I should probably go excersize to burn off this negative energy (updated)

Dear Everyone,

Facebook is not going to make a dislike button. Please stop inundating my news feed with posts about how you want a dislike button, you joined a fan page supporting the creation of a dislike button, you find it ironic that you dislike the idea of a dislike button, you've invited me to like the dislike button option, you'd sell your soul or at least engage in highly immoral activities to pretty please install a dislike button. In my recent turn of events, that I may or may not digress at a later time point, my facebook activity is at an all time high and a little variety would take the most minor bit of edge off.

Five buttons I would support, and thusly take over your news feed in support of:

1) Shut the eff up
2) No one cares
3) I feel bad for your significant other
4) O_o
5) You have a cold, not the bubonic plague

Perusing my news feed this morning, eating wheat chex, watching Robin Meade, and pushing the cat off my shit, it dawned on me why my FB annoyance peaks on Mondays.

number six, which is really an elaboration of buttons one and two. In fact this button is too verbose and detailed to really be a button, but I feel like I would probably be at risk for carpal tunnel if it existed. Besides, there are no rules or limitations on hypothetical situations. That's the beauty of them being hypothetical. So there.

6) You are not kooky or original when you bitch about Monday. Stop it.

Yours Truly,

Lisa

Lisa McCoig likes this

there is nothing passive about my aggresion.

The last week of the month """last week of the month""" is usually kind of rough for me, probably rougher for Chad because he has to deal with essentially a mentally unstable female. This past 48 hours though have been ridiculous.

I will now elaborate.

I applied for North Carolina residency, this involves a long winded complicated form as to which they want to know some inane shit like, hey how many times have you been on vacation since you have lived in North Carolina? what did you do on vacation? why did you go on vacation? how much of your money is in what bank and for how long and why? What did you do the last Thursday of June in 1996 and was it in North Carolina? Were you thinking about North Carolina that day? Do you secretly wish you could shape your head into the state of North Carolina? Isn't North Carlina the COOLEST STATE YOU HAVE EVER EVEN HEARD OF!? Also, please submit your tax return. Hey its cool though because I was all frustrated as shit while I was in North Carolina. Also, while I was in North Carolina yesterday I received an e-mail from Julie who is reviewing my application. She informed me that I, *I*, I submitted someone else's tax return with my application, someone by the name of Pergolotti, and if I could please resubmit *my* tax form, thanks kindly. I had to walk away from my desk as to not return Julie's email with the bad news that I was going to inform her halfway home that she is using again. Hey Julie, I understand sometimes stapling documents together is complicated, but I'm kind of impressed with your gall to blame it on me.

So I went to resubmit my tax return, and the application is set up as such that you have to

fill
out
the
whole
thing
again

and now to trump assholitis story #1 we will proceed to assholitis story #2:

this morning on my bike ride I was hit by a car. no wait. one more time for emphasis. this morning on my bike ride I was hit by a car. That's right, a car slammed into my left arm so hard their passenger side mirror broke. The car thusly gunned it and sped off.

The car behind them pulled over to make sure I was okay, and I watched this nice lady's face turn from a look of concern and worry to a look of worry and horror as the most delightful combination of explicatives were stitched together in a way that would have made George Carlin blush. The lady slowly drove off after I assured her I was more pissed than hurt, but still in the midst of my detailed explanation as to what would happen after I hunted this man down, and did she get a make on the car?

More importantly, this confirms what I already know:

I have arms of steel.

I am not a zoo animal.

I have been asked literally, super seriously, and no exaggeration here, at least 10 times, how old I am, over the past month. I get this once in awhile sure - but 10 times in a month is ridiculously excessive.

I don't know if its the fact that I'm a waif with a giant head from the prednisone, or that I look young and then confuse people when I speak the language of genius, or its all a giant coincidence (banking on the genius hypothesis)..but let me tell you how simply shocked each and every one of them was to discover I am 25.

Their ballpark?

14-16. Never older than 16. A whole decade off? honestly? I mean, its one thing if someone guesses 80, and your 70, and maybe you also smoked your whole life, lived on the streets, abused meth, and never wore sunblock....but come on - 15 and 25 is really mistakable? This is not a one time occurrence either. I have a pretty significant quota of inquirers here.

For example - Monday, registering for my umpteenth CT scan of the year (im having a litter of mutant aliens for children at this point), the guy behind the counter kept like - *looking at me* - like maybe that pizza I just scarfed made it into my hair/eyebrows/etc (this is unfortunately, not uncommon - and guess how pleased the CT people were that I ate, when somehow I forgot after my last 100 scans, that you aren't supposed to)...so anyway... this guy returns my insurance card and barks out at me. 'So how old are you anyway'

'25'

guy flips, '25? NOOooooo. no. no way. (chuckles, shakes his head, looks around in disbelief -anyone else catching this freak show?- looks back at me.) Really!? But you're so little! I thought you were 14... 25!?'

sigh. monotone. 'yeah. crazy. i get this all the time.'

guy engages ALL 5 employees behind the counter --'GUYS, guys, hey...guys, how old do you think this girl is!? (no time for their response) this girl is 25.....*twenty five*.....She's so little I never would have guessed!!

