My Summer from Hell - Part One: The Surgery

I just got a computer, yesterday, after 5 months of being without so my first task after restoring all my files and programs is posting for you guys. Thank you, Black Friday sales for decent computers cheap enough I can afford. The last time that I was without dedicated computer access for this long was in 1994, my freshman year of college, but most people didn't have computers then, so it wasn't quite as jarring then as it is now, especially when my entire life exists online.

So I wrote on Cheeseblarg's facebook page a while ago that y'all would find it hard to believe all the shit I had been through this summer, for those of you who aren't following along there, and you probably won't, but I assure you, it's all true, and it's absolute bullshit.

My wish for the upcoming year is that I never have to hear the words, "We're afraid it might be cancer," ever a-fucking-gain from a doctor. This summer started with a mysterious mass in my cervix. I went to the doctor in June because I was experiencing this weird feeling of all of my insides dropping when I stood up for more than 15 minutes which in itself is pretty alarming, but it was accompanied with sweating and feeling like I was going to pass out. Once it got to the point that I couldn't stand long enough to shower without feeling like I was dying, I decided I should probably do something about it, so I bucked up and went to have my lady bits probed by a stranger. I mean, she was a professional, not just some random person on the street with a speculum and a hankering for some gynecological exploring.

Since scraping my lady bits turned up nothing, we went to the next step of sonic spelunking. This revealed the aforementioned "mysterious mass" and then we went to the next step of traumatizing me forever and ever, amen.

Frankly, the whole business gives me more ammunition for the idea that there is a grand conspiracy of hatred for women in this world because I cannot believe that any kind of human rights coalition would allow the equivalent to a cervical/uterine biopsy to be done to any man without general anesthetic. And I've heard that testicular biopsies are done under local and still hurt like hell, but I'm arguing that that is not really equivalent, because testes are not muscles that try to slam shut when you drill pieces out of them causing your entire body to try to escape from what's going on in your nether regions. It was really awful.  So awful in fact, that before I even left that appointment, I made plans with my doctor, before the results came back, to have my uterus and accompanying accouterments removed as soon as possible so I would no longer have a cervix so that procedure could never ever happen to me again.

And my uterus was mint, guys, never been used, though it had been remodeled monthly since I was about 10, so I don't know if I could have gotten full price for it. Anyway, it's totally lost its value now because I took it out of the box. At the end of August, I had them remove my reproductive organs (though I kept my ovaries so they can grow cysts and be generally annoying to keep me off of hormone replacement therapy), and I finally finished healing last month after one of the holes popped open in a cinematic fashion when we thought they were all almost closed.
So that's the story of how I spent 3 months worrying that I had cancer before having a hysterectomy. I didn't have uterine or cervical cancer, but my cervix was faulty and if I had kept it, I would have continued to need biopsies regularly and it would have continued to make me feel like I was dying, and frankly, I wasn't planning on using it anyway, and I'm much happier to have it gone.

Spending all the time in a gynecologist's office, of course, led to appointments with mammography. And instead of just being routine, of course, I got my next, "it might be cancer." I was supposed to be going tomorrow, in fact, to have a lumpectomy to ensure that the tumor they found in my breast during the first biopsy is completely non-cancerous, but I got an ear infection, so now I get to add two more weeks to my 3 months of waiting to find out that this one is nothing too.

And I know that countless people who aren't so lucky would love to be told that it is nothing repeatedly, but having six months of your body constantly trolling you that is mutating and is gonna kill you only to have it yell "PSYCH" after you've had surgeries and near constant stress diarrhea, is relieving as hell, but also really fucking annoying that you had to go through all of that in the first place when your body could have just stopped growing benign tumors in the first damned place.

So that's part one of my trauma. I'm thinking I can wrap it up in one other post, hopefully, next week.

When Fruit Cups Attack

So I got these delicious sounding Del Monte cinnamon peach fruit cups on clearance. I was going to eat one while laying in bed watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer (up to season 5, whew hew), and I know they have a tendency to burble over some when you open them because of the vacuum seal, so I set myself up with a towel over my chest/neck, and slowly peeled the plastic lid off the cup.

