Frizzy Hair and Frazzled Nerves May 17, 2008

It’s Friday again.  How did that happen??  Seriously!?!  Time is funny…I wish I could articulate how much time amuses and tortures me, but I don’t think I can do that right now.  All I can do is hang on and lean into the curves.  

My to-do list is still daunting, but it’s getting pretty short.  The light at the end of the tunnel is starting to feel warm.  I still don’t know what I’m gonna do.  I feel unsettled that I don’t have a job, but it’s a bit too early still to start looking for jobs in August…I mean, I’m doing research, but so many of the job postings are for fairly immediate positions, and that just doesn’t work for me right now.  Stupid lease.  

Actually, I’m happy I have to stay here for the summer.  I have 30 years of living in this state to package up, not to mention the time I need to thoroughly enjoy one more Hot Southern Summer.  I don’t want to live my life always in a hurry to get to the next step…I’m trying really hard to appreciate the present.  Life is fleeting, after all.  

To date, I have lost 75 pounds.  It’s kinda crazy.  For the first time in my adult life, I purchased a dress that not only looks super cute on me, but I actually feel confident wearing it.  The dress creates the illusion that I have a (gasp!) waistline.  I kid, but it makes me really happy.  I weigh less than I did when I graduated high school.  I like that.  I went to my doctor last week for another saline fill, and he opted not to do the procedure (glory) because he feels I may be in the fabled Green Zone.  I have definitely figured out that there are certain foods I Just Can’t Eat Anymore, and that has been painful.  The list includes some favorites, such as: steak, pork chops, brocolli, rice, bread (unless it’s super cripsy), collard greens, apples, and…sigh…cheese.  I still try occasionally to enjoy these things, and it’s always fairly uncomfortable, and I’ll hold off for three weeks or a month, until the craving makes me forget what it actually feels like to try and digest the tasty treat.   I have lost my appetite, in general.  That’s truly the biggest problem I’m facing, five months post-surgery…I am forgetting to eat for long periods of time.  For example, I totally cracked under the pressure of the union exam, and couldn’t figure out why I was So Fatigued two and a half hours in, and getting shaky and edgy and emotional.  And then I realized I hadn’t eaten in about 20 hours.  Granted, my lack of appetite is exaggerated right now by extreme stress levels and the fact that I may or may not be falling in love, but christ! That’s not healthy.  I just don’t think to eat very often, because I so rarely feel hunger…and on the flipside, when I do eat, it’s not really satisfying, somehow.  I can still eat some good meals, but my passion for food has definitely waned a great deal.  Living on nuts and chicken pieces and greens is fine, but it’s not a culinary adventure.  It’s a small sacrifice, really.  I’m not complaining.  

I am feeling very conflicted these days.  There is so much going on at all times, in every single arena of my life, I am having a hard time keeping up, or knowing that I’m making the right decisions.  It’s so important to me to start Living Right, to create my own destiny and do it in a healthy, happy, productive, contributing fashion…but that takes so much thought.  Such careful, calculated planning.  Such thoughtful use of time and resources.  I am so much more impulsive than that, by nature…

P leaves so soon.  We are both so busy that we are not able to find the time we are both craving to spend together.  It’s really very difficult to have an unstoppable urge to share (for lack of a better word) with someone, so constantly, and simply not be able to find the time.  Recognizing that, of course!, it’s the right thing to do, at this time, to take a step back and focus on Finishing School.  There’s so much on the line right now, for both of us.  Making the correct, adult decision to take it slow, and not allow ourselves to get consumed when we can hardly spare the time…it’s hard and it feels gross Right This Minute and I want to see her so bad I can hardly stand it…but the timing is wrong.  We will have the Fall and beyond to have adventures, but that seems so far away, it will be cold then, and I want to play in the sunshine in her big backyard and drink the traditional summer drink of her Latin American upbringing and show her how to eat honeysuckle and just get lost in the amazing conversations we have.  No offense to all the really wonderful people that I dearly love who read this blog, but I am realizing, I think, that P is the coolest, most intriguing, interesting, diverse and spirited person that I’ve ever met.  The stories she tells me about her childhood and her home and her dreams inspire me and move me in ways I have never understood before.  

