Cyclothymia

Can you taste the equanimity?

The last few weeks have been so great I would think I was manic if I wasn't sleeping like a baby. My air conditioner fell out of the window (12 feet) this weekend while I was adjusting it, and after seeing that it wasn't cracked, or even dented, I was like "hmm, annoying...let's get that back inside." As opposed to bursting into tears or letting it derail my day.

Bring It On

After three years, a few thousand dollars, and countless hours of missed sleep, I have just two days before it is time to hit the submit button and see if any med schools are stupid enough to take me.* It's been so hard juggling this with work. At times I've wondered if I was making a mistake, but now...I am, as they say, all aquiver.

*Lest anyone feel the need to congratulate me on reaching some sort of milestone, this is only the beginning of a long and painful application process. Yes, a long and painful application process that follows the long and painful preparation process. And precedes the long and painful schooling process. Who has two thumbs and no common sense? THIS GIRL!

Muffy Sank to the Bottom of the Stairs

This picture does not do the damage I've done to myself any justice. The swelling was spectacular and you can't really see it from this angle. It was the sort of swelling that inspires actual gasps of horror from strangers on ferries and offers of transport from chivalrous men. I had other softballs lower on my leg and my other knee, so basically my whole lower body was one big, puffy, horror show. Rawr. BTW - I don't recommend googling 'elephantitis fetish'. I don't know why I do these things, but I do, so you don't have to.

I was going to write this whole super clever post about how this tragedy came to pass, but it turns out it can be summed up pretty quickly:

Nantucket causes the munchies. We ate every hour on the hour, with snacks to keep our energy up in between. If you eat a bagel, an egg and cheese sammich, a pb&j, fish tacos, cheese nips, kielbasa, and three beers before 6pm, your ass will erupt from your jeans when you squat to stretch them out, you will be forced to wear 3in fuck-me-heels to match your only other pair of going out jeans, and you will publicly mangle yourself as a result. In 3 days I got so fat that I BROKE MY PANTS. And then myself.

Luckily I was picked up and dusted off by a FINE radiologist*, going on to party for another 3 hours. It wasn't until I woke up the next morning that I had any idea it was so bad.

Speaking of waking up...I opened my eyes in the morning to see my roommate crawling into bed. I had earplugs in and hadn't heard anything, so I assumed she was just getting back from the bathroom, and went back to sleep. It turns out that she'd brought a guy home and screwed him about 10 feet from me ON THE FLOOR. It's the thought of the varnish chaffing that horrifies me. Then he curled up in the fetal position, and stayed the night, naked, under a throw blanket. She had just shown him out. Somebody needs a WWMD bracelet. I will never sleep without earplugs again. Never.

The funny thing is that I also have an eye mask, which I wasn't wearing, but that she apparently tried to put on me as I slept. Because, you know, then if I'd heard the squishy sounds of sex and woken up, I would have been all, "Oh, I can't see anything. I guess there isn't penetration going on within arm's reach. Phew."

So, anyway, I've picked out my outfit for the next Figawi:

 

* I was fricking catnip to the doctors - a radiologist, an otolaryngologist, an ER doc...do I smell like a nurse?

No Blowjob For Tad

My momma always said don't marry for money, but go where the rich boys are and fall in love. With that in mind, I'm packed and ready to go spend memorial day weekend at Figawi, half-heartedly fending off the advances of drunken sailors. My motto for the weekend is WWMD: What Would Muffy Do? I've got my party pearls on and will let you know the depths to which Muffy sank when I get back.

A Bit Much Before 9am

Groggy, barely processing, I'm standing in a long line at Starbucks behind a woman wearing a gold lamé sweater, stirrup pants, and ankle-high patent leather stilettos. She is waggling. Her butt. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back. And. Fucking. Forth. A few minutes later she starts moving her feet, and I realize she's practicing salsa. In line. At Starbucks. At 8:30am.

Dear Jeebus,

Like everyone else, I have a few requests:

1. Please strike me blind.
2. Please immediately immolate any individual who cannot resist the (oh so tempting) allure of wearing lamé before 9pm. I hear lamé is very flammable. Go Old Testament on their ass, you know you want to. With all the cyclones and earthquakes lately you must be missing the personal touch.
3. Get me my coffee ASAP.

Sincerely,
Your Thoroughly Creeped Out Friend.

Officially Done With This Behavior

6 Shots
1 Party Hat
2 Cover Charges
1 Great Band
1 Broken Plant
4 Random Bruises
6 Mardi Gras Necklaces
1 Case of Semi-Public Urination (not me)
1 Angry Note From Neighbor (re: urination)
1 Case of Public Snogging
1 Request to Get A Room
2 Piggy Back Rides
2 Oddly Placed Scratches
1 Spice Girls T-Shirt
3 Cigarettes
1 Disgusting Bathtub
+2 Days Hungover
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
1 End of Term Celebration & 1 Permanently Partied Out Girl

Seriously.