(mass hub bub behind the counter as they all strain in their chairs to take in this sideshow, who is either a lying sack of crap or a pure genetic anomoly, apparently I fall into some extreme category to warrant this reaction over and over - they are now just as shocked, talking amongst themselves about me, in front of me ---hey guys maybe you could be a little more rude? I don't feel awkward at all.)

...I thought she was 14! I thought my daughter was older than her! She is in 9th grade!'

so then, inevitably, this is always followed by the 'you'll appreciate it when you're older' speech.

'thanks. I'm sure I'll really like it' (not if I have to listen to this BS for the rest of my life)

So I turn around to take my seat in this gigantic ass waiting room to find, everyone, in the gigantic ass waiting room, is also looking at me. All that was missing was the requisite cricket soundtrack. Had I the balls, the right mood, the right amount of alcohol, this would have been the perfect time to break out an MC Hammer dance, the Meatstick dance, a little Michigan J Frog. But, I was pissy after spending my day getting various intravenous transfusions for hours on end. Or. maybe. I was in a great mood before the counter scene come to think of it. But at this point I kind of wanted everyone in sight to contract syphillis. in their mouth.

(but what makes these people ask in the first place if they are always so certain I am in fact, 14? Obviously you aren't certain, b/c these conversations always have the same pattern, I get a shocked look, a few comments of a disbelieving nature, followed by a little arguing b/c I might be lying and/or dumb, finally they concede the truth, all the while shaking their head)

I think my own return questions need to be prepared.

Yeah, I'm really 25. and how much do you weigh. Only 240? Crazy. Here I was thinking you were at least 290, I mean at the very very least. Hey. GUYS! (I will not restrain from pointing wildly) Guess how much this chick weighs. Didn't you think she was way fatter. Isn't SO. WEIRD. You'll probably never appreciate being fat like I'll appreciate my youthful glow when I'm 63, but maybe you shouldn't wear horizontal stripes, like, ever again.

The age question often doesn't get under my skin to this extent. The radiology experience however, was beyond called for, and its been festering in the back of my head. In case you know, that wasn't noticeable. Maybe when I manage to push beyond this plateau of 93 lbs that Ive hit, and cannot get past, regardless of how much I stuff my face, people will not feel the need to ostracize me. (granted, unintentionally)

Until then, be prepared to be called out on your own freak show.

sike

So, literally on my way out of the hospital yesterday - finally on my way home, my biggest dream of all dreams as of late, adorned with bags and bags of miscellaneous crap one collects over a 3 week stay in the hospital, in my chair ready to be rolled to freedom, I notice heeeyyy---this stuff coming out of my drain looks like, well, uh....poop. man, must be one nasty abscess I'm draining. By the time I get home and *heroically* begin to unpack, after, of course, a 15 min love fest with the cats who don't rememeber me, there is def lots of suspicious gunk reeaaalllyy flowing out of my drain.

Chad comes over, and with little debate , I'm of course thrown back in the car, and of course whisked back to the effing ER, and of course we sat there for hours waiting for assesment. And of course, my suspicions are confirmed, yes, your intestine have now managaed *Brace Yourselves!* to tunnel a hole into your abscess and I am now draining intestinal contents into my abdominal cavity! God. I'm good. honestly. On the day of departure and everything! Treatment for said diagnosis? No eating (like literally none, I'll be getting IV nutrition) and I have to adorn an unhideable drain. Thats draining crap. Not too bad maybe? Maybe not, except that it takes at least a month to clear up - upwards of six months. Sooooooooo, yeah. fuck my life right now. I'm typing this from a new hospital bed, where I have a roommate, and they like to talk to me.

titleschmitle

When did this blog take some pathetic turn for the worse, when did it succumb to some maudlin whiney bullshit one tracked theme of hospital perils. I can't seem to break out of it though. But you know, its so weird, when your only external stimulus is SITTING IN A HOSPITAL WITH NOTHING ELSE TO THINK ABOUT except that I'm still sitting in this effing hospital and I'm not at home, and um, I'm also in the hospital and miserable about the fact!? Then yeah, I guess thats all you get to read about until I leave. And speaking of leaving, right now I really feel the need to inform you that I sat and cried like a little baby in front of 5 doctors yesterday who told me my now new soonest release date is Monday. But that is if I can meet a lot of extraneous medical hoopla and criteria over the course of the next 48 hours. So, in Doctor speak, Monday means 2017. and I cried in front of all of them. and they barely batted an eyelash. In fact, I think I heard cash wagers and congrats of my imminent breakdown being divvied up outside my door as they left.