She just called me as I was typing this.  I guess I was thinking about her too loudly.  One of her classmates is getting married soon, and she’s in the wedding, and there have been all these parties and tastings and fittings and she literally doesn’t have a single day that isn’t booked full, before she departs.  Sad face.  My schedule is a bit more lax, and I almost wish it wasn’t.  It’d be easier if I was more distracted.  I take comfort in the small presents she leaves me in my school mailbox, and the hundreds of texts we’ve been sending (I finally got myself a chat account set up on the internets, because neither of us can afford to maintain a habit like we’ve established), and the fact that now, since we’ve been spending time together, she has begun researching ways to stay in the US after she graduates next year.  I don’t want to get my hopes up, or get too attached…there are a lot of complicated variables at play…visas and residency and taxes and all the paperwork that comes along with being here for her…there’s just no telling where this thing is gonna go.  That’s fine, that’s wonderful, really…part of the adventure…but I’m kicking myself constantly for not getting close to her until now.  And I’ve always had such good timing, up til now…

 

Shakespeare and Omelets April 13, 2008

My last show of my undergraduate education is in tech, which means my job is almost Officially Over.  I am so overjoyed and relieved and excited, I don’t really have words to describe how much lighter I feel now that this task is nearly complete.  I can paint a marble now, that’s for sure.  It was my one real weak spot so far as faux-finishing is concerned, but I have taken care of that, rather neatly, and developed a style of marble treatments that is both unique and effective.  Now I can go earn $150 an hour to make some rich persons bathroom look like marble instead of plaster.  

I got a summer job yesterday.  I will be the omelet chef at the pre-eminent brunch place in town.  My job interview was pretty hilarious; I met with the owner, and her first (and only) question was: “Are you a badass.  Because you have to be a badass to work in this kitchen.”  My response: “Check.”  She liked my answer, apparently, and jumped immediately to the scheduling part of the interview.  The pay is clearly not exceptional, not what I was earning last summer, but I am So Effing Excited that someone has finally given me a job cooking.  This restaurant particularly rocks my world; it’s one of my favorites in town, and their food as well as their decor and atmosphere suit my style and flair perfectly.  I anticipate we will be a good match.  Best part is, I only have to work on Sundays until after graduation/vacations.  I expected her to laugh when I told her I needed the first three weeks of June off, but she just shrugged and said that she could work around that.  At the end of the interview, she told me her daughter (that I had called as a lesbo about a year ago) liked me, and that was good enough for her.  Also, there is a surprising amount of street cred people lend to working at this particular restaurant, and I have a feeling this is a perfect oppurtunity to expand my network to include people that I don’t go to school with.  I’m nervous about starting a new job (it’s been a while…) but I’m really stoked to be working a kitchen, albeit one that serves up low-brow gourmet, just like I’d cook for my friends if I had more money.  

In less than fifty days, I will be at the beach, Very Expensive Piece of Paper in hand, drinking fruity drinks in the sunshine, barely believing that I weigh less than I did when I was a senior in high school, basking in the radiance of hot sun and accomplishment.  I feel like, at this point, I’m just hanging on for the ride.  The emotions are definitely creeping towards the surface, but my sadness for leaving this school and these people and my house and my routine is tinged with the excitement for my new beginning.  Somewhere new and far-away and frightening and gorgeous, and I’ll be a stranger again, and I’ll have to get my game face out of the corner of my closet.  I can’t wait.  I’m terrified but I can’t wait.  

I had fill number 3 on Thursday…this time, the doctor only had to stick me once, but only because I requested we go straight to flouroscopy, so it could be a one shot deal.  I made the mistake of turning my head towards him when he asked me if i was okay (during the procedure) and I saw the needle sticking straight out of my abdomen, standing up of its own volition (the doctor was studying the x-ray with his hands on his hips) just like I was Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction, but eight inches lower.  It was gross, and I had to will myself not to throw up for about a minute, but it was over quick, at the very least…and then I lost six pounds by the next day.  It’s blowing my mind, a little.  

