. I was probably the only bride in recent local history who chose her wedding dress with an eye to how well it would hide a flak vest.
Looking back, I think that probably should've been a clue.
Anyway.
TMIWMT went crazy, slowly, over the nine years of our marriage. Part of that was very likely my fault--I made demands on him that, had he had fewer stresses or a less-nutso family, he could've probably handled. I couldn't see that, though, and so kept pushing and pulling and yelling and generally making his life harder and harder until he couldn't see any way out besides fucking around on me. For him to do that means that he must've been miserable beyond expressing. I know I was.
So. Crazy mother who makes crazy demands, like "come over this very minute and clean my house, which means taking a shovel to the piles of rotten food all over and the dead rats and so on". Crazy schedule trying to start a variety of small businesses over the years and keep them going. Craziness in that he went to California and ended up working for another crazy person and staying away for better than a year.
Given that this was the first significant relationship of my adult life, and given that it lasted twelve years, you can see what I'm up against in the Land Mine department.
Foreground
Pal Keith can probably attest to the fact that when somebody gradually goes nuts, you don't notice right away. Instead, if you love them, you try to make them saner by changing your behavior and your reactions. (Parenthetical note: this is why the saying, "You can't change a person, but you can change your reaction to them" is so damning. It ought to be "You can't change a person, so run the hell away if they're nuts.")
Everything will eventually, if you're involved with a real nutcase, become your fault. Note here that I'm not talking about abusive relationships; that's a whole different kettle of fish. Abuse, be it emotional or physical or both, involves one person purposefully destroying another person's sense of self in order to gain and maintain control of them.
Being involved with a nutcase involves a person pushing aside their own ideas of what's sane and second-guessing their reactions in order to try to make things normal. Eventually this becomes second nature. Then you're really screwed.
Where I am now is screwed
Man A. and I reconciled a couple of weeks ago. I like him. A lot.
Tonight he's over at his mother's house, fixing some stuff she can't fix and doing a couple of quickie remodeling jobs. I'd like to see him Friday, but he's not sure how work is going to be, so I might not get to.
Work. Mother. Work. Mother. Work. Mother.
You can see the land mines here, right? Thought you could.
A normal person would say, "Gosh, what a nice guy Man A. is. He's helping his mom out, his nice, sane, normal, charming mom..." (I've met her and know this for the truth) "...and isn't that responsible and caring of him? Isn't it nice that he comes from such a close-knit family?" A normal person would understand that occasionally work is crazy-making, especially when you cook for a living.
Unfortunately, I am not normal. I am canalized to believe that Mother and Work equal Abuse and Desertion.
So I've been cleaning the apartment for the last two hours, talking out loud to myself in an attempt to defuse these particular land mines.
1. I get frightened when Man A. doesn't want to see me right now or can't drop everything to do so. This is totally unreasonable on my part. For God's sake, he's a grown man with a family and so on. Besides that, if he were clingy and remora-like, I would be flipped out by *that*.
2. But there's still a little, irritating part of me that curls up into a ball and rocks back and forth when he says we might not see each other this week. That's the part of me that spent fifteen months asking her husband when he would come home, and another seven years keeping dinner warm for him when he worked late.
3. If I could cut that whimpering part of me out and throw it away, I would. In a second. Because that's the part of me that's scared of everything, and being afraid makes me treat people unfairly and illogically.
4. Unfortunately, you can't cut tumors out of your soul as easily as you can cut them out of your body. So that whimpering bit is staying for now, and I'm not really sure how to deal with it, other than by making very sure that I treat Man A. well, without the whimpering bit's influence. Or with as little of it as I can manage, at any rate.
These are land mines. Clearing a field of land mines, especially when it's your entire life, pretty much, is hard.
Do they sell special boots for this?
Surly to bed, surly to rise...
It has been a Vaguely Grumpy Day. Maybe it's the heat. Maybe it's the humidity. Maybe it's lack of sex. Maybe it's lack of beer. Maybe it's lack of calories.