On the bright side, after searching in vain for the bariatric unit, the place where they keep all the new babies behind a glass window, and the psych ward (where we also hoped they would be displayed behind some nose/finger smudged glass display), my sister and I had profound luck stumbling into the PT gymnasium. It seemed as if maybe it wasn't where we were quite supposed to be, but seeing as they left some lights on, and the doors were unlocked, and most of the equipment was still conviently plugged in and on.....gosh how *couldn't* we have helped ourselves.

Today my adventures will take me outside. I plan on dragging my IV pole around campus. Keep an eye out for me. In fact, put a present or two in your pockets just in case you run into me, because material goods are just the thing I need to keep my morale slightly above the level of death.

FRIDAY

okay, so they are super seriously promising me I get to go home tomorrow, Friday April 10th.

I have been in here since March 25th. That is a 16 day grand total of eating hospital food, sleeping in a hospital bed, showering in a hospital shower that doesn't get hot, fretting and stressing over the blatant lack of even maintaining a baseline of health, 16 frustrating days of watching two teams of doctors play I know whats best for her so butt out - entertaining, but um - not very conducive to me getting the crap out of this place, and 16 days worth of tests, most of them odd, invasive, sometimes painful, but I now know my basal metabolic rate while lying in bed watching parent trap starring pre-whore lindsey lohan (?). So yeah, quick 16 day recap



March 25, went for a small bowel study, this was the last morning I left my house.

One of two blood transfusions, pre and post op.
After gratituious vomiting (guess how great if feels to vomit only days after major abdominal surgery) one unfateful evening, they shoved an NG tube down my nose and into my belly - so all my stomach/upper GI contents are promptly resucked back out and displayed in my proud see through vaccutanier. This is what a swiss roll cake looks like enroute from packaging, my mouth, my esophogeous, and back up the roller coaster ride of NG vaccusuck.


The vaccusuck --(proudly now) - I filled about one of those a day without even eating, its a little known fact my body is comprised entirely of pond sludge.


//kkuucchhhhaaaaa Luke I am your father kkkkkuuucchhaaa// or. you know. Caliormetry testing - so they can install a more or less permanent IV in my arm that travels directly to my heart feeding me TPN - i.e. liquid food, also good for narcotic drugs - tends to deliver a little more of a punch when administered through those lines I tell you what.


new portal of life.

and then last but not least, after 16 days of some really swell gumshoe efforts, it was determined the 105 fevers, massive cramping, obstructions, were all lo and behold the culprit of a large pocket of potentially infectious fluid hanging out in my abdomen. So this morning I went in to have them suck it out, leaving me with my final consolation prize of a JP tube that will continuously drain the contents of my interabdominal space a few mLs an hour. Also, I get to cleverly try and (its absolutely impossible) hide underneath my clothes.


Great. So they are letting me go home tomorrow. I have so much schoolwork to catch up on, a paper that will literally probably take me 30 hours to write, two paper presentations I have to put together, a take home test, all the class material that I have been missing must be caught up on, and oh - then of course trying to do what I'm really here for, and that's figure out my project so I can actually start working on something relative that might get me a PhD. While administering my TPN, emptying my drain, trying to figure out how to walk for longer then 5 min without needing to sit...etc..etc..

On the bright side, my older sister is flying in from San Fran to stay till Wednesday to help me out, hope she has a lot of quarters - I'll draw her a map to the laundry room.

only read while listening to soft piano. also read outloud. with the lights dimmed.

I really hoped that last visit was it, the visit where the doctors couldn't really put their finger on what was wrong with me after a week of unnecessary tests, several days on the 'no eating' diet, a melee of doctors that communicated solely with rocks and birds, certainly not their colleagues or me - and so they just kind of threw out some educated guesses as to why my belly has become a constant source of brutal misery and sent me home. And things kind of just slowly festered, until I found myself slithering through lab on my belly, pulling myself hand over hand to whatever destination because walking really hurt that much, assuring my labmates that no - ive gotten quite used to being in this much pain so its kind of just normal now, thanks for the concern though, try not to step on me as you guys just ""walk around."" I'm just going to roll my way to the microscope room now where I have to sit unfathomably upright for hours and count intestinal tumors.

I've been on this mission to not let whatever these doctor inspired 'educated guesses' that are attempting to take over my life, not take over my life. I'm really working hard to ignore the fact that I'm actually really effing sick, instead I am marching full speed on with my life in this senseless stubborn brattiness refusing to succumb to the absolutely immense weight of how sick I really feel. Thinking if I give in just a little, I might never again be able to get back up. And not being tough is just not an option ever really. Secretly, all I really want to do is take turns lying either curled up on my couch or in my bed, with my macbook, and the cats, softly whimpering, just enough so that I still look pretty and huggable while im crying and not a big mucus sobbing snot affair, and maybe I could say something heartbreaking and kind that would cause whomever was watching to tear up a little also, and for a moment they would really understand the injustice that comprises the brutal senseless shit that really great and A+ people like me have to endure.