 Apparently, this cup was SUPER vacuum-sealed because I was treated to a powerful nasal douche of cinnamon peach juice to my sinuses. I was amused, but also quite uncomfortable nasally. It was delicious (since I ate the cup after cleaning up the incident, the post nasal drip was a little off putting though), however I wish they opened without exploding and/or squirting long distances. Especially since they are for kids, or for adults who eat fruit cups in bed while watching supernatural shows made for kids.

 Also, I've passed this on to Del Monte and asked them if I could send them my doctor's bills  if I get a sinus infection from the peach cinnamon sugar water still lingering inside my face, but they are staunchly ignoring me, just like all the boys I ever loved...


Most hilarious comment when I posted about it on Facebook:

Just proves that no matter how well you prepare for a known eventuality, the universe is just going to shoot cinnamon peach juice up your nose anyway. - Lora-Lee

One-Uppers and Grief Shamers

While writing my post about Suffering Magnets, I came to the realization that I may be a One-Upper.

You know, those people who tell you something of equal or greater horror when you tell them something bad that happened to you?


I don't mean to be a One-Upper, it is just that people tell me something has happened to them and then, in an effort to relate, I tell a story about something similar that has happened to me, which usually tends to be a bit more terrible because, as we have established, things are always bafflingly fucked up in my life. So I hear the words just flowing out of my head and I think, 'SHUT UP, JUST SHUT UP. They think you are playing the Grief Olympics.. they think you are an asshole, just shut the hell up'... but OMG it just feels so good to share grief, to remove it from your stupid jerk head and let it out into the world like a little grief dragon, to let it stretch and spread its wings after keeping it cooped up in your belfry of a brain ALL THE TIME.

I'd like to quietly listen and say, "Oh jeepers! That is just so awful, you poor person, what can I do?" but it is rarely what ends up happening. Even though I try... really really hard.

 But in no way am I trying to be a Grief Shamer.

Grief Shamers are the type of people who won't let you have a second of complaining without reminding you that no matter what you are are upset about, other people have it 7 billion times worse so you should just STFU and be glad your grandpa was eaten by a tiger because your ENTIRE FAMILY could have been eaten by A STREAK OF TIGERS EQUIPPED WITH LASERS!

I don't even believe in shaming "First World Problems."  I think sharing suffering make it suck less and there is no shame in that. So, if people wanna complain to me about Bravo's Twitter team spoiling the winner of Top Chef for every time zone other than Eastern, like a bunch of assholes, or finding that their bag of chips is lacking in delicious powdered flavor, I have no problem with that. I just have a problem if you don't want to hear about the time my Chili Cheese Fritos were kinda flavorless, too, and were full of bees that stung my throat and I had to go to the emergency room, but I couldn't get in because it was full of wolves... with lasers.

Down low, too slow!

I hate high fiving. A lot.

High fiving humans...
I will high five the shit out of animals.
Except birds, fuck birds, but I will high five any hamster that puts its creepy little alien paw up for me to gently tap with my palm (because it is a tiny cute hamster and full on high five might hurt it).

High fiving humans holds no interest for me because they judge you when you are awkward and your hand isn't a fucking physics major, so you kinda miss their hand on the forward trajectory, not hitting it right on, and then they know you have spacial issues, and they don't say anything but you can see it in the way that they avoid your eyes.

Or you go for the high five and they do the mercy hand position and there you are, slightly horrified, looking like you are defending yourself again a bully who wants to break your wrists and they are clutching at your hands, jumping up and down, excited, and you are just receding to your happy place until this stranger danger is over.

And it is stranger danger, because anyone who really knows me knows I don't want to touch their hands. They also probably know that they don't want to touch my hands (see the post about my activities on road trips). I'd rather most people put their genitals on me than their grubby dirty hands.


That job I had, the one that I got fired from, they were staunch believers in high fives.  My soul died a little every time I was forced to partake in their bizarre hand touching ritual. Thankfully they fired me though, so I didn't have to come up with bizarre reasons to dodge being touched.  I had already considered "leprosy from an armadillo bite" and "mail order ebola that accidentally got shipped to me instead of my terrorist next door neighbors."  They probably would have just gotten hazmat suits for everyone and upped the "up highs" to boost my morale.

ANIMAL HIGH FIVE CHALLENGE! 

The best ones will be posted later this week with a link to your blog. Draw them up and send them to my email (cheeseblarg at live dot com). You have until Wednesday, 11:59pm my time.

 p.s. Your drawings don't have to be drawings if you'd like to work in another medium, but it has to be self made.