Yesterday, however, kicked ass. I went to a nice little scrub shop in the next town over that was packed *full* of interesting scrubs. I have a reputation at work to maintain, being the only nurse there with sushi scrubs, scrubs with cowboys on 'em, and scrubs showing Stepfordesque women who obviously love their appliances. Thanks to Beloved Sister for those.
The Haul yesterday was as follows:
One pair royal blue scrubs with multicolored embroidery around the neck and sleeves. The top made me think of saris.
One top with chickens on it. Chickens. I ask you, what less-likely pattern could you find for a scrub top?
One top from French Kitty, with winking Mod cat-faces on it.
One set of scrubs in a bluish lavender, which will undoubtedly freak out my coworkers, since I hate pastels.
One set of Dickies dark denim scrubs.
Two pairs each of navy and black pants.
And, when I got home, my white Dansko clogs had arrived. And, on the way up to my apartment, the nice man from the building across the lot gave me several fresh-caught sea trout filets. Not that I know what sea trout is, or what I ought to do with it, but I'm going to experiment tonight.
The marine life around here ranges from the inadvisable (gar, anyone?) to the bizarre ($10-per-pound scallops) to the acquired taste (squid and catfish and other things too strange to mention). I'm thinking that "sea trout" might actually be a name for something you don't really want to know much about. Like "monkfish". I saw a monkfish in a seafood shop once, still wholly corporate, and had nightmares for weeks.
Anyway, back to the scrubs. I think I might just be grumpy today because I have all these amazingly nifty things to wear to work, and I still have today and tomorrow off. The feeling of being cheated will stop abruptly at 4:20 Thursday morning, but for now it seems as good an explanation as any other.
Hell Cat said I should eat, nap, and get up again in a better mood. She said it works for her. She and I had salmon for lunch (her portion plain, mine with pesto) and now we will nap.
Later I will clean the oven and mop and vacuum and then sail out in the evening for a nice little drink at the local bar.
And perhaps I will be less surly tomorrow.
Yesterday, however, kicked ass. I went to a nice little scrub shop in the next town over that was packed *full* of interesting scrubs. I have a reputation at work to maintain, being the only nurse there with sushi scrubs, scrubs with cowboys on 'em, and scrubs showing Stepfordesque women who obviously love their appliances. Thanks to Beloved Sister for those.
The Haul yesterday was as follows:
One pair royal blue scrubs with multicolored embroidery around the neck and sleeves. The top made me think of saris.
One top with chickens on it. Chickens. I ask you, what less-likely pattern could you find for a scrub top?
One top from French Kitty, with winking Mod cat-faces on it.
One set of scrubs in a bluish lavender, which will undoubtedly freak out my coworkers, since I hate pastels.
One set of Dickies dark denim scrubs.
Two pairs each of navy and black pants.
And, when I got home, my white Dansko clogs had arrived. And, on the way up to my apartment, the nice man from the building across the lot gave me several fresh-caught sea trout filets. Not that I know what sea trout is, or what I ought to do with it, but I'm going to experiment tonight.
The marine life around here ranges from the inadvisable (gar, anyone?) to the bizarre ($10-per-pound scallops) to the acquired taste (squid and catfish and other things too strange to mention). I'm thinking that "sea trout" might actually be a name for something you don't really want to know much about. Like "monkfish". I saw a monkfish in a seafood shop once, still wholly corporate, and had nightmares for weeks.
Anyway, back to the scrubs. I think I might just be grumpy today because I have all these amazingly nifty things to wear to work, and I still have today and tomorrow off. The feeling of being cheated will stop abruptly at 4:20 Thursday morning, but for now it seems as good an explanation as any other.
Hell Cat said I should eat, nap, and get up again in a better mood. She said it works for her. She and I had salmon for lunch (her portion plain, mine with pesto) and now we will nap.
Later I will clean the oven and mop and vacuum and then sail out in the evening for a nice little drink at the local bar.
And perhaps I will be less surly tomorrow.
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