This secret fantasy decidedly does not involve straining at a microscope, attempting to walk, attempting to joke around, attempting to feel bad for someone who thinks their cold is killing them, attempting to care about anything really at all, and constantly telling everyone that I am perfectly capable to be carrying out the way that I am. I am so done with this facade of oh guys im not really that sick routine, sure I'll run here and there and take care of all your trivial needs.

So this morning, I was almost relieved to wake up with a bowel obstruction knowing that it would land me back in the hospital where I can finally take a few days off to rest and be the recipient of sweet sweet dilaudid - the wonder drug that cures all my mental and physical ailments in convenient 2mg 2 hour installments. Especially convenient this morning was the small bowel study I had scheduled for 9am which would certainly hasten the process of being admitted. Arriving in the basement of the women's hospital sufficiently comforted by maybe too many percocets, I eagerly told the technician that I was suffering from certain bowel obstruction - as to which he looked at me, practically skipping down the hallway with glee, with complete skepticism. Four very lousy hours of laying on a metal board later, percocets long worn off, I was finally declared blocked!! I was thusly whisked upstairs to the GI clinic where I was further whisked into the supreme comfort that only dilaudid can so whiskingly whisk into one's veins in a very mere and modest 2 mLs. I was so relieved I would finally have time to get some R&R at the excuse of being bed ridden in a hospital, where I pictured myself thumbing through magazines, leisurely watching daytime tv, chatting with the nurses, sun shining through my windows, god reaching down and pushing my dilaudid button for me....yes it would be *gloroious* -a real break where I could be sick in peace and whimper pitifully (but keeping it delicate and poetic).

so. yeah. I sure as hell got the eff what I wanted. This was last Wednesday. (I am typing on Friday, like 10 days later Friday, like, two episodes of lost later, like, 10 GIGANTICALLY LONG ARDOUS MIND KILLING DAYS). The doctors decided I needed more surgery (kind of saw this coming) - buuuttt, its mostly a minor two hour affair they promised, we'll just tidy up a few problem adhesions while we share warm stories of past xmas parties over my comatose body kind of blase run of the mill procedure.

Six hours later I wake up in some ungoldy agonzing pain where my surgeon declared my abdomen an absolute brutal battlefield and it was unheard of that anyone could possibly form that many adhesions post operativley in just two months. Well. I am a fucking miracle guess what. They were really impressed with the complete and utter mess of networked tissues that I had formed. So being a long and complicated surgery, I have been in here for a long and complicated post op stay - and I really just don't even know how I make it through each minute anymore.

The complications range from persistent fevers topping out consistently at 104- 105, profuse vomiting, where they eventually shoved an NG tube down my throat to cease said incessant vomitfest (Read:lubed a honking peice of gigantic pipe, shoved it down my nose , threaded it through to my belly, and have been sucking out my stomach contents that don't look so very unlike what one would find in clogged gutter detritus- cockroaches, wet leaves, dead spiders, that frisbee I lost when I was 9, etc - fascinating to watch though) ANYWAY. I would now like to continue on complaining on the subject at hand. The pain is monstrous, the back pain from laying in this bed is unbearable, I have swollen body parts that are hideous enough to make children cry, I had an internal catheter installed in my arm that travels to my heart yesterday, a sort of - permanent IV so they can feed me food via TPN b/c I haven't eaten a non vomited up food substance in over a week, two blood transfusions, and a ppaarrttrriiddge in a peeaarrr treeeeee.

The doctors still don't really have any consensus as to why I'm having all of these complications. They have a lot of ideas, but I have yet to see where they are logical, effective, and most of them don't even get acted on - I mostly think they are amused watching me rot here in this bed (they make their rounds at 6am to boot).

So, instead of having my hoped for little teary eyed sessions of 'man guys this is kind of the pits' cutesy cries, I have been having heaving pillow soaking gallon snot producing attacks....usually these are followed by my jamming on my dilaudid button waiting to become mentally comatose again. I have flipped through no magazines. I'm cranky to the nurses. The TV blows. I still can barely walk. My belly still fucking hurts, my head is positioned by a gigantic fucking window so I can remind myself daily that I'm in prison. My IV pole grows larger everyday, no literally they put a new piece of equipment on it like everytime I turn around- reverse nurse Jenga, honest to god. and having to unplug three different pumps, my ng tube, wrap 6 wires and my pain pump, everytime I want to walk 6 feet to the bathroom is RIDICULOUS. Then haul all that shit over to the sink. Pick at some new pimple. Get all the way back to bed, hook everything back up. Climb in. And then realize. in horror. that I forgot to wash my hands. I may or may not rengage in a crying jagg that my neighbors can hear. But I think tears are good for sterilizing or something?