                                     

I selected this post to be featured on my blog’s page at Humor Blogs.

A.A.A.D.D.

Dearest parents (especially mother), you should either not read this or, if you insist upon doing so, you should take a lot of illicit date rape sorts of drugs before reading this so you don't recall it and never discuss it with me. Let's go with never reading it, okay? Awesome. 


I'm not kidding either. 
Okay, on to the post ...


I was just reminded, when the boy I had a crush on in middle school added me on Facebook, that I was a fucking psycho when I was a teenager.  I think I owe pretty much everyone with a penis (who was not an immediate member of my family) that I knew from the ages of 11- 19 a major apology.  See, when I say "the" boy I had a crush on, I mean ONE of the 7 billion boys I had a crush on, but  definitely the one I spent the most time terrorizing, from my recollection. No, wait, the one I spent the most time terrorizing in eighth grade, and also part of 7th. I terrorized the hell out of a bunch of guys. I had a problem... we shall refer to it as attention and affection deficit disorder (AAADD).
I was  really bad, as a teenager, at ascertaining when someone was attracted to me. That is, people for the most part, weren't attracted to me, but if they were willing to make eye contact with me, or respond to me when I spoke and I found them even the remotest bit attractive, I was pretty sure they were in love with me. Or maybe it was that I was pretty sure I was in love with them, and any modicum of attention convinced me that the feeling was mutual or could, through repeated pestering and writing of REALLY bad poetry, be cultivated.

If you could imagine Chris Farley.. hell, you don't have to imagine. Here is a clip.

Yes, that was me, only quite a bit cuter. But the thing is, there was no chance of me having any sort of normal relationship with anyone at that time because responding to me was enough to set me off in a pattern of psychotic smothering attention. If I could just get my foot in the proverbial door, they were sure to adore the ever loving shit out of me... but the reality of it was, they were more than likely terrified of me, because my attention was fairly terrifying. And that was when I wasn't thinking of anything more than just holding hands and pop kisses.  I was probably about 42 times more terrifying when I was trying to seduce every male who interacted with me, not excluding my 9th grade Math substitute, some weird French guy who owned a leather furniture design company who may have been in his late 40s, my best friend, who was a male (the poor guy), C.B. Barnes, and our 25 year old neighbor.

Of course, people who WERE actually attracted to me, I was oblivious of.  If they approached me first, I was suspicious and bitchy.  Yup, bitchy is the word for what I was, in that it is a word that doesn't start with a C that would probably be a better word for how I acted, but people seem to have an aversion to that word for some reason that I am unable to fathom. Anyway, I mean that I was a jerk version of crazy when I wasn't being otherwise crazy and writing, have I mentioned, REALLY horrible poetry... like the kind where each line starts with a letter of the boy's name, and which I carefully calligraphized on floofy purple stationary that I might have rubbed on a perfume sample page of a beauty magazine so he knew it was from a girl and that I then stuck in his locker. After I stalked him and saw that he had seen the poem and hadn't come running to confess his love for me, though he was one of the most sought after boys in school and I had no concept of "out of your league,"  I then carefully extracted said horrible purple calligraphied poem out of his locker while pretending to go to the bathroom, so that it couldn't be used to humiliate me any worse than I had already done myself. Wait that wasn't clear. I meant, I asked my teacher to go to the bathroom so I could stop by his locker and go mission impossible on it, not that I was pretending to pee while I was shoving my fingers through the air holes of the locker to get the embarrassing fucking thing out.

Anyway, yeah, sorry boys, and maybe some girls too, for making you uncomfortable and for being unable to handle having female hormones. I'm much more balanced now, though I am still prone to bouts of adult AAADD... I am just aware of things like restraining orders and mace now, so I have toned it down and there is nothing to be afraid of. And also sorry for the poem. You didn't deserve that. Nobody deserves that... nobody.

Another time I thought I had cancer.

I learned yesterday that I don't like having needles stuck into my face.  I had an inkling before that it was the sort of thing that I would not be in to, but having it done totally cemented in my mind that I REALLY don't like it. I probably like it more than the prospect of having cancer though, which is why I allowed my doctor to put a needle into my face.  If he had just been like, "You know what would be fun? Stabbing you in the face with a needle!" and then he'd come at me all:

 I would have had to use my Hamster Style on him.