Completely unrelated: I found myself driving behind an incredible asshole, who perfectly summed up what I believe to be wrong with the ignorant masses in this, our great country of America.  Picture if you will a 1988 Datsun truck, the paint stripped away to a flat gray, jacked up on tires taller than me.  Behind the wheel, a greasy redneck with a mullet that flapped in the breeze.  On the roof, the Papa Johns light-up pizza sign was almost invisible, it was so far out of the line of my sight.  His license plate told me his truck was heavy, it had earned a Weighted plate.  Can you imagine the nerve of this guy?  A passenger truck so heavy that it required the same plates an 18 wheeler sports?  And he’s driving pizzas!  I know they don’t pay him that much per mile; I’ve delivered pies before.  The icing on the cake, the real piece de resistance, was the one and only bumper sticker attached to the truck.  It was small, maybe 3″x5″, positioned directly above the Weighted tag, below the 7′ tall tail gate.  It read, “If you are close enough to read this sticker, you will be shot.”  And then it was translated into sanskrit.  

I won’t miss the rednecks when I go.  

Why Yesterday Sucked January 26, 2008

All went well until 10; my puppet class was cancelled, which is a bummer because it’s my favorite class and I totally look forward to it every week.  So, in lieu of puppets, I returned home to deal with paperwork and phone calls relating to the follow-up care from my surgery.  I can’t decide if I was irresponsible and didn’t ask the right questions, or if I was misled.  The doctor here that’s supposed to do my follow-up care just told me yesterday that there is a $1000 transfer of service fee, since I had the operation elsewhere, in addition to a $500 fee to see their psychologist, plus a $350 fee to see their dietician, plus a $400 fee to take some class for people who are thinking of getting the lap-band.  I already did it, folks.  I need to get saline put into my band as soon as possible, and the nurse I’ve been interacting with told me it would be on Feb. 2, but oops! she hadn’t put my name down in the slot for the past several weeks we’ve been talking, and it filled up, so I would have to wait until the end of Feb to see the doctor.  Which is too long to wait. Soooo, on Feb. 11th, I have to be at the airport at 5 am, to make my 1 pm appointment in Detroit (which I just made yesterday because the people in Michigan can see me sooner than the people here…totally screwy), and then hop back on a plane to return home at 5 pm.  Can I officially call myself a jet setter?   The morning was a wash…I cried by 11 am, and that’s never a good sign for the rest of the day.  I went about my business, did some homework, tried to be productive, and then decided that since I was in such a bad mood, triscuits and hummus were in order.  I left my house for twenty minutes to get said items, and by the time I returned, someone had broken into my house.  Apparently, a neighbor had come over during those twenty minutes to see if we were having problems with our water, too (the street crew that jackhammers at 7 am had busted a water main, come to find out, and our water was flowing at a trickle, making showers impossible, and flushing the toilet more than once every two hours a bit of a process) and he must have scared the person off.  Nothing was stolen, and the only signs of tampering were the chunk of wood taken out of my back door where they used a screwdriver to get in, and the jewelry box in my bedroom was open.  Nothing was stolen, but it had been rifled through.  So, in fifteen minutes or less, someone broke in, bypassed the valuable electronics laying out in the open, downstairs, and continued upstairs to my room where they looked through my jewelry box but didn’t steal anything.   These oddities make me think it might be someone who knows me and my roommate, which in turn makes me violently hostile.  If I ever caught some shady fool I knew in my house, I’d at least break one knee cap.  At least.   After all that, me and my roommate and Anchors went down the street to the diner and had dinner, and drinks.  Since I rarely drink, I was faded by 10 pm and asleep by 11:30 on the couch as the Princess Bride played in the background.  I woke up on the couch at 2, scared and disoriented, and then slept for eight MORE hours upstairs in my room.  It was an emotionally draining day.   Today has been better.  I got up at a reasonable time, I went to school and did work for five hours, and now I’m going to meet friends from Greensberry for dinner and a movie…we are going to see Juno.  I will save this weekend from being a total loss if it kills me.  Stupid Friday.   

“Dear Lord, I Mean It!” December 28, 2007

On the eve of returning home to prepare for New Years and my next-to-last trimester before I get my effing BFA, I am feeling like, for all my crankiness and general Grinch-like holiday tendencies, I had a great time these last couple of weeks.  Pretty ideal, really. 