Now I fantasize about being back in lab and having a grad student gracefully float into my bay with a box of Dunkies and saying Lisa I picked out your favorite, and also, I have just a few samples of intestine if you wanted to count them? and her eyes would twinkle. and my eyes would twinkle. and we would share a doughnut moment while gazing at one another, endulging in silly light hearted tales that would cause the people overhearing to smile and shake their heads. and I would tell her I would be delighted to count tumors as I loving licked the chocolate icing from each of my nonswollen, non bruised, unfinger pricked, unscathed, hand washed fingers. And I would walk down to the scope room, with a little whimpering cry, and it would look pretty, and genuine, and the sun would reflect just right off my face - and the tears would be for happiness this time, because I just ate a fucking doughnut and its not causing me to double over and writhe around in agonzing pain, because IM LIVING LIKE A NORMAL HUMAN BEING DOES EVERYDAY. except I won't be taking it for granted. suckers.

I.can't.take.this.anymore.

the perils of slowly losing it.

If everyone wanted to just come stand around my hospital bed and look as morose as humanly possible while I played this on loop, it would kind of make my day. I mean, it wouldn't because I think I have successfully managed to go off the deep end this time, but the amusement potential would be greater than my joy of being able to surpass my previous pee hat volume record. I told my nurse about how fulfilling I find it to make it past the 650 cc mark on my urine hat, inclined to believe that if she couldn't relate, she could at least appear supportive. I was sadly disappointed when I only got a nervously confused chuckle in response as she flushed my big achievement of the day down the pipes. I took it as a sign she didn't want to know that was the most I had managed to pee all at once since I arrived Saturday, effectively beating my other urine output highscores, or how I had been holding it in all day until the cusp of imminent bladder explosion, so it was a hard worked for - and therefore well earned victory. HUMOR ME LADY. god. some nurse.

Well, I have a potential record beating amount of liquids just waiting to be ingested - I'm going for 700 cc - wish me luck, better yet, wish for my release before I end up in the psych ward.




p.s. this is really neither here nor there, I just wanted you to feel sorry for me over the fact that in the past four days I have been here, they have tried to insert an I.V. in me 11, yes that's right, eleven, ELEVEN, different times. Guess how great that felt. it didn't.

I would like to take a brief reprieve from marathon hw to whine.

In the past five days I have had to:

1) take a test covering most of endocrine physiology (fri)
2) write a 6 page report detailing the ins and out of NSAIDs and their effects on gi and cardio health (mon)
3) put together a 20 minute presentation on NSAIDs and their chemotherapuetic properties (mon)
4) write another 6 page report detailing the ins and outs of pre/probiotics and their effects on gi health (wed)
5) put together another 20 minute presentation on pre/probiotics and their chemotherapuetic properties (wed)
6) lab (all week)
7) redo my entire physiology test (in a timely fashion) , because I did just that bad on it the first time around. But apparently the whole class was given their test to correct and turn back in, so , on the bright side, it was kind of okay I failed the crap out of it.

I have a vague recollection of sleeping at some point last week. I think I ate a bowl of cereal or something yesterday. Ive adjusted to the permanent burn of exhaustion that has manifested itself in my eyeballs. Honestly, this was all for one class too. ONE CLASS. All three professors for ONE class decided to put this all on us due in the course of ONE WEEK.

That's all I really have to say. I have a quota of bitching that must be met every hour concerning my work load, and I thusly decided for the 15th hour of feb 24 I would whine via blog post. The last of my work is due tomorrow morning at 9am. 17 more hours left of the most schoolwork intensive week I have ever experienced. or anyone has really. I feel confident enough to go out on a limb and say no one ever, except the other 5 members of my physiology class, ever experienced this intense of a work load. If you think you have. you are wrong. My undereye circles will beat you into submission if you refuse to concede this truth.

I would like to borrow a hat please.

Why I have a lot of pimples on my forehead where there are usually none:


-Ive narrowed down my headaches to Ambien use. Rubbing my head while its hurting does nothing to alleviate the pain but it feels useful.

-Self diagnosing persistent fevers by touching my forehead with the palm of my hand, the back of my hand, my wrist, if someone is near I ask for their second opinion with their hands - - not that my forehead ever feels hot to me, but it seems like a necessary prerequisite to taking my temperature and eating motrin like m&m's.

-Sitting on my ass for the past two weeks waiting to miraculously look and feel like a normal person - and fretting/stressing/whining that I still look and feel like a 1 week post mortem starvation victim. This causes a lot of stress induced forehead rubbing.