Take a class, learn something.

I just handed in my term paper on the developmental sexual dimorphism of the preoptic area of the hypothalmus. Really sounds like a page turner, I know. However, despite the rather dry vocab, sexual differentiation is a truly fascinating process, due in no small part to the voyeuristic, comical, and sometimes sad behavioral testing methods used to measure the effects of various physiological manipulations.

What did you do last night? Oh, watched rats hump each other under a red lamp.

Some of the testing is done under "sub-optimal" conditions, which either means a scary new environment, a less than receptive female (if you feed them a few drinks they stop resisting so much), or, and this is my favorite, restricting access to the receptive female by tethering the male to limit his movement. One tiny little rat harness + one lusty but coy female = some aggravated rats around the water dropper in the morning.

Dude! I was SO ready to go but there was something holding me back. I don't know what it was. Maybe we've just grown apart.

I ended up writing the damn thing in one solid 8 hour stretch because I procrastinated for so fucking long. I had a thorough outline done, but still. Half of me is rather proud of what I managed to pull off, but the other half is kicking myself senseless BECAUSE IT WON'T ALWAYS WORK OUT THAT WAY.

What? You want to fail out of medical school? You want to know only 3/4 of the operation you are doing? You are proud that you have no self-discipline or work ethic? Sit up straight, and eat your breakfast.

Yeah, that part of me is really loud and really annoying.

Oh, one other thing. You might want to read up on the role of COX-II as far as masculinization of the brain during the perinatal period goes. Exposing a perinatal male rat to the potent COX-II inhibitor indomethacina "markedly" impairs adult sexual arousal mechanisms...the poor things just aren't interested when they get older. Latency to mounting? Long. Latency to intromission? Long. Note that's "inTROmission" not "inTERmission". Sadly, there is no half-time show or popcorn in the little tiny rat cages. Honestly, though, there should be SOMETHING to help alleviate the awkward mood. Ejaculation? Never. No word on cuddling.

Why is this relevant, you ask? Well two other (mild) COX inhibitors are asprin and acetaminophen. Yep, rats exposed perinatally to asprin show similar, although reduced, impairment of function as adults. Humans have very similar mechanisms, so the next time you or the guy you're with can't get it up, you can blame it on your/his mother and her filthy asprin addiction (as if you/he hadn't already). And if you're pregnant? How bad is that headache, REALLY? You horrible, horrible mother. See, it always comes down to mothers sucking.

ps. Just in case some fundy out there stumbles across this, mangles the science in their own special way, and starts having urges to go burn down a drugstore - asprin fucks with arousal mechanisms, which are not related to sexual preference. Asprin might make you flaccid and prone to buying sports cars, but it doesn't make Teh Gay.

Girlfriends' Guide To Self-Tanning

1. If the self-tanner you have chosen says "for face and decollete," take a moment and consider whether there's a reason for that. Then say, firmly and decisively, "screw it, I don't want to buy two, and the face is more important, right?" Don't bother to ask the sales person, you'll worry about that later.


2. If the instructions for the self-tanner you have chosen involve using a cotton pad to "gently and evenly sweep" the tanner across your face, neck and decollete, do not stop to consider what "gently and evenly" sweeping a cotton ball over your entire body will entail. Just go ahead and get started, you'll worry about that later.


3. If you notice spots that look a little streaky, alternate whether you go over them again or just leave them be. Consistency is overrated, you'll worry about that later.


4. When you get to your hands and feet, just pinch your fingers and toes together and swipe blindly. Who knows whether having a tan between your fingers is more unnatural than stark lines of brown across the tops of your fingers? You'll worry about that later.


5. Having used several hundred cotton pads to wipe every square inch of your body, spend a surprising amount of time debating the crack of one's ass, and how tan it should, or should not, be. Let's worry about that now.


6. Wake up in the morning and discover it's officially "later," and therefore time to get down to worrying.


7. Exfoliate ad nauseum, and consider canceling your swimming plans for later in the week.


8. Fret.


9. Exfoliate.


10. Definitely decide to cancel swimming plans. Consider calling in sick to work.


11. Notice the fine job you've done on the crack of your ass and face (in that order).


12. Say "fuck it," put on some long sleeves, long pants, and put hands in pockets.


13. Go to work.

Happy tanning!