I’m feeling great…I’ve lost about 28 pounds already, which is awesome.  Most of my incisions are healed–the big one, containing the Dreaded Port is still tender, and bleeding just a tad–and I’m off of the liquid diet (which, come to find out, can make a person appreciate the taste of food Real Quick) which is pretty exciting.  I haven’t gotten nauseous except for once, after my first run-in with the mayonaisse in my Grandma’s famous egg salad.  Not bad.  I can’t speed walk yet, I have to move at a healthy but slower than normal pace…the up and down movement gets uncomfortable after a while.  I’m still not entirely acclimated to the fact that there is a foreign body inside of me, and I can feel it, inside and out.  It’s not bad, just…creepynew. 

I spent some more time with the friends from high school after Christmas…that may have been the highlight of my holiday “vacation”.  They’re all doing so well, and they’ve (we’ve?) all turned into pretty cool, grounded, productive adults that can still have Real Good Times together; I appreciate the relationships that you can just walk back into, like no time had passed at all.  Those are the ones that endure forever, I think. 

Me and Dad took Little Brother (who I shall call…Tiny Man, because he is) to see the new exhibit at the art museum, a decent collection of expressionist work, mostly French, some American and English.  The two scene stealers were a particular Monet (the name escapes me) of a multi-story building set on a waterfront, and an artist I’d never heard of: Potthart.  His gorgeous use of a triadic color scheme in purples, oranges and greens made for one of the most gorgeous and loose interpretations of the ocean I’ve ever seen.  Tiny Man got bored about a half hour in, but he was a good sport and talked about the paintings he liked and disliked.  I feel some responsibility to try and help him learn to love art; he’s a math and music guy all the way, who also happens to be a good visual artist with no confidence about being creative.  He’s 9, and he’s interested in what I’m interested in, so hopefully I can be the Good Influence I aspire to be for my much-younger brother.  He’s a really cool kid.  I like spending time with him.  Alot. 

My mom and I have seen a lot of each other, which has had it’s tense moments, but we parted laughing and smiling with no hard feelings, and that’s saying something.  Mom and I don’t make good house mates.  I never have figured out why. 

And holy moly, it’s 2008 next week!!  It blows my mind every year.  Time is crazy. 

Jingle This December 24, 2007

This has been quite the eventful holiday weekend…one for the books. 

 My best friend and best partner in crime EVER got married yesterday.  It was beautiful.  She looked beautiful, he looked great, the ceremony was touching and short (always a plus, if you ask me) and the party afterwards was pretty great, too.  I got to see the people that I would have wanted to see at my 10 year reunion, without having to see the 600 people that I’ve forgotten ever existed.   All those people from high school (and a handful of middle school folks) that I can still connect with and have conversation with and still make each other laugh…it was all of Those People.  The ones I truly meant to keep up with, except life happened, and pulled us in different directions and there are just so many people to keep up with, you know?  I was almost emotionally overwhelmed to see the people I had loved most in high school, that I hadn’t seen in 5 or 8 years.   The best part of the wedding (aside from D and C’s joining in happy matrimony forever, of course) was reconnecting with people that I really like to hang out with and still live in my hometown…  this city had started to feel like a barren wasteland, with only two people to call to hang out with when I’m in town for the holidays.  Now I have friends here again. 

We’ve hung out for the past two nights; after the bride and groom left the after-after party (small gathering of the Close Friends) to return to their honeymoon bed, we moved the party back to Hometown, about thirty minutes away from the wedding site.   I was definitely a little shell-shocked, being with most of my gooooood friends from high school, and we’re all doing such different, adult things with our lives…we’re all 30, for chrissakes.  We have not lost our ability to party, apparently. 

Tonight, a smaller crowd reconvened for Round Two at a trendy bar downtown.  Man, I laughed so hard tonight that Incision Number 5 is aching like a motherfucker.  I LOVE those folks.  I can’t even remember why we lost touch.  One woman who has kept me laughing for probably a cumulative five years of my life, she was my best friend in 4th grade and I fucking adore her and we didn’t even have each other’s phone numbers…so bizarre.  I like that this Core Group of really awesome adults who shared the high school experience are still going out together when they all return home–and I’m most glad that D got married and brought us all back together again.  I feel like some good relationships got rekindled this weekend…that’s a really nice feeling. 