-Having my bf repeatedly ask me if I was recently in a knife fight, how I made out in my recent fist fight, and maybe I should stay out of dark dangerous alleys - due to illustrious pimple holes on my forehead that, apparently, resemble gigantic, violent, fight induced wounds. I then naturally feel the need to self consciously touch all of my pimples, because finger probing is an appropriate measure of pimple severity, even though I just looked in the mirror 5 min prior to assess said damage. Then I stress out and rub my forehead because not only am I really pale with gigantic undereye circles, but I also look like a leper. A starving one.

-I honestly really hate this 25 notes b.s. circulating on fb because I'm incapable of not reading everyone's kooky narcissistic self-commentary b/c IM BORED OUT OF MY MIND. (Certainly not a parallel to my blog here at all). I read them immediately upon their arrival on my newsfeed. I rub my forehead out of sheer stress that I just subjected myself to another 3 minutes of lifewaste.

-I haven't done my laundry in over two weeks and am wearing the last of the last. Stressful headrubbing ensues after every shower, as I stare into my dresser drawers, wondering how the cats are going to treat me if I pair nine year old plaid pj pants with a tie dye shirt and striped rainbow socks.

Okay, I can drag this list out forever, seeing as I have mammoth swaths of time on my hands, but I need to check facebook to see if anyone else posted 25 notes. I MUST KNOW HOW MANY PETS YOU HAD AS A CHILD. and I need to stare at the wall some more. and wait around for this day to be over so maybe I'll wake up tomorrow and look and feel a little more normal. I'm also horribly nauseous, that is to say I can literally feel my stomach throwing grappling hooks into my esophagus as a means to escape out of my mouth - so I need to lay down to thwart operation gut escape, and I can't really type from that angle.

I rubbed my head 11 different times during the writing of this post alone. I need to find a different means of physically expressing my stress. Like eating more than a meal a day regardless of how violently queasy it makes me, because dropping all this weight in the course of two weeks is terrifying, and naturally, it makes me rub my head.

-fin-

I am freezing, exhausted, and starving. I have not eaten since breakfast (it is 8pm), I am wearing flip flops (it is in the 30's), and I did not sleep last night (nor did I two nights ago - cumulative muck effect). I am also sitting in a lab with nothing to entertain me but a computer - and as it turns out you schleps are dead on facebook right now which means I have almost no entertainment at all.

But, despite falling apart at the seams, I am overly elated because I have just completed my *last* take home of the semester.

That's right. My take home final rests in completion beside me, all warm and toasty from being freshly printed, and ready to turn in tomorrow at 10 a.m.

I just wanted you to know that, even though it may look like I have bags the size of Croatia under my eyes, and my hair is unwashed, and I am more slouched in my chair then is humanily possible, and my eyes are glazed over, and my mouth is agape, you should and may consider being extraordinarily jealous. Because I am finished. and it was hard. and I almost died approximately 42 times this semester to get here. and I climbed over the metaphorical equivalent of 238 mountains to be at this point. right now. about to pick up a subsidiary dinner from the Teeter, where I will walk amongst the regular folk, who will have no idea how exactly special, this fucking moment is.

phlebotomy gone bad

This looked way more impressive yesterday, however, I wasn't struggling to finish a take home yesterday, therefore no procrastination was necessary.

Thanks lady, for practicing your cross-stitching skills in my veins.

advisement

If you happen to accidentally scare the everloving piss out of me - and subsequently you decide its a good idea to laugh at me, and hard I might add - because I did a little dance in place, and maybe I screamed, just a little bit....

well, you should probably consider running, at full speed, in the opposite direction

because that shit was decidedly the most un-funny thing that has ever happened to me in my life.

seperation anxiety

It was any other glorious day with my phone, running through fields of daffodils, constructing decoupage photo albums as we waited for our bunt cake to finish, and then retiring to the porch to share lemonade and tales of our childhood. While perusing facebook snuggled up in our favorite rocker, our most cherished pastime I might add, my little phone,

my
dear
poor
little
phone
passed away
in my hands

clutching my hair in my fists and screaming enraged to the heavens - I demanded God to tell me why he would take my phone at such a young and tender age. Why now!? WHY HALLOWEEN NIGHT OF ALL TIMES GOD. I worked hard to resuscitate my little love, but there was no hope, all I really had left to do was call T-mobile to handle the remains and begin the process of moving on. So many times between the passing away of my phone and now I have gone to snap an impromptu picture, jot a quick text, check facebook - all which unmercifully rips the scab off of my battered and broken heart upon recalling there *is* no phone to speak of, anymore.

I stopped at the T-mobile store today to purchase the cheapest replacement phone to tide me over until a proper replica of my old phone was delivered to me. My replacement and thank god temporary new phone will never ever fill the shoes of that which was all dear and sacred to me.




The customer service department at T-mobile handled my delicate situation with the utmost gentle and respectful nature. I was told I would have a new phone free of charge shipped to me in the next seven business days (7 days way to fucking long with the aforementioned replacement phone from hell). I was instructed to gut the contents of my phone in preparation for returning its now silent and still body to phone heaven, where it will undoubtedly rest in peace forever.