But why was a doctor sticking a needle into your face, JRose?

Funny you should ask.

On Friday, my face went all Volcano-mode and the mole by my nose did a dramatic recreation of the movie 2012.

I thought, eh, pimple, whatevs, because I like to talk to myself like I am cool and hep, as the kids say. I kept screwing with it 'til it popped because if I have a giant "end of the world" sort of face sore, I cannot do anything but poke and prod until it goes away or I pass out from pain.
I am not sure what it was, I don't think it was actually a pimple, but it had its sights on my signature mole which is now gone completely because it fell off.  PART OF MY FACE FELL OFF! One of my favorite parts of my face, too. I mean, I would miss my eyelids more, but I really liked that damned mole.

Of course, by "fell off" I mean I kept messing with the little flappy part that was threatening to fall off until it ripped off, but the results are the same, a bloody gross face hole that I was pretty sure was the deadliest kind of cancer, because I always think everything is the worst thing it could ever be... and obviously, my inane expectation that I'm going to die eminently led me to the doctor's office where I allowed him to inject shots into my face to do a biopsy because while it probably isn't cancer, he says, it would super suck to be wrong.

And now I feel sorry for strangers who have to look at my post-biopsy face because I am sure they must feel uncomfortable looking at me. It kind of looks like someone put a cigarette out on my face, which should totally be my story if anyone breaks social code and asks why I am so horribly disfigured.

New York: Secrets Revealed 2- The Garbage Monster

Living in an elevator shaft under Time Square Subway Station, there is a Garbage Monster.

There has to be, because the smell emanating from that elevator shaft is HORRIFICALLY offensive, and yet, it is a smell that I have never smelled before in my life and has no link to any sort of garbage that is created by man.

On Veteran's Day

I'm not going to be funny today, and I usually refrain from posting when I am not going to be funny, but I would like to say "Thank You" to all of our veterans everywhere today.  Being the child of two veterans of war, I know what a sacrifice you make, so, again:

If you would like to listen to the personal stories of how war affected my family members and my feelings on war, which again, is not funny at all and might cause facial wetness and feelings of sadness, you can watch this video I made 3 years ago on the subject. (There are a few not nice words in there, just so you know)

How do you create a wormhole?

Don't worry,  no matter what, the art I promised shall be delivered.

After much consideration, I suspect the thief was either a disgruntled cab driver who pilfered my credit card info, or someone in the airport, as it happened just as I was leaving and I only used my card a handful of times.  Hopefully, Paypal will understand that I didn't make the purchases and will give me my money back (it is being investigated now). And also hopefully, said thief will get diarrhea puke soon.

As Promised.

This is only funny if you read yesterday's post.

In fact, I did cry briefly today.  The love of my life died. Not my husband, he is fine.  Not bacon. It is presumably good, too.

I plugged my Kindle in last night to charge, because it was super dead when I went to read and when I remembered it was still plugged in this afternoon, it had somehow met an untimely demise.  I called Amazon (which I just typoed Amazin, probably not by coincidence) and after explaining in a panicky way that I had been depending upon reading on the plane to keep me from having a panic attack (haven't mentioned I don't like flying, have I?), Kyle the Awesome, told me that a brand spanking new Kindle would be over-nighted to me since mine was still in warranty. It should be here tomorrow in time to take with me. *crosses fingers*

So yeah, I love Amazon, and my Kindle... and while this is not a sponsored post, and is written of my own volition because I am really happy with the customer service I received, Amazon, I love free things and you are welcome to send me anything you like.

Evil Mike: A Cautionary Tale

The summer before my 10th grade year, I met my first boyfriend, Evil Mike*, over the phone while at my friend Veronica’s house.  Because I was awkward and weird and had REALLY low self-esteem, I immediately agreed when Evil Mike, after talking to me for a week or so, asked me to be his girlfriend.  This happened over the phone, of course, and I had not actually seen him yet, as the internet didn‘t exist so I couldn‘t force him to send me a picture before I accepted. I thought he was funny enough though, in a fart joke sort of way, and his voice was very attractive, which, you should know, is never indicative of how someone actually looks, but Veronica had assured me that he was “totally fine” so I figured I was good.

Yes, Clint Eastwood is my ultimate measure of sexiness, thank you.