 Also, in being out at bars two nights in a row, and not being able to drink (and it wasn’t even torturous…again, bizarre), I have realized that I make people uncomfortable when I drink water as they sip alcohol.  I feel compelled to explain, to put them at ease, and dispell any wild rumors about Recovering Alcoholic before they can get started.  It most certainly bothered my friends more than it did me, that I wasn’t joining them in drink.  I’m not a hater.  I wasn’t eyeballing them judgementally, or even jealously.  I still like the Social Times, I’m not going to stop going out to bars, it really doesn’t faze me that I can’t drink, but I hope that other people’s reaction to my water gets less awkward.  It’s the first interesting social stumbling block that I’ve run across with this surgery, so far. 

I got to take the bandage off Incision Number 5 last night…it had been on for ten days, some super-adhesive that was mostly clear plastic to keep the 3″x1″ bandage in place.  I guess the surgeon glued the bandage to me because it definitely didn’t want to come off by itself.  And then I almost passed out.  Or vomited.  Or both.  It is a bigger incision than I had expected…all the visible incisions are hardly even half an inch long; this previously hidden incision is about three inches long.  It’s right in the dead center of my abdomen, about four inches under my breastbone.  Right in the middle. 

When I woke up in recovery, my first question was Whats This Thing Here? in response to the only bandage, and they told me it was the port, and I said, slurred and groggy, “You couldn’t have put that somewhere else?”.  It was an appropriate estimation of the situation.  I’d still like to know why they couldn’t have scooted that one off to the side.  I can feel the port inside of me now…it’s shape and contour. 

That’s a Really. Weird.  Sensation.  

Also, I ate solid food for the first time in two and a half weeks.  It was delicious and wonderful.  I ate one egg, scrambled, and an egg has never tasted so good.  And then I was stuffedfull for four hours.  I’m still not used to that. 

Holiday Magic December 21, 2007

I finished my christmas shopping today, after only two intense days of panic and bludering through packed shops…I don’t really do Christmas very well; I leave all gift-buying or making until the very end, when I have no time and little money.  Christmas always comes at the end of the Federal Loan Check that is my lifeline and almost-sole source of income right now.  I feel like a douche, mostly, because I’m not one for overblown traditions and I can’t get inspired by the religious reverence.  Jesus is Not the Reason for My Season.  Jesus’ birthday means I get to see my cousins, play cards with my Mom and go on walks with the new family dog (my new best friend).  The commercialized celebration of a religion I don’t adhere to…it just leaves something to be desired.  Plus, I like giving spontaneous gifts way more…

Me and Mintos (the dog) had Magic Times today on a walk to the grounds of the loony bin that backs up to my parents property.  It was crisp and clear, with gorgeous perfect late afternoon sun, and we went tromping through the woods to get to the Big Field, where she can run off the leash.  Mintos is a corgy mix my stepmom picked up at the pound, and I am in love with her.  She’s got a hound-ish face with Corgi ears and shape and size, with a corkscrew tail, and the most adorable way of smiling when you get home; she jacks the left side of her mouth up in a big smile and winks.  So, we’re walking home after fetching sticks and playing with two other dogs, and all of a sudden, the bamboo grove 50 feet in front of us explodes as two young, cottontail deer bound out into the wooded area we were in.  Mintos wanted to chase them so bad, she made herself puke a little, dancing at the end of the leash, but then she settled on her hind legs, doing a little dance, and we watched these two deer bound around, playing, for about ten minutes.  It was one of the most magical things I’ve ever seen.  Pure, graceful, perfect nature, spontaneously occuring inside city limits, in a populated neighborhood where no deer could survive, and Mintos and I were the only ones who got to enjoy it.  One of the cottontails (probably male) had a crisp, snowy white tail that must have been a foot and half tall…I could see flashes of white flying through the air, even when they were running so fast that it became hard to focus on them, the little graybrown blurs.  They both cleared the long-abandoned road running through the clearing, in one single bound, curb to curb, with the most delightful noise of clacking hooves and crunching leaves.  It was idyllic, for a moment. 