The gutting however, lead to the pleasing discovery of the cutest little 1 gig card ever!


There is only one thing really I can do now, (who can possibly complete a take home test in stressful times like these I ask?) is put on Sarah Mclaughlin and reflect on our fulfilling and harmonious relationship. Recalling the euphonious chortling of incoming texts, the patience of learning T9 together, my phone was the best little mp3 player ever, and I'll never forget our sneaky voyeuristic endeavors with my favorite little camera. Yes, my phone did it all. I will be preparing a eulogy and candle lit services for later. If you can't make it, at the least, please send me your phone number - as my phone took these memories to the beyond.

I willlll remember yoooouu

*tear

[(in)sanity disclaimer - I was on hold with t-mobile for the majority of this post - hence my paper craft and photography exposition]

the seventh circle

How come, on a mental vacation to the seventh circle of hell, it feels like everyone around you is aware that you are failing miserably at life. Everywhere you walk, sit, eat, meander about, minding your own business, the mundane and ordinary crap happening around you is somehow now, a direct attack at you being a bad person who could have made better choices. Your professor that may have looked at you for a brief second? Totally the stink eye because he knows you aren't paying attention. Didn't get waved at by a friend who is two miles away and on their cell phone? Certainly its nothing rational like they didn't see you, because they secretly have been hating your guts and are choosing this moment to let you know, by ignoring your wave. feel like a friendless loser yet? no? great! the surface has just been scratched.

While mentally traversing the sub-strata of hell, don't forget to take a pit stop on the tier where people are secretly grimacing at you in complete disgust as they smile and nod their head at some vacuous blase conversation the two of you have somehow had the misfortune of falling into - because really they are thinking who let this girl into grad school, why do her pants have a hole in the leg-- WHY DOES SHE KEEP DIGGING IN THE HOLE, a pity how she forgot to filter her secondary antibody, whole weeks worth of experiments down the tubes, god this girl is basket case, the circles under her eyes are terrifying.

All the while, I'm not only tapped into possibly the most poorly timed conversation of my life, reading between the lines of said conversation, but understanding that everyone in a 40 foot radius is aware that I am currently the mecca of all that is execrable. Being such, these people are finely tuned into the fact that I'm not enjoying this conversation, I'm faking my chipper disposition, know that I am now one less friend, and think its also atrocious that I won't stop digging at the hole in my jeans.

I think I really arrive at sheer inner pandemonium when I speak with my PI about my progress in lab (this is the true test of keeping calm on the surface as my insides feel like they could quite possibly succeed in pushing their way through the finer pores in my skin). I could fill entire books on what I perceive to be happening in his head, every blink, breath, throat clearing, 'umm' and 'err' is cataloged to be a secret sign as to how he really feels about my lab work. My streaming thoughts follow a repeating pattern of, 'oh shit does this man even like me? will there be slander on my rotation assesment, Balfour!? WILL THERE?!' Multi-tasking however, like I'm really good at, in that I actually suck at it, I'm also carrying out a scientific, knowledgeable, controlled, and intelligent conversation about the direction of my project. I place more meaningful context with this man's basic bodily functions then I think I ever did in the combined last three years that I was in a relationship. (mis)construing the spectrum of my PI's physical and verbal cues, add up to at best, please strongly consider a job in the secretarial world, preferably that of a lowly run legal office. And, lest it not be forgotten, that this takes place while I mentally fan myself from a lawn chair, sipping warm shit through a straw, in the seventh circle of hell.


What has catapulted me into this mood that would permanently scar small children? Well, nothing really, I was just you know, in a mood for like - oh 4 days. Yesterday however, in the words of the great sabominator, I changed my tampon and got over it.

get your free advice here!!!!!

unless you are so inclined to stay awake for most of the night due to superfluous vomiting, do not, under any circumstance, ever, eat, a semi-raw sweet potato.

and if you choose to do so, do not under any circumstance, underestimate the ability of your body to procure weeks worth of food to disgorge in a fashion that would make the writer's of exorcist jealous.

3/4 finished with a test=new post!

So, I am desperately trying to finish up yet another brutal take home exam, and in doing so I manage to find myself analyzing every aspect of all that is everything with a magnifying glass that decidedly has nothing to do with Dr. Maile's question, which, is a direct descendant of some altered distopian cess pool universe from hell. (For the love of God, its open ended nature is a direct parallel as to if I was asked, 'hey - what did you do that time you were 10?')

As such, it has occurred to me that upon arriving to Chapel Hill, I have somehow let maintaining standard aspects of well being fall to the way side. For example, my diet has been whittled down to sweet potatoes and frosted mini wheats with the occasional apple. Every now and then I will splurge on tomatoes and mozzarella. Running constantly from point A to point L and then back to point C, and if there is time maybe point B - food is on the same order of silly notions as sleep and making friends with my neighbors 200 lb. Rottweiler.