I was still 14 when I agreed to his proposal of datitude, even though I was forbidden from actually dating, so our first date required the “best friend secret rendezvous” maneuver, wherein I’d spend the night at my friend Katriya’s house (because she was the friend my family liked/trusted the most) so I could do things my parents didn’t want me to do because they were bad bad ideas.  I got all dressed up in my sexiest acid wash mom jeans and an off-the-shoulder tube shirt with a horrendous flower pattern and applied my iridescent tan lipstick and off we went to meet him and his friend at Loehmann’s Plaza, where we were going to see Child’s Play III.

Katriya and I sat outside on a planter that doubled for an ashtray, nervously waiting for him to make his first appearance.  “Over there, that’s him!” Her voice was not kind  as she pointed at the pair of heshers coming out of the arcade.  “Veronica LIED!” I hissed at her as she began to laugh. Please let it be the blonde, please let it be the blonde, fuck, of course it’s not the blonde.  His friend was fairly attractive.  He, on the other hand, totally wasn’t.  He wasn’t much taller than I was, fancied himself a body builder, but his frame didn’t support it well so he just looked a bit like a tall little person. Beyond that, he had a mullet, but not just any mullet, it was a super mexi-mullet. And he was wearing a fitted jean jacket with Eddie Van Halen air brushed on the back of it. I wanted to flee. To pretend it wasn’t me, but it was too late. He had spotted me.

We bought tickets.  I can’t remember if he bought my ticket for me or if I had to buy my own. I spent the whole movie alternating between chastising myself for my desire to dump him on the spot because he was so repulsive to me and thinking how incredibly awful the movie was.  Really, have you seen Child’s Play III?! Serious crap! He spent the whole movie trying to touch my boobs and making me very uncomfortable by actually acting like he was my boyfriend. The only high point was that he smelled of Drakkar, which he might have bathed in.

Afterwards, we broke off from our friends and walked around the deserted outdoor mall. “So, what do you think?” I somehow realized he was asking me to assess his attractiveness. “Oh, yeah. You’re as fine they said.” I’m a liar, a dirty liar. Which should pay off right? Flattery and what not…  “And what about you?” Of course, he didn’t hold to the same principles that I did as his response was not flattering in the least. “Well, you’re not the beautiful flower they said you were, but you’re okay.”  He was entirely wrong.  I was an AMAZINGLY beautiful flower, and he was a jackass.

When I got back to Kat’s house, I called Veronica and informed her that she was a lying jerk, and she told me I was shallow (which I took to be a confession that she knew damned well that her pants were on fire) and she convinced me that I should give him a chance, which was a really bad suggestion, but somehow when you are 14 and you have really low self-esteem, you make really bad decisions, and instead of dumping him, like a sane person, I dated him for approximately two years.

Those were not two consecutive years, of course, because he would break up with me every couple of months/weeks/days because he was convinced I was either cheating on him at that moment, or was planning on cheating on him at any second, and I would cry and  plead with him not to dump me and he would declare that I just wanted to be with him because he was “sooooo fine.” Each time this declaration would come and each time it was really hard not to guffaw the moment he’d say it, but I somehow managed not to laugh openly at him and would assure him of all the stupid reasons I didn’t want him to break up with me, my level of attraction to him had ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with it.




* Evil Mike's name was coined after I started dating my husband, who is "good Mike" or just Mike.  But evil Mike was evil... or compared to all other Mikes who did not make my life miserable for 2+ years... Come to think of it, he wasn't really clever enough to be evil, I guess... he was really just a dick.. but Evil Mike has a better ring to it than "Dick Mike." 

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Remember, tomorrow is the last day to buy your Limited Edition September Sticker! 

http://cheeseblarg.blogspot.com/2011/09/september-sticker-sale-t-rex-wants-ice.html

Why my house is now clean.

There are two types of people who watch the show Hoarders- those who start cleaning their houses before the show is even over. . . and hoarders.

OMFGNOTBBQ!

I came to a terrible realization today.

Hanging out at my friend's house, we keep lamenting that the neighbors are ALWAYS barbecuing and it smells so delicious. We've even joked about showing up at their door with a plate for dinner. Then, this morning I walked out in the backyard and saw this over the fence:

I'm so sorry, Mr. Fluffypants. I'm so sorry.