Things I've Learned Recently

• Given my shockingly paltry alcohol intake lately, it is somewhat imprudent to go on a wine-tasting date. Two drinks in a month?! Oh, my poor neglected vodka. I have a loud mouth to begin with, but getting hammered in the first 45 minutes of a date seems to knock out whatever ragged bit of propriety I had managed to scrounge up for the occasion.

"You, sir, need to learn all about hyenas and their bizarre PENISES! No, really, they're fascinating! Sure, I'll take more wine. Anyway, the females have PENISES! Well, to be precise, they have PENIFORM CLITORI, but they're basically PENISES. Seriously! Isn't that, like, TOTALLY AWESOME?! But wait, it gets better, or worse, depending on whether you're a hyena or not - the females GIVE BIRTH through the aforementioned PENIFORM CLITORI. Max tip stretch? 2.5cm. Average cub head diameter? 7.5cm. You do the math. Let's just say a lot of dead puppies are born to first time hyena moms. Thankfully it (by which I mean the GIRL PENIS) rips during that first birth, so the others are fine. Isn't that soooooo weird?"

Cute, smart, funny, athletic, and apparently completely inhibition-free...dating me is a dream.

• One person's "rolling hills" are another person's "death march". It's just lovely that we have our own individual experiences isn't it? That is such a special part of the special gift of life. I went for my first outside ride of the season; 20 miles on what was described as "rolling hills." The funny thing about "rolling hills" is that what they really are are "endless hills." Before you have time to say "thank jeebus, a downhill," you look up and, shocker of shocks, oh yes, it's ANOTHER fucking uphill.

This experience has convinced me to buy proper bike shoes. My regular pedals with runners ain't cuttin' it anymore. I refuse to get my ass kicked by my riding partner every week for the foreseeable future. I WORK OUT DAMMIT, IT'S NOT FAIR. But you know what, it was a spectacularly pretty day,  and we managed an acceptable pace for my first outside workout, especially w/out the clip in pedals, so I should probably retract the whole "death march" bit.

• I have discovered the source of childhood obesity in America. It's Kimball Farms ice cream. Their kiddie size is...a pint. I'm not kidding. You would have to see their banana split to believe it. We both got kiddies and couldn't finish them. We, brace yourselves, THREW OUT ICE CREAM. It's a sad, sad day. Next time we resolved to get one and split it...but when I've got low blood sugar and ice cream within view I'm not necessarily at my most cooperative, or patient, so we'll see how that goes.

Pretty In Pink

A little while ago I decided to stay with a friend for a few days. Well, actually it was more like he showed up at my door and was all, pack a suitcase, woman, you're coming home with me. I was like, I'm not that kind of girl. So he packed for me. Never let a man do that, unless you want to be wearing your itchiest, most uncomfortable lingerie for a while, and have no pajamas to boot.

Preggers was on antibiotics for an abscess from a bite, so she had to come with us. We stopped on the way to get a litterbox and other basic supplies. Which apparently includes a scratching post.

Me: You hate cats, why are you getting her a scratching post?
Him: Just because I hate her doesn't mean I want her to be unhappy.
Me: You know, she also likes automated water fountains and those leopard print snuggle beds.

Night 1: We are watching a movie and Preggers hops up on the couch.

Him: Is she allowed on the furniture?
Me: It's your house, you set the rules.
Him: What's she doing?
Me: It's called snuggling.

Night 2: We get home and Preggers runs over to meet us at the door (like she usually does for me).

Him: Does she always do that?
Me: Yep.
Him: Weird.

Night 3: Friend runs out to pick up dinner, and he's gone for a long time. I'm close to calling to see if everything is alright, but just then he walks in the door with two bags. One's the takeout. The other is a petco bag.

Me: What is that?
Him: A surprise.
Me: For me, or the cat?

He has me grab Preggers and turn around (for the surprise, you know).

Him: Ok, turn around!

He's holding a pink rhinestone-studded harness. For the cat. Thank god.

Him: She's pretty fat, and I think it's because your apartment sucks donkey balls. She doesn't have room to lick her own ass, much less exercise, so you need to start taking her for walks.
Me: You totally love her now.
Him: She's obese. I'm just concerned.
Me: You wanna have, like, 10,000 of her babies.
Him: I'm taking the harness back.
Me: Chubby chaser.

There will be pictures forthcoming as soon as I exchange the harness for a larger size. Because, her size? Let's just say vanity sizing hasn't hit the pet market yet, and it turns out she can't shop in the junior department anymore. I think the problem might be the fat roll under her chin. Or the one on her chest. Maybe her corpulent elbows? Whatever the exact proportional problem is, she's headed to the Lane Bryant section of the kitty world.