I am happy to report however, I stay consistently showered (mostly) and I manage to make my bed every morning. And also, I even found time for a hair cut yesterday -which, the lady at Great Clips, where hair cuts cost $13, was horrified by the state of disrepair and pronounced dead end dissemination of what was once a nice hair cut (last year's?). Great clips people, the lady at great clips was disgusted with my hair.

I am also happy to report, that my brand new scooter - where I was asked to sign a waiver promising to bring my bike in at 200 miles, and no more then 200 miles for proper calibration post breaking in -is going in on Thursday morning pushing 600 miles.

I have yet to still find time for glasses, which is rapidly making its way to the top of my to-do list. I really hate sitting at the front of every class, its especially rough now that its getting cold and I wear my heavy ski coat in every morning because my scooter ride is on an order of fucking frigid that would cause trepidation among Russians and eskimos. So, arriving to class, more often then not late, which is to say a standard ten minutes late every class, I have to loudly swish my way to the front, swish my way into a seat, swishing while I unzip my back pack to pull out the requisite binder, pen, water bottle, and the inevitable tissue search, all, whilst swish swish swishing away in my ski coat. And, it is WAY to effing cold to remove my coat until hours after I have disembarked from my morning scooter commute. This, as you can imagine, causes quite the disturbance at the front of the lecture hall, causing my professor to stumble and loose his place, as it takes me five minutes to settle in, sounding like my own advanced acrobatic team dressed in full out nylon sumo suits. Yes, glasses are in order very soon. Honestly, carrying out such nonsense is a back of the classroom activity.

On and on I could go - however, now the sun is up which means I have to relocate to campus, and instead of posting, its more important that I try and find a brush to untangle my freshly butchered hair and scavenge my closet for something slightly clean before making my way to class, which I will be late too, because I will be looking for clean(er) clothes, a brush, packing my lunch of a sweet potato, forgetting 12 things as I walk out the door, returning for 6 of them, leaving, getting to my bike, cursing, returning for the other 6 things, and thusly managing to arrive on campus sans sweet potato, tired, hungry, and waiting to buy my next cup of coffee.

ppppppppsssssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh *pop



















o_O






today's onomatopoeia is brought to you by the letter death and number oh fuck.

old habits die hard

Out of sheer lack of motivation to crack into my latest series of papers I should read, before tomorrow, and allow me to re-emphasize the plurality of said papers - I am finding myself perusing the oldest of archived photo collections on my computer. I have thus come to several conclusions, many of these which I have previously thrown around lightly before in post-college haze memorandum style -- these conclusions often allude to a vague picture of me kind of being a hippie in college.

Now, in stark contrast to my current life, my retired hippie days have been etched, in marble, in a time capsule, in the safe hands of NASA. I am happy to leave them there, perma-sealed in with my old birkenstocks.

I bring to you the life and times of the ostensible college hippie:

:

really dirty table, beer shelf, hookah, shot glasses, old beer bottles, some - hugging hippie statue - now so cleverly turned upside down and balanced on aluminum foil and photographed. Really? I'm sure no one did that stoned, and it probably didn't blow their mind either.



Yes, my roommates constructed a solar oven. Yes, we used it, a lot. Yes, there are pictures of breasts on gandalf and frodo in the backround - and yes, that is a little tube of incense below the breast montage.

vegan burrito anyone?

Free hippie beats!



please. for the love of god. keep your pupils to yourself. thanks.


yes. awesome. lets camp and get dirtier together. it could be fucking harmonious.

dirty hippie feet. dirty hookah. dirty beer wall. the ever present dirty aluminum foil. hah! we weren't dirty crackheads.



yup.




check.



one tricked out hemp beaded necklace and one quintessential striped poncho



Thats almost definitely not me, I wouldn't be caught dead in a tie dye dress, hula hooping is for potheads, and this certainly did not take place two months ago.

You're invited!

TO A PITY PARTY!!!!!

Yes folks its that time of year already!! Where did the time go!? - the annual fall melee of fuck my immune system is here, only place to go where the gamut of illness runs from cotton balls in my nose to gravel and glass shards in my intestine, and I'm pretty sure someone put a few bricks in my sinus cavities last night. If you lost your chain saw/blender blades/nails/or otherwise obtrusive sharp objects - look no farther because I think I may have accidentally housed them in my throat and bronchial tubes.

To overload you on the fabulous and fantastic fun that I am currently sitting here not experiencing, I get to present my research tomorrow at 9am. Have I started on my presentation yet?? would this really be a proper pity party if I had? But no worries, because its not like I really sleep anymore anyway. I'll type and fret away into the wee hours of the morning whilst trying to keep most of my internal organs from crawling out of my esophagus.

RSVP by midnight. Bring your own orange juice, tissues are provided, hugs should be distributed cautiously.