Also, I woke up laughing this morning because a Toll House chocolate chip cookie commercial was literally playing in my dreams.  I woke up just as the hot-out-of-the-oven cookie was broken in half, and the long strings of gooey chocolate hung between the two halves.  The good part is, I could taste it in my dreams.  I might not be able to eat them in real life anymore, but I could still taste them in my dreams.  It was sweet. 

The Progress December 20, 2007

I have lost twenty five pounds already.  Woah, dude.  I knew it would go quick, but it surprised me, still.  I’m going to have to go clothes shopping much sooner than I anticipated….Oh, darn!!! 

 My good meds have run out, and I find myself forgetting to take Tylenol or Advil because the pain is so minimal (lovin’ that…), and I have totally lost all craving for food, so my protein drinks and tomato soup are actually enjoyable.  Especially the soup.  Every time it hits my lips, I can’t help thinking, Damn This Soup Is Goooood.  It’s weird. 

We’ll see how torturous Grandma’s house is…the land of everything southern that I like to eat.  And of course I can’t get back on solids until the day after xmas, the day we leave.  That’s okay…at least I’ll be the only one who doesn’t gain ten pounds this year.  That’s something. 

But I will miss my casseroles.  Sigh. 

Tomato Soup and Painkillers December 18, 2007

These two things are sustaining me, currently.  I feel pretty good….there is almost no pain at all sitting up from lying, or standing up from sitting, which were the two biggest sources of discomfort five days ago.  The healing is pretty rapid, which is just fine by me, and the weight loss is already becoming apparent.  My clothes fit me differently already and my face and hands look thinner.  I have completely lost my interest in food; I have to remind myself to make some soup or drink a protein drink, because I am the opposite of hungry all the time, without being nauseous.  I think I may never be hungry again.  That’s a bizarre thought.  The objective is to be able to eat three meals a day, of healthy content and small size, and never, ever get hungry between meals.  That sounds reasonable enough, I suppose.    I can’t get this new formatting to let me leave space between paragraphs…that’s frustrating.    So, I’ve been in contact with Jing Jang Jane again, recently, due to the surgery and not knowing for sure that I would still be alive…and things are confused again.  She is coming into Alot Of Money in a few months (from her real fathers estate) and says she wants to be my Sugar Mama.  I am weak to resist when someone that I loved (and had the best sex EVER with) tells me they want to take me somewhere tropical for spring break, then two and a half months later, take me somewhere exotic for a post-graduation adventure, all expenses paid.  I mean, I’m gonna go if she’s really gonna take me.  It will be hard not to immediately get back together with her.  It will be hard not to want all those same things I wanted less than a year ago, and it will be particularly hard to keep myself from forgetting why it all ended.  Ladies are a complicated affair.  It has been good to talk to her again, though, that’s for sure.  I’m not angry anymore, she’s trying really hard (including therapy twice a week!!) and there is a degree of honesty Now that we didn’t have Then.  Progress, at least.  She’s a comfort to me, and I like talking to her, so I’m trying to avoid feeling like a chump for letting her reel me in again.  Kinda sorta.  I’m like a fish that’s on the hook but still in the water and you can’t see what kind it is, and you know that it could still get away if you don’t maneuver just right.  Yeah, that’s me.  Except skinnier.   

Detroit Rock City December 11, 2007

My mom and I made it to Michigan last night, after fifteen hours of driving.  It was kinda intense, but I like driving on roads I’ve never been on before.  I made Mom let me drive as soon as it got dark…she is a very skittish, paranoid driver, and that drives me crazy, when I’m the passenger.   The International Center, which is the hotel that is attached to the hospital, where I will be staying for the duration, is alright.  We don’t have internet in the room, which is a bummer, but there is an internet ‘cafe’ located one floor below me.  It’s cute and comfortable and mostly quiet (except for the tiny Indian baby that has a stitched-up skull and sparkly blue sunglasses, but I would never begrudge her some laughs and shrieks), so hopefully I will be able to stay connected for the duration of my visit in stinky Michigan.   Canada is so close I can see it from some parts of the city.  That’s a funny sensation, for some reason.   Detroit itself is not as ugly as I had imagined it would be; Michael Moore skewed my idea of Michigan, in general, with his portrayal of Flint, in Farenheit 911.  Detroit’s downtown is littered with museums and theaters, and an overwhelming amount of the architecture is a very lovely, intricate art deco.  We tried to go to the Detroit Institute of the Arts and those fuckers are closed on Tuesdays…what kinda shit is that?  But we will be going back…they have the largest collection of antique puppets in the country, and as I start my puppet making class in January, it’s almost necessary research.  Plus, the foyer that we managed to walk into is lit by these beautiful suspended mirror pieces (must have been ten thousand of them) that glitter and glow like magic.  Mom will be wheeling me around in a wheelchair on Thursday, so I can see this place.  Detroit will not be a total wash.   Also, we found Greektown by accident, when we were driving around downtown, sight-seeing…that was sublime torture.  Everywhere I looked, there was Another Greek Eatery, and all I wanted to do at that moment was stop and have some spanikopita, a gyro, some chicken souvlaki and a pistachio baklava, for dessert.  But no.  800 calories a day rules any one of those things out, immediately.Tomorrow, I have surgery.  I am scared, but I have achieved a calm state of acceptance.  This is what I want.  This is what I have to do to get what I want.  It will be over before I know it.  Everything will be fine.   Just in case the unforeseen happens, I love you all; I hope you know that already. I have tried hard to live my life Saying What I Mean, when it crosses my mind.    I will post as soon as I am coherent again.  Wish me luck!!! 

I Was Just Kidding. I Don’t Want To Do All This. December 6, 2007

Now that the surgery is only six days away (!!!!), I am totally trippin’, yo. I’ve been off cigarettes for five days now–I still feel like there are bees underneath my skin every time I finish a meal, or get in my car, or go on my 15 minutes break at crew–and today was my first day of the 800 calorie a day, pre-op diet. As if the mandatory smoking cessation didn’t make it real enough, now I’m relegated to liquids. For the next two months. Woah.
I have been doing this silly thing in my head where I’ll rationalize all the reasons why it would be okay for me to go have a cigarette with my pals on Smoke Break, but then phrases like Heightened Mortality Rate pop into my consciousness, and I take a pass.

I’m scared, people.

I have the utmost confidence that my doctor is a trained professional, with a track record that ought to make me feel quite safe. But I’m a little bit of a Fatalist sometimes, and I’m having a hard time escaping the Worst Case Scenario Game, when it gets really quiet in my head…or the room I’m in, you know. Whatever.

For my Last Supper, I had: hibachi chicken with glazed carrots, sauteed mushrooms and rice, a house salad with ginger dressing (my favorite!!), and a Friendly Pyramid Roll–spicy tuna with asparagus and avocado. I had three Dr. Peppers with dinner. Adios, carbonated beverages.

I just noticed I have glitter all over my upper torso—I was gluing glitter to a multitude of props for the Nutcracker today, and I had to dump glitter on everything, and then blow off the excess; apparently, the excess went down my shirt. It’s quite the sparkly mess.

I want a cigarette, and I want something solid to eat, and I want to be able to sleep for longer than an hour at a time. Also, I’d like to go ahead and fast forward a week, so all this agonizing Waiting will be over. I will have lost approximately 100 pounds by the time I graduate at the end of May, according to projected weight loss charts. That’s mind boggling. I will be a different person, starting in one week. It’s all gonna go really fast, once it starts.

The next time I see you, I bet you’ll stare. That’s the part that’s gonna take some getting used to: I hear from people who’ve had this surgery that there will come a point where I will want to murder the next person to comment on how much weight I’ve lost, and how fantastic (”so much better“) I look. I’m sure the biggest challenges will be the ones I can’t even anticipate right now, as I sit in my bedroom, Not Sleeping because I want to smoke so bad, and wondering if the IV will be as big as a fork tine.

My mom and I have to be in the car together for at least 12 hours straight. And I can’t smoke. Pray for me, will ya?

OH! Also…my Hot For Teacher crush kissed me today, in the soft goods room, in front of two of her students. So scandalous. Not gonna lie; I loved every second of it.